#even after this arc ends and Ken starts to heal

[streetfarterturdstrike]

I think the fandom has a false sense of security that Ken’s depression arc is only going to last one game forgetting how long Cody’s lasted……

[kel-lance]

Jjk headcanons/fan theories/ random thoughts/random facts

I made this in a few months time so its prob repetitive

Tsumiki went into her year and 7 month long coma when megumi was 13-14 years old meaning tsumiki missed her sweet 16 :( (she’s a year older than him)

Toji was a good dad in the end (both times) bc he was already dead and told Gojo to take Megumi as a F u/later fix the alliance’s of the clans and to make sure that Megumi would be protected, fed, housed, and taught sorcery bc toji damn well couldn’t much less protect his kids from curses anyhow.

Noaya (and the men of the Zenin clan) abused Mai and maki bc they’re women (implied SA) noaya hinted at asking to beats em up like he used to (could be implied bc he called them hot & Mai has the same face) but he was also possibly teasing since Mai just 💀 but there’s no way he could have known that

It’s worse to be a male Zenin with no cursed energy bc then you’d be absolutely powerless, useless, worthless, etc. no other clan woman would want you and your fam would never coughed for you much less protect you bc why do they have to you were born a Zenin and yet…

So we know Kokichi Toji Mai n maki all were hit with HR but it was just a double whammy to also be twins? Yes. HR hit Toji so hard bc he was the first to be without cursed energy but then Nanako and Mimiko, bc they’re fraternal twins that that’s possible they’re able to both have CE?

Kenjaku stayed in Iori for so long that his stitches healed I’m guessing he planned it all (or saw hat happened which is why he chose Jin (bc there’s no way that’s random) and killed Jin and went to Geto when it was time (did Ken know about the KFC break up too??)

maki had no CE but still couldn’t get in tune with her full potential is bc Mai was there this the twin HR is f’d but there’s probably more chance one could 💀 the other to become powerful but in this instance it was about sacrifice and distance love. Different paths yet they were “the same person” so that’s only with identical twins?

sukuna loves to eat and is a cannibal and lactates and has 4 arms, 6 mouths or more, 20 fingers, many eyes, 4 legs, 10 toes, 3 heads, hopefully 9ft tall in his monster form…. 

stg toji had his divorced dad rock on religiously (nickel back fan don’t even start w me, weezer son nickleback dad)

nobara gonna be used in some way theres no reason to have her status as unknown of not to edge us istg I’ll even take a cursed spirit piloting her to mess with Yuuji more and she’s part of sukuna or some even worse group they gotta fight after the culling game arc

after chapter 253 are maki and yuta dead?? Hopefully Yuta was eaten but on Yutas birthday gege thats foul (I love it) 🫣🤩

It’s past ch253 and we’re waiting for 3/24 for the next chapter but I heard yuta yelled at Hakari to shut up with cursed speech? Or was that earlier 

Maki Mai and Megumi and Tsumiki met probably around the time tsumiki went into that coma/megs entered jjk no wonder hes so formal//doesn’t know them well he was under gojos protection for so long

some jsckass said mais first love is unknown or megumi are you dumb shes in love with her sister no sister kissed the other to give them a sword cooly and die she literally just wanted to be with her no matter what to go to the ends of the earth it didn’t matter as long n as maki was with her but maki knew Mai’s potential to be better than her so she tried to make herself better, leaving Mai behind in the process and they still never hated each other even after all the time away.

mai likes to take care of cacti/the clan favored her over maki bc she has at least some CE//weve only seen maki being affected by her family's rejection (jjk0 makis mom said shed wished shed never have given birth to her as she was a failure and same girlie but my mom chose any and everyone to compare me to) but Mai either didn’t see herself special in that way and put the blame on maki or dealt with it in her own way (maki vs the fam excluding Mai and Megumi // whereas Mai’s version US against the world)

if choso is yuujis brother and kamo is one of chosos distant family, that would mean Yuuji, Choso, Yuki, Todo, and Kamo are all "Brothers" I love the thought of them being super cool and scary together with their cute yuki & Yuuji golden retrievers in a Doberman family

the same people who ship yuki and choso also ship utahime and gojo or shoko and gojo yall have NO comprehension skills at ALL or cant believe men n women b close like Yuuji & Nobara/Power & Denji/ Sasha & Connie/ Nami & Usopp, Franky, or Luffy) 

Kenny planted the first finger by Geto’s twins to Yuuji’s school. they just had to get the finger to the occult club 

Does Kenny have a witch or oracle or even premeditative powers to know the future or did he just plan this out to a T and what is his damn goal 

Yuuji and Yuta are from the same home town bc gege said it’d be easier for the story but then todo also went to Yuuji’s middle school

Nobara dyes her hair lighter and I wonder how often she talks to Fumi back at home. And her grandmother if she’s like me w low contact

Megumi was alone with gojo for almost 2 years (no tsumiki) no wonder he’s so to himself he was probably always with tsumiki before, who decided everything for them (in a big sis way) and he respected it 

Yutas a pos for forgetting how Rika 💀 then trapping her w him bc of how traumatized he was like bruh you also yelled at her the first time u ever yelled at Rika was over another girl and he doesn’t do much else but manipulate like the Pisces man he is (I kin him/made an oc before I found out about his BITCH ass and he got everything word for word but is a dude I’m losing it) 

As an astrologer, I must say Gege’s planning with the character birthdays and everything else I can read from that is incredibly accurate I’ll give examples in the next points

geto’s mission was to go to remote village, he finds curse and exorcizes it, finds the twins the next dy, he kills everyone, he goes back to his pants to get supplies and kills them (prob no his first choice but once again was probably proven right) and runs has been gone for way too long and gojo doesn’t know what th ehhell happened. which is why he was so mad at kfc and geto just had to accept his new role while gojo was still in the past

Toji and Megumi (Kamo, Nobara, Todo) being cancer moons meaning they care about the heart, (todo has other placements making it seem a lil more “shallow” when he just wants a “straight” answer (lmao Megumi)

Yuta being a Leo moon and (outwardly asked) liking the chest

Yuuji being a libra moon liking butts all this makes sense (libra moons are indecisive, will weight out all the possibilities and still want the peaceful side unless there’s such chaos there’s no way for that to happen… then we snap)

Yuuji and Junpei would’ve been perfect friends we already saw but they both just didn’t ask for any of this and chose their own paths, they’re almost parallels of each other 

Geto’s birthchart shows a lot more of wanting to get humanity to evolve where gojos looks more like a POWERFUL cog in the machine 

Yap: Gege basically made this for women I’m sorry boys but why all the beautiful men & perfectly written women & relationships maybe it’s just a rare case where the mangaka actually knows women (or gege is a woman 🤗) & how all the dudes fit a Yaoi archetype & the women,,, they’re perfect & cute & not sexualized (other than maki in jjk0 & the glasses girl in ep 1 getting groped) but everything else is just hot w/o taking ur clothes off kinda energy & thats INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT w everything else going on 

You think something broke in Meimei when she said she wanted to be comforted and Gojo was like bruh I was joking 🙃 

Kirara and Uranme’s gender is yes 👍🏼 

Geto raising the girls as a 17-18yr old is insane same age as Megumi and gojo so for how long was Geto their dad? Inbetween 10 years but when did the girls realize that that wasn’t their dad anymore? I’m guessing Kenny can remember the vessel he takes overs memory or does something to their brain to replace it w him

I doubt a male mangaka can write good women (mostly bc of the stereotype that they’re shut ins but also from just reading/watching with my own eyes and being a woman myself) and add them in correctly, though the thing is in jjk they’re all just in a world but in Naruto and berserk and stuff she’s the add in into /their/ world where they keep fighting bc they miss each other and she gotta be used and a pillar for them or an excuse like Nobara and shoko weren’t used like that by satsug and itafushi they were their own ppl w their own sh like don’t get me wrong vasca and Sakura also were their own people but they really were given the bottom of the barrel sh bc of the dudes decisions. Shoko and Nobara strictly did what they wanted instead of falter to men

They’re literally all kids it doesn’t matter if some are weaker or useless, imagine a god/demon came here rn like the strongest will survive/fight you have to also apply the “weak characters” to irl bc I bet you they’re still stronger than most of us (miwa, Kamo, idk about momo still but she been w them I can’t doubt her skill just cause they had POWERFUL enemies

Gojo not being able to drink makes sense no drugs to impair his power and eyes (maybe lightweight maybe uncontrollable drunk and no one’s really ready or able to control that) 

Gojo isn’t coming back and he wouldn’t bc he half assed the fight and now he’s with his love and everyone has to fend for themselves now 

I like to think Gojo had Megumi and tsumiki, Geto had Nanako and Mimiko and nanami had Nobara and Yuuji in this preschool/parent AU (tojis gojos ex baby daddy) 

All of them are taller than me other than momo and Nobara. (Im 5’4” so gojos 10 years older and a foot taller 🫣) 

In one of Geges book covers it has Gojo in the winter w pink camellias and those flowers mean ily even after death and that flower is also specifically for the birthday feb3 (Geto’s) AGAIN WHY I THINK GEGES A WOMAN RAHHHHH

Maki, Mai, Toji, Kamo, Kokichi were all raised w no love like at all. Yuta had it good til 11, Miwa, yuuji and megumi never fully had it good, todo, Toge (?), Panda, momo, and nobara were just chillin.

HOW DID NOBARA COME UP WITH HER TECHNIQUE THEYRE ALL EMO BITCHES SHE WAS LITERALLY 16 FOR 2 MONTHS BEFORE HER FACE BLAST

SHE WAS SO YOUNG HOW DID SHE COME UP WITH HAMMERING NAILS INTO HERSELF WHAT

Uranme and Kirara go by (they/them)

Gojo and Geto were soulmates no matter the relationship

Utahime, Shoko, Momo, Mai and Nobara all like girls 

Gojo knew Geto for the short amount of time but thought of him for 5x longer.

Megumi’s been without his sister for 1.5 years so she went into a coma when he was 13, his 2nd-3rd year of junior high)

  Mai and maki didn’t know about Toji and Megumi until that year (2018)

Kenjaku planted the first finger at Yuuji’s school by Nanako and Mimiko (they’re the same age) hence why thanking Satsuki for taking care of his son

The person Rika is gone, her cursed spirit is what remains (an embodiment of her love/the curse yuta placed on her)

Yuta is wrong for using Rika and forgetting about his promise and why she’s even there for 6 YEARS then yelling at her about Maki 

Shoko started smoking in high school and stopped about 5 years ago, but started again when she heard Geto was alive again. 

Sukuna has 6 mouths, 4 arms, 4 legs, many eyes, and lactates. 

Choso, Yuuji, Kamo, Todo, and Yuki are all “brothers” by blood or not idc i love their lil weirdo family.

Toji was a good dad, dealt the worst hand, everything going down so the best way to protect his kids is to give them to people who can kill curses and teach them about sorcery. 

Nobara and Yuuji have the same friendship as Power and Denji, Nami and Franky/Luffy/Usopp

[project-sekai-facts]

VBS event teaser commentary

Sorry for not doing this last month. Again. Yeah I know I'm doing it just before the actual preview drops who even cares.

As per the norm, the teaser is just based on the jacket art so there's not a whole lot we can learn there. We know that cards are sometimes based on the song though, so maybe we can guess something there. Personally this gives me a retro nightclub sort of feel, and I'm kinda surprised they haven't done something like that with VBS yet, doubly so when you consider the Gekkou teaser had a very retro feel (I'm grasping at straws atp I've wanted this for two years lol).

Okay, so actual plot predictions time. I reckon this will be another POU or LUTF situation where the event focuses somewhat heavily on a side character. Ah, well, less so "I reckon" and more "Break Down the Wall foreshadows that this event will focus quite a bit on Arata and Souma". Based on bdtw, I think the event is going to focus on two things which heavily overlap with Toya's arc: Toya's feelings towards music, and getting Arata to rejoin the group.

The game has drawn parallels to the relationships between Akito & Toya and Arata & Souma since POU, with Toya outright quoting Kaito's statement from pou about their similarities in bdtw. Toya is able to relate to how Arata feels because their experiences with their partners are very similar. Akito and Souma are the ones who got Toya and Arata into the street music scene and shared their dreams with the other. Because of this similarity, Toya is able to put himself in Arata's shoes somewhat. I'm writing this very late so this is not clear what I'm getting at at all. Basically it's about partners. Toya is the best one to try and reason with Arata, and it's probably why this was his job given to him by Ken. R Sound Design says the song has a focus on relationships between the characters, so to say this will be a big part of the event is not a stretch at all.

(TL by pjsekai_eng)

And connecting to that: Toya (and Arata's) feelings about music. Toya's bdtw chapter also focused a lot on his feelings towards music, and how he'd grown to love it again thanks to Akito and VBS after his bad experiences with classical music as a child. Once again we're right back to the partners thing. Toya talks about his feelings towards music in woao as well, which also happens to be the event where Souma explains the story behind Gurney Flap's formation, and how he was able to get Arata to love music as much as he does. The key difference between Toya and Arata's stories though, is that Toya was able to move on from the past and his trauma. Toya seems to realise that Arata's past is affecting him in bdtw, and Taiga also pointed this out in lutf. While his relationship with his family is by no means mended, Toya was at least able to start healing with the help of his love of street music. On the other hand, Arata is very clearly still grieving the loss of Souma as his partner, and it's what's been holding him back this entire time. I could easily see Toya having a heart to heart with Arata in regards to their feelings towards music and their friends/partners. In a perfect world they do what they did in lutf where they explained a lot of the RADder backstory but for Gurney Flap this time, but I don't want to get attached to that idea. I think at the very least explaning what exactly happened to Souma could happen though.

Oh and on the off chance this ends up being An5, it'll be about her feelings towards Kohane. As in, her insecurities that have been showing up since Bout for Beside You about Kohane essentially becoming too good for her. Like with Toya this was heavily foreshadowed in her bdtw chapter and cards, as well as at the end of kiuan over a year ago. Combine An's grief over Nagi with her insecurities over Kohane and Kohane carrying Nagi's spirit in the sense of her singing, and you have an event story.

[cardsbizarreadventure]

I’ve seen a fad where people describe their original character’s personality with a few canon characters from different series.

What characters do you think you could combine to make Joelle?

☆꧁✬◦°˚°◦. ♠ ♣ ♥ ♦ .◦°˚°◦✬꧂☆ Thank you for the ask Mel! It actually took me a good amount of time to even decide upon who would be most fitting to build Joelle. Since she has some of my own self insert in her , but really which oc doesn't? It was kind of hard to decide xD But I think I've managed to collect the ones that are pretty relatable with my character. So here it goes!

Lucy - Elfen Lied If I have to be honest I've never would of thought upon how similar Joelle and Lucy stories are. I was never intending to have so many similarities with this specific characters until recently I stumbled upon a video that made me remember a bit more about the anime and how it played out. Lucy is a very interesting character , born with a 'sickness' ever since she was little kind of reminded me upon Joelle's origin as a pillar both past and present . Lucy has been bullied , barely knew any kind of friends and because of her 'sickness' everyone was after her because what she can cause with her powers , until she stumbled upon one that really liked her for who she was [Kind of gives me the possible Joseph or Rei vibes but without the romantic kind of intent that was implied in the story because Lucy did fall in love with her best friend.] She was brought into a lab to keep away from the outside world and experimented on , until she broke out and was given a chance for a second life regardless of what she had witnessed and did in her youth.

Ren Tao - Shaman King A few aspects that I can collect from Ren are the anger he has built for humanity that really matches with Joelle's story . Because when she ended up in the XPD facility where they did various of experiments on her and basically played her like a toy she began to pile up a lot of anger upon those people creating an image in her head that they were all the same . But after meeting with someone who opened her eyes to the world , she began to have another look upon things and wanted to try and move on and heal but also find a new purpose in life .

Edward Elric - Fullmetal Alchemist When ever I would look at Ed I could actually see a few aspects of Joelle as well , because of his own determination to fix what he has done in the past and return his brother back to his original body , reminds me of how Joelle wants to protect her new family and find a way to stop evil from prevailing . It also gives a pinch of hint upon how him and his brother were trying to bring back their mother , is a similarity upon how Joelle wanted to bring back her own mother but instead she ended up releasing a curse that later on haunts her , the same way Ed and Alphonse tried to bring their mother back and ended up creating a homunculus being. Sadly I haven't watched brotherhood and I really need to , but I'd assume I'd find even more similarities if I do so~. But I do however see a lot of pieces of Ed in Joelle!

Misaki Ayuzawa - Kaichou wa maid-sama This goes a bit on her emotional side to be honest. Misaki is a perfect representation of Joelle , a strong and very responsible individual and yearns for a piece of romance in her life that will assure her that they will stay with them for who they are . A perfect aspect of her Tsundere side because she is very conflicted and very confused when it comes to these sort of things. I absolutely adore her strong character and how she is able to handle so many responsibilities , reminds me upon her current position in the SpeedWagon foundation , a lot fear her because of how she would act and how her attitude just goes across the room, but a good amount also admire her when they get to know her personally and understand her better upon why she is the way she is , that she has a very gentle side to her.

Chise Hatori - Ancient Magus Bride Another little lost soul that was being sold to the world. Chise has always been one of my most favorite characters once I started the anime , the aspects of her that I see in Joelle are the growth she managed to accomplish with herself , she used to have a normal life a happy family , but eventually that turned around when 'dark beings' (which would hint the cults of Hearteater) began to make their way into their life and make it more dangerous to be around , and even the fact that her own 'blood and family' tried to kill her is the hint of her father that almost killed her. [But in the anime it was the mother that tried to.] She eventually ends up in good hands which help her see the world with different eyes and find who she really is and help her discover her own courage and determination that she wants to do better for herself and others around her .

Shigeo Kageyama - Mob Psycho Little little shy Mob~. He was one of my main inspirations if I have to be honest because a lot matched with the two of them. This comes around her more doubtful and shy side. Mob is a perfect representation of both Joelle's moods , when she is sweet and respectful to a menace and a deadly being if they come near their family. Her relationship with Reigen matches with the one me and my friend Mel have with Joelle and Yorie . Let's not forget about how crazy batshid he went when they took his brother away and he was willing to do everything in his powers to save him... but there was also the fire in his house.. now that is basically the next level of Chapter Death in a sense. But for real there are a lot of aspects behind Mob that I connect with Joelle and how her character is displayed~.

Yuuji Itadori - Jujutsu Kaisen Yuji is the aspect of Joelle that exists kind of rare but it's still there , it's her little goofy side , but the amount of love for her friends and family is also there . His determination and courage to protect his new friends is the same as Joelle trying to protect her own regardless of what kind of burden both of them carry that can cause the destruction of the world, even if the the two of them might appear weak to most they would always throw themselves in danger to protect their loved ones , but later one begin to grow in personality and strength . Maybe I can even connect a tad bit Sukuna and Chapter Death because both are the representation of the final stage when the 'scary' takes over and would basically erase your existence . Yuji and His friends remind me a whole lot of Joelle and her own little crew and how each of them help each other and will always be there no matter what. Basically the hero that wants to save everyone and doesn't really care what happens to them , as long as everyone is safe .

Manjiro Sano and Ken Ryuguji - Tokyo Revengers These two go in pair ~. I see a big portion of aspects of the two in Joelle and each of them kind of represent her 'goofy' and her very serious and respect side. Mikey is a bit more laid back and chill but at the same time very scary , a bit how Joelle is in a sense how she can be so calm on certain occasions until she finally snaps and beats the crap of anyone who doubted her and called her 'small and helpless.' This is the aspect I enjoy the most between the two because they underestimate their opponent and then get their ass handed to them , that's how the two kind of go xD. Draken would be maybe her grown up and mature side in a way and the one that keeps things in line when ever there is justice that needs to be served because no one is allowed to hurt their friends and family. Very loyal and determined and even jump down to apologize for their wrongs to try and correct themselves and possibly help their friends understand the situation a little better , unless there is no way out they always try and reason first before jumping into action.

Nezuko Kamado - Demon Slayer / Kimetsu no Yaiba [New Add] I almost forgot!! Honestly I can't forget to include my favorite little goofball . Another little demon that I can see a lot of personality traits and aspects in Joelle as well. Nezuko and Tanjiro are also a good representation of both Jericho and Joelle in a sense because of how strong their bond is beyond anything . I don't want to spoil anything in my current arcs because I want to keep it a surprise since I have a whole lot of things to decide on . Nezuko displays Joelle's very protective side and very caring one as well the side of value she feels towards her surroundings and regardless of being a little 'different' she still is the same person no matter what happens and will never lose her humanity even after being 'cursed'. And even be a little bit of a hint of her sensitive and cute side too regardless that she doesn't show it too often xD.

Saitama - One Punch Man And last but not least , I put him on the bottom because at the beginning when I was creating Joelle I would always think of Saitama and how she was going to play out of sort of a joke that is really powerful and kind of blunt in a sense . But now she has grown so much and has so much potential , story and personality behind her that you can't even imagine! Saitama was maybe my very first inspiration when I created her because for some odd reason I really like OP shid and I mean literally xD. I don't know why but I just do , but regardless of Joelle being kind of OP orientated , later on when I began to play out her story I started to balance her because I wanted her to seem a bit more real other than I just came here to kick your ass and you're dead now lmfao. She still has some funny little aspects of Saitama behind her that's for sure , but she is completely different now and I am super proud of what a long journey she has gone through and grown so much as a character ^ ^. Thank you so much for sending in dear!!I really enjoyed this ask <333!! - Cards

[crusherthedoctor]

Can you list anything you unironically like in the games (and cartoons and comics) that you don't like?

I won't bother mentioning music, since that goes without saying and is to be expected for a Sonic game... unless you're Chronicles.

Sonic Adventure 2 (mixed gameplay-wise, annoying story-wise) - While I prefer Sonic's SA1 levels for a number of reasons, I still think his and Shadow's gameplay in SA2 is fun on its own merit. I also don't mind the treasure hunting gameplay returning or how big the levels are this time around, since Knuckles and Rouge are still fast and not '06 levels of slow. It's mainly the gimped radar that creates the unfortunate domino effect of making them a problem.

- Introduced Rouge, one of my favourite characters for how playful she is and how she's a lot more nuanced and intelligent than you'd expect.

- Some genuinely good scenes, like Eggman's trap on the A.R.K and Sonic escaping from the G.U.N. helicopter.

- Had some good ideas going for it, like the Pyramid Base and the Biolizard as a scientific monster instead of an ancient one.

- Despite my thoughts on the backstory itself (or rather, its execution), Shadow has enough depth and subtle qualities and occasional unintended hilarity to stand out from the typical dark rival characters you see in media.

- The Last Scene's music in particular is one of my favourite cutscene tracks in the series.

Sonic Heroes (mixed gameplay-wise, loathed story-wise) - The gameplay is fun when you're not being screwed over by repetitive combat, overly long levels and/or ice physics.

- Boasts some of the most consistently Genesis-worthy environments in the 3D games, up there with SA1's and Colours'.

- The in-game dialogue that isn't the same tutorial drivel repeated ad nauseam can be interesting, funny, etc.

- Reintroduced the Chaotix, which provided me with another character I quite like in the form of Vector.

- Bringing Metal Sonic back in full force and front and center in the plot after a long absence (not counting cameos and the like) is a perfectly fine idea. Just... not like this.

Sonic Battle (decent yet repetitive gameplay, mixed story-wise) - Emerl's arc is compelling, and it earns the emotional weight of having to put him down at the end.

- While some characters are iffy (read: Amy), other characters are extremely well-handled. Shadow is probably the prime example.

- Gamma's belly dance healing animation is fucking hilarious.

- When I was young, and the game was first announced, I was really excited about being able to play as Chaos. This proved to be my downfall when it turned out he was arguably one of the worst characters in the game due to being slower than me during the writing process, but I still recall that excitement fondly.

Shadow the Hedgehog (comedy classic) - The sheer amount of legendary stupidity this game has going for it makes it practically impossible to actually hate. It helps that it's not quite as white-knighted on the same level as '06... usually. You know you're in for a unique experience when you hear a gunshot every time you click something in the menu.

- By extension, Black Doom never gained an unironic fanbase like Mephiles/Scourge/Eggman Nega did, which means I'm a lot more willing to take Doom's dumbass brand of villainy in stride. He even has a unique design... a terrible one that rips off Wizeman granted, but alas, even that is a step-up from Fridge Shadow and Bumblebee Eggman.

- Despite being... well, Shadow the Hedgehog, some of the environments would fit right in with any other Sonic game, like with Circus Park, Lava Shelter, and Digital Circuit. Even the Black Comet levels look pretty cool.

- This game understands amnesia better than IDW does.

Sonic '06 (what do you think?) - The obvious one: Shadow's character was handled pretty well, even if it came at the cost of everyone else being a dummy and being forced to interact with Mephiles.

- Like SA2, there are some good moments, like the Last Story ending sequence with Sonic and Elise.

- In the greatest form of irony ever, I like Solaris as a concept and design(s), and its backstory has potential to serve as a parallel with Chaos without being a complete ripoff. Iblis sucks, Mephiles sucks, but I'm fine with Solaris.

- Introduced legendary characters like Sonic Man, Pele the Beloved Dog, Hatsun the Pigeon, and Pacha from The Emperor's New Groove.

The Rivals duology (apathetic outside of Nega-related grumbling) - There were some cool zone ideas in both games that were sadly let down by the restrictive and limiting gameplay. I particularly like Colosseum Highway for thus far being the only full-on Roman level in the series instead of merely having a couple minor hints of Roman, and Meteor Base for the unique scenario of the space station being built into an asteroid. These level concepts and others deserve a second chance IMO. (At least Frontier Canyon got a second chance in the form of Mirage Saloon, amirite?)

- Ifrit has a better design than Iblis. Not saying it's amazing, but the Firebird motif it has going on is a lot more interesting for a fire monster than the Not-Chaos schtick they had with Iblis.

Sonic and the Secret Rings (a very frustrating gaming experience) - Erazor Djinn, A.K.A. Qui-Gon Djinn, A.K.A. Dr. N. Djinn, A.K.A. I'll Take It On The Djinn, A.K.A. Not From The Hairs On My Djinny Djinn Djinn, is one of the best villains not associated with Eggman in the series. He's a Mephiles-type character done right, and there's actual weight and reason to his actions, however sinister or petty.

- I don't have strong opinions either way on Shahra as a character, but the Sonic/Shahra friendship is sweet and well-handled.

- The ending is one of Sonic's greatest moments. The sheer contrast between how ruthlessly he deals with Erazor and how comforting he is towards Shahra speaks volumes... Still gonna make fun of the mountain of handkerchiefs though. (Before anyone lectures me, I understand the significance of it and can even appreciate it from that angle... doesn't mean I'm not allowed to poke fun at it. :P)

- Another game with some redeeming environments. I love the aesthetic of Night Palace, and Sand Oasis looks gorgeous too.

Sonic Chronicles (my personal least favourite game in the series) - Uh...

- Um...

- Er...

- I like Shade's design?

Sonic Unleashed (overrated game and story IMO) - The obvious two: the opening sequence and the Egg Dragoon fight deserve all the praise they get.

- Seeing Eggmanland come to life was an impressive moment to be sure. While part of me does feel it didn't quite measure up to what I had in mind (ironically, the Interstellar Amusement Park ended up being closer to what I had in mind), it still looks badass and works well for what it is. I also don't mind the idea of it being a one-level gauntlet... key word being idea.

- Obviously, the game looks great. Not a fan of the real world focus (real world inspiration is fine, but copy-pasting the real world and shoving loops in it is just unimaginative), but it can't be denied that the environments look good.

- This game pulled off dialogue options a lot better than Chronicles did, since they didn't rely on making Sonic OoC.

Sonic and the Black Knight (just kind of boring all around) - Despite my gripes with the story (Merlina wasn't nearly as fleshed out as her unique anti-villain status deserved, which ends up severely undermining the ambition of the plot in more ways than one, and the other characters go from being useless yes men for King Arthur to being useless yes men for Sonic), I will admit it provides interesting insight into Sonic's character.

- Like '06 and Secret Rings, the ending is very nice... well, aside from Amy being an unreasonable bitch ala Sonic X at the very end.

Sonic the Hedgehog 4 (apathetic) - The admittedly few new concepts sprinkled within had promise. They may not have been as fleshed out as they could have been, but level concepts like Sylvania Castle and White Park, bosses like Egg Serpentleaf and the Egg Heart, and story beats like the Death Egg mk.II being powered by Little Planet, all could have been brilliant had they been better executed.

SatAM (apathetic outside of SatAM Robotnik-related grumbling) - I'm not a fan of the environments on the whole due to them looking too bland or samey, but there are some exceptions that look pleasant or interesting, like the Void.

Sonic Underground (apathetic) - The character designs make me feel better about myself.

- Does "large quantities of unintentional meme material" count as a positive?

Sonic X (mostly apathetic outside of Eggman's handling) - Helen was a better human character and audience surrogate in her one focus episode than Chris was throughout his entire runtime.

- Actually, most of the human characters not named Chris were legitimately likable. Including everyone in Chris' own family not named Chris. Hilarious.

- Despite arguably having the most Chris in it, I actually don't mind the first season that much, partly due to slight nostalgia from seeing it on TV when it was new, but mostly because Eggman actually acted like a villain for the most part, and certain other characters weren't quite as flanderized yet. It's season 2 and onwards where things started going off the rails IMO. (Incidentally, Helen's episode was part of season 1...)

The Boom franchise (apathetic) - Along with Chronicles, the games provide yet more proof that just because someone isn't SEGA/Sonic Team, that doesn't mean they're automatically more qualified to handle the series.

- The show had some good episodes here and there, and Tails' characterization was probably the most consistently on-point out of the cast.

- Despite not exactly being favourite portrayals for either character, even I'll admit that many of Knuckles and Eggman's lines in the show on their own were genuinely funny.

Archie Sonic (pre-reboot is mostly terrible, post-reboot is mostly... bland) - Whenever I doubt myself as a writer, I think back to Ken Penders, and suddenly I'm filled with a lot more confidence.

Sonic the Comic (apathetic) - Fleetway isn't a comic I tend to recall much of aside from how much of a loathesome cunt Sonic is, but IIRC, Robotnik's portrayal is pretty good. Different, but good.

IDW Sonic (stop pissing me off, comic) - Putting their handling aside (and being too obviously "inspired" by MGS in the latter's case), Tangle and Whisper are good characters IMO.

- Same goes for Starline, before he was killed off-screen and replaced with Toothpaste Snively.

- Execution aside (noticing a pattern?), the zombot virus was a fine concept on its own and an interesting new scheme for Eggman.

- I get to remind myself that I've never drawn scat edits and posted them publicly on Twitter.

[pleasant-boi]

OK I'm still on wisdom tooth pain killers and I can't write shit so stuff for this AU where I give Akechi some parental figures to disappoint.

It is still going to be really, really bad. Akechi still gets involved with the conspiracy though he's like... 10% more mentally stable this time around due to some good influences.

By god we're getting you a fucking proper redemption arc bro.

I'm going to age the p3 cast a couple of years, since canonically there is a 5-6 year gap between the events of p3 and p5 if I remember correctly, and I want everyone to be adults ™ and in Tokyo for plot reasons when the p5 cast are children. I was thinking of maybe around 7 years? So Akihiko and Mitsuru are 25, Junpei and Yukari 24, Fuuka 23 and Ken 18 while the p5 cast are around 10-12...if my math is correct I'm gay ok?

Koromaru is not dying, persona makes animals immortal I don't make the rules I'm all for angst/whump but the dog lives. Koromaru insists on looking after strays so everyone in sees constantly fosters little animals - mostly Ken, but the others occasionally too, especially when Ken was exams

Is this also a convoluted way to give Akechi a puppy to bond with?

Yes, yes it is.

Basically adult!SEES with uni!Ken is like having cousins who live in the same city when you're in university. You love them you don't talk for months and suddenly you're around them for like a week straight. Ride or die (or ignore their existence for like 2 months straight because you were living ur life ™)

Ken is in his first year of uni in the beginning of this. He's studying to be a vet. Or maybe a doctor. Maybe he'll change majors in the future. Not sure. But I headcon him as wanting to get into something thats helps people like medicine and the boy has a soft spot for animals

Everyone is dealing with trauma. Other than Ken who like Arena (we're just using stuff we like from that game and ignoring the rest shh) stopped getting involved with shadow stuff and had a relatively normal rest of his childhood - with some help of Kirijo appointed therapists-, Junpei is the most well adjusted.

Everyone is still in a place where they feel due to the event's of p3 and after the death of p3mc, femc (twin AU! TWIN AU! ) and everyone else in their lives, getting close to people other than their group is... Hard.

Junpei is too busy loving his npc wife, so it's easier to ignore the bad stuff. He also has children. He cried when they were born for like a month straight. Thinking of them being twins, one of them having red hair like Chidori because of anime reasons ™.

Because of that they end up with a lot of impromptu sleep overs and basically everyone has a spare room except Ken because he's a student, Junpei because he has kids and even with Mitsuru being everyones unofficial platonic sugar mommy, that many rooms is expensive and Yukari who is the only one not officially living in Tokyo but she's there like 80% of the year for shootings and has a studio apartment.

They avoid gathering at Fuuka, because she insists on making food every time and while it is usually edible (or edibles lmao) she likes to experiment a lot. So it's a bet between normal food, maybe a bit burned sometimes but nowhere near as bad as in highschool or mystery food X.

I'm keeping Akihiko as a c- 🤮 as a cop, only because I found his reason for it in Arena super wholesome. If not maybe a police consultant. I'm still on the fence about it. Plus Mitsuru needs inside allies for shadow ops.

Speaking of Akihiko, that's how I'm giving Akechi parental figures!

One of Akechi's Foster homes locks him out when he doesn't come straight from school and this time they don't even let him in for the night.

Akechi kinda runs away, gets lost and ends up spending the night crying in some random alley before passing out.

If I'm keeping the cop ™ route maybe someone calls the police and Akihiko ends up checking it out. Or maybe he's out running in the middle of the night, because let's face it, probably no one could relax before 1am, anxiety about the dark hour some how returning and it's something Akihiko 'I deal with the deep terror of losing again everyone close to me by punching things, working my body to its limit and putting myself in danger but I'm definitely not an adrenaline junkie' Sanada would do

Speaking of which the investigation team definitely checks for the midnight chanell every time too

Akihiko sees a passed out kid in the middle of the night and of course he tries to help. He asks if he's lost etc and ultimately he asks and where are his parents.

It's mid fall so while the temperature isn't deadly it is cold out, maybe it's raining too, for the extra suffering/whump, and he's pushing a bit with the questions because the kid is definitely going to get pneumonia if he hasn't already.

Akechi doesn't really respond until the parent thing, almost screams about how his mom is dead and no body wants him around and starts crying again.

Akihiko has braincells, however none of them are any help with social interactions. Much less with a sobbing child in the middle of the night.

I'm not sure where to go exactly from here but Akechi clearly has a fever (and if we're going with the rain route especially he needs to get dry and warm asap) and is really against going to the hospital because 'they're going to kill me if there is a hospital bill' so either

a) Akihiko calls child services and takes him to the station and sits with him until they arrive or

b) he takes him back to his apartment for the night because it is late, the kid needs some sleep and blankets and he knows the system is underfunding and overworked at best so it would be better to just call them in the morning

That particular one can have some cute hurt/comfort with pancakes for breakfast because Akihiko is also pancake boi and Akechi crying again because no one has been nice to him in years

Anyway, both end with Akihiko giving Akechi his number and telling him to call if something bad happens again.

Akechi doesn't. At least for a little something over half a year. He's in a really bad foster home and one night he ends up locked in the hall closet, trying not to cry because even breathing hurts but if he did make more noise it would be worse.

He has the number memorised by now and when he tries to curl up in the small space and feels a cellphone in a fallen jacket (remember the 2000s where most people used their cells only outside or when you wanted to talk to your crush?) , he takes it out, heart beating loudly before sending a series of panicked texts explaining the situation

He doesn't really think that it's going to do anything because there isn't a response but the small part of him that hoped something would go right for once still hurts

Meanwhile Akihiko didn't even think about replying because he almost had to be physically restrained from running there and punching the shit out of them

It's not even 20 minutes later when the police comes with Akihiko and at that point Akechi is almost unconscious, but starts screaming and banging against the locked door when he hears the commotion, immediately passing out when he feels it open

When he comes to he's a in a hospital, getting yelled by a social worker about how he has to change homes again some soon and it his fault and Akechi just bites his lips, trying to tune it out and not cry again.

Akihiko overhears all that and while he would normally just leave it to the proper authority and is nowhere near close to the ready for a responsibility like that, is like 'fuck it temporarily custody until he's healed and also I'm giving this kid some proper food and a couple of punching lessons'

There's more but this is already getting long asdvyrsvgjcw

[astartesenshi]

A New Chapter(Drabble)

When she had stepped down from her asteroid to Earth, Sheba had known there was one place she wanted to go. The school in Juuban. Years had passed since she had been there in her own timeline, and even then, she was only there to spy on the Sailor Senshi for Elizabeth Bathory. But it was the one place she knew she could go without being forced to relive the trauma of her possession.

Sheba sits on a bench, staring at that school. The Sailor Senshi who attended that school have no doubt grown up since then. No doubt Sailor Mars is the chief priestess of her temple, Sailor Mercury is a teacher. Maybe Sailor Moon found a career in bringing smiles to other people. That would certainly fit the “Moon Rabbit” as Bathory had called her.

Her eyes close for a moment, remembering just how much those girls cared for her. How they studied together for a makeup test all those years ago. Sheba stands up and smooths out her crimson skirt. As she’s about to leave, however, she hears screams coming from a block away.

Nobody would fault her for running away. But no. She is not a servant of the vampires. She is not Cain’s vessel. She is the demon killer, Sailor Astarte. And she would rather be damned than ignore the screams of the innocent.

Quickly, she doffs her heels and runs around the corner. Directly ahead of her, this section of the city is seemingly vanishing into another dimension. And there, on the ground, is what looks like a swordsman in broken armor. The warrior is desperately trying to stand and face off with what looks like a monster that looks like a walking vineyard.

“Just give me the book and I’ll let you live.” The monster tells the Swordsman, even as it creates a whip of vines in its left hand. The swordsman clutches a small book in his left hand, protecting it.

“Never! This book is too powerful for you. You would destroy everything!”

Sheba doesn’t have much power left after her long fight with Samael, but she has to do something.Her body begins glowing gold and crimson, and rather than go through a full transformation, she channels her cosmic essence into a projection of a curved blade.

“SOLOMON ARC!” With a rushing wind, she sends what little Senshi power she currently has at the monster. It is enough to drive it backwards into a brick wall.

Both the monster and the swordsman look up to see a woman with a crimson glow around her body, breathing heavily from expending so much energy. The swordsman rolls towards her and holds up the book and a strange looking belt.

“Madam, I don’t know what power you possess. But you need to take this and keep it safe from the Megiddo!” As the swordsman hands over the items, the monster’s whip cuts through his chest and yanks him towards the Megiddo.

She has only been on Earth for thirty minutes and has already watched a man fall to protect something. If this book and blade were enough to die for, then she will honor her benefactor.

Taking the belt, she holds it up to her waist. There’s a gasp of surprise as it extends all the way around her, locking into place. But there’s no time for that. The Megiddo is coming for her.

Sheba clicks open the small book titled “Lost Songs” and it sings its name as she locks it into place in the leftmost slot on the belt.

“Megiddo. Demon from another plane.Today you face the slayer of the great demon Samael. I shall cut you down where you stand.” Her finger touches the release button on the Driver and she draws an impossibly large khopesh blade from the belt.

“ GINGA BATTOU! A Goddess From Another Time Shall Bear the Unsung Blade!”  The belt says as the WonderRide Book is opened.

“A little on the nose,don’t you think?” Sheba slashes at the air, creating the symbol of her divinity which glows with the light of the morning star.

An armor begins to form around her, matching the gold and crimson of her Senshi uniform. The astrological symbol slides into place, forming a helmet with the end of a khopesh blade emerging from the forehead. On her left shoulder, a guard made up of a trio of chorus masks in gold locks into place. One mask is smiling, one is frowning, and one seems to be opened in a shout of victory. Above the belt, the armor forms a circle with a star inside it.

“Asa No Hikari Ken!” the belt says as her khopesh shines golden.

“Do you even know what you are, interloper?”The Megiddo sends his whip at her, and she sidesteps, slashing down in a rain of sparks to cut the grapevine whip into two.

“I am the keeper of the forgotten lore, herald of the unknown legend. I am...” A name appears on the display inside her helmet. “Kamen Rider Apocrypha!”

Not wanting to waste any more time, she rushes her foe. As she bring her new blade down for a slash, the chorus masks on her left arm start vibrating, and instead of one blade striking the Megiddo, he gets hit by four. He staggers back and roars at Apocrypha. 

“Let’s skip the pleasantries,Megiddo!” She slots the blade back into the Driver and holds down the button for a finishing move.

“ GINGA HISSATSU! The Blade Sings For Those Whose Voices Have Been Lost To Time!” As pages flutter through the air, Apocrypha carves her symbol into the Megiddo’s flesh,causing a small star to appear in the middle of its body. When the slash resolves and she spins on her heel, the star expands and quickly collapses into a miniature black hole that consume the Megiddo completely.

She rushes over to check the swordsman. He is struggling to hold on, but as she approaches, he smiles. “I thank you for saving this book. I am the swordsman of Wonder World, Kakusureta Joho. May I know the name of the goddess who saved the tales mankind forgot or suppressed?”

“I am Sheba Shingetsu Astarte. Don’t walk into the light just yet, Joho.” She lets the armor fall away and holds out her hand to the wound. “I will not allow you to die as an unsung hero.” Her hand glows with the power of the goddess, and the wound heals.

Joho looks down at his other wounds. “I may need some more time to heal.Do you know a place where I can go?”

“I just might.” She lifts him up and drapes his arm over her shoulder,walking back towards Juuban. She collects her heels and has Joho hold them until the get to the door of a gallery called Dreamer’s Dreaming.

Sheba knocks on the door, hoping her first friend in this timeline is home. As the door opens, Sheba says “My apologies. However, something big has happened, and I was wondering...does your spare room have space for two?”

[mobius-prime]

139. Sonic the Hedgehog #78

Though it's not really relevant to the plot, this just so happens to be the first issue released in the 21st century! You'll notice the little jokey announcement of this fact on the cover above. It's also worth noting that at this point, it's been just over a year since the first 3D Sonic game, Sonic Adventure, was released in Japan, and several months since its international release… I wonder if this will have any effect on the comic?

Changes

Writer: Karl Bollers Pencils: FRY Colors: Frank Gagliardo

We open with Sonic kneeling in front of the king, who is giving a speech in front of the entirety of Knothole about Sonic's bravery and heroic actions. He touches a sword to Sonic's shoulders, and knights him as Sir Sonic the Hedgehog! Sally gives him a medal and a kiss on the cheek, and amidst the celebration of Sonic's new title the king makes another announcement.

It's about time he officially recognized them! While this is going on, Robotnik seethes in his headquarters in Robotropolis. While he's finally managed to rid himself and his computer systems of the virus Nicole and Sally planted, he had to dump a lot of old corrupted files, including the hidden location of Knothole and start from scratch. This is kind of convenient for the larger plot, seeing as since this is a different Robotnik from the original, it might be too easy for him to concoct a winning strategy if he was able to simply access all the old Robotnik's info from the get go. He vows revenge on Sonic, as he still has millions of roboticized slaves, including Sonic's uncle. Speaking of, Sonic isn't as caught up in the celebratory mood as everyone else. He's quite depressed, actually, as he finds himself having to move all Uncle Chuck's old belongings out from his house for Nate to move in instead. His parents, entering the house, move to comfort him about the situation.

It's been so long since Sonic has had parents to look after him that this is a very sweet sight. Aside from Sonic Underground and an old obscure manga only ever released in Japan, I know of no other Sonic media that actually addresses the topic of Sonic's parents. When the series was rebooted in the future, one of Sega's weird new rules for the comic was that they couldn't include any references to family members that weren't already defined within the games, but I always found that to be restrictive and detrimental - considering Sonic's very independent, cocky, cool-guy persona, it's fascinating to me to see how he ends up interacting with parents who care about him. There's this clash between his rebellious teenager attitude, and the side of him that wants to be taken care of by the parents he was separated from for so long, and I find his attempts to strike that balance very interesting.

Speaking of family and parents, Sally and Elias have joined their father in the building which has been hastily retrofitted to serve as Queen Alicia's new "storeroom" of sorts, the temperature brought down to freezing levels to maintain her cryotube. Apparently Dr. Quack is still trying to work out why, if her past injuries have healed, she's still in her coma, and they all resolve to continue to hold onto hope as a family. They turn away to help Nate carry a Super Emerald (still no real word on what these are or how he came by them, but eh), which conveniently means they miss the queen's hand twitch within her tube…

And here, we have our second space interlude!

Hmmm… who could be in these strange spaceships? Clearly they know where Mobius is…

Back in Knothole, Mina is wandering around, depressed from losing her family during Robotnik's takeover. She actually considers letting herself be captured to be with her family again, but before her thoughts carry too far she finds herself approached by Rosie, who has a special request for her.

As Mina heads over to watch over the children, Bunnie and Antoine pass by, chatting together. Bunnie asks Antoine why he's seemed so distracted lately, and he responds that the knowledge of his father being the roboticized sub-boss of Robotnik in Mercia has been weighing heavily on his mind. As that moment Sonic, Sally and Tails show up, and when Bunnie and Antoine congratulate Sonic on his new title he suggests cheekily that they call him Sir Sonic from now on.

Now this is something I am very pleased to see. This is the moment where Geoffrey starts to become less of an asshole, and become a whole lot more likable. I really prefer his rivalry with Sonic to be more about their respective attitudes toward life, with Geoffrey being all about duty and serious discipline, while Sonic is more of a free spirit who leaps into things without thinking to be a hero. It's much more interesting than the whole love triangle thing Penders tried to push for so long in eras past. They begin to discuss how the king apparently wishes the Freedom Fighters and Secret Service to begin working together more closely, but they're unaware of Elias watching from afar, thinking quietly to himself. Turns out all of this - the reinstatement of the Freedom Fighters and their working together with the Secret Service - was all at the suggestion of Elias to the king, as he sees Sonic as a hero who deserves to be on the front lines after observing him during the mission to rescue Nate. He walks obliviously past a group of heart-eyed girls ogling him (and really, can we blame them? He is very attractive), wishing that he could be more involved in the adventures and dangerous missions the others go on, that he didn't have to be a prince in line for the throne. However, he finds himself shaken from his thoughts when he hears his father and Dr. Quack speaking through the window of the queen's storage building…

Well, that's not good… Perhaps even more concerning, Robotnik back in his HQ has once again turned his arm into a terrifying mass of robot tentacles and plugged it into his now-cleansed computer system, and discovered a tidbit of information that he believes could cement his ability to rule over the planet! What is this information you ask? Well, all we know so of it so far is what's displayed on his screen as he orders his troops to march out - the outline of a continent that looks very much like South America, and the word "Chaos" emblazoned across it…

So you remember how I pointed out how the Sonic Adventure game had just recently come out at the time of this issue? Yeah, I didn't bring that up for no reason - much like Sonic X did several years later, the comics did their own adaption of the game! Unlike Sonic X, however, which was able to follow the script of the game fairly closely with only minor modifications to be made for the setting and characters, the comic adaption differs significantly from the plot of the game due to this world's vast differences from the games' canon - for example, humans and Mobians aren't exactly friendly with one another, the Master Emerald didn't even exist until recently, and perhaps most notably, the history of the echidnas has already been explored in a very different context from how it's portrayed in the game. This was perhaps the thing I was most interested in to see how the writers decided to resolve the discrepancy when I first read the preboot. After all, it wasn't until the 3D games that the Sonic franchise began to expand its worldbuilding and create storylines and characters that had a rich backstory. Up until then, the characters and story were barely given any backstory beyond quick blurbs within game manuals, backstories which were so fluid and indeterminate that they differed greatly between localizations of the games in other countries. Sonic Adventure was the first real attempt to add some depth to the world of Sonic the Hedgehog, and suddenly the Archie comics found themselves having to contend with this new reality being explored in the games, a reality which is extremely different to the one they themselves already created with the limited base they had to go off from the Genesis era. Now, not only do they have to find new roles for all the characters which simply don't exist in the games such as Sally and Bunnie, but they have to find ways to fit even very simple concepts such as Station Square and Chaos into this universe. As we'll see, there were quite a few workarounds implemented in the plot to explain these things away… but it will be several more issues yet until we reach that point, as we have the final arc of Knuckles the Echidna to tackle first!

Tales of the Great War (Part 6): What Really Happened

Writer: Ken Penders Pencils: Chris Allan Colors: Frank Gagliardo

We're getting close to the end of this arc. We head back to the campfire around which Jules and Bernie are telling their story of the Great War. Jules was on life support due to the extent of his injuries, and Bernie and Uncle Chuck decided to hide this from the infant Sonic for the time being to avoid upsetting him with information he was too young to process. Chuck, with Bernie's blessing, took Jules to his prototype device within the palace lab, unaware that Julian had been making some, let's say, unauthorized modifications.

Chuck, unwilling to wait the time it would take to run preliminary tests on his device for fear of losing his brother, stuck Jules in and hit the button, and was promptly horrified when a mindless, fully-robotic Jules emerged, unresponsive to anything he said to him. He blamed himself and became severely depressed, not realizing that it wasn't his fault at all. Around this same time, the Great War was coming to a close. Julian had suggested something he figured would give him a potential leg up in conquering the world - that King Max should duel the Overlanders' overlord in a winner-takes-all fight to the death, his hope being that whoever won, he could easily take the place of to conquer the war-weary world for himself.

Despite his disappointment in the outcome, Julian was somewhat gratified that shortly thereafter, Chuck left all his equipment to him and resigned from being the kingdom's foremost scientist. Bernie attempted to convince him that it wasn't his fault, and that despite Jules' state she was grateful to him for trying, that Jules would be dead if he hadn't roboticized him. Chuck merely retorted that he might as well be dead with how the experiment went, and despite Bernie still trying to reason with him, he left, leaving her wondering how to explain everything to the young Sonic…

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball Z Movie 5: Cooler’s Revenge

Movie time again.   This time it’s Cooler’s Revenge, which premiered on July 20, 1991, between the airdates of Episodes 99 and 100.    The original title was “Dragon Ball Z: The Incredible Mightiest vs. Mightiest“

I found the timing of this movie very strange, because the whole plot is direct sequel to the events of the Frieza Saga, which didn’t end until Episode 107.   In Episode 99, Frieza is still fighting Goku on Namek, and he feels pretty confident about his chances.    A few days after that episode airs, you go to the theater and see this movie, where Frieza’s already dead and his brother goes after Goku to take revenge.  

On the other hand, the manga had already moved on to the next arc by this time.   Chapter 333 was published on July 16, 1991, and it features Goku meeting Future Trunks, right after he finished killing Mecha-Frieza.    So this movie apparently presumes you read the comics.    Or, if you’re anime-only, maybe it assumes you kind of know which way this Frieza thing is going to turn out. 

The movie opens with the destruction of Planet Vegeta.    You know, they really got their money’s worth out of that Bardock TV Special, didn’t they.    I think this is the fourth of fifth time they used this footage for flashbacks, and it was less than a year old at this point.  

From a distance, a second spaceship observes Frieza destroying the planet.   They apparently have really great cameras if they could get such a good close up of Frieza’s face.

The crew also notices a single spacecraft escaping the planet’s destruction.    I guess they patched into some camera inside the ship?   Their leader orders them to destroy it, but then their boss belays that order.    He sees this Saiyan baby as an oversight on Frieza’s part, and he refuses to clean up Frieza’s mess for him.    As Cooler puts it, Frieza planted this seed, so he can reap the harvest, whatever that might be.   

And there’s the title card.    We’re underway.

On Earth, Goku’s parting the ocean outside Roshi’s house, and Roshi thinks about how much stronger Goku is since he returned from Namek.   

Back at Goku’s house, Chi-Chi brings Gohan some Tang and tries to chase Icarus away, but then Goku does that last one for her.    He’s all “Hey, don’t bother Gohan, Icarus.   He’s gotta do his homework!”  Chi-Chi assumes this means Goku has a fever.   

She’s so worried about this that she drinks Gohan’s Tang.    Rude.

Turns out Goku does have a fever, and the only prescription for that fever is camping.    He want Gohan to hurry up and do his homework so they can goof off in the woods somewhere.    I guess the TWO camping trips from Movie 3 didn’t scratch that itch.  

Meanwhile, on some other planet, Cooler’s men report that Frieza was killed by a Saiyan named Son Goku.   Cooler is astonished and outraged, and he resolves to go to Earth and kill Goku as soon as possible.    Not because he cares about Frieza, but because he insists on restoring his family’s honor. 

Flash ahead to the camping trip, where Krillin is making curry over a campfire.    He sends Gohan to get some more firewood and.... does Gohan have his tail?    Huh.

Elsewhere, Goku catches a big-ass fish that Krillin’s gonna fry up to go with the curry.    This does sound like a fun time, actually.  

But then the bad guys show up.   The big green one, Dore, grabs him by the tail, and questions how this kid could have killed Frieza, since his power level is 50.   Salza, the blue one, notes that his reading it probably low because of his tail being grabbed, but that’s still pretty weak.  

Then Goku shows up, and they introduce themselves as Cooler’s Armored Squad.   The brown one is named Neiz, by the way.   

Goku fights all three of them at once, and does pretty well, but then their boss shows up and he mistakes him for Frieza.   

Then Cooler tries to shoot down Gohan, who’s flying nearby, so Goku has to go save him...

... only to take a ki blast to his back.  

Despite this, he manages to fire back at Cooler, who deflects it.     Then Goku nd Gohan fall in the river and get lost in the water.    Cooler’s men are satisfied that they must be dead, but Cooler isn’t convinced.    Goku survived his attack, and had enough power to strike back, which means he’s tougher than most Saiyans.   He orders his men to find Goku no matter what.

Gohan manages to get Goku into a cave, but he’s still in rough shape.

Making matters worse, Cooler’s men decide to carpet bomb the whole forest to flush Goku out.   All the end up doing is sealing off the cave Goku’s hiding in.

Later, Cooler’s goons report that they must have vaporized Goku by now, but Cooler won’t be satisfied until they bring him a body.   He notes that he could have just blown up the whole Earth and killed Goku that way, but he wants to kill Goku in person, as he feels this would be the only way to satisfy his family’s honor.  

That night, Krillin, Oolong and Icarus search for Goku, and Icarus manages to sniff out Gohan’s hiding place.    Krillin digs them out, being careful to suppress his ki so the bad guys’ scouters won’t pic them up.    Goku insists that he should take care of the animals first.

But Krillin has already delegated that task to Oolong and Icarus.   Only trouble is that Oolong starts a rockslide while he’s freeng that bunny rabbit, so Krillin has to use a ki blast to save him.

Fortunately, Neiz nearly collides with a pterodactyl as he chases down the scouter blip, and he decides the pterodactly must have been the source of the disturbance.   

So Krillin sends Gohan and Icarus to Korin’s Tower to get some senzu beans.   Meanwhile, Goku sleeps on a deer while a bunch of otehr animals gather ‘round him to make him look cuter, I guess.

Gohan makes the trip via Icarus, because if he flew on his own power it would tip off Cooler’s guys.   But when he makes it to Korin, Korin chews him out for not climbing the tower like everyone else i supposed to do.   Gohan started about halfway, because he was riding Icarus.   This scene is kind of weird, because Gohan’s never even been here before, and Korin seems pretty content to mess around while Goku’s life is at stake.    Does he not sense Cooler’s presence on the planet?    This is an emergency.

So Gohan agrees to go back down and climb the tower from the ground, but then Yajirobe tosses him a whole bag of senzu beans.   He and Korin argue about it, and eventually Korin admits that he was just going to give Gohan the beans for being honest, so Yajirobe just stole his thunder.

On the way back, Icarus is pretty worn out, so Gohan gives him a senzu bean to rejuvenate him.   But it works a little too well, because Icarus ends up flying so fast that he creates a signal on the bad guys’ scouters.

Gohan tries to fight the Armored Squad by himself, and he doesn’t too badly, but there’s three of them and one of him, and soon the numbers game catches up with him.    It’s a really well-animated scene, though.   

Then Piccolo shows up to help, because by now it’s become a DBZ Movie tradition.

Piccolo sends Gohan on ahead, but the squad sends Dore after him, so Piccolo shoots a ki blast at Neiz.   Neiz can suck his entire head into his chest, though, so the blast misses him...

Only Piccolo wasn’t aiming at him in the first place.    The blast locked onto Dore and followed him until it killed him.    Piccolo, you magnificent bastard.

Neiz manages to catch Piccolo in some sort of paralysis field, so Salza heads after Gohan, leavng Neiz to finish Piccolo off.

That turns out to be a huge mistake, because Piccolo somehow manages to turn the attack back on Neiz, killing him instantly.  

Then Piccolo chases after Salza in the forest.    You know, this movie’s really good.   Even this middle part has plenty of cool visuals and action sequences.

Piccolo does some stretchy arm stuff, and Salza makes a ki blade on his arm that can cut through trees, but ultimately Salza only survives thanks to a timely assist from Cooler, who zaps Piccolo with ki beam.

Later, Gohan returns to his dad with the senzu beans... but then Salza shows up and zaps them into ash before they can use them.    Whoops.

While Krillin fights Salza, Gohan remembers that he still had one more bean in his belt, so he digs it out and feeds it to Goku.   

Salza makes short work of Krillin and Gohan, and then he checks for Goku... when his scouter explodes.

Goku’s back and he’s pissed.   

Then Cooler shows up and sets off an explosion under Piccolo.   What a jerk.

Salza tries to punch Goku while he’s distracted, but it does absolutely nothing.   Welcome to Goku Town, jackass.

Salza gets knocked into some rocks when Goku powers up, and then Goku and Cooler fight.    It’s mostly even, though it looks like Cooler is holding back somewhat.   Once he’s satisfied that Goku really is strong enough to have beaten Frieza, he decides to step things up a bit.   

He reveals that while Frieza had four forms, Cooler has a fifth, which means he can become even stronger. 

I mean, I get the idea of having your new villain one-up the last villain, but this sort of goes against the notion of Frieza’s transformations.    The “final form” he used was his natural state, and the weaker forms were ones he devised to help suppress the bulk of his immense power.    Cooler is starting out in his “final form”, and he claims to have a transform that will make him stronger instead of weaker.   I think Toei might have gotten it backwards.

Still, the fifth form looks pretty cool.  

Cooler just beats the shit out of Goku at this point.    Goku can barely do anything against the guy.   At one point he tries the 20x Kaio-ken Kamehameha he used against Frieza, but Cooler just leaps into the blast, swims through it, and comes out the other side to punch Goku in the face.    Wicked.

Satisfied that he’s beaten Goku, Cooler decides to go ahead and blow up the planet.   

Goku collapses onto the ground, and then he spots a bird that must have been hurt during Cooler’s invasion.   

Then Goku gets up and heals the bird.   How the hell did Goku do that, you may ask.  

Because he’s the Legendary Super Saiyan, that’s how.

Cooler tries to fire a blast down at him, but before he can even bring down his arm, Goku’s already floating next to him and grabs him by the wrist.  “Bitch, you thought--?”

Then he tries to punch Goku, and that does absolutely nothing.    Welcome to Super Goku Town, you grape-flavored dumbass.

Goku only hits Cooler a few times before he gets the picture.    This was the power Goku used to defeat Frieza, and Goku is about to use it on him.

So Cooler fires a huge blast at Goku.    It doesn’t hurt him at all, but that wasn’t the point.   The point was to use it as a diversion...

... so Cooler could make a big energy ball to destroy the whole planet.   Baically, Cooler is a lot like Frieza, only he’s much more direct.   He doesn’t waste nearly as much time on this stuff, although he could have done this half an hour ago and saved himself some trouble.

Instead, Goku stops the attack before it hits the ground, and then he mucles it up and launches it back on Cooler with a Kamehameha.   If you’re watching the dub version, “Revelation” by American Pearl plays over this, and it’s petty awesome.

Cooler ends up getting launched into space, and eventually he realizes he’s headed for the Sun.  That’s what you get for hurting innocent birds in Super Goku Town, you lowlife.  Also, Piccolo and so forth.  Mostly birds.

As Cooler dies in just about the most awesomest way possible, he realizes that he made the same mistake Frieza did.    Frieza failed to intercept Goku’s spaceship when he was a baby, but Cooler let it go too.   And now Goku’s defeated them both.    So their whole family  is a bunch of losers.  

I really dig this.   It’d be good enough to see the bad guy blasted into the sun like this, but on top of that, we see him realize the extent of his folly.   Cooler believed he was even more cruel and ruthless than Frieza, but in the end he was brought down by he same sloppiness that plagued Frieza.    He insisted on searching for Goku and giving him a chance to recover when he could have just blown up the planet from the start.    And look where it got him.  

Somehow, the explosion causes the whole sky to light up and then go dark before everything goes back to normal.  

Everyone congratulates Goku on his victory, but they wonder what happened to Piccolo.    Then they hear someone digging out of the rubble...

But it’s Salza.     He’s like “I lived, bitch.”   Then a Special Beam Cannon comes out of nowhere and kills him.

Elsewhere, Piccolo takes a drink of water and goes “No you didn’t.” 

How did Piccolo recover from his injuries?   He didn’t get a senzu bean, and Cooler worked him over pretty badly.   Oh well.

And that’s the end.   

Just to touch on continuity a bit, this one almost fits into the canon, because you could set it right after Future Trunks warns Goku about the Androids. It doesn’t seem too unlikely that Goku would take a camping trip as a break from training for the Android menace.  

The only real continuity problems that arise are things like Gohan still having his Namek-era bowl cut, and growing his tail back.   It’s not impossible, but it seems rather unlikely.   

More importantly, it doesn’t add up that Goku seemed to wait until the very end of the movie to turn into a Super Saiyan.    In the Future Trunks episodes, he revealed that he could transform at will.  In this movie, it feels like he couldn’t transform until the situation became desperate enough.    Also, it seems odd that Frieza’s brother invaded Earth and Tien, Yamcha, and Vegeta didn’t get involved at all.    When Mecha-Frieza came to Earth, everyone sensed it immediately.

Nevertheless, this is one of the better entries in the movie series.   The animation is really excellent, the visuals are pleasing and colorful, and the plot is satisfying enough to compensate for the somewhat unoriginal villain.   Frieza has an older brother who’s stronger than he is?    And where was he until this movie happened?    Why doesn’t he rule the universe instead of Frieza?  It’s the sort of thing a fan would make up as a gag, like El Hermano, Jiren’s evil brother from the Latin American DBZ fanbase.   Only Cooler really hapened, and he got to be in a movie.  Two movies.  

Still, Cooler does have a certain charm to him as a guy who wants to be a better version of Frieza.    My only complaint about him is that he’s voiced by Ryusei Nakao, the same voice actor who played Freza.    That makes sense, sure, but it’s also pretty dumb, becaue the character was already a Frieza clone to start with.    Giving him the same voice just makes things worse.   Funimation got it right by casting a completely different person to play the part, and punching up Cooler’s self-esteem issues.   Also, the dub had the cool soundtrack.    If you want my advice, watch the dub version, but the original Japanese is still a good experience.

[journodale]

Why I’m mad about the Rise of Skywalker

My first reaction to The Rise of Skywalker – once I got past the litany of eyerolls and “oh, come on!” reactions while I was watching it – was just how mad I was about it. It’s not a deep-abiding rage, mind you, and much of my anger is a form of disappointment, but some of it is just about how petty and spiteful aspects of the film seemed to be in response to things that happened in The Last Jedi. (Spoilers, and occasional salty language, about herein).

My biggest and first complaint is that JJ Abrams and his co-writer, Chris Terrio, turned Rey into Ken the Jedi Prince. Ken. The. Fucking. Jedi. Prince. For those of you who are unaware, these stemmed from a series of largely shite (but occasionally charmingly shite) young adult novels in the early 1990s, as the franchise was experiencing its first major revival with the publication of Timothy Zahn’s Thrawn trilogy. Several of those books revolved around the discovery of a Jedi “prince” named Ken, who started to follow Luke Skywalker around until he discovered that he was indeed Palpatine’s grandson (the books had a whole story arc about his father, Palpatine’s son, being a three-eyed mutant), though these storylines and characters conveniently disappeared from the old expanded universe and were never spoken of again. Around the same time, Dark Horse Comics also published Dark Empire, many of the plot points therein were also lifted liberally by Abrams and Terrio – specifically that Palpatine has resurrected himself by use of clone bodies and mysterious dark side powers – the film simply called the planet Exogol rather than Byss, but the broad strokes are the same, including that Palpatine was eventually trying to move his essence into a new body (in this case it was Leia’s unborn third child rather than Rey). These comics touched off a whole litany of spin-offs wherein the nature of the Force and the conflict between the Jedi and Sith descended to increasingly cartoonish depths, and yet here they are, reviving themselves, because of the need to give Rey a bloodline.

In an interview with Terrio in The Hollywood Reporter, Terrio stated that they chose to make Rey a Palpatine because it was the “worst news she could receive,” and then handwaved a bunch of bullshit about “dark side royalty” and how she was choosing her own family over her ancestry. The problem is that this makes no sense, either from a story perspective, or from the broader continuity of the Star Wars universe. Terrio insisted that the original films established that the Force ran along family lines because of Luke Skywalker’s line to Leia in Return of the Jedi about how the Force was strong in their family – discounting that this was Luke’s awkwardly trying to tell a woman who made out with him six months before that she was actually his long-lost twin sister, or the fact that the whole existence of the Jedi Order and their prohibitions against marriage and children precluded there being Force-wielding dynasties out there. Rian Johnson in Last Jedi to make the significant revelation that Rey was the children of junk traders and nobodies was not only “democratizing” the Force – that one didn’t need famous parents to feel the Force – but also to being a hero. Terrio insisted that they weren’t slighting Johnson – and that could be the case. They instead were taking the laziest course to telling the story of the film.

Absolutely nothing in the story demanded that Rey be of Palpatine’s bloodline – if they insisted on bringing back Palpatine (another lazy choice, but more on that later), he could simply have demanded that Kylo Ren find her because she was simply a powerful Force user, whom the Force seemed to manifest in her as a response to the rising darkness (which would seem to have been the whole promise of The Force Awakens’ title). They wouldn’t have needed to invent a son for Palpatine (and then handwave away the fact that he apparently didn’t have Force powers despite their insistence on strong Force lineages, or if he did, how he managed to avoid being groomed as his father’s new apprentice and heir, and how he wasn’t the subject of a war of succession to the throne upon Palpatine’s death), and they would have maintained the notion that the Force belongs to everyone – not the Jedi, not the Sith, and certainly not to famous bloodlines (as Johnson made explicitly clear in Last Jedi). But no – giving Rey a bloodline was about fan service, and the constant need by certain fans that she be related to somebody important (never mind that all of the theories they put forward would not have worked out in terms of ages and timelines).

Another example of Abrams and Terrio totally not thumbing their noses at Johnson was the complete abandonment of the core theme of Last Jedi – that it’s people and relationships that matter, not things. What Abrams and Terrio replaced it with was about turning objects into fetish items – lightsabers in particular. The fact that they insisted on Rey having rebuilt Anakin/Luke’s lightsaber – recreating it exactly rather than turning it into something new – or having Rey build her own lightsaber before the film opened, coupled with the fact that they also introduced Leia’s lightsaber to imbue it with special meaning, as though it was the fact that it was these two lightsabers in particular that imbued Rey with particular symbolic meaning for the final fight was a complete abrogation of Johnson’s message. Lightsabers are not Excalibur – they are not magic swords bestowed upon Jedi by women in lakes. That said, Abrams is pathologically incapable of writing screenplays that don’t have MacGuffins (though the Sith Wayfinders were themselves also MacGuffins, and the dagger another one – even though its appearance and history made absolutely no sense), so this is more of his particularly lazy writing. As an aside, the whole Wayfinder MacGuffin is itself partially lifted from the Jedi Prince series, where the Imperial warlords were looking for the Glove of Darth Vader and found it in pieces of the second Death Star…on a water planet. I’m not even kidding.

The redemption of Kylo Ren didn’t make any sense. Terrio tried to handwave some Joseph Campbell bullshit about how great myths required atonement with the father figure and the great sin of patricide, but Ren’s actual rejection of the dark side was completely nonsensical – particularly because of how they used the device of Leia going into some kind of meditative state that eventually led to her death, as though it was her mystical intervention and self-sacrifice that somehow drove it out of him, as though the dark side was some kind of demonic possession. It also didn’t make sense how Rey decided to heal Ren immediately after she struck him with a lethal blow with her lightsaber – which they played as an act of mercy – and it was Terrio’s contention that it was what allowed Ren to let the light in and see his father again (which was a memory and not a ghost, because how else were they going to get Harrison Ford wedged into the film for fan service). There’s no logic to any of that. Both Force Awakens and Revenge of the Sith showed that going to the dark side was a choice – Ren chose to kill his father because he thought that was what would allow him to bury his past. After a career of mass murder and raping the minds of his interrogation victims, he’s going to suddenly turn it all back because he got stuck by a lightsaber and healed? Really? I’m not buying it. (Incidentally, the fact that Ren’s body dissolved in the end also makes no sense either – Kenobi, Yoda, and Skywalker’s corporeal dissolution had to do with the powers that Qui-Gon Jinn learned to unlock to maintain his presence in the Force after death, which he later showed Yoda how to do in The Clone Wars series and in Revenge of the Sith. I can see Luke having taught Leia the powers, but Ben/Kylo Ren before his training had been completed? I have a hard time with that).

Yet another of Abrams and Terrio’s lazy choices was the need to bring in a Big Bad™ in the form of Palpatine rather than engaging with another of the significant aspects of the Last Jedi’s themes, which was about the banality of evil. The whole point of the casino sequence that fanboys like to deride is that it showed Finn the evil of indifference of those who profit from war, while the underlying theme of the rise of the First Order in the films had to do with people being nostalgic for fascism – sure, a lot of people got trampled underfoot but at least the trains ran on time and we were “safe” with stormtroopers on every corner. It made the film as relevant to the 2010s as George Lucas did with commenting about Nixon and Vietnam in the original trilogy, or his construction of a trilogy of films about political violence and the rise of authoritarian populism with the prequels. Killing Palpatine does nothing about these bigger, underlying societal problems that the Resistance has to confront. Remember in Last Jedi where Poe talks about being the spark that will light the flame that will burn the First Order to the ground? Well, that’s all evaporated with the revelation that hey, it was Palpatine pulling the strings all along. Nothing to confront here, people, let’s just kill the Big Bad™ and go home. Again, it’s cheap, it’s lazy, and it’s fan service.

I have a big problem with the way Abrams and Terrio treated the Finn/Poe relationship, which all of the actors were pushing for. Abrams, in several interviews, dismissed this as the fact that they have a bond that’s “stronger” because they’ve been through the fire together, or some bullshit like that, then assured fans that they would get their LGBT representation because it’s important to show queer fans that they too belong in the Star Wars universe. That “representation” – the fact that a tertiary character from Last Jedi shares a same-sex kiss with another woman (whom the materials accompanying the film identify as her wife) – is brief, in the background, and was easily sliced out of the film for foreign distribution. And yet, Abrams expects plaudits for his “representation,” while also trying to reinforce Finn and Poe’s hetero credentials with the ambiguity of what Finn planned to declare to Rey as they were sinking in the quicksand, and with Poe’s awkward flirting with Zorii Bliss (and we did learn in the subsequent materials that the pair’s previous “emotionally complicated” relationship was when they were teenagers). Abrams later said that a kiss between Finn and Poe would be “heavy handed” – erm, you know, like the fact that he had Rey kiss Ren, the man who chased her, tortured her, tried to rape her mind, killed her friends, and was a mass-murderer. Yeah, he’s a dark, broody soul who just needs the love of a good woman to complete his redemption story (and I’m sure that the Internet is replete with all kinds of fanfic about how her magic vagina cures Ren’s manpain). That’s totally not heavy-handed, heteronormative fan-service in the slightest. There was actual ground that could be made where Finn and Poe were gay male leads in one of the biggest blockbuster franchises on the planet – something that has never been done before. It would have been ground breaking, keeping entirely with the story that had been established, and would have actually been worthy of applause.

The diminution of Rose Tico’s role is also bullshit, and Terrio’s assurances that they filmed more good stuff with her that just wound up on the cutting room floor also doesn’t pass the smell test. Terrio asserted that it was great how she rose from being a lowly mechanic to being one of Leia’s right-hand advisors – which conveniently had very little screen time. There was an opportunity to have her included with the group aboard the Millennium Falcon on its spy mission right at the very beginning of the film, rather than the insertion of the puppet creature Klaud, so as to show that Rose was an integral part of “Leia’s best agents” entrusted with getting the valuable intelligence from their spy in the First Order, but no, that would be a little too obvious. What is left is essential proof that they have caved to the loud and obnoxious fanboys who objected to her presence in “their” films.

There’s a lot of other nitpicking I could do – whether it’s Abram’s inability to grasp how hyperspace works, the fact that the celebration scenes at the end don’t make any sense with the exception of going down the fan service checklist, or the fact that the closing scene contained so much cheese that I’m surprised the Supply Management marketing boards didn’t file a trade complaint and impose 300 percent tariffs on it. The pace of the film was so frenetic that any scene that could have been poignant or moving was lost in the bang-bang-bang editing. Overall, however, I’m just incredibly disappointed in the lazy writing and fan service that pretends it’s being clever.

This was not the film we deserved. This was a film that rewarded the legions of fanboys who complained that films with strong female characters who don’t wind up in bed with a man at the end were a “feminist agenda;” that films that didn’t pander to the very straight white male entitlement to a particular fandom were the works of “social justice warriors” that hate their own fans; that films that don’t recreate the wonder they felt when they were twelve years old – which is an impossibility – are somehow raping their childhoods. The CBC’s Eli Glasner called it “cinematic comfort food,” but it’s more insidious than that – it’s a repudiation of attempts to grow the franchise beyond just a nostalgia cult, as it increasingly morphs itself into (and by cult, there is now a legion of online “truthers” who trade conspiracy theories about how the films have been hijacked by executives with agendas). And because it will rake in billions of dollars, it will assure the people with the purse strings that this is what the market needs more of. My hope for the franchise is moving toward vehicles like The Mandalorian, and the other forthcoming live-action series on Disney+, because the lessons for blockbusters are apparently to be hollow facsimiles of what came before.

[anip-ocs]

Location: Town Plaza, Kihiro City, California, United States

Time: Sunday, March 29th, 3:18 P.M.

Compared to other monsters they'd fought before, this one was acting relatively docile... for now. Which probably just made it even more terrifying by that aspect alone.

Disillusions stood huddled in an alleyway, observing it. Whatever the monster had been doing before to initiate the warning ping, it had stopped. Maybe it was because there was no one on the streets anymore? All they knew is that they'd come onto the scene and it was eerily quiet.

The monster perched atop the fountain. At least, they presumed it was the monster. It was a bird--a black crow, just sitting atop of the bow of Eros, out of reach of the spray of the little cherubs spewing water in arcs around the Greek God. It was unmoving, and it's eyes seemed to be closed as well. But nothing else was on the street, nor was there any slight indication that the monster had actually moved to someplace else.

"What are we gonna do about it?" Brian asked, giving it another wary glance.

Ken looked at it a second before looking away, looking more than a little bit unsettled. "I don't think that's a normal bird."

"But what if it is?" Maddi asked.

"Doesn't smell like the birds that are in the forest usually." Claw mumbles, looking over at everyone. "So no, I don't think it is either."

"So then, why isn't it wrecking shit already?" CJ asked. "If it's a monster, then wouldn't it be hellbent on doing that?"

"Maybe it's waiting for something." Jay said with a shrug.

"Like what?" Taylor asked. "Us?"

"Probably."

"But we're here. Why isn't it doing anything yet?"

"I'm not sure, but we should probably go attack it while we have the chance." Ken said, standing straight and reaching for his swords. Alana put a hand on his arm before he could rush out.

"It could be a trap, Ken. I'll go." she said.

"Why you?"

"Because you're terrified of this thing, and I can sneak over and be way smaller so I won't get noticed."

"But what if it--"

"Attacks me? We risk that no matter what. I'll go up, and then pin it and then we'll figure out what it's up to. Okay?"

"I think it’s a good idea!" Claw grins. "And if anything goes wrong, we're here to assist."

"Yeah! I'll be fine." before anyone could protest further, Alana shifted forms into a chickadee and flew out of the alleyway, making her way to the back side of the corvid. It didn't even seem to notice, didn't even shift. She landed on the edge of the fountain behind the bird, shifted forms, and reached out to grab it.

Before she could, it opened its eyes--eight of them, pupil less and red, and turned to face her with a screeching caw that grated at all of their ears and left their heads reeling. By the time anyone was even mildly ready to react and attack the beast, it was as tall as the fountain and had Alana pinned under its talons, one sunk deep into her shoulder.

"Hey! Let go of her!" Ken shouted, but found himself paralyzed to the spot. The rest of the team rushed out to try and help her, leaping into action. Maddi tried to send out a plume of flame its way, but the beast flared out its wings--eight wings--and a flurry of arrows rained down on the group. Claw was hit in the leg, CJ earning a slice in the arm for his efforts to run and defend him. Brian cast out a hand, and a nearby car zoomed over to block them, separating the team from the beast, who still had their friend pinned. When the hail of arrows ended and the bird redirected its attention--and beak--to Alana, the car became surrounded in a blue glow and floated in the air a moment before being sent hurtling towards it. Before it could hit, it was sliced in half by a wing, and the following shots from Brian's gun seemed to do little to nothing more than irritate it.

No one else could even get any other attacks in before it fully grasped Alana in its talons and flew away, with another horrendous caw that seemed to rock the foundations of the buildings around them. Alana couldn't do much of anything more than reach out for them, vines desperately uprooting themselves from the earth to try and ensnare the corvid with no success. CJ tried to get into the air and go after them, but with another screech he let out a scream and plummeted to the ground.

"A-Are you guys okay?!" Ken called out, finding himself able to move again and rushing to their sides. Maddi turned and sent him a glare.

"Why weren't you helping?!"

"I-I panicked, I couldn't move, I--"

"Damn good time to panic! Ala--Bio's gone, Darky! What are we gonna do now?!"

"We could go after her instead of trying to start arguments?" Jay suggested with a flick of an ear. "Which way did they go? The faster we can get there, the more likely we're able to prevent anything worse from occurring."

"Jay has a point, guys." Taylor says, taking the Vastian's hand. "Let's get going." at that, the whole team set out to find their kidnapped friend. Hoping that nothing was happening she wouldn't be able to handle.

Location: Sanders Household/The Puppeteer's Base of Operations, Kihiro City, California, United States

Time: Sunday, March 29th. 3:30 P.M.

Alana was already pretty terrified the instant the monster turned and pinned her, and it only heightened once it took flight and whisked her away from her friends to who knows where. But as she started recognizing gated communities and roads her mother would have to drive through in order to get to the house of an old friend, her anxieties turned into irritation.

Of course, Will was at the bottom of this! For a moment, she'd worried that this monster was made by Zarroff--he was pretty determined to make man into beast, and she'd feared he'd figured it out. But no, it was just the Puppeteer again.

Was the Puppeteer still technically a threat? Yes, of course. Was the Puppeteer a coward who hid behind his magic book, had no real combat skills, and almost a full half a head shorter than her? Yes. All she had to do was make sure he didn't get a chance to crack open his book, and she could hold out until her friends got here--or even beat him herself.

The giant demon bird--that was two now, Will--touched down in the Sanders Household's backyard, immediately shrinking in size as it flew to perch on the back of a lawn chair. The pool was behind her, the chair and the irritating twig of a boy who'd decided to kidnap her in front. The book sat in his lap, the pencil in his hand, but he wasn't too interested in sketching her as it seemed. Instead he looked up at her, lowering his sunglasses to reveal his real glasses and... honestly, one of the more disturbing things today was that look on his face.

"At long last," he grinned, sitting up fully. "You're all mine."

"Uh. No, not really." Alana muttered, rubbing at the talon scratches across her arm. It hurt immensely to even try and move her right arm, nor was she willing to strain it until her shoulder healed. She wasn't a fan of the sticky feeling of blood, nor the boy who'd caused it.

"Oh, but that's where you're wrong, my love." now he was standing up, taking slow gliding steps towards her. Was he trying to be impressive? Right now, he was just annoying, and had her good shoulder not had a hole in it, she might've punched him in the face. "You don't have to pretend anymore, Alana. Your 'friends' aren't here to manipulate you! You can be yourself, we can be together!"

"How many times do I have to tell you that I do not want to be with you?"

"But you only said that because your friends were manipulating you!"

"No, Will. If anyone here is being manipulative, its you. You literally mind control people, and you think my friends are the ones who are being manipulative?!"

Will's smile shifted into a frown, and Alana unwillingly felt herself shudder. Goddamn shoulder, would you heal already?! "Alana. Together, we will be king and queen of this world. I can be king as is. If you need some... persuasion to be my queen, then so be it." he reached for the collar of his shirt and... started unbuttoning it. With every button, he took a small step forward, and Alana reciprocated by taking a step back. Eventually, the shirt was unbuttoned fully, and Will was standing there as if he was presenting something impressive. "Well? What do you think?"

"I think I want to go home." Alana rolled her eyes, but a glance down showed she was almost at the edge of the pool. One more step back and she'd fall into the water, and it wasn't like she'd be able to swim with her dumb arm still being injured. "Will, you can literally stop being a villain whenever you want. Just accept that I am not into you and let us move on with our lives."

"You'll learn to love me soon enough."

"Uh, no, Will, I won't--"

"Here, let me show you how," he took more steps forward, but before Alana could think about sidestepping to avoid him, the crow flew off of his shoulder and grew in size, just enough to block her way out. It made a sort of caw, and her head started to hurt too bad to even really see. By the time the spots were out of her eyes and her skin stopped crawling, she realized Will had grabbed her by the waist and was trying to tilt her chin towards him for a kiss. And then her skin began to crawl again.

Alana shoved out with her arms--her right shoulder began to bleed anew, but she didn't care as much at the moment--to get Will off of her, and stepped backwards, perfectly expecting to feel water start to flood over her. But she didn't get that--instead she got more solid surface to stand on. What? She looked down, and a giant lotus flower had bloomed beneath her, keeping her afloat upon its petals. When she looked back up, Will was lunging for her. Another shove, which wrenched him away and pushed her flower further towards the other side of the pool. He'd torn her shirt a bit, he'd grabbed her so hard. Her whole shoulder was beginning to throb with immense pain, and she clutched at it to try and stop the bleeding. What was in there, what was keeping it from healing?!

Will was occupying himself by taking pictures, but he was frowning. And then he began to make his way back to his lawn chair, to his book and pencil. "I tried to give you a choice, Alana, but now you leave me without one."

"Or you could stop being an asshole! What's your fucking problem!?"

"What can I say? I can't control myself when it comes to you." he was opening the book, flipping through the pages one by one. It was like torture, her heart was beating in her chest, but she wasn't sure she could even manage to shift into anything right now, let alone maneuver in that form well enough to escape in time.

"You can control yourself. You're just choosing not to." she sent him a toxic glare, but he laughed it off.

"You'll see things my way soon. Take a pose, sweetheart."

"Hey!" the two turned to see Claw standing there, the rest of the team behind him. He tapped his wrists and the clawed gauntlets appeared in a flash of red light. "Let her go."

"Coming to crash the party?" Will sounded frustrated, but then a malicious smirk crossed his face as he thrust out his hand. "Be my guest!"

The mutant crow once again began to swell, towering over the team. Ken's eyes widened in horror, his hands shaking as he drew his blade to fight the best he could.

A screeching caw from the creature shattered their resolve, and their focus, and before anyone was anywhere near ready to react, the bird was flying at them with a vengeance. Its talons were outstretched, and it pinned Taylor to the ground and knocked the wind out of her. She let out a scream as it bent to try and peck at her, but before it could a fireball flew into its mouth, and shortly after it was stabbed by Claw's gauntlets.

Will was just about to begin to draw something else when he heard CJ calling for Alana to jump. He and Brian were at the other edge of the pool, urging their teammate to jump to them. He couldn't have that, now could he?

The two boys stopped and turned to see that a snake-headed crocodile was behind them, letting out a hiss of a growl and targeting their ankles. It was a dark green, almost black, but with dangerous looking red spots along its back and at the tips of its fangs and teeth.

"Whoa! Scoot over!" Brian shouted, launching himself onto the leaves of the lotus flower. CJ quickly followed suit, but just as they were thinking they were safe, the beast slipped into the water and began circling around them. Oh fuck.

The others were a bit too occupied to help them, which wasn't necessarily their fault. The bird monster was still on top of Taylor, arrows shooting out of its wings at their friends. Jay had managed to form a shield large enough to protect three people, but Ken was still in the midst of the firefight. His own wings furled out of his back, and he flew at the monster with his swords and a battle cry. The two collided, Ken trying to slash through the monster's thick feathers with one sword while precariously holding back it's razor sharp beak with the other. Another caw sent their heads spinning, and the bird hopped off of Taylor to snap down on Ken's arm and shake him around. He let out a cry of pain, another following as Maddi attempted to hit the monster with her fire but instead hit his wing. Taylor thrust out her hands, summoning rocks to strike the beast in the side of the head and causing it to stumble to the side. The beast tumbled into the pool with a splash, Ken being pulled in with it.

The crocodile monster redirected its attention towards the giant splash, having already been on the leaves of the flower and about to climb over the petals into the center, but deciding to launch back into the water and go after whatever caused the disturbance. The three teens within the flower relaxed a bit, but weren't quite ready to leave the flower yet either.

Maddi almost launched herself into the water, but Claw stopped her, wincing a bit as he strained his leg to do so. "Wait! Don't!"

"What?! Why not?!" she groaned.

"Fire powers and water? No, that's not happening. Let's get Alana and them and--where's the Puppet boy?"

"Over there!" Taylor pointed towards the house, where Will was about to duck inside to supposed safety. The three chased after him, while Jay did his best to help the other three off of the flower.

Maddi, Taylor, and Claw raced into the Sanders Household, only to be stopped by Will's parents. The two servants lunged at them, his mother grabbing Claw and pinning him down and throwing punches while his father went for Taylor. He grabbed her arm before Maddi punched him in the neck, causing him to stumble back and let go of her friend. Claw was struggling to get up, mainly because Mrs. Sanders had relented to pulling at his ears as hard as she could muster, which was really damn hard when considering all of her normal inhibitions had vanished under the control of a madman.

Maddi and Taylor ran to go help him, but the cupboards began to tremble, slowly at first but then violently as a horde of black salamander-like creatures burst out of them and raced their way. While one of them wouldn't be too much to handle, hundreds and maybe even thousands of them was a bit too much, especially considering their footpads seemed to seep toxins into their skin that made them get too tired to keep fighting and resisting. Odd thoughts started filling their heads, thoughts none of them liked or even wanted to be hearing, but as the creatures overtook them, ignoring them became less and less of an option.

When he and the bird crashed beneath the surface, the monster let go of his arm with a gasp and tried to fly to the surface. Ken held his breath and thrust out his hands, and the surface of the water began to freeze over, trapping the bird underwater with him. Now it was a waiting game--who'd break through first, who'd drown first? He snapped his wings to propel him forward under the surface, striking at the bird with his blade. A gash of purple blood clouded out of the wound, but it wasn't fully down for the count quite yet.

Before Ken could go in for another attack, something bit down into his leg, causing him to cry out before he could think not to. Immediately his lungs began to fill with water, burning, but the new offending monster just thrashed about, as if it were trying to rip his leg right off of him. He barely managed to wrench it away, desperately trying to swim up and break the surface of the ice so he could catch his breath. Luckily, this was ice of his own will, and it broke easily enough for him to pop his head out of the new hole and catch a breath.

"Ken! What's going on in there?!" Alana gasped, eyes wide as she hopped off a giant flower atop the ice to run over. Her friend coughed out some water, but was unable to get any words out before he was suddenly pulled back into the water, desperately clawing at the ice to no avail.

"Dude?!" CJ shouted, running over to the hole with his friends beside him. There were three dark shapes under the ice, one large and desperately trying to peck through the ice, but the other two were smaller. One swam to the surface, but it swam too fishlike to be their friend. Indeed, the snake-odile surged up and nearly bit CJ's face off with a hiss. Brian formed a blade of metal and swung at it, but before it could connect, the beast dipped back under the ice. The two shapes began tussling again, the large demon bird fading away into nothing after it had sat still for far too long.

"Should we go help him?" Brian asked, looking to his friends.

"I can swim, but not well enough for that, I don't think." CJ said. "Now, I could try and make a bubble around me, but I don't know how well I could attack like that."

"I don't think I can even shift forms right now. My shoulder won't--oh? Oh, its healing now. Give me a second, then we can talk." Alana said, rubbing her shoulder.

Before anything else could be said, Ken's head popped out of the hole, and CJ and Brian lifted him by the shoulders onto the ice. An instant later, the final monster burst out of the ice, launching itself onto the surface. It came after them, its claws causing it to skid along the icy surface, but it was still moving formidably fast. Ken finished coughing and turned to face the beast, a sword held in front of him as he stood in place umoving.

"We're ending this!" He shouted, glaring down the reptilian monster. It launched into the air to attack him, but he stabbed through it's underbelly with his sword, the tip of the blade piercing through it's leather back, and he took his other blade and sliced it's head off it's form with one fluid motion and a spattering arc of violet blood. Only then did he let the fallen beast slide off his blade and onto the ice, where it then faded into nothingness.

"That looked so cool!!" CJ shouted, eyes wide.

"I wouldn't know anything," Jay said, causing everyone to turn and see him with his arms crossed over his chest. "Ken, with all due respect, I'm not sure what exactly I'm expected to do in a battle scenario like this, let alone why you brought me."

"Well... We could use your healing assistance." Ken offered.

"What about your telekinesis?" Brian asked. "You have that, don't you?"

"Yes, but I don't use it for much more than shields. I didn't really see a reason to train it any further. I can't really aim any attacks, could I?" Jay said, his tail flicking to and fro. "Is everyone alright, by the way? I know Alana's healing powers are faster than mine, but I can still assist."

"Honestly, I had a hole in my shoulder for a good fifteen-twenty minutes, and it's taking a bit longer than usual to heal up. I'm not even close to halfway done." Alana said. "And Ken has some damage on his arm, leg, and wing, so if you want to help him with that, you can."

"Alright! And if CJ and Brian are alright, then the rest of the team went inside a house or something."

"Oh, yeah! Let's go!" the two boys raced inside to assist their friends in hopefully bringing down the Puppeteer and his plots.

Brian and CJ opened the door to the house, and near-immediately a stream of black salamanders poured out, scattering into the world beyond the Sanders' yard. The inside of the house was dark, pale light seeping through as it shone through the bodies of salamanders sticking to the light. Asides from that, no one seemed to be around.

"Uh? Guys?" CJ called out. "Hewwoooo??"

"Maybe they're upstairs," Brian said, stepping further into the door to find the stairwell. Almost immediately, he was grabbed by a hand and slammed onto the tile floors of the kitchen, the force of impact nearly cracking them. Maddi had him pinned, one hand around his throat and the other about to cast a fire attack right onto his face, a knee on his chest. Fortunately, Maddi was pretty short and easy to throw off, but--

"What the fuck, Maddi?!" CJ shouted, only to be grabbed by Taylor and Claw. They seemed to be trying to strangle them, but even in the low light he could tell something was wrong. If the fact that his friends were attacking him wasn't enough of a clue, their eyes were too dark, it was like even the sclera was beginning to turn black. Something had happened. And they needed to snap them out of it.

Something started crawling on Brian's arms, making his skin crawl. He moved to swipe it off, but it just stuck to his hand, and then Maddi slammed him into the counters with bared teeth, trying to hold him still for... some reason... was that a salamander on her neck? And there were a few on her arms too, pressed down like tattoos, nearly flat against her skin. And the one on his arm was quickly being joined by many others, and the more they moved around the dizzier and dizzier he got. Serve the Puppeteer. What? No way that thought was his!

Wait a second.

"CJ! Get them outside!" Brian shouted, gesturing the best he could towards the door. CJ couldn't even properly see it because he'd been pinned on the ground, the blades of Claw's gauntlets hovering dangerously close to his neck.

"Uh, don't think that's an option right now!" he yelled, eyes wide and focused on the knife points.

"We need to!" Maddi tried to pin him more, but he kicked her in the gut to get her back before he pushed off of the counter and ran for the door, the girl giving chase. Taylor tried to block his way, but he just grabbed her arm and dragged her outside as well. Claw looked up at the commotion, distracted, and CJ managed to squirm out from under him and race outside.

The sunlight didn't seem to waver their resolve, the three teammates still chasing after them, but quite frankly Brian had a backup plan that would hopefully help. Ken looked up at the sound of the door slamming against the wall behind it, eyes wide.

"What's going on?!" he asked incredulously, prompting Alana to look up from her shoulder and Jay to stop what he was doing and listen in.

"Un-ice more of the pool!" Brian shouted as he jumped onto the slippery surface and fell on his butt, sliding halfway across the expanse.

"What?! Why?!"

"Just do it!" CJ shouted, leaping onto the surface as well. Ken made a larger hole in the ice just as the rest of their friends launched themselves after them, causing them to fall into the water instead. They let out shouts of shock before climbing out of the water, shaking themselves off as black salamanders slipped off their arms, necks, and legs before scattering into the distance. The instant they were all off, they rubbed their eyes and looked around.

"Since when were we out here again?!" Maddi yelled, spinning in a circle to make sure her eyes weren't tricking her.

"You guys got puppeteed by fucking lizards!" Brian said.

"What?!" the rest of the team exclaimed, eyes wide.

"Lizards?!" Taylor screamed, looking absolutely repulsed. "Oh, ugh, I can't stand lizards, what'd they make us do?!"

"You tried to attack us until you fell in the pool, then they fell off." CJ said. "You guys okay? Not still wanting to kill us, are you?"

"I'll pass on that," Claw said, trying to dry himself off further. "But I'm not really willing to go back into that hellhole again either."

"How'd it happen?" Alana asked, walking up to check them over. Asides from dark marks on their arms, they were okay, and it looked like the marks would go away sooner or later too.

"We went in and his parents attacked us! Then all these sala-shits came out the cabinets, like, thousands of them! Then we were out here!" Maddi huffed.

"That sounds... yeah, you couldn't pay me to go in there right now." Jay said, eyebrows furrowed. "Ken, you should be good to stand."

"Thanks, Jay. So, what are we going to do next?" he asked.

"Will's probably upstairs in his room, laughing his head off at us. And as much as I want to punch that look off his fucking face, I don't want to go back in there either." Maddi grumbled. "I just want to go home. Treehouse is ready now, right?"

"Yeah. I actually got the call a few minutes before this battle happened. You all can come to my house to grab your things and then I'll walk you over."

"Thanks."

"For?"

"Uh, for letting us not go back in there... and for everything else." Maddi's face turned red and she looked away, shoulders hunched. She let out a cough. "I mean, you could have saved your dumb money and done rich people shit with it."

"You're welcome, Maddi." Ken smiled.

"So, we can leave now, right?" Alana asked.

"Yeah. That was more than enough action for the day. We know where his base is, we can attack when we're ready."

With that, the team split off, making their ways home. Being generally sick and tired of Will's bullshit.

The Yakk List: @ravenpuffwriter @dreamswithadashofspice @ejmcmoon @writerofwriting @beeofwriting

[written-rebellion]

The Bone Crush

for the OL Prompt Exchange

Prompt #35: Harry Potter AU: Jamie and Claire as students in Hogwarts. Jamie in Gryffindor, Claire in Ravenclaw? Or both in Gryffindor. Maybe post-canon? (submitted by @thistlekat777 ) 

A/N: It’s starting to seem like in-school meet-cutes are becoming my personal niche LOL Here’s a little one-shot for @thelallybrochlibrary OL Prompt Exchange event this month! I was so excited for this prompt I legit ignored my 2k word paper to write 2k words of this in a one-night flurry instead. Please let me know what you think! :D

As far as days went, it could’ve been worse.

He could have been expelled, instead of just sitting in an empty detention hall. He could have lost 50 house points, instead of just 15. He could’ve gotten far worse than a broken arm, and he was lucky enough to have it in whatever muggle strap Hugh was able to produce at a moment’s notice.

And above all, he could have wasted his afternoon staring at a stone wall, instead of gaping blankly at Claire Beauchamp as she strolled into the room.

Yes, as far as days went, this certainly wasn’t bad.

“Um, can I help you?” she said quickly, whisky daring blue to look away.

“W-what are you doing here?”

Her nose wrinkled at that. She brushed her dark curls off her shoulder and crossed her arms.

“This is detention, isn’t it? I thought that was obvious.”

“Aye, but—” She raised an eyebrow. “But ye’re a prefect, are ye no?”

Her lips curved into something just less than a smile.

“My, how very observant of you.”

He sat up in his chair, catching her tone.

“So the rumour about ye stealin’ Madame Pomfrey’s bone-growing juice is true then?”

Whatever smile had been forming fell open and her cheeks pinked.

“It most definitely is not!”

Jamie tried his best to stifle the laugh trembling deep in his belly lest her cheeks get any redder, as tempting as the sight may be.

“Aha, I didna mean to offend ye, Beauchamp,” he said, shoulders still shaking.

“Hmph, Fraser.” She narrowed her eyes at him but pulled the seat from a desk and sat facing him regardless.

“What’s that on your arm?”

“Oh this?” He’d almost completely forgotten the dull throbbing in his broken bone when she walked in. At its mention, the ache rushed back in like blood to an open wound.

He winced as he turned in the desk to face her. “Some muggle cloth my mate Hugh had on him.”

“It’s a sling,” she said, brows drawing together.

“Aye, that’s what he called it. Keeps my arm all still until I can get the bone healed.”

“But—” Her eyes darted from his arm to his face and back. “But then, why are you here? You should’ve gone straight to Madame Pomfrey.”

“Well what good would she do me, lass, since ye stole her bone potion?”

She gave him a dead glare and he laughed until his arm ached again.

“Ach, it wasna really my choice, aye? The prefect who sent me didna leave much room for negotiation, especially considering he’s the one who did it to me.”

Claire sat bolt upright.

“Who the hell was it?”

Jamie ran his free hand through his hair.

“Ye ken Jack Randall, the Slyther—? Ah, I see ye do.”

Her face had contorted in the way so uniquely attributed to Randall by everyone he knew in the Gryffindor common room. Evidently the Ravenclaws felt the same.

“We’ve met, yes.”

“Aye well, he was picking on Hugh – Hufflepuff lad, around this tall, ye know him? – and one thing led to another…”

“And what? You two beat the shit out of each other?”

“Mmrmph, more like I brought my fists to a wand fight.” He squirmed as best he could in his chair, trying not to jostle his arm. “Damn prick doesna fight verra fair.”

“And he sent you straight here? After he started the fight and did that to you?”

“Madame Hooch was the one who caught us brawling. Randall wasted no time giving her his side and offering to escort me right to detention.”

She frowned, and Jamie felt a small surge of pride at her genuine concern for his well-being. The surge stopped roughly around his arm though, as it throbbed with pain yet again.

He repositioned the sling on the desk between them, trying to get more comfortable in his seat.

“What about you, lass? What trouble has the darling Ravenclaw prefect gotten herself into?”

She looked up from his arm to meet his eyes again but said nothing.

“Och c’mon Beauchamp, fair’s fair, aye? It’s no’ like we’ve got something better to do.”

She gave it a moment’s thought before her shoulders slumped.

“Oh alright,” she said, resting her elbows on the edge of Jamie’s desk. “I got caught trying to steal—no, not that. I was trying to take a mandrake root back to my dorm.”

“A mandrake—? Those things from second year that look like tree bairns and screech like the devil? Why on earth would ye want one of those in yer room?”

“If you actually paid attention in Herbology, you’d know they’re a base ingredient in most antidotes and potions.” She huffed, her cheeks puffing out indignantly.

His heart thudded against his chest.

Christ, had she always been this cute?

“They’ve got all sorts of medicinal qualities…” He took another look at her, enjoying the way her face practically glowed, even as she listed off something as mundane as the uses of a mandrake root.

“…they use them for just about everything at St. Mungo’s. I only wanted to do a few tests of my own, but the damn stupid little bugger started fussing in its pot and it slipped right out of my hands.”

“Hang on—” Jamie snapped back into the present. “—aren’t mandrake shrieks fatal? That’s wicked careless of ye, lass.”

She smiled.

God. Damn.

“So you were paying attention in class, I’m impressed.”

“I’d do well to remember things that might kill me, especially at this school,” he added wryly.

“Well, I’m not stupid, I brought earplugs just in case,” she said. “Plus, the baby ones can’t kill you.” Her cheek fell into her palm, and she rolled her eyes. “All they can do is cry loud enough to call Professor Sprout back from her office apparently.”

“Not bad at all, Beauchamp.” He chuckled, but had to stop short as a dart of pain came rushing down from his shoulder. His eyes squeezed shut.

“Is your arm bothering you?”

“Nay Sassenach,” he said through gritted teeth. “I just like makin’ the odd wee grunt of pain every once and awhile, aye?”

“Well, if you weren’t such an arse about it, I could probably help you.”

He regarded her with one eye.

“Help me? So ye’ve got that potion after all?”

“Or I could just let you suffer in pain—”

“What help is it then, Beauchamp?” he said, looking her dead on.

She sat straight, edging the end of her chair as she leaned in, visibly bristling with the same excitement he’d seen on countless first-years as they entered the great hall for the first time.

“There’s a spell used by combat healers in the last Wizarding War. It helps alleviate pain temporarily so that aurors and other soldiers can last longer before getting properly treated.”

“I dinna remember hearing this in class. What spell is it?”

“It’s not really—well, it’s a nonverbal spell, actually.”

“Nonverbal magic?” He raised his brows at her. “Where did ye learn that?”

“From a book,” she answered, suddenly not able to meet his eye as she began to mumble hastily. “A book… from the restricted section of the library.”

“Christ Jesus,” he laughed, “and what else do ye do in yer spare time, Beauchamp, plan to rob Gringotts?”

“Fine. Suffer then.”

Her pout was back, full reddened cheeks and all. Jamie stopped himself, opting for as warm a smile he could muster in spite of the pain.

“Ach, I’m sorry, lass. I just—It feels like I’m only just meeting ye for the first time is all. Please, by all means, I trust ye.”

They locked eyes then, hers looking almost incredulous at the notion. Surely this wasn’t the first time someone’s said that to her. And yet…

“You’re… you’re sure?” Her hand slowly reached down to her boot, drawing out her wand.

“Aye.” Jamie said, feeling quite like he’d never been more sure of anything in his life.

Her face flushed again, but it seemed decidedly different from the last time. He tried not to read into it, even as she leaned over the desk towards him, close enough for him to feel her breath against his throat.

Her left hand gently pressed into his shoulder as she aimed her wand with her right. He hissed at the contact and she peered up at him.

A nod. Trust me.

He nodded back.

And with a practiced twist and flick of her wrist, Jamie felt a warm glow coil around the break in his arm and then dissolve, taking the pain with it.

“Gast' air fad!”

“It worked?”

“Aye, I dinna feel a thing.” He wiggled his fingers, opened and closed his fist. “Thank ye lass, truly.”

She looked up, absolutely beaming and, though the pain was in fact gone, Jamie felt his heart thundering like it had when the bone had just broken.

Something arced between their eyes. Her smile was slowly fading as she started to notice too.

“T-thank you, Cla—”

“Well, if it isn’t Claire.”

Her expression turned venomous in a millisecond as she swiveled her head toward the doorway, rising out of her seat to return her wand to her boot.

“Hello Jack.”

“And what might you be doing here in detention?”

What was a wide smile not three seconds ago was now a tight thin line across her mouth as Claire looked from Randall to Jamie and back again.

Then she smirked.

“Leaving, actually. Jamie and I were just about to go.” She motioned for him to stand and he did.

“Go?” Randall said as Claire strode to the door.

“Yes, go,” she replied, clapping a hand onto his shoulder. “Jamie wasn’t supposed to be here anyway, and I have to take him to Madame Pomfrey’s straight away.”

He sneered, looking from her to Jamie, who simply kept his mouth shut. Claire meanwhile, was not-so-gently pushing against Randall’s shoulder until they were facing each other head on.

“Oh, and Jack?” Jamie could see her nails digging into Randall’s robes even as she smiled at him, dangerously sweet just like the tone of her voice.

“If I ever hear about you picking fights, injuring other students, and sending them to detention without a second thought—” Her pretense dropped, as did her curve of her lips. “—I’m sure Jamie, his friend Hugh and I will have plenty of interesting things to say to Headmistress McGonagall.”

Randall sniffed, his lips tightening together as Claire’s smirk returned.

“A pleasure as always.” She patted his robes, neatly sweeping him aside as she marched off.

Jamie, unable to hold his own smirk back, nodded in greeting with little more than a curt “Randall” before following Claire out the door.

He waited until they turned into a far enough corridor to break.

“Jesus, lass, that was incredible!” he said, grinning even wider when he saw her cheeks flush again. “Guess I have to thank ye for saving my hide twice today.”

“No, I have to thank you,” she said, shaking her head. “I’ve been waiting for a good reason to put that git in his place for ages.”

“Well, happy to oblige ye then.”

The two laughed, letting the sound echo through the halls, hoping that it would somehow make its way back to Randall.

“Well,” Claire said finally, “let’s get you to Madame Pomfrey’s, shall we?” She gave his arm a nudge.

“Och, ye dinna have to go out of yer way, lass.” He shrugged. “I ken where it is.”

He was loathe to leave her though, and just maybe – possibly, hopefully – she felt the same.

“Well, yes but…” He tilted his head at her as she paused, weighing some invisible scale in her mind before heaving a great sigh.

“I suppose I should probably return this,” she mumbled, reaching deep into her robe’s pocket and procuring none other than one large bottle of Skele-gro.

Jamie’s barking laughter most assuredly made it back to Randall, wherever he was.

“Ye truly are a wonder, Beauchamp.” He ran his hand through his hair.

“Tell no one about this, Fraser, or I’ll just as easily un-fix that arm of yours,” she said, only half-joking.

“Do ye mind letting Madame Pomfrey heal me properly before ye set her off in a rage?”

“Fair’s fair.” She returned his grin, sliding the bottle back into her pocket.

“Verra well, Beauchamp, shall we?”

He offered his good arm to her and she, with a smile impossibly wider than his, looped hers through without a second thought.

[recentanimenews]

Bookshelf Briefs 12/17/20

Chainsaw Man, Vol. 1 | By Tatsuki Fujimoto | Viz Media – It’s a little hard to live up to the hype that this title has gotten on social media, and I admit this first volume did not wow me as much as I’d expect. It seems to run on gonzo and gore, and (from what I’ve heard) gets better as it goes along. That leaves us with this volume, where a young man trying to pay off his father’s debt gets nearly brutally murdered, only to fuse with a chainsaw dog, making him the titular character. He’s taken in by an agency whose head seems so deeply, deeply suspicious I’ll be very surprised if she turns out not to be evil. It’s OK, though, because it means he might one day squeeze her chest! I might have liked this better in a different year, but I will give it another shot with volume two. – Sean Gaffney

The Invincible Reincarnated Ponkotsu, Vol. 1 | By Reona Umitsuki | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – This may be one of the dumbest manga I’ve read since the halcyon days of Sasameke. That said, it’s not trying to be anything else—ponkotsu means “airhead,” but apparently not the same way a tennen is. Our protagonists get reincarnated into heroes. Sanae has absolute brute strength, but only when used by accident. Shota has supposed high defense, but he keeps ending up near death anyway. And Kana can heal Shota (because she has a crush on him)… but only with her boobs. It’s deliberately over-the-top and silly, and sometimes I did crack a smile, but mostly I just sighed, especially towards the end when it briefly tried to be serious. For hardcore ponkotsus only. – Sean Gaffney

Komi Can’t Communicate, Vol. 10 | By Tomohito Oda | Viz Media – I was running behind when I reviewed volume nine, so I got to read volume ten straight away. And it’s a big sea change—there’s a new year and new classes, and most of Komi’s friends are not in her new class. Fortunately, Tadano is, so she’s not completely alone. (Also fortunately, this means Yamai is now elsewhere, though we see her once or twice.) In their place we get Rumiko Manbagi, who is a hardcore gyaru with tons and tons of makeup, who is also suffering from her friends now being in another class. The makeup doesn’t last, but she and Komi bond more than any other friend Komi’s had except for Tadano. Speaking of Tadano, Manbaki is acting awfully tsundere with him. A great addition to the Komi cast. – Sean Gaffney

Mujirushi: The Sign of Dreams | By Naoki Urasawa | Viz Media – I primarily picked up Mujirushi for two reasons: (1) Urasawa is one of those creators whose manga I will always try and (2) the volume is part of the “Louvre Collection,” a series of comics commissioned by the Louvre highlighting the museum and its art. Considering these two things, as well as the somewhat ominous cover image, I really was not expecting Mujirushi to be as much of a comedy as it is. (I also wasn’t expecting masks reminiscent of President Trump’s face to come into play multiple times.) In addition to the Louvre, Mujirushi is also inspired by Fujio Akatsuka’s Osomatsu-kun. In particular, Iyami, a character from that franchise, is pivotal to Urasawa’s story. The real star of the show for me, though, is the whip-smart Kasumi on the cover. Mujirushi is an entertainingly absurd caper, featuring an art heist which is certainly not to be taken too seriously. – Ash Brown

Practice Makes Perfect, Vol. 2 | By Ui Hanamiya | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – There’s a sweet romance going on here, as our two protagonists realize that they’re not really content with this just being practice after all, and I enjoyed the big press conference at the end of the book after they’re found out, where both admit—on air—to being virgins. I read this title more for the hilarious aspects of treating sex as another Olympic sport like volleyball or judo. The two shouting at each other about training harder is great, but I think the top moment of the title was when (pardon me, it is a mature manga) Takaya tries to get advice on how to use his fingers to pleasure Nohara, and whines “they’re going to cramp up!” Still better than I expected. – Sean Gaffney

Shikimori’s Not Just a Cutie, Vol. 1 | By Keigo Maki | Kodansha Comics – This did not really go in the direction I expected. Shikimori is indeed cute, and does show off that side of her to her boyfriend. Sadly, he has bad luck and is pretty weak, so essentially needs saving constantly, which inevitably makes her more cool than cute. Of course, he loves that too, but Shikimori is a fragile young woman, and would much rather be cute. There’s no real ‘are we going to break up’ dangers here, and indeed they start the book already together. The reason to read this is Shikimori’s embarrassed blushes and cool poses, which is exactly the same reason that her boyfriend loves her. It’s not the best romantic comedy in the world, but it’s pretty damn cute. I mean cool. – Sean Gaffney

Spy x Family, Vol. 3 | By Tatsuya Endo | Viz Media – There is so much wonderful comedy in this series. Yuri’s huge sister complex, Anya and the dodgeball game (complete with Bazooka Bill!), and everything about the “extra chapter,” where Yor gets shot in the ass during an assassination and has to endure the pain with a massive frown on her face. But there’s also a lot of heartwarming family stuff here as well—Yor doubting her skills as a wife, Anya getting upset whenever Lloyd and Yor aren’t getting along, even that same extra chapter, which is very funny but also has Anya tell an enemy agent to hang it up and go keep his girlfriend happy instead. It’s that balance that makes this one of the breakout hits of the last two years. – Sean Gaffney

UQ Holder, Vol. 20 | By Ken Akamatsu | Kodansha Comics – There’s a lot going on here—flashbacks (or is it flashforwards?), training arcs, lots of big old battles, and, for once, surprisingly minimal perverse antics. (Akamatsu is in shonen fight mode rather than harem nudity mode.) The general question we see in this book… and really the entire series… is “is being immortal a good thing?” Especially if it comes at the expense of a great deal of the solar system. Touta continues to show off how much he’s not like Negi—unfortunately, that makes him far more normal, and there’s less to distinguish him from other idiot heroes. I still enjoy reading UQ Holder, but, as with all of Akamatsu’s series, it feels like it should have ended a while earlier and is coasting a bit. – Sean Gaffney

By: Ash Brown

[murasaki-murasame]

Thoughts on Tokyo Ghoul :Re Season 1

I just finished rewatching this, so I figured now was a good time to make a big post about it, especially because of how the manga also recently ended and so it’s a lot easier to look back on the story as a complete product.

As someone that’s already read the manga, it’s basically impossible to discuss this season without taking about the entirety of :re, so this is gonna have some casual spoilers for later stuff. It’s also mostly just gonna be me talking about how the anime feels as an adaptation, because of that.

My non-spoilery TL;DR is that I think this was an imperfect but surprisingly great adaptation of a very flawed manga, and I honestly think I prefer it to the manga already. If season 2 can go anywhere near as well as I hope it will, at least now that we have confirmation it’ll cover the rest of :re, I would probably just suggest people watch the anime instead of reading the manga. It’s a shame that the anime side of the franchise doesn’t quite stand on it’s own because of how Root A went, but that’s not super relevant to the :Re anime.

Anyway, more detailed and spoiler-y thoughts under the cut, including some more of my speculation for season 2. [As a fair warning, this got really long, and there’s a fair bit at the end that could be taken as being anti-Tou//ken, even though I don’t mean anything malicious or ship hate-y by it]

It’s interesting to look back at this season of the anime, after having read the ending of the manga, and after having seen how disappointed people were with pretty much the entire second half of :re. People complain about the anime in general cutting out ‘important narrative details’, mainly to do with backstories and worldbuilding, but I feel like those things ended up being a double-edged sword in the manga that ultimately got people’s hopes up, and made them more annoyed at the ending than they should have been.

For instance, the anime didn’t go into Saiko’s backstory, and they didn’t show the fact that Shirazu’s father had killed himself, but it’s not like those things came up again [aside from Saiko’s family being mentioned in an off-hand bit of exposition in the finale], so I can’t exactly say that it took away from the story in any meaningful way.

In general, I feel like anime-only people would mostly just be confused as to why the manga side of the fandom developed such increasingly complicated theories about certain things, and why it disappointed them so much when, for example, Uta ended up just being some regular quirky dude and nothing more. Which I think says a lot about how it’s probably a good thing in the end that the anime glosses over the sorts of details that got people making theories as they read the manga.

The part of the manga that this season covers is definitely the most well-written part of :Re, but overall the series is a bit of a bloated mess, so I’m glad that the anime ended up being almost like a second draft of a novel, that just trims things down to a more reasonable size and pace. The effect should be a lot more apparent in season 2, though, since they’ll probably start cutting out entire story arcs, whereas with season 1 it was mostly just a matter of them shortening scenes a bit and being less repetitive in general with their storytelling.

There’s definitely some small parts where I think they cut a bit more than they should have, though, like how much they heavily gloss over Matsuri’s backstory and reason for being at the CCG, and then the whole Rose investigation. It’s not a huge deal though, since the audience can still basically understand what’s going on. It’s also made a bit better by the fact that those writing issues pop up during the part of the show that was best overall, so it’s easy to just focus on the good parts.

Other than that, I really had no issues with them cutting out story material. For the most part, as I said before, it was just a matter of the anime being less repetitive, and in general it came across like it didn’t need to spell certain things out to the audience as much as the manga did.

One of the more important elements that were cut was how they removed a lot of Akira’s warmer moments with Haise, and in general the whole framing of her being a mother figure to him. But honestly, after sitting on it for a while, I think I prefer it to how she was portrayed in the manga. It feels more in line with her characterization in the first series, and I think it just makes more sense and is more interesting for her to basically hold him at arm’s length most of the time. It’s also just a bit sad how, in the manga, she acted as a mother figure toward him because she was ordered to in order to manipulate him. On a more subjective and broad note, I think the manga slowly got more and more off-putting with how it handled familial or psuedo-familial relationships, in a sort of . . . Freudian way, almost. The stuff with Haise and Akira was a pretty minor example of it, but it ended up being part of a larger whole, so I’m not exactly upset that they just cut that little bit out.

I also think it gave it a bit more weight later on, when she awkwardly tried to comfort him during episode 10. Since it was the most overt act of affection that she’d displayed toward him until that point, and because it had so many conflicted emotions behind it. And in general, they kept her warm attitude toward him during episode 7, so that was nice.

While I remember, I should say that the whole house party scene in episode 7 was a great example of the anime editing down the manga into something more concise and less overwhelming. Changing it so that it was just about Haise, the Qs, Arima, and Akira, made it feel a lot more cozy. It was a little overwhelming to have like twice the amount of characters involved in that scene in the manga.

Anyway, back onto the topic of cut/condensed material, the other more blatant parts are how they gloss over some of the details of the Torso and Nutcracker investigations, which I think was fine. The manga mostly just dropped that police procedural-y tone pretty quickly, so it just feels a bit more consistent with the story’s overall tone, for them to not worry so much about the details, and to focus more on the action. And for episode one in particular, they didn’t really have much choice in terms of how to adapt it, since the end of chapter six was the first good stopping point they had. Anything before that would have made the first episode feel insubstantial, like it was lacking a meaningful hook. So I think they did the best with what they had. I appreciate that they took the chance to actively change how the Torso arc was structured and paced in order to make it fit more reasonably into one episode, instead of being slavishly 1:1 with how the manga did it.

One of the big changes that happened early on which I think got people off onto the wrong foot with the anime, so to say, was the whole taxi scene with Mutsuki and Torso in episode one. Hoo boy, that one sure caused a lot of complaints from people. Personally, I thought it was fantastic. Overall, it feels like the anime treated Mutsuki with more respect and dignity than the manga ever did. Which is one of the big reasons why I disagree with the idea that the anime ‘lacks heart’. In a sense, I feel like it reflects the strict love of an editor, rather than the obsessive love of a fan. But for this in particular, it really does just feel like the people writing the anime care more about Mutsuki than Ishida does, to be honest.

They actually kept like 99% of the content related to Mutsuki and Torso, but just reframed things slightly to be less in-your-face and shock-value-y about it all. The anime already explains how Torso exclusively preys upon ‘women with bodily scars’, and shows him being very specifically obsessed with Mutsuki’s body later on, so really they had no need to actually show Torso ripping open Mutsuki’s shirt and exposing his binder and whatnot. I’ve seen a lot of people accuse the anime of being too blunt with it’s writing, but it’s moments like that which feel like they respect the reader’s intelligence and their ability to put two and two together than the manga did.

Similarly, they kept the part where Mutsuki has social anxiety in the night-club because of people staring at him, but they just left it at that. Which was fine. And during the auction raid, they very bluntly make it clear that he ate parts of those dead investigators to heal himself, and just presented it as a pragmatic choice on his part, whereas I’m pretty sure the manga was less clear about it, and eventually tried to frame it as a ‘big shocking twist’ later on that was meant to play into the whole emerging theme of him being a crazy serial killer or whatever. Yet again, another way in which the anime treats him with more dignity, and isn’t just trying to manufacture forced shock value to surprise the audience.

On the note of the auction raid, it’s kinda amusing to me how that was the part of the story that was probably the most faithful to the manga, and cut barely anything out, but I think we can all agree that it was the worst part of it. To me, it mostly just suffered from the inherent flaws of the source material. The manga could at least somewhat coast by on flashy art and fight scenes, but the general opinion from manga fans has always been that the auction raid was a pretty messy and kinda uninteresting arc. It has good moments in it, but for the most part there’s just not a lot of emotional weight behind the fights, and to be quite honest, Takizawa in this arc is one of the more overtly edgy and over the top parts of the entire series. As a whole he’s a really good character, but man, that first impression of him being a minor character who comes back as a crazy half-ghoul with white hair and scary eyes, and who starts eating people and rambling about fruit sure is, uh . . . something, alright. If anything, the anime’s more subdued art made him come across as being less ‘overwhelming’ and over the top, which was nice.

Although they were just minor cuts to a few lines of dialogue, the auction raid did cut a few things though, which I also think were for the best. During the Mutsuki-Urie hug scene, Urie’s sentence just gets cut off as ‘you’re a . . . ‘, which is honestly way less clunky than the ‘you’re a wo(man)’ way it was phrased in the manga. On the one hand, it’s a very overt indication of how Urie still views him as a man even after figuring out about his biological sex, but on the other hand it’s so awkward and clunky in it’s delivery that most people didn’t even take it that way in the first place. I think it was just fine how it was in the anime, although I do sorta wish that during episode seven they could have included the detail of Urie continuing to refer to him with male pronouns even in his internal monologue, but oh well.

Similarly, during the scene where Suzuya kills Big Madam, the anime just had him say ‘Farewell’ instead of adding ‘Dad’ onto the end. To be blunt, I have no idea what the fuck Ishida was thinking when he wrote that line in the manga, and it’s stuff like this which is why he comes across as having Really Weird hang-ups about LGBT people. That line in particular in the manga was basically just an act of deadnaming, in essence, since Big Madam is obviously a trans-woman who clearly presents and identifies as female. So yeah, cutting that part of the line out in the anime was entirely for the best.

Some people complained about the use of Unravel during the Takizawa fight as being kinda nostalgia bait-y, which I get, but I think it was fine. It was surprisingly fitting, since that whole scene focused so much on Haise grappling with the identity of Kaneki that lives within him. I’m mostly just glad that they didn’t try and use it a second time, since that would have been a bit much.

Though the auction raid was a bit dull overall, thankfully episodes seven through ten were fantastic, and overall the peak of season 1. I really appreciated that they took the time to spread the material from volume four across three episodes. The anime’s definitely at it’s best when it focuses on character interactions/development, and that part of the story had a whole lot of that. Even though I think that for the most part this season was better than it’s respective part of the manga, these episodes in particular were just great. With the rest of the anime, you could definitely say that the manga’s fight scenes are superior, but when the story isn’t focusing on fights, the anime just feels fundamentally better. Episode seven in particular was very nicely structured, and felt a fair bit more fleshed out and cohesive than it did in the manga. I already talked about how the house party was way better than in the manga, but I also preferred how they handled the scene at the cafe, though I’ll wait to talk in detail about the scenes involving Touka and Kaneki until later, since I have a lot to say about that.

Oh, and the visual changes they made for the ED in episode seven were great, and got me kinda emotional, given that I know where things end up, lol. I’m really happy they inserted that one panel of Kaneki and Arima walking together during it, in particular. It really sets up the emotional weight that comes to fruition during the Black Reaper arc.

Although I still think episodes seven to ten were the best part of season 1, as I said above they do also have some of the more unnecessary story cuts. It’s just really easy to not care much for that when it’s surrounded by so much good material.

The final two episodes weren’t quite as great, since they were so action-heavy, but they were still really good, and I think I enjoyed them slightly more the second time around. Episode eleven in particular really nailed all of the emotions surrounding Tsukiyama and his servants. But it was in these episodes in particular that I also really noticed how the anime is a lot more gore-y and explicit than I expected it to be. It’s kinda surprising how often they just outright show characters getting stabbed through their stomachs, and so on. There’s also a lot of limbs being cut off in that whole arc in general, and even though they silhouette Kijima when he gets chainsawed, there’s at least one cut that just outright shows him with the chainsaw sticking into his head with no real censorship.

In general the only real censorship in this season was how some stuff like Hairu’s decapitation was strategically placed out of frame, and also that one scene where Yuma’s tongue was pixelated. But that’s about it. There’s certainly nothing like what we got in the first season of the anime, where obnoxious shadows and black bars got put over the screen during action scenes, or the colour scheme got all weird to try and obscure the gore, or whatever.

A lot of people disliked the overall pacing of the finale, but I thought it was great. It’s easy to unfairly compare it to the previous season finales we had in the anime, but those were largely the products of Morita’s directorial vision, and how much he heavily fleshed out the source material. This was just a more straight-forward adaptation of how these chapters played out in the manga, so it feels kinda mean to bash it for not being as interesting as some of the previous season finales. Though even then, I kinda prefer how certain things were done visually in the anime. Like how heavily they used the checkerboard room thing during Haise’s dream sequence, how they fleshed out the child abuse memory scene to be more than just a single static panel, and in general how they portrayed Haise’s memories of the ‘underground garden’. That place always looked nice in the manga, but I really like how the anime portrayed it. It might seem jarring to some people that it was so bright, but I think it worked really well. For one thing it makes sense for it to be a well-lit area, and it has an interesting contrast against the violence that goes down there. The haziness of it all, and some of the visual effects, also made it more apparent in a neat way that the flowers were a hallucination of his, and not actually real.

I also thought that the scenes with Kaneki after he regains his memories were very well-done. I think some people misinterpreted him as being more hot-headed and angry than he actually was, since I remember there being some complaints about how blunt and monotone he was. It seemed perfectly fitting to me.

Eto’s voice-acting in general was also pretty damn superb, and really added to the experience. She was clearly having the time of her life with that one.

I liked that they waited until the finale to show Eto’s kagune talking. It gave it a bit more impact when it finally happened.

I honestly don’t really have much to say about Karren’s part in it all, but I think it was done pretty well. In general, the anime cut out a lot of her more repetitive scenes that just hammered in things we already knew, so that was good. I also liked how they were a lot less blunt and on the nose with how they revealed that she’s a woman. I still can’t help but roll my eyes at that one panel where Ishida basically goes ‘hey isn’t it such a neat coincidence that the kanji used for Kanae’s name looks like a female symbol :^)’. In general, her whole story arc is mostly just a kinda old-fashioned Mulan sort of arc, but it’s executed pretty well.

Oh, and the anime handled the scenes of her being tortured by Eto incredibly well. The garish purples and reds mixed with the oppressive clock noises were a really nice touch that made those scenes even creepier than they already were.

Before I forget, I should mention that, in a similar way as how I felt about Akira’s character in the anime, I quite liked how they handled Hairu. I get why people were disappointed by her, but I enjoyed the way that they toned down her airhead nature, and how they only really showed how she idolized Arima right before she died. In a way, it just made her seem more professional and self-motivated.

Now that the manga’s over and I’ve had time to look back at it as a whole, and to think about how season 2 will adapt it all, it’s been really interesting to see exactly what the anime kept versus what it cut, and how they reflects upon how they’ll probably handle the next season.

Firstly, they kept pretty much everything that sets up the Black Reaper arc, to the point of even ending the season off with a teaser preview of the big Kaneki-Arima fight. But they also kept details like Shirazu’s corpse being stolen, Okahira getting killed, Hinami getting taken into custody, Akira finding out that Takizawa’s alive, Amon getting teased at heavily, Scarecrow being shown in the auction raid [and even in the OP], Torso becoming obsessed with Mutsuki, etc etc. So it seems pretty clear to me that they won’t really cut much of anything out of that arc when the next season comes around.

One thing they cut, which I haven’t even seen many people comment on since it was pretty subtle, was the detail of Kaneki’s rapid aging and how it affected stuff like his vision and regeneration. The anime never showed Haise wearing his glasses [at least from what I remember], didn’t show him having headaches, and during the finale we didn’t see his weird kagune hand thing. So I think they’re just completely removing that whole detail from the story, which I’m fine with. But it does have some interesting implications for how season 2 will go. Overall, it was a pretty irrelevant plot point that ended up getting hastily resolved anyway, but in practice, it was mostly just relevant to add some more tension to the Goat arc by making it look like Kaneki was at risk of dying, and it helped give a reason for him to become Dragon, since it ended up curing him.

I think the main implication of them cutting it from the anime is that it’d make it a LOT easier for them to just not bother having Kaneki become Dragon, since they wouldn’t need to bother with using it as a way to magically cure him. I’ve been thinking for a while now that it’d help streamline the story immensely if they just have Rize be the one to become Dragon in the first place, and this would help facilitate that.

As I’ve said, from season 1 it looks like they’re being more respectful with how they’re portraying Mutsuki, so I wouldn’t be surprised if season 2 is much kinder toward him than the manga was. They might even more or less cut out the whole subplot of him becoming an antagonist, which would be good since that was just a dumpster fire of bad writing that didn’t even go anywhere meaningful.

One interesting addition they made was explicitly showing Eto delivering the Hangman’s McGuffin book to Haise. That’s a REALLY interesting detail, since in the manga, we found out much later on that Hide was responsible for sending it. I don’t think this is a retcon or anything, though. I think this was how it went in the manga, too. I’ve talked before about how I think Hide had been working with Eto since around the end of the first series, and that for some reason or another Ishida was unable to get around to explaining that, and this makes it seem like the anime might be a lot more open about their connection. It makes a lot of sense to me that Eto would deliver the book on Hide’s behalf. It makes me very excited to see how Hide will be handled in the next season. With the manga, it really feels like Ishida had to scrap a lot of his plans for his character, and so when he finally came back into the story he felt like a bizarre tacked-on remnant of a previous draft, so it’d be great if the anime ends up handling him in the way that Ishida might have originally intended. And on the note of Eto’s involvement in it, I wonder if she might drop a hint to Kaneki about how she sent the book to him. That’d be neat.

They also added in a shot of a missing poster for Hide at the very start of the season, but that’s pretty minor. It at least helps immediately remind the audience that his official status as of that point is ‘missing’, not ‘dead’, though.

Oh, and judging by the scene we got of him during the auction raid, he seems to still have the same injuries as in the manga. I really liked how they just outright showed him having a wheezy, broken-up voice. But either way, it goes to show that they seem to definitely be keeping that detail from the manga. It makes me wonder how they’ll handle things later, especially with the part where Kaneki remembers having eaten him. I wonder if they’d keep it as-is, or try and integrate it into the way that the scene played out in Root A. Overall, it definitely seems like they’re pretty much ignoring the story changes made in Root A, but we’ll see. I hope they at least flesh that part out a bit, since I still feel like the flashback we got to it in the manga just raised more questions than it answered.

It’s pretty difficult to judge the anime as it’s own thing since I’ve already read the manga, but I still think it did a really good job with getting across the emotional thrust of the story, and the character arcs, and whatnot. The Qs in particular were handled fantastically. I got the impression that anime-only people actually liked them, particularly Urie and Mutsuki, slightly more than manga readers did by this point. Probably because they heavily cut down upon the quantity of Urie’s more shitty bits of dialogue, and because they were less overtly weird and obnoxious with how they framed Mutsuki. I distinctly remember that the Mtusuki Discourse [tm] was already a thing by this point in the manga, but nobody watching the anime has any real reason to be all weird about him. So that’s been nice to see. 

Haise’s character arc was also handled really well. It really reminded me of how his whole arc was by far one of the best parts of the manga. At least in terms of :re. It’s just a really effective, tragic arc about how he’s stuck living in and clinging onto this fake life, and slowly being chipped away at and replaced by somebody that he effectively doesn’t know. Seeing him be a happy dad taking care of his surrogate found family of misfits is still endearing no matter how many times I read or watch it, and it hurts just as much to see him get ‘replaced’ by Kaneki and immediately abandon the Qs.

Tsukiyama’s part in the anime was also great in general, and also reflected the strengths of the manga. It’s pretty insane how much more interesting of a character he is in this part of :re than basically anywhere else in the franchise. It really helps that they spend like half of the season with his whole story arc being in the spotlight. They really did him justice.

Before I forget, I also wanna say that, even though the animation wasn’t much to talk about [but also wasn’t anywhere near as bad as some recent production disasters I’ve seen], the art itself, especially in terms of character designs and backgrounds, were consistently fantastic. In general, ‘consistent’ is definitely the word I’d use to describe the overall art direction of the anime. On the other hand, the manga is a lot more uneven in terms of it’s art quality, varying from hyper-detailed fight scenes or individual expressions to silly chibi reaction faces or some really sketchy fight scenes, and so on. The anime smooths things out to a nice, consistent mid-ground, which I appreciated. The manga has always been a bit too bombastic and over the top at times, especially with how it handles action scenes, so I kinda prefer how the anime handles it, even if can come across as being more boring.

I also kinda feel like it took Ishida a little while to nail exactly how to draw a lot of the new characters in :re, so them having consistent, clean designs from the start was pretty nice. Similarly, I get why people were annoyed at how the anime slightly changed Touka’s hair-style, but it just makes it more consistent with the rest of the series. In the manga, she ends up going back to her original hair-style and hair colour anyway, so it makes perfect sense to just have her design be consistent from start to finish, rather than making her hair blue and fluffy for a while and then going back to how it used to be. And judging by the s2 key visual, it looks like they might just keep this design for her for basically all of s2 as well, instead of literally just going back to exactly how she styled her hair in the first series. So I’d also appreciate that.

And on that note, I should finally get around to discussing my thoughts on how Touka was handled in general in this season, and her whole connection to Kaneki in particular. To put it simply, I had absolutely no issues with it. I really loved how she was handled in this season, and I think it has interesting implications for how she’ll be handled in season 2, but at the same time I get why some people have frustrations with it.

To start off with probably the most minor thing, they cut out the scene where she was visiting the hospital, although they still showed her flower basket being left on Shinohara’s bedside table. I’m fine with this change, since it felt like such a long-running mystery in the manga that I couldn’t help but feel disappointed when we found out about what was actually going on. And also, since they stilled showed her flowers there, it’s entirely possible that they’ll touch upon it sometime during season 2, and possibly have a flashback or something to reveal that she was the one sending them. So ultimately it might not even be cut at all, just handled slightly differently.

Just to cut right to the chase, it sounds like some people are annoyed that the anime cut out/toned down upon the romantic set-up between her and Kaneki, but that’s actually a big part of why I liked it, haha. Though they didn’t even technically cut much, if only because they barely have any scenes together in this arc of the manga to begin with. But they did cut stuff like that scene where Kaneki wonders to himself if she’s out on a date, and they cut the part where she talks to Tsukiyama about how the :re cafe is a place for Kaneki to return to if he wants to in the future.

I get why that bugs people. I’ve seen a few people complain that because of those sorts of cuts, it’d seem forced and out of nowhere when they get together in season 2. But, well, what if that’s the point? What if they’re NOT going to have them get together in season 2? I haven’t seen anyone really talk about this possibility, understandably, but I think it explains the choices they made with handling Touka as a character in this season.

The biggest point worth considering is the insert song they made for the cafe scene in episode 2, where Haise and Touka meet again for the first time since the original series ended. The soundtrack composer put out an official AMV for it on Youtube that uses that full version of the song. It’s a really wonderfully made AMV, and a very pretty song, so everyone should check it out. Put simply, it’s a song about the bittersweet process of letting go of an old crush, and moving on with your life, even after you have a random chance encounter with that person later down the track.

The lyrics are pretty blunt and unambiguous about it. The chorus is about how Touka kept dreaming that Kaneki would return to her side as if he’d never left her, but the song starts out with ‘I’m waking from this dream. Returning to reality is so bittersweet. I open my eyes, and the illusion is fading, slipping away’, and ends with ‘Although I’ve found you, I know this meeting will not last. I have to let go. Continue finding your own way, though I will miss you. It’s time to wake from this dream’. Especially since :Re already uses the motif of ‘waking from a dream’ to describe how Haise eventually has to give way to Kaneki, it seems very noteworthy that they so overtly used the same motif to describe how Touka wanted Kaneki to return to her, but slowly she comes to terms with the need to let go of that dream. They even play those last few lines during the scene in episode 2 itself, just to make it even more clear what it’s referring to.

So yeah, I feel like that whole insert song helps make it clear that the writing changes made with Touka might just be rooted in the possibility of the anime committing to this idea of her moving on from Kaneki. It’d certainly explain why they cut out the scene where she says that the cafe is a place for him to return to, if she’s already resolved to let him live his own life, while she lives hers. It’s worth noting that, even though it’s technically about the same as it was in the manga, these writing changes put a different sort of twist on what Touka says to Uta in episode seven about how, in response to him asking if she plans to just wait for Kaneki to return, she says ‘I’m going to continue doing what I’ve already decided on’. In the overall context of the anime’s writing, it mostly comes across as her talking about how she’s not just waiting for Kaneki to return to her, but has chosen to move on from him. It’s worth noting that one thing the anime did change about that scene was that they had Haise visiting the cafe and getting served by Touka, shortly before she talks to Uta. The way that we see her, for a second time, treating Haise as just a regular customer, also helps emphasize the overall point.

On the note of Haise’s involvement in that scene, it’s also interesting to me how in episode seven in general they added some original scenes with him that went a long way to emphasize the idea of him being nostalgic toward Anteiku as a whole, more than anything else. He doesn’t even seem to have much of a reaction to Touka the second time around, and as I said above, they cut out the part where he wonders if she’s out on a date, so it comes across a fair bit less like he has a crush on her. And while I remember, I should say that the original scene with Haise remembering Anteiku but not knowing what it really is was incredibly good. 

And in terms of the scene between them from episode 2, I still just think overall that it was way better than the manga version of the scene was. It was so good and emotional. In particular I love how the anime really highlighted Touka’s shock upon seeing him again, and the way that she quickly adjusts herself and just treats him as a regular customer. It’s really effective, especially in conjunction with the insert song playing in the background. Haise’s line about how she looked sad, and at a loss, also has even more weight to it if she was resolving in that moment to finally let go of him for good.

So yeah, I honestly think that the anime might just not have them end up together at all. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have them hook up anyway, to be faithful to the manga, but it does feel like the only real explanation for why they’d make all those subtle but important changes to how they wrote her parts in season 1.

To begin with, I still think that even if they did include their whole romance in season 2, they wouldn’t really have the room to include ALL of the stuff between them from the manga. For one thing, I doubt they’d be able to animate the sex scene because of broadcast regulations and whatnot, and since I feel like the whole 24th Ward arc is one of the first things they might cut in order to fit the rest of the manga into twelve episodes, it might be difficult to include their wedding, or Touka’s whole pregnancy drama. And if they avoid having Kaneki become Dragon, they wouldn’t need to use his wedding ring as a plot device to have everyone find and rescue him. Plus, in general, even if they did include stuff like the sex scene, it’d probably have to happen in the same episode as when Kaneki starts living at the cafe, or the episode directly after it, which would probably feel a bit rushed.

Though even then, it would be possible for them to just imply that they hook up after the anime ends, or for them to just have them have sex off-screen and basically leave it at that until the epilogue. So it seems particularly interesting to me that it seems like the anime might be outright moving away from the idea of them hooking up at all, rather than just having it be that the anime doesn’t show as much of their relationship.

To be blunt, I feel like the only real reason why they’d actively shut down the idea of them getting together at all, rather than just reducing the time spent on their relationship, would be if the anime plans to have Kaneki end up dating a different person instead, in which case it’d obviously make sense for the anime to cut the romantic ties between him and Touka as neatly as possible. At the very least, I think we can all agree that they’re not just gonna have Kaneki be single in the anime forever. That’d just piss off everyone for no good reason, lol.

Basically what I’m saying is that the anime might have Kaneki end up dating Hide instead of Touka. At the very least, he’s Kaneki’s only other real romance option at that point in the story, so it’s either him, Touka, or nobody. But I think it’d make a lot of sense for Kaneki to end up dating Hide. We know for a fact in the manga that Hide is in love with him, and going by stuff like the whole Hide hallucination scene in the Cochlea arc, or him talking to Touka about how his desire to be with Hide again is paralyzing, it’s not exactly hard to believe that Kaneki could have feelings for him as well. It’d barely require any real changes or additions to the story to make it work. Just have Hide directly confess his feelings to Kaneki rather than having him awkwardly tell Amon about them. And unlike with Kaneki and Touka, there’d be no real expectation for them to include a whole sex scene or marriage scene or pregnancy plot-line with Kaneki and Hide, so they could easily get by with just leaving their relationship off at a mutual confession/kiss scene, until we see them together in the epilogue. And given that Hide already narrated the whole epilogue chapter of the manga, it’d be pretty natural and easy to have it end in the anime with him going out on a date with Kaneki or something.

I don’t want to get too, like, conspiracy theorist-y about this, but part of me still wonders if one of the reasons why it felt like Ishida handled Hide so poorly in the manga’s final arcs was because he might have originally planned to have Kaneki end up dating Hide. It’d certainly be a good explanation for why things got so out of whack with him, and Hide ended up feeling so out of place and unnecessary in the manga. It’d also explain why we conveniently only learn about Hide’s feelings for Kaneki when he talks about it to Amon, and why the intensity of Kaneki’s feelings toward Hide seemingly got thrown out the window when they actually got to reunite.

Either way, I don’t mean any of this in a ship-hate sort of way. I have very . . . complicated feelings about how Ishida handled Kaneki’s relationship with Touka in the manga, but these are just the observations I have about how the anime seems to be handling it, and what it might be setting up for season 2.

Anyway, that went on for way too long, lol. To sum it all up, I thought that season 1 was surprisingly good, in spite of it’s flaws. I honestly had very low hopes for it before it aired, since it seemed impossible to adapt properly, but I ended up being very surprised by how it went, and I’m very excited to see how season 2 wraps it all up. I was apprehensive about season 2 when it was first announced, but the more I thought about it, the more clear it became that with some strict and careful editing, it could easily adapt the meaningful parts of the rest of the story into 12 more episodes. Either way, if it goes well in the end, I might even end up buying both seasons on BD when Funimation eventually releases them.

[hawk-in-a-jazzy-hat]

Anime Review: Eureka Seven, and Why Anime was Better in the Olden Days

In a constantly shifting world, people are clinging to life as best they can, despite tectonic shifts and mysterious Desperation Disease making life hard. Still, the people cling to hope in this weird world; hope for the military, for the rebel group Gekko-State, and hope brought about by the hero of the people, Adroc Thurston. Hope that the world will someday be healed.

So we meet Adroc’s son, Renton Thurston, who lives with his mechanic grandfather and dreams of a life where he can freely lift through the sky. Then his life changes as a giant robot crashes through his roof, and he meets a mysterious young girl named Eureka, as well as the Gekko-State leader himself, Holland. Given a powerful device called the Amita Drive by his grandfather, which is able to power a famous robot known as the Nirvash, or Type/Zero, Renton rushes off in pursuit of Eureka, and a new life aboard the Gekko-State. But ominous rumblings are brewing in the military and the very core of the world itself, and the carefree life that Renton thought he was getting into may just be the greatest test he’s ever faced...

Oh yeah, I’m going there. And I’m finally gonna explain why.

The golden age of anime, or of media in general, is an incredibly subjective thing. It depends on your tastes, the things you grew up with, and the things thrust at you as you stumble through life. As such, I cannot in any way say “anime was better at this time that it has ever been since”, because that’s just my opinion. And I would always respect otherwise. But still, for me, film, music and anime were all better in the olden days.

Of course, “the olden days” itself is relative. In my case the golden generation would be the one before me; say the mid-80s to the mid-90s for music and film. Anime is slightly more recent, given that the industry is actually slightly behind western animation on the timeline (so much so that the first ‘anime’ series, as it were, Astro Boy, was based off of classic Disney cartoons). That means the ‘golden age’ of anime for me actually spans from the late 90s to exactly 2007. And yes, as with everything, of course there was a load of crap that came out in that time period, and yes there have been better shows come out since (two of my favourite shows are from 2010 and 2011 respectively). But, in general, I feel anime was at its best during that period, for a few reasons.

So where does that leave Eureka Seven? It came out in 2006 as an original story from Bones, and is now considered one of the classic mech shows along with Evangelion and Gurren Lagann. So how exactly is it? And what is it that makes it so firmly a product of the golden age of anime?

Let’s start with the animation. The absolutely phenomenally awesome animation. Oh yeah, Studio Bones, baby. Immediately that puts this in the classic category; I know nowadays there are a tonne of awesome studios out there, both veterans and newcomers, but back in the day when you saw the Bones logo you knew that the show was going to look stunning. Wolf’s Rain, both FullMetal Alchemists, Soul Eater, Darker than Black, and even in the recent years they haven’t let up with shows like Blood Battlefront Blockade, My Hero Academia and Mob Psycho 100. For the longest time they were the epitamy of quality animation, and they don’t drop the ball here. Eureka Seven looks absolutely wonderful. The character animation is amazing and never devolves into emoticon slapstick, the backgrounds are wonderful, as are the colours, and the show has probably some of the best aerial battles I’ve ever seen. Eureka Seven has the unique style of having giant robots surfing through the sky, and whether or not it’s a silly concept, you can totally buy it with some of the most wonderful flying and falling moments I’ve ever seen. The only time Eureka Seven looks less than stellar is just on occasion, where they’re obviously holding back a little budget and some of the faces get a little squash-and-stretchy.  But honestly, it doesn’t matter one bit. Having every frame be perfect is nowhere near as important as having the truly important moments be special.

The animation truly is excellent, but honestly I was far more blown away by the score to this show. The composer was Naoki Satō, and honestly I’ve only heard his work once before in Assassination Classroom, although for the life of me I can’t really remember a single track. Here is a different story though, as the entire score to Eureka Seven just blew me away. From wonderfully emotional opening themes to bittersweet endings to great sweeping strings and horns to some actually epic trance and techno pieces; the whole score is full of standouts both long and short, and it’s probably the only anime soundtrack I’ve listened to in full while I’ve been working (aside from Baccano). The music belongs to the show, and it is the show. Without it, it wouldn’t be the same. I’ve heard some people say over the years that soundtracks aren’t really important, and there seems to be a rising case of that in many modern blockbusters. But as these old series, and heck, even older films can testify, the soundtrack is important. In fact, essential. Decisive Battle. Goodnight Julia. The friggin’ Team Rocket theme. And among films, The Raider’s March. He’s a Pirate. Binary Sunset. I don’t even need to have the music clips and you’re probably already humming them in your head. The music of your favourite things will stick with you until the very end of time. That is how important the soundtrack is. Again, anime was better in the olden days.

While I can’t lavish as much praise onto the dub as I can the music, I can say it grew on me an awful lot. This is, I believe, an early Bang Zoom! effort, a company who would later go on to do good work with Madoka and Kill la Kill. It still has the old dub flavours though, with a few very recognisable actors and a few actors who don’t really act very well? I don’t know; as older dubs go it’s not as fluently fitting as GTO but it’s nowhere near as flat as Elfen Lied or Soul Eater so it sort of balances out. And for the most part the actors do a great job; Johnny Young Bosch and Crispin Freeman perform really nicely as Renton and Holland respectively, as you’d expect; Kate Higgins is a standout as Talho, and while Stephanie Sheh as Eureka takes some time to get into the role, she’s definitely nailing it by the end. In fact most of the Gekko-State, the recurring villains and even a few one-off characters really nail the voices, with the exception of Woz’s actor, who always sounds like he’s questioning everything he says, and Ken-Goh’s VA in the second half of the series, Kyle Hebert. He isn’t terrible, but after the original actor Bob Papenbrook sadly passed away in 2007, the change is very noticeable.

If there is a problem with the dub it lies a little more with the script than the actors. While most of it is very well handled and feels natural, there are definitely a few monologue-y moments where the actors are clearly just standing on a soapbox. But still, as a dub it works well. Very well. And I’m not convinced that the monologue-y moments are really the fault of the ADR team, at least, not completely. But I’ll get to that a little bit later.

You may have been slightly confused with the plot synopsis, and all the weird and wonderful terms and things going on. This is understandable; this is not a simple series, with alien worlds, political and military turmoil, and a huge cast of characters. There is a lot of lore, and a lot of stuff going on in the background that even I couldn’t always follow. Much like Outlaw Star, this is a world of...well...worldbuilding. And yet despite not being simple, it is far from inaccessible. I’d even go so far as to see this would be a very good introductory series for anime newcomers; certainly a better introductory mecha series than either Evangelion or Gurren Lagann.

(Partly because it’s kinda not really a mecha series. I mean, it is, and the mechas are a very important part, but halfway through it sorta turns out to be Trigun in disguise, in more ways than one).

There’s a reason for this, and again it goes into why I prefer the older style of series; despite the fact that all this stuff is going on, the focus is constantly on the main characters. The central point of the series, for the whole 50 episodes, are the relationships aboard the Gekko-State. Romantic, platonic, and familial. Renton’s growing relationship with Eureka and Hollands strained relationship with Talho. And the characters interact with each other, and no interaction is the same. There’s no simple ‘oh I respect this guy and I’m utterly loyal to him’. There’s a lot of back talking, and a lot of abuse being flung around. There’s blood, there’re tears, and fights, and some of it can be downright unpleasant to watch. But guess what; that’s a family! Even when Renton is being at his most annoying-teenager, or Holland is at his most annoying-manchild, or heck, the three kids who are constantly annoying, it still feels natural. They are inherently relatable characters, even if we don’t always like them.

And that’s just the main four; the rest of the Gekko-State are wonderful to watch as well, and heck, even members of the military. Despite the fact that not all of them go through a character arc, even the less prominent ones like Woz and Joves still feel like real people. And I say that not all of them go through an arc, but there’s a lot of really sneaky development here across the board. The shouty military commander Jurgens spends the beginning as a shouty commander, but he reveals a few hidden depths later in the series. Moondoggie (yeah, I know, but just roll with the names) is constantly fighting against feelings of his own inadequacy. Stoner is trying to find his own way to fight, being very pacifistic. Ray and Charles, despite a limited screentime, still manage to be some of the best written characters in the cast. Even among the children, there is Maurice, whose story I found utterly heartbreaking, not just for the obvious reasons, but for the build-up throughout the series and how much the final...reveal...hit close to home. These are real people. We spend the series following real people making real decisions, and some of them are very bad decisions. They make mistakes, they scream and shout. Some of them never recover, whereas others must try to deal with the consequences. And occasionally...just occasionally...some of them find their redemption. And let me tell you, they may make for the most glorious scenes of the show.

That’s the thing. Not every character needs to go through a deep epiphany, or come out on top, or even have a real purpose in the story. You could easily write out half the members of Gekko-State, but the show would suffer greatly for it. In most modern shows of this kind, every character needs a purpose. They must have their moment in the spotlight, and their own character arc. But the thing is, we already have a story, that being, Renton and Eureka’s relationship. Some of the other characters will have stories tying into it, but this is their show. We are seeing things unravel through their eyes, and sometimes, the main character needs a constant they can lean on. That’s when you need the Winrys, the Meryl Stryfes, and the Gekko-States. Back in the day, characters were exactly that. Characters. Characters in their own right, whose paths would cross with those of the mains. Not constructs. As wonderfully crafted as shows like Hunter X Hunter and FMA Brotherhood can be, the side characters too often steal the focus away from where it needs to be. The show does not need to pull you out of the main character arc to show you another one; it should be able to just show you through the eyes of the main. I don’t need to know Shoot’s or Ikalgo’s or Ling’s motivations absolutely word-for-word; I should be able to work it out for myself.

And that’s the point (which I’ve finally gotten back round to); when I see a good modern anime, or a good modern film, or hear a good modern song, I see and hear something that is perfect. Something that has been crafted beautifully and exquisitely to be utterly flawless. And, as weird as it sounds...that’s not how art works. Art needs to have flaws; that is one of the fundamental aspects. You cannot have art that is objectively perfect, since part of the reason it exists as it does is the fact that it is subjective to the creator. It cannot be objectively perfect, therefore, it must have flaws. Every show, every film, every song out there has flaws. And that’s what makes things beautiful.

Eureka Seven has flaws. Oh boy, does it have flaws. Way too much technobabble and monologuing in parts. Some of the dialogue feels incredibly forced and preachy. Some really, really unpleasant scenes in places where even if it fits with the characters it’s just not nice to watch. The pacing can be very off, especially in parts where there are multiple things going on at once. Little things scattered throughout the series, and heck, I like it. There are people out there who are going to hate this show for the choices it makes.

But the flaws make Eureka Seven what it is, just as they do for every show. But more and more nowadays, I see films and shows that have to be utterly perfect in everything they do. The plot has to have the right timing and the right number of twists, and be split into nice neat little arcs. The characters need to have a distinct character arc that finishes in the correct place, and heaven forbid we let any characters make mistakes. Nothing is allowed to be their fault. As technically great as things such as Civil War or Frozen are, I hate the fact that there has to be a villain. There has to be somebody you can point at and say “I can support the good guys in everything because it’s all their fault.” Direction and music fit everything to a tee, to the point where the soundtrack can just be plucked from a massive backlog in order to fit the mood perfectly. In songs, it’s always the same beats, and the same chord structures, and the same computed synthetic backings, in order to show how the singer has such perfect control over their voice even though they’re not saying anything. And NOTHING is allowed to have flaws anymore. The moment a show goes into the very slightest of heavier material, suddenly it’s problematic and sending a bad message. The general public are far too critical of everything nowadays, constantly pointing out plot-holes and every single mistake a film makes, so much so that you fail to see the good. We live in a culture that will judge everything we see before we’ve even seen it, and we will praise the technically flawless as the very best without accepting that people could possibly, possibly like something else more. And believe me, I’m among them. I went through a period of being so critical that I was willing to criticise the technicals of a joke in a kid’s play. It’s not a good look, and it’s not a good feeling when you look back and realise that sometimes you just need to sit back and enjoy something for a change.

Does it go for everything nowadays? Of course it doesn’t, and of course not everything in the olden days was better. We’ve kept the good stuff and wisely decided to leave the crap behind. Even in anime. Too much studio meddling, too little effort going into the story or animation, often way too much filler, and sometimes so needlessly dark that you end up with a Berserk or an Elfen Lied.

And the very reason that so much modern anime is so technically great is that the industry is in a fantastic place. More series are being made every season, with a variety of lengths, new techniques and new studios. Just last year Studio Mappa made a massive hit with Yuri!! On Ice; a unique sports show that was funny, charming, had some gorgeous skating scenes and finally gave a great representation of a gay couple in an anime, in a mainstream hit. It had its issues with the animation and the ending (and I’ll admit, I haven’t seen the whole show so I can’t give my own opinion) but honestly that’s what made it such a hit. It’s going to stick, whether people love it, hate it, think it’s over or underrated or just think it’s meh.

And in every medium, that is the art that will stick. I can think of two areas which are better now than have ever been before. One is kids’ shows and films, which are finally being taken seriously as a legitimate art form and are having more effort put into them than ever before (Lego Movie, Zootopia, Gravity Falls, Steven Universe, Inside Out, and every Laika film, among many). The other is things that are entirely creator-driven, which was what made the classics what they were. More and more people have more freedom to create the thing they want to make. Over in the west, people like Guillermo del Toro, George Miller and Neil Gaiman, or again with the kids shows, people like Rebecca Sugar, Pendleton Ward, Daron Nefcy, Ben Bocquelet and Alex Hirsch. Netflix and Amazon are bringing more unique and wonderful shows and adaptations to more and more people. And in the anime world, there are creators like Gen Urobuchi, Kunihiko Ikuhara, Jun Maeda and ONE, as well as new and upcoming studios like Shuka, 3Hz and of course Studio Mappa. The talent is out there. The people who care are out there. And I have no doubt that in another few years we’re going to see a new renaissance of media as people like this – people like you and me - take the technology and the dedication we now have, sit down, and make the story they want to make. Flaws and all.

Anime was better in the olden days. Film was better in the olden days. Music was better in the olden days. Not because it had more talent or technique behind it, though we have sadly lost several geniuses over the past few years. It was better, because the people who made it cared. They didn’t care about it being perfect, or being good for people. The things that were good were so good because people picked up the camera, or the pen, or the instrument, and they wanted to make something. They wanted to make their very own piece of art, and nobody was going to stop them.

And we got Empire Strikes Back, and Blues Brothers, and Terminator 2, Labyrinth, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Ghostbusters, Lion King, Gremlins, Jurassic Park and Beetlejuice. We got Take On Me, Living On a Prayer, I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That), Heaven is a Place On Earth, Under Pressure, Tunnel of Love and Dry County. And we got Cowboy Bebop, FullMetal Alchemist, Wolf’s Rain, Gunslinger Girl, Baccano, Bokurano, Clannad, Princess Tutu and Welcome to the NHK.

And we got so, so many wonderful things. Not one of them perfect. But all of them forever wonderful.

Eureka Seven is a deeply flawed show, and yet I absolutely love it. It impressed me in all the right ways, with relatable characters, an exciting world, an inspiring story and an absolutely gorgeous presentation. It is every bit a product of the heart and love of Dai Satō, Naoki Satō, and every member of Studio Bones who worked on it. Not everybody will like everything about it, but personally, I found it a true classic. It made my top 20 in an instant and I would recommend it to anybody interested, and in fact, if you live in the good old UK like myself, the whole series is available completely free and legally on Viewster. Go for it. See the stories that came out over a decade ago. Because let me tell you, it’s going to be a little while before we see anything like their kind again.

My score: 9/10

[spriteluca-blog]

Kokuyo Land Arc - Pt.1

(Major Spoilers Ahead! You have been warned.)

Hiya Everyone! Today we’re gonna observe the 2nd arc in the world of Reborn! This arc is commonly referred to as the Kokuyo Land Arc, or Kokuyo Arc, and everyone’s favorite manipulator...literally, Rokudo Mukuro is at the center of it. So, without further ado, let’s get started!

Sorry, I just had to insert that song. If you have already seen the Kokuyo Land Arc, then you are already familiar with Mukuro and his little trademark chuckle, “kufufu.” The song above is Mukuro’s character song and actually represents his personality quite well….well, that’s to be expected since it is Mukuro singing. But anyway, if you don’t know Mukuro then that song is a perfect introduction.

Starting things off, we see that a lot of Namimori Junior students are being targeted and sent to the hospital, this continues until we gain information on the culprits. Reborn constantly finds pocket watches that have stopped on 6 and 5’o’clock, deducing that whoever is targeting the students means business, and probably after Tsuna. Not much later we see that Vongola Nono (9th) has sent Tsuna a letter and demands that he must stop the criminals that have escaped and rescue their hostage, who turns out to be a 9 year old boy by the name of Futa. Futa is an asset to the mafia world, and is sworn by the Omerta (Vow of Silence) to never reveal the secrets of the mafia world to anyone. Futa is able to look into a person’s heart and body and reveal their rankings in the world; these rankings can be about any trait of the person in view.

Trying to get information on Vongola Decimo, Mukuro kidnaps Futa and takes a page from his book, revealing the fighting rankings of Namimori Junior. At the top of the list are Hibari, Yamamoto, Gokudera, and Ryohei. Hibari, frustrated that his Namimori students are being attacked goes to Kokuyo Land to essentially destroy the person behind the attacks, while Ryohei gets attacked and sent to the hospital. Gokudera is next to be attacked, and this is when we really start to find out who is behind all of the attacks.

Chikusa Kakimoto (nicknamed Kakipi by Ken) is the same age as Tsuna and his friends, and wears the Kokuyo Junior uniform along with the rest of the Kokuyo gang that Mukuro has assembled. Chikusa’s weapon of choice are yo-yo’s that spin out poisonous needles, able to kill a target. Chikusa attacks Gokudera in the Downtown Namimori Shopping area. The match is quick and noted that Gokudera and Chikusa are evenly matched at mid-range fighting techniques, ending in both parties severely injured. Yamamoto and Tsuna meet up with the injured Gokudera, believing that he had finished Chikusa off. To his dismay, and the shock of the others, Chikusa emerges from the rubble battered and bloody. Upon seeing Yamamoto, he states that he is Ken’s target and cannot further engage with him, and was happy to see Tsuna believing that he could take him on and bring him to Mukuro. At the end of the battle, Chikusa decides not to engage in a fight that he cannot win and returns to Kokuyo Land to report back to Mukuro.

At this point, Hibari still has yet to return, and more students are consistently getting injured. Reborn reports that he knows the hideout of the criminals, Kokuyo Land, an amusement park similar to Disney...but smaller. Yamamoto and a somewhat healed Gokudera show up and say that they will go with Tsuna.

The day comes to take on Rokudo Mukuro and his gang, Tsuna is worried, especially with the way Leon is acting. He can’t keep his chameleon form and is constantly changing shape, for the most part we see Leon as a shimmering green glob. Tsuna wishes that Reborn would fight too, but to his dismay the arcobaleno states that in the letter Nono gave Tsuna the order to recapture the criminals, so Reborn will not participate. Yamamoto and Gokudera show up at Tsuna’s house and find out that Bianchi, Gokudera’s sister, will be coming as well. She even made a box lunch for Tsuna...that is a poison one. Hey, she isn’t called Poison Scorpion for nothing.

Upon entering Kokuyo Land, Tsuna recalls a few memories from his childhood as he leads the gang to an entry of Mukuro’s hideout. Before reaching Mukuro there are 5 battle scenes that Tsuna’s famiglia has to go through.

Yamamoto versus Joshima Ken. Ken is a unique teenager, he was experimented on by the Estraneo Famiglia like Mukuro and Chikusa, that’s actually where they all met. Ken is able to change his physical traits to that of animals, similar in a way to Vixen of the DC Universe. Vixen uses her magical Tantu Totem necklace, well Ken has teeth cartridges that he uses to adapt to a different animal channel. Same idea but different power vessel. This is Yamamoto’s first battle using his transformative bat, and at first it seems like he isn’t doing so well against Ken. No surprise, Ken is using the darkness of the room to attack Yamamoto in his blind spots, and Yamamoto is worried about getting hurt due to the baseball team has a game coming up. It takes some time, but after Tsuna gets launched down into the room, Yamamoto gets serious and defeats Ken.

After this battle we come across another of Mukuro’s chess pieces, M.M. A young woman that is far older than her appearances let on, and she is in fact in love with Mukuro, and quite jealous of a future character named Chrome. Anyway, M.M. attacks the group with sound waves via her clarinet...which just happens to come apart into a 3 part nunchaku, proving that she can fight both midrange battles and hand-to-hand battles. Unsure on how to fight against sound, Bianchi is the first to take the lead with her poison cooking. As everything begins to explode, Bianchi continues to charge; her poison cooking may be destroyed but its lethal qualities are still just as powerful. As the fight continues from midrange to close combat, M.M. shows her clarinet’s hidden ability and hits Bianchi. Taking the opportunity, Bianchi takes the hit as she subtly touches the clarinet’s mouthpiece. Before there’s anytime, M.M. places the clarinet to her lips to deal the final blow, and instead ingests a glob of poison. Apparently, Bianchi’s Poison Cooking comes from the fact that anything that she touches becomes poisonous...this kind of sucks for Bianchi, cuz really, if I were to put so much effort into something like a food item that I wanted to give to someone and it turns out that the said person died from my cooking, well….geez, I’d never create anything ever again. I give props to Bianchi, she is a strong woman, both mentally and physically.

Enemies continue to appear one after the next in this arc, causing it to go by pretty fast. I think this arc was only 5 or 6 episodes long? Maybe 8. The next enemy we face is Birds, an elderly man that attaches cameras to the little tweety birds that he controls; we also get to meet 2 murderers that have an insatiable thirst for death, the twins Jiji and Djidji. It seems that Birds is in control of these twins as we see him use them for his own means, telling them to kill both Haru and Kyoko if Tsuna isn’t harmed by his famiglia. Birds finds pleasure in the torture of others, but he doesn’t wish to get his own hands dirty, which ultimately becomes his undoing.

For now, that is all, it seems my spell is losing power. Check back tomorrow to find out what happens next!