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itsclydebitches · 4 years

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RWBY Recaps: Volume 8 “Ultimatum”

Welcome back, everyone! We had an unexpected break last week due to the horror going on in Texas. I'm glad we did. Not because of any salty "RWBY is bad right now yay free Saturday" feelings, but because keeping to a schedule for a fictional webseries should never take precedence over peoples' safety. I can't believe I need to type that sentence out, but it's true! Over the last seven days I've seen fans who are not merely disappointed by the mini hiatus (understandable) but outright hostile towards the crew because they... were ensuring everyone survived during an unprecedented emergency? Yeah. Given the highly critical nature of these recaps — including today's! — I want to be clear that my thoughts towards Rooster Teeth's creative choices are distinct from any thoughts about the crew itself, including the most basic forms of compassion like, “I sure hope everyone is okay over there.” In an age where it has become horrifically common to harass creators and even send them death threats over stories, it has likewise become necessary to remind people: Don't do that shit. Never do that shit. If I can teach anyone anything at all, let it be that!

Anyway, dark fandom reminders out of the way, let's dive straight into our delayed episode. It was certainly a doozy. Titled "Ultimatum," we open on a trigger warning for flashing lights. Good on Rooster Teeth for including that, though I do wonder if creators shouldn't be including time stamps as well? Or perhaps a note that you can find those time stamps in the credits, avoiding any (minor) spoilers for everyone else? I'm not photosensitive myself, so I certainly don't mean to speak for that group, but my first thought was, "So how would I watch this episode if I was? Hand on the pause button, hoping I stop fast enough as soon as the lights start?" Hard to do given the surprise nature of the scene. Really, my answer would be, "Wait for the fandom to post warnings of their own, likely including where it happens so I know when to skip" which is perhaps an indication that this information that should be included from the get-go.

But I am glad the warning exists, regardless. The episode itself begins with a shot of Ironwood looking down at the kingdom. He's used his windows as a vantage point since Volume 7, so that's nothing new, but something about this particular shot reminded me of Ozpin, looking down from his tower. I'm sure the response from many would be simply, "Ah yes, the two power hungry dictators watching over their victims," but I think there's a much more nuanced reading here about leaders being expected to fix the literally unfixable and what that responsibility does to an individual. Of course, it's a nuance that is absolutely obliterated by the episode’s end, but the implication existed for a hot second!

Two other soldiers are in the room with Ironwood, reporting that Cinder has helped Watts escape. They try to soften this with news that they still have Jacques in custody, but receive only a, "I don't give a damn about Jacques Schnee." Which, fair. He's pretty useless at this point. It's when Ironwood learns that both Qrow and Robin escaped too that he really gets mad, something his subordinates have been expecting given their scared expressions.

Now, I'm treading lightly here because I realize how this is going to sound given the end of our episode, but I still want to note that outside of that ending... this is a weird take? Just hear me out. Since Volume 7 the show has worked very hard to make Ironwood seem scary and unstable — bad setup for what we end with today — but the problem is that none of it works in context and it certainly doesn't work when compared to other characters' actions. They are literally in the midst of an unwinnable battle and thousands of his people are dying. If the audience wants a human being — who also just lost a limb and was betrayed by half his allies — o remain perfectly poised and polite during that, sorry, but that's not how human beings work. But even beyond this, what’s the message here? Ironwood raises his voice, so does Yang. Ironwood hits his desk, Qrow hits a child. If we're going to examine how Ironwood handles his stress and anger, he often handles it better than many of our heroes. Namely, by continually taking that anger out on inanimate objects. I kept waiting for him to attack his subordinates or attack Winter this episode, especially given where we end up, but it never came. Ironwood always has enough control to break the desk or punch the wall, not the person in front of him. Which, of course, would not be a good thing in the real world. I want to be clear given these sensitive subjects that if someone is breaking things in your presence that's a major problem to address. But this isn't the real world. This is a fantasy world in the middle of a war, populated by other characters who express their anger by punching people, slamming them into walls, or screaming at them until they run away. The story wants us to fear Ironwood long before he makes his objectively horrific choices and it tries to achieve that by showing us characters who are clearly terrified in his presence, by giving us a string of broken objects in his wake. But those details don't land well when we compare them to other instances of stress. In the same volume I have watched Ironwood take a deep breath to calm himself down when things have gone horribly wrong. I've also watched Weiss start a conversation by threatening her defenseless brother. So again, what’s the message here? It can’t be that acting violently towards someone = villainous behavior because, as established since Volume 6, that’s common for the heroes. Why are these subordinates terrified about Ironwood slamming his fist on a table, but Whitley has no problem hugging the woman who threatened him? Obviously there is a HUGE difference between our main group and Ironwood when it comes to other actions (cough-bomb threats-cough), but these day-to-day moments don't match up. The show wants to use violence as a way for us to easily identify the Bad Guy while ignoring all the times when our heroes do the same thing.

All of which isn't meant to be a defense of Ironwood. As we'll see in a bit, there is no defense for what he's done. Rather, it's a way of acknowledging just how badly he's been written. Why does a man who consistently reins in his anger and takes it out on objects suddenly shoot a councilman for literally no reason? Why does a man defined by wanting to save as many people as he can suddenly threaten to bomb his city? Ironwood's characterization is all over the place, in the sense that they keep writing him as the morally gray, sometimes harsh, but ultimately compassionate man he started out as... up until they need a villain. Salem isn't here yet, so Ironwood can shoot Oscar. Salem isn't attacking yet, so Ironwood can shoot the councilman. Salem is currently reforming, so Ironwood can threaten YJR and Mantle. He's the B-plot villain whenever Salem is out of commission, which is a problem for both their characterizations. This filler doesn't make sense for Ironwood and it severely undermines the threat of Salem. You finally introduce the Magical Big Bad and our heroes are facing more of a threat from a guy with a broken army and three loyal allies left? Hmmm.

The tl;dr is that Ironwood's arc is a disaster and, frankly, it's gotten old reading simplified takes of, "It's just a realistic look at what white U.S. men will do in power sweetie :) " RWBY does not have the context capable of conveying that sort of critical take because our world is not besieged by literal monsters and an immortal witch, to say nothing of how real life good guys do not get deus ex machina canes that fix the problem instantaneously. Ironwood is not an example of anti-U.S. imperialism, he's an example of writers who don't know how to write.

Anyway, I'm getting severely off topic. Obviously Ironwood is a major part of this episode, but the problems demonstrated here are two years in the making. This is the culmination of things I've been discussing for months across hundreds of posts... so I should probably stop trying to summarize it all in a few paragraphs lol. Perhaps when RWBY is over — or Ironwood has died — I'll do a single meta on his character, try to pull everything into one, unified argument.

For now though, we have an episode to analyze.

While Ironwood is receiving this news we get flashbacks to Qrow and Robyn. Qrow attacks a soldier in his bird form, which is hilarious. Someone GIF that please. It does raise some interesting questions about this magic though: does Qrow retain his aura and strength in this form (something I thought given his choice to transform during the explosion), or was that soldier just so shocked at being attacked by a crow that he went down easy? We'll never know, because that would require establishing concrete rules for this world. The point is Qrow is going feral in his freedom, throwing punches left and right — did he kill that guard? — while Robyn watches it all from under a rock. They're apparently still somewhere in the facility since all the exits are guarded, but that's not the good thing Ironwood seems to think it is. After all, Qrow is out to murder him. He wants to be there.

We all see where this is going, right? The show is going to ignore Qrow's crazy belief that Ironwood got Clover killed in favor of a "Qrow saved Mantle by murdering Ironwood"/“Qrow got revenge for Mantle by murdering Ironwood” ending. Who cares why Qrow wanted to kill him in the first place now that Ironwood has his finger on the trigger? If RWBY is good at anything, it's writing moments that encourage you to ignore everything that came before it. We'll be seeing more of that in just a bit.

"Damn it!" Ironwood yells, because the show is leaning into its cursing. He orders that the subordinates not return until "you have Qrow Branwen in custody." Here we have another great example of the show conflating what the audience knows with what other characters know. See, we know Qrow has a vendetta against Ironwood. We know their relationship is the important one to the story and that Robyn is incidental. Ironwood doesn't know that. There's no reason for him, as a character, to specify that they only bring Qrow back, but it makes sense for the audience who has the whole, thematic picture. Our understanding of the situation is influencing Ironwood's dialogue, which is... not great.

This entire scene we've had creepy music to hammer home just how evil Ironwood is. Except, as said, he takes a breath to calm down and the music fades. Instead of flying into a rage, hurting someone, or doing anything the music suggests he might, Ironwood calmly calls in for an update — which is when the explosion hits.

It's MASSIVE, seeming to originate from a lightning strike, which is weird, since it's coming from inside the whale, but whatever. The animation is very dramatic and pretty, as we've come to expect of RWBY, but the actual plot is lackluster at best. It's funny though because I thought for a hot second, when Winter and the Ace Ops were caught in the blast, that RWBY had actually done something exciting. I mean, holy shit! There are the deaths we expect from a battle like this. My god, what is everyone going to do when they realize that Oscar's needless attack took out five characters, including Weiss' sister —

No wait, never mind. They're fine.

Let's talk about that "needless" descriptor for a moment though. Do you all remember, two weeks ago, when I went, "Hey, why isn't anyone telling Oscar that that Ace Ops are approaching with a bomb? They're on a time limit! If someone would just mention that Very Important Information then Oscar wouldn't keep standing around to fight Salem." See, at the time I was frustrated because of how the plot was needlessly allowing Oscar to put himself in danger (especially when the whole point of this mission was to rescue him). Now, I'm frustrated because that same plot needlessly wasted the most powerful weapon the group had. There was no reason for Oscar to use literal lifetimes worth of stored energy when the heroes already had a bomb to do the same job! What was the point of that? I guess he took out the other grimm too, but without the whale that still would have been a challenge with a finite end, one Ironwood's army and the remaining huntsmen should have been able to handle. It doesn't feel justified to have Oscar use a weapon kept on the bench for lifetimes when there was another option literally minutes away.

There's so much wrong with this I need another list. So:

Ozpin's cane supposedly stores kinetic energy, which may contradict what we've seen from it before. Regardless, we��ve never heard about this. The all powerful weapon comes out of nowhere

It also begs the question of why Ozpin wouldn't use that power at Beacon and why he wouldn't insist that they try to get their cane back while captured. You had an out this whole time! But we’re going to ignore that because Oscar is a little hesitant?

Which makes YJR's presence even more useless than it originally was, which was already pretty useless. Oscar essentially rescued himself

This kinetic energy miraculously doesn't hurt any people or buildings, just grimm

So what is the point of Silver Eyes? That's been their MO since they were first introduced. Sure, Silver Eyes can be used far more often than Ozpin's cane, but it still feels like a let down to learn that the Big Secret behind this weapon is... the exact same thing Ruby has been doing for years

Like Ruby, Oscar likewise didn't need any practice or training. He just set off this massive attack perfectly and without issue

We have now eliminated the biggest threat to the cast instantaneously — the whale and the other grimm — with no effort from the rest of the heroes. Like the Hound, the stakes are obliterated with no satisfying work on the part of our protagonists

Instead, as said, the actual plan already in place never happened. The bomb just... goes back. Kind of like how Cinder attacked and then just went back to Salem. Penny woke up and then just got knocked out again. We continue to go in circles

This is because no one took two seconds to tell Oscar, "There's a bomb on the way"

Because this threat is gone the show needs a new one, hence Ironwood randomly threatening Mantle with said bomb

The one way we might have justified Oscar blowing up the whale instead of Winter is if he did it to save Hazel, but Hazel is implied to be dead

Maybe he's alive, but if he's not that happened off screen and we're not sure how. It couldn't have been because of the blast itself — everyone else is fine — so what, Salem somehow killed him before she was blasted to bits? While he was holding her?

And there's no body?

Salem was torn apart multiple times during that fight and reformed instantaneously, yet now, conveniently, she's taking her time

None of the characters mention the issues above. None of them admit that there was no reason for Oscar to waste LIFETIMES worth of power when they already had a solution in the works. Fantastic

I need to take a moment to acknowledge that so far this recap feels... bad. Disjointed. Bit all over the place. Which makes a certain amount of sense because that's where my thoughts are at. There's so much going on in this episode — so much wrong with it — that I don't know how to boil it all down into a few, neat claims. This episode is a mess! We're barely a few minutes in and the combined issues of Ironwood's characterization and Oscar's choice have left me reeling. So if you're still reading this, bless your patience, I think we'll both need it for the rest of this journey.

Let's snag a neater plot-point to discuss. Amidst all the chaos Neo literally skips away with the Lamp, clearly thrilled at how her own life is going. Later in the episode she'll text Cinder with the obvious: Salem is going to be pretty pissed when she realizes this is gone. “If you want her name you know what you owe me."

So wait... what is Neo leveraging here? Is she agreeing to give the Lamp back so Cinder doesn't get in trouble with Salem? Give Salem the password she's been looking for? Or give Cinder the password to use the Lamp for herself? What would Cinder even want the Lamp for when she's after the Maiden powers? I'm confused about what Cinder is being blackmailed with. Regardless, she needs the lamp for something and presumably what she "owes" Neo is Ruby. We get a cut to her just to hammer that home.

(Side note: both pictures of Neo are hilarious.)

Before that though, back at the whale, everyone is taking stock of the situation when Marrow cries, "Hey, they were still in there!" I feel like this is another scene meant to make him look like the one good guy in the group — he cares about YJOR while the others can’t be bothered — but as always, that reading doesn't fit well with the situation as a whole. The others have barely had time to realize they're alive. I don't think it's a moral failing that they didn't instinctually worry about four betrayers, one of whom attacked them, while they're still checking that they have all their limbs intact. Besides, why does Marrow assume they're dead? The Ace Ops were caught in the blast as well, yet miraculously came out unharmed. They clearly didn't set their own bomb off, so it's logical to assume that YJOR did something themselves. It feels weird to have a "Marrow mourns them and Winter is the only other character who cares" moment when everyone is recovering from bomb shock and no one even knows if the others are dead. But, of course, the show is out to portray only two of these characters as good people, so ignore the logic and run with the emotion of the scene.

All of which is bolstered by Elm pulling away when Vine puts a hand on her shoulder. Why is she acting cold towards him now? Because they're not friends, remember?

While we get more ridiculous relationship dynamics, Ironwood calls in and congratulates them on the bomb working, but tells them to get back because they have another problem in the works. That would be Qrow and Robyn. Winter decides to tell him about the bomb in person.

We cut to Watts and Cinder watching the remnants of the blast from a rooftop. Cinder has tried calling, but no one answered. Unsurprising, given that Salem doesn't have any other allies left. Cinder says that the plan hasn't changed, she's still going to take the Winter Maiden's power for herself, and Watts can help her by bringing Penny here. He explains that he doesn't have full control over her. Rather, he implemented a virus that is setting her on a single path: open the vault, then self-destruct. Cinder, as one might expect, is furious.

She snags Watts by her grimm arm and threatens to toss him over the side of the building. Thus begins the best part of the episode, hands down. Despite the danger he's in, Watts throws common sense out the window in favor of dragging Cinder in the most satisfying manner possible.

“You think you’re entitled to everything just because you suffered, but suffering isn’t enough. You can’t just be strong, you have to be smart. You can’t just be deserving, you have to be worthy! But all you have ever been is a bloody migraine!”

It's true! You know what else is true? This speech could apply to our heroes as well. Accusations of entitlement and reminders to be smart as opposed to just strong hit hard, considering those are the same flaws our protagonists are struggling with. The difference is that Cinder, miraculously, listens, pulling Watts back to safety and going to cry by herself. That moment is simultaneously more growth than Ruby has gotten and more sympathy than Ironwood has gotten. The woman who murdered Pyrrha is treated more kindly by the narrative than one of our initial heroes and our very first villain has taken more time to reconsider her choices than our title character. You know a show is falling apart when excellent choices are applied to the worst possible character.

So Cinder is crying while Watts looks guilty and we cut back to YJOR's group post-blast. Yang is finally able to answer a call from Blake who is obviously overjoyed to see her. Weiss gives them directions to the mansion and they ask what in the world they'll do with Emerald, currently on her knees, mourning Hazel.

Thus begins the third most frustrating part of this episode. See, on the way back the group continues the conversation about what to do with Emerald, with Yang and Jaune distrusting her vs. Ren and Oscar encouraging cooperation. I can't believe I'm saying this after's Ren's speech and Oscar's entire existence... but I'm team Jaune and Yang here. Look, what Oscar and Ren say — the literal words coming out of their mouth — is nonsense. Ren goes, “We can’t let all of our actions stem from fear," as if Yang and Jaune are being ridiculous for mistrusting Emerald, one of the established villains, after years worth of harm from her. It’s weird that Yang points to her arm as something Emerald is responsible for, rather than being framed or the deaths at Beacon, but the general sentiment of, “She’s done horrible things!” is true. Ren’s perspective is the same simplification that was applied to Ironwood last volume, wherein everyone acted as if he was crazy for fearing an attack on his kingdom... post an attack on another kingdom and pre an attack on his kingdom. Putting generic lines in Ren's mouth about not being afraid makes him sound willfully ignorant, as if choosing to believe that someone is good will magically make them so, to say nothing of thinking it will erase all the harm they've already done.

Oscar at least acknowledges the difficulty here, but then follows this up with, “You don’t have to forgive her… just give her a second chance."

Oscar, honey, that amounts to the same thing in this situation. Allowing Emerald a second chance means working with her, which means trust, which means emotionally reaching a point where these characters can put aside the harm she's done them in an effort to give her that chance in the first place. This actually ties into a post I saw last night, one I've come across before, that claims redemption arcs don't require any suffering on the part of the person who has done wrong. I agree in theory, that prolonged suffering doesn't help anyone, but the problem is that people tend to conflate suffering with consequences and someone who has done this level of harm should face consequences for their actions. The problem with redemption arcs is not that the bad people suffer too much — emotionally and physically beating on them as a form of revenge — but that the people they've harmed are put into situations like this one. If Yang and Jaune let Emerald go like she suggests, they are agreeing that she doesn't have to face any consequences for the damage she's done (which, keep in mind, involves multiple deaths, not including all the lost lives here in Atlas). If they agree to give her a second chance, they are forced to jump straight to some level of forgiveness. We might claim they don't have to forgive Emerald to work with her, but from a practical perspective how are they meant to function, especially during a warzone? Anything she provides them with — information, watching their back in a fight, undertaking missions, etc. — requires trusting her enough to allow those things to happen: working with that info, letting her protect them, allowing her that responsibility. It's all about trust, trust she has yet to earn. In order for a redemption arc to be successful, the power has to be in the hands of the victims. They need to be able to see some justice for what was done to them, be offered some proof that the person in question has truly changed, and have the ability to walk away if they decide no, I don't forgive you, glad to hear you've improved, but please stay out of my life. Jaune and Yang have none of that. There are currently no systems in place for Emerald to face consequences for her choices, she has offered them no proof of her remorse or true motivations, and the other half of the group is pressuring them to give her that second chance without closure or reassurance. None of that makes for a good redemption arc and reducing that to, "So you want to see poor Emerald suffer, huh?" ignores the suffering she has already caused. The group are her victims and they are under no obligation to give her a second chance, particularly under these circumstances, which makes the story's choice to have Ren and Oscar act like Yang and Jaune are being stubborn or inconsiderate a problem. The conversation boils down to, "Give the woman you know to be a liar, manipulator, murder accomplice, and servant of our enemy a second chance based entirely on unfounded faith. If you don't you're letting yourself be ruled by fear."

RWBY's touchy-feely themes really don't sit well within its realistic, morally gray premise. We cannot continually have these characters go through hell one moment and then have others accuse them of being paranoid the next. The fact that all of this is wrapped up in the group trusting Robyn, Emerald, and Hazel over their established allies remains beyond frustrating.

Because yeah, you know how Oscar finishes his speech? “I’ve already gotten a lot of help today from someone I don’t exactly trust right now." Meaning Ozpin.

The story is trying to compare Emerald and Hazel to Ozpin.

"Oh hey, I kept a secret from you after lifetimes of watching that secret lead to betrayal and death. I keep apologizing for my mistakes while ignoring that I had no reason to trust a bunch of kids with such world-shattering information and also that you tore it from me in the most traumatic way possible."

"Oh hey, I willingly joined our world's version of the devil and helped her destroy your school, leading to numerous deaths including your friend and headmaster. It was his death that put Oscar in this position in the first place! I then continued to attack your group, leading to another near death of a friend, and a kidnapping, and the destruction of Amity, until I became scared enough to make a run for it."

Which one of these characters is granted an instant second chance? You'll never guess who!

And I do think the word "instant" is important here because just like Jaune and Yang have the right to have distance and justice from Emerald, they had that right with Ozpin too. The difference is they got it. They had the power in the situation, as evidenced by their use of the Lamp and physically attacking him. Ozpin heard what they needed from him — leave us alone — and did that without complaint. They were given months to come to terms with the secrets he kept. They were offered apologies and acts of service to demonstrate intent: saving them in the airship and continually saving Oscar. I don't believe Ozpin ever needed a redemption arc, but even if we think he did, he had it. After three volumes of material Oscar's perspective is still "I don't exactly trust [him] right now" but Hazel and Emerald have earned at least the same amount of trust in a matter of hours? They're really having my boy look at the guy who has tried desperately to do right by him despite unimaginable circumstances, and the guy who tortured him to get information for Salem, and went, "That first guy. He's the one we need to watch out for."

To make things even worse, Oscar tells the others that Ozpin took on all the torture so he wouldn't have to. So he did that and they still don't trust him? If you had told me back in Volume 6 that two years later the group would still be hostile towards Ozpin, while simultaneously urging one another to trust Emerald, I would have said you were lying. RWBY has its problems, but it's not that bad. Yet here we are. I suppose the one silver lining here is that Ren smiles when he realizes Ozpin is back? So at least one of them isn't prepared to draw their weapon at the mere mention of his name.

Both these moments raise more questions though. How in the world did Ozpin take on that torture when we clearly saw Oscar getting pummeled for a good portion of the kidnapping? Is that a weird merge thing the story hasn't bothered to explain? I wouldn't be surprised, considering Oscar said last episode he didn't want to use magic because it hastened the merge, he uses the biggest explosion of magic we've ever seen, and nothing has changed. Ozpin is still in the back of his head, thanking him for the tinniest shreds of decency they get. Ren, meanwhile, seems to be back to mindreading. How in the world does he know that Ozpin is back? I assume it has something to do with his semblance, but we don't know what. They could have shown us Oscar from Ren's perspective, perhaps with two distinct emotions swilling around to imply that he sees two different people now, not a useless shot of Emerald with purple flower petals, whatever purple means.

Oh, but no, we shouldn't have gotten either of these scenes. Remember that Ren's aura broke a very, very short time ago? Is it back already? Can he use this part of his semblance without it? Considering it was near impossible to see Ironwood's aura breaking in the Watts fight and we were then mistakenly told he used his semblance in the office, I'm going to go with, "The writers forgot."

Oscar explains that the cane had "lifetime after lifetime" of power in it and though there's still some left, "we have to be careful with how we use the rest." He says that Ozpin trusted his judgement and of course he did! Ozpin also didn’t know that there was a bomb on the way. Yet funnily enough, no one else mentions that, whoops, your choice made in ignorance was a waste and that's due entirely to us prioritizing hugs over basic mission information.

Also, all these explanations take place in front of Emerald. Half the group doesn't trust her, but they'll freely discuss their powers and limitations here. Remember how the group once wanted to talk about magical relics in front of the old lady they'd just met? Yeah, they've learned nothing.

Combine all this insanity with the fact that Ozpin's magic saved the day before Ironwood's bomb could do the same... while Ruby sat in a mansion drinking tea. Who's our hero again?

So things are a hot mess, to put it lightly. Their conversation finally ends when they hear voices and round the corner to find all the Atlas citizens huddled in the subway. For once the show actually writes them in a sympathetic manner, emphasizing how terrified and helpless they are. This image doesn't lead the group to any revelations though, certainly not anything that would tie back to Ren's earlier speech in the snow. No, once again the justified criticisms here are ignored as we hear that “However this fight ends, we could really use someone like you, [Emerald.]” That's it then. Discussion over. We knew as soon as it started that blindly trusting her was being presented as the "right" thing to do and now here we are, deciding that conclusively, despite Jaune and Yang's complaints. By the time the group reaches the mansion, Oscar is defending Emerald from Ruby. We're supposed to just accept that she's a part of the group now, only minimal pushback allowed.

Before that though we return to Ironwood getting news that their bomb never went off. He briefly wonders who else could have done that, but puts the currently unanswerable question aside for what he does know. They still have the bomb and it could be "useful." See, this moment — like shooting Oscar and the councilman — is when Ironwood just randomly goes off the deep end. One minute he's talking about what they've lost and cradling his new arm,

the next he's saying that he should have tortured Qrow to get Penny to obey him! Which doesn't even make sense since I'm pretty sure Penny hasn't ever spoken to Qrow. She wouldn't want anyone to suffer, true, but it's not like Ironwood had a close friend like Ruby to use as leverage. Qrow is just Some Guy to her. Regardless, he thinks Yang, Jaune, and Ren are decent replacements, despite Penny also having no relationships with them. This is what happens when your characters only start breaking up their teams eight years into the story, the response to Ironwood wanting to torture Ren to hurt Penny is, “Does Penny know Ren exists?” But, you know, torture is torture, right? Maybe. Probably not. I mean, if they're going to turn Ironwood into a cartoon villain, they could at least keep him smart.

Because all of this is just the height of stupidity. Ironwood wants to torture people Penny barely knows to make her listen (so just grab some civilians? It would do the same job...). Ironwood wants to shoot down empty ships, even though no one, including us, knows where in the world those ships would have gone. Ironwood wants to destroy an entire city to try and save another city. He wants to use a bomb meant for a comparatively small whale and acts like that alone will take out the majority of a kingdom. None of it makes sense! And I know the easy comeback for that is, "Well yeah, Ironwood is crazy and evil" but he's not. I mean he is. Threatening torture and bombings is obviously evil, but he's never been insane, or stupid. As said before, his arc (or lack thereof) is an absolute disaster. The fandom assumes so many things about Ironwood given the opportunity — the whale is a suicide mission. He expects the Ace Ops to die on his order — and the writing hints at so many things that never happen — he's going to hurt his subordinates, attack Winter for disobeying him — and every time what we actually get is a far more compassionate, level-headed character... until he randomly does a 180 and goes, "Let's murder a whole city now!" I never wanted Ironwood to be the bad guy, but they could have at least given me a persuasive decent into this level of horror.

So... yeah. Ironwood has got to die by the end of the volume, yeah? Between Ruby warning the whole world about him and him going into full villain mode, there's no coming back from this.

Neo sends her text to Cinder and the group makes it back to the mansion. Remember Yang's criticisms of Ruby's leadership? The ones she conveniently forgot about when Ren started to agree with her? Yeah, those are entirely gone as the sisters hug it out and, presumably, forgive one another for... daring to admit that things are bad? Look, I'm not going to deny that Ironwood's scene with Winter was creepy as fuck,

but I'm not of the opinion that the heroes are any better when it comes to the theme of obedience. They've attacked one another, screamed at one another, and any dissent from Ruby's leadership results in the questioner being left behind in the snow. We'll accept you again when you fall back in line. I used to adore the relationships in this show, but watching them now is just discomforting. The show might be 100% more obvious with Ironwood, using creepy music, a smile, and that hand on Winter's shoulder, but the concept of, "Sorry I dared to question you before! We won't ever do it again :)" isn't healthy either. The fact that the show keeps erasing theses problems with hugs — Weiss hugs Whitley now, Yang hugs Ruby, someone will probably hug Emerald soon — doesn't make the circumstances any less uncomfortable.

None of this even gets into the Blake and Yang hug. First of all, why is Blake acting like they had a fight and Yang might not want to see her? She's hiding inside rather than rushing to greet them, ears down in a devastated expression until Yang touches her. Combine this with Yang's "Do you think she's mad at me?" and it feels like the writers cut a fight in the final script and then didn't bother to remove the fallout from that. Seriously, where did any of this come from? You can't just have characters act like they've been fighting when they haven’t.

Also, can't forget this.

At this point there's nothing more I can say in regards to RWBY's almost-queer baiting. Is touching foreheads more intimate than the hugs Yang gave the others? Absolutely. Is that an appropriate stand-in for overt representation? Absolutely not. This would have been a perfect time for them to kiss. Take out Blake's nonsensical fear and replace it with them both reuniting after their first separation since Volume 5, working under the knowledge that either one could have been killed, finally admitting their feelings. Hell, they don't actually have to kiss. Not all girlfriends are interested in kissing! But they could use the terminology that makes things unequivocally canon. Another forehead touch when we got that in Volume 6? It's not enough, especially not when our straight couples have all been allowed their rep.

Ren at least wants to know where Nora is. He's presumably told what happened off screen as Oscar tells Ruby that Emerald is their friend now.

Then an emergency call from May interrupts the reunion and the group learns that Ironwood is bombing the Schnee ships. “Those ships… they were going to save people” Weiss whispers. How? Tell me how they were going to save anyone. Where were you going to take these people where they would be safer than where they are now? RWBY continually asserts things without explaining them, meaning there is precisely zero emotional weight here. Again, Ironwood is far past the point of defense, but I'd be a whole lot more critical of this particular action if I had a better sense of why it's bad. He appears to be endangering the people given May's shout to run — falling debris? — but the further implication is that Ironwood has doomed the people of Mantle by denying them these ships. It's that part that makes no sense based on what we've been told.

Which finally comes to the ultimatum of our episode title: Penny opens the vault, or Ironwood bombs Mantle. Great! So glad this plan is wicked smart and works well for his characterization. It's definitely not a nonsensical, unfounded, overblown change that feels like it belongs in a child's cartoon, complete with dramatic spotlight. Nope. Excellent writing choices all around.

Our final line of the episode is, “I hope you live up to the title I gave you," referring to Penny's job as the Protector of Mantle, and you know what? That line could have been very cool if it was delivered by an Ironwood with a persuasive fall and a halfway decent plan in place. I love that we've twisted the concept of a protector and turned the title into a horrifying, rather than honorable responsibility... I just hate everything surrounding those details.

So, usual RWBY fare.

(At least we get to see that Nora is awake!)

Will things get better over the next four episodes? I doubt it. We're still expecting the rest of the Ace Ops + Winter to ditch Ironwood, someone getting the vault open, the fall of Atlas, now the potential destruction of Mantle, and none of that includes Salem who should reform at any moment. Frankly, I'm not looking forward to any of it. The final leg of a season should make its audience excited to see how everything turns out, not dreading it. I've heard from multiple people that this is the volume that finally got them to drop the show and honestly? I'm not surprised.

As a final (happier?) note: we've finally got a bingo! I completely forgot our board last time, which was a terrible oversight, but we can update it now.

Our army of grimm can't kill anyone now that it got KOed by Oscar (that is the third one hit defeat of a major enemy we've seen this volume. Yes, I'm including the Hound considering it was obviously on its last legs after Ruby's eyes.)

I'm likewise including "Ozpin apologizes for everything including his existence" because he's done nothing but apologize since he came back. The emotion is there even if the literal words are not. Oscar reminded everyone of how untrustworthy he is, but kept the group from jumping them again. And Ozpin thanked him for it.

Neo didn't literally backstab Cinder (shame), but the Relic still counts.

So a triple bingo! Is that how bingo works? Idk, I've never played. I feel like I should have thought up some sort of humorous prize, but sadly I've got nothing. If you think of anything, let me know lol

That’s all then, folks. Until next week! 💜

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #rwby ultimatum #rwby recaps #mymetas

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iridescenceoflove · 3 years

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Okay, I know I said I'll take what I got and still love the show—and I still really, really do—but the more I dwell on it and stew in my turmoil of feelings, the more...depressed I get about the ending. Honestly, it was just all kind of messy and underwhelming after so many good, fast-paced and resourceful episodes.

1. We already know everything wrong about Han Seo's end, I don't even need to hash it out. If you don't understand what was wrong with that... 🤷🏻‍♀️

2. I was okay with Cha Young getting shot for the protection of Vincenzo; cliched as it was, they still kept her pretty in character with the way she stood up against Han Seok while being held at gunpoint. However, they took it too far by having her get shot, just to simply stay in a hospital bed until the very end. No action for her, no behind the scenes work, no second party (what the hell was the point in that anyways?), just—reduced to an invalid in bed for saving the love of her life. After all she's done, after always wanting to be right up in the front lines. I know one of the issues with her getting shot was the overused setup for Vincenzo to reveal his feelings, and honestly, I didn't mind that. But that doesn't even work, because he doesn't. He clearly is worried for her and we know he loves her, yet it doesn't spur him to make any further move. Han Seok already killed his mother, it doesn't even add to the narrative of him having a loved one get hurt to do something. He would've still killed Han Seok brutally regardless if Cha Young had gotten hurt or not. She deserved to be a part of it all. And I don't mean the killing. She didn't have to hit the button. But she deserved a final line to Myung Hee at least since she's her father's murderer. I'm pretty sure the Geumga men got more action than she did.

3. Han Seok gathering a bunch of mercenaries seemed filler. It makes sense for the purpose of hiring people to kill Seung Hyuk, but they literally added nothing to the very mediocre face-off with the Geumga men. In fact, the face-off at the beginning of episode 19 with the whole Cassano family was way cooler and more dynamic than whatever you call that. How the hell did they even know specifically where to find Han Seok and his men? Vincenzo and Cho were the only ones aware of the tracking device anyways. I mean, I could've lived with that, except, why have them come fight? We know they can stand on their own, it's been very much established multiple times. The stabbing wasn't even done by one of the hired men, it was done by Han Seok. Just seemed really messy and unnecessary; simply there for the purpose of having some of the Geumga tenants have one last moment.

4. The whole Guillotine File thing had such a great setup. It seemed very anticlimactic just for Vincenzo to whip it out and tell Gi Seok to take it. Like, they made a huge deal of using it to take down everyone, he even says nobody but himself knows where it is, then whips it out to hand it over like nothing when he could've used it for, oh, I don't know, being pardoned so he doesn't have to leave for a whole year. Which—

5. A whole year? Come on, you just can't have me fall for the fact that this guy, whom even the Director pardoned for a bit of time, has to leave for a whole year with no way or alternative reason to come back for more than just one day because he has to sneak in with Italian delegates? I'm calling bullshit.

6. I love Vincenzo and Cha Young. They truly do love and deserve each other. But the ending for them? Nah. I hate the fact they pulled a CLOY, I really do. You're telling me Cha Young has to be content with spontaneous year to year visits or has to go visit an island in Malta to be with the one she loves? FUCK NO. I'm manifesting a completely different end for that, same with Han Seo, don't @ me.

7. Where the fuck was Inzaghi? He didn't even get to say goodbye in episode 18, seriously, what the fuck.

8. The gold storyline was okay. I'm glad they didn't leave loose ends, but it once again just didn't sit right after all the buildup. They moved it all to her house and she sleeps on a hard ass gold bar bed. Queen behavior, but still.

9. Bye Bye Balloon. We all wanted it. We didn't get it.

As you can see, the more I ramble, the less eloquent and structured my points become. All in all, did they tie most of the loose ends up? Yes. I'm glad they didn't kill Mr. Lee off, I would've been too pissed for words if that had happened along with Han Seo. In my opinion, they didn't leave an open ending, which would've made things ten times worse. And it really isn't the worst finale I've seen. Far from it, contrary to my points. It's just after so much anticipation, building, excitement, and truly amazing episodes, it fell very flat for a finale. Way more bittersweet than needed.

However, I will end on some good points because I don't want to ignore them either.

1. I love Han Seok's and Myung Hee's deaths. Absolutely love it, so much that somebody would probably deem me crazy for how much I enjoyed it. Myung Hee fire dancing to her zumba music was so poetically beautiful. Han Seok and all the references to Greek mythology or whatever as he's left for the birds was stunning. Both of them being cocky until they realize how miserable their deaths really are going to be was pure enjoyment for me. Nothing says satisfaction like watching the pure horror take place on their faces as they beg for Vincenzo to just end it instead. They really and truly did deliver with their deaths, and I am still shocked and pleasantly delighted with how they didn't shy away one bit with the brutality of it.

2. I'm glad they at least gave Cha Young her moment somewhat in the end. She got to take down the Tae ho lover and his mom in retribution for both Vincenzo's mom and her dad. Her sass and savagery in the end gave me the hint of original Cha Young I'd been craving for the whole episode. And the fact that she got to lead the Cassano Geumga family was great too (despite how cheesy that walk up and taunting of Kingmaker and his guys was).

3. I'm glad Gi Seok was promoted, and I'm especially glad he and Mr. Cho get to work together. Those two are the best and deserve everything.

4. As much as they could've really polished it, I'm glad Vincenzo and Cha Young got their moment. At that point, I think my standards and expectations were so low that I was blown away by their kiss. I didn't expect it at that point and thought we were going to be left with them walking off together. It was still a pleasant surprise, nonetheless.

5. I really do like what the monk said to Vincenzo. Wrapped up his feelings regarding his lifestyle very well, and I thought it was the perfect balance of philosophical and realistic as you could get. He needed to hear that, and I'm so glad he got some form of content and peace with who he is in the end.

6. I really love that they didn't stray away from Vincenzo truly being an anti-hero. He even refers to himself as a villain, and I'm glad they didn't try to gloss over that in the end just so it could look good morally. His take on justice is very...Vincenzo Cassano. Befitting.

I love this show still, would still recommend it, and would still do it all over again. I'm so glad I was able to be active in this fandom and see so many wonderful discussions, people, and analyses. I'm going to miss these weekends so badly.

#vincenzo #tvn vincenzo #kdrama #vincenzo cassano #hong cha young #my post

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buddha-in-disguise · 4 years

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I haven’t had a chance to watch 5.17 again yet, but some initial thoughts.

1st things 1st, there were some sublime choices from Melissa Benoist as the Director. I have a couple of screen captures of the ones that immediately spring to mind. She definitely showed her nuanced understanding of the characters, and that really was so fantastic to see. She deserves another shot in the directors chair in S6 if she wants to (& it sounds from interviews as if it is something she’d like to have chance to do more of). Even without understanding the characters, some of the lighting & overall framing of shots were so good! From lighting to just mirroring chess board pieces. I loved it. I felt the Eve fight scene was pretty masterful.

The episode itself. Whilst it did give up a couple of twists (the most major being Lex set up Jeremiah’s death), honestly it fell pretty flat for a number of different reasons.

My biggest problem (& this isn’t new for me), is that Lex’s behaviour was entirely predictable. That all bar a couple of plot points weren’t things that the fandom haven’t already talked about in one way or another almost Ad nauseam.

A big part for me was this flashback episode leaves us with no more truly relevant details on things than before the episode began.

Lex setting up Leviathan? Knew he was going to do it, this is Lex we are talking about.

Lex manipulating Lena, especially against Kara. C’mon, you’d have to be either blind, or in denial this has been going on for months on his manipulation of Lena. Yes, she should realise he is doing it, but again, Lena (as even Mon-El mentions) is the product of her abusive family. That doesn’t simply disappear!

Eve - we knew she was back, so again no real surprise on Lex manipulating her. Again (oh and side note. If you’re going to hate on Lena for ‘killing’ people & say her manipulation by Lex doesn’t excuse her, but don’t say the same thing about Eve, who killed outright for both Leviathan and Lex, your hypocritical hatred of Lena is showing. Check yourself at the door).

Lillian. She had already admitted she wasn’t Earth 38 Lillian to Lex from the award ceremony dialogue. So again, it wasn’t a surprise.

Honestly I could keep going, but you get the picture.

With only 2 episodes left, (& even had it been a full 3 episodes as I expect them to perhaps try and extend 5.19 into a longer one, perhaps over 1.5 hours instead of the usual hour schedule), we still have no clear answers on anything. Leviathan? Nothing was added to their story, and considering they were supposed to be the big villain of S5, only Lex has been that so far. And when you have an episode that does nothing more than we saw in S4, to ‘expose’ Lex ..... news flash. We know all this about him.

What we don’t know is who leads Leviathan? Who else is part of the organisation? We practically know nothing about them.

I felt this episode would’ve been better placed after Winn’s first episode (I’ve said I felt having him over that 2 episode arc was a waste, as again that 2nd episode did absolutely nothing plot wise that couldn’t have been added in the 1st episode, & the 1st episode didn’t add a lot either! I’m not saying don’t bring Winn back, but make it relevant & not 2 filler episodes). To have it done so late in the season makes zero sense to me. It feels messy.

On to William Dey. I’m not even going to try & pretend I like the character. I absolute despise him, & not because of trying to be Kara’s LI. I despise him, because once again we had him in scenes that others should have been in, especially Alex at the beginning. She is supposedly working with J’onn, and while I get they might not want her around Lex, have her working remotely from the tower, sending that information from the video clip to J’onn and Kara. After all, she did that from the DEO. J’onn has all that computing power & I’ve yet to see it used to any full potential.

I also found it strange William just walked up to Kara & J’onn as if they’re best of buddies, but we have nothing to suggest he knows Kara is Supergirl. I hate he has that level of familiarity with them. It again feels rushed & disjointed & totally wrong for any of the characters. Failing having Alex working it, how about having Nia, who again I keep repeating, is an actual reporter, but also as Dreamer could help scout out & report back in with them all back at the Tower.

I also found the wording Lex used to Eve in regards William. "Activate William."

So activate how exactly? Sure they got him working as a journalist, but how? Through clues being sent to him? Is he under some kind of control? I can think of a host of different ways to phrase that, but activate? That sounds an awful lot like some kind of manipulation that is far more than straight forward sending William some clues is about.

And about this. William is a Nobel Prize winning Journalist, & yet not once has he been able to do anything without someone giving him the heads up! I know some journalism requires that, but constantly? If he is so good at his job, he should be finding more than dead ends. It grates like crazy.

Then he simply arrives at Kara’s with sympathy baked goodies - only to then launch into needing help over what he has found. There is a time & a place for that kind of thing. That was neither the time nor the place. I know Lex wanted to get Leviathan on board with his plan, & needed to show they were about to get Supergirl looking at them far too closely, but really? Just no. He could’ve met Kara at CatCo. Met Kelly at Obsidean. Texted or called Kara to check it was okay to drop by her apartment even. But doing so unannounced, when he knows Kara & Alex have just lost their father? It also grates.

Now onto Kelly - lovely to see her supporting Alex - and Kara - after the loss of Jeremiah. But does she know Kara is Supergirl? We still don’t know for certain! The inference in this episode is Kelly does know, as William tells them about the warehouse, then Kelly & Alex are at the tower with J’onn in the same outfits, as Supergirl lands, stating there was nothing at the warehouse. So yes, it is highly likely Kelly now knows. But how or when did she know. It’s these kind of details most fans actual want, not to have to make educated guesses on! This is a reason fans get frustrated. We were being told who used to get to know Supergirl’s identity, but now with Kelly, nothing! And people wonder why fans feel the LGBTQ characters are getting shortchanged this season. It isn’t just about lack of screen time. It’s about lack of depth of story, when previously they had people falling over themselves to show how they knew Kara was Supergirl.

Another example of this lack of depth or explanation is Brainy. Sure he is likely doing what he is because of future Brainy’s warning, but it still comes across as Brainy seemingly stupid considering his apparent intellect. We have been thrown these plot lines, but they’re then left for us to have to fill in the blanks as each episode airs, as we’re not getting them otherwise.

It is far too chaotic for my liking.

So once again my overriding sense after watching this episode is frustration. It still feels like a total mess, with no answers (& even if they give us those answers, 3 episodes - now 2 - would be nowhere near enough time to do it without rushing. It even felt rushed at times in this episode).

William continues to be an absolute waste of space, (and God do I feel sorry for Staz over this), taking perfectly good screen time away from other already established characters, who could do what he has just as easily.

The Kara and Lena push & pull is giving us nothing new! Nothing. It’s gone well past giving us angst to us having had enough. Like with Lex, they seem to have gone too far with a good thing, & now rather than enjoying it, the majority simply hate it. With a passion. I am sick to the back teeth with it. Lena deserves to finally be rid of this villain tag, & given her rightful place back with the Superfriends (after a damn sit down talk with Kara - not Supergirl - and get on some level ground for good this time). I don’t expect a miraculous friendship rebuilt in seconds, but I do want actual forward progress between them to stick. Not 1 step forward, 2 steps back. I certainly don’t want this carrying on into S6, or at least not without resolving more than this.

In all the 5 seasons I’ve watched Supergirl, I don’t think there has ever been such underlying anger or frustration on how the season has panned out, both from fans & media alike. The disconnect from the fans to the show is huge right now, & really I cannot understand how the end of S4, which was seen as a real step forward for the show, to the excitement of S5, & how it was being portrayed; to this.

I want so much to be able to sit here & write positively over the episodes generally, but too often this season I’ve not been able to do it. I feel so sorry for the cast, because I know they love the show so much, and I want nothing more than to be writing positively about it each episode, but I simply can’t do that.

So in conclusion.

Phenomenal directing by Melissa Benoist.

Complete & utter frustration & disconnect everywhere else.

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appleb18 · 4 years

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Star vsThe Forces of Evil Season 4... One Year Later

One year ago, Star vs The Forces of Evil ended its fourth season and it was a disaster. It wasn’t always all that bad, in fact the show was pretty good on it’s first two seasons and bit of season 3 however it's just the final season that ruins it. It didn’t live to people expections and it felt rushed. Now let’s discuss how the show messed up shall we?

Behind the Failure

Before I talk about the dreadful writing of season 4, I want to talk about behind the scenes of the show's downfall. According to Daron Nefcy Twitter, she tweeted that “Just finished the last episode of Star vs The Forces of Evil” a month before the finale.

It’s fine if it was an episodic show like Phineas and Ferb, Batman Brave and the Bold and episodic shows but writing an ending for an ongoing story is something you should NEVER do. Writing the ending without a plan is a terrible decision to make, especially past plot points that were established and most of them were left answered.

You’ll probably be thinking that they were rushed and while I understand that all plot points can’t be answered like Gravity Falls but they wanted to make the romance their top priority over the story, which I’ll talk about later. Daron actually knew she had four seasons to work with and it makes it so frustrating to hear!

So now let’s talk about how it all went wrong.

Character 180

Previously, I used to like most of the cast, they used to be enjoyable characters but in season 4, oh dear they all turned into pricks.

The onlys characters that didn’t get ruined in the fourth season were

Eclipsa and Globgor

River Butterfly

Tom Lucitor

But everyone else, they all became such unbearable picks like The Magic High Commision. They used to act like decent people, trying to defend Mewni from Ludo/Toffee

And they actually have character, especially Rhombulus growth when he befriends Star.

But they get character assassinated and become monster haters with no actual reason just like the Mewnimen and they never atone for what they’ve done to the Butterfly family.

Moon betrayal came out of nowhere and it only lasted like seven minutes then she joins Star and Eclipsa because she didn’t realize Mina and her soldiers are going to commit genocide. Why didn’t she see that coming? They were racist to monsters, did she think they’ll actually spare them?

Her reason behind is so stupid and that is because she doesn’t trust Eclipsa ruling Mewni but why all the sudden? While it’s true she let her get shot by Meteora but that’s an mother instinct to protect her child. Also she tried to kill her own daughter to protect Star and Mewni. So Moon shouldn’t see her irresponsbile. While she isn’t fit to be ruler, she is trustworthy. What’s worse is she admittedly teams up with them to defeat Mina.

Then there’s Star and Marco, the two main characters of the show and they became terrible people. All of the development from the previous seasons get thrown out of the window.

Marco never talked to his parents after he left and barely visits because “he’s too busy” and he didn’t even know he’s gonna get a baby sister. Clearly doesn’t care when Star’s mom goes missing, his ego in the Neverzone and neglecting Nacho’s for a very long time at least 1000 years. Marco breaks up with Kelly for no reason and he knows what’s she going through.

For Star, she acts more of a princess and has responsibilities, having a reason why she can’t go back to Earth but it doesn’t excuse her being a terrible person. She’s irresponsible that she leaves Rhombus and Eclipsa alone despite it’s very clear they want to kill each other, she’s a brat in “Junkin’ Janna”, she’s so rude to Tom when he comes a better person for her, she’s been eyecandy on Marco even though she has a boyfriend and she’s a complete dick in “Cleaved”. I hate the excuse for her acting like a prick because “she’s a teenager, and teenagers are dumb”. What a load of bull

Losing Focus

Season 4 has to be the most unforced in the entire show. They present plot points and they barely explore it. They’ll make a comment about it and the show just moves on from it. Mostly showing shipping episodes and filler

The show introduced that mewmens were originated from Earth but never further explored that.

Mewni hates monsters but never shows why and how. It just makes them complete dicks throughout season

They never had a set goal or what’s trying to be. The only thing that made the plot moving was Moon disappearance but it gets resolved in two episodes.

So the only thing left is Star trying to end racism for season 4. The problem with this is there’s no stakes, if she fails, monsters and mewmens won’t get along and that’s fine because their children on both sides won’t make the same mistake as they did, making it no need to push it.

It would’ve worked better if they showed the Mewni perspective when Eclipsa became ruler. Unfortunately, they display them as unguided children, expecting Moon to do everything for them and complain. Also they hate monsters because they do not like them. Most of them go live with Moon, making them not accept change nor monsters. They don’t deserve any sympathy, they are just a bunch of idiots who are racist.

And the thing that made the season so unfocused is the freaking shipping.

Starco is Terrible

Remember when it was good back the first two seasons but season 3 and mostly season 4 made it so hard to watch and instead of shipping being a subplot like most shows, they turn it into a main plot. I don’t understand why they have to prioritize shipping over the story. It’s inevitable that Starco will become cannon because that’s what people wanted but it cost to establish ships to be torn down in the most frustrating way.

Kelly and Marco break up with no reason why and it’s off screen.

Star is a bad girlfriend to Tom, leaving Star crying

Then in a few hours, Star and Marco become a couple. Only a few hours and the resolution was so dang quick. It makes me wonder why they have to stay so long if she loves Marco more than him?

Star and Marco would rather die together instead of being with their family despite their relationship just starting. It would’ve worked better if Tomstar broke up earlier and Starco become cannon so we can see their relationship more than just a few episodes. There’s really no need to drag it for so long!

Mina Loveberry isn’t Threatening

Mina Loveberry, the main villain for season 4 and yet didn’t do anything. Unlike Toffee scheming behind the scenes for three seasons, Ludo raising an army of rats and gaining better control of the wand and Meteora powers growing, she didn’t play her role for the whole season. All she did is she rebuilt her battle armor and send poison fruits to Eclipsa, that’s it. The show never showed how dangerous she is

While sure she can beat Star and Tom but she got oneshoted by Meteora who got defeated by Eclipsa. So she really isn’t that big of a problem to handle.

In the finale, again she never did anything and she got knocked down by a Corrupted Unicorn, making her not so dangerous like other characters said she was

Seth should’ve been the main villain instead of that crazy lady but unfortunately, they never introduce him even though he’s still alive according to The Book of Spells.

Cleaved

So the series finale and I have to say, my god how the show has fallen. This finale is a disaster, it’s way worse than any other cartoon finale such as Adventure Time and Steven Universe Future.

With no build up, Star has come to a conclusion that she needs to eradicate magic because it’s bad. There weren't any clear signs that magic is truly bad. Star never actually thought about everyone else that is made out of magic or used it for their daily life. The only thing she realized is she won’t be with Marco. Not able to her friends or the many lives she’ll ruin but she won’t see Marco and everyone agrees to destroy the magic.

So Star and Marco go to the World of Magic to destroy it. As they enter and almost forget who they are, the pudding apparently helps them jog their memory and he’s carrying a lot of them.

They realized Tom was still at the realm and he’s riding on the Corrupted Horse so Marco will handle it while Star uses the whispering spell to destroy it.

Star gets help destroying magic by Eclipsa, Moon and for some odd reason Meteora can do it too with her butterfly form even though she never went through mewberrity. Then the past queens help them out too

As they were destroying magic, Marco feeds Tom the pudding but gets impaled by the unicorn with dramatic music playing but that got completely scrapped when he goes back to Earth.

After they successfully destroyed magic, Star and Marco have to go back their worlds but then she decided she wants to abandon everything and everyone so she can be with Marco and he does the same by staying in the realm. They both hug and something happens through the power of love that links between two worlds and again they were a couple for two episodes.

She goes back to Mewni and sees that she doesn’t have cheek marks anymore. Moon, mewmens and Mina are reformed and no punishments were given.

With magic gone, her and her family just caused the multiverse that relies on magic, face chaos and they will collapse entirely. Although they prevented genocide of the monsters but ultimately cause genocide at a larger scale than Mina’s in the process like all of Star spells, people who are made out of magic and The Magic High Commsions are dead.

Then two portals for each world exploded and both worlds collide. The writers made it out as if it’s a happy ending but it just causes panic between both worlds and racism towards monsters is now worse than ever but Starco can at least be together.

Conclusion

I used to like Star vs The Forces of Evil and I thought it would’ve been great but like most shows that disappointed me such as Steven Universe, and Voltron, this show really frustrated me. If the show actually didn’t focus too much on the shipping or made it as a romantic show, it would've been great but they didn’t and the show suffers for that. It’s a dang shame that it has to that route.

#Star vs The Forces of Evil #svtfoe #Star Butterfly #Marco Diaz #River Butterfly #Eclipsa Butterfly #Moon Butterfly #Rhombulus #Hekapoo #Mina Loveberry #Globgor #Tom Lucitor #Kelly #Starco #Tomstar #Kellco

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keepyourpantsongohan · 5 years

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Ayesha Liveblogs Naruto Shippuden S20 (Pt. 4)

Hashirama’s “:O” face at everything is so endearing

Hagoromo is now really the time for a family story there are three children and a sad old man in need

“It was a few thousand years ago” Zetsu just said it was 1,000 years ago how bad are you guys at telling time

I wonder how Hashirama feels about Madara being his Soulmate™

“I want make sure [the Tailed Beasts] don’t fight amongst each other, and that people don’t use their powers for evil” better 2 have tried and failed I guess

“That’s because a toad’s dream is destiny” weird flex but ok

“So then, will everything I do now be meaningless?” “Don’t waste your time worrying” Ffgkjhfgkjh damn I didn’t ask for a lecture on fatalism in my Naruto liveblog

Lmao @ this dude revealing his thievery scheme after talking to Hagoromo for 0.5 seconds what makes him think everyone will be on board with it

“I only want you to go away as soon as possible” ah looks like Hagoromo made a friend lmao

“If we make it too sturdy, you’ll break your bones when you try to destroy it” they actually did a really good job of making Hagoromo charming like consider me charmed I wanna hear abt ur ninja way

Hahahah I admire Futami for not bringing up the horns for the entire length of time it took them to build the bridge

Futami: Hagoromo-sensei gave me a high-five one time and it touched my heart so I formed a cult around him

Wait if Hagoromo only gave 8 disciples chakra are the nine of them together responsible for fathering all the shinobi world what kind of Gengis Khan fuckery

Minus the Hyuga, who, for some reason are moon aliens, I guess

“Throughout this long history men appeared, one after another, with the desire to use the tailed beasts for their own evil purposes. And that turned the tailed beasts against mankind. Anyway, back to my story.” Hahahaha did Hagoromo just go “(A/N: Fuck Obito and Madara lol)”

Unbelievable you’re telling me there was someone who wanted to get with this old man with horns and three eyes who leads a cult and you won’t show me WHO where is the justice

OH HEY FUTAMI HELPING RAISE THE KIDS I GUESS? WILD

Mmmm I love Ashura already 1000/10 endearing impulsive baby

Some filler storyboard artist who I respect beyond reason: But what if... we added.... a dog

“It might even be bigger than yours” please don’t tell me they fished Zetsu out of the river

"I didn’t realize you thought so deeply about [chakra being used as a weapon]” “Yeah, well” “But then again, what will be, will be” what kind of parenting is this Hagoromo kjhgkjhgkjhg

Indra, 10 years old: I am concerned about the ethical impact of my innovation

Hagoromo: YOLO, son ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

“I’ll be watching you” Is that the voice of......... Pubescent Zetsu

LMAO IT IS

These kids are really emotionally unprepared for the boar considering they were following boar tracks into the woods

ARE YOU SHITTING ME THEY EVEN USED THE SAME FILLER DOG NAME LMAO WHO IS WRITING THIS

I CANNOT BELIEVE THEY KILLED THE DOG I’M SO MAD

Wow @ them having Indra invent chidori instead hkjhgkhg poor Kakashi

Indra awoke his sharingan over losing his dog I cannot believe this how are dogs the central plot device of multiple arcs

“Whatever is in this village belongs to everyone - that’s the law” wow along with fatalism this arc is also teaching us about the practical failings of communism

“The law is still the law” where’s the post that says Sasuke is ethnically a cop. Because that’s this arc

Not 2 be that gal again but Indra’s voice is also nice on the ears he has inherited his grandmother’s kekkei genkai of having an attractive voice and a terrible moral compass

...............kekkei grandma

“Looking into his eyes reminds me of my mother’s eyes” I was kind of joking about the kekkei grandma thing but fair

“At that moment I felt that I understood for the first time why heaven had blessed me with two sons” have you ever considered your eldest son is mean in part because you make comments like this

“What will the two of you do when you are out in the world alone” wow Hagoromo is giving his kids some kind of High-Stakes Bell Test

Hahaha I like Taizo I hope they don’t do anything to him but they probably will because he’s had so much screen time

HAHAHAHA I LOVE THIS SQUAD it’s the first ninja team and the boy is the healer!!!

Ashura: OH NO I’VE FORGOTTEN HOW TO GENJUTSU

Kanna and Taizo: WE GOT U BUDDY WE GOT BATS

I thought I was going bananas for a sec but the intro did change lol

Poor Tenzo I think he’s been officially discarded from OPs RIP

Side note: Having a Naruto blog has made me so wary of Kakashi and Sakura standing next to each other I don’t trust the ppl on this website to be normal for a second RIP x2

“They’ll suffer, sure, but everyone dies eventually” okay calm down Taizo

“It doesn’t matter whether it’s possible or not, because I’ve decided to do it” I admire Ashura’s blind optimism lmao

Not to poke too many holes but why would the water in the well not be affected by the Divine Tree

I take my comment about healing back ludicrously all the men get to display chakra natures and the women can only display glowing yin chakra hands booooo

Omg there is a Tenzo after all in an ED at least!! This is the first time I’ve seen all three members of the Naruto’s Dad Association in one place!!! Bless up

A shot of them standing all together!!!! My heart!!!!!!!!

SASUKE AND NARUTO’S GRINS AT EACH OTHER I WEEEP

[Hagoromo as Kakashi voice]: TEAMWORK!!

I was very much expecting Indra to go crazy and kill those two guys but wow that was a scene

“Enough to make you fall in love with him and follow him all the way here” At least Ashura gets like a real wife instead of Hagoromo’s ‘ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ she dead’

Hagoromo: Indra’s a dick because his eyes are red trust me it has nothing to do with my parenting I’m a chakra scientist

“Indra, just what is the meaning of this” it’s a temper tantrum lmao

Was it really necessary to kill both of those guys Indra one best friend death usually suffices for mangekyo my dude

Minato joining Kakashi in the club of Boyz Who Jutsu Was Plagiarized

Hagoromo really has absolutely zero hesitation to attack his son and you wonder why Indra has a complex

“THIS IS THE POWER OF OUR BOOOOOND” he said, as he punched his brother in the face with a thousand wooden hands (mood)

Indra’s Lightning Teleportation Jutsu is really doing The Most the Raikage is not nearly this dramatic about it

Can you... just.... declare that your soul will be reincarnated? Is that how that works?

Also. Who slept with Indra?! U made him out to be like. Very Not Okay. But he’s the forefather of the Uchiha?? WHERE ARE THESE CHILDREN COMING FROM TELL ME WHO IS BANGING THIS OUT OF CONTROL FAMILY

Hahahahaha I’M SO READY FOR THIS RIDICULOUS TEAM 7 TRYING TO UNMASK KAKASHI EPISODE BRING IT THE FUCK ON

I knew the Sukea voice would be different but omg I’m still thrown

“S-kay-a” is really not how I thought that would be pronounced wow

“If I’m able to capture this Kakashi guy without a mask on, it’ll be the biggest scoop since the Leaf was established” a little arrogant Kakashi but okay kjhgkjhgkjhgjhg

This is such an adorable and weird bonding exercise of Kakashi teaching his kids how to break into Konoha’s archives I’M WHEEZING

I would pay money to see Kakashi explain what he was doing to all those dudes in ANBU who probably thought he was intimidating as all fuck catching him a wig with three twelve-year-olds breaking into his own file

“Who cares what I look like anyway!” THIS IS SO DUMB I LOOOOVE IT

“I think that a woman might’ve drowned right over there on the river bank” HINATA!!!!! UR TOO NICE TO BE ENLISTED INTO THIS SCHEMING HAHAHA

Oh I remember seeing reference to this scene booooo do they really have to make it weird all the time

This concept is even MORE ridiculous in the show bc it expands beyond Team 7 to all the other Konoha rookies like Kakashi how much do u enjoy teasing the children that this is how you’re spending your day

HAHAHAH Kakashi is lucky that the person who knows him best has face blindness and can’t call him out for his schemes

Okay not to betray my own brand but ᵏᵏᵍᵃᶦ ᶜᵘᵗᵉ

They really designed a nicer apartment for Kakashi just so they could animate his silhouette in the shower STUDIO PIERROT PLEASE

Fhkjhkjfhkjhkf that last scene made me so uncomfortable I don’t really like seeing Kakashi’s mouth while he talks it’s weird

You know I spent a lot of this interlude chanting main arc main arc in my head but alas now that we have arrived I’ve remembered that the war arc climax is a mess

“If my chakra runs out, I’m done” seriously Obito.......... how are you here

Can you imagine if Naruto actually died.... what would that even mean for this series I can’t imagine

“I already marked this space, so I can hide out in my time-space” I want to know how Obito “marks a space” is it like a jutsu or does he just have to nod at it and go “my space now”

I would also pay money to see what Obito and Sakura talked about when they had to hang out in Kamui for a solid two minutes lmao

“So you’re friends with sensei huh?” “Yeah it’s complicated but I think we’re cool now” “Yeah, same with us and Sasuke” “Sorry about that” “I don’t forgive you but thanks”

“You alright?” define ‘alright’ but also Obito’s never been alright a day in his life, Sakura

Uh oh foreshadowing to the heavy gravity space where Obito d*es

Okay maybe this is the part of me that is still clings to their Part I friendship but Sasuke helping Sakura stand really brings out my inner soft bitch

“It would’ve been helpful if we could’ve received this advice a bit earlier” Tobirama’s bitter about sitting through five episodes of filler

Tobirama: Why haven’t u been helping this whole time

Hagoromo: It all comes down to Madara’s magic pelvis—

“This man lent me his power and that’s why we were able to get here” does Sakura not know Obito’s name either khgkjhgjkgh

How many times will we watch these same two flashbacks of Obito’s life

Looks like Kakashi brought a knife to a taijutsu fight LMAO

God Rin is such a good friend to Obito and he repays her by literally defacing her grave

“Am I powerless to do anything but sit here and watch” it’s not really your fault you can’t fly Kakashi tho u could try throwing some kunai or smth ur not a one sharingan pony

Ddkjhsdkjhd why does Obito get a line worrying about Naruto’s death but Kakashi doesn’t he’s spent the past two days trying to kill Naruto

I’m still emo abt Kakashi trying to die for Sasuke that’s his soooon

“Rin... this time, let’s spend some alone time together, just you and me” Why phrase it like that, Obito

"Why save someone useless like me” Kakashi get some therapy

“A fool full of only mistakes” it’s hard to disagree with Zetsu when they’re flashing back to every mistake Obito has ever made

Where’s the graphics set where Obito goes ‘admittedly I lost my cool here’ because that’s what that flashback was

Update: found it

“Don’t cry, Obito, you’ll just get laughed at” this fantasy is an indication that Obito has no real comprehension of how fucked up Kakashi was by Rin’s death

Can you believe that Rin still dies in Obito’s jonin AU like....what. It’s not even like “AU of what I want” it’s like “AU where I learn how to cope with trauma”

Also was this just an out for not designing an adult Rin bc he’s been thinking about Rin endlessly for like three episodes straight so..... what up with that

It’s still so fucking funny that Iruka’s in Obito’s jonin fantasy like when did they meet did he just absorb secondhand Iruka appreciation from Naruto

“But, if you screw up, I won’t hesitate to step up as a candidate for Hokage myself” yesssssssss let Kakashi be the playful menace he truly aspires to be

Gjghjkhgjhg Obito’s “euuuuuuuuehhhh” when the paperwork dropped was funny

Sasuke’s face when Sakura punched Naruto was also v funny

Honestly to be real for a second Obito imagining himself as buddies with Team 7 makes me mad u’ve done nothing but make these kids’ life TERRIBLE until today babysitting license REVOKED!!!!!!

Am I a hypocrite for enjoying AUs ft. Obito? Mayhaps!!!

“You told me that saving you was pretty much the same as saving the whole world, remember?” (Well.)

“I’d say, you did your best” You know that post that said it makes sense that Rin said this bc she’s a Scorpio. I’m still upset about it

You know... Naruto’s “the coolest guy” (“nothing but awesome”) comment about Obito is a direct parallel to “Bravest man I ever knew” in HP and that’s why, if I were to meet either adult man, I would dropkick both of them. In this essay I will—

“It’s kind of annoying seeing [Kakashi] all stiff and useless” u right Obito

Kishimoto pick up the phone I just want to talk about that rabbit bijuu design

“A Susano’o? But whose?” DAD’S HEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRE

Kakashi with Six Paths Power REALLY feeds into my theory that Kakashi is Hagoromo’s transmigrant

THAT’S MY TEAM READY TO SAVE THE WORLD TOGETHER!!!!!

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 KAKASHI GETS HER VULNERABLE AND THEN THE BOYS ATTACK WHILE KAKASHI GUARDS THEIR BACKS AND SAKURA FORCES HER INTO PLACE THIS IS WHOLEASS TEAMWORK

“I really love you guys” YEAH HE DOES 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Okay arc over haha right guys we’re good now RIGHT GUYS??

In part, Kakashi jumping around to save his students feels very much reminiscent of Part I’s “MY SENSEI SENSES ARE TINGLING” swoop and scoop that he and Gai loved to do

Lmao @ Kaguya spitting Madara out like he’s a bad-tasting vegetable

Coming up with an OP specifically for VOTE2 is so extra but I kind of love it the Diver parallels!!!!

Sasuke is SUCH a liar abt his attitude towards Team 7 - more specifically towards Sakura and Kakashi bc he has already granted that he cares for Naruto

Sasuke: Comrades? I don’t know her

Also Sasuke: Constantly urging Sakura and Kakashi to get to safety and actively intervening when they’re not

“Honestly at this point I don’t think anything could shock me anymore” Sakura really needs a hug and a nap

“I shall be sure to ask Obito tell me that tale in the afterworld” the real question is if Obito will still look 12 when he takes Hagoromo on the harrowing journey that is his life

Kakashi truly has endless love in his stupid ass heart Obito’s like, “Hmmm... whoops sorry 4 committing mass murder” and Kakashi’s like “Hehe, we all mess up sometimes :) See u in heaven”

Madara and Hashirama really did invent being in gay love huh

WOW I WAS NOT EXPECTING TO TEAR UP BUT KJHFKJHFKJH MY BABY BOY SAYING GOODBYE TO HIS DAD HE IS THE WORLD’S BIGGEST SWEETHEART

“You’ve now finally settled things with Madara” Tobirama has been waiting for like a hundred years for his brother to get over his ex

Hagoromo: Naruto’s your new conference room congrats kids

Mmmmm I don’t like aaaaannnnnny of this

“You’re suggesting that I enjoy a roooOoomance” why say it like that Sasuke

I genuinely think this is the maddest that Kakashi’s ever been at Sasuke that boy is very, very grounded

“I, too, had two children at one time” OMG KAKASHI OFFICIALLY DESIGNATED TEAM 7 DAD BY HAGOROMO (ur miscounting tho Kakashi actually has four (4) children)

“I think I shall let Naruto handle this” said Hagoromo, and everyone who encountered any problem in this series ever

I’m very distracted from Sasuke’s dictatorship speech by the fact he looks so much like an alien. What is UP with his eyes they never look like this???? Why are they so far apart and narrow and angled

“Your blood will be the last that I shed” what r u just gonna keep genjutsuing ppl Sasuke? Could just keep the Tsukuyomi on then, homie

It also plays into the Hagoromo and Kakashi are related (spiritually or literally) that Hagoromo is equally as useless with advice to him lmao

Kakashi: What should I be doing, sir?

Hagoromo: Sometimes I like to pray :)

Fjkkjgkjhgkjhk Sasuke claiming that Naruto is his only bond never ceases to amaze me like Sakura and Kakashi are RIGHT THERE ghkjhgkjhgkj u have been protecting them this whole time while they shout how much they care abt u. Just admit u have a crush on Naruto and go!!!

“I know your heart well by now. And you mine” Sasuke u unintentionally romantic dumbass

“Finally decided to kill me, huh,” said a thrilled Sasuke, taking a lesson from the Kakashi School of Very Much Needing Ninja Therapy

This entire fight is the Life or Death equivalent of this tweet:

Lmao one of these boys lost a tooth I want to know which of them has a dental implant

Omg............... Iruka what is going ON.... u are suddenly v pale and also I think ur VA might be different could they not get the same Iruka or has he just forgotten how Iruka sounds

It was real unclear until this fight that Sasuke had any of the same powers as Nagato

“Now I can finally be alone... farewell, my one and only... friend” again... Sasuke... u can be in love with Naruto and still have other friends!!!!!!! Ask Naruto he has tons of friends he’s not in love with*

*Disclaimer: they are all in love with him

The idea that everyone Naruto’s ever cared about is spiritually trying to help him kick Sasuke’s ass is p funny

“Sakura and Kakashi are still there, they’ll figure something out” cute that you have such an assload of faith in your loved ones in ur life-flashing-before-you moment Sasuke but with what jutsu lmao

“I began to see a shadow of my own family in Squad 7″ YEAH HE DID 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

I still can’t believe that Kishimoto really wrote that all it took for Sasuke to return to Konoha was Naruto explaining to him how love and empathy work

Omg Sasuke laughing...... I missed your laugh you precious boy

“Release the infinite Tsukuyomi once I’m dead by transplanting my left eye into Kakashi or someone else” Fhjfhkfh it detracts a little from the significance of Sasuke offering his eye to Kakashi to add the “someone else” but I guess they gotta make the syllables match up

Why is every Uchiha’s long-term plan just to die before they have to deal with the consequences of their actions

“I’m sorry” “Sorry? For what” “For everything” “You got that right” Sasuke I think u need to treat all of ur teammates to ramen

“It’s finally back to the way it was” Kakashi loooves his baaabies

TENZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Omg they included Guren from the filler arc in this crowd hahahaha

Gaara and Naruto enveloped in that same beam of light like Kakashi and Tenzo in the Tsukuyomi kghjghkgh SP said gentle gay rights

“I’m forbidden to talk about it” Team 7 would RIOT if Sasuke was locked up in a cell like that fuck you

Hahahaha I wish I could see the scene where Kakashi and Iruka decided to ambush Naruto with study materials

Okay this is definitely a different Iruka ahhhhh weird I don’t like it

Iruka bursting into tears whenever Naruto talks about his progress.... same

I 100% believe that the vast majority of the reason Kakashi became Hokage was to pardon Sasuke but also that prison scene still seems appalling to me STOP MAKING THINGS WORSE THAN THEY WERE SHOWN TO BE

"Maybe next time” is super funny in the context that he does take her on his next mission outside the village and comes back with one (1) whole baby

Sasuke’s introspection usually seems to amount to “Birth is a curse and existence is a prison... oh hey Naruto <3″

The moral of the story seems to be that the best way to show someone you love them in ninja language is by telling them you want to keep punching them for the rest of your life

#i have caught up to the 699 adaption i am freeee #liveblogging #long post #ayesha liveblogs nahruto shipduden #ayesha talks anime #naruto series

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thecartoonarchivist · 6 years

Text

My Thought on The Dragon Prince

So, the first season of The Dragon Prince released on Netflix yesterday and like the cartoon nerd I am, I binged watched all the episodes at like... 12:00 at night. (Sue me.)

And I’m gonna be honest: I have some opinions.

For those of you who don’t know who I am, or haven’t seen my posts popping up from time-to-time over the past month or so, I’m the Cartoon Archivist. I’ve watched a lot of cartoons over the years and I help people find the cartoons that they’ve looking for; in my spare time, I write exposés on different cartoons that used to premiere on various networks and rate them. I won’t go into detail about my “cartoon resume” but if you’re interested in what I do, go ahead and check out my blog, or read this post here to get started.

Regardless, I feel that it’s my duty to my followers and my blog as a whole to write an article about what I’ve seen thus far and my opinions about The Dragon Prince.

And honestly?

It’s not that great. Shocking, I know. Unpopular opinion? More than likely. Will I get flack for it? Probably, but I’m more than willing to accept that.

Here’s the thing. While watching this series, I was keenly aware of all the things that it lacked; I knew exactly what it could be and that’s just not a spot that you want to place you want to put your audience into. It then appears to be half-baked, rushed, and disappointing because you know how much work went into the show--- you know how much was sacrificed to get it out on time.

And that’s just sad.

Now, before I go into detail, I feel that I need to clarify a few things.

As much as it seems extremely unfair to compare this series to that of Avatar: The Last Airbender, that’s exactly what I will be doing but for a good reason. You see, Avatar: The Last Airbender was a trailblazer in a lot of ways. Although it wasn’t the first western animation that featured a large, complicated, overarching plot, it was the first to do so with, not only a plan of how each season was to go and lead towards the finale, but to have such important character growth as well. Shows like Teen Titans, Ben 10, and Samurai Jack to varying degrees all had similar types of storytelling that was present in Avatar: The Last Airbender and these groundbreaking shows helped pave the way for Avatar to even exist. But it wasn’t until Avatar was released that it helped show western audiences the types of stories that could be told in animation. Anime was already telling these stories over in Japan, even premiering some of their stories in the west with television programming such as Anime Network, or Toonami--- but these never really seen such sweeping popularity, and for the most part, was catered towards kids and early teenagers. However, Avatar was so popular that I haven’t met a single person who was a child when this show was airing that hasn’t at least seen the show. (I’ve met one or two individuals who didn’t like the show, but they’ve at least seen it. [Needless to say, they turned out to be very nasty people but that’s neither here nor there...]) It’s probably one of, if not the, cartoon that went from being considered a “children’s show” to being a family show. My parents watched it! My parents loved it! It wasn’t a weird thing to watch this show because it managed to cater to many demographics. And for that, it becomes one of the most influential cartoons within the past 20 years. Avatar has turned 13 years old this past February and it feels like it could of been released this past year. It is simply, a classic.

However, aside from Avatar, there’s not many cartoons to compare The Dragon Prince to. I could compare it to shows that I’ve stated before: Teen Titans, Samurai Jack, Ben 10, Codename: Kids Next Door, and many others. But the problem is that many of these shows focus on one type of storytelling. With Ben 10 and Codename: Kids Next Door, there wasn’t so much of an “overarching plot” that drove the series forward as much as there was character development over a series. You could make a case for Ben 10, saying that Ben 10 gaining the omnitrix and trying to remove it was the overarching plot of the show, but to that I say, there wasn’t a particular finale planned for that “goal.” It was more of a vague possibility that they worked and not every season funneled towards it. There wasn’t an escalation. Not everything was working towards this goal. It was simply there. For Teen Titans and Samurai Jack, there was an overarching plot but at the expense of other things. For Teen Titans, there was an overarching plot for a season; it focused on the problems and the struggles for one of the Titans for a season, maybe even a couple of episodes within a season, but there wasn’t a particular end goal. There wasn’t a final boss to defeat. There wasn’t an overarching plot that connected the overarching plots. It was primarily focused on character growth. For Samurai Jack, it had an overarching plot at the expense of character growth. For the most part, Jack stays the same throughout the series. He may learn some new tactics, become more accustomed to his new surroundings, fight new and increasingly difficult challenges, but he doesn’t grow towards something. He continuously tries to go back home and defeat Aku, but there’s not the constant escalation towards a final battle like there is in Avatar. Because of this, The Dragon Prince is in the difficult position of not only having such a ridiculously small venue to compare itself to, but also the fact that it’s going to be compared to its spiritual predecessor. It’s unfair. It’s cruel. But it’s the only other show that uses the same complete range of techniques that The Dragon Prince uses. I may compare it somewhat to Anime, but seeing as that’s eastern animation versus western animation, I’ll try to refrain from that as much as possible. So while it appears that comparing The Dragon Prince to Avatar: The Last Airbender pre-establishes a bias and unfair advantage towards Avatar, I’m only doing that out of lack of options and opportunity. Otherwise, I will try to remain as objective as possible. After all, The Dragon Prince needs to be able to stand on its own merit, regardless of its predecessor.

Now that that’s out of the way...

One of the first things to comment on is the art-style, and for a lot of people, it’s a bit of a turn-off. For one thing, it’s animated using cheaply produced CGI, which leaves the animation rather choppy.

However, that doesn’t really bother me too much. The character designs are fantastic. The establishing shots and aerial angles of the backgrounds are absolutely stunning. And even while using such a generic type of animation, they were still able to create a unique look to their animation that anyone would be able to identify this cartoon from a mile away. For what the technology they were working with, they did a great job. Could they have used better technology? Certainly. But for what they had, I was generally pretty happy with the result.

On top of this, I was an individual who was able to sit through the awful animation of Ajin: Demi-human and still enjoy myself so... really... it’s not as bad as it could’ve been. (And for those of you who never saw Ajin, here’s a clip of the animation. It’s just... hot garbage...)

Watching all 9 episodes that released yesterday on Netflix, I feel that I can identify 3 major problems that I had with the overall quality of the series.

1.) The Plot Felt Rushed.

The best way I can describe the overall feeling I had from watching this series is if someone tried to explain to me their DnD campaign in the span of 9 twenty-five minute episodes. And to any DnD or Table-top RPG player, this seems like a dream come true. However, in practice? This is a very poor way to tell a story. Having watched way too many hours of DnD livestreams and YouTube shows, I can tell you that when you try and summarize a DnD campaign, it just doesn’t amount to actually sitting down and watching each individual session. Many of the things that the average individual wouldn’t include in their overall summary of the campaign help us feel closer to the characters involved! The weird, crazy antics and conversations that players get themselves into help reveal to the audience (and to each other!) the type of people each character is. If we don’t spend enough time with these characters, getting to know their personality, they’re speech patterns, their quirks, it becomes a whole lot harder to care for what they want or are striving towards. It becomes difficult to relate to them as people and you begin to view them more as symbols, or objects than actual living beings. Watching this series, I felt like I was constantly being fire-hosed with information and plot and world-building and backstory and character growth and new characters and my god how much can you fit into one fucking episode I’m so---- I never had breathing room. I never had enough time to get to know these characters. I never got to see them when things were dull, or they had a long stretch of road to travel, or just having a moment to process all that’s happened. To be honest, I wanted some filler episodes. I wanted an episode or two where we weren’t focused on all the terrible things that were going wrong. I just... I wanted a moment to breathe. And seeing as they only included 9 episodes instead of the standard 24, I can’t help but feel that they should’ve put it off. Now, maybe there was some pressure from Netflix to get this baby out to the public, but really, it was to the show’s detriment. It wasn’t ready. It needed more time. The scripts needed a better once over, another look to say, “You know what? Maybe we should put another couple one-off episodes to make this breathe a little better.” It just... it needed more time.

2.) The Characters Felt Like Chess Pieces, Not Characters.

What do I mean by that? Well, let me explain.

In writing, one of the major things that they tell you is that your characters should fuel your plot. Their actions and reactions should help push your plot forwards; in every scene, they should be working towards their goals and what they want, and if they aren’t well... you should cut it.

If you’re using your characters as chess pieces, that simply means that your characters aren’t fueling your plot, your plot is fueling your characters. Each character does a certain thing, not because your character wants to do X thing, or does something because of X reasons, but simply because the plot calls for it. When this happens, characters become wishy-washy. The small little problems that arise come, not from conscious character decisions and personality clashes, but from lack of communications and convenient drama problems. On top of this, small character quirks, lines of dialogue, actions that actually affect the plot of the story, could be fulfilled by any one of the cast of characters. They aren’t individual people with their own wants and desires, their own personalities and flaws. They simply become pieces to fill a role that’s empty and as an audience member, how am I supposed to empathize with that? How am I supposed to care about these people and their struggles when whatever “3- dimensional personality traits and backstory” could’ve been fulfilled by... anyone...

On top of this, it causes character motivations to become muddled. They may have a “reason” as to why they act the way that they do, but it doesn’t really affect their personality.

Let’s take Zukko for example. It’s goal, his motivation, is to capture the Avatar at all costs. Why? To restore is honor. To be accepted back into the Fire Nation with open arms. To make his father proud of him for once in entire life. Because of this motivation, Zukko is desperate. He wants so badly to be accepted by his father that he’s willing to do anything in order to capture the Avatar. This affects his actions. He’s very rash. He doesn’t think things through to their fullest extent. He’s a very angry character because of the fact that he’s so desperate for the love and acceptance that he’s never received from his father that every single failure, every single step back, every single moment that he has to wait and plan and think things through seems like a delay of his desires. If you were to place Sokka, or Katara, or Aang, or any other character in the same exact situation that Zukko was placed under, they wouldn’t react the same exact way and that’s what makes a character individual. If we were to compare Zukko to Rayla, we see that Rayla’s actions... could’ve been Soren’s actions, or King Harrow’s actions, or even Callum’s actions if placed in the same exact circumstances. The fact that she spared a random human soldier, or the fact that she’s teaming up to save the Dragon Prince doesn’t seem like a decision that she’s actively made. It only seems like she’s made those decisions because the writers wanted her to, or because the plot called for it. The writers say that it’s because Rayla wants redemption for her parents cowardice but I don’t really believe it. If Rayla really wanted to redeem herself, she wouldn’t have hesitated to kill the human soldier. If she found the Dragon Prince with the human princes, she would have taken the egg for herself and became the hero of her people. Why would she care about some war? Why would she care about the “fear in the soldier’s eyes” or “the right thing to do?” The only thing that is established that we know about is that she’s trying to redeem herself for her parents mistakes, which is why she’s the fastest, the strongest, and the most skilled in her group. All these... additional actions? They make no sense. They’re out of character. They just don’t... fit. And because of that, they don’t feel real. They simply feel like chess pieces that the author uses to further the plot. Granted, we’ve only seen 9 episodes of Rayla, but even in the early seasons of Avatar, every character’s actions had a purpose even if we, the audience, couldn’t see it, we could feel the consistency within the character. But with The Dragon Prince? There was no character consistency and because of that, the audience could feel that.

3.) Who’s The Villain?

Consciously, I know who the villain is. Viren is supposed to be this big man-ba-jama that’s supposed to be out to kill the prince. Why? Because he wants the throne... supposedly. But... why? What does he gain by becoming the King of an empire at war? Power, sure but... nobody wants power for the sake of power. If he really did, he would have killed King Harrow a long time ago. But instead, he’s simply trying to pull Scar (from The Lion King) with... no real reason? I mean, Scar wanted power because he wanted people to respect him. But I’m still baffled as to why Viren wants the throne...

And as far as The Dark Magic is concerned, I mean... I get why Dark Magic is supposed to be bad. Using someone’s life-force against their will is... it’s kinda horrific. Not to mention, the process appears to be pretty fucking painful, so yeah. Bad Idea™. But like.... what’s the benefit of using Dark Magic? What do you gain by using it? Like, we have 6 different sources of magic. We have multiple different magical ways to solve a problem, why do we need a new “evil terrible” one? On top of that, Viren isn’t... a threat? Like... yeah, he orders to kill the princes. Yeah, he places Runaan’s soul in a coin which is pretty fucking bad but like... with Firelord Ozai, he killed millions of people. He burned his own fucking son just because dared to speak out of turn, like that’s straight up sociopathic. He uses his children as tools and doesn’t care for anyone but himself. But Viren? He... actually cares? And he has legitimate feelings? And maybe he uses his children as tools but at the end of the day, he still actually cares about them and like... Viren legitimately seems like he’s just trying to do what he thinks as right, but doing it in the worst fucking way possible.

And maybe that’s the point of the series. Maybe it’s the idea that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” but there just... isn’t enough indication of that fact. The series tries to paint these children as “right” and Viren as “wrong” and Runaan as “overzealous” and General Amaya as “misguided” and... when you want to use gray morality, you have to show the good actions people take along with the bad actions. You have to show that the villains are capable of good, that the heroes are capable of bad, and that there’s a reason for everything someone does.

That’s how you write gray morality. But seeing as the characters aren’t solid personalities and there isn’t really a reason for a character to make any particular action, it becomes nigh impossible to do so.

So, where does that leave us?

Well, it’s not a bad show. The world-building is so vibrant and so alive that I would love to see a DnD campaign or some other form Table-top RPG to come out of this series. The animation was actually surprisingly good for what they were working with. Yeah, backgrounds were a little recycled and a bit bland from time-to-time. They could’ve used some more in-between frames to make the animation more smooth and connected. Even some shots leave me going, “Ewwww.... You really skipped that one for time, didn’t cha?” But at the end of the day, I could dig it. I could ignore it for what was happening.

The problem is that the writing was so rushed. The characters felt lost. The plot was running at a break neck pace. I didn’t understand why anything was happening the way it was. I was just... disappointed. While looking through some gifs for this post, I feel like this one really describes my overall impression of the show.

It needed more.

It needed more time, more character development, more episodes. Just... more.

Problem is that it’s a quality show. It’s so much better than many of the animations that I’ve seen in recent years that it really does become a cut above the rest. However, like I said before, I know what it could be. And that just makes me extremely sad for its lost potential.

Overall, if I had to rate it, I’d give it a solid 7 out 10.

I’m going to keep tabs on it. The first season is always the roughest one, so in the future, it very well could live up to expectations. But for now, it’s just... disappointing. It isn’t bad by any means. I’ve seen some bad animations in my time and this doesn’t even come close to that. But I just feel like it could be so much more and that really bothers me.

If there are any corrections you’d like to make in regards to this post, please feel free to send me a message with your corrections and I’ll get back to it as soon as I can!

Do you remember a cartoon your friends have never heard of? Got a scene from an animated film that you’re dying to know the name to? Send your questions to The Cartoon Archivist and I’ll see what I’ve got in the vault!

#the dragon prince #tdp #tdp spoilers #the dragon prince spoilers #netflix #2015-present #I see one of two things happening #1: I'm gonna get a big boost in followers #2: I'm gonna get a lot of hate mail for this #Or both #I don't really care all that much #I just felt the need to share my opinions on this because let me tell you: I HAVE SOME OPINIONS #I JUST WANTED MORE GODDAMN IT

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sweetsummersansa-blog · 7 years

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EVERY SINGLE DETAIL THAT PROVES JONSA IS ENDGAME!

OKAY SO HERE IT IS! Instead of focusing on University and schoolwork and basically all 1 000 000 more important things I need to do, I’ve written this collection of EVERY. SINGLE. REASON why Jonsa will happen in the books and/or show… or all of them I can remember at least! There are honestly so much! Brace yourselves, for it is long (and full of spoilers if you aren’t caught up in the books or show), but I have tried to organize it best I can, and promise you it will be worth the read!!!

Are your Jonsa shipping hearts ready? Okay! Here we go!

SECTION A - SO MANY NED AND CAT 2.0 PARALELLS!

Let me just start off by saying that of all the romantic couples ever to have been shown/talked about in ASOIAF and GOT, Ned and Cat have been shown to be the strongest, healthiest and as close to perfect as any married couple can get. Their love didn’t come in an instant crazy passion (which GRRM makes pretty clear that he thinks those kind of relationships are unrealistic or doomed from the start, as he shits on those kinds of pairings -Robb/Jeyne/Talisa; Rhaegar/Lyanna; Sansa/Joffrey; Tyrion/Tysha; etc.) Ned and Cat built their relationship stone by stone and they had the happiest of marriages in the series. Cat even calls Ned “The rock I built my life upon” … I mean that’s just beautiful.

Okay! That being established, there is just soooo much evidence in the show and books that points to Jon and Sansa being set up as Ned/Cat 2.0 and thus, foreshadowing that they will end up together…. And here it is:

1)-Parallels in the way they look (Books and Show)

Jon is the Stark child that looks most like Ned (Ned 2.0) – even more than Ned’s trueborn children, while

Sansa is the Stark child that looks the most like Cat (Cat 2.0) - this has been emphasized A LOT in the books and show, I don’t really think I need to get into the details because it’s been stated soooo many times and it’s pretty obvious.

But I will note that even the costumes and hair choices made for both Jon and Sansa in the show are definitely made to parallel Ned and Cat. Take a look:

**BONUS: Michelle Clampton said in an interview that Sansa’s costumes have a pattern that is almost fishlike, referencing her mother and her Tully blood (Cat 2.0).

Also, when Sansa gave Jon his cloak, she made it specifically to look like the one their father wore (Ned 2.0).

2)- Parallels in the way they act (Books and Show)

Jon/Ned parallels : Honor is very important to Jon, just as it was to Ned, and Jon often channels Ned when making decisions in the story: EXAMPLE: Jon Snow executes Janos Slynt in the same way Ned Stark executed the deserter from the Night’s Watch

And can we just take a moment to appreciate this…

I saw this on google, so I don’t know the original poster, can someone tell me if they know whom the gif set belonged to?

Sansa/Catelyn parallels:

Sansa often channels her mother to give her strength when she needs to be strong in the story. EX: Sansa says in the books “I must be as strong as my Lady mother”

I also want to point out that Sansa resembles Cat so much, in personality as well as looks, that Creepyfinger projected his obsession with Cat onto Sansa… and even went so far as to murder a King out of obsession for her.

3)-Both Ned/Cat and Jon/Sansa built their relationship stone by stone (Show)

Like Ned and Cat, Jon and Sansa have been building their relationship stone by stone ever since they reunited. Jon and Sansa had the most estranged relationship out of all the Stark “siblings” and now, they have become the closest. This all happened stone by stone.

It started out with little things- like Sansa gifting Jon with a Stark cloak she made- and then developed into the both of them being able to place huge amounts of trust in each other - i.e Jon entrusting Sansa to rule the North for him.

4)- Jon/Sansa scenes are shot in the same way as Ned/Cat scenes (Show)

Just look at this! In FOUR instances, THREE being separate instances over the span of two episodes in the most recent season, Jon and Sansa scenes were shot EXACTLY the way Ned and Catelyn scenes were shot. Same camera angles and everything! There is no way in hell this is a coincidence. This is deliberate!

THE SHOWRUNNERS ARE DELIBERATELY PARALELLING JON/SANSA AS NED/CAT 2.0! …But okay… if you need more proof that Jonsa will be endgame, wait right there honey because I gots a hell of a lot more up my sleeve! Let’s continue, shall we?

SECTION B - FORSHADOWING OF JON AND SANSA REBUILDING WINTERFELL/THE NORTH TOGETHER (BOOKS AND SHOW)

1-) Foreshadowing of Jon and Sansa being an excellent team as King and Queen (of the North)

When discussing battle strategy with Stannis, (in the show and especially the books) Jon shows impeccable knowledge about the North- its houses, its people, its strength and weaknesses… basically everything that a good Warden/King of the North should know. Why show this is such detail if it isn’t going to be useful/foreshadow something further down the line – as in him using that knowledge to defend the North when he rules it?

Sansa has learned from the very best in The Game – (Littlefinger, Margery, Cersei) and has proven to be very politically savvy in both the show and the books. Again, why bother giving her character these skills if she isn’t going to use them?

With Jon being the military man and Sansa being the political mastermind, they are both foreshadowed in the books to be the other half each other needs to rule well.

This is then PROVEN in the show

The show has shown Jon and Sansa to be a very good team as King in the North and Lady of Winterfell. Jon is a great military man, and is working hard to defend the North. Sansa is very politically savvy and great at managing domestic responsibilities as well (ex: food stores, clothing and armor). They work well together…almost as if they were a married couple?

Why show them as being a very efficient team to such detail unless to set them up to be King and Queen together in the end?

...SEE even Sophie Turner ships it! (anyone know the original maker of this gif set, for credit purposes?)

2-) Both Jon and Sansa dream of recreating the Winterfell of their childhood and putting their family back together (Books).

Jon’s Dream:

“I would need to steal her if I wanted her love, but she might give me children. I might someday hold a son of my own blood in my arms. A son was something Jon Snow had never dared dream of, since he decided to live his life on the Wall. I could name him Robb. Val would want to keep her sister’s son, but we could foster him at Winterfell, and Gilly’s boy as well. Sam would never need to tell his lie. We’d find a place for Gilly too, and Sam could come visit her once a year or so. Mance’s son and Craster’s would grow up brothers, as I once did with Robb. He wanted it, Jon knew then. He wanted it as much as he had ever wanted anything”

- Jon dreams of having a son named Robb, taking his father’s place in the family (and also raising Mance’s and Craters’s son in the way Ned raised Robb and Jon).

Sansa’s Dream:

“If I give him sons, he may come to love me. She would name them Edward and Brandon and Rickon […] In Sansa’s dreams, he children looked just like the brothers she had lost. Sometimes there was even a girl who looked like Arya”

-Sansa dreams of having sons named Bran and Rickon and a daughter like Arya, taking her mother’s place in the family.

Notice that Jon and Sansa’s fantasies complete each other – or complete the Stark family when put together. The only person who is missing from their fantasies are themselves and each other.

And while their fantasies are with other people (Val and Willas) they do not feature their significant other in their fantasy much… they fantasize about those people as being filler roles for the mother/father of their children in their hypothetical family. They are not important to fulfilling the fantasy at all.

And truly, Jon and Sansa are the only ones who knew what each other’s childhood in Winterfell were like, and they are the only two people in the whole series who share this dream. Thus, they are the only ones who can realistically bring the other’s fantasy to life. Them sharing this particular dream foreshadows that they are each other’s perfect partner/soulmate. Together they will make their dreams a reality.

3)- Sansa literally rebuilt Winterfell out of SNOW (Books and show)

In case you didn’t get that… SANSA REBUILT WINTERFELL OUT OF SNOW (A.K.A JON)

**BONUS: In the books, while building the castle Sansa “could feel the SNOW on her lashes, she could taste the SNOW on her lips. It was the taste of Winterfell. The taste of innocence. The taste of dreams (a reference to the dream she and Jon share of raising a family in Winterfell?) […] Drifting snowflakes brushed her face AS LIGHT AS A LOVER’S KISS”

There is also more text in the beginning of the chapter linking Jon with this scene:

“The snow drifted down and down, all in ghostly silence, and lay thick and unbroken on the ground. All color had fled the world outside. It was a place of whites and blacks and greys. White towers and white snow and white statues, black shadows and black trees, the dark grey sky above. A pure world, Sansa thought. I do not belong here. Yet she stepped out all the same. Her boots tore ankle-deep holes into the smooth white surface of the snow, yet made no sound”

This passage strangely reminds me of Ghost, Jon’s direwolf. I mean “ghostly silence” and Sansa not making a sound when walking in snow…Ghost is said to make no sound when he walks (which is why Jon gave him that name) just like Sansa in this quote. Also, Sansa sees the world around her in “whites blacks and greys”, almost as if she’s colour blind… colorblind like a direwolf.

**BONUS 2: Jon literally dreams about rebuilding Winterfell in the books: “Winterfell, he thought, Theon left it burned and broken, but I could restore it. Surely his father would have wanted that, and Robb as well. They would never have wanted the castle left in ruins”

Alright with all that said and done, now I’ll just finish this section right here with this little gem of a quote of Sansa’s while she was Alayne Stone:

“Stone and Snow, that was all that was left of Winterfell. Just like she and Jon”

SECTION C: JON BEING SANSA’S ONLY HERO (BOOKS)

1)-Jon as Prince Aemon the Dragon Knight

Okay, so to begin, I would like to draw everyone’s attention to this passage in the books about Jon and Robb:

“Every morning they had trained together, since they were big enough to walk; Snow and Stark, spinning and slashing about the wards of Winterfell, shouting and laughing, sometimes crying when there was no one else to see. They were not little boys when they fought, but knights and mighty heroes.

“I’m Prince Aemon the Dragonknight,” Jon would call out, and Robb would shout back, “Well, I’m Florian the Fool.” Or Robb would say, “I’m the Young Dragon,” and Jon would reply, “I’m Ser Ryam Redwyne. That morning he called it first. "I'm Lord of Winterfell!" he cried, as he had a hundred times before."

This particular passage foreshadows Robb’s fate.

His first hero, Florian the fool, was indeed a fool and died because of his love for Jonquil. In that respect, Robb was also a fool and chose love/a woman over his duty, and he also died because of it.

Robb also parallels his second hero the Young dragon. Read this conversation between Jon and Benjen:

"Daeron Targaryen was only fourteen when he conquered Dorne," Jon said. The Young Dragon was one of his heroes.

"A conquest that lasted a summer," his uncle pointed out. "Your Boy King lost ten thousand men taking the place, and another fifty trying to hold it. Someone should have told him that war isn't a game." He took another sip of wine. "Also," he said, wiping his mouth, "Daeron Targaryen was only eighteen when he died. Or have you forgotten that part?"

Both Robb and the Young Dragon were very young when they began playing at war, and both were very good at it – I will remind everyone that Robb was an excellent battle commander who won every battle he fought. He also died very young, just like the Young Dragon.

So, if this passage accurately foreshadowed Robb’s fate, we can assume it will accurately foreshadow Jon’s fate as well.

Jon will become - narratively speaking - Aemon the Dragonknight. Prince Aemon has been referred to as the noblest knight who ever lived, (by Arianne Martell explicitely and the majority of people in Westeros) and we all know how much Sansa wants a true and noble knight!

What is more, is that Prince Aemon was famously in love with Naerys –HIS SISTER.

Prince Aemon once won a tourney after his brother Aegon had forbidden him to take part, because Aegon wanted to crown his mistress of that time as the queen of love and beauty instead of Naerys. Disguised as the Knight of Tears, Aemon won the tournament and named Naerys Targaryen as queen of love and beauty in place of the mistress.

The love between Aemon and Naerys makes for arguably the most famous of love stories in all of the seven kingdoms.

Thus, as foreshadowing goes, Jon being Aemon the Dragonknight will have a romantic relationship with his sister (or sister turned cousin) Sansa.

Adding to this, in Sansa’s chapters, Prince Aemon comes up very often:

“Father, I only just now remembered, I can’t go away, I’m to marry Prince Joffrey.” She tried to smile bravely for him. “I love him, Father, I truly truly do, I love him as much as Queen Naerys loved Prince Aemon the Dragonknight” –Sansa to Ned

“Sweet one,” her father said gently, “listen to me. When you’re old enough, I will make you a match with a high lord who’s worthy of you, someone brave and gentle and strong. This match with Joffrey was a terrible mistake. That boy is no Prince Aemon, you must believe me.” – Ned to Sansa

“There are gods, she told herself, and there are true knights too. All the stories can’t be lies. […] She shouted for Ser Dontos, for her brothers, for her dead father and her dead wolf, for gallant Ser Loras who had given her a red rose once, but none of them came. She called for the heroes from the songs, for Florian and Ser Ryam Redwyne and Prince Aemon the Dragonknight, but no one heard” – Sansa’s thoughts. In this quote we see all 3 knights Florian, Ser Ryam Redwyne and Prince Aemon the Dragonknight come up again.

“True knights.” The queen seemed to find that wonderfully amusing. “No doubt you’re right. So why don’t you just eat your broth like a good girl and wait for Symeon Star-Eyes and Prince Aemon the Dragonknight to come rescue you, sweetling. I’m sure it won’t be very long now.” – Cersei to Sansa

Original poster of this theory was @butterflies-dragons I suggest you read the whole post linked here because it’s amazing and full of other foreshadowing moments! : https://butterflies-dragons.tumblr.com/post/162797291864/sansa-stark-a-wolf-with-dragon-wings-i-an

2)- Jon as Syemon Star-Eyes

Symeon Star-Eyes is a legendary figure from the Age of Heroes who was blind. He is described in tales as a knight even though chivalry came to Westeros thousands of years. He is also a knight associated with Jon who shows up reputedly in Sansa’s chapters.

Here is Jon being associated with Syemon Star-Eyes for the first time:

“There was a knight once who couldn’t see,” Bran said stubbornly, as Ser Rodrik went on below. “Old Nan told me about him. He had a long staff with blades at both ends and he could spin it in his hands and chop two men at once.”

“Symeon Star-Eyes,” Luwin said as he marked numbers in a book. “When he lost his eyes, he put star sapphires in the empty sockets, or so the singers claim. Bran, that is only a story, like the tales of Florian the Fool. A fable from the Age of Heroes.” The maester tsked. “You must put these dreams aside, they will only break your heart.”

The mention of dreams reminded him. “I dreamed about the crow again last night. The one with three eyes. He flew into my bedchamber and told me to come with him, so I did. We went down to the crypts. Father was there, and we talked. He was sad.”

“And why was that?” Luwin peered through his tube.

“It was something to do about Jon, I think” –Bran to Maester Lewin

...

“Those old histories are full of kings who reigned for hundreds of years, and knights riding around a thousand years before there were knights. You know the tales, Brandon the Builder, Symeon Star-Eyes, Night’s King … we say that you’re the nine-hundred-and-ninety-eighth Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, but the oldest list I’ve found shows six hundred seventy-four commanders, which suggests that it was written during—”

“Long ago,” Jon broke in. “What about the Others?”

This is a conversation between Jon AND Sam (the only chapter that overlaps across ADWD and AFFC).

...

“Not every man has it in him to be Prince Aemon the Dragonknight or Symeon Star-Eyes”

- Manderly to Davos. Jon isn’t mentioned in this passage, but I found it interesting how Symeon Star-Eyes is again associated with Prince Aemon the Dragonknight.

Some people think these parallels means Jon will be blind, but I think its a Jonsa foreshadowing.

3)-Execution of Janos Slynt

This is a CONCRETE EXAMPLE of Jon becoming Sansa’s actual hero! Take a look!

“Frog-faced Lord Slynt sat at the end of the council table wearing a black velvet doublet and a shiny cloth-of-gold cape, nodding with approval every time the king pronounced a sentence. Sansa stared hard at his ugly face, remembering how he had thrown down her father for Ser Ilyn to behead, wishing she could hurt him, wishing that some hero would throw him down and cut off his head. But a voice inside her whispered, There are no heroes,”

-Sansa’s thoughts in AGOT.

Then, in ADWD Jon acted as Sansa’s hero and literally cuts off his head:

Emmett kicked his legs out from under him. Dolorous Edd planted a foot on his back to keep him on his knees as Emmett shoved the block beneath his head. “This will go easier if you stay still,” Jon Snow promised him. “Move to avoid the cut, and you will still die, but your dying will be uglier. Stretch out your neck, my lord.” The pale morning sunlight ran up and down his blade as Jon clasped the hilt of the bastard sword with both hands and raised it high. “If you have any last words, now is the time to speak them,” he said, expecting one last curse.

Janos Slynt twisted his neck around to stare up at him. “Please, my lord. Mercy. I’ll … I’ll go, I will, I …”

No, thought Jon. You closed that door. Longclaw descended.

Credit to @blindestspot she wrote about this in the post liked here: http://blindestspot.tumblr.com/post/50820774456/jonxsansa

4)-Jon refuses to take Sansa’s claim to the North away from her

Marriage/betrothals are a very important part of Sansa’s character arcs and storylines. She is the key to the North and a very valuable political pawn. Everyone wants to use her for her claim, and not one of her suitors came to love her for who she actually is. She comes to this realization in the books, and it totally breaks her heart.

“No one will ever marry me for love. It's my claim they want” –Sansa’s thoughts

However, in ADWD Jon says:

1- "By right, Winterfell should go to my sister Sansa." –Jon to Stannis in his first chapter. "Lady Lannister, you mean? Are you so eager to see the Imp perched on your father's seat? I promise you, that will not happen whilst I live, Lord Snow."

2- "Winterfell belongs to my sister Sansa." –Jon tells Stannis this AGAIN in another chapter later on. "I have heard all I need to hear of Lady Lannister and her claim." The king set the cup aside. "You could bring the north to me. Your father's bannermen would rally to the son of Eddard Stark

Jon is the only one who does not lust for Sansa’s claim on the North. When he is offered it, he refuses it and states TWICE that Winterfell and the North belong to Sansa and Sansa alone , despite the fact she married Tyrion– thus, being the only person who cares about Sansa more than her powerful political position and also foreshadowing that Jon will be the one to marry Sansa for love and not her claim on the North.

I don’t think it can get any more obvious without being too obvious that Jon is Sansa’s perfect hero, and that they will end up together at some point. #jonsaisendgame

But if you still aren't convinced that Jonsa will happen, don’t look away just yet! I still have many a more proofs to provide you with!

SECTION D: HISTORY (BOOKS AND SHOW)

Alright, so I suggest you guys go get some coffee because this section will get a little long. But I have made charts and put pictures to make it easier to follow… Basically I will explain why Jonsa is endgame based on history!

Here we go! So GRRM based his series on the War of the Roses that took place in England in the 15th century, and many of his characters parallel the key players during that war. Specifically, Jon Snow/Targaryen parallels Henry Tudor and Sansa Stark parallels Elizabeth of York – and these characters ended up MARRIED as King and Queen of England at the end of the war. So according to history, that means Jon and Sansa will be married as King and Queen at the end of the series too!

Want proof Jon is Henry and Sansa is Elizabeth? I gotchu! Here we go:

** Little reminder before we start: GRRM confirmed that the Yorks of England are represented by the Starks in ASOIAF, (and the Lancasters of England are represented by the Lannisters).

...Need I say more?

And because I’m lazy, I’m reposting this post of mine I made a while ago comparing Sansa to Elizabeth of York, it’s not as detailed as the Jon/Henry chart, but this is the gist of the parallels between Sansa and Elizabeth:

Here is the link to my original post about EoY if you want to see the gifs in better quality : https://sweetsummersansa.tumblr.com/post/164786372376/elizabeth-of-york-sansa-stark

Now for all historians who want to argue about who Richard III actually is in the series (I say LF but some say Tyrion) if you see Richard III as a Littlefinger- which I think is more fitting- then this last point, as all pints about Richard II, applies as illustrated by the images above.

But I also want to note that for those people who see Richard the III as Tyrion, this last point still fits because Sansa married Tyrion- so still a strange romantic relationship. And we can also argue that Sansa lived as a bastard because of Tyrion – since she posed as a bastard in hiding because she was wanted by the crown after Tyrion was charged with Joffrey’s murder- and she was Tyrion’s wife. We can also argue that Tyrion did have something to do with the downfall of the Stark family, (as pictured in point n.4) because Tyrion was captured by Cat, which set into motion the events leading to the War of the Five Kings.

Anyways… regardless of who you think Richard III is, one thing is perfectly clear: SANSA STARK IS ELIZABETH OF YORK! Meaning she will end up with Henry Tudor/Jon in the end!

***Also wanted to add:

-Both Sansa and Elizabeth are described as having red hair and being fair of face

-Both are/were a valuable political pawn: Sansa = Key to the North, used by people to gain access to the North by marriage. While Elizabeth = used to solidify the King Henry’s claim to the throne through marriage

-In this video, in which historians and GRRM talk about the war of the roses, Sansa is also compared to Elizabeth of York https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOyUy5teWp. (Feel free to message me if the Sansa/Elizabeth parallels are unclear!)

**BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY OF ALL: Despite marrying initially for purely political reasons, Henry and Elizabeth are known for having one of the most successful and loving marriages/relationships of the English monarchy – and they built this loving relationship STONE BY STONE!

Last thing! Take a look at the Tudor coat of arms:

ITS A DRAGON AND A DOG/WOLF STANDING BESIDE EACHOTHER (WITH A LION ON TOP). THE SEVEN KINGDOMS WILL SEE A DRAGON (JON TARGARYEN) AND A WOLF (SANSA STARK) RULE SIDE BY SIDE!!!! (maybe with a lion as hand of the King) #GETHYPEDJONSAFAM

Credit to @kitten1618x: I drew inspiration from this post linked below, especially for the Henry Tudor parallels and the Tudor flag/coat of arms bit. Her post is great, I really suggest you read it she did amazing research! : http://kitten1618x.tumblr.com/search/henry%20tudor

Okay! Whew! I know that was a longer section but hopefully everyone is still with me!

And now, for my next act in the Jonsa-Is-Endgame show, I will be discussing one of my favorite theories/pieces of proof that Jon and Sansa will be together by the end of ASOIAF: LET’S GO

SECTION E: ASHFORD TOURNEY (BOOKS)

This is one of the more popular theories that predict Jonsa being endgame. The Ashford Tourney theory is something found in the first Dunk and Egg novella, "The Hedge Knight." written by GRRM. Basically, it gives reason to believe that Sansa will end up with a Targaryen – and since Fake Aegon hasn’t been important enough to include in the show, we can safely assume that Targaryen will be JON!

In the Hedge Knight, Dunk and Egg go to a tourney held at Ashford to celebrate Lord Ashford's daughter's 13th name-day. The tourney at Ashford Meadow was a tourney hosted by House Ashford at Ashford Meadow in 209 AC. Lord Ashford staged the tourney to celebrate his daughter's thirteenth name day. His daughter was the queen of love and beauty and would have five champions to defend her honour.

The final five champions in the Tourney were:

⁃ Lyonel Baratheon

⁃ Leo Tyrell

⁃ Tybolt Lannister

⁃ Humfrey Hardyng

⁃ Prince Valarr Targaryen (a Targaryen with dark/brown hair)

These oddly correspond with all the men Sansa was betrothed/married to in ASOIAF.

⁃ Sansa’s first betrothed to Joffrey Baratheon

⁃ Sansa’s then planned to be wed to Willas/Loras Tyrell

⁃ Sansa’s married to Tyrion Lannister

- Sansa’s now being betrothed to Harry Hardyng (in the books)

So if logic follows… Sansa now has to be betrothed/married to a dark haired Targaryen… a.k.a Jon Targaryen!

…C’mon, this is too crazy a coincidence not to be a foreshadowing of some sorts! Especially with a Harding in the mix- since it is not a very prominent house. And Especially considering how important marriage/betrothals have been to Sansa’s storyline and character arc.

Here is the link to the original reddit thread first discussing this theory: http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2Fasoiaf%2Fcomments%2F1vsuxb%2Fspoilers_all_the_tourney_at_ashford_and_sansas%2F&t=OWVmMTQ1ZGZhZDQ4ZWQzNzEwNjE1YmNiZWRlZTlhNTEwNTQyMjRiNyxreWRjaFJnNw%3D%3D&b=t%3A1mugv0k5s0amNKww0gMA7g&p=https%3A%2F%2Fmarydri.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F162256888280%2Fthe-secret-betrothal&m=1

And I’m pretty sure AltShiftX made a video about it on Youtube for those who would rather watch than read!

Is all good Jonsa shipmates? Good! Let’s continue!

SECTION F : JON’S DEATH (BOOKS)

1)-Sansa feels Jon’s death:

In Sansa’s final chapter in AFFC which matches up with Jon’s final chapter in ADWD as far as timing goes (because the two were meant to be one giant book) Sansa heard Jon dying:

“There was ice underfoot, and broken stones just waiting to turn an ankle, and the wind was howling fiercely. It sounds like a wolf, thought Sansa. A ghost wolf, as big as mountains”.

***Freindly reminder that Jon’s direwolf is named GHOST and that Ghost howled for Jon after he died like Grey Wind howled for Robb.

2)-Jon associates Sansa with his romantic love as he died:

Right before he died, Jon thought of Sansa and connected her to the one women he ever truly loved (Ygritte):

“He thought of Sansa brushing Lady’s coat, singing to herself. You know nothing Jon Snow”

ALSO: Jon likes redheads!

**BONUS: In ADWD, Jon chose Ygritte (his red-haired love) over Val (a beautiful woman with silver hair he may have been infatuated with)

“Would I sooner be hanged for a turncloak by Lord Janos, or forswear my vows, marry Val, and become the Lord of Winterfell? It seemed an easy choice when he thought of it in those terms… though if Ygritte had still been alive, it might have been even easier. Val was a stranger to him. She was not hard on the eyes, certainly, and she had been sister to Mance Rayder’s queen, but still …”

SECTION G: FORSHADOWING IN COSTUMES (SHOW)

1)-Sansa’s hair

I actually screamed internally when I saw Lyanna’s hair when she wed Rhaegar! At first first I was sooo mad (like livid) that she wasn't wearing a crown of blue winter roses and just had a typical hairstyle just like Sansa’s... then I realized, she could have been wearing a crown of blue winter roses but they decided to have her hair be Just.Like.Sansa’s.

^^THIS is Lyanna Stark’s hairstyle when she married Rhaegar Targaryen

^^THIS is Sansa Stark’s hairstyle for Season 7.

I mean Wow! It really seems that the showrunners wanted us to see parallels between the two Stark girls, especially in the scene where we find out Jon is a Targaryen and where a Stark Lady married a Targaryen! I mean this show is truly all about the details, and they could of had Lyanna wear a crown of blue winter roses- which would have been more obvious/appropriate for her character, but instead, they made her have the EXACT hair Sansa had all season (despite fashion/hair trends most likely being different at the time she married Rhaegar). History will repeat itself! A Stark Lady and a Targaryen King will fall in love! The episode was called the Dragon and the Dragon Wolf for crying out loud!

2)- Sansa’s wardrobe

Just like Sansa and Lyanna had similar exactly the same hairstyle, they also had similar wedding dresses:

Both Lyanna’s and Sansa’s wedding dresses had the same light/pastel colour palette and the same type of belt that wrapped around the bodice.

Sansa is also dressing like Jon. She has emulated her wardrobe/hair after the people she admired in the past (Cersei, Margarey). Now that she loves Jon, she is emulating him in her choice of clothing (along with his mother).

Jon and both even wear the little Stark direwolf heads on their clothes... but Sansa stops wearing that after Jon leaves... she stops wearing the pin with the direwolf couple because its no longer a fitting representation of her since Jon (her other wolf partner) has left her alone.

Credit to : @jonsalways for the Lyanna/Sansa costume parallels and the “wolf bit” -see what I did there?! She does amazing costume analysis's! go follow her! I mean how do you even notice something as small as Sansa not wearing the stark pin after episode 2! Wow! https://jonsalways.tumblr.com/post/164964237964/sansalyanna-parallel-in-costumes

**BONUS: This is a quote from an article analyzing the meaning of the GOT Season 7 costumes:

Like both queens, she is inspired by influential men with whom she frequently disagreed and that is reflected in her costume design. For Cersei, it was Tywin; for Dany, Viserys. In Sansa’s case, she’s dressing like Jon Snow.

Article: http://tomandlorenzo.com/2017/08/game-of-thrones-season-7-style-costume-analysis/

3)-Jon’s Wardrobe

I just want to point out that Jon is rarely seen without his cloak that Sansa made him. Oh and… cloaks in Westeros symbolize protection in marriage!!!

Like, seriously Jon! You’re in the capital, where it’s hot and sunny for crying out loud! It ain’t even snowing! what are you doing with that heavy ass cloak?!

...Whatevs! Keep wearing that cloak your wifey made you! I guess its cool... let’s just move on, shall we?

SECTION H : FORSHADOWING IN SONGS (BOOKS)

In this section, I will be discussing Jonsa foreshadowing in A Storm of Swords, specifically foreshadowing in the songs that are in Sansa and Jon’s chapters when their chapters are back to back.

So first, in Sansa’s chapter, Sansa is talking to Margarey and Olenna about Joffrey while listening to the song The Bear and the Maiden Fair – a song about a fair maiden falling for a man she’s not expected to fall for.

Lyrics here: http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/The_Bear_and_the_Maiden_Fair

Next is Jon’s chapter. This is when Jon is taken to Mance Raider’s tent by Ygritte, where he fools Mance into thinking he isn’t a crow anymore and successfully infiltrates the Wildlings. Yet when he walks in the tent, he hears someone singing The Dornishman’s Wife – a song about a man loving a woman so much that nothing – not even death – could be worse than not knowing her love.

HOWEVER – and this is the most curious thing- The Dornishman’s wife is later sung by Mance Raider in ADWD at Ramsay’s wedding to Jeyne/fake Arya (JEYNE IS CHANGED TO SANSA IN THE SHOW), only Mance changes the song from The Dornishman’s Wife to THE NORTHERNMAN’S DAUGHTER

“The singer changed the words, though. Instead of tasting a Dornishman’s wife, he sang of tasting a Northernman’s daughter” – this is from one of Theon/Reek’s chapters in ADWD

…We all know who the Northernman’s daughter is- SANSA!!!

Lyrics for the Dornishman’s Wife here: http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/The_Dornishman%27s_Wife

Also, to all those who find the Jon-being-Dany’s-third-treason theory/ undercover lover theory appealing (as I do), I will say this:

RIGHT AFTER these two chapters is Dany’s chapter, and in this chapter, she is very aware that a betrayal is coming her way and she thinks long and hard about the likelihood that someone coming to kill her soon:

“The Usurper on his Iron Throne had offered land and lordship to any man who killed her. One attempt had been made already, with a cup of poisoned wine. The closer she came to Westeros, the more likely another attack became”

Then, Jorah and Dany discuss the possibility of her being betrayed at length:

“The warlocks in Qarth told you that you would be betrayed three times,” the exile knight reminded her, as Viserion and Rhaegal began to snap and claw at each other. “Once for blood and once for gold and once for love.” Dany was not like to forget. “Mirri Maz Duur was the first.” “Which means two traitors yet remain . . . and now these two appear. I find that troubling, yes. Never forget, Robert offered a lordship to the man who slays you.”

I think a red herring is set up in these three chapters. In Sansa’s chapter, we are led to believe that the Hound is “the bear” that Sansa the fair maiden will end up with. In Jon’s chapter, we are led to believe that Ygritte is “the Dornishman’s wife”/ Jon’s true love. And in Dany’s chapter, she and Jorah talk of her betrayal, and we are led to believe that this foreshadows Jorah’s betrayal.

However, the fact that these three chapters being back to back, and GRRM being THE LEAST obvious writer on the planet, makes me think that what is actually being foreshadowed in these chapters is Sansa falling for Jon (someone whom she’s not expected to fall for)- who then also falls in love with her, and she is his one true love not the other red-haired girl (Ygritte)- and then finally, Jon will end up betraying Dany for his love of Sansa- being her final treason “for love”.

This is a MUCH subtler foreshadowing, exactly GRRM’s style – make you think you know one thing through red herring foreshadowing… but it actually turns out to be a completely other thing that was foreshadowed even more, just more subtly.

Credit to @natty86 Original post about these three chapters, and their foreshadowing is here: https://natty86.tumblr.com/search/Jon,%20Sansa%20and%20Dany.%20The%20betrayal%20for%20love..

SECTION I : ORINIGAL OUTLINE FOR ASOIAF

For those who haven’t read the original outline already, these are some quotes/plot points that GRRM had planned in his original outline:

"Arya will be more forgiving ... until she realizes, with terror, that she has fallen in love with Jon, who is not only her half-brother but a man of the Night's Watch, sworn to celibacy. Their passion will continue to torment Jon and Arya throughout the trilogy, until the secret of Jon's true parentage is finally revealed in the last book."

"Exiled, Tyrion will change sides, making common cause with the surviving Starks to bring his brother down, and falling helplessly in love with Arya Stark while he's at it. His passion is, alas, unreciprocated, but no less intense for that, and it will lead to a deadly rivalry between Tyrion and Jon Snow."

I won’t go too much into detail on this one… the outline should be taken lightly because a lot of things have changed from outlines to novels.

However, enough of the ideas in the outline have held base in the books, especially the most basic of plot points so I think it’s fair to assume that the whole “Jon will fall in love with his sister and be tormented by it until he finds out his true parentage” will stay the same. I mean, we already know Jon’s secret parentage was an idea that GRRM kept from the outline… and honestly what other reason could he have for the whole “secret parentage” that would be as important as making a forbidden/twisted love suddenly possible? It seems to me that one of the main reasons for the whole “secret parentage” trope was to create a more twisted and epic love story between Jon and his sister.

The sister has definitely changed from Arya to Sansa though… book Sansa is much closer to book Arya than book Arya is. And GRRM has been foreshadowing Jonsa a lot… hence this meta.

Also, take this with a mountain of salt, but Sansa was once married to Tyrion, so maybe the Jon-Tyrion-Sansa love triangle could happen?

Anyways! Moving forward! We’re almost dome but we still have more to discuss…such as:

SECTION J: JONSA SCENES BEING SHOT LIKE PRETTY MUCH EVERY OTHER ROMNTIC COUPLE ON THE SHOW... JONSA HAVING PARALLELLS WITH EVERY.OTHER.IMPORTANT.ROMANTIC.COUPLE.ON.THE.SHOW.

I won’t include Ned/Cat on this part, mainly because I already touched on this. But I will show parallels between Jon/Sansa and : Sam/Gilly; Robb/Talisa; Brienne/Jaimie. Although the Jonsa/Bramie gifsets are from a post of mine, I want to say right now, all credit to the Sam/Gilly and Robb/Talisa and Jon/Ygritte parallel gifsets goes to @baelerion, she/he made these AMAZING gifsets, I couldn’t make them any better myself. I give ALL credit to @baelerion. Amazing job! Go follow her/him!

SAM/GILLY AND JONSA:

ROBB/TALISA AND JONSA:

JON/YGRITTE AND JONSA:

BRIENNE/JAIME AND JONSA:

I mean.... this speaks for itself... If anyone has doubts or was wondering if Jonsa scenes were actually being shot in a romantic way, the answer is: YES!

SECTION K : OTHER

Okay Jonsa fam, we’ve reached the end of the meta! If you’re still here and reading this, I sincerely thank and applaud you for putting though with it’s extreme length... I had no idea it was going to get so long! Like holy cow, this is section K, this meta 11 sections long, with subsections! WOW! That just shows you how solid our Jonsa ship is.

But before I leave you for good, here are some more Jonsa endgame foreshadowing moments - in no particular order- that just wouldn’t fit in any of the other categories :)

...

1. Dany’s hair is styled like Sansa’s in only one scene- the scene where J and D actually have a tender moment, and grab eachother’s hands (similar to how Sansa grobbed Jon’s hands) and in the next episode they have sex… the costume department is very careful with the details when it comes to the girls’ hair, why would they make sure there is a ghost of Sansa in the most tender scene Dany and Jon share together, right before the episode in which they have sex? #Jonsaisendgame

Credit to @jonsalways: Original post noticing this is right here: https://jonsalways.tumblr.com/post/165044111469/theres-something-weird-about-dany-and-sansas -read it! its so much more detailed and amazing!

2. Jon noticing Sansa’s new dress, and stuttering like a nervous boy who has a crush on a pretty girl when he gives her a compliment..

..Hmmm ya sorry Jon, not brotherly AT ALL #Jonsaisendgame

3. Jon gave Sansa a lingereing very non-brothery forhead kiss, and then LOOKED AT HER LIPS!!

^^^IF YOU THINK THIS SCENE WAS PLATONIC YOU ARE LYING TO YOURSELF. This is the scene that cemented it in for me that there was definitely something non-siblings going on with Jon and Sansa tbh. #JONSAISENDGAME

4.Jon and Jorah spoke about Jon’s children in 7x06 AND THEN THE STARK THEME PLAYED AND IT CUT TO SANSA AT WINTERFELL!

^^^Um so ya, everybody, meet Sansa and Jon’s three future sons Robb Eddard and Rickon... #Jonsaisendgame

5. Jon looked back and Sansa when he left her but didn’t do the same for Dany.

And in the script, it read:

“Jon turns in his saddle, sees Sansa standing up there, raises his hand and flashes the smile that wins him the hearts of Icelandic models and Scottish baronesses."

– so a very puppy dog/ half flirty/I love you smile… ok so not the way a brother smiles at a sister…got it! #Jonsaisendgame

6. Aggressive angry kitten Jon threatening and strangleing the shit out of his competition due to jealous rage:

7. And who can forget about the OH SHIT looks from LF and Davos...

Even they know #Jonsaisendgame

8. The camera zoomed in every time Sasna touched Jon… they want us to notice the angst!!

Dem camera angles be screaming #JONSAISENDGAME

9. They had the most emotional reunion out of all the Starks, and have spent a lot of time together to grow close – a season and a half! That’s a lot in the GoT universe!

I wonder why? Oh right! Because #Jonsaisendgame

10. And finally... just the way he looks at her... I can’t even

Pictures don’t even do it justice... but i’m so tired from writing this meta I’ve grown to lazy to go get gifs at this point. And i’m 100% sure I forgot at least one thing I wanted to put in...

But regardless the message is clear #JONSAISENDGAME. Believe that! Because if you cant believe it after this much proof, I would be very very worried!

Ours is the endgame! It is known!

#jonsa #jonsameta #jonxsansa #actuallyjonsa #sansaxjon #jonandsansa #sansaandjon #jonsaiscoming #jonsaisendgame #oursistheendgame

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