#have made a difference to me. like in the latest arc he's fine but no amount of 'he's a good person' will make me like him

[llycaons]

the littlest boys are watching hxh! second brother cannot remember anyone's name but third brother loves killua <3 and dislikes leorio LMAO I think we have the same taste in a lot of things actually, this is the one who loves mp100 and who watched cql with me

[utilitycaster]

You have been watching CR so much longer than me, and I'm curious to know your take on TV Show Canon interfering with or replacing Live Play Canon? On the latest 4sd, Sam mentioned that they're sort of in a schrödinger's Canon, where in one instance the show and campaign have two opposing cannons and they get through it by not directly addressing one or the other. The example he gave was Highbearer Vord, who was an old man in campaign 1 and a woman in the show, whom Matt referred to by name or as 'they' in campaign 3.

Personally, I've never been precious about adaptations changing or ommitting things, and I didn't care about the change from the campaign to the show, but for some reason, the show changing the campaign gives me pause. I also personally love the show! Campaign one was my favorite, especially the chroma conclave arc, and I love the tv show just as much, so I don't know why I would be precious about one over the other? I think maybe I'm worried about changes retroactively impacting the campaign because I already saw and loved the campaign as it was and I don't want it to change, whereas the show is currently being created and so any changes or adaptations just feel like their own thing that I get to see unfold.

The change I mentioned is very small and doesn't really impact much, I'm just wondering what your preference would be for this practice in general! I think that the cast mentioned that some changes will be made to the beginning of the Mighty Nein's story for the upcoming show. In a hypithetical future campaign, if someone mentioned the M9, would you prefer it to be in line with the campaign or the tv show, would you prefer if it was vague like Vord, or is it dependent on what the changes are?

For me it would be dependent on the scale of the change and what it is. Honestly, for Vord I don't even find it in conflict in the present campaign (ie, in 843 PD); while obviously Vord's gender is different between the canon of Campaign 1 vs. the Legend of Vox Machina and those are taking place as two versions of the story in the same time, I just assumed that in 843 PD Vord was figuring some shit out re: gender and pronouns. (I'd also add that Vord's description during Campaign 1 itself varied wildly; Matt's changed character pronouns before in the past and I don't know if it's been deliberate or if he forgot but it's not a big deal).

I think if we're talking about scenes that were not visible in the campaign and were expanded upon in TLOVM (eg: getting to see more of the Briarwoods or the Chroma Conclave plotting without Vox Machina present), treating them as canon within Campaign 3 is fine; honestly those probably were canon in Matt's notes anyway, just unseen. Small things that aren't plot critical - changing a character's gender or appearance, for example - are also fine by me.

The issue arises if we get into actual plot conflicts - for example, the party splitting during the Feywild and Westruun arcs in TLOVM vs. Scanlan and Grog being present in the Feywild in canon. In that case, resolving the two is not possible and I don't care for attempts to make it so. I don't generally care for attempts to justify a cast mistake or canon contradiction and make it all lay flat when the answer sometimes is just "this is improv and they forgot", and this feels similar. Like...if Kamaljiori were to show up in Campaign 3, that would be valid, because he doesn't die in Campaign 1 and does in TLOVM, and when we're watching the streaming campaigns we should defer to campaign canon. I don't think it's fair to Campaign 3 to try to play it with an eye to animated adaptation, so any ripples from that can be addressed if an when they come up. But for stuff like Vord's gender, as long as you get the presence and the vibe right, details can be altered. The same, presumably, will be true for mentions of the Mighty Nein if there is an Exandrian-set Campaign 4.

For what it's worth, that is what I expect when the cast mentions changes to the adaptation as well. Like...look, if I'm wrong about this there will be other discussions to be had, but I think the idea that Molly won't die in the Mighty Nein adaptation is a rather desperate and unrealistic one since that sort of derails the entire rest of the campaign both plot-wise and thematically. Fine for AU fanfic, though I'm personally uninterested, but a poor adaptational choice. But changes like splitting the party between the Feywild and Westruun, or Grog becoming weakened, or Vax communing with the Raven Queen a little earlier and at a smaller temple, or Vex facing Saundor alone, all maintain the core vibes and themes while dealing with time constraints and letting Pike be more present. If someone were to ask Vex point-blank "was Scanlan there when you fought the guy who had that cool bow you're carrying" in Campaign 3 I think the answer should be "yes"; but that's not actually important. What's important is that Vex faced a guy who had been consumed by bitterness and grudges for a weapon that she ultimately carved the word for "forgiveness" into as a personal reminder. An adaptation should retain what's actually important to the story, but changing what hangs on the same fundamental fixed skeleton is fine.

[fandovers]

Hey gamers, back at it again with another huge ramble!! Albeit a bit scrambled, but a ramble nonetheless!!

Say, have you ever enjoyed a character and thought "wow, what the fuck are the writers doing?" That's me right now with SMG4's tv headed guy.

"But Pyro", I hear you say, "what makes you think that?" WELL OH BOY. Let me tell you some things on my mind, my fellow tumblr user. Grab your pepper shakers, because you will need it to compliment how much salt I am about to spill.

V--- Ramble below the cut !! ---V

Firstly, what you could probably guess. The latest arc. Or well, mini arc as they call it. I think things moved way too fast and that's having a negative impact on people's view of Puzzles.

Think about the Puzzlevision Arc. We got hinted at this mysterious figure only a few times over a course of almost a whole year. Making his appearances so sparce added to the intrigue. Who was this guy and what is he planning? It left everyone on the edge of their seats. Just how much of what has been going on, like Western Spaghetti and IGBP, links back to him? Or that in a way, it was his fault these things happened.

And then we see him more in the Mr. Puzzles' movie lineup. We get a mix of the main crew who we know, as well as Mr. Puzzles, both being the focus of the episodes. There is a really good balance of that in these movies, in my opinion. Because of how we only see him in certain moments, it reads to me as "this shows he has complete power, but he isn't getting in the way of his shows or movies in order to flaunt his power TOO much. He is still trying to have the brainwashed SMG4 characters be the main focus. Because it's a part of his plan."

Then the Puzzlevision movie drops and in my opinion, its great. It's wonderful even!! Puzzles shows up more, but the balance is still kept. And at the end when he is punted to who-knows-where, it was a good ending to this villian, who may return with some new evil plan in the future!! Or so we hoped...

After this episode a LOT of people wanted him back. Personally, I didn't want them to bring him back so soon. I had a feeling it would be a disaster to his character. Think about it. Having his seemingly mastermind who hid behind the camera for a year. With thought out plans, a whole bunch of tragedy and chaos that was all his fault because of how thought out these plans were... this guy coming back so soon? I don't think it would go well.

That brings us to the mini arc where I think it proves me right in my worries; it didn't go well. I will get it out of the way and say yes these epsiodes are entertaining, but not fulfilling. If that makes sense?

A metaphor for this could be something like... think of it like you ate a sugar cube and thought "wow, that was good, I want more!!" And over the course of a year, you treat yourself to a single sugar cube. Then suddenly, one day you get a whole bag full of sugar cubes to eat. It's so much-- so suddenly-- that you get sick from how much you now have to eat. Something you once enjoyed, you got sick over because of the amount you got out of nowhere. You see what I am getting at? With how much Puzzles content we have gotten in this min arc it throws the previous balance out the window and it's completely different.

Anyway back to the tv head. I think what they are going for is to make Puzzles so very power hungry he will do anything to get his power back. He is desperate, which is played off as silly and clumsy. A goofy villian with no power anymore but still thinking he has atleast some power left. Thinking he still has the charm that got him into power beforehand. But he doesn't, not anymore.

Instead of going back to the shadows to plan and think, he wants that power so bad again that he is throwing himself right back in with a less thought out plan. One made in a shorter time frame and is more vague. Get into the Meme Factory and The Comedy Zone.

I get it, they wrote him this way and it's fine, I guess. But this all makes me think. How did Puzzles get into power prior to Puzzlevision? Was he this reckless and straightforward, or was he as we saw him over the year? Everything planned out, sticking to his plans like glue. Keep his cool and make his shows exactly how he wants to get popular or whatever his overall goals are.

This just makes me feel like comparing "Puzzlevision Puzzles" to "Mini Arc Puzzles" feels like night and day. Almost like they are different characters. And I don't say that as a good thing.

We got this villian trying to juggle his power going up and down via ratings. Who is intimidating and feels like an actual threat. He hurt so many people to get what he wants, and he prioritizes his plans above all else. He is scary, he is evil and he is downright awful. But thats what made him a good villian.

Then in the mini arc, we have him going for The Comedy Zone but befriending Leggy along the way. I think they try to hint that despite his exterior behaviour, Puzzles does enjoy Leggy as a sidekick. He suddenly has a change of heart, befriending Leggy to use her. Then he sees she is useful, and that leads to him actually somewhat caring for her how she cares for him. Or that's what we are made to think.

I'll say it outright; I don't think Puzzles cares for Leggy the way she does to him. She goes so far that she throws herself into danger for him, or is actively thrown around like an actual weapon, in order to help him. Because she cares about him. Puzzles doesn't really do that in turn for her, does he?

Also lemme just talk about the end of the latest episode real quick. So, Meggy turns back into her normal self. When she remembers Mr. Puzzles and her when she was Leggy, having "good moments", she smiles. A lot of people read this as her forgiving him.

I think this is moving on way too fast from the pain and torture she was put through. For an entire month during Puzzlevision Arc, Meggy was killed over and over by Wren. Who never would have gotten the power to do so if it wasn't for Puzzles giving him that facility for him to control. "But Puzzles didn't torture her directly during Western Spaghetti" I hear you say. This is true, however he did brainwash her like the others during the movies. He still rubbed it in her face how the events of Western Spaghetti effected her. And yet now she smiles because of a few "good moments" in that last few episodes. Which are really just Puzzles giving Leggy the bare minimum of praise and calling her a friend?

As I have seen mentioned around; I suppose it could be that she is smiling because she sees that he has some good part of him. But the good part she did see, does have the possibility to be a lie. A facade. Honestly if they go with this possibility, that he was faking the whole time and just playing it up like an actor on a set, that would be awesome. Have him in the future in a scene where he can just be alone. Reflect on how much of it was an act and how much he actually did care and felt actual emotion. Have him contemplate his own plans or think over what he has done. If he is to be redeemed like people want, he will have to reflect. If he doesn't, he continues to be a villian and that's great too!! Just as long as they don't fumble his character...

I think the best thing the writing team can do now is keep Puzzles away for a bit. Keep him away until WOTFI 2024 because I am pretty sure we are all expecting him to have a part in that. I mean, he technically caused the last one. Why not cause another? If they are to have him be a physical threat again, in person, they should focus on keeping that balance of who is in the spotlight. Have the episode or movie be not centered around one character but a select few. I feel like he works better when even in Puzzles centered episodes, you see a lot of the other characters too. As mentioned, you have too much sugar and you can easily get sick off it.

Also completely changing the flow of this rant, ramble, whatever you wanna call this. But I have a small nitpick. The recent episode seemed so heavily hinted to be a FNAF parody. However, after watching it, it seems it wasn't at all. We get references to other games but not FNAF. So, why name the episode that? Why hint at an idea just to not use it at all? Why get our hopes up for something that didn't happen?

And oh, one more thing. Let's not forget how odd it is that Puzzles is in the spotlight so heavily all of a sudden. After Puzzlevision, I heard word going around that the SMG4 team "might bring him back if people like him enough". As you could probably see, people more then liked him. They LOVED him. I think because of how much attention he was getting, it only makes sense they would make more Puzzles content. People enjoy him, so why not make a whole mini arc for the new wave of fans to enjoy? It gets them views, fans, attention, and makes the people happy!!

All this just feels... odd. This doesn't give me a good feeling because of the design problem. As mentioned in my latest post, Mr. Puzzles and RGB, (a character from a comic known as "The Property of Hate") both look EXTREMELY similar. The SMG4 team has said nothing about this, and I think they should really be confronted. Asked about it. Whether it be asking them in an email or social media dms, I am THIS close to just outright asking them myself. We deserve to know the truth on this. It's for the best and this silence is driving me a tad batty.

This also leads me to talk about a... misconception? People were saying that the new facial expressions for Puzzles weren't credited. I saw that even an artist of the expressions stated it was alright if they weren't credited. However, in the video's description, it credits the artists who made the expressions. So, was the description edited later? Was it always like that and people didn't see? If I am wrong here somehow, please do correct me. But it seems all that is alright now... unless I am wrong.

I think this is all for my salt filled rant. Please feel free to share your own thoughts on the new episodes and mini arc!! Do you agree with some points I made, or not? I would love to discuss this further and see other's point of view on this!!

Eitherway, I thank you for reading. You take care yall!! ☆

[tagsecretsanta]

From @mrmustachious

From @mrmustachious to @godsliltippy

A/N: Happy Holidays everyone! I was originally going to just write a fic, but then I decided to do something a little different for my gift. Hopefully my recipient likes it! The prompts I was given were:

- Gordon and a cramp

- Bros-mas with Gordon and Fuse.

- "Sorry I can't be there." (either said to/by Gordon)

I tried my best to incorporate them all. This is set in a universe where Fuse got his redemption arc and ended up becoming best friends with Gordon like we all wanted.

I really hope my recipient enjoys their gift and is having a great holiday! <3&lt;3<3

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Gordon slipped his phone into his pocket when he saw the man making his way towards the small cottage. Fuse had an armful of logs and he was looking down at his phone, but Gordon could see the moment that Fuse read his latest message, because his head shot up towards the direction of the cottage. Even from a short distance away, Gordon could see the smile that stretched across his face when he spotted him, and Gordon knew his own face matched.

Gordon let the other man get closer before he then barrelled down the porch steps. Fuse barely had time to drop the logs before Gordon lept on him, wrapping all his limbs around the other man like a squid.

Fuse expelled a lungful of air at the surprise, but he didn’t falter, and his arms were around Gordon in an instant to stop from dropping him. Gordon could feel as well as hear Fuse break out into a laugh, his whole body rumbling.

“Hello to you too.”

They stayed like that for a moment. Gordon soaked in the warmth of the other man, as he wasn’t lying when he said his hands were getting numb, before he finally let go.

“You’re lucky you get a hug after leaving me stuck outside,” Gordon said as his feet hit the ground, but he grinned at the other man so he knew he wasn’t serious.

“How about I make it up to you by getting the fire on?” Fuse asked as he started to pick up the discarded logs.

“Throw in a hot chocolate too and we have a deal.”

Fuse laughed, but he couldn’t say no to Gordon.

“Sure.”

Gordon let out a small cheer, before he helped Fuse pick the logs out of the snow before they got too wet.

“So, what do you have planned for tonight?”

It was Fuse who had planned this whole evening. He’d come up with the idea and rented the cabin, and all Gordon had to do was show up.

“Once we get the fire going, I was thinking Christmas movies and baking. I know an amazing gingerbread recipe.”

“Sounds good. It’ll be nice to have something that wasn’t baked by my Grandma for once.” Gordon shivered as he remembered her latest creation just the night before.

“Yeah,” Fuse grimaced, as he had been subjected to her cooking on more than one occasion, and he knew far too well what Gordon was talking about.

As they chatted, they finished gathering the logs that Fuse had unceremoniously dumped on the ground thanks to Gordon, and then they made their way into the cabin where the promise of warmth waited.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

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Gordon let out a little huff of laughter as he placed his phone on the kitchen worktop. He felt bad for Alan, but only to an extent. Lady Penelope’s holiday galas were rarely boring, and if they were, there was always some drama about to kick off to liven up the night. And even if that didn’t happen, he had access to basically unlimited food and drink, not to mention their family was there too. He would be fine.

Gordon turned to Fuse, who had just finished placing their gingerbread people on a cooling rack.

“So, how long until we can start decorating them?” Gordon leant on the worktop next to him to peer at their cookies. They looked really tasty, and he was desperate to try one.

“We should wait a few minutes until they cool down, but I can never wait that long.” Fuse seemed to contemplate it for a few minutes, before he shrugged. “I mean, what can go wrong?”

He grabbed a few colourful tubes of icing and handed them to Gordon, then grabbed the rest for himself. Gordon was also not a fan of waiting, so he joined Fuse in creating a colourful collection of characters made of gingerbread.

“Hey, squid, check out this guy.”

Gordon looked up and over at the gingerbread man Fuse was holding, and chuckled at the dorky look on the little guy’s face.

“I don’t think you need to add any more to him. He’s perfect.”

“Some of my greatest work, I think.” Fuse placed him back on the tray and then pulled his phone out to take a picture.

“Y’know, I was thinking that maybe in a bit we should go down to the lake or something,” Fuse spoke as he typed something on his phone, before putting it back in his pocket. “Might be fun to have a wander.”

“Yeah, that sounds great!” Gordon was quick to agree. This cabin was in a beautiful spot and he didn’t want to go home before he’d had a chance to explore, and he couldn’t say no to a lake. “But not before we try these little guys.”

“Of course!”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Gordon rubbed his tired eyes. This was not the way their evening was supposed to end, but it wouldn’t be the first time he or Fuse ended up in the hospital after seeing each other.

Perhaps walking across a frozen lake wasn’t the best idea, and Gordon definitely knew better, but he had at least been sensible. It was Fuse who had fallen in first, the ice abruptly cracking beneath him, and Gordon had to dive in after him to get him out. His training made it easy to get Fuse back up onto the ice, but things took a turn for the worse when Gordon got a cramp in his leg.

By that point, he knew he had been in the freezing cold water too long, and he couldn’t remember his training for such a situation. He couldn’t get himself up onto the ice as his legs failed to kick beneath him, and he started to slip under the surface.

However, Fuse’s grasp around his wrist was all that kept him from slipping completely under, and together they got him out of the water too.

After that, they dragged themselves back to land, where they sat shivering in the snow. Gordon wasn’t aware of Fuse calling an ambulance, nor did he remember the ride to the hospital. He only remembered waking up in this bed, his head pounding and beneath a million blankets but still freezing cold.

Gordon was brought out of his thoughts when there was a knock at his door, and he called for the person to come in as he sat up slightly.

Fuse peeked his head around the door, and then stepped into the room.

“Hey.” Fuse gave him a small wave as he walked over to the bed. “I would ask how you’re feeling, but I imagine it’s similar to how I’m feeling right now, which is awful.”

He fell into the seat next to the bed and put his head in his hands with a groan.

“I was told not to get out of bed, how did you get out of your room?”

Although it was a relief to see that Fuse was alright with his own eyes, Gordon didn’t want him collapsing in the middle of the room.

Fuse dropped one hand from his face to send a look to Gordon that answered his question. Compared to what Fuse had done in the past, just a few nurse’s orders would be nothing for him. Though Gordon was sure they would give him a run for his money if they caught him here.

“I let your brothers know you were here, by the way,” Fuse said as he dropped both hands to his lap.

“Oh, thank you.” To be honest, Gordon hadn’t even thought to do that. He wasn’t even sure where his phone was. Probably with the rest of his things. “What did they say?”

Gordon dreaded to think about what they would say about all this and how he ended up in the hospital, again, after doing something idiotic.

“Honestly, I’m too scared to look. I told them where you were and then turned my phone off, but they should be here soon.”

Then, Fuse abruptly stood up.

“Speaking of which, I’m gonna head back to my room. Nurses orders and all.”

“Fuse.” Gordon knew what he was doing.

“Good to see that you’re awake. Don’t let your brothers murder you after I saved you.”

“Fuse!”

“Speak soon!” And with that, he slipped out of the door and disappeared from sight.

Gordon shook his head, and would have laughed if he didn’t know it was going to hurt his chest and send him into a coughing fit.

Coward.

Not that Gordon could blame him. He would hide away if he could too.

But, despite it all, Gordon didn’t care that the night had ended disastrously. He’d had an amazing day with Fuse, and if anything, he had several more to come. He would be off duty for at least a week, maybe more, which just gave him an excuse to spend more time with Fuse.

He would just have to deal with several angry brothers first.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

[stressedbisexualtm]

WAIT HOLD ON I HAD A BIG BRAIN MOMENT

For anyone that didn't catch Wilbur's stream today: when he checked the mailbox in front of tallulah towers looking for clues on where Llulah is, he noticed he had a letter from the federation. It basically said that Lovejoy is funding the federation, and they're proud of Wilbur. It also had a picture attached of a painted drawing of the Brazilian cargo ship on fire, in the same style Lovejoy's album covers have all been lately. I noticed this during the stream, but didn't have much time to think about it. However, a user on twitter pointed out that there's gotta be some deeper meaning there, which lead me to look back on Lovejoy's recent releases.

First up: Call Me What You Like - A single released by Lovejoy very early in the year (february or march I think, but idk for sure) whose album cover depicts a plane crashing toward the ground, on fire. I, like any good sleuth, immediately connected it to the French plane. The French crashed into the island via plane, and I do belive it was on fire before they hit the ground. The thing that made me jump the most was that this was, as far as I remember, released before the qsmp had even STARTED, much less when the French joined the server. Another small detail I noticed that might not be important is that Quackity appears in the music video as well as cc's not affiliated with the qsmp and people I could not identify any of the times I watched it (probably just background actors, but my brain's working overtime anyway).

Next up: Wake Up & It's Over - Lovejoy's latest EP, which includes the single Call Me What You Like. It's album cover depicts a train on fire, heading sideways off of its tracks. This reminded me of the first trains on the island - the ones that brought the initial English and Spanish speakers to the island. There was never a problem with them crashing or being set on fire as far as I remember, but it could be poetic. Another thought I had was about the create mod. For the past month or so, about since the eggs left I think, people have been experimenting with the create mod more - mostly using trains, actually. This could be a future event occurring with all the trains people have been building, something going wrong or some crazy angsty lore, idk. Again, it could be more of a symbol or an omen, but with cmwyl and the picture the federation gave q!bur I don't think it is. Another very obvious possibility is that it represents new members joining, like the other two do.

Third, and final: Normal People Things - Lovejoy's latest single, released just a week or two ago. The cover image for this song depicts a car crashing into the side of a house, the car very clearly on fire. I don't know if it's worth mentioning, but the other three covers all seem to take place during the day, but Normal People Things looks like it's happening during a sunrise/sunset (likely the latter). This cover is one I'm not really sure what to do with. It obviously follows the pattern of the others, so it's gotta fit in somewhere, I just don't know where. Nothing like that has ever happened to the players so we can be sure it's a future event. I'm not sure if it represents new players joining or just something the residents will have to deal with. (This last bit that I'm about to talk about is a huge stretch, but I've seen crazier connections.) As I was looking at all of the album covers, I thought a little bit more about the lyrics in npt. It reminds me of the happy pills arc, where Forever was taking pills and going a little insane. Here are a few of the lyrics:

Panic attack,/Backing track

Background hum/Of the cerebellum

What a blessing/To meet someone like you

With eyes as dead as mine, it's fine/It's normal people things to lie here in silence

(skip)

Spending days in/Self-medicating

Lost too much weight/Unpleasant aftertaste

We look the same/Play different games

This is probably the biggest leap I have ever made when theorizing, and it's most likely wrong, so don't judge me too harshly for it lol. I've probably got something with the covers, though, so I'm gonna be keeping my eyes out for that, and JESUS this is so COOL

[medea10]

My Review of Rurouni Kenshin (2023)

If you grew up in the 1990s and early 2000s, chances are you’ve come across this title.

Rurouni Kenshin’s original anime aired in Japan from 1996-1998. It managed to make it out west with being licensed by Media Blasters and aired on Cartoon Network’s Toonami block in the early 2000s. With 95 episodes to its name, Rurouni Kenshin was pretty popular everywhere. In later years, a couple of OVA’s were released. One of them was a prequel that was never seen outside of the manga. The second one was a sequel to the main series that goes in a different route from the manga. And the third was a retelling of one of the series best moments.

And just laying it out there, yes, this series is sadly also known as “Samurai X”. I say “sadly” due to what was done to the series with that name. What with the bastardization of people’s names and what have you! The name of the series is Rurouni Kenshin. If you see that other name, turn around and don’t look back.

Now, does this series live up to the hype? Yes and no. While this was one of Japan’s most rewatched animes of all time, the series could have been better. Pretty much everything after what is known as the Kyoto Arc is seen as garbage to many. In some cases, they’re not wrong. It’s just a sea of fillers until the series ended in 1998. I guess some of the blame could be that they changed studio hands during the run of the original anime. Studio Deen has such a lousy reputation for messing with a good thing.

Case and point, Rozen Maiden 2013!

It’s just that when Kenshin gets into the swing of things, it’s a thrill to watch. So, having a retelling of the story and have it be faithful to the manga is welcoming for long-time fans and curious newbies.

Just. One. Thing. Though.

THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM: Nobuhiro Watsuki is the creator of Rurouni Kenshin. Back in late 2017 while he was releasing more Rurouni Kenshin in manga form, it was discovered that he was in possession of child pornography. This news alone is an immediate red flag, drop everything, cancel this bro right stat now kind of thing. What happened was he was arrested, paid a fine, and went back to releasing his manga after a several-month hiatus.

Obviously, everything about the story is disgusting. I’m not sure how much child porn was removed from this man’s place but I feel like it was somewhere between what Jared Fogle had and a fuck-ton. And now every fan is having this moral dilemma of watching this anime if it’s supporting this man. When it comes to me, fuck yeah, I’m still watching it. Do you have any idea how many things I still watch where the original creator is a fuck-bucket? And don’t lie, you probably do the same. Ren and Stimpy, The Loud House, Rick & Morty, Earthworm Jim, all of these and more are the product of some sick ass-banana. Just keep that in mind before tossing stones. You all know who you are and you all aren’t squeaky clean in what you watch. None of us are.

In the end, it’s your call to make on watching this or reading anything else that comes from Watsuki. Certain companies have made their call already when it comes to Rurouni Kenshin. Weekly Shounen Jump still prints whatever Watsuki puts out. Viz Media however has put an end to the latest Rurouni Kenshin manga that’s been put out in the last few years, but has kept the original manga up.

OKAY, NOW LET’S ACTUALLY TALK ABOUT THE ANIME: I know it’s a lot to go over, I just felt it necessary to do the frank discussion before I talk about the anime. This anime is a full reboot. That means, it’ll be a different studio animating it, it will supposedly take after the manga instead of diverting into a different path like the original series, and yes, the cast will be different. Which cast? All of them!

Rurouni Kenshin goes like this. It has been well over a decade since the end of a brutal war. With the entering of the Meiji era, peace was assumed as weapons like swords are banned. Of course, that won’t stop people from killing. And the never-ending fight with the government can cause this peaceful time…it was never really peaceful. Kenshin Himura is a wandering rurouni. He carries with him a double-edged sword despite the sword ban law put in place. Prior to this moment, Kenshin was known as “Hitokiri Battosai”, a ruthless killer. But after certain events, Kenshin swears to never kill again.

One day, he meets a young girl named Kaoru Kamiya. She’s the owner of a dojo that specializes in a certain style. At first, she confronts Kenshin thinking he is the dreaded Hitokiri Battosai. Most of it was a misunderstanding because yes, Kenshin is that, but he’s not the one using the name in vain and using Kaoru’s fighting style. After several incidents between the characters, Kenshin decided to set up shop and stay with Kaoru at her dojo. Eventually, two other characters join along. Yahiko, an orphaned boy who is training to be a great swordsman one day. And Sano, who once served during the brutal war is now a bit of a drifter. But he’ll have Kenshin’s back when they’re in a battle.

BETWEEN THE NEW SUB AND THE NEW DUB…AND EVERYTHING ELSE: I’ve gone on in length about the dubs to Rurouni Kenshin in the past. Prior to the 2023 remake, there were a total of three English dubs. The first one was for the original television run featuring Richard Cansino, Dorothy Elias-Fahn, and Wendee Lee. This was dubbed by Media Blasters. The second one consisted of the OVA’s featuring folks like Shannon Weaver, Gray Haddock, and Katherine Catmull. These were dubbed by ADV films and later Sentai Filmworks. And as for the third dub, that would be Sony’s sad attempt at redubbing Rurouni Kenshin filled with bastard names, a bastard name title, and new voices.

In the beginning, I was hoping for the absolute best-case scenario when it came to an English dub for this retelling. When it comes to me, I will always pick the first dub and that is for one big freakin’ thing. Steven Blum voicing Makoto Shishio. That and I always thought Richard Cansino was the best Kenshin. I’ve already been disappointed when Sentai didn’t reunite the original cast when retelling the Kyoto Arc several years ago and that’s why my skepticism is in play here. Plus, I’m pretty sure some of the original dub cast has already retired from voice acting. Sadly, the original voice for Misao (Philece Sampler) passed away in 2021. Much to my dismay, there was a new cast alright. Who they are was the bigger question.

Crunchyroll dropped the episodes without warning three months after the premier and without stating who would be in the cast. That’s certainly out of character for them. They get chatty when showering the masses who is going to be in an English dub cast everywhere they can including all social media platforms. I would have chalked it up to the SAG-AFTRA strike. But then I remembered, Crunchyroll has a conniption when it comes to that certain union. Plus, it never stopped them before as they’ve been whoring other English lists that same week this dropped. So, the obvious reason has got to be fear of having the audience badger the cast for being in Rurouni Kenshin after what the creator did. Only Kenshin’s voice actor came forward a week after the actor’s strike. The rest, most of us had to guess. Except for Yahiko, he just sounded like an angrier Gon. So, it’s Erica Mendez.

Just so you know, Aniplex had a live festival with seiyuus promoting the shows they’re on back in September of 2023. And what do you know, Souma Saitou and Rie Takahashi were on stage promoting Rurouni Kenshin. Out and about, no one getting doxxed, threatened, hate-mailed, or anything of the sort. I have a few scattered thoughts here. First of all, if there’s any bad-mouthing of Rie Takahashi of any kind, you and I are going to have a problem. Second of all, American fan-bases are fucking toxic and would harass the voice actors relentlessly to the point of no return. And third, why couldn’t they just come up with some fake-ass alias names for the English cast? On the other hand, I’ve seen how people on social media has harassed voice actors over trivial bullshit and it’s only getting worse. So, I kinda understand why this happened.

As for the sub, yes, the voices here have changed. So, when I originally watched Rurouni Kenshin, I watched nearly everything dubbed. It wasn’t until much later when I stumbled upon the sub, I discovered that Kenshin was voiced by a woman. Now, I’m getting another case of whiplash as I’m getting used to hearing Kenshin having more of a manlier voice. With all of that said, here’s the cast of Rurouni Kenshin 2023!

JAPANESE CAST: *Kenshin is now played by Souma Saitou (known for Diavolo on Jojo’s Pt. 5, Yamaguchi on Haikyuu, Kain on Rinne, and Miyano on Sasaki to Miyano)

*Kaoru is now played by Rie Takahashi (known for Ai on Oshi no Ko, Megumin on Konosuba, Emilia on Re:Zero, Sumi on Rent-A-Girlfriend, Ena on Laid-Back Camp, Mash on Fate/Grand Order, and Tomo on Tomo-chan is a Girl)

*Yahiko is now played by Makoto Koichi (known for Elza on Interspecies Reviewers, Young Jun on Tomo-chan is a Girl, Sumika on Yuri is my Job, and Sakura on Lycoris Recoil)

*Sanosuke is now played by Taku Yashiro (known for Friede on Pokemon Horizons, Natsuo on Domestic Girlfriend, Kouichi on Horimiya, Vulcan on Fire Force, and Arai on Chainsaw Man)

ENGLISH CAST: *Kenshin is now played by Howard Wang (known for Piers on Pokemon Journeys, Anastasia on Jojo’s Pt. 6, Kokonoi on Tokyo Revengers, Atsushi on Lovely Complex, Goshiki on Haikyuu, and Chuusaku on Komi-san)

*Kaoru is now played by Risa Mei (known for Futaba on My Senpai is Annoying)

*Yahiko is now played by Erica Mendez (known for Gon on Hunter x Hunter, Haruka/Uranus on Sailor Moon [redub], Ryuko on Kill la Kill, Raphtalia on Shield Hero, Retsuko on Aggretsuko, and Megumin on Konosuba)

*Sanosuke is now played by Darius Johnson

SHIPPING: Can I delve into this topic without going off the deep end and bringing up spoilers?

No, not really. These spoilers are over 30 years old. Deal with it.

Kenshin x Kaoru is a ship that has set sailed into the sea. No matter how much sex appeal Megumi can throw at it! Trust me on the matter, it’s a signed deal. I know that it almost seems one-sided in these 24 episodes, but that’s how it is.

WHAT TO COVER: In a reboot, you’ve gotta see what this version kept and what they didn’t and if it’s all in the right part of the story. Of course, we get the stories everyone is used to with this series like Kaoru being duped by that old creep and the debuts of Sano and Yahiko. Near the halfway mark, we’re already introduced to Aoshi and watched Kenshin and Sano take on the drug lords that were using Megumi. There have been a couple of episodes dedicated to some familiar storylines like Sano’s old comrade and the young lad Yutarou who wound up on the wrong side of the blade. Meanwhile, I’m squirming around in my seat waiting to hear something from a certain awesome villain. I have made no secret to loving the Kyoto arc and its main villain, Makoto Shishio.

Come episode 19, I heard his name uttered and know that it’s coming up.

Wait a sec! There are only 5 episodes left in the season. If this studio dares to even cram the whole Kyoto arc in that short amount of time, I’m throwing this entire media out the window. There’s gotta be a second season. Even if it’s only like 12 episodes that covers the span of the Kyoto arc, it’s better than the worst-case scenario. Thankfully, they did not cram the entire Kyoto arc into an episode. No mad man would ever do…Studio Deen would do that.

Case and point, Rozen Maiden 2013!

I am now being informed that I have already insulted Studio Deen’s attempt with Rozen Maiden twice now in this review. Let me get back to what I was saying. Thank the great good lord those guys are not in charge of Rurouni Kenshin again.

Actually, two of these episodes were a flashback episode that was originally an extra chapter to the manga. And if you’re wondering if this flashback episode contains Kenshin back when he was the legendary manslayer, it does not. It’s a story of Kenshin a couple of months prior to meeting Kaoru and the rest. For Kenshin’s past…just watch the OVA’s from 30 years ago.

The final episodes of the season set the stage up for the Kyoto arc with the introduction to Hajime Saito. Ten years prior, he was a bit of a rival to Kenshin back when he was the noted manslayer. Now, Hajime is part of the Shinsengumi. Kenshin and Hajime end up facing off like back in the day and he wound up reverting back to his manslayer mode.

Apparently, Kenshin can turn off that mode with a punch in the face.

As one does! The last time Kenshin was in that mode was when Kaoru was kidnapped earlier in the series. This time, Kaoru’s voice had no effect. This moment leads to Kenshin’s crucial decision at the end of the season. After the spar, he is confronted by Okubo Toshimichi, the man who has been trying to make the Meiji era a more peaceful time. He asks Kenshin for help of taking out a certain someone. Yes, it’s Makoto Shishio. Also known as, the man who just won’t die. Case and point, he’s been stabbed, knocked unconscious, and even set on fire. He’s still standing! Hell, he’s even known as the new Hitokiri Battosai manslayer. Kenshin gave this a lot of thought as he wants to remain peaceful and never kill again. Unfortunately, he’s given no choice when Okubo…well, he…

He fucked around and found out!

One of Shishio’s commrades (Soujiro Seta) murdered Okubo and sent a stark warning to Kenshin about going forward with anything brash. Kenshin truly wants for a peaceful nation and doesn’t want to kill again. In the final moments, we see him have a few precious moments with Kaoru before proceeding to leave her.

DON’T CRY, FANS! HE AIN’T GONE FOREVER! But a season two must, must, must, must, MUST COME!

Thankfully, two days after the finale we get the announcement that Rurouni Kenshin is indeed getting a sequel in 2024. Unknown to when in 2024, if the same studio will be doing it, how many episodes it’s going to be, or if Steven Blum is going to return as the voice of Shishio. Seeing as NO ONE from the original English cast has returned to do this project, I’ll shut up about it...

For now.

Was this a great reboot? That’s your call to make. For me, it’s too early to tell as there’s only been 24 episodes and none of them are the classic Kyoto arc. It’s too preliminary to call it a masterpiece or trash. Manga readers are somewhat split as they will always find fault with everything. Not every anime adaptation is going to do everything by the book and that’s their conniption. I read the manga too and I wasn’t picky about the adaptation. It’s not like they skipped 50 chapters and went right into unknown territory.

And before you say, “Oh, there goes Medea again bashing Rozen Maiden 2013”. NO! I was actually poking at The Promised Neverland this time.

Thankfully, Rurouni Kenshin was done well. The art was beautiful. LIDENFILMS did a spectacular job. If you’re not familiar with the studio, they have recently done Call of the Night and Tokyo Revengers. The music was great. Every opening and ending were bangers. Reol was the real stand-out star in that department. They kept the language Kenshin uses when he speaks, that they did. I’m satisfied. I know more fans would want to see some more footage of Kenshin back when he was the notorious Battosai. I’m just going to say to be patient. You’ll see some stuff soon enough. And if you’re an impatient fuck, the OVA’s are around. Trust & Betrayal will give you what you want.

Can I recommend this? Not without having a giant elephant sitting on my shoulders.

For now, Crunchyroll has Rurouni Kenshin 2023 available for streaming.

Now then, for those who are looking for the original series, OVA, and even the live-action movies, here’s where to find them.

The original 96-episode series is currently on Hulu. The recent live-action movies are currently available on Netflix. All of the OVA’s (Trust & Betrayal, Reflections, and Kyoto-arc retelling), I can’t seem to find them streaming wise. Also, unsure if the hard copies are out of print or not.

[k-s-morgan]

Hello Morgan! I've just seen your latest update. Thank you for letting us know what's happening in Ukraine.

This is the first time I've left a review on your blog, and I also want to let you know how amazing you are. You've written one of the best Tomarry stories I've ever read - or I should say, the BEST "Harry raises Tom" fic I’ve read.

English isn't my first language, and to be honest, I wasn't used to reading English fan-fics, but I couldn't stop reading WGBTB because this story is genuinely EPIC. The relationship between Tom and Harry is powerful and intoxicating; I couldn't put the story down until the final chapter. (And thanks to your fantastic tale, I've been reading English fics ever since.)

I was genuinely sad to see such a great story come to an end, but you ended it very well. I also want you to know that your ATLWETD is incredibly intriguing. I held my breath and literally forgot to breathe for a few seconds when Tom was trying to murder Harry. For Merlin's sake, how do you come up with so many brilliant ideas and plot twists for your stories? You are truly a talented writer.

Honestly, it saddened me when I learned that you're from Ukraine - I discovered it from your notes in WHGTB. I'm truly sorry for what's happening to you and the people in Ukraine, and what the Russian government has been doing to your country is outrageous and pure evil.

There are indeed far fewer news reports on Ukraine than a year ago; however, I've been concerned about the current development of the war and am grateful to learn about it here on your blog.

I've just realised that I've left a really long message here - maybe I'm just too excited to speak to one of my favourite writers! XD

Please always remember that you are amazing both as a gifted writer and a strong person who remains optimistic even in such a difficult situation. I was truly surprised and moved to learn that you've persisted in writing all those amazing stories right under the shadow of war.

I wish you all the best, and I'm looking forward to your latest work :)

Hello! Thank you so much for your amazing words, this absolutely made my evening! I'm delighted that you enjoyed WHGTB and that you already like the new Tomarry. I'm very excited about the new chapter, I have a lot of it done already and I can't wait to share it. Tom trying to kill Harry so early on was an arc I was very curious to portray because this dynamic differs from the one I spent so much on building in WHGTB, and it's interesting to write Tom who is not infatuated with Harry yet. It's all coming, though. The current Tom cannot imagine how much his life and his priorities are about to change :D Harry will turn the world he's used to into hell, but he'll also bring the brightest kind of happiness into it.

I don't envision myself ever abandonining this story becaucase in a way, it is my war letter. The romance will hold the central stage, but war will play an important part, too, and I want to express and explore lots of feelings, big and small, that I've been experiencing myself in it.

Your English sounds very fine to me, but I definitely encourage you to keep reading fics! This is how I learned English, too - I read everything I could find in my first language and I was forced to make my way through the English fandom :D

Thank you again for your wonderful ask <3

[woosh-floosh]

JANUARY MEDIA ROUNDUP

Here's everything notable I watched/played/listened to in January yay!! All the yewchub videos and music are linked (and also there's spoilers for the ending to season 5 of Fargo). Let's a go!!

SUPER MARIO RPG

Fun RPG! I see why it’s kept the reputation it has! I love Mario!!!

OLDER, SLOWER B/W EVERYTHING REAL IS FREE - GODDAMN WOLVES

I don’t know what changed with Seven Days a Week/Ah Maria but I’m really digging the latest Goddamn Wolves. I prefer the first song but the second one has a real Fountains of Wayne sound to it.

BARBIE

It’s fine, doesn’t live up to hype at all for me. Extremely hamfisted, shallow, babies first feminist message. Doesn’t seem to be interested in exploring anything deeper. The girl calls Barbie out when she first meets her for all the reductive views of women she represents and this never gets explored! The image of womanhood and femininity it represents is narrow and alienating for someone like me. White feminism at its peak.

IDK I guess it’s fine for preteens who are first being introduced to feminist thought, I probably would have liked it more at 11. But… can’t we do better now?

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY

It’s fine I didn’t pay that much attention.  I liked Helena, I think she’s a good foil to the older Indiana Jones. There’s a lot of noticeable CGI and fake places and that made me sad. Half an hour too long.

Deepfake Harrison Ford is so scary

TASKMASTER CHAMPION OF CHAMPIONS THREE

So fun and funny ^_^ I’ve been rewatching TM NZ with my parents and it’s good… but when you go back to UK you think “Why do I even watch the other versions, nothing could ever top this.”

They also announced the Series 17 line up! I only recognize Nick Mohammad from the couple episodes of Ted Lasso I watched.

BUBBLY - GOOD KID

Seems like everytime a new Good Kid comes out I think “this is good and awesome, their songs seem to keep getting better and better.” I think I am just a bigger Good Kid fan than I want to admit!!

FARGO - SEASON 5

Really good!! Lots of themes to dissect. I was mainly focusing on the theme of misogyny throughout but the finale brought in themes of religion and debt that I hadn’t thought about.

Very glad it stuck the landing in the finale. The ending scene was really funny, and thoughtful and sweet.

Going into the finale I knew they were going to give an ending to the character arc for Lorraine. I was worried that the fact that runs a debt collection agency was going to go uncommented on and thought “the only way I would come around fully to her character is if she forgives all the debt she owns.” The finale has her starting a fund to forgive the debt of prisoners specifically to fuck with the one guy she hates is 1. Very funny and 2. Perfect for her character.

PINOCCHIO IS A STORY ABOUT ART AND GOD - JACOB GELLER

The best video essays are the ones that make you want to gaze out of the window after watching, Jacob Geller consistently does it for me

Thinking about how there is an “other” component to Pinocchio. He’s a little wooden boy but not a “true” boy. Most stories end with Pinocchio becoming a “real boy.” Geller brings up how the story can be about being human, but at the same time becoming a real boy takes away the thing that’s special about him. A Pinocchio story about embracing his own difference and how that doesn’t make him any less of a real boy (because he was a real boy all along!) would make an easy trans metaphor.

Pinocchio also having to learn about the world from a lower baseline than other children seem to have (and being much more gullible) also makes an autism reading easy.

The comments are filled with people saying “You forgot about this story!” and “What about this reading?” that I think this video hit a lot of people the same way.

THE TRUTH ABOUT POINSETTIAS - INDIGO’S FINDINGS

that's a hell of a mystery no one thought was a mystery and didn't even really need solving but damn if it didn't just get solved so nice work

In all honesty, a really good deep dive about a tradition most of us take for granted.

MOONSONG / LAST BATTLE [NEW REMIX] - RADIATI0NAL

You can really hear the homestuck influence in this, I love it

Wish they were working with a bit better samples though

LA LA LAND

One of those movies that makes me go “Wow! This is a really well made movie! Must be amazing for someone who actually likes musicals, romance movies, and classic hollywood.”

SHE SENDS KISSES - THE WRENS

IT NEVER ENDS

Reminds me of the Fargo main theme, even though I don’t think they actually sound that similar? Might just be a me thing

TASKMASTER MINNESOTA - SEASON 2

Wah! I’ll miss you Taskmaster Minnesota!! Wah!!

Way better than last season thanks to the better equipment (I also think Carter makes a much better Taskmaster than Luke, though I think Luke was pretty good as a fill-in contestant!)

David Ha (and whoever else) is extremely good at making up tasks. Multiple tasks that made me think “they should do this on Taskmaster UK!” or use the setting so well it’s perfect

DRAGON QUEST MONSTERS: THE DARK PRINCE

Monsters…

The performance is BAD, the environment textures are BAD, the story is BAD, but those monsters? But those monsters.. Those monsters are damn good

The end ended up being pretty grind-y, I think dragon quest games are known for that, but still a bit of a bummer way to end what I thought was a pretty fun game!

The gameplay loop of synthesis is addicting, every new area feels like an iceberg where beneath the surface are all the new monsters you can make in synthesis!

The ranking system also pushes you to change your team throughout the game to add those higher ranking monsters to your team. One of my problems with pokemon is how the game starts to grow stale once you have a full team. Dragon quest monsters and Yo-Kai watch both side step this problem and keeps the gameplay fresh to the end!

I’m curious about playing the older entries now!

My favorite monster is every slime and Imp

LEAST FAVORITE THING: When Jacob Geller brought AI: Artificial Intelligence in his Pinocchio video and I had to remember how much I hated that movie. We watched in Philosophy class. We didn't even discuss it, we just watched it.

[everybody-loves-purdy]

After rereading TNP, I think it’s fairly safe to say that Brambleclaw wasn’t particularly out-of-character in Squirrelflight’s Hope. He’s always been awful and abusive, he shouldn’t ever have been made deputy

I completely agree. I remember liking him when I last read them when I was about 18, but now after my latest reread I see TNP Brambleclaw completely differently. I think in the first half he was fine, but he just annoyed me so much in the second half of the arc. I did a few posts about it at the time, but I feel my reread review of Starlight just being “please stfu Brambleclaw” conveys my overall feelings well lol

[riboonies]

I posted 205 times in 2022

1 post created (0%)

204 posts reblogged (100%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@7nsomnia

@wonwooridul

@silvysartfulness

@zvezdacito

@bearplush

I tagged 194 of my posts in 2022

Only 5% of my posts had no tags

#art - 89 posts

#enstars - 20 posts

#deukae - 20 posts

#seventeen - 19 posts

#ensemble stars - 18 posts

#dami - 15 posts

#jjba - 15 posts

#svt - 14 posts

#loona - 14 posts

#nature - 13 posts

Longest Tag: 43 characters

#they are happy little blobs and i love them

My Top Posts in 2022:

Enstars MV Review - 'Believe 4 leaves'

Hello!

I’ve wanted to do this kind of thing for a while and I hope to make it into a little series as I really enjoy these sorts of things!

Our point of discussion today will be ALKALOID’S latest mv: ‘Believe 4 leaves’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amQWzsFo-7I

I’ll start with saying I am VERY HAPPY ABOUT MAYOI BEING CENTER!! He’s vocals have always stood out to me in past songs and I think this role in the song really did him good!

I was really unsure of this concept when I first started watching as it was not what I expected at all from them- but as it went along I really enjoyed it! I’m really happy to see how Happy Elements is expanding on the way they make these mv’s!

The setting was very different from usual and gave me ‘Castle in the Sky’ vibes, which is always a good thing.

It went really well with the STORYLINE they decided to include in this- another thing Happy Elements has started putting in (another example being fine’s ‘Feather of Arc’.) Fans can interrupt what is going on which I think a lot of us will have fun with.

Aira being upset at the start caught me off guard, it was interesting to see that level of emotion.

And then we got Mayoi’s relieved smile that was somehow filled with raw emotion??

I LOVED THE CHOREOGRAPHY- Enstars MV’s tend to have some pretty good dances but this one was definitely one of the best I’ve seen. It gave me kpop vibes a lot with the style, especially the part at the very start (stream WA DA DA by Kep1er). It didn’t get boring and is one that I think some fans would really enjoy learning!

And now for the best part about the mv…. MAYOI’S VOCALS???!?

Now don’t get me wrong, I think all the members have really nice vocals and flow really well together, but Mayoi really stole the spotlight in this one.

He had a LOT of high notes- and literally all of them were very unique. Some were very raspy and sounded really funny but they fit the song so they’re still good (ex. 1:09, 1:55). And then the others were GODLIKE and made me scREAM BECAUSE LIKE OKOEE (ex. 1:44 and 2:11).

So overall this is probably one of the best enstar mv’s I’ve seen as it was good in all the parts it should be. I really hope to see more enstar mv’s like this because it was really well done! Um thank you for reading, I hope it was actually interesting for some of you! I’d like to do this again and hopefully gain more structure for how I do it! Thank you!!!

24 notes - Posted January 28, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[starlight-time-machine]

Week in Review

04/14/2024 – 04/20/2024

Sunday

Week 10 of missing Cipher Academy

Woah, another new character in Girl Meets Rock…I’m a little trepidatious but let’s see how it goes… Always appreciate more Machiavellian Rin, though.

I didn’t have a lot of time for manga today, but I read the new Unluck Undead chapter because I wanted to see the popularity poll results. Like a lot of fans, I was surprised to see Tatiana up so high, but I’m soooo happy to see Feng at third. Then the chapter itself went and reminded me that oh yeah he’s kind of a complete asshole at times… But it seems like Nico giving him a talking to was enough to change his mindset a little. I’m excited to see how this tag team shiritori match goes, especially with Feng already being able to target the pieces of Language’s soul embedded in her creations. (Also how did he braid his hair so fast…I really would’ve liked to just see ponytail Feng or hair down Feng…)

Monday

Oshi no Ko fine. Sometimes the insertion of comedy to soften dramatic blows gets a little grating.

Dandandan good, this mangaka’s creature designs are always some of my favorites, and this one is no exception. It seems like we’re going through the regular cycle of a kid being overtaken by supernatural powers before incorporating those powers into their own fighting style and joining the team, though, and I’m really hoping this is the last. I don’t know how much more I can take before Dandadan feels like it’s really just spinning its wheels.

Magilumiere fine. It appears we’ve been flung into the endgame all of a sudden.

Chainsaw Man fine. We got some fun banter between Quanxi and the others, at least.

Watched through the rest of the Glow Up season and it was generally uneventful (I skipped the Metaverse episode because LMAOOOO fuck that dumb shit). The drag episode was my favourite, as it felt like they were having a lot of fun being self-referential and irreverent (bringing back the model from the infamous I Like To Watch video was an inspired choice). Roo’s look for Cheddar was really breathtaking, too. Other than that, I’m just glad that the person I was rooting for won.

Finally continued my Undead Unluck reread and it’s so good… The best part about Loop 101 for me is how every arc feels like a completely different genre. Fuuko and Void’s boxing match was so hype, Fuuko defeating Sean and his switchblade with ease was such a nice full circle moment, the Buroja War arc was fantastic in terms of character development across the board (gay of Billy to find Tella by the scent of his conditioner though), and the Phil arc was fun, but I mostly loved it for all the Sean/Gina moments it provided.

Tuesday

Agh

Wednesday

Aghhhhhh

Thursday

I can’t believe I missed DunMesh Thursday but I was truly knocked out after rushing work once again. But I did have time to read the latest chapter of Yuria-sensei no Akai Ito – it seems like learning about her dad’s affair and coming to understand her sister’s perspective is what’s going to push Yuria to chase her own wants, which I think she rightfully deserves at this point.

Friday

I’m not gonna lie I got some insanely bad news today so I’ve just been lying in bed depressed out of my mind

Saturday

Undead Unluck reread made me feel better…especially since the Tenraisai arc is so fun and funny. The exploration of the familial bond between Feng and Shen is so cute and touching…and that being the crux to Shen winning their bout was absolutely perfect. One thought I did have while rereading was realizing how…Feng has kind of overtaken Shen as my favourite character… 101 Shen just doesn’t have the tragedy-tinged unhinged energy of 100 Shen that I loved so much, and meanwhile Feng has just grown more and more likeable while still being a battle freak… And he’s even funnier in the subsequent high school arc, which was super wholesome and fun as a whole. (But wow, Chikara’s parents deciding to time travel with Chikara at the end kind of fucked me up, because for all their relatives know, they just disappeared for 16 years…). I decided to stop reading here since I’m pretty much caught up, and I’ve just fallen more in love with Undead Unluck now that I can actually remember more than 50% of the plot. At this point I might raise its score from a 9 to a 10 (I had docked it points for being so heterosexual and having so many fridged relatives, but now I’m just enamoured by the story’s heart and compassion), but I’ll save that thought for when the series ends.

DunMesh Saturday…with a side of spicy ramen and cheese rice cakes to soothe my depressed soul…it was a fun episode…seeing the groups collide and the new social dynamics forming was fun…the first next episode should be fun too…

[sandflow]

So I just finished reading Golden Kamuy

 Oh boy I got lots of things to say about it.

Warning: spoilers from latest and final chapter 314 + rants that might anger people

[Edit] -  added new info from vol.30

So I’ll preface by saying that I first started reading Golden Kamuy because of  Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san which sort of advertised the series. And when I checked it out, I liked the combo of a grown ass man teaming up with a kid and hunting stuff. So it got me super hooked. 

I checked out the first season, and then I picked up the manga back when the latest chapter that around that time was 179. It was a super great experience.

Fast foward 5 years and it finally ended. Let’s start:

Pros:

1. The plot is simple and great, it starts off with a simple premise of finding the hidden ainu gold and then it slowly builds up with episodic criminals being killed off and skinned one by one. Sure it does go shonen tropey when it immediately followed with “you need to skin an x number of convicts to get to the gold treasure” but that problem is solved when they find out they didn’t really need all the skins.

2. The humor was mostly great, anime/manga doesn’t normally humor me but GK really delivered something more different than your average "main character gets slapped or yelled at because of a oh so funny misunderstanding har har”.

3. The overall positive and great portrayal of the indigenous group (ainu). The whole ainu theme really contributed to lore for the series. I admit there were times when I didn’t really pay attention to the trivia and cared more about the main conflict and characters but overall, or at least in the first half of the series - learning about the culture of ainu people and seeing the main characters + readers explore it was a nice breath of fresh air.

4. There are a lot of great characters. You just can NOT end up with a favourite by the end of the series. Every main and most secondary characters are likeable. Hell, the main character who is a child isn’t annoying as hell which already is a big + for me. While I did end up disliking some of them by the end of the series, they were still enjoyable at a certain point in the story.

5. Abashiri jail was the best arc in the series. Hands down. It got so well built up, the arc itself had amazing action, the factions blended in so well, and with a great shocking ending too. I may be biased though. Other amazing arcs were : the fake ainu village, Anehata, blind bandit, banya, circus, hospital rescue, and around half of the sapporo arc

6. Tsurumi ended up being a satisfying villain. Best mother hen for a bunch of normal and well adjusted soldiers. My only gripe was that he felt more of a gray to black area character in the first half of the series, while in the second half he fully became black, and that he didn’t get to kill off Sugimoto for good. But he was fine and didn’t drastically change his course.

7. I really liked the aspect of there being different factions having their own goals. It made it seem like there was no true villain. So when they were clashing you’d root for who you like rather than what the plot is trying to show how you should root for.

Cons:

1. The final arc was bad. Characters kept dying one by one and you just stop feeling any sadness or shock for them at some point. You’re just waiting for the next corpse. There’s also a ton of plot conveniences. Sugimoto being so exhausted, shot, stabbed etc etc only to still be able to lift an adult bear and let it hang unto him for at least 20 minutes, or Ogata who didn’t shoot Sugimoto directly in the head when he was pinned by the bear. Or Ushiyama who doesn’t one hit kill Tsukishima. Or Koito who easily killed Hijikata, and so on.

2. Goryokaku was boring. It was mostly filled with Wilk and Hijikata flashbacks. Wilk does have his importance in the plot since he was supposedly the initial “villain” in the series, but Hijikata ended up being a very boring character to me, so him getting around 3 separate flashbacks in the same arc really didn’t do it for me. Other than that, the arc spends a very big amount of time with characters killing off completely irrelevant background soldiers and criminals. 

It also had this style of advancing really slowly in the plot, but also rushing through it.

3. Sugimoto and Asirpa’s partnership was pretty cool and I liked their bond a lot. But after Asirpa rebounds with Sugimoto after Karafuto, their bond starts to feel very codependent. So codependent that Sugimoto turns from a soldier that had issues with PTSD, to a guy who at any time opens his mouth says “Asirpa”. If he’s not near her we see him monologue about “what’s Asirpa doing?”. That’s his whole character now. 

And Sugimoto kind of stopped having this active role in the story at some point. It’s mostly Asirpa who points the story forward, with Sugimoto burying the bodies left behind. Maybe it was like that even before Asirpa got kidnapped, but it’s a lot more obvious in the later half.

It also didn’t help how after Karafuto the plot kept hinting at Asirpa’s crush on Sugimoto even more. Boutarou full on shipping them like “oooh you care about him” and “take Sugimoto and have a family with him”. 

And in the end, Sugimoto chooses to live with Asirpa for an undetermined time as “partners”. 

I don’t ship Sugiripa and I don’t really care if other people do, but the ending was written intentionally ambiguous with slight shipping tones. I’d definitely think it would have been a purely comradery ending if Noda didn’t add in the numerous hints that Asirpa is crushing on him.

4. Koito was handled pretty badly by the end of the story. I was so invested in his character development. I was waiting in anticipation for his betrayal after he got bitchslapped by Ogata. And it was THIS }{ CLOSE to happen. 

But it didn’t....or....it sort of does? back when they’re in Goryokaku but it went like “Tsurumi you lied to me and dad but let’s say I’m fine with that now, but if nothing good comes out of all this then I gotta protect my men from you-” “oh ok Koito then kill me here and now” And Koito just looks down and leaves. Koito still keeps fighting for Tsurumi.

His character was severely limited to redeeming and saving his subordinate in distress Tsukishima.

[Edit] Since vol. 30 is out, Koito’s confrontation with Tsurumi has been altered slightly. Tsurumi instead of the line “kill me now” he now says “I have no intention of losing” and Koito feels sad that Tsurumi didn’t persuade him to being on his side. “W-why don’t you ask me to be by your s-side? FINE I’m leaving let’s go Tsukishima.” Lol. And Koito still fights for Tsurumi’s goals on the train. A strange and kind of useless addition if you ask me.

5. Tsukishima was frustrating to watch. I truly liked him up until chapter 210. But then he swears total loyalty to Tsurumi and threatens Koito’s life. But then he saves Koito from the Sugi stab. But then he actively hunts down Tanigaki and pregnant Inkarmat just to kill them. But then he’s saved by Koito who reminded him of his ex finacee! But then he gives death glares at Koito when he accidentally speaks normally to Tsurumi. But then joins in the Sofia interviewing thinking he’s finally seeing Tsurumi’s true colours! But then he’s loyal to him again and ends up (almost) killing Ariko (followed by sparkly eyes) and Kikuta.

 It’s like Noda wasn’t sure wether to keep him alive or die with Tsurumi. And Koito kept pushing his ass into redeeming him soooo so much that Tsukishima literally fainted.

Tsukishima got so exhausted of being constantly juggled around between Koito and Tsurumi that he ended up fainting in his moment of choosing any side. And in the end, he isn’t even taken out of his misery. He keeps searching for Tsurumi in the sea, and then Koito appears and asks him to forget Tsurumi and join the him as his right hand man. And Tsukishima is like "sure!”. Welp. That was fast.

6. Tsukishima and Koito end up not confronting Tsurumi at all. Which is honestly dissappointing. I was fully expecting them to have a final battle with him. Nope. Tsurumi fights the main characters. Not that he didn’t have to fight them too, but there was still unresolved tension between him and his subordinates. Tsukishima never finds out that Tsurumi played him again, and Koito still fought for his cause until he had to save Tsukishima from joining Tsurumi. 

7. Vasily was the most underused character in the series. He was put back into the plot just to keep Ogata away from sniping anyone from the Sugi group. He never got a backstory, he never got a proper character ending, he had an annoying language barrier with everyone around him which was lame because I really wanted to see him truly bond with ANYONE. But nope. He’s simply an extension to Ogata’s character. 

And his ending concerning his Ogata lynx painting is just....I mean...if he truly was obsessed with Ogata then why keep a painting of him dead rather than alive? Because it reminds him of how he failed to kill him? Oh wow that’s so romantic Vasilygirls please rejoyce.

I think what Noda truly wanted to do with Vasily is to portray him as the typical Ogata fan insert of the readers (who are also coincidentally creating a ton of Ogata fanart).  

8. Ogata was handled like garbage. He was a pretty complex character plus a total enigma. Lots of people wrote a ton of theories about him. Everyone was talking about him endlessly wether they loved him or hated him. 

But then chapter 304 dropped and it reveals that he just wanted to advance in rank because he wanted to see if a low life like him can reach such a high and esteemed position. Which was...huh? Ogata said he isn’t interested in ranks to Hijikata around the time they were about to attack Abashiri. Now he is. 

In chapter 310 he kills himself because he didn’t want to feel guilt. Because he killed his only chance at true love with Yuusaku. ?! He didn’t want to have anything to do with Yuusaku. He was unifying with the walls when Yuusaku was trying to approach him. But now he was his only chance at love?? What about his grandparents??

Oh and he also felt guilt because he was always born a blessed child just like Yuusaku. ???? Yuu was rich and had loving parents. Ogata was raised in poverty, with shitty parents and was being constantly ostrasized for his bloodline. By this logic, if your parents had sex once, had the child and then broke up, even if they did feel a little bit of true love in that moment, it fully justifies their child in being blessed from the very beginning and growing up just as blessed even if they’re raised in a shitty environment with a dysfunctional family. 

9. Sugimoto should have died. There were so many hints that he’d die in the last chapter. His name, his “going to hell” catchphrase, his numerous wounds in the final arc, the SWORD STABBED IN HIS HEART, his final line to Asirpa after he throws her off the train “I’m immortal you know?”, seeing him with closed eyes and being sunk deeper into the ocean.

Next chapter he’s okay and already found Umeko. He doesn’t even confront her directly, and he doesn’t even get emotional when he eats the persimmon. OK. So much for the pay off of that amazing emotional scene when he started crying inside the deer.

[Edit] 10. Sofia’s character was treated poorly. You start off with a really strong woman who can wrestle and ride a tiger with ease. But then she fights Tsukishima and overpowers him and she conveniently- I MEAN accidentally hits a pole thus now is Tsurumi’s hostage in the church. 

And afterwards, She kills a ton of 7th soldiers with utmost ease only to be killed by Tsurumi because she froze (initially) though in the volume version she tries to shoot him (even though she wasn’t able to even scratch him which makes me think she deviated her shot because of guilt).

Conclusions:

- don’t ever read an ongoing manga especially when you have no other series that you’re following. Noda was sometimes taking breaks in moments where he’d drop a chapter with a cliffhanger ending.  It’s paintful. Plus more and more expectations get built up the more you wait. So yeah, don’t touch anything that isn’t finished.

- the series was super great but then the quality dropped at around 65% progression of the story (around the beginning of the Sapporo arc). Maybe it was becoming a lot more serious and had less comical scenes. Or maybe I’m just hung up on Pre-Abashiri times lol.

[traincat]

I’ve been trying to piece together a few things from your Twitter and Tumblr posts alike and still can’t make heads or tales of things, so would you mind helping out a FF & spideytorch noob? 1) what is currently happening with Johnny in the comics? (I’ve fallen head over heels for this guy, largely all your doing) 2) when’s the last time he and Peter have interacted, canon wise? (And do you think upcoming interactions are likely?) 3) your thoughts on if they’ll have him come out in the near future? (has that ‘biggest change to the fantastic four’ teaser come to pass yet?) Love all your content, thank you!

I'd say no problem but then I started thinking about this current run again and got a headache. But yes, I can do that to save you from reading it, because it is very largely not good.

So I don't think it's unfair to just flat out say the current Fantastic Four run is not very good, largely due to writer Dan Slott's efforts. Slott was previously on Amazing Spider-Man for 10 years, to mixed opinions, but a large portion of Spider-Man fandom, myself included, blames him near singlehandedly for the decline in quality of Spider-Man books over those ten years. I will say, in the interest of fairness, that Slott as a writer has an incredible fondness for the Spider-Man/Human Torch relationship, and that a lot of the recent teamups and interactions between them have been written or co-written by him. So it's all not all negative here. But in general, I personally find Slott's more recent comics (the last seven-ish years especially) to be badly plotted out, messily characterized disasters that feature characters written with all the emotion of a cardboard cutout. That's me putting it nicely.

To explain this fully, you have to understand the position Fantastic Four comics were in from the years 2015 through 2018, both in the fictional 616 universe and in the real publishing world. Following the 2015 Secret Wars event (great if you want some Johnny angst in the background of your plot), the Fantastic Four were disbanded -- Reed, Sue, and their many biological and found family children were presumed dead but in reality were remaking the multiverse, unable, for a reason that was never clearly defined, to reach home. Ben and Johnny were left on Earth. They had an unspecified falling out, likely due to Reed and Sue's absence, and went their separate ways -- Ben joined the Guardians of the Galaxy and went to space. Johnny was featured on both Inhumans and Avengers books. What's notable about this period is that it's the first time since 1961 that there was no Fantastic Four book being published by Marvel. Now the real world reason behind this is both complicated and extremely petty: Marvel really wanted the Fantastic Four film rights. Marvel denied this explanation at the time, stating that the reason was sales motivated, but it was a thoroughly flimsy excuse and Jonathan Hickman, writer of 2015's Secret Wars and overseer of the current X-Men plot, gave an interview saying the decision was film rights motivated. This decision kept the Fantastic Four books off the shelves for three years, up until the Disney-Fox merger, which secured the X-Men and Fantastic Four rights for Disney's Marvel Studios. Marvel then announced that the Fantastic Four book would be returning. So that's a little bit of background as to the precarious place the Fantastic Four currently occupy in the Marvel universe -- it's worth noting that this year is their 60th anniversary, and Marvel has done very little for it. Compare this to the X-Men, whose film rights Marvel also obtained during the Disney-Fox merger, and whose books are currently dominating the publishing lineup. The Fantastic Four definitely occupy an unpopular position, one Marvel themselves is at least partially responsible for forcing them into.

But to move back into the actual content of the book -- the readjustment period Slott wrote reintroducing the Fantastic Four into the Marvel universe can be described as clumsy, at best. It's never fully explained why Reed, Sue, and the kids couldn't return to Earth, something that was explored in Chip Zdarsky's 2017 Marvel Two-in-One, which featured Ben, Johnny, and Doom on a multiversal roadtrip to try and find their family and which I on the whole recommend, despite it having an awkward ending due to being cut short by Slott's announced Fantastic Four main title.

(Marvel Two-in-One 2017 #4)

Instead, the Fantastic Four return to a Marvel universe a little different than how they left it, with the Baxter Building -- formerly the offices of Parker Industries, the company Doc Ock started in Peter's body during Superior Spider-Man that Peter inherited after his defeat and then lost spectacularly when he trashed his own company to fight nazis (good for him) -- occupied by a different fantastic foursome in a plot that goes nowhere and does nothing. This is somewhat emblematic of the early days of Slott's run -- he introduces ideas that fail to go anywhere, including Johnny's rekindled relationship with his other best friend and former college roommate, Wyatt Wingfoot, who he was seen being very cuddly with in the early issues.

(FF 2018 #1) A small group of Fantastic Four fans have argued for a while that if Marvel was to have Johnny come out, a relationship with Wyatt would feel very natural -- they're already close, with Wyatt being an important Fantastic Four supporting character since the '60s. I have some further analysis here on the conspiracy theory that Johnny and Wyatt were supposed to be in relationship at the beginning of this run but that that plot was, for whatever reason, nixed. I don't know that I entirely believe this theory, for the record -- but I do think the pieces line up remarkably well.

Anyway, that didn't/hasn't yet happened, obviously. Slott instead for the most part put Johnny on the back burner for the beginning of his run, up until the Spyre arc, which I have reason to believe is the main story he pitched that he credits with securing him the Fantastic Four title. The Spyre arc suggests that the Fantastic Four's failed space exploration during which they got their powers wasn't just to beat the commies to the moon, as Lee and Kirby envisioned (simpler days), but to reach a specific planet outside of our galaxy. When the team sets out to conquer this mission, they arrive at the planet, but are quickly captured. The planet, they find out, operates like a soulmate AU -- everyone has a fated person that they are matched to via a gold armband. Reed and Sue are soulmates (and Ben is confined to an underground subterranean with the other monsters, because this is a Fantastic Four comic) while it's discovered! Shocker! That Johnny is actually the soulmate of the one the planet's inhabitants, a winged woman named Sky, with the suggestion that this is both why Johnny's previous relationships have never worked and why he loves space exploration -- he was just trying to get to his Soulmate TM.

(FF 2018 #15) "What's going on here? Where are my clothes?" As you can see, this didn't start off super great, with Johnny being separated from his family, stripped naked, and put in Sky's bed with a soulmate armband slapped on him. Did I mention they're only removable if your soulmate takes it off for you? And that Sky has consistently refused despite Johnny asking her to? Yeah. It's bad. (I think it's important to note Johnny's long history as a victim of assault plays into this narrative, whether or not Slott is personally holding that in mind while writing, which I don't believe he is. cw in the linked post for discussions of sexual assault.) There's an additional issue here in that Slott has a history of problematic writing regarding women of color, featuring characters he's created to act as love interests being oversexualized, infantilized, villainized, or some mix of all three, with two examples of this phenomena being Cindy Moon and Lian Tang, both of whom he introduced in quick succession in Amazing Spider-Man. Slott certainly didn't have to write Sky as manipulative or controlling towards Johnny, but that's what he chose to do, and that factors into the bigger picture of unfortunate themes in his writing.

Sky returns to Earth with the Fantastic Four despite Johnny appearing unenthused about the idea and initially generally reluctant to interact with her. Apparently they went on a few dates after this and kind of made up. I don't know because I stopped reading for about ten issues in there but I feel confident I missed very little. It's hard to talk about the Sky plot without referencing Johnny's previous interactions with a character named Lyja, a Skrull whose relationship to Johnny I have a long breakdown of here. It's doubly hard, because Lyja actually showed back up in Fantastic Four during this plot. Lyja's modus operandi has remained consistent throughout almost all of her appearances, which I guess makes sense, because she literally has no storylines that do not involve her being obsessed with Johnny, and this recent story isn't any different: Lyja shows up, Lyja disguises herself as another woman in Johnny's life to get close to Johnny, Lyja gets caught and claims it was all fine because she did it for love. This time she disguised herself as Sky.

(FF 2018 #32) Not gonna lie, kind of proud of him for this one. That's one of my problems with Slott -- very occasionally, he busts out good moments, only to undermine them with the rest of his narrative.

In the same issue, Alicia Masters, the first woman Lyja impersonated in order to get close to Johnny, uses her supervillain stepfather's radioactive clay to control Lyja's mind and send her back to space, and I do think she utilized girl power when she did this. Johnny, left reeling after Lyja's latest attempts to trick him into a relationship, ends this issue by sleeping with Victorious, Dr. Doom's right hand woman.

I know she pegged him. I know it. This scene was a little controversial in Johnny fandom, because a lot of people viewed it as Johnny cheating on Sky and thought that that action was out of character for Johnny. I'm personally of a little different opinion, which is that regardless of whether or not you view Johnny and Sky in a committed enough relationship that Johnny's tryst would count as infidelity when all Johnny and Sky are bound by are magic plot soulmate bracelets, I think Lyja's involvement changes things significantly when it comes to Johnny's characterization. All of Johnny's "playboy" periods, if we can call them that, coincide directly with Lyja having been in and then left his life again, which I think makes a certain amount of sense -- it's Johnny trying to wrest control back after a situation where he had none. None of this is explicitly canon, I have to note, but sometimes in comics you have to do the work yourself. So I think this is a case of something being accidentally extremely in character that Slott accidentally stumbled into because he had these love triangles in mind, not because he put a lot of thought into it.

Speaking of love triangles! Johnny sleeping with Victorious gets more complicated when Dr. Doom announces his intent to marry Victorious -- not because he has any romantic interest in her (this engagement caused a lot of uproar in Fantastic Four because Victorious had been previously referred to as being like Doom's adopted daughter) but in order to install her as Latverian regent in his absence. I'm not going to lie, I love a political wedding. Victorious, for some reason, thinks Doom will be deeply upset that she slept with some closeted blond twink and the member of the Fantastic Four he views least as an enemy and more as an annoyance. Johnny, who Sky is currently not talking to because she "felt" him sleeping with Victorious through their magic plot soulmate bracelets, also feels nervous about Doom finding out about this, which I guess is slightly more valid. Anyway, for some completely ridiculous reason, Victorious decides the best time to tell Doom about this little indiscretion is when they're standing at the altar, which coincidentally the Fantastic Four are also standing at, because Doom asked Reed to be his best man in a not at all homoerotic little setup involving midnight swordfighting and Reed slipping Doom's emerald ring onto his own finger. Sorry to sidetrack into DoomReed territory here but it's just like. It's just a lot.

(FF 2018 #33) Also, Ben walked the bride down the aisle. :,) Look at his gigantic hand.

Anyway then Doom decides he's going to kill everyone in a completely reasonable and not at all overblown reaction to Johnny and Zora having what was most likely both disappointing for Zora and weepy for Johnny sex. And that brings us up to where Fantastic Four comics left us yesterday -- in answer to your "big change" question, that's most likely coming up in the next issue, so it hasn't come to pass yet.

Having gotten all that out of the way -- the last time Johnny and Peter interacted canon-wise was in the recent Empyre Fallout Fantastic Four, at the end of the Empyre event:

It was cute! Slott does right good interactions between them. This is possibly the Stockholm Syndrome talking. I don't know if more interactions are likely imminent -- the Empyre event was fairly recent. On the other hand, Slott does like writing interactions between them. So I'd give it about a 50/50 shot. I was skimming the letter page in the latest issue and someone wrote in asking if Peter was likely to appear in the pages of Fantastic Four again any time soon, so there is definitely a demand.

As for Johnny coming out -- I don't know. It's not a call I feel comfortable making at this moment, which I guess means I wouldn't bet money on it. I'd like to say yes, especially because I think Slott set up, whether that was his intention or more likely not, several good places in his run where Johnny could have come out. The beginning, when he's implied to be living with Wyatt again and where he and Wyatt are paralleled against Ben and Alicia. Ben's bachelor party, where Johnny laments not finding the right person -- specifically person and not woman -- and where Ben tells him to "be brave, Johnny Storm." And the soulmate planet plot, where I think could have had a very different and much better ending if Johnny had told Sky that she couldn't be his romantic soulmate, because he knows he wants to be with a man. But those are just places that I think would have made good opportunities for a coming out story. Instead, Johnny's been involved (dubiously) with three different women over the space of the last 10 issues, which is more heterosexuality at one time than he's been confronted with in the last 60 years. So my thoughts are still that it's going to happen eventually, but quite possibly not anytime soon.

Hope that helps! And that my incredibly long answer about what's currently going on with Johnny in comics sheds some light on things!

[midnight-in-town]

About the current (last?) arc of AnY and going full circle

Sorry if some fans already mentioned those ideas but I’ve been rereading the current arc, because it’s been quite long and the pace has its flaws sometimes, so I wanted to broaden my perspective on the story. 

First of all, as an introduction can I just say that I’m, as always, impressed by Hak’s character. He had so much cliché and shallow potential when the story started (I really used to roll my eyes at him), but he became one of my absolute favorite by how deep and strong-hearted he actually is, once he allows people behind the walls he built around him. Anyway, my love for his character & development knows no boundary. I had to say this, ok. I’ll explain why later in the post. Moving on. 

A conflict of generation

If there is one thing I love about Kusanagi-sensei, it’s the feminine touch she adds to her writing. For example, when she naturally addressed periods during the Xing arc and it fit perfectly, because that’s just how her writing goes. In this arc, it shows through the initial bold move to tell us readers about the past through the thoughts and words of a character we’ve never met, that is to say, Yonhi, Yuhon’s wife and Suwon’s mother. 

And yet, it made absolute sense, because Yonhi was the reason behind the cataclysm that eventually led to Yuhon killing priests, as well as the falling-out between him and his younger brother, Il. All along, Yonhi was the silent but pained witness to this feud, watching as the ego of two brothers destroyed everything when none of the two backed down, leading to first Kashi’s death, then Yuhon’s murder and finally Suwon’s coup. 

So, in a way, even if I think Suwon makes a far better king than Yuhon or Il, his circumstances kinda precede the logical decision to get Il out of the picture before he completely annihilated his own kingdom in poverty and war, because there is too much resentment and hatred that fueled Suwon while growing up, even if we readers know that his motivations are primarily about saving Kouka from war against the Kai Empire.

Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely despise both Yuhon and Il but, unfortunately for Suwon, Yona growing up sheltered and mostly unaware of the horrible truth highlights her own decisions throughout the series to be completely selfless and wanting to own up to her father’s misjudgement, rather than trying to get back at Suwon, effectively breaking the cycle of hatred amongst the royal family. 

Why the Wind Tribe kept on supporting Il when everyone else could notice that he was betting on his daughter as the reincarnation of King Hiryuu to save his country is beyond me (Mundok plz explain). Not that Yuhon was better, preaching wars, and I’m glad that Il eventually reconciled with Yonhi, telling him that he would accept Suwon’s judgement but...

...I can’t forgive him for his words. 

Like Yonhi, I’d rather he would have hoped that his conflict with his brother did not reach his children than entertaining it the way he did.

Hopefully though, now that Yona read Yonhi’s memoirs, she will work towards achieving that goal. Not that I have any doubt, since she never really managed to hate Suwon. 

Speaking of the past generation, reading the latest chapters I couldn’t help but wonder about Yona's sad dream... could it be that she inherited Kashi’s gift? Kashi did say that she had these prophetic visions since very young which doesn’t seem to be Yona’s case, but I’ll keep the idea in mind, because it’s interesting. I mean, from Yonhi’s memoirs, it seems that Kashi envisioned that the child she would have would be Hiryuu’s reincarnation (whoever the father was going to be), so Yona inheriting the same prophetic gift from her mother would make sense. 

What an ironic parallel to Suwon inheriting the Crimson Illness from Yonhi if that’s the case, am I right? 

Yona as Kouka’s next Queen

And by that I do not mean Keishuk’s plan to marry her to Suwon, because of her popularity with Kouka’s people. Obviously, the story always was to conclude in Yona getting her throne back and that’s even easier to imagine with Suwon’s disabling illness, but becoming a ruler is tough work and Yona had no real experience acting as a leader for an entire country. 

She didn’t know much before her father’s murder and, even after she became a runaway with Hak and the rest of the HHB, she finely dealt with crises affecting some parts of the kingdom but never the whole kingdom at once, like it’s doomed to happen with the war against the Kai Empire. 

So I really appreciated her stepping up when Suwon couldn’t, because that’s definitely good training and we see the results in the latest chapters:

To be fair, I always thought that Keishuk would be the biggest thorn in Yona’s side during this arc but, as many characters have said in this arc, he’s rather clever and honest about what he intends to achieve, which is why it’s not in his interests to get in the way of Yona if they share a similar goal. 

Looking forward to her facing even greater challenges. Good luck, Yona. <3

War against the Kai Empire: there is strength in unity

The Kai Empire has been depicted as the story’s big bad for a long while now and the common goal for which Yona’s faction and Suwon’s allies could unite, but I’m glad to get more specifics and new characters to explore that part of the plot.

Namely, Mei and Vall. With Chagol, they seem like the perfect foil trio to Suwon, Yona and Hak, except that Chagol seems like a real thorn in the other two’s backs, when a strong bond still ties our main trio in spite of the sad circumstances of the beginning. I particularly love the mirroring reflection between Mei and Yona...

&

...except that Mei is not at odds with one kingdom but with two and that she also deals with the Crimson Illness. :/

Now that war has started, the big threat that South Kai represents will obviously be dealt with, but Kouka kingdom will need more than its five tribes to win this. That’s where I’m sure we all expect to see old “enemies” come back, namely Xing Kingdom, since Kouren signed a military agreement with Suwon, thanks to Yona and Tao. I would bet that this won’t be enough either, but Xing are the only known allies that Kouka kingdom has. 

There is another “enemy” we know from the previous arc though, who have strong feelings against the Kai Empire, specifically about rulers treating their women badly and they are...

...Ying Kuelbo and the Tully tribe. 

The big difference between Xing Kingdom and the Tully tribe is that Suwon never met or dealt directly with Kuelbo the way he did with Kouren and Tao. The Tully tribe lost and Kuelbo ran away, betrayed and having to find a new way to take on the Kai Empire. That’s why I think the Tully tribe would eventually make for a good ally in this war: it showed good promises when Yuran and Yona got along and I think Yona understood where Kuelbo was coming from, especially now that Mei is with them and can probably tell them in details about Chagol.

Not saying this will happen soon, but since there is someone who met and fought against Kuelbo, probably gaining his respect, if this person was to seek the Tully tribe to make them Kouka Kingdom’s ally on Yona’s guidance, I think Kuelbo would give it a thought. That’s right, I’m talking about Hak, who’s currently on his way with Yoon to the Earth Tribe to fetch a drug that will not be able to save neither Suwon nor Mei, thanks Zeno for spoiling us. 

That’s what I meant when I said that Hak slowly became one of my favorite characters throughout the story. While the Sky Tribe seems to be taking bets on who between Yona and Suwon will eventually sit for good on that throne, there is a good chance that Hak will be one of the key players when it comes to winning that war against South Kai. Not that we should expect any less from the Thunder Beast. <3

To be very honest though, I expected this arc to be very tough for his character, because the truth behind Il’s death and Suwon’s coup would never be easily understandable to him (Yona’s own words, not mine): 

Yet, surprisingly he was able to at least listen and, no matter if he will ever understand Suwon’s choice or not, he decided to trust in Yona’s decision to back Suwon in the rising political issues.  

In general, I love how Hak is the least bound by the past before Suwon’s coup. He did respect Il as his king, but he did not protect Yona in the beginning for anyone else’s sake but her own. Just like Kashi once asked him to always protect Yona (which is sweet since she could see the future) but, considering he never even thought about her words once in the story, it’s likely he doesn’t remember that at all, making the choice to be by Yona’s side defined as solely his own. 

It’s this strength of his that eventually led him to say recently that he would go fetch that drug with Yoon, knowing that it was for Suwon’s sake (surprising Suwon himself), just like he will definitely fight for Kouka Kingdom, not because Yona wants him to but because it’s clearly his own desire (see ch211 where he let Yun go alone so that he could help the Earth Tribe fight):

All that makes Hak the wildest card of every agency in the plot, not simply because he’s strong and reliable and the biggest worry of the Sky Tribe, but because...

...Yona and the four dragons will never give him up.

Through Hak, Yona will be able to assert her political weight and he will be there for her, like he always was, making it impossible for their little group to lose. What a power move, I love it. 

I think I should stop there because I already rambled so much. Looking forward to the rest of the arc, it’s going to be a wild ride!! 

[adhdeancas]

Dean Winchester (and the script leaks last night) possessed me to write this.

Dean happens upon Chuck's latest book: Carry On. Except it ends differently than it really went, and the ending? It's really fucking bad.

tw: suicide mention, transphobia (quickly shut the fuck down) 

Dean doesn’t make a habit of going to bookstores. Not because he hates books, contrary to what Sam might think; he just prefers to buy used books. There’s something comforting about a book that has already been worn and read over and over, that already shows how much the previous owner loved it. Plus, y’know, big corporations are evil and all that. And Dean only allows himself to overlook that when his stomach or his wallet wins over his hatred of the shitty mass-produced products. 

This time it was Jack who won; he’s obsessed with this new fantasy series and the new book just came out, so there’s no way he can hunt it down on Ebay. He makes his way to the fantasy and sci-fi section, eyes roaming over the displays of new releases, and his eye catches on something that turns his blood cold. 

“Supernatural: Carry On, The Final Book of the Winchesters’ Epic Journey” takes up a whole table, the generic and overly serious cover jeering out at him. 

He storms over to the display, anger covering up for the way his body feels light as a feather and like lead all at once, and picks up a book. “Why is Sam always fucking shirtless?” he mutters, the only thought that allows itself from the mess inside his head to his mouth. 

“Book sales.” A voice behind him says. He turns to see a teenager with their arms crossed over their work polo, pierced lip fixed into a customer-unfriendly frown.

“People want to see that?”

They snort, a small grin turning up the corner of their lips. It reminds Dean of Cas. “No. But that’s what advertisers think all ‘women’ want,” They use air quotes. 

He raises an eyebrow and asks. “Women?”

They shrug and uncross their arms, leaning back against the display table behind them. Their nametag says Jadyn. “Supernatural’s biggest block of readers is queer. I’d go out on a limb and say a lot of those the marketers think of as ‘women’ aren’t, or if they are, they aren’t itching to see Sam’s six pack.” Jadyn smirks. 

Dean takes a second to digest that, then grins down at the book, thinking past Sam’s apparently badly-received nudity now. “So how’d they like it?” he asks, waving the book a bit and looking up at Jadyn. Apparently they know a lot about the fans of the books, and for once, he’s proud of the way the story ended. 

Jadyn’s face sets into all hard lines. “Most people fucking hated it.” they say bluntly, then, probably remembering that he’s a customer, correct. “Sorry. I mean, it got some good reviews, mostly from people who like Wincest, but beyond that, it had some problematic plot points.”

Dean winces at the reminder of the ship between him and his brother, then scrunches his whole face together in confusion. “Wait, what? Why?” Why would Wincest fans like it? What was problematic about their end?

Jadyn shifts from foot to foot. “I don’t wanna spoil anything for you-”

“I don’t care about spoilers, just give me the short version.” Dean says quickly. A quiet panic is rising in him, and suddenly he has a horrible feeling that he’s not holding the truth in his hands anymore. 

“Uh, okay… Well, the most obvious thing is the bury-your-gays thing, then there’s the fact that it completely contradicted the rest of the lore. And it was ableist, misogynistic, and messed up, like, every character’s arc.” they take a breath, clearly worked up by it. “Even if they changed any of the details too, it was all built on Dean’s death, and that’s just bullshit. Sorry.” they apologize again, apparently mistaking Dean’s stricken expression to be in reaction to their rant and swearing. 

“No, nah, you’re… you’re okay. Uh, thanks.” he waves a hand and wanders away from them, only remembering Jack’s book when he’s almost to the register. He manages to make his way back and find the damn thing, but he’s still in a fog when he gets to the register. 

“Did anyone help you in the store today?”

“Huh?” he looks up and meets the middle-aged cashier’s gaze for the first time. Brent, from the nametag, looks at him impatiently. “Oh, yeah, uh… Jadyn. Jadyn helped me.” Brent scoffs and starts typing with a shake of the head. “Uh, is there a problem?” Dean asks, a little annoyed at this cashier’s unnecessary attitude. He usually doesn’t care if an employee’s rude, because they have to deal with assholes all the time and honestly Dean isn’t much better, but this one gives him a bad feeling. 

“No, no, sorry. It’s just - “Jadyn’s” got this idea that he’s a girl. Makes everybody call him that name now too. Just-” Brent shakes his head. “I mean, you get it. Their generation, everybody wants to be special.”

Dean glares. “No, I don’t get it, Brent.” He says through gritted teeth. “Seems to me like Jadyn probably deals with enough assholes like you that her asking for a little basic decency is the exact opposite of special. Sounds pretty normal, actually.” He can see the fear creep into Brent’s eyes, and he knows the cashier is reacting to the murderous look in his eyes more than his actual words. 

Brent hands Dean his bag of books with a quiet, “Here you go.”

Dean snatches it away. “Oh, Brent?” he checks over his shoulder to make sure they’re alone and then leans across the counter into Brent’s space. “You should find a new job, one where you don’t have to interact with other people. At least until you learn how to stop being a piece of shit.” He starts to ease away but thinks better about it. “And if you think that’s a suggestion, it’s not. My husband likes this book coming out next month that I’ll need to buy, and if I see you here when I come, well… it would be really embarrassing for you to tell all your little friends that you got your ass beat by a ‘special’ guy, huh?” He pats Brent on the cheek condescendingly and leaves with a huff. 

Damn transphobes. 

He only remembers the book once he’s back in Baby, and he takes the time to drive out of town before he pulls over to read it. It’s an old abandoned church, the cross long since fallen from the roof and the doors hanging off their hinges. He sits on the steps just because being in Baby seems claustrophobic for once in his life, and going back to the bunker to look at this is just… not happening.

Dean only skims the beginning to see that it starts the same. The ground erupting with bodies, hell spitting out its most-conveniently placed nasties, Rowena sacrificing herself, Cas leaving. His throat closes up at that, at Chuck’s description of Cas’s heartbroken expression as he climbs the stairs of the bunker. He clears his throat and skips to the end, right past Cas’s death that he doesn’t have the time to think about right now, past them defeating Chuck and then stops. He goes back a few pages, trying to find the disconnect. 

The story’s different.

After Jack takes on God’s power, in the book, he’s totally fine. Not almost vibrating out of his skin or anything, not crying like the three year old he is because he’s scared. Not like it really happened. He just smiles and leaves him and Sam, and they let him go. 

Dean scoffs, skimming over the story as it just gets more ridiculous. 

In the book, he doesn’t even try to save Cas. They barely even mention him. And they never mention Eileen, either. In fact, Dean notes disbelievingly, practically the only characters in the last few chapters are him and Sam. They’re hunting again.

“What, is Chuck trying to keep the series going?” he whispers to himself, anger flaring through him. They let Chuck live, and he decided to write obnoxious fanfiction about them? He’s gonna kill that shameless little fucker. For real, this time. He deserves it.

In the book, Sam and Dean torture some vampire mime, and they enjoy it. Dean cringes; this is really what Chuck thinks of them. Then they tussle with more vamps in a barn and- 

Dean’s brain stops working. He rereads the scene again and again. 

“There’s something in my… something in my back. It feels like it’s right through me.” 

Dean Winchester dies in a dirty barn, on a piece of freaking rebar. 

More than that, Dean realizes on his fourth read-through. This Dean? He tried to drag out his speech, Dean can tell by the way he pauses for fucking drama. He would never do that. He would never talk to Sam for fifteen hellish minutes when he could be trying. Trying to live, so he can actually get his life back on track, get his family back. No, he made that speech stalling. He made that speech so Sam wouldn’t try to save him. 

“You gotta admit, I had one helluva ride.” He was strangely calm.

Chuck made him kill himself.

Dean reads the rest of the book through blurry eyes, reading an ambiguous and nothing-ending, one where he’s somehow happy to be dead and driving around in heaven alone while Sam raises a kid into hunting and cries about Dean decades after he’s died. Eileen isn’t mentioned. Cas is mentioned once, and Bizzarro-Dean doesn’t even think about seeing him, apparently. The whole book ends with a hug between him and Sam, both dead. Both alone. 

Dean rips the ending up. He tears through the stupid paper covering and keeps ripping the pages up until they’re the size of confetti. His lower lip wobbles. He throws the whole thing against the side of the building, and it tumbles through the broken doorway and drops into a pile of dust and dirt. “That isn’t the fucking ending.” he grounds out, knocking his hand against the flimsy handrail. It gives a little under his fist and he kicks at it. “That isn’t the fucking ending!”

He’s having a panic attack. Again. He tries to take deep breaths, but they’re gulping, too big, they’re making him panic more. He scrambles back to Baby and grabs his phone, presses the first number on his favorites list and waits for him to answer on speaker phone.

“Hey Dean, what’s up?” Sam sounds like he’s been laughing. There are voices in the background, and Dean tries to convince himself one of them is Eileen. 

“Hey Sammy.” he chokes out, trying to sound normal. “You busy?”

There’s a pause, and then the sounds in the background. “Nah, Rowena’s just over.” he says casually. 

“So those voices in the background were-”

“Rowena and Eileen, yeah. They’re trying to convince me we need to go to Mexico. For the beaches.” A smile in his voice. Dean lets out a sigh of relief.  What’s up, Dean? You need something?” The smile drops, and Sam’s worried. 

Sam’s okay. Sam’s okay. “No, nah. Hey, you heard from Donna lately?” Dean just needs to triple-check.

“Uh, no, not since Sunday dinner… Dean, you okay?”

“Yeah, she just- she hasn’t been answering my texts. Just wanted to make sure.” Dean lies quickly. His breathing is still uneven, but his body is settling into uneven shakes. 

Sam sounds skeptical. “Yeah, well, she did tell us it’s been pretty busy at work lately. Y’know, everybody going out for the first time with COVID, getting stupid. Plus, y’know, nowhere’s drowning in EMTs right now.”

“Right. Yeah.” Dean takes a deep breath, a distant memory of Donna talking about that coming back to him.

“Pretty sure you were setting up a D&D session with Charlie while she was talking about that,” Sam laughs. Dean knows he means it as a subtle jab, but there’s too much relief flooding through him to care. Still, a string is pulled taut in him, and Sam can’t fix that completely.

“Gotta go, Sam,” Dean hangs up before Sam can say anything else, and goes to his next contact. It rings for far too long, and Dean’s heartbeat picks back up to thundering.

“Hello, Dean.”

“Cas,” Dean breathes out. “Cas, you know I love you, right?” He needs to test all the bounds of this, to make sure, just to make sure. Make sure Chuck isn’t still fucking with him. Because apparently, Chuck won’t let him be queer. Not in his story. Not out loud.

He can hear Cas’s eyebrow raise through the phone, and his chest is overcome with stupid fondness. “I would be a little worried if you didn’t.”

Dean grins widely. “Like, romantically. I’m in love with you. Because you’re the love of my life and I’m bisexual.” He says it all like it’s a checklist, like he expects some cosmic being to slap a hand over his mouth before he gets each next phrase out.

“Yes, Dean. We’ve been married almost two months.” Cas is smiling. It happens everytime he talks about their wedding. Dean adores it. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, now it is.” His whole body relaxes, still vibrating with leftover panic, but satisfied. “I got Jack’s book.”

“Oh, good. He’ll be so pleased.” Cas pauses. “Dean, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah.” Dean eases off the ground and sends a last look at the dilapidated church before climbing into Baby. “Just- read a bad book. I’ll tell you about it later. When I get home.”

[shoezuki]

Tommy's prison/revival arc isnt well written actually

Anyways ive been wanting to talk on it a while for a bit here but havent had the Time or like. The thought to. But im gonna go off now.

First off im gonna say im ASSUMING this stream and plot of tommy being in the prison with dream is written entirely by tommy and dream. Wilbur May be involved in the latest stream but im not sure.

Bringing tommy back to life after only three days of him being dead did practically nothing to progress plot, the characters, or audience's understanding. In fact i feel that it damaged Other characters' potential and plot and already established plotlines.

The 'development' aspect

A really, really easy way to see if anything has changed or developed through an arc or plotline is to straightup just compare the 'beginning' to the 'end' in terms of the barebones situation. So;

Beginning: tommy is trapped in an isolated prison cell with dream, his own abuser who has hurt him in the past, for an unknown amount of time. He's terrified of dream and being stuck there with him.

End: tommy is trapped in an isolated prison cell with dream after being killed then revived by him, his own abuser whos hurt him in the past, for an unknown amount of time. Hes terrified of dream and being stuck there with him.

Okay. This is simplified obvious. But the point stands. ALTHOUGH the troupe of 'going back to the beginning' is common in the heroes journey its. It doesnt work here. Has tommy learned anything? Has he changed as a character? Is the severity of their situation any different? Have we, as the audience, learned anything new?

Im going to expand on that last point because i think it has the strongest potential argument. Technically for progression in literature and development of plot/characters, things can Change without them being Aware as characters. It can change just by the audience's perception changing or being challenge.

Slight example: i've been reading a webcomic called Your Throne. Its a fantasy/political drama about a noble lady who entered a competition with another noble lady to become the empress. The main lady lost despite her being a better fit, and the comic starts with the main lady trying to assassinate the empress. Its assumed and stated by the main lady that she 'ruined her life' and so thats all the readers know. However, later in the novel we see flashbacks to the competition itself and find that the two ladies were extremely close friends, neither wanting anything bad for the other, but it was the emperor himself who manipulated both of them for his own agenda. Those flashbacks gave us an entirely different idea of who the real antagonist is and completely changed the two main ladies' relationship. THAT is how the audience's understanding of the plot and novel can be used to change the entire story. We dont get such here though

Some things that were brought to light during tommy being dead/revived:

Dream is capable of reviving people infinitely

This was already implicated and assumed. The book dream has being a means of reviving people has been around Technically since schlatt's death. This just 'confirmed' what was known

Time works differently/feels longer in the afterlife

This doesnt really impact much beyond emotions and implications. If we had more insight into what the 'afterlife' is like beyond nothingness perhaps so. But really it just makes it so wilbur being dead for what feels like 9 years and tommy having been dead for 2 months appeal to emotions.

Wilbur is evil

This one fuckin sucks i cant lie HSKSHSISSGEGDV. Like i was gon go on bout it and i will but it jus sucks. We have nothing to go on besides tommy's word, no examlles of what Horrible things wilbur said could make tommy assume this, etcetc. Ill most likely make a seperate post on how this feels like we're just going to get 'wilbur is a horrible villain' type with him. But still. I feel wilbur Not Being Good isnt a new development.

Dream is going to revive wilbur

This doesnt feel new either, part because phil had wanted to revive wilbur before (ill get to that more later) and that tommy had kept dream alive/initially imprisoned him with the idea of him reviving wilbur.

Dream believes wilbur will break him out of prison

Okau this makes no sense to me actually. I cwnt understand How exactly wilbur would be able to do this? Or why dream believes he even Could? Mans been dead for like 9 years and all we Know of the afterlife is that its black... nothingness. How would 9 years of that make wilbur capable of busting the prison open?

So. Yeah. All in all this plotline hasnt done anything new, developed things, or altered people's perceptions. We just ended up back at square one. Back to tommy being traumatized, dream being 'evil' and horrible and doing villain monologues, and them being stuck together.

Other characters and plotlines

Im pretty damn sure tommy's revival fucked up a LOT of other characters' plotlines and potential development. Honestly i feel this has a lot to do with the writers not communicating with other ccs well enough. But Ill talk about specific characters from least to most fucked over in my opinion:

Sam

He's the best off. He hqd been there during tommy's death, had been close to tommy, had majorly blamed himself and his own mistakes for tommy's death. His grief and self hatred was actually really heartbreaking and well done. The attached character of Sam Nook being unaware of tommy's death and simply waiting for tommy to return was a really good parallel to sam's own grief and anger. like it really snapped sam the guy who cares for tommy and wants to do Right by him back together with him as the Warden of the prison. Mixed personal life with 'just business'.

I feel it wouldve been nice to have him like. Have more time to grieve properly and come to terms eith tommy's death and his own involvement/influence over the events. Him finding tommy alive again Could be a means of him like. Facing his own grief head on if done well.

Ranboo

Mostly in the context of him and sam's argument do i feel it got screwed over. The weight of them yelling at each other and trying to find who to blame and the implications that Maybe ranboo was the one who caused the security breach that closed down the prison on tommy just.... doesnt hit so hard anymore. Because how can there be blame and arguments and a 'who done it' mystery when tommy popped up all fine again?

Puffy

I dony know much of her involvement or how she found out tommy died (besides metagaming shhhhh) but i saw her monologuing of how they 'failed' tommy and like. Her whole 'he was so young we the Adults failed him' spiel is like........... inconsequential? Now??? Like no dont worry he died but hes alright now.

Philza

BET YOU DIDNY EXPECT TO SEE THIS FUCKER!!!!!! But actually though i want to talk bout how this ties into phil. A LOT. for Zalbr ❤. But also because i see ppl tying phil to tommy's death n like nah shutup u doin it wrong. Ill go off more in a Wilbur Post. But essentially: i dont like that dream is now going to revive wilbur. I feel they arent going to tie philza into this Despite phil having originally been trying to revive his son and studying on it and Attempting and Failing. But now suddenly dream can just. Say some magic words and Poof wilbur lives? So we're just going to Kill philza's revival attempts plotline and leave that hanging? This made his efforts seem pointless and Wack like oh why didnt you just Say The Magic Words phil????

Niki

I feel really bad for niki. She hasnt been able to do a lore stream during tommy's 'death' (she tweeted she wanted to but her computer wasnt working) and considering her entire character.... that shit is important. We seen it with Jack Manifold how tommy's death impacted Him considering he literally wanted tommy dead. And since niki is in a similar boat to jack of trying to kill tommy and it being her Only goal...... thats extremely important.

BUT. i feel there wasnt any communication. Did she or anyone even know tommy would be revived? Did no one consider they could At Least let her do a single stream on it? Like jack manifold????

We couldve gotten a Really good niki lore stream. I genuinely was so excited for it and i dont regularly watch her. But we seen it with jack manifold which is why i dont feel he got screwed because mans genuinely did So Good he could pop off with anything n i think it works in His favour. But now........ for niki. Canonically she never even knew tommy was Dead. So its like nothing even happened for her. Is she just supposed to continue on trying to kill tommy with no progression?

What i think would work

This is more me being like 'hey @ the dsmp writers let me in' type speculation sbosegussgs. But i was thinkin on a Really easy way to 'fix' this without rewriting lore and the streams.

Dream should kill tommy again now that he's been revived and Leave Him Dead.

More development for the characters who are affected by his death Especially niki. More time for grief and self reflection and development

A chance for the audience to figure out what the 'afterlife' really is.

Dream is supposed to be smart and a master manipulator or something right? Why doesnt he use being able to revive tommy as a bargaining chip with sam for his own freedom?

The audience would now Know dream's intentions with tommy better, that this death isnt 'final', but we could still see other characters' grief and reactions and coping without it feeling cheap. Ive seen some 'but people dont know tommy is alive so hes still dead in their mind' but that sucks imo.

We'd know more on dream's ability to revive people and that he can just Do It on a whim (which i think sucks but hey im trying) but no one else would know this canonically

Okay. Im done. If you read this. Thankyou. I love you. Hmu.