#he acts the same as THE MOVIE VERSION OF HADES

[deanpinterester]

okay so i don't really want to keep saying "in the books they did xyz" but in the books, percy said hades is the first god he met that actually looked and acted like a god. and i mention this because the show's introduction of hades EERILY reminded me of how he was introduced in the godforsaken movie, with the palace itself looking scary and haunting, and a regular funney guy just appears onscreen and goes "hi. i'm hades :)" so i'm just thinking. for a show that the author claims is nothing like the movie, they sure are making a lot of the same mistakes.

[sole-di-fragola]

Super Late but Wish redesigns and rewrite

Update: I changed Mizar’s design a little bit

I tried to recreate the 90s Disney art style in this drawing since I imagine the rewrite as a 2D movie

(Click image for better quality)

There’s some details about my rewrite (copypasted for the Notes App and modified a little bit)

Asha is the daughter of the deceased king Tomas and the royal seamstress Sakina

Rosas used to be allied with a kingdom in the sky called Al-Jady and both battled the black hole monsters who attacked their kingdom

Both kingdoms had a good relationship during the years, but when Magnifico came, Al-Jady decided to cut ties with them

Her dad Tomas and Magnifico are brothers. Tomas was wise and loyal and was a philosopher and astronomer, while Magnifico is ambitious and power-hungry and is a sorcerer. Tomas was chosen to be the heir to the throne

Magnifico’s real name is Marion

Magnifico, jealous kill Tomas.

Then he lies to Asha that her dad was killed by thieves from another kingdom, and then she is banished with her mom and grunkle

They now live in a Hamlet, in which Sakina is the matriarch

She works undercover by the name of Layla. Layla means night in Arabic and is a pretty common name, and Asha is a rare name. (Referring to Aurora’s Briar Rose and Mulan’s Ping)

Asha is a quiet, reserved and studious. But also she is snarky and quick tempered

She likes to draw, animate and learn about astronomy. Her drawing skills are shown more often than in the original movie

Layla (undercover Asha) works at the palace as the royal librarian and reads stories to children

Although Asha considers some stories, as fantasy and childish stories, including the origin of the kingdom of Rosas she likes to practice magic (probably she thinks she is more mature or realizes that these stories may be fake, idk)

Her friends live in other hamlets outside the kingdom

Her Mom and Sabino still exist

Sabino plays the guitarra morisca (or Mandora) as his instrument (to make it historically accurate)

Sabino is Asha’s grunkle

The Star being a shape shifter (like the concept art) and his name is Mizar. His appearance is like a moth creature, when he turns into a human he looks more like an Afro-Arab teenager, chubby and shorter than Asha (I make him different than the average Disney Prince)

He has a companion named Najm, he is inspired by Tinkerbell and only Mizar can understand him

Also the main couple both having sidekick has been seen in many Disney movies (ex: Ariel and Eric, Jasmine and Aladdin)

Najm was a gift from Mizar’s parents to him in his 18 birthday

Mizar can fly and transform into various living things

Mizar likes music and he can play the flute (inspired by @a-storytellers-wish’ s version of Star)

He also likes to study about The Mainland and it’s inhabitants (Yep, I called it like how the fairies in Tinkerbell called the human realm)

Najm can make animals talk and give cosmic dust to make a person fly

His inspirations includes Genie, Peter Pan and Maui

Mizar has the same powers as Merlin (shapeshift,make objects move and see the future)

Magnifico and Amaya are an evil couple (like the concept art) with a pet lynx named Lola and a daughter called Celeste

Celeste is Asha’s cousin, she is 25. She acts like a big sister for Asha

If you are a writer and you had you own rewrite, please I need your help, I’m not good at writing

Sort of spoilers of the rewrite but I will put it anyways

Magnifico summoning the blackhole monsters who are jailed and attack Al-Jady (referring to Hades summoning the Titans to attack the Olympus in Hercules)

Magnifico dies pulled by the Black Hole monsters like Dr Facilier (also referencing Kira’s death in JoJos since both have the same voice actor in Latin Spanish)

I might make a separate post about the designs, but idk yet.

(I don’t like to randomly tag users, but they inspired me to do my own rewrite, although I found the movie decent but it still has flaws and was a nothingburger movie for celebrating the 100th anniversary of one of the most historical and important studio in the animation industry. If I said my unpopular opinions about the movie, some people would probably burn me in a stake)

@rylxdreams @your-ne1ghbor @annymation @uva124 @rascalentertainments @erijuice @cerulean-crow @signed-sapphire @mythartist21 @strawbxerri (I know the last one is not in the “fandom” anymore but “Asha being a refugee monarch like Simba” is kinda similar to their rewrite and it was just a coincidence. The idea just came when I was brainstorming the AU with a mutual of mine on Twitter)

[aliciavance4228]

I don't like to act like an angry missy right now but why do so many people have to ship Athena with someone?

I can somehow understand shipping her with a female character because:

Many people interpret being a virgin as not having sex with a man and consider that penetration = losing your virginity;

Athena is already believed to have two romantic (though not sexual) relationships with two different women, namely Chariclo and Myrmex.

However, people sometimes really manage to come with the worst pairs ever. Athena + Medusa = LOVE; that's why she helped Perseus to decapitate her and then attached her head to her Aegis. Athena + Arachne = LOVE; that's why she bellitled her so bad to the point where she wanted to kill herself out of shame, or just turned her into a spider directly. Athena + Artemis- You know what, this one is not so bad, actually. I won't criticize this one.

Anyway, but the worst ships ever are those which include her + a male deity.

Athena + Hephaestus; Hephaestus tried to rape her once.

Athena + Poseidon; Besides the fact that they two are already known for deeply hating each other, it is said that Poseidon was the one who suggested Hephaestus to force himself on Athena while he was drunk.

Athena + Zeus; No. Just no. We already have Zeus raping Rhea and Persephone in Orphic Greek Mythology, and trying to rape Aphrodite (in the versions where she is his daughter) as well. We don't need a disturbing SA scene involving them two.

Athena + Ares; It's pretty clear that they two have a common brother/sister rivarly. That's it. That's all.

Athena + Hermes; She's acting like the big sis towards him.

Athena + Apollo; Same as for Athena + Hermes.

Athena + Dionysus; In some myth versions she literally took care of him when he was a baby.

Athena + Hades; Surprised that there are people who actually ship them two, honestly.

The more I see these pairs the more I'm starting to believe that these people cannot understand the fact that there are women who can be happy without a man as well, or that if two people of the opposite gender are getting along it's not necessarily because there's something inherently romantic/sexual in their relationship. They're really acting as if there's something wrong with being asexual or just not interested at all. Furthermore, we already have a lot of goddesses who are not married and sexually active (Aphrodite post-divorce and Demeter are the first examples that come to my mind).

The best theory that I have right now is the Forbidden Fruit Effect. To resume it shorter, the Forbidden Fruit Effect is when someone either craves for something that they clearly cannot have, or can have but with serious consequences. The best example in this case are nuns and how they are presented in an extremely sexual/provocative manner in movies, video games, fanarts etc. Which not only that is disrespectful to religious people, but it's also completely disgusting. You're specifically choosing to sexualize a category of women who made a vow of chastity and clearly expressed their choice of never sleeping with a man.

Athena is one the Three Virgin Goddesses along with Artemis and Hestia in 99,99% of Greek Mythology, so why can't people just respect that and move on?

[descendantofthesparrow]

Brutally honest thoughts on each character?

...*Each* character???? bruh thats so many, okay ill keep this short cuz im waiting for a haircut rn

well start with the vks cuz thats easy

Mal-started off strong and then just became...THE WORST, love hate relationship for her. shes my art block fix but also i hate her

Jay-i dont have strong opinions on him, he actually never stuck out to me other than 'obligatory jock dude of the friend group.' i wish i liked him more but im more attached to his fandom self over canon Jay

Evie-got boring after D1, i wish they let her keep her chemistry stuff, love her vibe but shes kinda boring to me. SHOULD'VE BEEN THE MC OVER MAL!!

Carlos- lots of lost potential with his tech stuff from the first book and movie. easily could've been an engineer or inventor but they just made him an animal lover and i got bored of that real quick.

Uma-my queen, my idol, can do no wrong i love her so much i WILL kill for her.

Harry-i love his dumbass so much YALL DONY EVEN KNOW I WANNA BITE HIM SO BAD

Gil-one of the few characters i felt actually...grew up? idk but hes one of the few characters were it actually feels like time passed for.

Dizzy-oooooooh honey, honey honey, sunshine baby, please, put the glue gun down.

Celia- they should've gone with her trailer persona. Her outfits are so bad and i wish she got better writing and designs, so much lost potential, also she should've been Jays pick.

Smee twins- why the fuck are they even here they had one line and no significance. also they should've had a Harry scene.

Aks

Ben-puppy boy, deserved to have doberman energy. got turned into a doormat by the writers and is unfairly hated.

Audrey-bitch queen, shes not a nice person and thats okay~ girlboss.

Chad- should've been the D3 villan they had that all set up in D2 with his weird ass attitude over Ben getting kidnapped on the isle.

Doug -....honestly gives me the ick, especially in D3, i HATE the long hair his actor had/has. gold is NOT his color and neither is pastel purple or green. he looked good in D1 but ICK for 2 and 3.

Jane- bby gurl, blue bird sweetheart. yeah she did some fucked up shit in D1 but she was an insecure 14 year old girl who got manipulated by Mal and other aks!!!

Lonnie- deserved so much better, shes Chinese why is she getting Japanese style stuff?!?! her plot in D2 didnt even do anything it just happened and no one cared and Jay just shoved his problems of girls playing roar onto her.

Beast- *inhale* i wanna kick his ass, and i could, lemme at him. how dare he force an entire kingdom on Ben at 16 when he didnt become king when he was 28(when he married Belle)

Belle- they took away her backbone, shes not Disney princess book worm and independent Belle. she just, lost the spark

FG- they turned her into a preschool teacher, GIVE ME MY OL COOKY FAIRY LADY BACK

Leah- *seething rage*

vk parents

Maleficent- fuckin love her, shes such a manipulative bitch and feels like a gone crazy version of a Maleficent made for kids. def not the mistress of all Evil but i love her nonetheless

EQ- shouldve been the head villain, SHE WAS THE FIRST DISNEY VILLAIN CMON! def not the same character from the animated movie but shes dramatic and sassy and i adore her.

Jafar- haha funny characature~ i wish he was more menacing like he had been. Jafar is not one of my fav villains so descendants jafar didnt exactly translate for me well.

Cruella- yeah they nailed her, no complaints about her. good design, good dialogue, good acting.

Hades- LEMME KICK HIS DEAD BEAT ASS, fucking 'daddy issues made you stronger' my butt. i hate his hair and honestly he doesnt fit the washed up punk design, he didnt deserve the speech at the end and didnt deserve to be forgiven by Mal.

Ursula- we only saw her tentacle and one line but she seemed spot on so yeah

Lady Tremaine- why the fuck was she nice in D3??? bitch is the EVIL stepmother.

Smee- spot on, i have words for his sons designs becuaee hes old not naturally white haired but hes chill, makes sense hed be a good parent, he never felt evil to me, just compliant

Facilier- such a vibe, his actor got him spot on, would've changed up his suit design but hes chill and i can see him being a family man(ignoring wicked world).

[riddlerosehearts]

love your critical posts! one more thing they weirdly added in that wasnt in the book but was in the movies: the car escape from the hotel. was it like........ richard trying to outdo the movies. oh my god.

oh my god you're right?? i've seen so many posts criticizing the fact that both the movies and the show ended with a post credit scene where gabe just stumbles upon medusa's head in the box instead of letting sally kill him herself, and the fact that both the movie and the show changed hades from the first god percy met who actually looked and acted like a god, the first one who had a truly terrifying presence, into Just Some Guy who cracks jokes like a worse version of hades from hercules (1997) (although at least the movie gave him an alternate form that was scary, lol)...

but i have not seen a single person bring up the lotus casino car escape, and i haven't seen the movies in so long i forgot about it. actually kind of insane to me how rick has spent years talking about how much he hates the movies for taking so many liberties with his books but then allowed the show to take some of the exact same liberties with his books. and he even made that "normalize bad movie erasure" tweet about how the lotus casino episode specifically was going to be soooo much better than the movies... and now as i'm writing this i realize he also said in that tweet that he would never allow any callbacks to the movies near his show and that's why they wouldn't play poker face. WHEN THERE WAS BASICALLY A CALLBACK TO THE MOVIE LITERALLY IN THAT EPISODE like hello?! 😭 thank you for pointing this out to me anon.

[trizy0]

Descendants- Entry #2: The Villains

I'm going to make a quick analysis of the Villains as parents and of their character in Descendants

The Villains

Maleficent

Maleficent's character is quite solid during D1, her being based off in her counterpart of the animated movie, even when we see her in Merlin Prep we can see that counterpart of hers.

What I don't understand is why they didn't use her counterpart's past from the Maleficent movie (2014) that would've been even more gut wrenching since it would've added depth for both her versions. But, utilizing her version of the Maleficent movie wouldn't make sense for her to be a bad mother (given that we see her being like a mother to Aurora).

Evil Queen

For me, the best interpretation of the Evil Queen was Regina from UOAT, she was misunderstood and had a stronger affinity with magic (and better character development).

We don't see that much of her during D1, but the little we see about her, I interpreted her as a mother that tried to do her best, who tried to get past that 'fairest of them all' thing to be a better mother to Evie, even tho we later learn that Evie was scared of her mother.

For me, the Evil Queen was the best parent between all the villains, who was proud of her daughter because of everything she could do and become, but thought that her daughter would only gain success if she married someone with royal lineage, which made her the kind of mother who a daughter would think that she'd never make proud.

Jafar

The biggest mistake that D1 made was making him have a kid (even tho I love Jay and his fantastic) and that he could live in a house with two teenager girls (I think that everyone was weirded out by the scene where Jafar kissed Jasmine).

But other than that he would just ignore the existence of a son and would just use him to make his dirty bid.

Cruella De Vil

Cruella being one of the big bads in D1 didn't make any sense, she isn't considered a fairy tail nor had magic to make others so afraid of her (but the , só having her as one of the 'absolute rulers' of the Isle of the Lost didn't make sense.

Hades

Hades being the CEO of daddy issues is so funny to me (since his dad literally ate him), and he didn't even apologize to Mal for draining her magic.

Other than that he was a fantastic character and was really coherent with his animated version (plus the way he was portrayed in D3 was super good, because that was exactly how I would imagine Hercules' Hades in a modern setting)

Ursula

With what we know about Ursula (basing in her tentacle appearance in D2 and Uliana whole personality and actions) is that she's someone that both her daughter and her sister looked up to her, wanting to be her (Uma wanting her mother's influence and Uliana wanting her sister's power).

We cannot determine if she was a good mother to Uma, but we can determine that she had that sisterly relationship with Uliana where both of you are a pain in the other ass.

Captain Hook

Same goes with Hook, we don't know if he was a good father, but we can speculate that Harry looked up to him (since he tries to act like his father) and that he was a rather ambitious man (D4 Hook).

As a character, younger Hook having already lost his has was like "where TF is this kids parents", my man already had beef with Peter Pan (and the probability of Peter being a goddamn baby is too funny for me).

Dr. Facilier

Facilier being a good dad to Celia is cool as fuck, I, personally, can't think of him as a girl dad, but is rather good his relationship with Celia.

And his character is not consistent when we compare him with his animated version. I just hoped we saw more about him.

Drizella and Lady Tremaine

Drizella not appearing was a crime and Lady Tremaine trying to be a good grandma (D3) did make sense, but them trying to redeem her in D3 didn't make sense.

Lady Tremaine character was consistent in ROR, but in D3, it wasn't that much.

Mr. Smee

Him being a good dad made sense, we know shit about his version in Descendants

[idkjustletmescroll]

Idk why rise of red is on my mind so much when it hasn't been since I stopped watching it, but anyways--here's how i would slightly modify ror because i feel like writing this. I'll probably take it down tmrw. Anyways:

-The start of the movie pretty much stays the same, but uma's the acting principal until mal and ben come back and find a permanent replacement for fg, not the permanent principal.

-It goes pretty much the same way, but qoh realizes that "taking over a high school" doesn't equate to "a coup," so she takes a bunch of important people hostage instead, i don't write politics so don't come at me. Anyways, red still sentences Cinderella with treason, etc.

-Also minor changes: when red first meets chloe, she's kind of startled by Chloe's bubbliness, but starts to answer nicely--yes, i'm princess red, i mean there's kind of a barrier over wonderland rn, but you know--and then her mom looks back and red quickly does the whole jabberjocky line. Idk I just feel like red would be excited to make new friends away from her mom's influence.

-Also, qoh takes members of uma's crew hostage or something, just to further dissuade her from acting up, at least rn.

-They go back in time, meet bridget and ella, etc. The villains are pretty much the same, but hook doesn't have his hook yet (chloe can be all confused and clarify it for the viewers), and idk why hades would be there. He's a god. I did love the hades x maleficent background moments tho so...that's smth i guess?

-Anyway, they're all making fun of bridget, and ella tells bridget not to care what other people think of her, but it really gets to bridget, which is obvious to the viewer; and then people, not even the villains, just a few normal "good guys," start trying to get chloe and red to ditch bridget and ella. Obviously they refuse, but bridget's embarrassed and has a terrible idea.

-She starts to tell ella about it, and red and chloe cause like plot, and ella and red are just like "be careful, watch your words, do you want someone with you?" and chloe's like, "girl wtf you are NOT supposed to do that and it's for a reason." And then she and ella have their "get your hands dirty" scene or something like it way earlier in the movie.

-But bridget sneakily follows the villains to the black lagoon, where we meet uliana's big sister ursula, who's chilling there to talk to her sister. And bridget makes a deal with ursula that every cupcake she makes will make whoever eats it like her and want to be her friend, but in exchange, bridget will have to give up her love of baking. She struggles with it, but uliana says something that reminds bridget of the incident and agrees.

-Red and chloe track down ella and stuff, and chloe breaks the vase, as it happens in the film, and ella gets pissed, which is understandable. And then ella gets grounded.

-When bridget goes back to school, she makes cupcakes and hands them out again, and now everyone loves her and wants to be her friend, and everything's happy! But when red and chloe tell her ella's been grounded, bridget's kind of distant and doesn't seem all that interested--too wrapped up in her new friends and the popularity she's never experienced in her life. But now she's desperate for it not to end, but she also hates baking now. So, you know, not all THAT happy.

-Red tells Chloe they should sneak ella out of her house to go to castlecoming, and chloe's obviously not big on rule-breaking, but she's warming up to minor infractions, especially now that bridget's acting weird--they don't know about her deal with ursula, so they both think chloe's protests pushed her into acting like that, and chloe'll also be established as not having been popular growing up, so she doesn't want to alienate her new friends.

-So they have their red-blue friend(ship) development, and break ella out of her house, and manage to run into fairy godmother (who's a recent graduate in this version, not a current student). She's still been struggling with her magic, but manages ella's look, with the same caveat. Ella stops by the dorm to get Bridget, but Bridget's left a note saying she's getting ready with a bunch of her new friends. Oh, and red and chloe also get makeovers, cause i want outfit variations!

-Everyone's chilling, but ella's feeling kind of left out because bridget's with her new friends; charming notices her and dances with her, and she starts to realize he's not really stuck-up and he's actually pretty nice. In keeping with the fairytale, he doesn't recognize her and is kind of sad because he thinks ella isn't there, and thinks this is, like, a new kid or someone's cousin idk and idc. Anyways, red and chloe are celebrating; everything's great.

-Until one of uliana's gang eats one of bridget's magic cupcakes, wants to become her friend, and she gets pissed because she doesn't want her crew deviating from her. So she starts talking about the deal bridget struck with ursula, which never specified that people would want to REMAIN bridget's friends after the initial cupcake, and a bunch of them start laughing at her.

-Bridget is obviously humiliated, and ella tries to get to her, but uliana or her crew attack her, charming tries to defend her; the clock strikes midnight, ella decides to leave and meet up with bridget in the dorms later when she's not being fucking attacked, she drops her shoe, etc. Bridget only saw ella with charming, though, and thinks ella abandoned her, so she doesn't go back to their dorm. Red and Chloe look for bridget but don't find her, and red mentions breaking into merlin's office to see if he has, like, a crystal ball or something to find her location.

-Chloe protests again, because following the rules earlier would have saved everyone so much trouble and pain; but red argues that bridget could be in danger, and they can't waste time looking in places she's not.

"get your hands dirty" reprise because i like that song okay sue me.

-And ofc chloe eventually agrees to go through with it.

-Meanwhile, bridget's at the black lagoon, trying to strike another deal with ursula.

-In this new deal, nobody would ever be able to harm bridget again, but in exchange ursula demands her softness of heart or whatever. And bridget hesitates, and goes to take a walk to think about it, replaying the years of bullying in her head.

-Red and Chloe break into the office and find a crystal ball, and use it to find bridget at the black lagoon; they almost get caught by merlin, but they escape, although in the scrying ball's reflection you can still see bridget talking to ursula.

-Red and Chloe find bridget heading back into the grotto and hurry to try and talk her out of the deal, telling her that ella tried to help her, that they like her, that if people need to be spelled to want to be her friends they're idiots, and they just met her and they like her, so why shouldn't anyone else?

-And bridget goes back to the dorms, but there's something unfinished/ominous about the way it all plays out; even red and chloe mention something like, "well, that was anticlimactic." But they go home, everyone's alive and happy and loves each other!

-Except the qoh and ella aren't necessarily friends; they're just also not enemies. They talk to each other very formally: "queen bridget" and "queen cinderella," almost on the cold side. But both red and chloe are too happy to really notice, except very briefly in passing.

-Back in wonderland, maddox hatter is very aware that something's gone wrong.

It's like 1 am and i only watched the movie once, so if you're going to criticize me be nice about it.

[aquaburst3]

A lot of you guys probably don't know this about me, but I also have a GoodReads account. I left a review on the first chapter of the Heartslabyul manga. I read some of the reviews for the manga on GoodReads. One trend that I noticed is that some adult Disney fans read the series expecting a lot of Disney references and all of the villains to be major characters in the story to only come away completely lost by the concept.

Newsflash—Twisted Wonderland ISN'T like Kingdom Hearts where the Disney characters are major players in the story! It's not even like Descendants where they are the children of well known Disney villains either! The Great Seven and all of the other popular Disney characters are historical figures, and all of them minus Hades are long dead by the time the events of the story take place. While there are a lot of mentions of them, since people idolize both the heroes and villains, none of them have any sort of roles in these events outside of maybe Maleficent. (I still think Malleus' grandma was originally intended to be her, but they couldn't use her likeness thanks to trademark or copyright issues. That's beside the point.)

Instead the game is more like Harry Potter meets Ever After High with a bit of Madoka Magica and Six of Crows thrown in there for good measure. Like Harry Potter, the game is set in a magical boarding school in a fantasy England-like setting with a dark academia flare. But like Ever After High, modern tech exists. All of the characters in the games are more like morally grey canon OCs based on the Disney Villains. Take Vil. He's based on the Evil Queen. But at the same time, he's not the same character. He's his own person. He's an actor, who can be kind and wants to help others to become their best selves. But at the same time, he can be ruthless, domineering, harsh and overly critical. A lot of the others are like that. A little messed up, and sometimes do questionable acts, but over all decent people. Just like The Dregs from Six of Crows. Each story arc is based on the movie the house/dorm is modeled after. For example, Heartslabyul is a loose modern retelling of Alice in Wonderland, especially the Disney version. There is a lot more lore, but that's the main basics to understand the franchise.

If you are coming into this for a Kingdom Hearts like series where the Disney characters play a major role in the events of the story itself, this franchise really isn't for you and you'll be sorely disappointed. But if any of this sounds remotely interesting to you, this series is at least worth a shot. (Though, I do admit there are a lot of aspects that could've been done better, but I'm trying to keep this positive.)

[its-monster-mash]

You know, between talking about the funeral in House of Wax and writing my Horror novel(where the deuteragonist is a retired serial killer turned priest), it's REALLY funny to me personally how weird be religious upbringing was.

Like my parents divorced when I was three, but my dad got me on weekends, so every Sunday until I was 11(Great-Grandparents moved to California) I was forced to go to church (because my Great-Grandfather was the priest) BUT MY DAD DID NOT ATTEND WITH ME. HE JUST DUMPED ME OFF AT THE CHURCH.

My dad is this big, 6'1 death metal dude, long hair, always wears black clothes and a perma-scowl, would drop a tiny girl version of him(I insisted on black shirt red skirt EVERY CHURCH DAY since I was little) at the steps of the church and bail before he had to see his Grandparents(Fun fact, they raised him, because my Grandma--while she is the most loving soul on the planet--is not a competent parent).

Putting the rest of this under the cut because it's just a rant about my weird relationship with religion as a child, if I'm being honest.

The religious weirdness started at my baptism, actually.

When I was that age, apparently my FAVORITE toy was a little Hades figurine--a McDonalds toy from the movie Hercules. My mom, while carrying me up to the big water basin or whatever where my Great-Grandfather(we just all called him "Grandfather", our family had a huge "Head of the Family" complex until he passed), noticed that I HAD HADES WITH ME, so she tried to take it away from me really quickly, because Grandfather was already kind of rude to her(fun fact, she's been a wiccan my whole life and hid it from me until I was like 12).

Well, like ANY child with a comfort toy in an unpleasant situation when the toy is being taken away, I held onto that toy with all my might and mustered my tiny lungs to scream "THAT'S MY HADES"...as loud as possible, in my Great-Grandfather's church.

I should explain that my Great-Grandfather was an Episcopalian Priest. Episcopalianism shares all the aesthetics of Catholicism, with mostly superficial differences (The MAIN differences being that Episcopalian priests can marry, an they don't do confessional).

ANYWAY, it only got worse.

I attempted to accept communion wine all of TWO times; once as a very small child, and once when I was around 8 or so(memories of my childhood are very spotty due to Trauma, but I know I had to be younger than 9 because my brother wasn't born yet). Anyway, BOTH TIMES I tried to take the wine, I projectile vomited all over the velvet altar, as well as my Great-Grandfather's vestments. BOTH times old ladies whispered shitty things about it, and no one tried to comfort me. It was some bullshit then, but it's a hilarious inside joke with my close friends and I now. Funny part is? I'm not a puker in general, and those were the only times in my whole life I ever PROJECTILE vomited.

FUN FACT: When I was little, I believed the Christian God and Santa Claus were the same entity. Both beings are always watching you to judge your merit, and I equated Hell's Brimstone to Santa's Coal for naughty children.

I wouldn't say it got WORSE after my Great-Grandfather retired, but it WAS weirder for me. I was still forced to go because he and my Nana still attended services(I was allowed to stop going when they moved when I was 11), but because I was his Great-Granddaughter I was like...church famous?? I was always highlighted in Sunday School, and special attention was always drawn to me when they'd round the kids up to send us off.

Problem is, I HATED the new priest. He creeped me right the fuck out, and I was not shy about showing that.

I made a scene EVERY single time I got bad vibes, and the congregation always laughed like it was some kind of staged act.

On the flip side, every winter I would always ask my favorite priest to get the shovel for me because I shoveled the ramp and steps every sunday because I was afraid the advanced elderly people would fall; so I was very much A Good KidTM, just HATED every second of being in church.

My Great-Grandfather was a VERY interesting person, but most of that I didn't know until after he died, because all he ever wanted to talk to me about was Jesus. It really hurt my feelings, because I was a science kid--I got GREAT grades--and I worked really hard for it, yet this most revered person in my family only ever responded to any of my achievements with "Thank Jesus for your Gifts." (I was nominated for a Student Ambassadorship that would have taken me overseas to study three times in a row. I was never able to go because we were broke as shit, but like, I worked fucking HARD and all he ever saw were the "gifts from Jesus", and I full on hated Christianity for it)

Now, on my MOM's side of the religious stuff, I mentioned already how she kept it under LOCK AND KEY that she was Wiccan until I was twelve. The reason being, because she didn't want my dad to point at it and tell people she was getting me into Devil Worship, because she was SUPER paranoid about me being taken away (that did not stop HER from abusing the hell out of me, but long story short that was psychosis and memory loss from a medication she was on long term; we are on good terms NOW).

Funny story, I DID have a Satanism phase, but that was a direct result of hating Christianity and wanting to piss off my family, if we're being honest.

ANYWAY THOUGH; I have been Pagan since I was ten years old, and went YEARS guarding that as a well kept secret, because I was afraid I'd get in SO much trouble for not being Christian, until one day when I was 12 I had come into my mom's room when she still had her books out and I was like !!! "WITCHCRAFT!!???!?!?". It was one of our biggest parent-child bonding moments tbh lol.

I went hardcore Atheist for a brief time during a massive mental breakdown I had in college, which was IMMEDIATELY followed by Performative Satanism, but when I Calmed DownTM I went back to general paganism. I have a very loose spirituality and a hyperspecific belief system, but I don't need to get into that here.

ANYWAY RANT OVER. I just think it's really funny that I grew up the way I did and now I write nasty blasphemy kink shit lol OOPS.

[princesssarisa]

Character ask: Hercules and Megara (Disney's "Hercules")

Tagged by anonymous

Hercules

Favorite thing about them: His innocence and likability. While he does have a touch of macho swagger at times – which is more "acting the way he thinks heroes act" than any real arrogance – he's basically just a normal, friendly, slightly goofy, kindhearted teenager who happens to be a musclebound demigod. He's as free of toxic masculinity as any version of Hercules/Herakles can be, and I love the way he blends courage with sweetness and vulnerability, especially in his romance with Meg. (I'm fairly sure that when he mourns Meg's death, he's the first adult, human, non-deformed male Disney hero to ever be shown crying.) His boyhood feelings of being a "freak" and not fitting in are poignant and relatable too, so his quest to rejoin the gods on Olympus, where he thinks he'll "belong," is an engaging one. So is his arc of learning that a "true hero" means something different than being a great, famous fighter, and that his birthplace isn't necessarily "where he belongs."

Least favorite thing about them: Two things. (1) The way he lashes out at Phil when the latter tries to convince him that Meg is a fraud. (2) The earlier moment when he's happy to hear that two little boys are trapped under fallen rocks, because it gives him the chance to prove his heroism by saving them. Even though it's played for laughs, it's still selfish of him. But I suppose that's part of the whole point of his character arc. While he's a good person and genuinely does want to help people, his deeds are always partly driven by the self-serving goal of earning back his godhood, which is why they don't prove him a "true hero." That he only becomes when he shows true selflessness for others – first when he faces near-certain death at the Cyclops's hands to save Thebes from destruction, and ultimately when he chooses to sacrifice his life for Meg.

Three things I have in common with them:

*I often feel like a misfit.

*I tend to be innocent and trusting.

*My greatest strength is my love for others.

Three things I don't have in common with them:

*I don't have godlike physical strength.

*I've never fought a monster.

*I'm female.

Favorite line: The lyrics to "Go the Distance."

brOTP: Phil and Pegasus.

In crossover-land, I also like the idea of him befriending Aladdin (as he did when their spinoff TV series had a crossover – their movies are especially similar in tone out of all the Disney canon, and Hercules's brawn combined with Aladdin's brain really would make them a good team), Ariel (a similarly naïve yet friendly, brave, and likable misfit – and if King Triton is the Triton from Greek mythology, then Ariel and Herc are first cousins once removed!), or Don Bluth's Anastasia (their respective movies have virtually the same plot in different trappings, so he would identify with her.)

OTP: Meg.

nOTP: Hades.

Random headcanon: When he eventually dies, instead of going to the Underworld he finally will rejoin the gods on Olympus, and Meg will be granted immortality to join him there.

Unpopular opinion: Sometimes it seems unpopular to like him. Repeatedly I've seen him either dismissed as a bland protagonist overshadowed by the other characters (especially Hades) or hated for not being 100% selfless and perfect. So even though he does have his fans too, I'll list the fact that I like him as my unpopular opinion.

Song I associate with them: "Go the Distance"

Favorite pictures of them:

Megara

Favorite thing about them: In the first place, she's a fun character, with her sassy personality and all her clever, funny lines. I also love her complexity and uniqueness among the Disney heroines. A tough, jaded heroine who masks her inner pain with snarky humor? A morally gray heroine who starts out working for the villain and has a redemption arc? Maybe common in other movie genres, but not so common in Disney's animated canon! Family media is filled with the trope of "prickly cynic with a hard past and a hidden heart of gold meets and learns to love an innocent ray of sunshine who sees their inner goodness" – Disney has used that trope many times. But those pairings are usually "male cynic/female innocent," not the reverse, and I love that Hercules gender-flips that standard romance arc! That combined with Meg's playful wit makes her a favorite Disney heroine of mine.

Also, while she's far from the only Disney heroine or hero to temporarily "die" but then be revived near the end, she's one of the very few who explicitly really do die (not just lose consciousness or be put under a spell), in an especially brutal, self-sacrificing way too, and the only one revived by having her spirit physically brought back from the afterlife! That's fascinating stuff for child viewers in our culture where death is so often treated as taboo!

Least favorite thing about them: Well she does spend about 2/3rds of the movie (reluctantly) working for Hades and helping him try to bring Hercules down. But of course her redemption is part of the whole point of her character.

Three things I have in common with them:

*I'm a brunette female.

*I'm sometimes tempted to be cynical and untrusting.

*I like Hercules's innocence and kindness.

Three things I don't have in common:

*I'm not particularly sassy.

*I'm no good at flirting.

*I've never had a romantic partner dump me for someone else.

Favorite line:

In the clutches of Nessus the Centaur:

"I'm a damsel... I'm in distress... I can handle this. Have a nice day!"

Her self-introduction to Hercules:

"Megara. My friends call me Meg, at least they would if I had any friends. So, did they give you a name along with all those rippling pectorals?"

In response to Hercules being happy about the two trapped children:

"You're really choked up about this, aren't you?"

After Hercules escapes from his crazy teenage fangirls:

"It's alright. The sea of raging hormones has ebbed."

When Hades wants her to find out Hercules's weakness, because Pain and Panic couldn't handle him as a baby but Meg can "handle him as a man":

"Hey, I've sworn off manhandling!"

And her understated confession after her self-sacrifice:

"People always do crazy things when they're in love."

brOTP: Phil and Pegasus, once they learn to like her.

In crossover-land, I'd like to see her be friends with Esmeralda from The Hunchback of Notre Dame (another sassy, sexy and tough, dark-haired and purple-clad heroine, but one with a sweetness and idealism that would make her a good foil for Meg's cynicism), or with Dimitri from Anastasia or Flynn Rider from Tangled (two male heroes with wisecracking, morally gray personalities similar to her's, and who have similar character arcs of "self-interest to self-sacrifice" as they fall for their respective love interests).

OTP: Hercules.

nOTP: Hades.

Random headcanon: She's slightly older than Hercules (since he's 18, I'll imagine that she's 20 or 21), and in a reversal of gender expectations, he's a virgin but she's not. She's his first love, after all, and he isn't the type to have sex outside of a real relationship, but she lost her virginity to the earlier boyfriend who jilted her.

Unpopular opinion: I don't think I have one.

Song I associate with them: "I Won't Say I'm In Love"

Favorite pictures of them:

[h-worksrambles]

I wanna talk about Cloud and Sephiroth in Kingdom Hearts

Oh boy. Final Fantasy characters in Kingdom Hearts. Now this is a controversial topic. While originally pitched as a Disney and Final Fantasy crossover, Kingdom Hearts is relatively sparing in its utilisation of the cast of FF. They’ve never had a dedicated world and they tend to serve as AU cameos to help populate the games’ original locales, such as Tidus, Selphie and Wakka being kids on the Destiny Island, or Squall, Aerith, Yuffie and Cid being in Traverse Town (having come from Radiant Garden). And when they do show up, their characterisation tends to be a point of contention.   Some people want more of these guys in the series and are annoyed that their relevance has dwindled still further with time. Others dislike their KH iterations, finding them too out of character. And some of the most controversial have been the cast of Final Fantasy VII. Being the most popular entry in the series, VII has several representatives in Kingdom Hearts, and just as with the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII (which Nomura also had a pretty big hand in), their portrayals are pretty divisive. So I thought it might be interesting to try doing a little fix it fic of how the FF7 cast could have been handled in terms of their role and backstories in this continuity.   My thought process has been to try and retain the core essentials of their character, and to find a reasonably close KH equivalent to their original lore without making it too complicated. They only have so much time after all and there’s a LOT going on in KH as there is. Also, I want to think about organic and fitting interactions they could have with the series’ original characters.   With that said, I’ll be looking specifically at the archetypal JRPG protag and villain themselves: Cloud Strife + Sephiroth

  Cloud first shows up in Kingdom Hearts 1 hired by Hades to take down Sora and Hercules, but ultimately sees the error of his ways and befriends Sora. In KH, he’s a swordsman wandering from world to world hunting for his nemesis, Sephiroth. We only get snippets of their history, but from what we can gleam, this version of Cloud succumbed to darkness in the past. He was saved from turning fully in some way by Tifa Lockhart, but this ended up creating Sephiroth, a being of pure darkness who torments Cloud, trying to push him back into corruption as the devil figure of his conscience. He can only be eliminated by Cloud himself.

  The biggest issue with Cloud’s characterisation is really the same one that dogs a lot of the Compilation. Specifically, that a lot of Cloud’s quirks and insecurities are airbrushed away to make him stoic and ‘cool’. My stance on this is that, (and this goes for Dissidia to an extent too), KH and the Compilation treat Advent Children Cloud as the default. Thing is, Cloud is very different from his usual self in that movie, since he’s riddled with trauma and depression from the events of the OG game. Now Advent Children doesn’t handle this character arc super well, but there is at least a reason why Cloud is the way he is there. And yet, that version of Cloud is treated in wider media as how Cloud should act all the time. It’s almost like if you took the extreme version of Batman from something like the Dark Knight Returns, and made that your default Batman in a movie with no additional context. But no director would ever do THAT right?

Oh wait…

  Normally, Cloud is a huge, socially awkward dork acting cool and hyper-masculine to hide his own insecurities. And there’s a lot of potential pairing him up with someone as earnest as Sora, who is so goofy and unapolgeticaly himself. If you wanna see what that dynamic would look like, just look at Cloud and Wedge in VII Remake. So as for Cloud’s character, sure he can be cool at first, but that facade can break after the fight with Hades and Cerberus. Let him be awkward, let him be snarky, let him and Sora have a proper dynamic. Sora indulges Cloud’s cool guy persona because he knows that, deep down, Cloud is a huge softy. Look, I’ll be real the cheat answer is just make him like he is in Remake.  However, I am keeping his Vincent Valentine esque redesign because it is AWESOME.

  He can still hunt for Sephiroth, he can still work briefly with Hades. But his overall character writing will hopefully be much more in line with the original game, which should help to give him better chemistry with Sora and even Hercules. Multiple times KH has made FF7 characters strive to become heroes at Olympus the same way they wanted to join SOLDIER in the OG (we see this with Zack in Birth By Sleep especially). You could do a lot by making Hercules an ideal of the kind of hero Cloud wants to be, in contrast to his former fallen idol, who himself was once a legendary hero...

  And with that, let’s get to Sephiroth. Admittedly his actual demeanor is not too far off the mark and his boss fights are absolutely legendary. I’ve touched on what little we know of KH Sephiroth’s backstory already and I really don’t care for it. I think it represents a fundamental misunderstanding of Cloud and Sephiroth’s dynamic for one simple reason.

  Sephiroth should not give a damn about Cloud.

  In FF7, Sephiroth barely interacts with the party, and when he does, it’s usually Jenova taking his form. This is because Sephiroth is too concerned with his lofty goals of destroying the Planet with Meteor, and thus taking control of the Lifestream, to pay attention to the ragtag group following him. Because power wise, they’re practically ants to him. Why shoud he care if they’re following him? There’s a sequence in the beginning of the game where you have to take a huge detour to avoid a monster callled the Midgar Zolom. It’s far to powerful to defeat at your current level, you can only avoid it. About 15 in game minutes later, you see another one of these things impaled on a tree by Sephiroth.

  It’s such a brilliant way to communicate that Sephiroth is on a whole other power level compared to Cloud and co. He is not just the man Cloud hates, but also the embodiment of everything he once wanted to be. He is an almost godlike mountain for Cloud to climb, symbolic of Cloud’s own self doubts. The only time he gives Cloud the time of day is when he can use him as a puppet for personal gain. Unravelling his false memories, realising he was strong enough to beat Sephiroth once, and can do it again, is a huge part of Cloud’s arc, piecing together his fractured identity, accepting himself for who he is and overcoming his insecurities. There’s a reason the final fight of the game is a scripted one hit kill against Sephiroth. Cloud has finally learned to believe in himself, and can overcome the man who once personified his fear and self-hatred, the man who underestimated Cloud to his cost. Cloud proves to be both the better warrior and the better man.

  But in Kingdom Hearts, as in Dissidia and even Remake, Sephiroth is constantly popping up to taunt, torment and manipulate Cloud. He doesn’t seem to have a life outside of bullying the guy. Cloud should be the one pursuing Sephiroth, not the other way around. Which is why I don’t think the whole ‘Sephiroth is Cloud’s darkness’ thing really works. Sephiroth is more than an aspect of Cloud. As I said, he should feel like a demigod on a whole other level. Sephiroth’s goals should be far beyond Cloud himself. He should think of Cloud as no more than a flea, unworthy of his time.

  The games seem to want to push Sephiroth as a symbol of Cloud’s old shame and past. Something he wants to escape but can’t, with Tifa trying to help him move on from it. Again, kind of like what Advent Children was trying to do. But without any details on any of these characters’ shared history, it just reduces their conversations to empty, pretentious refrains of “darkness, darkness, light, light, darkness” without any substantial character work behind it. It’s honestly just a worse written version of Riku and Ansem’s dynamic. Their portrayal is not just a disservice to their FF7 incarnations, it’s emblematic of all the worst excesses of Kingdom Hearts’ writing and none of the strengths.

  So, here’s my take for a rewrite of Cloud and Sephiroth’s backstory. Cloud and Sephiroth were originally from the same world. However, eventually Sephiroth learned of legends of chosen warriors who travelled from world to world as protectors. It’s not said outright, but we’ll imply that what Sephiroth read about, was the existence of Keyblade wielders. Believing himself to be one of these chosen ones, Sephiroth opened the door to the heart of his world, causing it to be swallowed up by the Heartless. Cloud, only a child then, was one of several to escape, being flung to Radiant Garden (as would Aerith and Tifa but I may save them for another time). This allows for something that better parallels their FF7 backstory, with the destruction of their world mirroring the Nibelheim Incident, and Sephiroth’s goal of becoming a Keyblade wielder mirroring his delusions of grandeur as Jenova’s ‘chosen one’. But all in a way that isn’t too dark or complicated for KH. Hence, Cloud sets out across the worlds to take revenge on Sephiroth, and is willing to learn how to use darkness if that’ll get him what he wants. 

  This also makes for an easy way to get Sephiroth to fight Sora, one KH2 already hints at. Sephiroth takes an interest to Sora because he covets the Keyblade which is why he challenges Sora to fights. He doesn’t have to be a major villain. He can still be an optional superboss. But now his dynamic with Cloud and narrative role is much more true to the original. It also gives Cloud another interesting parallel with Sora. Sora and Cloud were both torn away from their original homes and want to recover what they’ve lost. But Cloud does so through revenge and is willing to rely on darkness to do it. This can allow KH1!Sora to grapple with whether using the darkness would be an easy shortcut to getting his friends back (which is exactly what Riku struggles with in KH1). I believe Disney worlds are at their best when they can meaningfully impact the heroes’ development. And I think that should apply to the FF characters too. Both should be more than filler episodes. This can also continue when we introduce Tifa in KH2. Now Cloud has reunited with another survivor of his world, he can begin to question whether his relationships with the people around him matter more than vengeance against Sephiroth. And that’s a lesson Sora, who values his friends above all else, can help to drill into him. Wait...have I basically made Cloud into Guts? Uhhhh...

  If we’d actually gotten that long awaited Sephiroth superboss in KH3, we might even have been able to bring this to a conclusion. And there’s lots of different ways we could take it. Maybe Sora and Cloud could have taken on an ascended Safer Sephiroth, as Sephiroth’s quest for power ends not with a Keyblade, but a twisted angelic monstrous form. And so Cloud overcomes his self-doubts by defeating Sephiroth with the help of his friends. Or maybe Cloud chooses not to kill Sephiroth. He decides he isn’t worth it and chooses to put his friends over revenge, leaving Sephiroth to blindly wander the worlds, never getting the Keyblade he seeks because, ironically, he drowned himself in darkness in a way the Keyblade could never accept. Maybe Cloud could meet Riku in Radiant Garden after he comes back from the Dark Realm. Riku knows what it’s like to rely on darkness as a shortcut to power, and can relate to Cloud’s enmity with Sephiroth by comparing it to being haunted by Ansem. We could have fleshed out his dynamics with Tifa and Aerith or even Zack (assuming he’s not dead in this canon that is, BBS is a little unclear there). There’s lots of different ways you could go with it.

  I love Kingdom Hearts. I love Final Fantasy VII. But I don’t think Cloud and Sephiroth’s showings in KH, cool boss fights notwithstanding, are a proper showcase of what makes these characters so great. I understand that this is a different canon, and these are alternate universe versions of these two. But I think they could be implemented in a way that is more true to why they were so compelling in the original, while still being thematically fitting for Kingdom Hearts. I’m not a writer, and I don’t pretend to be better than professionals just because I’m playing script doctor. But I hope I succeeded in doing these characters justice, even a little.

  I hope you guys liked this. If you did, let me know and maybe I’ll evaluate/rewrite other Final Fantasy characters in Kingdom Hearts. Maybe I’ll even talk about ones who aren’t here already that I would like to see. Until next time, take care!

[twistedtummies2]

Christopher Lee: A Sinister Centenary - Number 25

Welcome to Christopher Lee: A Sinister Centenary! Over the course of May, I will be counting down My Top 31 Favorite Performances by possibly my favorite actor, the late, great Sir Christopher Lee, in honor of his 100th Birthday. Although this fine actor left us a few years ago, his legacy endures, and this countdown is a tribute to said legacy! Today’s Subject, My 25th Favorite Christopher Lee Performance: Dr. Wilbur Wonka from Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Uploading this one slightly early, sorry about that. XD As I said on my Honorable Mentions, Christopher Lee collaborated several times with director/producer Tim Burton in his lifetime. This is another of those occasions, and it’s arguably the single most prominent of his performances in the wonderful world of Burton movies we ever got. People are…split, to say the least, about Tim Burton’s adaptation of Roald Dahl’s famous story, “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” This is largely because people mistakenly believe it to be a remake of the classic 70s film version starring Gene Wilder, entitled “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” and even for those who don’t, the comparisons to the old classic are inevitable. Back in 2005, when the film was first released, most people seemed very into it, and it certainly has its fans even today, but the loudest voices regarding the movie, at least nowadays, seem to be negative ones. Me, personally? Ehhh…if you had asked me back when I was a kid, and the film was still new, I’d say this film was superior to the original, but nowadays, it’s harder for me to say. In some ways I still think it is, but in other ways I feel the original film – not to mention Dahl’s book – is superior. Weirdly enough, Christopher Lee’s presence in the movie is a chief example of both elements: he is both one of the best parts of this film, and one of the…well…I hesitate to say “worst,” because there’s no way in Hades I’d EVER use that word in regards to Christopher-Bloody-Lee, but he shows one of the flaws of the film, all the same. The 2005 Tim Burton feature is noteworthy for, among other things, going more into depth about the backstory of the mysterious and eccentric Willy Wonka. In a series of flashback scenes, Lee plays Dr. Wilbur Wonka: a well-respected and successful dentist. Wilbur HATES candies, seeing them as harmful to children and “a waste of time.” He denies Willy any candy on Halloween, instead disposing of the sweets in a fire each year: he’s only trying to protect his son, who actually has EXTREMELY bad teeth in his youth that require freakishly large braces to maintain…but yeah, burning a kid’s Halloween candy miiiight leave a few mental scars. Eventually, Willy does get to taste candy, and begins to grow a secret fascination, eventually revealing to his father that he wants to be a candymaker when he grows up. Wilbur is appalled at the idea, and when Willy threatens to run away from home, he warns him, “I won’t be here when you get back.” Sure enough, when Willy inevitably returns home, he discovers his father – and his home – have disappeared. It’s because of his father’s vanishing act, above all else, that Willy basically goes a little bonkers in life as he grows older, and develops a deep-rooted dislike for authority, embracing his anarchic, creative side with an obsessive fervor. HOWEVER, this isn’t the last we see of Wilbur. SPOILER ALERT: after the events at the factory, the story doesn’t end. With help from Charlie, Willy actually manages to locate his father, and is able to reconnect with him. It’s revealed that Wilbur is still a practicing dentist, and despite his long absence…he never stopped loving his son. His wall is covered in postal clippings and photos of Willy, chronicling his many achievements, and the tearful reunion father and son share when they realize how much each truly does care for the other is genuinely touching and powerful. Lee plays the role perfectly, balancing Wilbur’s strict, at times seemingly cruel qualities with a tenderness and sympathy that makes it hard to hate him. Again, you can tell he truly does care about his son, he’s just not always sure what the right move is, and I personally like to think maybe it’s because he had a pretty rough upbringing himself. Whatever the case, as much as I love Lee’s appearance as the good doctor in the film, it also highlights one of my problems with the Tim Burton feature: I personally like Willy Wonka best when we DON’T know him very well. It’s the mystery of the character that I feel makes him so fascinating, above all else; the more we get to know the man, the more that mystery fades away. So by having Lee in the movie as such an integral part of putting the puzzle together, it sort of works against the film’s favor, at least in my opinion. That’s really the only reason I don’t think I can give this performance any higher spot than Number 25. Still, you can’t fault the actor or his work for that matter, and this is still an iconic role of Sir Christopher’s in my book. I’d be ashamed to leave it off the list. Tomorrow the countdown continues with My Number 24 choice!

[arsenicgodhead]

Seeing all the JKR shit that’s going down on Twitter rn and how Rick Riordan is trending in response, I wanna point out WHY Rick Riordan was used as a response:

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was published in 2007, ending the Harry Potter book series. The last chance to edit this narrative in a wide-spread manner was in 2011, with the release of the second half of the film version of the book. A few weeks after the release of the book, JK Rowling announced that Dumbledore was gay. It’s 2020 and she’s never once depicted this in any canonical sense - not in passing in the movie versions of Deathly Hallows, or in the Crimes of Grindlewald (which likely took place DURING Dumbledore and Grindlewald’s romance), or, to my knowledge, in any of the supplemental books that have been released. I didn’t pay attention to pottermore, so correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t think it appeared there either. It seems that the most she’s done is remove a line by a screenwriter in Half Blood Prince that alluded to a woman that Dumbledore once loved, but as far as in-universe confirmation: nada.

Riordan, on the other hand, outed his first gay character in-universe in 2013’s House of Hades. The character in question is Nico di Angelo, who had been present in the series since the third book of the original series (The Titan’s Curse, published 2007). Nico started off as a minor character - a 10 year old boy who admired Percy for being a strong, cool demigod who rushed in and saved his life and his sister’s life, and was given more and more importance as the series went on. When it’s revealed that he’s had a crush on Percy since he was young, it made a lot of sense - whether or not that was Riordan’s initial intension, this new meaning worked with the material that we were already given, rather than simply making sense with information that wasn’t already there.

Furthermore, Nico was far from Riordan’s last LGBT+ character. By the end of House of Olympus, Nico is hinted to be perusing a relationship with another boy at camp half blood. This fact is confirmed in the following book, when Nico’s boyfriend’s godly father is turned mortal and takes a break from the narrative to explain that he is not the least bit unnerved by his son’s same-sex relationship because he himself is bisexual. As the series goes on, the audience is introduced to two major middle aged Lesbian characters, given confirmation that Artemis is aromantic, shown a struggle with romantic attraction from a character that ultimately decides her path lies with a largely aromantic group of women, and told about many of Apollo’s previous hetero AND same-sex relationships. And that’s only accounting for the main series of books - Magnus chase is a whole other story, which includes a homeless pansexual main character, the concept of found family, a hijabi Muslim best friend, a genderfluid love interest, and LOADS of deaf culture.

The main difference to consider here is that JK Rowling makes a big show of including diversity in her work - she boasted about Dumbledore being gay and made sure that there was no canon evidence to contradict it, but also made sure to never confirm this in-universe. Rick Riordan, on the other hand, said that the world is a diverse place, and that he hopes to represent that as best as he can considering his race, age, and gender. He’s never promoted a character’s sexuality as a feature in one of his books - I think the closest I’ve seen him come to that is confirming that Reyna isn’t canonically gay, because he felt that he couldn’t write this without confirming the negative stereotype of “women becoming lesbians because they couldn’t find a man”, and instead chose to show Reyna’s struggle with her sexuality and romantic attraction throughout The Tyrant’s Tomb.

TLDR; JK Rowling likes to talk a big game about how inclusive she is and makes it into a big promotional stunt while never actually acting on it in-universe. Also she’s a TERF. Rick Riordan likes to make his characters diverse for the sake of representing his readers, and doesn’t make a big fuss about how great he is for doing so. Love Harry Potter, but stan Rick Riordan over JK Rowling.

[anime-grimmy-art]

Hahhaa, well, that escalated quickly XDD  After drawing the “I won’t say I’m in love” sketch, I couldn’t get this idea out of my head XD This AU kinda has some changes compared to the actual Disney Hercules story, so here a list of things I thought of while drawing: -Ofc, Kim would be Hercules, but I couldn't see Ron taking over the Meg role and just making him Pegasus is boring (I also don't like KiGo, so yeah). So instead I made "Hercules" both Ron and Kim. My idea is that Kim is the actual child of Zeus and Hera (James and Ann) and Ron either is another god's kid or sth like a godly spirit. Instead of Herc making his legend, there already are prophecies of a hero defeating the titans. Being ancient times, ofc you'd think they boy is the actual threat. So, in the kidnapping scene, Pain and Panic (2 of Drakken's Henchmen) just take both babies, cos they don't know which one is the supposed hero, but still make Kim drink the most of the juice stuff. The parent's who adopt the two are Ron's parents from the show. With the prophecy being a know thing, the parents try to "train" Ron aka just implanting the idea that he is a chosen hero even though Kim is the one with powers. So, the movie would be a mix of Herc's actual journey and constant misunderstandings cos Kim does all the work while Ron thinks it's all his doing. - I also like to imagine in all the years they talk to Zeus' statue, Ron actually doesn't understand that James doesn't even talk to him but to Kim. It fit his character too, cos he's the type to babble on and on and not catch that he's not the focus at all. - As for abilities, Kim is basically the same as in the series, just with super strength. Think the ep where she gets Higo's powers. Ron himself ain't a pushover tho, cos he still is a divine deity. I'd say it's pretty much like in the show too. Super speed, endurance and resiliance with a good dose of dumb luck. - I toned down Phil's role cos both Kim and Ron already encourage each other. Still, Phil would be played by Mr. Barkin. Just imagining him giving in to training them and it cuts to him in full war gear and saying "Ok, listen up people". It just makes me chuckle. - The one to push Kim out of the falling pillars way would be Ron. (I couldn't see Shego do it) So Kim does go to hell and takes back Ron's soul and the end is basically the same, where she says she's going to stay on earth with Ron. And when the depart from Olympus, it would pan to James and Ann and he'd go "well, Roland could have stayed here too, he did show an act of a true hero" - Now for a bit more complicated stuff, Shego and Drakken. Since I'd love "misunderstanding" to be a running joke in this AU, Drakken, for one, doesn't understand til after "I won't say I'm in love" that the threat actually isn't Ron but Kim. The other thing he doesn't get is that Shego is his "assistant" by choice. Drakken thinks that, like in the movie, he saved Shego's old lover and took her soul for it. In actuality, Shego saved her previous partner's ass but he dumped her anyways, so she cursed him with Drakken's help. I'd like to think Dr. D presented her the contract and was busy monologuing while Shego edited the contract to her liking. First of, her old partner wouldn't be saved, but cursed, and that she had "hell priviledge", so, even though she's a living being, she could go in and out of hell as she pleases. - Cerberus would be a three headed Commodore Puddles. - I like to think that Shego still has her green glow attack thingy, just with limitations. My idea's that she got hit with hellfire at some point, before she even met Drakken, and she can now use it but only for a limited amout of time before it burns her. Her powers were also the reason Drakken tried to recruit her. - Back to the part about misunderstandings. The idea for this AU actually started because of me doodling fanart of Shego with her singing "I won't say I'm in love". The way it would play out is that Drakken sends her on a date with Ron to find his weakness (even though she knows he's not the problem). Ofc she cringes through the day and it's super awkward and in the end Ron kinda turns her down, which, ofc, makes her mad. Thankfully, before anything happens, Mr. Barkin shows up, just like Phil does, and they leave. Shego is super frustrated as she sits on a bench and she mindlessly picks flowers off a bush. She asks herself why tf she even does stupid stuff like that when she picks a blue flower. Cue "I won't say I'm in love". Now, I'd find it hilarious when the muses join in, thinking Shego is singing about Ron, when rly she is thinking about something (or someone?) else. (kinda ambiguous if she just does it for villanous life or for Drakken). But the whole sequence would be her bumping into Ron statues, the muses all swooning, when Shego acutally flinches away cos she got embarrased as she got a  glimps of a hades wall painting or sth - After that stuff, they have an argument and Shego finally makes see that Ron doesn't need to have a weakness, cos he IS the weakness. Mr. Barkin doesn't see them cos it's not relevant for the plot. The rest kinda plays out like in the movie. Ron is the one Drakken has hostage and he makes a deal with Kim. Ron and Kim would be sore at each other cos Ron was enjoying all the glory for the work KIM did and Kim felt underappreciated. So, even though Ron tries to stop her, Kim goes and gets beaten up. Mr. Barkin still gives the pep talk like Phil did, but Kim and Ron manage to defeat the titan with team work (they did BOTH have Mr.Barkin's training after all). Yeah, then Ron gets crushed, Kim gets her powers back and yadda, yadda - Oh, and last thing, gods actually have names and titles. So, Zeus' name is James but he has the title of Zeus. Drakken's name is Drew and his title is Hades, but being the petty dude he is, he went with sth original. The Dr. is him just flexing tho. Phew, that was a lot, but I had a lot of time to think while designing these AU versions. If I think of more, I'll add on to it.

[antiloreolympus]

7 Anti LO Asks

1. tbh the fact rachel purposely didnt let persephone have any romantic relationships before hades gives the impression that had persephone had any other experience, she'd see right through him and not want him because she had better. not having any other point of reference isnt good. its setting up that hades can get away with whatever he wants because she doesnt know anything else. thats really not a healthy dynamic to have even while dating, much less eternal marriage.

2. You know what’s weird? How Hades is a 2000+ year old being and still has not gone through his trauma. We know that he was eaten by Kronos when he was around 8 and stayed there for like 13 years if i’m correct (in the LO version), so we can assume that when he got out he was in his early to mid twenties. And then he fought in the war which we don’t know how long it was in LO bc there’s no info on that at all but let’s assume that that lasted 100 years.. he’s still pretty young there. So how is it that he’s only now getting help for his traumas? Which we don’t even see actually, it’s just a sentence said by him when he adopts the little dog. We don’t even know how old he actually is bc it’s always assumed it’s 2000+ but 2000+ years old could mean 2030 years old or 2999 years old or even 3000 and more and he has just lost track of time. All of these years and he still has not processed or made any progress?? At all?! Unless therapists are a new thing in the Underworld but we have Chiron who says that she was a physician in the old world but got tired of it so she decided to study the human mind. And that must have been quite some time ago. So why exactly is Hades a 2000+ broken man who needs to be fixed by a 19 year old going through her own trauma? 

3. The underworld being an infertile world doesn’t make sense at all. If we compare the underworld with the underground it’s a fact that where there’s decay if is more fertile. Not to mention that in the myths the underworld is in fact considered a fertile land. We know that the underworld is full of souls, and souls are considered what give life to a body or place, so the underworld being a desert still doesn’t make sense at all. 

4.If I may also add, just because LO is a “retelling” doesn’t mean it doesn’t harm Greece or Greek people. They still exist, funnily enough, they didn’t all die once Alexander the Great stop conquering. They’re a country full of strong, passionate people who have gone and are still going through massive problems and hardships. They are also a country who are still, at best, ignored, or at worst, mocked for the suffering they must endure by nations that are far from economic instability and from actual war zones like Greece is. Despite all that, their mythos are seen with great reverence to this day, and they don’t “gatekeep” it, you can ask any Greek in here and they’ll tell you they enjoy stuff like the Disney version or PJO just fine, but you have to stop and wonder why LO is a Greek myth product that is almost universally despised to Greeks who know it exists.

It’s pretty obvious why, RS not only butchers the myths completely to where they don’t even resemble what they once were, but her constantly silencing and badmouthing actual Greeks who want to help her make it more accurate is not a great look. She’s acting as if she, a white woman from an island made of literal England reject descendants, somehow not only knows more about Greek myth than actual Greeks, but that she OWNS the mythology and she can do whatever she wants with it, and only those who agree to her biases know what they’re talking about while everyone else is wrong, so obviously Greeks don’t know Greek mythology! Even media products in the same, non-Greek realm as her get her ire. Case in point, we know she’s hostile to PJO, she badmouths the Disney movie all the time, she complained about Blood of Zeus (emphasize on ZEUS) didn’t revolve around HxP, and despite them being heavily promoted by her own employers, she never speaks of Punderworld or HxP ficlets, even when her fans harass them and in Ficlets case purposely got them kicked off Canvas for “copying” LO, meanwhile she will happily promote OSP because they confirm her biases and kissed her butt in their HxP video. What does this tell us? Because it doesn’t seem very nice.

Of course she’s allowed as a creator to play with the mythology as she wants, but even then there are still limits to adhere to, and she never does it because obviously her half-baked concept of the “mythology” is way better than the 3000+ years of texts and interpretations out there. Sure she has people flinging themselves at her to offer her help for free, especially Greeks and academics, but what would they know over her, the self proclaimed master of mythology itself? Obviously she created it all in 2016 when she decided to draw a sexy pink girl and that’s it. Greece and everyone else was just using a fake version this whole time! 

It seems from her POV, Greece ands its citizens are, in her own words “haters” who apparently know less about Greece and its own mythology than her, a white woman who uses a fanfic-writing white supremacist as a main source. The ego on this woman is astonishing.

5. May I also add to the age discourse, something like Edward and Bella can get away with it because Edward stopped aging physically, mentally, and emotionally at 17, and even in story there is a logic to them still going to HighSchool after all this time. He may be 117 age wise, but he’s at the same exact level as Bella in every other regard. That doesn’t excuse his creepy actions, of course, but there is in canon logic to it to justify it and make sense.

I’d say LO could use this too, but tbh it wouldn’t work. Either it’d involve making a CEO king as immature and childish as a 19 year old (not great) or it’d have a 19 year old suddenly be way wiser beyond her years which wouldn’t make much narrative sense, but also has some really creepy implications to it. Anyway RS dug herself into a stupid hole and doesn’t know how to get out of it. 

6. im in the same boat 😭 i was watching one of those LO critique videos you posted and they were showing panels from early on and i just thought "they photoshopped this, right? theres no way it looked this bad. they're just goofing around with this" and nope, that's exactly how they looked the video didnt change a thing. the bright colors really were distracting your eyes from seeing how bad it looked.

7. Correct me if i’m wrong but in one of the first few episodes wasn’t Hades annoyed with Persephone? Especially at the panel where she wanted to drive his car? Like nothing has really changed in her behaviour with him apart from her being more flirty, but the only change is that Hades started viewing her more sexually. Always thinking about her breasts and butt, and nothing else. Half the time he was thinking about her, he wouldn’t even think of her face. So how exactly is their relationship a romantic and lovely one? 

[dani-luminae]

OKAY IM BREAKING FROM MY WORK TO COMMENT. We absolutely stan Silver in this house!! Just protecting the kids however he can! an icon. And his moment with Lia was so good. Ahhh and Ben still doubting himself even after what he's done for the kids and how he's literally leading the charge to get them free was so sad - no, Ben! You've done so much good that Mal had nothing to do with! You've got this! (And he pretty much did save the day at the cotillion, he jumped in the water and got them to stop fighting.) I'm hoping Lia will be able to get his confidence levels up, she certainly has a lot of it herself! The way Lia was just straight up haunting the ship was so eerie and cool, I was picturing Eris from Sinbad, just in terms of her flying through and messing with things - the same sort of fluidity I guess. Im gonna enjoy seeing her interact with Ben and the kids now that she's with them - it's gonna be hard to act "normal" after appearing from nowhere but I cannot wait to see it 👀 And all the kids are so tough I love them 😭 just the powerful aura of Lia with her sword and holding Ben and just walking away from the pirates and dropping into the lifeboat- so cool. If it were a movie I'm picturing this whole chapter would have a very fast, tense but badass soundtrack playing, but then when Lia grabs the sword and Ben, the music would cut short and the scene would be dead silent up until the end of the chapter when Ben passes out - or have some sort of soft, maybe eerie but powerful music playing very quietly. Those are the vibes I get. Loved this chapter!! Excited for next time! 💖

YAYYY I LOVE YOUR COMMENTS AND REVIEWS SO MUCH

Yes Silver is the best!!!!!! He may be a morally grey pirate but he does have a soft spot for kids. I will add that he's not aboard the Gruesome Gangler for no reason, so soon enough I hope we'll have a reason to stan him even more!

Yeah, that moment with Ben there is kinda heartbreaking. I didn't even originally plan that moment, it just happened. (And yes I understand that Ben was the real hero of Cotillion but canon - and therefore Auradon - kinda ignore that so even Ben understates his hand in keeping everyone safe, which is why he thinks Mal saved the day there.)

The kids are all so tough! All of them! I love them so much, which is amazing for a bunch of side-characters I made up and named on the spot lol.

This version of Lia is so fun to write! I envision her motions as an Etherial as like a combo of Eris from Sinbad and Hades from the animated Hercules, like able to mold their own reality in a way and unbound by silly things like physics and logic. Which means yes, Etherial Lia can absolutely be spooky space goddess sometimes, haunting the ship and being wrathful and destroying whatever she wants. (She's gonna be one heck of a match for Hades, I can tell you that!)

That moment she appears as a normal person (kinda) is one of my favorite parts - and it wasn't even planned originally! My original ending for this chapter was that Ben was wounded but managed to still try and get to the lifeboat, only to fall nearly overboard - into open space - but "starlight" catches him and pulls him aboard and suddenly, there's a girl. But as the scene played out it was clear that Ben wouldn't even be able to get that far without some help, so... Etherial to the rescue! Random new girl here to save the day, and she's so powerful and scary that even the pirates don't want to mess with her!

For the writing of this chapter, I switched through various Pirates of the Caribbean soundtracks as well as some Little Mermaid-affiliated videos. This POTC one from Ambient Worlds, as well as this Little Mermaid attraction queue music from Cinemagic Park Ambience, are some of my favorites. (In fact, I rather imagine that a bit of that LM queue music could fit for the "quiet/eerie music" you describe!)

Thank you so much! I’m so glad you loved the chapter!