#i am just. like. seriously. what were you expecting???? its a battle comic for young boys

[swallowtail-ageha]

Every time a shounen becomes popular and every time when that shounen ends people get extremely mad it isn't a dissertion on societal dynamics and structures and pro communist revolution. Without fail

[saladejin]

Call An Uber? | 06

BTS x Reader | idolverse au, uber driver!Reader, translator!Reader | Fluff, flirting, super slow burn, angst and hurt/comfort, mature themes and eventual smut

Summary: Your normal life with a normal, yet inconsistent job gets drastically changed when your dreams come true. Sounds boring right? What happens when all of this occurs, but you’re still doing something you love AND getting a large sum for it? Now there’s something to think about, and it’s definitely not what you’re thinking.

Warnings: None

Word Count: 1.8k 

< masterpost >

A/N: This is a short chapter entirely focused on BTS’ point of view, and it basically addresses their thoughts and opinions that have developed since Chapter 1. (I’ve been re-editing some things from the original version)

Enjoy :)

»»————- <<prev | next >> ————-««

      BTS POV

  “Hyung, I’m not burning this am I?”

Seokjin clicked his tongue and wandered over to where Taehyung was hovering over a sizzling pan. The contents within steamed thickly, and the hissing sounds were noisy enough to drown out a horde of hungry trainees.

“No, it’s meant to be like that. Let me know when the onions turn golden.”

“Okay.”

Taehyung exhaled sharply and stirred whatever was in the pan once more, trying his best to avoid splatters of searing oil. The younger vocalist was known for his smooth and seemingly perfect tanned skin, so having little burn marks littering its surface would be super annoying.

Suddenly, the front door jolted open, and both men working in the busied kitchen whipped their heads upwards at the sound of loud voices filtering through. 

“Confidence is seriously so important,” Jimin’s voice was raised, as if he was agitated. Hoseok responded with his own murmur of agreement, but both dancers drew to a halt when they finally inhaled the scents emitting from the kitchen.

“Wow! Hyung that smells amazing,” Jimin praised. The young dancer took a seat at the countertop while making sure to rest his sports bag underneath the chair.

Taehyung pouted and stirred again, playfully whining to gather everyone’s attention. “Hey, I helped!”

Seokjin chuckled and reached over to turn the heat of the stove to a lower temperature, finally allowing Tae to stand upright with no danger of getting burned.

More compliments towards the delicious smells emerged when a couple of the remaining members, Namjoon and Yoongi, trudged into the living area. The two rappers soon returned to their conversation regarding their recent tracks, barely seeming to take in the world around them as they lost themselves in musical discussion once more.

“Can someone get Jungkookie? It’s almost ready,” Jin then spoke, and shifted to taste the food with a small spoon, smacking his lips and groaning at the heavenly mix of flavours.

Hoseok snorted at the sight. “I thought you always said to never taste the cooking,” he quipped, then shrugged at Taehyung’s blankly confused expression. Nobody had gotten up to rouse their napping maknae, but they all knew he’d be drawn to the smell of food sooner rather than later.

“Were you guys just out for practice?” Namjoon questioned in a slightly louder voice once he spotted the dancer’s sports bags under the bar stools. He, Yoongi and Hoseok had plopped onto the plush couch in front of the TV to relax, waiting for dinner to be dished up.

Jimin swirled around in his stool, almost toppling over a glass of water in the process. He ignored Seokjin’s warning mumble and focused intently on their leader. “Oh, best practice ever!”

“True, wait what happened after I left?” Taehyung gasped and rested his wooden spoon inside the steaming bowl of vegetables, much to Seokjin’s disappointment.

“Well, we didn’t get to stay for too much longer, but we taught her the chorus part.”

Hoseok broke off into loud sniggers as he recalled the memories, while Jimin slid off the stool to contribute better to the conversation.

“Wait, you were teaching a girl how to dance?” Namjoon lifted an eyebrow while Seokjin reluctantly turned the stove off to let the food simmer gently. He was too curious to miss out on this news.

“Yeah, it was just (Y/n),” Jimin provided, and Namjoon eventually nodded slowly, still seeming utterly confused. Taehyung, after receiving the eldest member’s permission, bounded over to where everyone was gathered either on top of or in front of the couch.

“She dances really well but doesn’t give herself enough credit for it.” Hoseok’s eyes were blown wide, and his voice had an almost offended tinge to it. Jimin nodded, smiling and shaking his head at the thought.

“It was so funny, I never expected her to just start dancing like that.”

“Neither did I!” Taehyung exclaimed with a voice full of shock, “I was laughing way too hard, I feel kind of bad now.”

“Nah she was fine, she’s actually super laidback. It’s really strange to see, but it just makes her fun to be around.” Hoseok grinned when Jimin and Taehyung nodded eagerly in agreement. Before anyone else could input, the sound of shuffling footsteps brought everyone’s attention to the hallway.

“Why are we talking about (Y/n)-noona?” Jungkook rubbed his eyes, which were bleary with sleep, and hastily joined Taehyung on the floor in front of everyone else. Most of the boys chuckled at their youngest member and how it looked like he’d abruptly roused himself from his comfy bedsheets just for this conversation.

“Wait, if we’re talking about her, why hasn’t Yoongi-hyung told us off?” The dark-haired maknae’s question triggered various sounds of realisation, and everyone’s eyes swivelled to the mostly silent member in question.

“Well, I’ve met her now, so I can’t get that angry over it anymore,” he revealed, and Hoseok blinked rapidly.

“What? You didn’t tell us?”

“When?” Jungkook and Jimin chorused, the latter giggling quietly afterwards.

“It was only last week sometime, so I would’ve brought it up eventually.” Yoongi furrowed his eyebrows suddenly. “And I told Namjoon, so it wasn’t as if it was a secret.”

Namjoon nodded, his smile stretching wider and his dimples making an appearance.

“Yeah I knew, I just didn’t think it was a huge deal…obviously I was wrong.”

“You’re all missing something really important!” Seokjin suddenly cried out, his voice rose as he playfully slapped the armrest of the couch next to him.

“Why am I the only one who hasn’t met her?”

Everyone laughed loudly at their eldest member and his angry outburst. Hoseok grasped both of Seokjin’s shoulders and coddled him, fussing in a high-pitched voice.

“It’s okay hyung, your time will come.”

“Why are we overreacting about this? It’s just like meeting anyone else, for crying out loud,” Yoongi’s insulted tone battled his small smile as he protested loudly.

“Well, s-she’s different than the average person!” Jungkook stammered, and Jimin made a loud noise of agreement, pointing to Jungkook and nodding. “She’s a foreigner, and I’ve never seen her be shy about anything, it’s actually really interesting.”

“Well, she’s been embarrassed, that’s for sure.” Hoseok covered his mouth to stifle his laughing, and Jimin turned his pointed finger to the rapper, sharply exhaling in amusement.

“Damn right. Jungkookie even promised he would make her blush one day, but Hoseokie-hyung and I bet him to it,” the blonde gloated.

“Hey, not even fair,” Jungkook clicked his tongue. He was suddenly reminded that he had, in fact, told her he would accept the challenge of bringing colour to her cheeks again.

Seokjin shook his head, still bewildered over the conversation that had transpired. This girl had suddenly appeared in their lives and now she had somehow left her mark. He could only grow annoyed because he would never admit it, but he was fairly jealous. Why did he have to miss out on every single time she was there? He shook it off, trying to regain somewhat reasonable thoughts, and got to his feet to dish up dinner for the night.

“No more talk about (Y/n), we have delicious food to eat.”

“I don’t care what anyone says, I think she’s really pretty. Jiminie, please tell me you felt how soft her skin was.” Hoseok held out his open palms towards Jimin, and the younger widened his eyes.

“I thought I was the only one who noticed that!”

“Hey, that’s weird, I hope you guys didn’t do anything creepy,” Namjoon huffed in disbelief and a look of concern crossed his features. He was completely stunned, but he was still smiling.

“No hyung! It was just her arms!” Jimin buried his head into his hands, face erupting just like it had back in the dance practice room. Hoseok only laughed and slapped Namjoon’s back in retaliation.

“Yeah Joon-ah, not everything has to be perverted.”

Jimin didn’t hesitate to jump to his own defence along with Hoseok, but his head just wouldn’t rid itself of memories of the woman in question. The way she’d felt underneath his careful touch. How she’d seemed so small standing beside him, attentive and eagerly watching to obey his every instruction.

In the car during their first meeting, she’d had such an outgoing and charismatic presence that made Jimin want nothing more to befriend her and gain a sense of mutual respect, but in the studio, her sudden shyness and undertones of vulnerability made him want to hold her closer instead. He wanted her in ways he never thought he’d want someone he realistically should’ve still known as ‘stranger’.

On the other couch, Yoongi eyed Jungkook who was just sitting there looking dazed and confused about the entire situation. The elder of the two couldn’t hold back a snort of laughter before diverting his attention to the darkened window, the mere view of their struggling maknae too comical to stand. Taehyung was giggling, and he reached forward to slap Jimin’s knee.

“So that’s what happened after I left! You guys are terrible.”

Jimin groaned and batted away anyone who tried to tease him further. He wondered why nobody was beating up Hoseok, seeing as though he was the one to bring up the topic of touching girls in the first place.

“Yah! I’m serious, if you all want dinner, no more talk about (Y/n), if I hear (Y/n) one more time…” Seokjin shook his head, also concerned about the shift the conversation had taken.

When not one of them responded, the black-haired man craned his neck around to see what had caused the silence to befall them.

Jungkook was observing the floor with a tiny shy smile plastered on his face, his eyes darting side to side and his lips pressed together apprehensively.

Jimin’s smile was wider as he brought his hands up to his face, the blush still dancing across his cheeks as he tried to gently massage it away. He ruffled his blonde hair, as he usually did when he was feeling bashful, and for some reason swallowed nervously.

Taehyung had regained a fairly blank expression, but Seokjin knew he was thinking hard because the boy’s teeth gnawed occasionally on his bottom lip before running his tongue over the pressured skin.

Yoongi was still gazing out of the window absent-mindedly, his brows knitting together from time to time, and that was the only indication that he was thinking about anything at all. The rapper bounced his left leg whenever he lost focus like this, so it wasn’t hard to see that he was currently lost in another world.

Hoseok was busying himself by organising the contents of his bag, but his lips would suspiciously quirk every two seconds, and he even chuckled randomly once before getting up to make his way over to the dining table.

Namjoon had gotten to his feet as soon as Seokjin had warned him, but his gaze was glazed over with deep and conflicted thoughts. His fingers fiddled with the bottom of his long, black shirt in heavy distraction, and Seokjin observed with astonishment how his leader’s full lips eventually tugged up into a meaningful smirk.

“What, are you all fucking whipped!?”

          Copyright © 2020 by salade. All rights reserved.  

tagged:@l4life​, @joyful-jimin​

[rwdestuffs]

The real problem with the show.

Look: I’m not one of those idiots who is going to constantly shit on the show for this whole thing, nor am I one to blindly praise the show for doing the bare minimum.

But I am someone who is going to try to put this into perspective.

Our main issue that’s going to be talked about is the fact that this show doesn’t really address the issues from previous volumes.

Take Weiss’ racism for example. They didn’t want to have to address her developing. The whole issue with Weiss is that the whole thing got resolved off-screen. There’s no reason to have the conflict on-screen if the whole thing was going to be resolved off-screen. The big problem is that this show didn’t want to tackle heavy subjects that they weren’t comfortable or capable in tackling. And like, I get it. There are some subjects that people aren’t that well-versed in, and truth be told, there’s a hard way to determine if something that is wrong is worse than something that isn’t there at all. They didn’t want one of their main characters to be a racist.

But the problem here is that that’s okay. Especially when the characters grow and learn from that. I’m sure that everyone has pointed this out already, but Sokka was a sexist in the early episodes of A:tLA, but he learned his lesson and started regularly chugging his Respect Woman juice happily and regularly. Weiss’ whole racism thing was kinda… dropped. That’s not really interesting.

Your characters should have flaws. Real flaws. Ad real character traits. Character quirks that could make for some really interesting moments. I think I mentioned this somewhere on an earlier post, but Ruby being a weapon nut could have been a really good and natural way to explain everyone’s weapons. She could brag about hers, hype up Yang’s, pester Weiss about hers, or even ask about Blake’s, and boom! Everyone’s weapons are explained. Their names, what they can do, and how they work. And maybe even whether or not they made them (I imagine that Blake made hers with help from others, while Yang and Ruby made theirs on their own from scratch, and Weiss got a hers commissioned). This could have even extended to team JNPR too. We already know that Jaune’s is an heirloom, but what about Nora? What about Ren? How about Pyrrha? The thing about that quirk being dropped is that it takes away something from Ruby. HBomb talked about it in his video, but an arc where Ruby helps Jaune forge a new weapon or even add to his existing one would have been so awesome. But no. The upgrade comes from a never-will-be-seen-again blacksmith in Volume 4, and the best it can do is… Become a bigger sword. Then it gets another one in Volume 7 where it’s Penny’s creator that delivers the upgrade. These aren’t emotionally significant in any major way. Sure, the first upgrade is combining Pyrrha’s stuff with his, but it would have been more emotionally impactful if he had saved those things, did his damnedest to bring them to Pyrrha’s family, only for them to now say something like “Pyrrha sent us letters about you. She would want you to have them.” And then and only then, would he incorporate them into his weapons. Imagine how impactful that would have been! Imagine how heartwarming that moment would have been! I’m the resident Jaune hater of the rwde tag, and I’m pretty sure that I would love that scene. I might’ve even called it my favorite.

Like��� These character moments get dropped for no real reason. A lot of character moments are just rendered insignificant because of them wanting to advance the story. But a story takes time. It takes setup. Let’s take Dragonball Z for example. There’s a lot of buildup to Gohan being Goku’s successor before he eventually gets upstaged again because the fanbase wanted Goku back. He had those bursts of power that made him stronger. It was built up to. It was hyped up. There was a lot of foreshadowing. Pyrrha’s death… Didn’t really have any of that. Outside of her name, she wasn’t really set up to die. Especially since she hardly had any interactions with the characters outside of Jaune. Because of this, Pyrrha’s death doesn’t hit as hard as it could. Why exactly is Ruby going ballistic? We never saw any major scenes that would indicate them as anything beyond classmates. Like… Moments where Ruby and Pyrrha bond over having high expectations for them. Ruby’s supposedly the daughter of a famous huntress, so everyone seeing her as basically another “Summer Clone” would be a really awesome move to go with. Ruby’s quest should not only to be to save the world, but to also prove that she isn’t a carbon copy of her mother. Have characters like Yang ad Qrow point out what Ruby does different. Maybe one of them is encouraging of being different, while the other doesn’t like it because they want Summer back. I guess Yang would encourage Ruby being different while Qrow would discourage it. A major theme in Volumes 6 ad 7 seems to be how the previous generation kinda screwed things over for the next one. Couple this with Oscar also trying to separate himself from Ozpin (and then immediately trying to talk down Ironwood in a way that Oz would try to do (seriously… WTF?)), Ruby could do something different.

Something that Ruby could do different is something in regards to her plan to stop the end of the world. Instead of trying to defeat Salem, she could try understanding her. I mentioned that Salem was effectively gaslit into being the villain, so the characters trying to help her recover would be an awesome moment. As of right now, everyone (even the fndm) wants to demonize Salem, and doesn’t want her to be redeemed. This is despite all the shit she went through. If anything, Salem was restraining herself when all she wanted was freedom and a life with Ozma. She could have very well have wanted to get back at the world that wronged her. Salem shares so many traits with the titular team that if anything, the fact that she is named after an event where women were killed for false prosecutions should be an indicator as to how much more sympathetic Salem is. Stopping Salem isn’t the answer. All that will do is delay the inevitable until an even worse and less sympathetic version of her comes along… Probably Cinder, but I think I’ve covered her already. The main point I’m trying to make here is that Ruby and her relationship with her mother is something that should be touched upon more. In fact, Ruby and Yang should have this subject brought up. The problem is that these writers don’t want to do anything that doesn’t lead to a fight scene because they’ve come to the conclusion that people are only here for the fight scenes.

And really, they should go to DEATH BATTLE or One Minute Melee if they just want a cool fight scene. People are ultimately here for the shipping and fight scenes. When it comes to character moments, that’s forgettable… Unless it’s something to mock the characters for like Yang’s singular burnt item in the comics automatically making her a bad cook. Why is that capitalized on, but Ruby’s “It’s also a gun” line hardly gets brought up anymore? Is it because people can mock Yang for it? Like… I know that I’m biased because I’m a Yang fan, but come on! COME ON! Yang had to take care of Ruby. This is something explicitly stated in the canon show. Unlike Raven’s up to interpretation line about her killing OG Spring, which has a lot of ambiguity to it, Yang’s whole taking care of Ruby thing is explicit. Ruby even states in Volume 1 that Yang read her fairytales when they were kids.

And this all ties back to the dropped character traits and/or moments. These are important moments for the character. Yang is a Mom Friend for a reason, and Blake is the Rebel Aunt friend for a reason too. Blake has shown that she has a lot of resolve when it comes to her beliefs. Weiss can be treated as the “Deprogrammed Karen” friend. The one that used to have some prejudices, but ultimately was able to move past that. Ruby could be the “Young and aspiring hero” type too. But these initial traits are forgotten because instead of them having their personality traits clash with the world around them, they are forgotten so that they don’t. These characters don’t grow on-screen. They don’t learn their lesson on-screen. They don’t even have it implied on-screen. We just have to assume that Weiss learned her lesson off-screen. We just have to assume that these characters worked and trained hard together off-screen. Like… Was a montage too expensive?

All I’m saying is that these characters are deep. But that deep characterization is never explored or used to its fullest extent because the writers don’t know how to keep having a character grow beyond that. Once a character is finished growing, instead of having said character help others grow, or show how that growth impacts others or themselves, they are forgotten.

Except for Jaune. Jaune’s more shallow than a puddle.

[very-grownup]

The Year is 2020 and I Watched Neon Genesis Evangelion for the First Time, Part 2

Episode 8.

Misato takes a bunch of teen boys out on a military rendezvous thing because she is at the point in her life where they are the only ones who think she is cool and don't judge her for her terrible lifestyle and alcoholism.

We meet a new friend, Asuka, who has red hair and is German (to contrast with Rei who has blue hair and is Japanese). She establishes her dominance by slapping teen boys and refusing to be embarrassed when the wind blows her dress over her head. She thinks Shinji sucks because he has poor self-esteem and empathy is hard and society does not have an understanding place for teen boys who manifest their issues through passive depression. She has an EVA and she loves getting in the robot because it is cool and powerful and strong. Her EVA is red which does make it objectively the coolest of the giant robots so far. She comes with her own inappropriate adult guardian named Kaji who has poor boundaries, does nothing to deter her crush on him. Kaji sabotages Misato as an authority figure by flirting with her and alluding to a sexual history. I guess it makes sense because fourteen is a prime age to begin noticing people sexually and the combination of that and the adolescent desire of the tantalizingly distant adulthood makes that one hot, relatively young teacher you have a fascinating source of fantasy.

All of the boats are named after Shakespeare plays except for the one called "Over the Rainbow". I like this.

This is the first episode where I notice Shinji is referred to as something which the subtitles have decided to call the "Third Children" so that I know these are bad subtitles that would rather be literal than good even though this is my first time watching the series!

A majestic sea pancake with teeth attacks from the water and basically all these ships are fucked and probably a lot of sailors die and Asuka gets in the robot and makes Shinji also get in the robot because she wants him to know how cool her robot is.

Asuka seems like the kind of girl who doesn't expect her peers to like her and who will pursue the approval of cool adults instead and doesn't mind not being friends with her peers as long as they fear/admire her because those are more reliable feelings than friendship.

Kaji /fucks off/ while the boat is under attack because he's not actually here to protect Asuka and these teens AND the giant robots are super disposable. Misato briefly thinks he's going to be helpful before realizing he's ditching. I feel like that's probably a lot of their dynamic - Kaji letting Misato down even though each time he shows up part of her thinks maybe he won't suck. This is probably Misato's relationship with a lot of people. There's a reason she drinks.

There's a cool underwater fight scene which is also a city destroying fight scene because the cities of the 20th century are underwater due to Incidents. They refer to the power plug and the cord Asuka's robot is attached to as the umbilical cord and hey I hate that. The only two remaining battleships get fucking jammed into the sea pancake's mouth simultaneously like hotdogs and then blow up and that's considered a win. /So many sailors are dead from this incident/.

Kaji fucking ditched to bring Shinji's dad a briefcase with some fucking space blob DNA encased in a fancy casserole dish and they refer to it as Adam and fuck you know nothing good ever comes from things named Adam. This concludes my report on Episode 8 of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Episode 9 and 10 behind the cut.

Episode 9.

Asuka hates being in Japan and all her peers hate that she's in Japan. Asuka derives her self-worth from excelling at something she is used to having no competition in (piloting a giant robot) and being homesick just pushes that need harder. Shinji is upset because Asuka's aggressive and enthusiastic approach to the thing he is most frightened of makes him feel like less of a man and also less grownup. Also she has boobs and he is fourteen and girls existing is maybe as distressing as giant robots.

Someone in this episode realizes that having fourteen-year-olds pilot the giant robots is both a stupid and embarrassing decision when Shinji and Asuka's poor teamwork cause an Angel to duplicate itself which is the opposite of giant robots.

There is a lot of giant robot slapstick in this episode and it's very good and I laughed.

Kaji has stuck around to sexually harass Misato and make her workplace awful and make everyone, including Misato, not take his harassment seriously because they used to date so it's not harassment it's just falling into an old bad habit and it's depressingly realistic.

Misato is made entirely responsible for Asuka and Shinji's slapstick failure even though Asuka is supposedly Kaji's responsibility. She comes up with a very stupid plan to help them synchronize via DDR and being humiliated in front of their peers. Humiliating teens IS funny. But it also feels cruel when you consider Misato is the closest thing to an ally Shinji has. How much of Misato's poor decision making (with respect to the kids' emotional wellbeing) is a result of Misato living her best worst life and how much is the result of Misato being stressed out and doubting herself and her decisions and so much else because of Kaji's constant negging and flirtatious presence? She's already in over her head with the Shinji situation.

Shinji and Asuka are forced to live together in Misato's tiny shitty apartment and do everything together and in tandem and it's mostly a comical training montage of how much they hate each other.

There's a night when they're alone and they steal the opportunity for privacy. Asuka sleepwalks onto Shinji's futon and she still has boobs and Shinji is still 14 and he moves in to kiss her while she's asleep, until he realizes she's crying for her mother in her sleep. He removes himself from temptation, realizing that Asuka's just a fucked up kid, too. But it's a realization that comes with resentment: he wanted that fantasy of the peer who is also a sexy, confident grown up because it makes Asuka both an aspirational power fantasy figure and a sexual fantasy and if she's just a messed up kid like Shinji she can't be either.

It's sad because the whole episode encapsulates how NERV is failing these kids as well as why. Misato makes Shinji and Asuka figure out how to synchronize and work together but in a bad shitty way where they don't really understand each other because this is the military. Misato's job is to defeat the Angels and doing that efficiently and quickly takes priority over Shinji and Asuka's well-being as individuals. So, it works in the moment, but they aren't any closer to each other or understanding each other. There is no /time/ for empathy.

Their synchronized battle at the end of the episode against the duplicated monster is visually very cool and exciting and dynamic and a great sixty seconds of animation and it's clearly mostly a light gag episode to support the resources going to those sixty seconds. But that's sort of sad too, isn't it? This concludes my report on Episode 9 of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Episode 10.

Okay so we started Beastars which has some really gorgeous use of colour that manages to echo the distinctive and striking style of the manga while being very much its own thing and we end the night with Madoka where tonight were time loop death pacts, so the Evangelion episode kind of got overwhelmed.

There's an Angel egg in the depths of an active volcano and Asuka's giant robot has to be put in an adorable space suit so as not to be crushed/melted by the pressure. Asuka's got a box to trap the egg in. I think they want to get the egg out of the volcano because if it hatches in the volcano it'll explode but they don't seem to have a plan for what to do with the egg if they manage to remove it from the volcano (they don't, obviously; egg hatches and has way too much mouth).

The main takeaway is that Shinji's dad is 100% ready to fucking nuke his son if it's necessary to stop the volcano from volcanoing with the Angel? I'm not actually clear on this point, but I am clear that Commander Ikari will nuke his son, possibly for many reasons.

It ends with Misato taking the kids to a hot spring because they couldn't go on their class trip to Okinawa (even though surely all the beaches are radioactive?). Surprisingly, you do not see the ladies in the hot spring, although Shinji gets a boner hearing Misato admire Asuka's breasts and skin. A penguin is the first creature to see Shinji's erect penis. This concludes my report on Episode 10 of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

[tessatechaitea]

Teen Titans Spotlight #9: Changeling

I feel like this is the first appearance of the Changeling logo.

It's as if General Immortus knew that one day Niles Caulder would be just a head! Or, more probably, Grant Morrison fucking remembered this one panel and thought, "I'll turn The Chief into a disembodied head!" Unless it was Rachel Pollack who did that. What am I? The Doom Patrol wiki?

Cliff Steele has just been on another adventure where his body was torn apart. At least I'm assuming it was because whenever he or Red Tornado are in a super hero battle, they usually get torn to pieces. Somebody's got to be and you can't do it to Batman. But Cliff is tired of it and he's ready to retire to a ranch in California. I wonder why Grant Morrison's run didn't take place there? Cliff and Garfield wind up at the New York Zoo because Garfield wants to fuck the lioness and Cliff wants to buy hot dogs that he can't eat.

Based on the repartee between Robotman and Changeling, I don't think the crowd are the only people to mistake Cliff for Cyborg.

The previous caption was a criticism of the writer, Paul Kupperberg. Was it too subtle? I know it wasn't on the level of Ann Nocenti criticism where I once questioned how she survived the surgery that replaced her brain with Jello pudding but sometimes you need a little subtlety in your life. Like when you want to masturbate but all you have on hand are your sandpaper masturbation gloves. I don't know if that final sentence had anything to do with subtlety. I think it had more to do with me introducing the public to my new invention! It, um, needs some work.

I first read Changeling's line as "You're obviously a fat." Not because I often misread the fuzzy text of old comic books but because I saw the kid in the first panel and my brain began thinking, "How do I make a hilarious and inoffensive fat joke about this kid?"

I just realized I should mention the writers and artists of these old issues since they're not on the cover. The artist is Dan Jurgens and I already mentioned the writer. I don't know what inkers do so I don't remember who the inker was. And the one thing I've always refused to do in my comic book reviews over the last eight years is to mention the letterer! Mostly because I always hated reading letters from fans who praise the writing and drawing and then offer a throw away line about how easy the typeface was to read thanks to Costanza or whoever! Oh, and I actually really forgot about the colorist until just now! That was Adrienne Roy! Who better to color some kid green than good old Adrienne! Cliff walks off in a huff when people begin to actually recognize him. He should have thrown in a few "Booyahs" and offered to show off his white noise cannon. Um, wink, wink! I'm not proficient at flirting. Before Robotman can find a quiet bathroom stall to wish he could cry in, Mister 104 attacks! I know. You're thinking the same thing I'm thinking, right? What happened to Misters 1-103? Oh, and probably, who the fuck is Mister 104?! But then I'd be disappointed if a Doom Patrol villain showed up and I recognized that villain. Their villains should get a "What the fuck?!" reaction at least ninety percent of the time. That's another thing the television show got right! How many scenes have Crazy Jane shouting "What the fuck?" and then Cliff responds with "What the fuck?" and then Crazy Jane is all "No, fucking seriously! What the fuck?" and then Cliff is all "What the fucking fuck fuck fucking fuck?!" The show uses the F-word a lot! Luckily Changeling remembers who Mister 104 is and thinks through Mister 104's entire origin for us. It turns out Mister 104 can turn into every known element on the periodic table. He's only Mister 104 because that's how many elements were on the periodic table in 1965 when he first appeared in Doom Patrol #98. Except when he appeared in that issue, he was Mister 103. So either he hadn't looked at a periodic table since 1961 when he first attacked the Doom Patrol in 1965 or Arnold Drake, the original Doom Patrol writer and co-creator, fucked up. Or maybe there was a plot reason for it in the story, like Mister 103 just despised Helium or maybe Superman paid him to never turn into krypton(ite)? Still, this is 1987! He should be Mister 109! I didn't learn all of that from Changeling's thought bubbles! Some of it I learned because Mister 104 mentions that when he last encountered the Doom Patrol, he was left as "a mass of free floating destabilized atoms" and the editor helpfully noted that took place in Doom Patrol #106. In 1987, I would have just thought, "Oh, okay. Whatever." But in 2019, I can use the Internet to find out all about that issue! Suck it, me in 1987 who didn't learn anything new or helpful in any way and who couldn't pretend like you were super smart and knew all about the periodic table because you didn't have Wikipedia like a stupid idiot! Ha ha! Apparently Mister 104 appeared in other comic books I've read (like The Doom Patrol vs. Suicide Squad Special) but it's understandable that I don't remember him. Partly because he may have been going by Atomic Man or Atomic Master and also because he's just kind of stupid. But stupid in just the right way that Doom Patrol villains should be stupid!

Don't read this text if you're trying to avoid spoilers for Teen Titans Spotlight #9: Changeling!

It looks like Mister 103 first takes on the name Mister 104 here. But what's odd is that he tells Cliff, "You might remember me: Mister 104!" And Changeling thinks, "That's Mister 104!" I guess Paul Kupperberg couldn't abide the fact that Arnold Drake fucked up and he had to correct him. I bet he was fuming for over twenty years! He probably got a job as a comic book writer simply to fix this mistake from his childhood! But then, I suppose everything can be explained away by simply invoking Crisis on Infinite Earths. That probably changed things somehow.

That's your argument for why you'r going to win this fight?

During the battle, Mister 104 turns into a lot of different chemical compounds, proving that he was indeed a molecular engineer. But Robotman manages to thwart each of his different shapes with punches, proving that nerds just can't win in physical combat. Eventually, Mister 104 sets a fire that traps the fat kid from earlier who didn't have enough sense to get the fuck out of the way. Interrupting the battle is a scene where Mento plots the downfall of the Teen Titans with the help of his captive, the star of the next issue of Spotlight, Aqualad! Back to the fight, Changeling saves the kid and drops him off by the hot dog stand. He sees some canisters and the fat kid says, "Those? But that's just soda gas!" Who the fuck calls it soda gas? I lived through 1987 and I don't remember ever saying, "The soda gas in this soda really hits the spot!" Maybe calling it carbonated water or carbon dioxide or carbonation would have given the game away too early! Changeling appears as a giant ape wielding cans of carbon dioxide to smother Mister 104's flaming fury. And this time instead of transforming into some other element, he's knocked out cold! Way to go, soda gas! Teen Titans Spotlight #9: Changeling Rating: C+. The entire point of the story was to show that Robotman's estimation of Garfield Logan has grown and that he now sees him as a real hero. I guess the reader is suppose to think, "Yeah! If Robotman can admit that Garfield is now a real hero and not some jerk off jokester who causes more problems than he solves, I should probably think that too!" And since I'm a totally average comic book reader, I'm totally a Garfield Logan fan now! He isn't obnoxious and annoying at all in the way I thought! He's a real hero! Not as big a hero as soda gas but still pretty great!

[21secondsofchristoph]

Here is a full translation of the interview with the FAZ:

Mr Waltz, statistically you're a rarity. Only five percent of all actors in Los Angeles manage to get enough jobs to get accepted into the SAG. And out of that group, only about five percent earn enough to make a living out of their art.

Becoming an actor is like becoming a father: really easy. Being and staying an actor is much harder.

We're meeting today, because you're not playing the villain for once, but some kind of action-hero in James Cameron's Manga movie "Alita: Battle Angel"

As a futuristic doctor you revive a cyborg from Mars, so you're basically working on the interface of human and machine

Haha, you could put it like that! I like that!

When the story was published as a comic in 1990 it was considered Science-fiction. Today, people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos actually work on brain implants and dream of colonies on Mars. Have you dealt with such things as preperation?

I don't take Elon Musk seriously. His behavior strikes me as ridiculous and you can't forget that he has a commercial interest in the topic's sensation. I've already watched moon landing's and flights into space as a child. Is it really necessary to introduce billionaires into space tourism? Well, we will see what happens. I am interested in new technologies but it's difficult to seperate them from journalism of sensation, even if it's dressed seriously.

In time, a lot of things might be possible that I can't even imagine right now. But there is another question: the question of necessity.

The market economy drives our world into an orgy of uselessness. It damages our planet and our lives on it. Who wants to live on Mars? That we will all be unemployed and the environment destroyed is in no relation to any use.

Can one stop the progress if it's useless?

Not as long as someone benefits from it.

What about the desire for disruption?

Disrupting something is an easy action, replacing it with something useful is not.

I'm always ready to disrupt something if there is a useful counterproposal. Not necessarily until then.

A lot of things are turned upside down in film industry. Netflix not only revolutionized the concept of television, it also produces exciting movies. And Youtube even has its own celebrities among the new generation.

Over the past few months I've watched some movies which hadn't been produced without Netlflix. For example the winner of the Venice Film Festival "Roma". Movies like that wouldn't run longer than 3 weeks in theaters. Through the premiers and prices it now receives the attention it deserves. And after that it's on Netflix. As superficial as I can see that, it's not the worst thing.

In contrast to that, I don't have a hard time with not watching Youtube. It's probably a cultural matter and depends on how we want to shape our lives. Of course it's also a generational matter. But why is that? Just because someone is younger, it doesn't mean they are predestined for entertainment through videoclips.

You have 4 children. You have to be familiar with this world. Where do you see the difference to your generation?

In school we were always confronted with things we didn't like, but which we couldn't dispose of.

That's where the wonderful word "Bildung" comes from, which doesn't exist in English. Education refers to an information value. "Bildung" goes further than education through its cultural formation. When I was in school I also didn't understand why I had to study Latin. But not wanting to learn Latin would have never occured to me. Just because no one speaks it anymore and learning it seemed uncomfortable.

And did you like it?

It created connections within a language, trained precise phrasing, as well as logic and discipline. It's certainly more challenging to learn an abstract language than watching a funny Youtube video.

About for or five years ago you warned Facebook might be a breeding ground for the fast growth of terror organisations. Are you surprised that it also seems to threaten western democracies now?

Not at all. History has taught us that medium and structure can be more dangerous than the message, because it's easier to handle the problematic movement than the well oiled machine that keeps it going. Especially when algorithms control the dynamics in the networks, those networks can become independent.

Some hope that societies might improve through a "Wutbürger"-culture and a crazy government.

At best, all of that just has entertainment value.

So maybe not anyone should always add their opinions?

If you don't have anything clever to say you should shut your mouth. But actually it's the other way around. Apart from this choir of stupidity being really annoying, people who haven't developed the resistance and sensors might fall for the noise. Whoever shouts the loudest ends up being heard.

You are known for keeping your private life private. How does that match marketing's and fan's expectations?

Fame is an unsolved problem, not only for me.

You either remain an anonymous observer without a bigger platform to present your realizations. That is an unfortunate paradox because the people who get the chance to move in public have to deal with growing fame while they also distance themselves from the influences and experiences of real life.

Studies have shown that introverts would handle most jobs better. But they tend to get cast out by the loudmouths.

I can imagine that. Self- and foreign perception are a tricky thing. I can remember the first Loveparades in Berlin which I saw on TV. I always avoided the event myself. In the interviews, people were saying things like: "We celebrate our individuality!" And there were one million people that all looked the same. The music was a monotonous bum-bum-bum and I always tried to spot a moment of individuality.

You've been living in the centre of individuality for a while now. Do you still consider the United States of America governable?

Maybe not as a federation. The question I'm interested in is whether the USA as a federation are still worthy of governance. California alone is the fifth largest economy in the world.

In an interview from 2003 you talked about posing, about film makers who eroticise themselves and about how to stand yourself

Oh God, I remember.

Are you currently able to stand yourself?

Sometimes. But it's not easy.

At that time you weren't a Hollywood star and you made yourself very clear in interviews.

"Schindler's list" is mendacious because Spielberg might have thought "that type of movie still lacks from my collection of movies about dinosaurs and UFOs

Or that Roberto Benigni's "Life is Beautiful" is "crap" because it communicates that it's alright to laugh about concentration camps. "when it's a tender laugh"

Do you still dare to say such things now that you constantly meet other Hollywood stars?

In Germany, yes. In America, no.

Do you believe it's better to become famous later in life? And does aging feel better when you're at least famous while you're aging?

Hopefully both, right? As a young man you often experience the world through tunnel vision, because you impatiently want to experience everything, even though you can't sort a lot of things right. If the attention hits you at that point in life, you get in danger of stirring towards a dead end where you don't develop well.

Do you believe you became more careful and more lenient over the years and success?

You're becoming more careful and more lenient. I never thought of that before. I thought: Now I suddenly step back a little. You become more lenient when you connect yourself to it. In a strict German way you could call it cowardice, because you gain another point of view, the insight. And apart from the experience and the success it might be due to the abrasion of the testosterone-related edges.

[unknown-de-mordor-blog]

Five ships I’m still not over

Beleg Cúthalion/Túrin Turambar

Universe: Middle-earth, first age

Ship name: Nothing that’s widely used in the fandom, I don’t think. But I like to think of them as ‘Black Sword (referring to Turin’s cursed weapon) and Strongbow (direct translation of Cúthalion)’

To me, there's no character more tragic than Turin son of Hurin, and no pairing more tragic than him and Beleg. And no clearer love, too. I don't know if J. R. R. Tolkien intended for them to go that far, but their emotional connection is so deep and powerful that whether you ship them or not it's undisputedly one of the most beautiful relationships in Tolkien's lore. Alas! It's not powerful enough to undo the curse placed on Turin and his clan, which ends both his and Beleg's life all too soon and all too tragically. So, yes, I count Beleg as one of the elves who die for love.

Favourite quote: 'I would lead my own men, and make war in my own way,' Turin answered. 'But in this at least my heart is changed: I repent every stroke save those dealt against the Enemy of Men and Elves. And above all else I would have you beside me. Stay with me!' 'If I stayed beside you, love would lead me not wisdom,' said Beleg.

Uh, I love this so much because it shows the difference in their temperament and maturity. Beleg's an elf who has lived through and fought in so many wars. He's an (elf)man of duty, honour and intellect, and Turin is still a young man whose pride and stubbornness can seriously get in the way of a grown-up conversation. And Beleg is so not having any of that in this scene. He’d do anything for Turin, including ditching his command to find him, but he can pull some tough-love moves, too, when Turin’s unreasonable.

Uzumaki Naruto/Uchiha Sasuke

Universe: Naruto

Ship name: sns, narusasu, sasunaru

I think Naruto and Sasuke canonically love each other, I really do, but I don’t think they are together romantically at any point in the series. And that’s by design, really. Sasuke -- the last of the Uchiha, the tragic figure of the Naruto series (still not as tragic as Turin, but let’s not do this morbid comparison) -- has too many issues to work through, and Naruto isn’t in the position to really help him through them. So as soul-deep as their bond is, they couldn’t have been together and survive each other. Although, I really want that to happen. That’s what fanfictions are for, I guess.

Favourite quote: ‘If you attack Konoha, I will have to fight you... So save up your hatred and take it all on me, I'm the only one who can take it. It's the only thing I can do. I will shoulder your hatred and die with you.’

Honestly, Naruto might just as well propose to Sasuke with that because he’s essentially saying ‘give me your worst, I’m not leaving and never will’. I know friends could be like that, too, but normally not to this degree and not with this kind of commitment. I’m not surprised at all when Sasuke has to ask Naruto why the hell he is doing all this for him. It just goes beyond reason, really.

S'chn T'gai Spock /James T. Kirk

Universe: Star Trek

Ship name: K/S, Spirk

The Daddy of all ships! Pun intended! Spock and Kirk's friendship really walks that fine line of are they/aren’t they. I personally think they aren’t (another controversial statement coming from a shipper), but they’re so cute together you just can’t help think: what if they are? They have this deep trust and affection for one another anyway; why not push it a notch further? ‘This simple feeling,’ as Spock calls it, might as well be love.

Favourite quote:

Kirk: How's our ship? Spock: Out of danger. Kirk: Good... Spock: You saved the crew. Kirk: You used what he wanted against him. That's a nice move. Spock: It is what you would have done. Kirk: And this... this is what you would have done. It was only logical. I'm scared, Spock. Help me not be. How do you choose not to feel? Spock: I do not know. [tears fall] Right now, I am failing. Kirk: I want you to know why I couldn't let you die... why I went back for you... Spock: Because you are my friend. [Kirk places his hand against the glass and gives the Vulcan Salute as he dies]

It’s actually really hard for me to pick a quote for these two because I think every ‘Jim’ from Spock does the job except nobody else would understand it but me. (Second to that is, ‘Captian, not in front of the Klingons.’) While I love them teasing each other a lot, I think Kirk’s death scene from Star Trek Into Darkness has all the right punches to it. Spock has been unable to accept the feeling of friendship towards Kirk (actually just feelings in general) until the moment he watches Kirk dies behind the glass door. And all just comes out like BOOM! Not to mention how close Spock comes to killing Khan for revenge before Uhura tells him that Kirk can be saved but they need Khan alive. Honestly, that’s the only reason Khan’s head doesn’t go plop in Spock’s hands.

Morgoth/Sauron

Universe: Middle-earth, first age

Ship name: it just came to my attention that the fandom is calling this ship Angbang (a wordplay on the name of their home/fortress Angband). Nicely done, you naughty people. Also Melkor/Mairon if you’re going by their proper first-age names.

I think a lot of people seeing this ship would go ‘what?!’ Like, how is that even possible when Tolkien didn’t write a single scene with the two of them in it. I’d say in this case the absence is more powerful. Tolkien wrote the Silmarillion and the Unfinished Tales as lore, so they necessarily come from the perspective of the tellers; i.e., humans and elves. That doesn’t mean Tolkien didn’t drop hints about the complex characters that the dark lords of Middle-earth are. He even has Elrond says that people don’t start out evil, not even Sauron. So the question becomes, what the heck happened? And the heck that starts it all out is pretty much in the first few chapters of the Silmarillion where Morgoth is clearly a powerful and inventive figure but in many ways an outcast and shunned by everyone including the very power that made him. (*cough* daddy issue *cough*) And then we are made aware of the fact Sauron, who is also powerful and creative, isn’t on Morgoth’s side from the get go but decides to join him later. The power-hungry dark lords we are later told about aren’t that at all, so it raises the question of their true characters and motives. If anything, I think the length in which Sauron would go for Morgoth thousands of years after his master is defeated and shut away says something about their bond with each other. And if I know one thing, it can’t be fear or respect. If I have to make a guess, I think it is akin to love.

Favourite quote: There isn’t anything I can quote from the source material since there hasn’t been a dialogue or anything they say to an audience that could be trusted as genuinely representing who they are. One thing I do scream about is the scene in the Return of the King movie when the black gate opened and behind there isn’t just the tower with the eye of Sauron but Mount Doom next to it in the same frame. I was like ‘I know Morgoth’s not here but isn’t that him in spirit.’ Yes, I’m a proper trash for these two.

Also, there’s this awesome comic series (unfortunately discontinued) by Suz. It’s legitimately hotter than the fire of Aule’s forge, honestly.

Beren/Lúthien

Universe: Middle-earth, first age

Ship name: I’m not aware of any ship name for these two but ‘Beren and Luthien’ is catchy enough as it is.

How else to finish this list but to dedicate the last entry to the greatest love story of Middle-earth, and, yes, I'm saying that with a straight face because, holy hell, this couple defies expectations left, right, and centre. Luthien, our elven princess, is an active participant in her own fate. She falls in love with a human who, in an act of valour, accepts her father's stupid, impossible task to steal the most treasured jewel from Morgoth the Dark Lord himself. Luthien basically runs away from home, finds her man captured and tortured, and tears the goddamn fortress down in a showdown with the-dark-lord-to-be Sauron himself (which makes you question the competency of everyone else in Middle-earth). They then proceed to steal the jewel together. They don't quite succeed in bringing it back and Beren loses his hand in the process, but hey, they could say it's in his hand, somewhere, and now could they please marry because otherwise I have a feeling that Luthien is going to elope with her boyfriend and her mom and dad won't be seeing her again ever.

And this is really just scratching the surface of Luthien’s feisty personality quite unbefitting of most princesses until the recent overhaul of attitude by Disney. And all this came from a man who was born in the Victorian era when women's autonomy wasn't given or respected. But I think Luthien's depth of character comes from the fact that she has a real-life counterpart, and so she feels more like a real woman. And the love between Beren and Luthien feels compelling because its the love the professor himself had for his wife and life-long partner, Edith. You can check out their gravestone. I'm so not making this up.

Favourite quote: The song of Lúthien before Mandos was the song most fair that ever in words was woven, and the song most sorrowful that ever the world shall ever hear. Unchanged, imperishable, it is sung still in Valinor beyond the hearing of the world, and the listening the Valar grieved. For Lúthien wove two themes of words, of the sorrow of the Eldar and the grief of Men, of the Two Kindreds that were made by Il��vatar to dwell in Arda, the Kingdom of Earth amid the innumerable stars. And as she knelt before him her tears fell upon his feet like rain upon stones; and Mandos was moved to pity, who never before was so moved, nor has been since.

It’s not a scene between them, but this is how far Luthien’s love and badassery goes. She loses Beren in a battle to protect her father’s kingdom, and she dies grieving him. In the afterlife, she gets to meet the god of death Mandos and sings him a song of their love and her grief. Apparently, she’s so good with words and music that Mandos is like, ‘I can’t handle the feels. You can have your husband back and have a mortal life with him.’ And Luthien takes the deal, of course.

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #425

Top Ten Things Missing From Disney+

It’s been about a month now since Disney+ finally – finally! – launched here in the UK, and what a ride it’s been. It’s totally taken over my daughters, in the sense that now they don’t watch TV, they watch Disney+; apart from token gestures to the iPlayer for the more educational endeavours of the likes of Numberbots or Do You Know, they’ve not seen anything not produced by the House of Mouse.

But at least I now know all the words to the Vampirina theme song.

Of course, it’s not all kids’ stuff; we’ve been enjoying visiting and re-visiting some classic movies, and The Mandalorian – which I pretty much figured I’d enjoy – has totally blown me away. It’s true that I adore The Last Jedi, but Mando is more of what I want from Star Wars going forward; singular takes that employ the classic iconography we know and love, but with fresh storylines and characters, giving us something familiar but different. It’s the Lone Wolf and Cub breezy space western I didn’t know I needed.

But the more I look at what’s on offer, the more I see things that aren’t there. This isn’t me being greedy and demanding more and more content (well, not exactly); rather, it’s things I find curious by omission. I mean, don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot of stuff on here that I really want to see; but at the same time, I don’t really get whey it’s not there. Or even if I do, I also find it a little odd. There are some obvious rights issues at play; but this is Disney, could they not fork out the money? And I’ve left off other films where I guess they’re timing the release to maximise publicity – for instance, whilst they brought Frozen II to the US earlier than planned, I sorta get why keeping it back in the UK might make financial sense. Similarly, the Christmas-themed Noelle was essentially a Disney+ “launch title” in the States, but I imagine we’ll eventually see it come November. Again, adding fresh content throughout the year makes sense, from a brutal capitalist perspective.

So this list isn’t a whine, necessarily; nor is it a deep-dive into Hollywood rights issues. It’s really just me pondering the reasoning behind what we got and what we didn’t. But make no mistake: I’m seriously pissed off we didn’t get number one.

The Ewok movies: Caravan of Courage (1984) and Battle for Endor (1985) were video rental staples of my childhood and really synonymous with my early love for Star Wars in general and Ewoks in particular. I am absolutely certain that they will not have aged well, and I wonder if their low-fi cheesiness is what keeps them off the service. Plus, maybe Disney doesn't want to acknowledge their continuity? Regardless, I think they’re missing a trick by not acknowledging the weird hinterland of Star Wars stuff pre its late 90s renaissance.

Genndy Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars: not the more famous Dave Filoni CG one, but the earlier series of shorts from the beloved Samurai Jack creator that ran from 2003-05. Beautiful, elegiac, and filling in minor plot points between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith (we all wanted to know how Anakin got that scar, didn’t we?), these were fantastic tone poems dedicated to our favourite sci-fi universe, and I'm a bit mystified by their absence. Surely these at least are still canon?

1960s Marvel cartoons: y’know, like Spider-Man (1967-70) – the one with the theme tune. There were several of these shows, often adapting the comics, sometimes very literally (the Hulk one is practically a motion comic). Their quality now is perhaps variable, but they’re fascinating artefacts of their time. I'd love to see them again (especially as we’re probably not gonna see the Sony Spider-Man films any time soon).

The Hulk movies: Hulk (2003) and The Incredible Hulk (2008) are, neither of them, very fondly remembered; Edward Norton's solo outing very much the MCU’s red-headed stepchild, and Ang Lee's film predates the idea of shared universes to deliver a very singular vision. The rights to the Hulk are tied up in complex pre-Disney contracts, meaning a solo Jade Giant movie would need to be released via Universal, and I imagine that holds true for streaming. But come on; he's a major Avenger. Surely they could come to some arrangement regarding The Incredible Hulk at least, just to try to bolster the MCU playlist? It's not as if Disney can't afford it. 

Droids and Ewoks cartoons: in the Eighties ('85-’86 to be precise) young Star Wars fans could relive adventures in a galaxy far, far away with two different classic animations: one following the high-camp adventures of Threepio and Artoo, and another focused on Wicket W. Warrick and his furry friends. I've not seen either since I was very little, but I remember them both with enormous fondness, and I find their absence from D+ to be a personal attack. Even if – let’s face it – these are definitely not canon.

Sofia the First: Once Upon a Princess (2012): see, this one's a bit strange. Sofia the First – the pleasant Disney Junior cartoon about a young village girl becoming a princess – is on D+, as expected. But its double-length pilot, released essentially as a TV movie, is not. The Tangled series had a similar debut, with its pilot “movie” Before Ever After, and that's on the service; so whither Sofia? It's not as if they’re gonna cause a Twitter storm by releasing it later. Did they forget? Is it down the back of Bob Iger’s sofa?

Logan (2017): yeah I know why this one isn't on there; it's full of effin' and jeffin' and blokes getting their arms lopped off. But it's a bit weird to only get two of the three Wolverine movies. True, the continuity of the Fox X-Men films is all over the place, but all the same, to miss out the “last” one feels a bit off, ultraviolence notwithstanding. Skipping Deadpool is more understandable, mind.

Futurama (1999-2013): Disney have rightly made a big deal about The Simpsons. But Futurama is more-or-less equal to Simpsons at its height (and being a much shorter run, less variable in quality). Whilst it skews a bit older, I don't see it as being unsuitable for Disney+, so not sure why it's not there. My guess is they're waiting to release it with a big splash somewhere down the road (unless there's some rights issue I'm not aware of).

The Indiana Jones movies (1981-2007): this is either another rights issue (do Paramount still own the distribution? Are they signed up to another service?) or they’re waiting for an opportune moment to strike. Because, really, this is a no-brainer; Indy is right in Disney’s wheelhouse. Sticking Harrison Ford’s weathered but beautiful face on their advertising is a huge draw. But if somehow they can’t show the Indiana Jones movies, then it’s gonna be weird come Christmas 2022 or whenever it is that James Mangold’s Indiana Jones and the Quiet Sunday at Home Watching Antiques Roadshow reaches the service. Say, they’re not gonna make us wait that long for the other films are they?!

Star Wars Holiday Special (1978): no, wait, hear me out. This could be big. I get why it’s not there, really I do; it’s a much-lambasted relic, a TV variety special kitted out with emerging Hollywood glamour, made when Star Wars wasn’t really Star Wars and therefore a perennial embarrassment to George Lucas. But its naffness is now legendary. Disney should give it a rudimentary nip and tuck, clean up the noisy VHS transfers that flood the internet, and whack it on National Geographic or something, maybe with a humorous retrospective documentary from the guys who did The World According to Jeff Goldblum or something. This could be a huge, and that’s a hill I’ll die on.

Right, that’s ten big ones whose omission either baffles or offends me. There are others, both large (whither Titanic?) and small (I find it a bit weird that Garfield 2 is on there but not Garfield 1). My eldest also noted that The Nightmare Before Christmas is missing, although I’d wager that’ll pop up before the year’s end (EDIT: turns out it is up there. I'm pretty sure it wasn't at launch, though). Disney is playing a clever game with content that is, to some degree, limited (in the sense that it can only really add new movies or shows that it makes itself, and there’ll only ever be a few of those a year); holding back some prestige flicks for opportune moments makes sense. But, c’mon; give us our Ewoks, man.

[recentanimenews]

Manga the Week of 7/31/19

SEAN: Most of the rest of Yen is next week, though some got delayed to August. And lots of other publishers as well.

Dark Horse has the 3rd volume of Mob Psycho 100. Actually, that may have come out this week. Dark Horse release dates are ephemeral things.

MICHELLE: This is a pretty fun series.

ASH: I really like it so far!

SEAN: Ghost Ship gives us To-Love-Ru Darkness 11.

J-Novel Club only has one release next week, but its title is so long it counts as three. Seriously Seeking Sister! Ultimate Vampire Princess Just Wants Little Sister – Plenty of Service Will Be Provided! (Tonikaku Imouto ga Hoshii Saikyou no Kyuuketsuki wa Mujikaku Gohoushichuu) is a one-volume light novel about a vampire princess and her desire for a cute little sister. It sounds dire, but who knows?

MICHELLE: Dire, indeed.

ANNA: I feel confident about forgetting this exists.

SEAN: Kodansha, in print, has UQ Holder 17.

Kodansha, digitally, has much much more. First, we have a debut, The Slime Diaries. This is a comedy spinoff of the Reincarnated as a Slime series.

ASH: I did enjoy much of the original series more than expected.

SEAN: Also debuting in volume form (individual chapters have been released previously) is Farewell, My Dear Cramer. A sports manga that’s a sequel to Sayonara Football (which got no attention over here) and by the creator of Your Lie in April (which certainly did), I’ve heard good things about it. Girls’ soccer, in case you were wondering.

MICHELLE: I hadn’t realized the history of this series or its creator. I was just, all, “Ooh, sports manga.”

ANNA: Did someone say sports manga?

ASH: Indeed!

SEAN: And we have new volumes for Asahi-sempai’s Favorite (5), Back Street Girls (12 and final), Domestic Girlfriend (19), Drowning Love (13), Hotaru’s Way (10), Kakafukaka (8), and My Boy in Blue (11). Kakafukaka is hard to read but highly underrated.

MICHELLE: Hooray for more digital josei!

ANNA: One day I might catch up….one day…..

SEAN: Seven Seas makes up for barely having any releases at the start of the month. Debuting is the manga version of My Next Life as a Villainess! All Routes Lead to Doom!, based on the light novel. I love Katarina, and want to see her in any format. (Also, anime next year!)

We also see D-Frag! 13, Fairy Tale Battle Royale 3, Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash 10 (print version), Harukana Receive 4, Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid 8, Mushoku Tensei’s light novel 2 (print) and 3 (digital), and the 4th Precarious Woman Executive Miss Black General.

Sol Press announced something that’s out this week, but I wasn’t able to get it into last week’s MtWo so here it is. Two manga titles. How to Treat a Lady Knight Right (Ima made Ichido mo Onna Atsukaisareta Koto ga nai Jokishi wo Onna Atsukai Suru) runs in Kodansha’s Suiyoubi no Sirius, and is about a knight who’s always been seen as a muscley sort getting treated as an attractive women. She spends the next 3+ volumes of the manga looking shy and blushing heavily, from what I can tell. This screams “not for me”.

ASH: I mean, I’m definitely a fan of knights who are women, but…

SEAN: They also have The Ride-On King, from the creator of Golosseum, which is about a Putin with the serial numbers filed off and his adventures being awesome. It’s for those who want more titles like Golosseum or those who think Russia is awesome.

Vertical has the novel version of Voices of a Distant Star, subtitled Words of Love/Across the Stars. I seem to recall this wasn’t as depressing as the creator’s other movies. Slightly.

JY, Yen’s young adult line, has the Little Witch Academia light novel. Enjoy Akko being Akko in prose form as well!

ASH: I somehow missed or completely forgot that Yen has a young adult line???

SEAN: They also have the 4th Zo Zo Zombie.

Yen On gives us three new debuts. Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki is for all those who want gaming but without the fantasy isekai aspect. Tomozaki is an awesome gamer, but fails at real life, which he describes as a horrible game. Then he meets a girl who’s not only as good a gamer as he is, but explains how to win at life too. Fans of My Youth Romantic Comedy Etc. should like this.

The Dirty Way to Destroy the Goddess’s Heroes is not as naughty as the title makes it sound. A demon King, who wants to live in peace but heroes keep attacking him, hires a Japanese boy to take care of them. This proves to be a mistake, as the boy goes a bit overboard.

ASH: That could be entertaining.

SEAN: Last Round Arthurs: Scum Arthur and Heretic Merlin has a very Magical Index feel, possibly as they share the same artist. Our hero is tired of his boring life, so teams up with a girl to become the next successor to King Arthur.

There’s also another Final Fantasy tie-in novel, Final Fantasy XIII-2: Fragments Before, as well as The Saga of Tanya the Evil 6 and Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online 4, which starts a new arc.

Print manga debuts. There’s The Alchemist Who Survived Now Dreams of a Quiet City Life (Ikinokori Renkinjutsushi wa Machi de Shizuka ni Kurashitai), whose light novel is out in September. It’s about a run-of-the-mill alchemist who ends up in stasis to save herself, and after coming out of it finds there aren’t any more alchemists in the world! How will she live her quiet, boring life? Sounds like it’s for fans of Killing Slimes for 300 Years. It runs in B’S LOG Gomic.

ASH: This could be interesting, too.

SEAN: Secretly I’ve Been Suffering About Being Sexless (Jitsu wa Watashi Sexless de Nayandemashita) is done in one, and ran in Comic Flapper. It’s about a married woman trying to figure out what to do when her libido is much larger than her husband’s.

ASH: I’ll admit, I’m curious to see how this premise is handled.

Manga Bookshelf’s Pick of the Week (OK, I’m just guessing, but pretty sure I’m right) is debuting next week as well. Skull-Faced Bookseller Honda-san (Gaikotsu Shotenin Honda-san) already has a cult classic anime, and this is the manga, which ran in Gene Pixiv. It’s about… well, the title says it all. This looks fantastic.

MICHELLE: Well, your guess is right on my end, at least. I’ve only seen a little of the anime, but it is charming and I’m really looking forward to reading this.

ANNA: Me too!

ASH: I am so, so looking forward to this series!!

SEAN: We also get first volumes of light novel adaptations with Torture Princess (an omnibus, done in one) and Woof Woof Story.

A lot of ongoing titles moved to August, but we do see Interspecies Reviewers 2 (bleah) and Sacrificial Princess and the King of Beasts 6 (yay!).

ASH: Shoujo fantasy for the win!

SEAN: Lots of new series next week. Perhaps you could ask a skull-faced bookseller what works for you?

By: Sean Gaffney

[stacks-reviews]

Must Reads Part 12

Happy Friday everybody! This week we have children made of snow, a mysterious spaceship that has done nothing for three years, a feminist anthology, and more! 

--Eat the Sky, Drink the Ocean by Kirsty Murray “Little Red Riding Hood is a teen who wears a protective suit and has to fend off a very human wolf. Girls and boys walking to school band together to turn the tables on catcallers. A MasterChef contestant goes time-traveling to secure fresh ingredients for her famous recipes. This collection of feminist fantasy and science fiction stories weaves together impossibilities, dreams, and ambitions to reimagine what girls - and boys - can be. Award-winning Australian and Indian authors worked together and separately to create stories that bridge continents and will inspire readers to open their minds and take a fresh look at the world we know. Travel to outer space with a boy who’s a space miner; find yourself cast adrift and rescued by a pirate ship manned by women; get lost in an eerie airline terminal where your mirror image - a perfect version of you - wants to suck you in. Every story in this collection will take you far from the everyday, to push past boundaries and explore new possibilites. When you eat the sky and drink the ocean, you embrace the world and are connected to all humanity.”

This anthology caught my eye because of the beautiful cover. And after reading the description on the jacket I knew I had to have it. I do own it but I have not had an opportunity to read it yet. Some of the stories are comics and at least one of the stories is a screen play.

--Iron Hearted Violet by Kelly Barnhill and illustrated by Iacopo Bruno “In most fairy tales, princesses are beautiful, dragons are terrifying, and stories are harmless. This isn’t most fairy tales. Princess Violet is plain, reckless, and quite possibly too clever for her own good. Particularly when it comes to telling stories. One day she and her best friend, Demetrius, stumble upon a hidden room and find a peculiar book. A forbidden book. It tells a story of an evil being - called the Nybbas - imprisoned in their world. The story cannon be true - not really. But then the whispers start. Violet and Demetrius, along with an ancient, scarred dragon, may hold the key to the Nybbas’s triumph...or its demise. It all depends on how they tell the story. After all, stories make their own rules. Iron Hearted Violet is a story of a princess unlike any other. It is a story of the last dragon in existence, deathly afraid of its own reflection. Above all, it is a story about the power of stories, our belief in them, and how one enchanted tale changed the course of an entire kingdom.”

There is a short preview up on Goodreads which I really liked. I really like how the story flows in that preview and its voice. The preview follows the storyteller of the kingdom as he recounts what Violet was like as a child and how she captivated the people with her own ability to tell engaging stories. It ends with how she meets her first friend, Demetrius. 

--The Riverman by Aaron Starmer “’To sell a book, you need a description on the back. So here’s mine: My name is Fiona Loomis. I was born on August 11, 1977. I am recording this message on the morning of October 13, 1989. Today I am thirteen years old. Not a day older. Not a day younger.’ Fiona Loomis is Alice, back from Wonderland. She is Lucy, returned from Narnia. She is Coraline, home from the Other World. She is the girl we read about in storybooks, but here’s the difference: She is real. Twelve-year-old Alistair Cleary is her neighbor in a town where everyone knows each other. One afternoon, Fiona shows up at Alistair’s doorstep with a strange proposition. She wants him to write her biography. What begins as an odd vanity project gradually turns into a frightening glimpse into a clearly troubled mind. For Fiona tells Alistair a secret. In her basement there’s a gateway and it leads to the magical world of Aquavania, the place where stories are born. In Aquavania, there’s a creature called the Riverman and he’s stealing the souls of children. Fiona’s soul could be next. Alistair has a choice. He can believe her, or he can believe something else...something even more terrifying.”

This is going to be a surprising dark children’s book (or so I assumed it is classified based on the characters ages) if what is mentioned in the first chapter is anything to judge by. It starts with talking about lost children either due to them running away, bad custody battles, or being taken by strangers. Alistair remembers his towns lost boy by the name of Luke, who’s body Alistair unknowingly finds after he had been missing. He just didn’t realize it at the time until years later. 

I’m already hooked. After that opening Fiona asks Alistair to pen her biography. And at first he says yes but then changes his mind. In part because it worried him and although not expressly stated, it could be because everyone thinks Fiona is strange and she does not appear to have very many friends. And it hints that she may be the next child who disappears in their town. It sounds like an enjoyable, dark read. And I’m sure there is an even darker story going on below the surface and I’m going to guess that the more terrifying truth Alistair will believe is an abusive household. I could be going way off rails here but it is what makes the most sense to me if the gateway isn’t actually real. What better way to escape that reality than by creating a world for yourself?

--The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey “Alaska, 1920: a brutal place to homestead, and especially tough for recent arrivals Jack and Mabel. Childless, they are drifting apart - he breaking under the weight of the work of the farm; she crumbling from loneliness and despair. In a moment of levity during the season’s first snowfall, they build a child out of snow. The next morning the snow child is gone - but they glimpse of a young, blonde-haired girl running through the trees. This little girl, who calls herself Faina, seems to be a child of the woods. She hunts with a red fox at her side, skims lightly across the snow, and somehow survives alone in the Alaskan wilderness. As Jack and Mabel struggle to understand this child who could have stepped from the pages of a fairy tale, they come to love her as their own daughter. But in this beautiful, violent place, things are rarely as they appear, and what they eventually learn about Faina will transform all of them.”

Based off the Russian fairy tale Snegurochka or The snow maiden. I really want to read this on a purely nostalgia reason. Someone at work showed me this book and it immediately reminded me of a children’s book my grandparents owned about an elderly couple who made a little girl out of snow. The girl lived outside in a snow bed and made friends with all the other children. But once summer came she left and the couple were heartbroken until the next winter when their snow daughter returned home. I then told everyone at work about it and hunted down the one I remembered at my grandparents house. It was The Snow Child retold by Freya Littledale and illustrated by Leon Shtainmets.

In this book here, the couple believe that the little girl living in the woods is the child they made out of snow (in the children’s book the child is actually snow, in this rendition that is not the case). Or so the wife believes as she is familiar with the fairy tale as it is mentioned in the book. I doubt that the little girl is really made of snow. She was probably left to fend for herself for one reason or another. Regardless, I never expected to find a full length novel of a children’s book I had read long ago. I did not even know that the book was based off a Russian fairy tale back then. My grandma let me have the children’s book and it is now sitting in my room on a safe shelf. I was not the first to read it and I am pretty sure I wasn’t the last. 

--The Spaceship Next Door by Gene Doucette “The world changed on a Tuesday. When a spaceship landed in an open field in the quiet mill town of Sorrow Falls, Massachusetts, everyone realized humankind was not alone in the universe. With that realization, everyone freaked out for a little while. Or, almost everyone. The residents of Sorrow Falls took the news pretty well. This could have been due to a certain local quality of unflappability, or it could have been that in three years, the ship did exactly nothing other than sit quietly in that field, and nobody understood the full extent of this nothing the ship was doing better than the people who lived right next door. 

Sixteen-year-old Annie Collins is one of the ship’s closest neighbors. Once upon a time she took every last theory about the ship seriously, whether it was advanced by an adult, or by a peer. Surely one of the theories would be proven true eventually - if not several of them - the very minute the ship decided to do something. Annie is starting to think this will never happen. One late August morning, a little over three years since the ship landed, Edgar Somerville arrived in town. Ed’s a government operative posing as a journalist, which is obvious to Annie - and pretty much everyone else he meets - almost immediately. He has a lot of questions that need answers, because he thinks everyone is wrong: the ship is doing something, and he needs Annie’s help to figure out what that is. Annie is a good choice for tour guide. She already knows everyone in town and when Ed’s theory is proven correct - something is apocalyptically wrong in Sorrow Falls - she’s a pretty good person to have around. As a matter of fact, Annie Collins might be the most important person on the planet. She just doesn’t know it.”

The first four chapters of this is available to preview on Goodreads. It is very detailed like the description here. I didn’t mind it. I liked the voice it was giving the book and it really gave me a feel for what Sorrow Falls is like. Everyone so far seems pretty laid back and friendly despite the fact that there is a spaceship right outside of town. 

I really want to read this because it makes me think of Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel (which was really good and is actually one of the few reviews I have written so far). Although the whole world knows about the alien object from the start and that this is classified as a teen book. And also makes me think of just a little bit of the great animated film, The Iron Giant. And as for theories. After reading the preview I’m guessing that either Annie is an alien from the ship but currently doesn’t remember it for whatever reason. Or the whole town is nothing but aliens forgetting what they are to better blend in with the populace. 

[tessatechaitea]

Young Heroes in Love #6

I was expecting Monstergirl to spin webs but not from her fingers.

Growing up, I thought the word "betrayal" was a command so every kid in my class named Al hated my fucking guts. Also, I'm constantly confused by the name Al because whenever anybody named Al accomplishes anything, I first think that some super smart robot AI just accomplished it. This issue is called "You'll Never Walk Alone into the Furnace of Unstable Molecules." I have not been discussing the names of the issues. You might be able to guess why. They're all like that. Issue #1: "Your Lips! Your Eyes! Your Nuclear Breath Vision!" Issue #2: "Look Before You Leap into the Telekinetic Proto-Bomb!" Issue #3: "Two Hearts Beat as One Giant Undead Guy!" Issue #4: "Cry Me a River of Nigh Irresistible Beams!" Issue #5: "Out of the Frying Pan and into the Trans-Universal Galacto-Storm!" They're probably secret messages which need the Young Heroes in Love secret decoder butt plug to decipher. Sure, I own it so I could decipher the messages but it's kind of being used right now for its other intended purpose. The issue begins not with Bonfire exposing Hard Drive's manipulations of the Young Heroes but Bonfire waking up in bed having been mind controlled to forget that she was exposing Hard Drive's secrets. Or she did expose them and later, after Hard Drive recovered his spent powers, he simply mind controlled everybody to forget it and now everything is back to normal. At least until Tara realizes what Willow has done and then sings a duet with Giles about how she was violated by Willow and then everything will fucking just fall apart. Seriously, just stop watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer after the musical. Just pretend it all works out for the best. Because it eventually does! At least until Angel brings about the end of the world. With dragons!

With sexual applications!

I mean, I don't have a clitoris but I'm just going to assume that doing anything to it is good. Yeah? Meanwhile, a villain team known as The Ratpack are busy extorting a school for three thousand dollars. The members of the Ratpack: Mongoose Lord, Doc Ferret, She-Weasel, Flying Squirrel, King Rat, Gerbil-Girl, Whiskers the Living Hamster, and Captain Kangaroo Rat. It's like a meta(l)gene bomb exploded in a pet store. Being that I'm a fucking weirdo who isn't afraid to admit that he has sexual fantasies about comic book characters, I'd just like to say that I've already imagined three different sexy scenarios involving me and Gerbil-Girl. Also, what the fuck does Whiskers think Hamsters are? Zombies? Why is he the "living" hamster?

Gerbil-Girl is so mad at my dick.

The school contacts the Young Heroes because even though they don't think the money is too much of a hassle, they fucking hate filthy rats. Nobody likes rats! At least not the metaphorical ones. You know the saying: whiskers get stichers. But real rats are adorable. At least the ones that pet stores sell and not the ones that climb out of your toilet in the middle of the night. While the team stakes out the school waiting for the Ratpack, they get to discuss relationship problems! It's the entire reason for this comic book to exist. Bonfire is all, "I want to fuck Thunderhead but I'm not sure I'm ready to fuck Thunderhead, you know?" And Monstergirl is all, "I love fucking Hard Drive but I'm not sure I want to be with Hard Drive!" And Bonfire is all, "I don't even remember that I want to fuck Frostbite!" And Monstergirl is all, "I know, right?!" And Grunion Guy is all, "Our initials are exactly the same! I know Gerbil-Girl and I will be happy together forever!" Before any of the better drama can happen, like Off-ramp telling Frostbite that he wants to kiss him in a really bad place, the Ratpack crawl out of the sewers! And they almost instantly get beaten up by the Young Heroes. That's because the Young Heroes are on Issue #6 which means they're basically Level 2 or 3 and battling rats in the sewers is a total Level 1 adventure.

"Insert two fingers, Gerbilgirl! Insert two fingers!"

After the battle, Bonfire takes Thunderhead to the library because Bonfire doesn't know what libraries are for.

Outrageous! Throwing their chewing gum wrapper on the floor!

Oh no! I just read the last page of this issue and it turns out Bonfire wasn't Bonfire at all! It was Monstergirl pretending to be Bonfire! That's like, um, rape or something! Am I not allowed to like Monstergirl's ass now that it's the ass of a rapist?! I hope Bonfire doesn't treat Thunderhead the way Starfire treated Nightwing when Mirage did this to him! That was some totally unfair blaming the victim shit. Not that Nightwing was much of a victim. Look, I know this is a controversial thing to say but getting fucked by a shapeshifter who is pretending to be the person you want to fuck isn't the worst thing that can happen to a person! I wish I were friends with some horny and unethical shapeshifters right now! Young Heroes in Love #6 Rating: A. It's too bad I can't continue to like Monstergirl anymore because she was my favorite. I could say she's even more my favorite now but that would look bad so instead I'm saying, "Gee. What a terribly unethical person. Doesn't she understand consent? She not only violated Thunderhead but Bonfire as well! In fact, now that I think about what she did to Bonfire, I'm really beginning to not like her as opposed to just saying I don't like her so that people don't tell me I'm gross. Poor Bonfire! Now her relationship with Thunderhead is tainted before it even had a chance to begin? Also, what if Monstergirl made her vagina look horrible?! Monstergirl really is a monster!" In summation, I think what Monstergirl did was super wrong so don't judge me! But Thunderhead still got laid so, I mean, was it that wrong? I mean, it was! So wrong! Terrible! The worst even!

[recentanimenews]

THE GREAT CRUNCHYROLL NARUTO REWATCH: The Fall of a Legend In Episodes 48-84

It's time once again for the Great Crunchyroll Naruto Rewatch! I'm Cayla Coats, Editor in Chief of Crunchyroll News, and I'll be your host this week as we travel ever further into the hallowed halls of shonen legend in our quest to watch all of Naruto. Last week, we covered episodes 71-77, and we pick up today with episodes 78-84. Let's get into it.

This week we got a kaiju fight between Naruto and Gaara that ends in a particularly impactful moment of empathy between the two young ninja. Sadly, we lost Hiruzen, the Third Hokage, during the battle back at Konoha. But things never stay still for long in Naruto, and the search is on for the next Hokage!

Let's find out what the Crunchyroll Features team thought of this week's episodes!

Shukaku is a pretty terrifying enemy for Naruto, but the way that ”A Thousand Years of Death” injects some levity into the fight while simultaneously functioning as solid battle strategy really gets to the heart of what’s so special about this show. How did you all feel about the interplay in episode 79 between Naruto fighting Gaara and the ninja fending against invaders back in Konoha?

Kevin: For me, a lot of the war between the Leaf and Sand ended up being “oh yeah, that’s happening, too.” It’s not handled poorly by any means, but going from seeing Gaara turn into a giant monster to the third or fourth scene of the Third Hokage and Orochimaru standing still and having a battle of wills doesn’t do much to help the tension or emotion of either scene.

Danni: I loved the way it kept cutting between the one-on-one battles between Naruto/Gaara and the Third Hokage/Orochimaru. Pulling back to show the entire village resisting against the invasion really helped set this arc’s climax apart from previous ones. It wasn’t just Naruto defeating Gaara that saved the day, it was the Third Hokage’s sacrifice and everyone keeping the invaders at bay that kept the village from crumbling.

Paul: I was happy to see the Leaf Village pull together and beat the stuffing out of the invading forces from the Sand and Sound Villages. I liked the strong sense of community displayed by Leaf Village, and I was surprised with the amount of screen time that the animators dedicated to showing people helping out with repairs. It really drove home the size and scale of the crisis.

Joseph: I also loved the scenes of everyone banding together outside of the two main battles. Cutting back to the Old Man Who Wouldn't Die definitely got a little comical, especially when watching the episodes back to back, but I liked how it was handled overall. There are finally some killer Naruto moments, too, from his expert-level kancho to the transformation while fighting Gaara.

Jared: It’s one of the things that I was impressed with in the last set of episodes as well. Considering all that was happening, it’s hard to keep all of that in check and give each situation the right amount of time. With all the fights happening, it also gave it the feeling of chaos, which it definitely needed.

David: Still really can’t take the kaiju stuff very seriously, but I am a fan of showing how everyone in the village was fighting back in their own ways. That, and the level of detail in the aftermath, made it feel like a ‘war’ in a way a lot of similar stories fail to.

Carolyn: I have to agree with Kevin, I kept forgetting the Hokage and Orochimaru were fighting in the middle of all the Gaara stuff.

Kara: It was actually kind of neat. I forgot about the Hokage fighting Orochimaru as others said. But when they’d cut back it was like “Oh, hey, this is going on!” and it was more a pleasant surprise/reminder than anything else.

Noelle: I thought it was handled pretty alright, all things considering. Of course, I’m more invested in some fights than others (Gaara vs Naruto) but reminders that there’s a fight going on that’s more than just those two was fairly helpful. Still funny at parts though.

I really admire Naruto’s ability to turn his own trauma and past pain into empathy. Even after everything he’s done, Naruto still reaches out to Gaara to tell him he understands how he feels. And yet his determination to protect his friends is unyielding.

Now we’re getting into the really sad stuff. Hiruzen’s final act of sealing Orochimaru’s arms was pretty amazing, especially with the disarmingly kind parting words he left his former pupil. How effective did you all find this scene?

Kevin: It is legitimately difficult to explain how impactful the Third Hokage’s death is, both in terms of the show’s narrative and audience expectations. For most viewers, I suspect that they thought Sarutobi was going to be a minor authoritative character for the entire show. Instead, he got a deeply emotional fight against both his predecessors and pupil ending in a minor victory that cost him his life in exchange for crippling but not killing the main villain.

Danni: Extremely effective. I can easily see this being the big turning point in the show with the Hidden Leaf Village’s peaceful age ending at the assassination of their leader. I imagine it also puts into perspective for Naruto the kind of responsibility he needs to accomplish his goal of becoming Hokage.

Paul: I'm a sucker for martial arts stories where the kind-hearted master can't bring themselves to go full-force against their evil pupil, so the bit with the Third Hokage picturing Orochimaru as he used to be when they were both younger and more innocent really hit me in the feels. Unfortunately, I accidentally spoiled the reveal about Orochimaru's arms getting sealed and the Third Hokage dying when I was looking for some unrelated info on Wikipedia, and I'm afraid that knowledge lessened the impact…

Joseph: Even though I kind of joked on their struggle in the previous answer, the ending really tied it up with some emotional impact. I also appreciated the flashback to his past training Orochimaru that came into play after the fact.

Jared: It was really good. After all that had happened in that fight and all the reveals, the Third Hokage still trying to see the good in Orochimaru was real emotional and effective. Plus with this really seeming like a huge tonal shift for what’s to come next, it had to be that effective to push that forward.

David: I’ve seen this show before and I still couldn’t believe he died so early! It definitely hit hard when I realized this was it for him (the realization that ~80 episodes still felt ‘early’ also hit hard for a completely different reason).

Carolyn: Empathy always hits me hard. So, on both counts, Naruto and the Hokage, it was inspiring and hard to watch.

Kara: I think the back-and-forth between the two fights, now that I have that to think about, really shows that… actually, yeah, maybe Naruto does have what it takes to become Hokage. We’re starting to crack open what it means to have that degree of responsibility, which I think a lot of people within the show believe is just a matter of being a Super Good Ninja. But interposing Naruto’s willingness to connect with Gaara with the Hokage’s genuine kindness was very telling. There are some emotional skills you can’t just trin into people.

Noelle: I’ve seen the show before, so knowing that the Third was going to die wasn’t that surprising. Still, he was set up as an overwatching figure that was supposed to stay around for quite some time, so considering how long the series is, that he dies so early on is surprising. Still, it sets into motion that things change, peace isn’t forever. Underneath all that, empathy being the driving factor behind resolve and transformation is something I adore.

How did you all think the funeral was handled? Personally, I was blown away by the restraint shown by the staff in having a few moments of near silence with no music while Naruto gets dressed and goes to meet up with Sakura and Sasuke.

Kevin: Naruto silently sitting on his bed, then getting up and getting dressed to meet up with Sasuke and Sakura to go to the service is one of the images that still sticks in my mind when I think of Naruto.

Danni: It got a little bit heavy handed with the bit about the rain, but I’ll let it slide. It was definitely a lot more restrained than I expected, which I loved. The silence really punctuated the loneliness of someone you love passing on and the resulting triumph that coming from the support of the entire village.

Paul: I understand the symbolism of why funerals are always in the rain, but that particular artistic flourish didn't work for me. What did work was the shell-shocked expressions on the faces of all of the funeral-goers, and the quiet moment you mention where Naruto has to drag himself out of bed and get on with the business of living. That part felt very genuine.

Joseph: The rain is one thing, and is pretty generic on its own, but when the sun comes out and shines on the framed photo. Oh boy. Other than those standard symbolic practices, it was handled with care.

Jared: Having that rain shower happen during the funeral was a bit on the nose, but I think everything else they did with it being this incredibly somber moment in the show worked. It really puts over just how the Third Hokage and everyone else who died in the invasion reverberated throughout the entire village and forced it to a stand still.

David: Cliches aside, I’m mostly glad the show is willing to dedicate basically a whole episode to mourning. A testament to how great the pacing has been thus far. Also, did anyone else notice Kiba brought Akamaru to the funeral? What a well behaved boy.

Carolyn: Silence is always a great addition to scenes like this. We depend on music as an audience to tell us how to feel and react. Silence leaves us feeling whatever we feel and that makes it more uncomfortable, which is what you need for a scene like this. I also appreciate that the characters were even given time to grieve. So many shows where deaths happen left and right tend to have the characters just move on like it’s normal or they are desensitized. “It’s all just part of this ninja gig!” It’s nice to see death acknowledged in an emotional and realistic manner.

Kara: I also noticed Akamaru at the funeral. That was lovely. And yeah, I thought that whole scene was handled nicely. I don’t mind anime funerals being a bit on the nose symbolically, because they sort of are what they are.

Noelle: I could go without seeing another funeral in the rain for the rest of my life. That being said, that the BGM completely cuts out, showing just how hollow everyone feels- that’s really good right there. The entire episode showcases just how important the Third was, and we needed that.

How did you feel about the arguably precarious balancing act of Itachi’s fight with Kakashi and the Jiraiya/Naruto research road trip shenanigans?

Kevin: Much like with the Sand-Leaf War, the two stories work fine on their own, but cutting from one to the other stops either from building up drama or comedy. I would’ve preferred if Naruto left the village, then follow Sasuke’s story to the jonin and then to the fight with Itachi and Kisame, then cut back to Naruto and Jiraiya, showing the Akatsuki following them, with both stories meeting up again when Sasuke confronts Itachi.

Danni: I honestly didn’t feel like the cuts between the two were particularly jarring. Maybe I’ve been watching anime long enough to not really notice the dissonance between super serious fights intercut with someone being a creep.

Paul: Just like I wasn't sold on Orochimaru before, I'm not quite sold on Itachi yet. He seems way too powerful and way too arch, and his official introduction front-loads too much info with too little time to digest it. They'd have been better served with more foreshadowing and a slower reveal, since through Sasuke's memories we only see Itachi as a homicidal psychopath that murders his entire family for no real reason. Meanwhile, Jiraiya continues to be the worst, although that bit where his giant frog summon had a pair of huge swords strapped to its back was pretty keen.

Joseph: Like Danni, I didn’t really find it jarring at all. Both stories are different, but I’ve come to expect those tonal changes. With that said, the introduction to Itachi and the Akatsuki is huge. I really dug the fight between Itachi and Kakashi, even if they could have depicted the hellish world in a cooler and less garish way. Some people would pay good money to be stabbed with swords for 72 hours straight.

Jared: I think with just watching this show so far, it’s not surprising they were able to juxtapose these two stories with each other. For me, what was surprising coming out of this part was just how fast the show gets right back into it after the funeral scene and everything. Pretty much immediately we have a new villain group set up and Itachi making his grand return which they certainly put over big with how he wrecks Kakashi.

David: The juxtaposition between Naruto’s normal antics and Itachi causing chaos by simply existing didn’t feel off in itself. However, it made Sasuke’s concern for Naruto’s safety feel really silly until Itachi finally got to him. Sasuke fearing the worst immediately cuts to Naruto and Jiraiya being silly enough times that I never actually felt like Naruto was in danger, but maybe on some level that was the point.

Carolyn: I guess I kind of saw it as a foreshadowing or “calm before the storm” type thing. Look at these two goons who don’t even know what dangers lie ahead.

Kara: It’s kind of wild, but it’s kind of what I’ve come to expect from Naruto. Over here, people are straight up killing each other with their minds; over there, people are being dweebs. I do think it’s interesting that we’re now getting two completely rounds of back story in very different ways: Sasuke’s very sobering childhood vs. Jiraiya being the one who got tied to the post during training.

Noelle: It’s a bit of mood whiplash, I won’t lie. Mostly because Itachi’s been built up as an extremely ominous character, and cutting that in with joke moments… well, that sure is a choice alright.

And, finally, what were your highs and lows for this stretch of episodes?

Kevin:

High - This week had some great moments (Gamabunta transforming into the Nine-Tailed Fox, Naruto headbutting Gaara, the conclusion of Sarutobi and Orochimaru’s fight), yet somehow still easily the best moment of the week was the near-silent scene of Naruto getting ready for the Hokage’s funeral service.

Low - Itachi murdering the Uchiha clan. I won’t say much for fear of spoilers, I’ll just tell first time watchers that basically everything involving the Uchihas and Sharingan will be fleshed out later with a lot more detail.

Honorable Mention: We are Fighting Dreamers! Da da da, dat-da, da da da. Fighting Dreamers…

Danni: The technically correct answer is the leadup to the Hokage’s funeral, but I have to go with the funniest out of context scene in the entirety of Naruto where Sasuke finds out the man who murdered his entire clan is back in town because some idiot barged in the room shouting about it. Low point is Fighting Dreamers. I miss Asian Kung-fu Generation.

Paul: My high point was the pay-off for all of the mirror imagery in the fight between Naruto and Gaara, culminating in the insert shot of the leaf on top of the sand. I really dug that. My low point was the ham-handed way that they try to promote Itachi as the new top villain. The bit with Orochimaru talking about how scary and bad-ass Itachi is didn't work for me, especially since he'd just lost the use of his arms and his Chakra, so I'd think he'd have other stuff on his mind than how Itachi fills him with diaper-wetting terror.

Joseph: My high was Naruto being an EXTREMELY GOOD BOY in these episodes. For the low, there wasn’t much, but it did stick out to me that Naruto counts Sasuke among the people who have befriended him and whisked him away from the type of path Gaara went down. Did Sasuke ever really accept Naruto for who he is? I guess to a certain degree he tolerated him, but I don't know that I'd lump in with all the positive influences in his life.

Jared: I think my high point that’s outside of what happens at the funeral, is the end of Naruto/Gaara when they face off in-between the big blade in the ground and there are two shots that you see their faces meet in the middle which I absolutely loved. Low point, which isn’t really low, was the poor dude who barged in yelling HEY Y'ALL DID YOU HEAR ITACHI IS BACK and somehow didn’t see Sasuke standing there. Buddy, you’ve got to read the room.

David: High point for me was Jiraiya’s memories of training with Orochimaru and Tsunade. I’m a sucker for cyclical storytelling like that. Low point was Jiraiya’s usual antics. Guess it evens out in the end?

Carolyn: My favorite moment was actually Big Daddy Toad’s reaction to learning Naruto helped out Baby Toad. Low point, yeah, I guess just Jiraiya again.

Kara: High point is literally any flashback to younger Third Hokage (except for the line about him sneaking around being invisible with Jiraiya, eesh) because I’m enjoying learning more about him. Close second was Exposition-maru coming in and telling Sasuke everything.

Low point was the show not letting my enjoy Jiraiya by reminding me he actually is the perv Naruto claims he is.

Noelle: High point, the Naruto-Gaara fight and their mirror imagery, I still love that dearly to this day. There’s some genuinely good imagery going on right there! Low point would be, sadly, Itachi’s intro, because it feels kind of clumsy, with them building him up too much. It’s a shame, because Itachi is my favorite character in this whole series, but his intro isn’t that strong.

COUNTERS:

"I'm gonna be Hokage!" count: 3 (26 total) Bowls of ramen consumed: 3 bowls (33 bowls, 3 cups total) Shadow Clones created: 23 + 1 uncountable scene (297 total)

  And that's it for this week! You are welcome to join us for this rewatch, anytime, especially if you haven't already watched the original Naruto!

  Here's our upcoming schedule:

-Next week, on APRIL 12th NOELLE OGAWA will take a turn at the wheel for EPISODES 85-91.

-On APRIL 19th NICOLE MEJIAS will walk us through the legendary Sannin battle in EPISODES 92-98.

-April 26th will see DAVID LYNN guiding us through the Land of Waves arc in episodes 99-105.

  Thank you for joining us for the Great Crunchyroll Naruto Rewatch! Have a great weekend, and we'll see you all next time!

  Have a question for next week's batch of Episodes 85-92 Drop it in the comments and you might find your answer in next week's installment!

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