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#i have some access to some monologues and scenes such B)
romeoisalesbian · 11 months
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i am keeping track of every play i've read. and i need to put it somewhere
this list is long so im putting it under a cut
The Pillowman - Martin McDonagh - really interesting read, i keep going back and forth on how I feel about it which is a sign that it's REALLY well-crafted. Pieces: Katurian (act 1, mostly), Ariel (act 3, mostly).
Hamlet - William Shakespeare - what a good play!
Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare
Titus Andronichus - William Shakespeare
Macbeth - William Shakespeare
Henry V - William Shakespeare
As You Like It - William Shakespeare
Much Ado About Nothing - William Shakespeare
Fences - August Wilson
Agamemmnon - Aeschylus
Electra - Sophocles - modern story conventions mean this play doesn't age well. Contemporarily, the drama of the play is centered around whether Electra will do matricide/step-patricide (with the audience at least hypothetically against the matricide), but modern story structures lessen this drama and turmoil because of moral changes -- it seems arbitrary that Orestes has to do the murder, and Clytaemnestra can be a little girlbossified. Pieces: see conversation between Electra and her sister, maybe.
Medea - Euripides - you don't need me to tell you this play is good.
The Frogs - Aristophanes
Phaedra - Seneca
Fat Ham - James Ijames
Fences - August Wilson
LOVE/SICK - John Cariani
Almost, Maine - John Cariani
Late: A Cowboy Song - Sarah Ruhl - I need to read more Sarah Ruhl
Fairview - Jackie Sibblies Drury
Intimate Apparel - Lynn Nottage
The Last Days of Judas Iscariot - Stephen Adler Guirgis
12 Angry Men - Reginald Rose
The Laramie Project - Moises Kaufman & The Tectonic Theatre Project
You and Me and the Space Between - Finegan Kruckemeyer
This Girl Laughs, This Girl Cries, This Girl Does Nothing - Finegan Kruckemeyer
The Book of Will - Lauren Gunderson
MilkMilkLemonade - Joshua Conkel
You on the Moors Now - Jaclyn Backhaus
The Metamorphoses - Mary Zimmerman
Fuddy Meers - David Lindsay-Abaire
A Doll's House - Henrik Ibsen
A Doll's House Part 2 - Lucas Hnath
Men on Boats - Jaclyn Backhaus
The Snow - Finegan Kruckemeyer
The Phantom Tollbooth - Susan Nanus
Digging Up Dessa - Laura Schellhardt
Actually - Anna Ziegler - i'm not sure how I feel about this play. both characetrs are strongly written. a lot of potential for monologues.
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chemicallywrit · 4 months
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Happy Audio Drama Sunday! What a week! Let’s talk about some shows!
🕷️ Ghosts in the Burbs continues to be the kind of quiet horror that creeps into your brain. This last multipart story has a twist that makes me genuinely worried about the fictionalized Liz Sauer of the podcast. She seems overcome by anxiety and a lack of trust, and I worry it will make her vulnerable to supernatural or mundane attack. And all that would do is reinforce her fears! Hang in there Liz.
📻 @breakerwhiskey HARRY DID WHAT? Suddenly this tenuous, teeth-gritting relationship makes sense. Of course our hero feels betrayed! Of course they never really reconciled! Note that it’s out in the open, I wonder if real reconciliation is on the table.
🌺 @wanderersjournalpod is so fascinating, not just because of the framing device, but also because Marigold tells on themself in this surface humorous story about accidentally poisoning themself. She is starving. Both Marigold and Pluto are in tricky situations and neither of them seems to be reaching out for help from anyone but each other. Is it by necessity, or are they just stubborn?
🦀 What can you say about @thesiltverses? These episodes, mostly monologue, set the scene for whatever the finale will bring, and I can feel the tension building. I have to pour out the accolades for the actors, whose work embodying these roles has been incredible, especially B. Narr.
🌳 My best friend @worldgonewrongpod is back this week and I love this small town drama over creepy trees. Being from small town Colorado myself (although not quite this small), it felt comfortingly familiar. I can’t help but see the parallels between the book banning campaigns in small towns all across the US, which work about as well as shooting trees. This show continues to, in a friendly gentle way, destroy me.
✊🏾1972 wrapped this week! I love a historical drama, and I cheered out loud when Angela Davis was declared not guilty, even though like. That’s a historical event. It wasn’t a surprise. At the same time I found Shirley Chisholm’s campaign so heartbreaking, even though she didn’t. I’d like to be as forgiving and smart as Chisholm, I think. Even though she lost, what she did mattered; even though Angela Davis was in jail for years for no reason, it mattered.
⚙️ In Inn Between news, GET READY FOR THE FINALE KIDS. The penultimate episode is out, and our early access folks will see this season wrap this week. Now I gotta like. Write season six. Pray for me, hopefully this one won’t take a tear and a half.
That’s it for this week! 😘
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bleue-flora · 1 month
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do you think c!drunz used the revival book pre or post prison, I used to think pre but now I think they started using it post.
things that line up: in dreamxds vid it’s said that they don’t know how to use it yet, preparing for staged finale they would have had no time, c!Dream seemingly panicking over c!tommy dying in exile, c!dream worrying in general about death, testing it in prison like he claimed. In disc finale he could have lied about knowing how to use the revival book but still had access to it. However c!drunz already had vikk and lazar captured prior to c!dreams imprisonment maybe they were working out the revival book there and later post prison they used it on them. What do you think becsuse it’s never stated anywhere what date they had been testing the revival book on those two and there’s definitely things that go against it happening pre- prison arc.
You do realize this topic got me caught in an essay “war” ;) a couple months ago [here] right? You really trying to get me booted out of dreblr for my opposing thoughts huh?… thanks a lot…. welp I hope you know anon this has been plaguing me for weeks…
See this is a thing of much controversy because there are lots of variables and just as many if not more unknowns so honestly my opinion on the matter has shifted a quite a bit over my time here, but here are my current thoughts.
Originally, my theory was that they tested on Lazar and Vik before staged finale, and then themselves (if they even did - we don’t necessarily have direct evidence of that to be fair… but that’s besides the point) after prison. This made sense to me for the following reasons. a) I don’t feel like Dream would go into staged finale without knowing that if things went super wrong and they did kill him, Punz could bring him back. b) I’m pretty sure Vik and Lazar go missing before Doomsday. c) Wouldn’t you want to make sure your leverage is legit before you get thrown in a box. d) It makes sense with the timeline of his spiral. e) There is no evidence that suggests the book can revive multiple lives back so how would Dream then have all three lives for the staged finale. Plus the genuine sounding fear in his voice both in the staged finale and in prison makes a lot of sense if he had tested it on Lazar and Vik learning how terrible limbo is and hadn’t yet died and experienced it for himself. And then there’s f) given the comment in the finale about them dabbling in mind controlling Ranboo using the revival book, the scenes we get in the Revival Book video that shows Ranboo (implying there is at least some connection between the enderwalking and revive book), and Ranboo’s first known enderwalking (see now you know why I was asking ;D) starts not long before Doomsday we can then reasonably determine that they likely were experimenting at minimum with mind control before prison as Dream used that during prison - and why would you be experimenting with a Revival book to mind control without also testing if it could actually ya know revive -> hence at least testing with Vikk and Lazar….
Anyways I think a) is the main reasoning in my mind as to why I think he at least tested the book before putting himself in a position to be killed. Though I do think perhaps revealing he had the revival book was his last card to play and not his plan A. I mean after making sure he talked on and on about how secure and stuff the prison was in his monologue, it’s likely he assumed they’d put him in there automatically instead of permanently killing him. I mean he’s not an idiot and revealing he had the revive book was likely going to lead to someone trying to take it from him (aka torture). He just wrongfully assumed Sam wouldn’t let that happen. But this is what I think he means when he says “Your means was getting the revival book. Uh, fair enough, you know, you need- you need to value- it’s a valuable thing. I knew the risks when I had it. I knew the risks when I told people… that I had it. But… you know, I—I accepted the consequences and it—it happened.” I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, them putting him in Pandora’s Vault was for only one purpose and that was to get the book. They can pretend all they want that it was for another reason but the truth is that they would’ve let Tommy kill him if not for the book and we know already that they have shone in the past that they are more than willing and capable of torture… and I think Dream considered it a possibility, but he didn’t necessary plan on revealing he had it in the first place and depended on Sam to not let torture happen. Anyways, I guess also why have the revive book and not test it? Especially when you think the entire server is trying to kill you. It doesn’t make sense to only test it after…
However, I do think that the experiments they may or may not have done on themselves more likely happened after prison. When Dream cares a lot less about his own pain and suffering having spent months being tortured, plus maybe after he sees DreamXD come to the cell, hears about this Egg, and Foolish having powers… etc it would make sense for them to dive back into experiments this time not to test if it works but what other secrets and answers it holds like limbo and such…
This post [here] actually does a great job going into great detail about the timeline of experimentation. My only counter points to it would be that I think they didn’t experiment on animals as he says it’s “one of the rules” to Sam in Daedalus that it doesn’t work on animals and Sapnap’s book has a list of rules for usage so it would make sense to me for the revival book to have the same (though an angrument could be made that they ignored the rule and tested it anyways…). Also I think Dream helping Techno get totems that Techno conveniently has to use in his execution, highlights that Dream likely knew of Techno’s execution before it happened, which I think would actually be the turning point and perhaps the moment he started thinking about putting himself in the prison. Because it seems to me that he already made up his mind before speaking to Punz (right after the execution) and filling him in on it vaguely and forming a plan of separation [vod]. I’m also not sure if it’s ever confirmed that Dream’s death (any of them) in the first disc war are confirmed to be canon, yes he says you killed me in the finale but also death is referred to throughout even non canonical so I’m not sure that means it counted as a life. (Having said that I do actually love that death being canon as it means Dream was the first to lose a life and makes his actions and his outrage in the finale about it make a whole lot more sense)… so to answer your question: Vik and Lazar right before prison and Themselves after prison.
Or so I thought when I wrote this essay, but then as I combed through the Revival book video I noticed some things that blew my mind show I was in fact wrong, but as this is already long, I’ve put it in a separate post [here].
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panpraja · 1 year
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A tip for writing truly immersive environments and locations — building your very own Snapshot library.
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How it started:
In real life I like to think I'm an observant person who notices the tiniest things around me, but when I sit down to describe, I don't know a forest — 🤯 poof, I'm blank. Can't remember a thing about my own town even.
The events of my current novel are happening in August. Writing any kind of non-plot related narratives throughout the year was very difficult, especially describing nature, and I kept waiting for actual August to happen in my city so that I can write in the moment.
When August came, I was jotting down everything about this time of the month. The weather patterns, what was flying through the air, what the people around me were behaving like and so forth. I was even able to divide those into subcategories like 'conversations I overheard' or 'internal character monologues while going from point a to point b'.
I called it a Snapshot of August.
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So, how do I use these 'Snapshots'?
They're like a recipe cards for all kinds of situations — or at least the ones you've been. So you wrote a Snapshot about a coffee shop. You add more and more snippets every time you sit in a coffee shop. If my characters are in a coffee shop I pull up the appropriate Snapshot and start picking and choosing elements in order to build the environment. I'll take that description of couple these to highlight MC's low esteem, a pinch of cinnamon smell in the air, a dash of how square my butt felt against the uncomfortable wooden chairs...
Sure, I can just take a picture things then I'll have a stupor as to how to describe the picture later. Sure, I could try to write from memory and get two lines in, or you could be that mysterious individual at the corner of a bar peeking at people from under your glasses and scribbling away every curious individual you see every mannerism and the ways the light hits their beer glasses.
The difference is that I wrote those snapshots WHILE I was in those situations and locations, so I can describe in utmost detail the August frustration of constantly wiping my sprinkled windowsill from the winged seeds of catkins hanging from the branches of a silver birch outside my house.
I forget these things! Snapshots are both for little details and large, descriptive scenes where you can plug your character into.
This is especially crucial when you're in a unique place you can't easily access again, like when you're on vacation! And it's a powerful ally for never slowing down on things like narrative descriptions during a NaNoWriMo sprint.
I will update this post in the future with some snapshot examples.
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Dave time!! Twitter is limiting how many tweets people can view now (🙄) so I am parking myself here (this will be thoughts about #davebenjo day 7, episodes 8-10 session 2; I'll edit the content under the cut as we go)
Dave continues to be wrong about Bridglar
Bridglar domestic at home real!! Also the way Dave talks about "when they get home"..."when they get home they'll find a way to live together"...dave...I'm sorry to tell you this...
I want to watch the terror camp panel about what medically went wrong
I also hope we get a terror camp talk about Silna's family. I love how much I'm learning about her culture just from these questions
two-spirit silna!!!
Dave being so strongly affected by Christos's monologue!! dave!! dave!!! Also he's right, Paul's acting in that scene with his eyes was amazing
"How do you create such a supportive environment on set?" 🥺🥺🥺
"Actors think out loud a lot" lmao
Scripts show them bus stops on their journey, and the actors have to figure out how to get from point A to point B. If the script isn't helping them, they can't figure out how to get from point A to point B, and then it's Dave's job to get them back on track.
Dave talking about how much he loves actors and will do anything for them 🥺🥺🥺
The director and showrunner's roles are to talk to the actors and find out what they need, then be as flexible as possible to give that to them
Episode 9 as a montage...damn
Dave's answer to the "when does Hickey become irredeemable" question...it's when he sees the hill they're going to camp beneath! Yes! Yes!! This is when he no longer acts to save himself, but thinks he can access the Netsilik mythology. The transgression that is actually unforgivable! I love that
Why didn't Hickey show signs of poisoning after eating Goodsir? They did have shots of Adam cramping, but no good ones so they skipped them. Adam had some explanation for why he wouldn't be as affected but Dave didn't really get it
Me: Hickey had probably experienced worse in his terrible childhood
Also me: Cramping? Trans Hickey real
A disaster exposes what's best and worst in us, often at the same time
Dave has only watched the show 8 or 10 times XD I definitely thought it would be more, but I guess that's a lot when you also wrote it, edited the script, were there when it was filmed, and edited the footage after
Ohhh no, in Goodsir's last moments, he thinks about the things that brought him joy, not people
Tuunbaq's death: intentionally put Anglican church music over his death to be the most offensive, in the sense that it's from Crozier's POV and he believes he is the main character and just vanquished a foe, not realizing that he just killed the main character (!!!)
Taking notes of ensemble horror films with naturalistic characters that Dave mentions: Black Christmas, The Fog
Dave is fine with his work being in the "missed by most, but fiercely loved by some" category: good!!
The setting itself can be scary if it's a horror setting (e.g. a haunted house); The Terror is like that. Pen in the chat: "also a haunted house to some is a home to others!" Yes!!
Dave might have originated the "Dundy" nickname for Le Vesconte XD It makes sense to him that JFJ would dole out nicknames. Yes!!
Oh nooooo they did ask the "body retains sensation after death" when Silna sees Goodsir....no....no!!!
"If you take 128 men, one of them is bound to have killed someone" 😂
"I think he dislikes murder in some respects" 🥺 thank u dave. Hickey has been in a horror story for years before the story starts...!!! The general idea that Hickey is just so tired of having to murder as was mentioned last week lmao
To understand Gibson, think of someone who knows he is just as good as someone in university but knows he will never get that opportunity. Ugghhhh dave talking about Gibson's intelligence always makes me !!!
"I don't fuck with how people pray, how they love, and how they grieve" ❤️
Love this question about the laundry!! Completely missed the longjohns. This is so interesting. I love that there's always more to explore in this show
Dave cracking up talking about Herodotus 😂 it comes highly recommended
So appreciate the question about who would have taken the "opportunity to participate in cannibalism" ldfkads (my kind of question)
POLL TIME
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finaledenialist · 4 years
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so in one of your asks you said you dont think cas was in love with dean since the beginning and idk its interesting to me because everyone seem to think he was from the start so what is your take on that? idk im just curious haha
ohhh I wanted to make a post about this so thanks for asking!
disclaimer: I don’t want to rain on anyone’s parade I just have a different take on this whole thing!!! 
So. I see people are like: OMG he was in love ALL THIS TIME SINCE 4x01 and I am like: no. 
Was he lost since he laid his hand on Dean in hell? Yes. Was he instantly in love? Nah.
See, Cas in season 4 and 5 is starting to feel. He is conflicted, he is questioning, he doesn’t have ‘people skills’, he is confused by what he feels, he knows there is a ‘profound bond’ between him and Dean and he is rebelling for Dean, because Dean has a point and Cas feels Dean is right and apocalypse and destruction are wrong, and this human is so human and he never had that connection before. Add the sexual innuendos, the eye fucking and the tension between those two and this is what i call ‘classic destiel’. I do have a strong feeling this is partly Jensen’s and Misha’s fault though haha but I am also convinced that the jokes like ‘Cas, get out of my ass!’/’Blow me Cas’ are purely for ‘comedic purposes’ because haha gay so funny (keep in mind it’s still 2008/2009 and things were so different then BUT we still got Endverse which had not only sexual stuff implied but romantic as well - ‘all we have left, Dean and I, is each other, if Dean says it’s time to go in a blaze of glory, so be it’ (I am writing this from memory so these might not have been exact lines but you know what I am talking about).
And then in season 6 and 7 is where things start to get romantic. ‘I watched you rake leaves’, Dean’s blind faith that no, Cas can’t be working with Crowley behind their backs because come on it’s Cas and the whole 6x20 episode is *chief’s kiss* and then season 7 and Cas dies to make things right and Dean keeps his trenchcoat and moves it from every car they have been using that season to always have it with him because part of me always believed you’d come back. OK, but I was meant to be talking mostly about Cas’ point of view. Which takes me back to 7x23 and I’d rather have you, cursed or not. I think these words had a major impact on Cas. Something just clicked. Because he realized that he could say these exact same words to Dean and they still would be true. 
And then we got season 8 which was a major shift and it really moved stuff from ‘sexual tension’ to ‘romantic tension’ and it’s still called ‘season fanfiction’ because I wanted to keep them away from you in purgatory and Cas generally not feeling worthy of anything but I think this is when he started to realize that what he feels is not like ‘brotherly friendship’ but something much deeper but he had his issues (I don’t deserve to be saved from purgatory thing) so he kind of kept it buried. But this was when the Real Love really started. But did he admit it to himself? Well I am not in Cas’ head but something must have been on his mind - Naomi had access too his mind and she immediately recognized that there is a certain Feeling that is dangerous and Cas needs to be fucking lobotomized (I still have shivers thinking about it). Did Naomi knew it was love? Idk, but she felt something was going on - that is why she tried to mess things up between Dean and Cas (I only wish he felt the same way ouch my heart....) and Metatron also recognized it, quicker and better (maybe because he spent much more time on earth and was generally a little more powerful and knowing as the scribe of God) and he immediately used Cas’ grace to banish angels from heaven because Cas was feeling love for a human. But did he, himself recognized it as love? Did he admit it to himself? I still have a feeling that no. I still think that his ‘I don’t know’ after Dean’s ‘What broke the connection?’ was honest.
Now let me fast forward to season 12, because this post is getting too long already and while seasons 9-11 had some good episodes and even good destiel scenes I feel this was the time many people - rightly so - were starting to lose faith in canon destiel, starting with Dean not letting Cas stay in the bunker in season 9 and bros acting like they only call Cas when they need him. I repeat - there were still some good episodes, even great ones. And we were shown Cas worried about Dean and being there for him anytime Dean called, there was so much pining but once again let me raise The Question: did Cas know what he was feeling was love? Or was he still confused, not letting himself believe, not being able to name his own feelings and emotions? And this is merely my opinion but this is also time where many people started to be bitter and negative by how writers treated Cas (and other characters in general but I am not gonna dive into that dumpster now, especially the Cas-having-sex-with-a-reaper thing which was awful, but in retrospect is even more awful because if it was Chuck’s writing this seems like some kind of sick attempt to do a conversion therapy and I want to throw up; plus he thought? he was into his boss at gas’n’sip and he thought she was into him and what even was it if not a. bad writing; b. Cas being confused; c. Cas being confused about this bad writing).
So season 12. First of all 12x12, when Cas thought he is gonna die and the infamous line ‘I love you. I love all of you’ happened. I  am 100% sure this is when Cas realized. This must have prompted questions for him. Why did I say what I said? He blurted those words out but why like that? Aaaand after some thinking I think he realized why. He must’ve been like ‘oooops’. But then Jack was about to be born and he had to protect Kelly and then he died.
And then he is in the Empty who says - I know who you love, I know what you fear, there is nothing for you out there. She doesn’t know shit, she just has access to Cas’ mind and apparently those were his thoughts, already at that time, he thought there was nothing for him out there (again, his depression issues) BUT THEN CAS, MY SWEET CAS, THIS BAD ASS MOTHERFUCKER says fuck you Empty in one of his best monologues (before 15x18 I’d say it was his best but here we are) and she yeets him out, because HE decided HE is already saved and he doesn’t need a permission and you can preen and you can scream and yell and remind me of my failings but somehow, I'm awake. And I will stay awake and I will keep you awake until we both go insane. I will fight you. Fight you and fight you for... ever. For eternity. 
And then Jack dies and he takes the humiliating deal.  And now we’re at 15x18 and he says: ‘I have always wondered.... ever since I took that burden.... What my true happiness can even look like... Because the one thing I want is the one thing I can’t have’. SEE THESE WORDS HERE ARE WHY I CAN’T SLEEP AT NIGHT. BECAUSE THEY IMPLY at least to me THAT:
1. He was aware of his feelings, he knew what he felt was love at the time he took the deal. and after that he was like ‘I guess I am immortal now’ because the one thing I want is the one thing I can’t have so nothing else is going to make him truly happy; this also implies that there is only one thing he truly wants and the rest is just not that important, whatever else happens won’t make him happy which is heartbreaking;
2. He knew what he wanted, so this means that at some point he wondered, he imagined, he took his time to picture the ‘thing’ he wanted. Which is life with Dean. Because he is in love. LIKE HE THOUGHT ABOUT THIS, HE REALLY DID AND HE CONCLUDED THAT THIS IS OUT OF HIS REACH (now people argue if that is because he thinks it’s unrequited or because he thinks that something something hunter life-fighting all the time-no attachments lifestyle won’t allow them to have this sort of life - and frankly, knowing that he learned everything, or almost everything about emotions from Dean, who isn’t really good at them, I am not surprised if he is sure that this feeling is one-sided, because maybe he conquered his fears in the Empty the first time around but taking the deal must have made him anxious and Chuck still calls him self-hating so he probably thinks this is one-sided and he is unworthy of love anyway);
3. He tried to imagine different scenarios that would make him happy but eventually it all came down to That One True Scenario, out of his reach, that couldn’t compare with anything else, and he tells Jack - you know about that deal, it’s ok, I don’t see myself becoming happy anytime soon AND IT HURTSSS
so to conclude and tl;dr - I think Cas realized that what he was feeling was love after 12x12 although he felt it before but might have been confused by it. I do not think he was ~in love~ since 4x01. There was tension and there was pining but no. This feeling evolved, it didn’t *just* happen in the barn. 
also i am so sorry this took so long but i have thoughts and feelings and can’t form a coherent sentence since november 5th anyway thanks for asking nonny, ily!!!!
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Sometimes a Great Notion
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This is one of those old movies my mom requested that we couldn’t even find at our local library. It’s incredibly hard to track down, which says more about how easily lost our film history and culture can be as we move from format to format rather than its quality as a film, but that is another conversation. Basically this 1971 film is the second that Paul Newman directed, and it tells the story of the Stamper family, a family who run an independent logging business in a town where the local logging union has gone on strike. As independents, they take the union’s former contracts and as the film goes on, the consequences of that choice become larger and larger, and depending on your perspective, this is either an indomitable tale of the perseverance of the human spirit or a disheartening look at everything that makes America the end-stage capitalist nightmare it currently is.  
Some thoughts: 
It appears that I’m supposed to think Henry Fonda, as the patriarch of the Stamper clan, is a charming old coot, like an Archie Bunker type, complaining about Commie pinko socialists and calling his estranged son a New York fairy. I’m not really seeing the charm here.
I’m not 100% sure what’s going on with this subplot where Joe B (Richard Jaekel) and his wife apparently attend the Church of God and the Metaphysical Science...so maybe they’re cult members too? That never really gets delved into, which is a head scratcher.
I feel like with this dialogue they’re supposed to be kind of...gruff and jokey with each other, but I really don’t get it. None of it seems funny at all, just aggro. 
I think I'm just really confused about what exactly this movie IS. It’s not a character study because we’re learning so little about these people. It doesn’t seem to be a David vs. Goliath small business taking on The Man story because the whole union vs. Stamper family thing doesn’t seem to be anything the Stampers are that concerned about. Leeland (Michael Sarrazin) coming back after a long absence is certainly a wrinkle, but no one is actually delving into what that means for the family or how they feel about it. Like the purpose of the film seems to just be “these are some people doing their jobs and going about their business for a couple hours.”
Like for real, there are multiple really long segments that just show them doing logging shit. 
And listen, I’m not one of those people that only wants to watch media where I like the characters. There are a lot of bad people and evil characters that I don’t want to emulate and would absolutely hate to be around in real life that I REALLY enjoy watching. Hell, in the last year, my main TV hyperfixations have been Succession and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. So it’s not the fact that the Stampers are sexist, stubborn, union-busting jackasses. I just don’t really care about any of them and I question why I should care about their story because the movie isn’t doing a very good job at convincing me. 
There are some Very Good Dogs! At least that’s something.
This would be a way more interesting movie if Leeland and Viv (Hank’s wife, played with stunning grace by Lee Remick) hook up because Leeland is the only one who talks to her or listens to what she has to say. He sees her in a way no one else in the family sees these women at all. ESPECIALLY because even though Henry is Leeland’s father, Hank had an affair with Leeland’s mother too, which is deeply disturbing because we find out he was 14 and she was 30. Fuck, now there’s statutory rape and unresolved trauma involved. Wouldn’t this be a fantastic thing to actually talk about and delve into? Wouldn’t this whole relationship entanglement and the ripple effects it’s had on this family be really interesting? NOT ACCORDING TO PAUL NEWMAN I GUESS.
As much as I love Paul Newman, I’m really questioning a lot of his directorial choices, too. He can’t control the story or the script so much (this is based on a Ken Kesey novel) but other choices are baffling. The pacing is a mess. Some scenes go on for what seems like forever for no reason, others are brutally short or feel cut off. The transitions between scenes are all these quick cuts that don’t let anything breathe. Leeland and Viv’s deep, intimate conversation ends with her saying Hank’s satisfied and Leland asking “Are you?” and then BOOM next scene where bluegrass kicks in and they’re all riding motorcycles. What should have been a body blow of a moment gets its legs cut out right from underneath, and it’s a damn shame.
“To work and eat and screw and sleep and drink and keep on going, that’s for what. That’s all there is.” - the film’s central thesis, uttered by Henry Stamper in his big Oscar-worthy monologue. Which in a nihilist sort of way I agree with, but there’s a big fat asterisk that gets ignored here: if you’re doing those things and directly, knowingly causing the suffering of others - and you can make choices that AVOID that as much as possible, and you DON’T - well that’s where your philosophy turns to shit, I’m afraid.
And the consequences of that philosophy are laid bare when the Stamper family has one HELL of a bad day. Play stupid games and win stupid prizes. 
I really thought the movie was going to end with Hank sitting alone in his dark, quiet house drinking beer and feeling sorry for himself and maybe reflecting on the enormous cost of his decisions. Instead the movie ends with Hank displaying his father’s severed arm at the top of his boat, flipping the bird to the town he’s turned his back on. And frankly it’s a big “fuck you” to the audience as well, for thinking that the Stamper family could learn or grow or see outside of their own rugged individualism for one second. 
Did I Cry? I probably should have, but any emotional weight the tragedies we watch hold gets completely deflated when no one learns a goddamn thing from them. 
All things considered, this movie is a perfect encapsulation of the toxic attitudes that have yielded every single moral failing of America from its inception. The myth of the American frontiersman, pulling himself up by his bootstraps, owing nothing to no one and simply trying to work hard and provide for his own family - it’s all wrapped up in the same wars (both literal and figurative) we’ve been fighting for centuries. We’re supposed to cheer at the Stampers for sticking to their guns and moving forward to get the job done no matter the cost, and that’s precisely the fucking problem. Costs matter, especially when they’re paid in human lives. And I would be more willing to view this film as a fascinating artifact of attitudes that have gone by the wayside if we weren’t having the same damn argument today. As a result, it ends up just feeling frustrating. 
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phoebehalliwell · 3 years
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I think getting things from Dency’s perspective could be cool!
As someone who hates first person POV I find that for me even if I hate reading it (with some exceptions) drafting certain scenes from different character POVS have give me a better gauge of them a people, even if it ends up in third person person later. idk it’s a weird process but it helps me 🤷‍♀️
That being said I’d love to see what’s going on in Dency’s head 😂 can’t wait to read whatever you’ve got planned :) I love the Dencyverse and the W&S verse honestly top teir oc content!
thank u bb 💕💞 i personally always really liked writing in first person when i don't have an ensemble cast however the majority of everything i write has an ensemble cast bc what can i say i love ensemble casts even with things like warren & sheridan while there are only two leads i still love to jump around into like jennys mind or reemas darlene gets a monologue as well just bc i think it's important to see the ways people see them but with dency it's like. a) she's the lead she doesn't share the protagonist title w anyone else b) there's no one else's headspace that is relevant nor accessable to us. like. like her main costars are dove and penn, and both of them act under a layer of artifice. dove does it for sport & penn does it for necessity but both are just. it's just. we're not meant to be inside their heads because they don't let people in. so i think restricting the narrative to dency and dency alone could be really interesting bc um. well obvi im not going to spoil anything but there are one or two friendships with her where like. she's kind of in the wrong in?? but like. i think it's more important that we get it from her point of view. inappropriate love conversations type thing like um. like someone's like wow i just met this person and i really like them this is the most ive liked anybody in a long time to which dencys like fuck now's my last chance: i think im in love with you. which is just. something you should not do it really reads as you only want what you can't have which may or may not be true and now you've thrown a wrench into their very fresh relationship and muddied it with your own feelings that you literally never acted on until they were telling you about how they were happy with someone else but literally locking that off to just solely dencys perspective. not getting the smallest insight as to what the other's thinking rn. i think could be really fun
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sometimesrosy · 4 years
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What elements make B/E such an obvious romantic obstacle to B/C, narratively, etc?
A lot really. I mean, first, with that time jump, we needed to see that Bellamy had grown and moved on from the trauma of earth. Who better to show that transformation than the grounder who represented betrayal and brutality and murder and war to him? The one who betrayed him and almost killed his sister and held him captive. To forgive HER means he’s over the s3 bizness where he treated all grounders as the enemy who deserved death just for existing in some cases. We SAW him learn the lessons, but with the time jump and B/E he now INHABITS it. He’s grown from it. 
There’s also the parallels between CL and B/E. first alliance, then betrayal, then kidnapping, then working together, then saving from sucide, then forgiveness, then love. I know some people consider CL to be endgame, but my theory here is based on CL being over, for important reasons within the narrative. So to parallel two relationships that are important and transformative, but not endgame, and to show the longer pace of B/E which shows that Bellamy was healthier than Clarke was, is a sign of character development.
Bellamy needed a relationship in order to move forward on the ship, so he wasn’t a wreck. He needed to be a whole person, who COULD live without Clarke, because the Bellarke relationship is a relationship of equals, and it’s NOT codependent. They don’t fill in the holes of the other person. They are not INCOMPLETE without each other, They needed to be shown as complete people on their own. So showing that he’d not been destroyed by her loss meant having him accept love, accept that he deserved love. Therefore, he needed a healthy relationship. 
OKAY. This turned out to be A TOTAL EPIC post. And it’s too long so after the jump. STay tuned.
IT COULD NOT BE RAVEN. Wanna know why? Because Raven has her own journey. And she CAN NOT be second choice, because of her problems with finn and clarke in s1. Raven needs someone to be head over heels over her, if she’s going to have anyone. And if Bellamy had been in a relationship with Raven, CLARKE would always be standing between them. And with Clarke’s resurrection, Bellamy’s SOULMATE, Raven would be cast into second place, thus ruining Raven’s character arc, and putting Clarke into the SAME narrative of being the other woman, without any development. This would be a failure of storytelling, lacking growth and transformation which is NECESSARY for this story. 
As long as Bellarke is endgame, Br/aven could NOT happen. If Bellarke is NOT endgame, Br/aven is actually the CLEAR AND OBVIOUS choice for Bellamy’s next relationship. They already love and respect and like each other. Raven is a major character. The audience loves and wants them both happy. If Bellarke were not endgame, then Br/aven would have been. If Bellarke were PLATONIC, for real? Then Br/aven should have been developing all this time. But since Bellarke is an endgame romance, Br/aven CAN NOT happen romantically. 
THUS they needed a character to be his romance, to show him moving on, but it couldn’t be a character who was TOO essential that we would replace Bellarke with that ship, as would have happened with br/aven. Although it also needed to be a character who was tied to the major issues we’ve been dealing with, someone who maybe reminds him a little of Clarke even. Enter Echo. betrayals, ruthless, sneaky, beautiful, cheated in the conclave, almost killed his sister, does whatever she has to to save her people, loyal. 
I’d also like to bring up Echo’s name. And I think her name DOES matter. At first I thought it was because she was an ECHO of CL and that betrayal for Bellamy.  The myth of Echo, as the nymph who pined after Narcissus didn’t make sense to me, as Bellamy wasn’t a narcissist in love with his own reflection... UNTIL someone made the point that the classical concept of soulmates was one soul split into two bodies, so a person and their reflection COULD be a metaphor for this soulmate concept. Which made Bellamy in love with his reflection/soullmate Clarke, which now ENTIRELY fit the Echo and Narcissus myth. Echo is in love with Bellamy who is obsessed with his soulmate Clarke (who in s6 was ‘behind the glass’ like a mirror image! huh. Who was it that posted that theory!? that sounds like a confirmation to me.) Now again, Clarke and Bellamy are separated by this distance, and Echo goes in to find him? I hope Echo doesn’t fade away like her namesake did, but it’s possible. But Narcissus also dies at the river, in love with his reflection, becoming flowers, right? This actually fits my spec that Bellarke will “die” but in reality just be separated from their family and live out their lives in pastoral happily ever after. Anyway. The myth of Echo and Narcissus, means Echo is NOT the soulmate.
Also. JR said Clarke and Bellamy were soulmates. And fine, I don’t use commentary in my analysis... but I do if it fits, and this fits. They are SHOWN as being soulmates from season 4 AT LEAST. “you center her.” “you got it backwards.” for an example. 
Okay, but now lets get to the narrative. What I told you before is more about storytelling and tropes and character development. Or HOW you tell a story. Now we’ll get to canon evidence. There’s still some storytelling in there. I’m gonna start with s5, because that’s when romantic b/e showed up.
This was the big sign to me of what was going on with Bellarke and B/E.
The first episode of s5 was almost ALL Clarke. We were focused on her survival in the wastes. We were given access to her feelings and thoughts and pov. We were given her monologue.  Which was not a monologue.
It was a conversation, one way, with Bellamy. The voiceover of 5.01 was Clarke making her 2199 radio calls. Which is a romantic trope. They were, essentially like a diary, or love letters, or even a prayer, in a way. For that little bit of the story, in fact, huh. We could almost think of that whole episode as being Clarke’s tales of survival, told to Bellamy as a kind of epistolary tale. What we see IS what she said to Bellamy. Hmm. That’s interesting.
ANYWAY. My point was. The audience is put square inside Clarke’s head, and her head is “why haven’t you come home,” and talking to Bellamy and missing him.
THEN we get the scene where Clarke is talking to Madi about them, and missing them and then the camera pan up through the stars to Bellamy looking down on them, unknowingly, at the valley.
THIS IS THE MOST POETIC THE MOST ROMANTIC SHOT IN THE WHOLE SHOW. MAYBE IN EVERY SHOW EVER. It is a poem. She yearns for him, across time, beyond the stars, and he’s looking down on her, thinking she is dead, and the INFERENCE is that he’s yearning for her too, past death.
A love that literally lasts past death time and space. ULTIMATE EPIC LOVE STORY. And they are finally going to be reunited. AH, resolution for their separation and their love.
AND THEN... dun dun dunnnn, the plot thickens. 
Out of nowhere, the reveal that Bellamy and Echo ARE LOVERS. 
BAM! OBSTACLE. more, ROMANTIC obstacle. 
Clarke’s yearning was romantic in nature. We don’t see inside Bellamy’s head, but making the obstacle to their reunion no longer tech, but instead an established romance, means that the narrative has set Bellarke on a romantic path. Because otherwise another romance would not be an obstacle. Heck, Echo is not against Clarke. Even when she was threatening her life she wasn’t really against Clarke. She gets her. As a leader and partner, she gets her. Echo is ONLY an obstacle if the goal is a romantic relationship between Clarke and Bellamy.
That it’s set up this way, as a shock, is part of the romantic narrative.
THIS is on purpose a slap in the face. Because the audience has been set up to want them to come home TO CLARKE, to want a Bellarke reunion and to FEEL that they belong together. 
THEN when Echo is sure things will change between them, and Bellamy assures her that nothing will change between them on the ground, this is what’s known as DRAMATIC IRONY. The audience knows that Clarke is alive, they know that the bellarke bond is epic, they know that Clarke is yearning in a romantic way, they know that when Bellamy finds out that Clarke is alive EVERYTHING will change with his relationship with E. 
But then, we get a misdirect, or rather, a plot obstacle to B/E. Octavia is not forgiving and she’s scarier than ever. 
B/E is set up from the VERY BEGINNING as a romantic obstacle.
Then to prove it, we get
Clarke’s VERY shocked and jealous face when B/E reunites and kiss. That the camera focuses on HER, shows her watching them, and not on THEM means the main emotional weight of the scene is not the lovely reunion between loving partners, (thank god you’re ok i was so worried i’m so glad to see you again love love love,) but rather on clarke. (omg bellamy is kissing someone. bellamy is not mine. heartbreak, jealousy, shock!) See the focus is NOT on the established relationship, the B/E leg of the love triangle, but on CLARKE, the pining one, the one whose love is unrequited. The soulmate.
IF B/E were endgame, the focus would have been on the relief of the reunited lovers. But we’ve just spent like two episodes on the reunited (non-romantic apparently) soulmates, and the CANON relationship can’t even get an infocus shot?
A close up of someone’s face means the narrative wants us to feel their EMOTIONS. We got lots of those when Clarke and Bellamy reunited, when they hugged, when they struggled to regain their connection. But with the B/E reunion. Their faces were obscured, not shown, blurred.
Ok. And YES, Bellamy then moves on to focus on Echo and B/E, and saving her from Octavia, and that is to show that B/E is real. Because no obstacle that is not made real is going to be enough to really scare the audience into worrying that it could stop our heroes from their goal. IT HAS to be real. But even while Bellamy is proving to O that he loves Echo, the focus is NOT really on B/E, but on the Blakes relationship.  And on Bellamy and Octavia. This is teaching us who they are now, after 6 years apart.
Then there’s a love scene between B/E, or half a love scene anyway. The beginning. It is cut off in the middle and cuts to CLARKE getting ready to leave.. Oddly, the music for the scene stays the same, which CONNECTS the two scenes. A LOVE SCENE cut with a LEAVING SCENE. An established romance confirmed, a pining soulmate leaving aka giving up. And in the next scene, we get this dynamic reinforced... however, there is a change. The romantic couple is confirmed again, while Clarke watches. HERE we are shown a closeup of her face, tears in her eyes, all about how she feels about their relationship, after the close up of their faces I think, and sadness and love yes. this is real. Then Clarke steps back, straighten her shoulders and accepts it. She won’t interfere. He’s not hers to love. HOWEVER, then Echo LEAVES. The established couple separates. And we turn to Clarke and Bellamy immediately he knew she was there somehow.  
While B/E are split up, Bellarke are brought back together, although at this point they are non romantic, with each member choosing Echo for him. And we spend many episodes with them rediscovering their soulmate bond and getting closer and more intimate as they do so. While Echo has her OWN narrative and it has nothing to do with Bellamy or b/E. 
This leads to Bellarke making pledges to each other, over her daughter, and he swears to take care of Madi when/if Clarke dies. Bellamy promises to parent his soulmates daughter while his canon girlfriend is off risking her life. They bond as, well, co parents. Making them a family unit, Mother, Father and Daughter, though no romantic or sexual relationship between the two? 
Not so fast.
“Another traitor who you love.” Octavia lays out the issue. Bellamy loves Echo. Bellamy loves Clarke. She is comparing Echo and Clarke in his love. This is a ROMANTIC love comparison. She’s goading him. He doesn’t take the bait. Because he has a plan. 
Bellamy sacrifices his sister for Clarke’s life. Poisoning her. His sister who has been established as the person who means more to him than anyone else in the world. When it was O or E? He chose O and let E go off on a suicide mission to win a place with wonkru. When it was O or C? He chose C and poisoned O. That is an equation. Bellamy loves these three women. C more than O. O more than E. C>O>E. When compared, Clarke wins over Echo. If Octavia made it clear that the love is romantic, then Bellamy made it clear that his love for Clarke is deeper than his love for Echo, even if he’s not ready to face that or deal with it.
AND THEN SHE LEAVES HIM TO THE PIT. He knew he’d betrayed Clarke, but it is confirmation to him that Clarke does not return his feelings. So, when that’s sorted out, he has a moment where he’s choosing between Clarke and Echo (the earth vs the sword, it’s a heavy handed bit of symbolism so we don’t miss it.) He chooses Echo. It’s the logical choice. Head over heart. 
MEANWHILE, Echo and Clarke are having their own life or death convo. In which we find out that Bellamy loves Echo, Echo loves Bellamy, Clarke always cared for Bellamy but thinks him dead at her hand. NOT SO FAST. Bellamy is alive, “oh now you care?” AND THEN, revelation from the past FlameLxa tells her love is not a weakness, she was wrong to betray Clarke (canon love) and Clarke should not do the same thing (betray her love bellamy.) Remember also CL and B/E are paralleled. Remember also all the same players were at MW the original betrayal. L walked away, Echo walked away, Bellamy was under the ground, and Clarke stayed to get to him. it’s just interesting. So in the end, Clarke betrayed ELigius, spares Echo and sends her daughter (another love equation. Clarke canon loved Lxa, but she tells Madi she loves her SO much more than Lxa. Now she risks her greatest love Madi to war in order to save Bellamy. Here’s the equation. Clarke loves Bellamy>Madi>Lxa. We have two equations using actions to prove a primacy in love. Clarke love Bellamy more than all of her other great loves. Bellamy loves Clarke more than all of her great loves.
HOWEVER B/E comes back together to fight. As a couple. It is a couple reunion, but not as romantic as their first reunion, or their goodbye. THEN, they are fighting together and it isn’t romantic. And from there to the end of the season, the B/E romance disappears. 
HOWEVER, Bellamy learns that Clarke cares for him so much that she called him every day for six years. That changes his perception of Clarke, and how Clarke feels for him, and when she urges him to come in, he says, broken, I can’t leave them behind. “Not again.” With the understanding that leaving HER behind was the trauma that he can’t do again. 
So where did B/E go? It doesn’t matter. It’s literally not important to the narrative. Echo literally goes to sleep. B/E is frozen. What is important. Bellarke’s intimacies of saying goodbye to their families and their connection that is still there. And THEN them waking up TOGETHER and facing the loss of Monty, the revelations, the new world AND the commitment to be better, to be the good guys, together.
Known: B/E is a canon relationship. Clarke loves Bellamy and has been pining for him for six years. Bellamy loves Clarke but has moved on though he cannot ignore his feelings for her. Bellamy CHOSES Echo, but Echo keeps disappearing from his story while he focuses on Clarke and their relationship.
HOW do I know Echo is the romantic obstacle and Bellarke is the endgame rather than Clarke being the romantic obstacle and B/E being endgame?
Because the story focuses on the deepening relationship fo Bellarke, while his attachment to Echo stops it from moving forward. It focuses on the FEELINGS of Clarke about B/E, but not the feelings of Echo about Bellarke. It is never even presented. Her feelings are absent, when if her ship was endgame it would be about her feeligns at least partly. Now we do seem BELLAMY’S feelings, but his feelings which start out as about Echo vs Octavia, who hates Echo, shift and become Clarke vs Echo... evenn though Clarke does NOT hate Echo and accepts her just fine. So what is the conflict?
The conflict is that he can’t have competing feelings fo Clarke if he loves Echo. That means his feelings are ROMANTIC.
YES. He does choose Echo near the end of s5. This is because Clarke leaves him to die. Not because his feelings for her are not as strong (remember C>O>E) but because HER feelings seem to show she doesn’t care about him. UNTIL Madi spills the beans, and then he shifts back to Clarke a bit, even though his choice is STILL Echo.
Bellamy loves Clarke but thinks Clarke doesn’t love him so he chooses Echo.
Clarke thinks Bellamy loves Echo and not her, so she refuses to show him or admit to him that she loves him and she attempts to move on and keep him as her “platonic” soulmate.
Echo loves Bellamy and Bellamy loves Echo but Echo has no idea Bellamy also loves Clarke or that he is deciding between Clarke and herself. She has no say in this narrative. It’s not about her. It’s about Clarke and Bellamy. She thought the problem was Octavia. And while that’s a problem, it doesn’t affect Bellamy’s feelings for her. 
Echo has done nothing to make him not love her. Their relationship has remained stable. The only change is that there is another love in the equation. That Clarke’s existence puts B/E into jeopardy means that the Bellarke love is AT LEAST as strong as the B/E love. Possibly more... the love equation says more, but we will get more proof of that in season 6.
When we actually see the love triangle thrown into comparison CONSTANTLY. S5 had Bellarke and B/E separated. We got very few shots of them all together, and when we do, it’s Clarke’s jealousy and dismay on display.
However in s6, right from the beginning, the shots have all three of them in view. With Echo between Bellarke or Clarke between B/E often. Oddly, we also see Echo supporting Clarke. Or not that oddly. They’re a lot alike. She’s not competitive with Clarke, though. Even though there IS a competition. She does’t know about it. We see Bellamy choosing B/E with Clarke on the outside in ep1, but by the time they get to Sanctum, we start to see Bellamy choosing Clarke, or Clarke AND Echo (come look at this echo) with his focus on Clarke not E. We see him REACHING OUT to Clarke. (commiserating about raising their adopted kids without school, then the radio calls conversation which she runs away from because she’s scared.) Even in the eclipse psychosis, he goes after Echo first, but then turns his attention to Clarke. Murphy gets in the way as he always does, but he ignores everyone else. 
As time goes on, though, we get a NEW dynamic. He’s starting to argue with Echo. It’s over Octavia mostly,  but Clarke and Bellamy use Octavia to speak about their feelings for one another, without admitting them, so is that happening here? He’s using the argument over Octavia to express his feelings of frustration and distance with Echo?
Look. I’ve been showing you the love triangle. It is a CANON love triangle, which means B/E is romantic and requited and Bellarke is romantic although it’s unrequited. 
I need to show the love triangle in order for B/E to be A ROMANTIC OBSTACLE.
But just showing the love triangle means it could be B/E that is the endgame and Bellarke that is the love triangle.
How do we know this isn’t the story? 
Well aside from the love equations. We see Bellarke get closer while we see B/E bickering constantly over tactics, over octavia, over feelings, in season 6a. Clarke talks to him about her regret over the pit. The making amends scene is actually pivotal in their relationship. In the C/B/E love triangle. 
He accepts Clarke’s amends, and her claim that he is so important to her. He didn’t want to talk about it. But she is open and they are intimate. Cut to Clarke being PHYSICALLY intimate with Cillian, and Bellamy looking on with all sorts of emotions in his face. Sorrow, happiness, pining, regret, jealousy, acceptance, longing, who knows? And we IMMEDIATELY get Echo coming up, trying to talk to him about Octavia, and him turning ViCIOUS on her, blaming her for not being human, not being emotional, not being open (which clarke just was and is.) He’s STILL watching Clarke.  B/E is falling apart, not because of anything that Echo did, but because of something that Clarke did, again. HER actions are the deciding factor, and HIS emotions are where the choice is coming in. Echo has no control over it. Her emotions don’t matter. Her actions don’t affect it. He is not a character who has agency over this storyline, over her own relationship. This scene leads to Clarke being betrayed at the same time that Bellamy apologizes to Echo and Echo, FINALLY, opens up to Bellamy about her past. 
For the first time, Echo has agency in how her relationship goes, and Bellamy admits he’s a dick and commits to Echo. NOW. If this story were ABOUT B/E as endgame, this would be the point where their relationship rises to new heights and becomes stronger.
Instead. Clarke dies. And Bellamy’s attention and emotions go to CLARKE. Even when she’s dead dead, all he can think about is not having Clarke, how it’s not living, Echo comforts him but it goes nowhere. Instead, we see him grieving ALONE. Echo is willing to destroy everyone, but Bellamy chooses what Clarke would do, and keeps everyone safe. 
Until he finds out Clarke is alive, and then all bets are off and it’s a race to bring her back, canon, “you only care about Clarke.”
Yeah.
True.
Another pivotal scene. Bellamy leaves Echo to take care of their people and goes with Josephine to save Clarke. Echo says “Go save Clarke,” which is a parallel to Clarke telling Echo to “go save him.” Echo let Bellamy go to Clarke the same way that Clarke let Echo go to Bellamy. 
We’ve now switched who the primary relationship is. It’s Bellarke, not B/E. Echo and Clarke made the choice to let the other woman “have him.” They gave up their claim.
Everything we see with Bellamy and Josephine acts as if Bellarke is romantic and the true love in his life. An epic love compared to Josephine and Gabriel DOZENS of times. And Bellamy’s last ditch save her from death scene is GLARINGLY romantic in the way that all the best fairytales are romantic. 
There was never anything to compare to this in the B/E story. 
The next morning, Bellarke talk about leaving Echo and spacekru behind to save Clarke, and Bellamy still isn’t willing for her to risk her life to save them, although she insists, and they agree to do it for Monty. SO MUCH INTIMACY. And Octavia witnessed it.
Their goodbye is more romantic and more intimate than Bellamy’s reunion with Echo, even though she was STATED as at risk and being in danger. She almost died. And all she got was a hug, much like he’d hugged Harper after the fighting pit. 
The hug when Bellarke is reunited, however, is cast in romantic buttery light, with emotional close ups of their faces, and a rather intimate discussion of feelings and pain, with a parallel to their OTHER hug outside Camp Jaha, which was one of the pivotal moments in their relationship. 
This in contrast to the pat on the back he gave Echo before this, and how Echo, who is standing right there, disappears from the scene.
The final scene after this Bellarke intimacy, has B/E back together. ExCEPT there is NO initmacy. He’s the leader, she’s the soldier. No feelings. Just defense and tactics.
From the beginning of season 6 to the end, Bellarke and B/E have switched placed. on the non-romantic/romantic scale. Comfort and intimacy goes to Bellarke. Team work goes to B/E. 
THE JOURNEY of the love triangle switches from the primary leg being B/E with a side order of Bellarke partnership, to Bellarke with a side order of B/E partnership.
Technically, because we’ve had no time to sort out all these emotional issues with B/E (although we kind of have with Bellarke) B/E is still the canon ship. 
But that’s just a matter of dealing with the plot point. Because the NARRATIVE is now about romantic Bellarke, and all that’s left to deal with in regards to the B/E romantic obstacle is how it ends. (And for Echo’s side, she has been focusing on Ash, and her own independence. They have set her up to have a self empowered storyline, which means she does not need and should not have a king anymore. Bellamy is her king, even now. And she needs to be her own person. Which means B/E is doomed even without Bellarke.)
Thus I have shown why C/B/E is a love triangle. Why Bellamy needed a relationship ANY WAY. I take for granted that Clarke was in love with Bellamy and he was her fantasy boyfriend over the time jump. That Bellarke is romantic as is B/E, that the show has created a love equation for both of them. How the love triangle is shown in s6. How B/E fades while Bellarke grows, and that B/E is the romantic obstacle while Bellarke is the soulmate endgame. 
I’m so tired now.
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bettsfic · 4 years
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Hi Betts, I wondered if you'd mind sharing some advice on POV. I am writing in third person present tense. I have two main characters and I want to work from both points of view but I can't seem to make it work. Should I stick to one POV in a paragraph? Or in a chapter? There are some small moments where I really want the reader to understand each character's thoughts. BTW this is the first thing I've ever tried to write so I would be grateful for any advice at all. Thank you!
first of all, congratulations on starting your first story! this is a really important question to be asking, but the answer is a complicated one.
generally, the rule of thumb is that you stick to being in one character’s head per scene (scenes are usually broken up by white space or an asterisk or something like that) or chapter. in many cases, stories are only written in one point of view at all. but there are also plenty of stories that are written in multiple points of view, that head hop, or that remain outside of the characters’ minds entirely. 
i think what would be most helpful is explaining how point of view affects conflict.
you can think of point of view as access. whose mind do we have access to? how much of their thoughts and feelings? and then how true are those thoughts and feelings in relation to the external events that are happening? how true are those thoughts and feelings to the narration itself, or is the narrator lying to us, or themselves? these are all things that can be specifically chosen in order to better command a story’s tension.
let’s say you choose an omniscient pov where we have total access to every character’s accurate thoughts and feelings. you then run into a hard decision: how and why would you hide anything from the reader? in what order do you unveil information (reactions, emotions, the external events themselves)? with omniscience, it’s very difficult to hide anything from the reader, unless the character is specifically hiding it from themselves.
conversely, if you have a limited pov, the thoughts and feelings of all the other characters are hidden, and that not knowing can create a lot of narrative tension. it’s important for you, the writer, to know what every character is thinking or feeling, but sometimes it’s more engaging for the reader not to know everything, to see the situation solely through the eyes of one character and have all the events colored by a singular, potentially faulty, perspective.
i think a good challenge for a first story would be to limit yourself to one point of view, and observe how an absence of access to the other characters affects the conflict. do the stakes become higher when we don’t know for sure what character B is thinking or feeling? 
what happens when you play around with zooming in on a character’s pov, so that the narration mirrors their actual thoughts, or their inner monologue is greater than the external events that are happening? conversely, what happens when you zoom out, and limit the narration’s access to your character’s internality? what happens when you factor in unreliability and doubt into the point of view?
tl;dr if you’re ever in doubt of how to frame pov, ask yourself: how much access should a reader have to the characters, and how does that level of access impact the conflict?
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mendelpalace · 4 years
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Recently I learned about a bizarre public access show that aired during the late 80′s called The Asylum For Shut-Ins: Video Psychotherapy. Created by a video editing major from Cleveland, it was originally going to be a Svenghouli-esque show that aired horror movies with the rantings of The Doctor (a sunglasses-wearing ventriloquist dummy) serving as the frame. Instead, it became a nightmarish collage of film/documentary clips interspersed with his maniacal ravings. 
This description from the Dangerous Minds blog sums it up well: 
In 1987, the East suburbs’ Cablevision company began airing a strange program called The Asylum For Shut-Ins: Video Psychotherapy. It made no pretense to being edifying, it showed no local bands’ cheapshit music videos, it wouldn’t tell you when the PTA rummage sale was being held. It was there to disturb, and goddamn, at its best, it was magnificent.. The aforesaid Doctor was the titular psychotherapist and host - a cheap, sunglasses-sporting ventriloquist dummy whose persona was half Peter Ivers manic cool, half Reverend Jim Jones mass-homicidal, and he’d deliver insanely malevolent monologues/scoldings in between rapid-fire clips of B-movie violence. 
But check out the rhythms of all those jump cuts - they have an undeniable musicality to them. This obviously wasn’t some busted-ass Cleveland Heights freakshow who just wandered in one day, the man behind this curtain had skill. We’ve gotten used to a world where a feature film can be quickly cut on a laptop computer, but in Asylum’s day, uzi-edits were tedious and cumbersome work involving multiple tape decks, mixers, and extraordinary timing and patience. 
The show became the talk of the town’s weirdo art and music scenes around the turn of the ‘90s. Punk singers started mimicking the Doctor’s misanthropic rants as between-songs patter. A sculptor designed and exhibited a viewing booth made expressly for watching the show. Around 1988-1991, Asylum really was, more than any band one could name, THE Cleveland underground phenomenon that kept things interesting in the downtime between the waning of the ‘80s music scene and the grunge dam-burst. 
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@highway62 @costak @titleknown and anyone else who enjoys weirdness. 
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drtwit · 4 years
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RWBY and the Shades of EEEEEEVIL!
Villains aren’t exactly uncommon, in fact, you could say they’re a constant thorn in the side of reality that only exist to make a story complicated. They hurt our favorite characters, monologue a second too long, spout threatening one-liners they probably spent weeks in front of the mirror preparing, and sometimes they even have the audacity to have sympathetic qualities just to mess with us even more. In short, they’re a bit rude. However, we’re not here to talk about the sympathetic and redeemable qualities of our nefarious opposition. No comebacks here. No, we’re here to discuss the bushy mustache twirlers, the little Hitler youths, whiny brats and the candy thieves who have a pronounced hatred of puppies.
With pure evil characters who are there to break the story over their knees and practice their maniacal laughter, it’s often that writers forget to incorporate the character’s motivation, or at least fear the mention of that motivation. See, I find that many people find it hard to recognize that even for the most insane and cartoony of bastards, there is a reasoning, however twisted, behind their actions. The Joker commits crimes to spark chaos, push Batman to question his moral code and prove life is just one big joke. Darth Sidious wants to control the entire Galaxy and believe that nothing can be allowed to surpass him, not even his legacy. Zamasu wants to fulfill his image of a perfect universe and see’s Mortals as a stain upon reality. Prince Lacroix wants a bigger dick... Oh yeah, and something about fearing super powered Asians and the apocalypse, but I think he’s just racist. They have motivations and their actions are fueled by how they reason they can achieve their goals.
In RWBY, we have our fair share of evil ice cream flavors. Power hungry Fem Fatal? Darwin’s Edgy Fangirl? Sinster Overlord shrouded in mystery? Extremist swallowed by his hatred? Mustaches? We have them all, so feel free to choose your poison. But the one I want to talk about to illustrate this trend is the most pure evil of the bunch: Jac-ass Schnee.
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This blight upon the good name of a bitching stache has been a point of apathy for me in the show, both as a character who always managed to feel like a background character forced to be an antagonist and as poorly done part of Weiss’s arc. He’s the best example of what happen when you need a character to always be a villain, no matter the scene, no matter the context, he always has to be hatable and pathetic to make sure you still hate him. This leads to a rather inconsistent character.
There’s a previous point of contention the fandom had with his post-volume 3 portrayal, where both in the way Weiss acts and how he’s mentioned prior to volume 4, there seems to be a disconnect to the abusive corporate worm we’d eventually meet. In the first three seasons, he and his company is something that Weiss clearly tried to emulate, something Weiss seemed to take enough pride in to be such a snob about it, something that Weiss goes out of her way to defend against accusations from Blake. You get the idea that Weiss’s father is harsh, distant and negligent, but that he’s still someone Weiss seems to hold a little affection for. Go to volume 4 and the way the two interact make it suddenly makes prior Weiss moments rather questionable, she seems suddenly very clear about how much she doesn’t like him, he’s very obvious with how much of a dirt bag he is and the everything we learn about the SDC and Atlas elite in general make it hard to think Weiss wouldn’t have agreed with Blake back in volume 1. Hell, I found it odd how Winter back in volume 3 cared about Weiss not returning her abusive father’s calls, you’d think Winter would be like “Yeah, fuck ‘em.”
But okay, maybe it’s just some subtleties missed, Jacques is the straight up corporate sleazebag, doing anything he can to get that payday. He has money, and he knows how to use it, dominating the market and knowing which shortcuts to take to move things in his favor. Now, let’s strip away these elements to the concrete core of the the type of evil Jac is. His evil is one of apathy towards morals in the face of greed. He wants money and power, and doesn’t care what he has to do to get it. He’s a good business man who’s worked his way up the ladder. This worked for volume 4, he uses Weiss as a symbol of sympathy towards future buyers at a party, he pretends to care about the fall of Beacon to look good and slaps Weiss when she starts to threaten that with her antics.
And then here comes volume 7 to take him down in the lamest way possible. We have the build up: Weiss running away, the songs about her wanting to break free, the whole motivation of bringing the SDC back to it’s former glory, the fear of having to return to Atlas on her own, ect. He’s her personal villain and as such you’d expect her returning home after he’s had two volumes to build up his already substantial power during a crisis where his business is needed more than ever, he’d take on a rather daunting role as secondary antagonist to Watts and Tyrian. Our first scene with him in volume 7 tells us the answer.
He storms in, easily loses his cool, is revealed that no one really likes him, Ironwood makes it clear he has very little power here, he’s unable to do anything other than throw petty insults at Weiss and immediately he’s stopped being the corporate bastard he’s supposed to be. This continues with the rest of the volume with him, where the writing seems to make him multiple villains at the same time and reduce him to Watts’s mindless flunkie who could have been replaced by any character. His actions don’t connect to his motivation and situation, there’s nothing that makes me believe that he actually reasoned that this would advance his goals.
He’s a ruthless business man who brought the SDC from poultry earnings to a global monopoly. But he doesn’t have one lick of charisma or cunning to the point he thinks taking away people’s jobs will get them to support him rather than hate him.
His company is constantly facing controversies, accusations and attacks with apparently everyone hating him. But he has shit security and isn’t the least bit paranoid of bugs from potential journalists in his house.
He wants money, power and security. But goes along with Watt’s plans that clearly weaken Atlas’s defenses and isn’t suspicious at all at Watts wanting admin access to Mantle’s entire system with no attempt at insurance in case the clearly suspicious mad man doesn’t stab him in the back.
He doesn’t care about Weiss at all, she’s simply a means to an end, even disowning Winter for joining the military. But he still let Weiss attend Beacon, went back to get Weiss from Beacon when he had Jac 2.0 on standby to be his heir.
He’s a man who’s been in the game of feeding people bullshit for years to justify his bad deeds. But he immediately crumbles the moment he’s accused of anything.
He wants to sweep all accusations of unfair labor practices under the rug so they don’t damage his business. But apparently he allowed faunus to get branded with his logo.
On and on it goes, where his motivation is thrown away because “He’s evil, he doesn’t need a reason to do bad things.”. Joker wants to push Batman over the edge, thus he creates a situation that fucks with Batman’s moral code. Sidious wants to crush the Galaxy’s hope, so he constructs a symbol of fear big enough that it can be seen looming overhead from the planet below. Zamasu wants to purge the universe, so he takes the body of the man who embodies the ‘sins’ of mortals and travels to another timeline to make sure the much more powerful Gods and Zeno can’t interfere with his plans. La Fuckwad knows that everyone is looking for an excuse to get rid of him and knows the apocalypse might be coming, so he manipulates a fledgling vampire to get him the sarcophagus of an ancient vampire so he can absorb that refine ‘87 vintage blood wine and become powerful enough to survive.
You can see how they reason they need to do the things they do to achieve their goal. What connects A to B. The only way Jac’s action sync up with his motivation is if he is such a profound moron that Weiss besting him means nothing. “Wow, you beat the illiterate kid at reading, well done.”
As I stated earlier, Jac is viewed strictly as a bastard, strictly as Weiss’s antagonist, in every scene the show has to push in our faces that he’s the bad guy and that Weiss is superior to him. He never gains an advantage over Weiss, or puts Weiss in a difficult situation, he never has a real chance in this story. He is there to be arrested by Weiss. Every scene changes him to be the villain it needs for him to be for us to hate him the most. So, in some he will be calm and composed to frustrate us, while others he’ll be made to yell like a petulant child to make him pathetic and other’s he’ll just be stroking his mustache. His first confrontation with her ends with him getting slapped down and humiliated, then he’s just a yes man who does what Watts tells him to do with no thought or agency, then Weiss just walks into his party, get’s handed victory on a silver platter and arrests him.
That’s it. You got your ice cream flavors, and all of them can be pretty good on their own. However, if you get a bunch of them, stick them in a bowl and then just take a few bites and leave ‘em out in the sun, all you’re gonna get is regular intervals of a muddy looking puddle that eventually becomes grey sludge.
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sparrowsabre7 · 4 years
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Used a guide, because life is short and this game is long. So I'm meant to talk to Fragile by selecting Fragile jump in my room. I guess that makes sense but given it's only ever been for fast travel not sure how I would have worked that out as a method of communicating, or that Fragile could put you into a beach.
It's quite a nice story beat, that Fragile can't jump to Amelie as previously explained, but she can jump to Sam and Sam can get to Amelie through the things that bind each of them like knots on a strand. It may be a little on the nose but it still works, as does perhaps the first moment of consensual touch Sam allows in the game, after Fragile quietly says "I'll have to touch you" and he silently accepts. For all his weird sexualisation of some scenarios and badly worded dialogue, Kojima can still sell emotional beats when he needs to.
On the beach at last; ok, Higgs is Darth Vader now and has force powers. He creates a BT spiderweb and sets Amelie at the centre before a fourth wall breaking monologue about stick vs rope and one last boss fight: no items, final destination, Fox only.
It's Strandin' Time!
Ok this kind of... blows. It's a stealth segment where he can find out where you are almost instantly. Why the fuck wouldn't you take any weapons Sam? It's really hard to break line of sight. I know I need to throw the boxes to distract him but it's not working. Did manage to yeet one right in his dumb fucking face though. Didn't see that coming Mr. God Particle.
Ah fuck this; LEEROOOOOY mmJENKINS!! Decked the shit out of him then pivoted to bind and then kick the shit out of him some more. God, that's satisfying.
After a few rounds of that, "I don't need a gun Sam". Brave of you to say half way through the fight dickwad. Come at me.
When you were partying, I studied the strand. When you were learning how to control BTs, I mastered the parry mechanic. While you wasted your days at the gym in pursuit of vanity, I cultivated inner strength. And now that the world is on fire and the barbarians are at the gate you have the audacity to come to me for a boss fight and expect victory. Welcome to dirt, punk.
Oh, and apparently you don't need a gun but do need grenades. You're a real honourable warrior, Higgs. Truly the last of the samurai.
Kicked out a Snake-like "Aaaaaah" from him and it's over.
No. Wait. Round 3. "We got DOOMS, Sam! This was only ever gonna end one way." Ok, I... I don't know what that means but now we're in Tekken apparently. Health bars above our heads and everything. Oh no, it's Mortal Kombat, with the slow mo jaw break.
This...
This is kind of a shitty end to a boss fight... I'm literally hammering attack and winning it's just so incongruous with the rest of the game, should have left it at stage 2.
It's got dramatic music like it's meant to be the Snake and Liquid fight in MGS4 but I have no emotional connection to Higgs, in-game or out. He's just kind of a shithead, there's no brotherly bond here and he's not been established enough.
Ah multiple headbutts finisher. It is literally trying to be that MGS4 fight.
I know this isn't the end since Cliff's thing is still unresolved, but it is definitely trying hard to feel that way.
Oh shut the fuck up Higgs, stop with your "you won but still lost" bullshit. Fragile, kill the fuck out of him, please. Ugh, don't repeat I'm not that Fragile like it's your catchphrase.
Ha! Fuck you Higgs! Run out of BT juice. Oh... was that it? One punch. Also, don't just repeat "You're damaged goods" back to him like you're in a Joss Whedon film and that's an adequate comeback. Wow after a strong start this not-finale has been super anti-climactic.
Oh nope,she is going to shoot him. But offscreen. Fragile managed to bring Lou over too, nice. "Where should I take you?" Fragile asks, before Amelie butts in with "He doesn't need you, he's got me." Alright, calm down. Jealous much. But Sam is like "yeah you should go." Glad Fragile at least calls them both out on it.
Ok, so now Amelie says she could have left at any time basically, but did it to force Sam to connect the Chiral network.
And now we're "Mario and Princess Beach" running back home.
And now everything has gone insane. Now Bridget is here but maybe she's also Amelie and Die-Hardman is here to kill Bridget for fucking the world up and now Cliff is here and he knows Die-Hardman (who's real name is John) and Bridget is sending him after Sam but now she's Amelie again and behind Sam and tells him to run by pushing him in the sea, causing him to repatriate but in the repatriation sequence it's not BB inside Sam but one of those horrid dolls.
What the FUCK.
Ok and now I'm back in my room and Deadman tells me Amelie ported me here and then checked out to "finish what Bridget started" which I'm guessing may still mean blow up the world or the beach or something. Christ it has got very dense very quickly.
"We've been operating on the assumption, Higgs was controlling Cliff"; have we? News to me, I always assumed they were two separate antagonists given the Battlefield was entirely separate from Higgs' brand of goopy nonsense. So now Cliff has Amelie AND Die-Hardman on the beach. Great so things have gotten worse. Now Fragile can't port me to the beach either because reasons.
So I have to walk all the way back East all the fucking way because she transported all the secondary characters before me.
Thanks a fucking lot. This has been a real kick me while I'm down moment.
At least I don't need to carry anything there save protection and climbing gear. Hope I can at least drive some of it.
Ooh more flashback time. Looks like Bridget was intending to use BB as a sacrifice to build the UCA, unclear if by causing the Death Stranding or somehow starting the Chiral network.
Anyway now I'm walking these 6k or whatever back to Lake Knot. Some zipline help but one asshole put the zipline where the dismount is off a cliff. Sam echoes this though with a "nice zipline, asshole".
I also have no equipment, so stopping off at the paleontologist to gear up. Nice, a free bike too. Everything's coming up Bridges.
Oh fuck off Deadman, I don't want a Cliff notes session (pun intended), especially when you're just restating a bunch of theories. So Cliff wants BB to b whole, yep already gathered, the battlefield is tied to him due to his anger dragging his hellscape through with him. Sure, cool, can I get back to my drive now?
Oh come on... BTs can now spawn as catchers immediately, don't even need to grab you. Fuck this, I'm running. Sorry purple bike!
Jesus fucking christ Deadman, fuck OFF. Blah blah secret BB experiements were to make BT detectors but actually they were designed to make the Chiral network like I thought.
Oh.
They made the network by building all the cities with a BB integrated into each one.
Jesus Fucking Christ, I didn't see that coming...
That's some heavy shit man. This is that episode of Doctor Who with the space whale heavy.
While I ponder that horrific choice I'll inevitably have to make I am enjoying coming back and seeing how much bigger the highways have gotten in my absence. It's so fun to boost down them on a trike.
Another call from Deadman. Cliff put his BB in the care of the scientists but didn't know they were going to use the BB for the Chiral network, I assume he thought the experiments were benign per the lie told. Deadman says he's unsure how he was able to arrive on Bridget's beach and that there must be more to their connection so I'm going to go ahead and guess, he's Sam's father as well as the BB's, or he's a sibling of Bridget.
Fucking hell, another call from Deadman. Jesus give it a rest. No apparent connection between Die-Hardman and Bridget because his past has all been redacted, also suggested that Die-Hardman had no connection with Amelie/Bridget and that it's DH connection to Cliff that allowed him access to Bridget/Amelie's beach. God my head hurts.
Heartman's saying that the beaches are beginning to merge into a single seam, aside from the battlefield and Heartman's beaches. Amelie may have some kind of super bridge that controls all beaches which further my theory that she was BB patient zero.
Oh boy, big ol' Chiral storm, looks like it's battlefield time.
Flashback time, Cliff gives a sad speech about being a father and it looks like Die-Hardman killed Cliff under Bridget's orders.
Ok we're in Vietnam now and Cliff's wearing DH's mask. Comparatively this opener is less badass than the WWI and II battlefields but only in comparison. In any other games this would be a ridiculously cool moment. The arena itself excels as always, still not sure I could pick a favourite. Vietnam feels more linear but the mix of violent explosions, fire and oppressive silence and darkness work so well together.
Ok, I was wrong, actually reaching Cliff gives a supremely cool scene of Cliff and co marching through a lake of fire.
Another intense game of cat and mouse later and Cliff is finally down.
It's actually a really nice moment of emotional catharsis. Cliff begins to whistle a tune to BB and Sam completes it. It's not a big shock reveal, just a quiet mutual realisation that Cliff is Sam's father. They embrace and then a gunshot is heard and Cliff disappears, having first transitioned from combat gear to a suit, I hope implying his becoming whole and at peace. Despite minimal development until this past hour of exposition, Cliff has been a much more successful antagonist compared with Higgs.
Another flashback, DH is saying that Cliff should escape with his BB, but he will be forced to carry out any orders Bridget gives, hence the previous flashback. Seems DH was one of Cliff's soldiers. Still unclear if the woman lying on the bed, who is Cliff's wife, is the same person as Bridget. It's deliberately vague and when Bridget approached the BB in a previous scene her face was covered with DH'S mask.
Oh... Sam seems to think Cliff is Lou's father but that very much wasn't my take away from that scene. Deadman comes along with a recording of DH, says that Amelie left a message for him to get to the beach with one of Cliff's dolls. He knows it's a trap but plays along anyway and says Amelie also has no recorded past and made the point no one's ever met her in person. Seems to point to the fact that she may only exist on the beach.
DH says that her soul remained on the beach while her body deteriorated in the real world, but with high DOOMs abilities. She could then travel to the beach body and soul by the time she was 20 and the president said never contact Amelie except by hologram, but once the Chiral network was up and running DH checked the old records:
Bridget had uterine cancer in her 20s and never had children, yet Amelie is the spit of a younger Bridget, so... what's the connection?
Ok, now Fragile's here, and says Amelie was behind Higgs, she led the Demens and he abandoned Fragile when Amelie showed up, began the extinction initiative. She could control BTs and she was the one who turned Higgs into Homo Demens, able to command BTs at will. There was no BB in Higgs' chest pack either, only another of the dolls Cliff had.
But if that's all true, then why did she not just trigger the death stranding when Sam competed the network? Why did she need Sam to kill Higgs?
Another chapter closes but I feel we've still got a ways to go.
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shaonsim · 4 years
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Thoughts on the writing of itv!!! What kinda show would you writeee
My friend. My hero. Thank you for sending this in. Thank you so much!! You gave me such a wonderful opportunity to blab about stuff.
THANK YOU ❤️❤️❤️❤️
The writing of ITV, you ask? Hang on my friend, this will be a WILD ride. A wild ride. This will be loong and wordy and a little incoherent, jumping from one point to another, but this will tell you a lot about how I feel about the writing of ITV.
And yes, this will read like a letter to the CVs because I am totally incapable of abiding the rules of grammar and I don't want to edit all this.
And I apologise for the out of context references that seeped in with time. Sorry, couldn't help it. I will gladly expand upon any of the references.
The main thing with writing (according to me, but I don't like repeating this disclaimer since by asking the question you already know that this will be my personal opinion, but still, for safety purposes)...The main thing with writing is that the core concept can be summed up in one single paragraph, and then you add words for emphasis.
You write in a thousand situations, in different styles, only for the message to hit home.
Look at our Epics.
Ramayana can be summed up as the Ram-Ravan conflict in a good Vs evil way. Lakshman is the devoted brother, Hanuman (ji) is an ardent devotee of Ram-Sita.
Mahabharata is basically another story of good Vs evil, where Duryodhan is the evil guy , Shakuni is an evil mastermind, 99 Kaurav brothers (+ Karna) the sidekicks, and the rest of the Kurus (+ Drona and Kripa ) as the silent voices of reason.
And almost every event emphasises these points. Because that's the story.
Look at Harry Potter. Three kids (young blood/new generation ) fighting against the big bad and pointing out and fixing the mistakes of the past along the way.
Look at Kalpurush (I read it during the quarantine and I am in love ❤ ) , where the main theme is that a mother worries whether the circumstances will lead to history repeating itself, whether a son will follow his father's footsteps, and whether she would be happy if he did turn out to be like that.
Technically, it is the same with shows.
Sasural Simar Ka began with the concept of the deep bond between the sisters, then moved on to supernatural forces interfering with the Bhardwaj family. The theme changed, but it didn't vanish.
Swaragini began as a show revolving around the sisters, and it stayed like that for forever, even when the plot went sideways and the sisters were pitted against each other.
Kumkum bhagya is a show where the leads battle kidnapping, murder attempts, misunderstandings etc and come out longing for each other and dreaming about happier times (the same was the theme of Pavitra Rishta too, if I remember correctly. But with less kidnapping.) And now the show has taken a leap with a love triangle between the kids (look, another similarity between kkb and pr. Go Ekta)!
KZK2 *cringe cringe* is all about AnuPre who love each other but don't end up with each other because of various reasons.
ITV has this thing down pat.
But it fails to come up with proper events to highlight their core concept and of course, they fail to choose an interesting theme for the show, but heyy, human mind and relationships is a gold mine for ideas. It is fascinating, and quite enjoyable, if it is done right. Am I biased because it is my favourite genre? Yes of course.
But the point stands.
Another important part of writing is that in order to come up with plot points that will reinforce your main idea, you need to come up with a cast of interesting characters, and develop their background to give you an ample opportunity to create the above mentioned plot points. The spectators, onlookers, the influencers need motivation - reasons for their actions.
Think about Karna. Think about Drupad-Drona. Think about Bhishma-Amba. Think about Jayadrath and his boon.
Sub-plots, side-plots. Parallel storylines.
For the most part, ITV fails in this department. The characters or stories they introduce are a) boring (either because we fail to understand their motivation or because they are diluted versions of the leads) or b) annoying because of their over enthusiastic and blind favouritism for the lead character they support.
^ Casting and acting also plays a major part in this (ugh Chandni ), but most of the time, it can be solved with focusing on the actor's strengths and weaknesses and changing the dialogues based on that. A writer can change things.
That's their job.
If your side characters are not interesting enough to deserve a story of their own, you aren't trying hard enough. That said, if you can't weave in their story in your main story, do not focus on the side plots. No one is interested in seeing your hodgepodge of TWO (or more) stories. It should all come together in the end, it should become one BIG story. Bring it all together!!
But do focus on the side plots, because there is only so much you can do with your leads, especially in the romance/family (whatever you call it) genre that occupies 90% of tellywood (and for good reason too!!)
A good plan is to create events with one of your main character and a group of characters (how small or big a group is for you to decide). If you force the audience to look at two/three supporting characters, no body will be happy.
Use your leads!!!!
Also, PLEASE use the show Vs tell method.
You want us to know that the male lead is adored by his sister? Show us. And by that, I meant scenes where we can see the bond they share, NOT dull monologues where the sister sings praises of her brother (a few monologues are fine though). You are an audio-visual medium.
ACT LIKE IT.
Monologues are for written things. Where we only have the words and our own imagination. Here, you have the tools to present us with the pictures, with the words they speak to each other.
Don't waste it.
In the same vein, do not repeat dialogues. Not word to word (don't repeat the same thing with different wording multiple times in a single episode or a week of episodes). Switch it up, and if you have to, have to repeat stuff, use an actor who has decent facial expressions and voice modulation. If the actor is stiff, robotic, then don't use that actor to parrot your lines. Seriously.
<< Not to hate on anyone in particular but Prerna's 'Anurag Anurag Anurag' is very annoying, for reasons that are better left unspoken >>
Hey, hey, you know what else is an integral part of writing? Research. Making a show on doctors? Police? Engineers? Lawyers? Chefs? Do your research. And if you want to take the short cut and go with the convenient business men/women trope, by all means, go for it. GO FOR IT. But show them working, and no, not because of tracks revolving around the business, but always. Running a business is a full time responsibility. Show that. I repeat, show that. Show that the character isn't home 24x7, show late night meetings, show files neatly stacked (or strewn about, your choice). Show the products or materials involved in the business. Show your characters being exhausted with the amount of work, show their involvement in their work. Or don't, if that suits the story and your character is neglectful, or if you have a proper reason to have them take some time off. Pay attention.
Time for a checklist.
Central theme? ✅
Side plots (+ characters)? ✅
Edit things because of the actors? ✅
Show Vs Tell? ✅
Research? ✅
How much DRAMA is too much drama? ❔❔
Now, this is a product of my curiosity (+ me posting the Fic Which Must Not Be Named), but I think this fits nicely with the rest of this answer. I wouldn't explain this in detail because the original post does a much better job (and I need validation, so go read that post) but to think, that ITV tells us stories of other people, and whether it is this very question, this doubt, that leads to the numerous kidnappings and accidents/fire/misunderstandings we see in 90% of the shows.
Okay, time to return to the checklist.
Oh. Oh! I forgot my favourite part.
The influences of the audience. Every writer has a story to tell. And while it is difficult to think that the ITV creatives know what they want to do with their story, I would give them the benefit of doubt. Besides, as a writer myself, I know that 80% of writing is having no clue as to where you want to take the story. ANYWAY, back to the topic at hand. I think, if everything was written and shot before telecast, we might get cohesive writing. As it is, the creatives put out some content, look at the reaction, and try to maintain the highs or fix the blunders, by hook or crook.
And the story suffers.
Complete revamping of tracks, characters behaving worse than pendulums, repeat of romantic scenes, bringing in new characters out of the blue - I believe, most of these things occur in a rush to fetch (or maintain) ratings.
Now, let's talk about copy-pasting tracks without bothering to look at the bigger picture. What works for one show, works only because it goes with the past and future events of the show. You can't grab xyz from show1 and throw it into show2, because S2 does not have the background of S1. It wouldn't work, because the characters are different, their motivation is different, their past is different, everything is different.
Also, can we talk about how two people of opposite genders can be friendly and helpful to each other without secretly pining for the other person? It doesn't always have to be romance, although it can be perceived as that, if you want a jealousy track. Character A and B both know there is no romantic feelings, but Character C is seeing green because heyy, DRAMA!!
((This is one thing that disastrous Bajlo tomar alor benu did right, in respect to Minu and Rudra))
Another important thing - people can (and should, if you want it to be realistic) be morally grey. There is a phase between liking someone or hating them or wishing them to be dead or actually killing them. Also, not everyone has access to criminals and goons. I REPEAT, not everyone has a criminal connection, or the mental capacity to actually execute the plan to the T.
Thinking of murder, planning murder and straight up plunging a knife in someone's chest are different things. Remember the difference.
USE THE DIFFERENCE.
And while you are on it, learn the difference between attraction, appreciation and love.
We might be attracted to a particular quality - a physical attribute, a skill, a specific philosophy etc. We might appreciate that quality in a fellow human being. And we might be attracted to and appreciate the person with those qualities, but that doesn't mean that we would love them.
In the ocean of unnecessary romance angles and third wheels, this core difference is often brushed away in a bid to gain trps. Please don't do that.
Another checklist.
Ratings changing the story? ✅
Copy pasting tracks ✅
The world is grey ✅
Less criminal activity ✅
Not everything is love ✅
Would you look at that! I covered so many things. Fear not, I still have a lot to say. Mwahaha.
Not going to go into detail about my opinions on in-laws on ITV, because that is already covered here, but let's talk about the actual family.
The parents, siblings, cousins, relatives. Again, I am going to repeat myself and tell them to use the show Vs tell method. And actually focus on the dynamics because although the equations will change after marriage (for the male lead, the female lead will be cut off from her family 80% of the time), these relationships set the foundation for your character. Their personality. Motivation.
If you are going with a character who is distant, then by all means, do so, but do NOT ignore the family. Show that the character doesn't care.
Show it. Don't gloss over it.
That said, limit your exploration of characters and back stories. There is no hard or fast rule, but if it feels like too much focus, then it is too much focus. Go follow your basic INSTINCTS.
Okay, now is the time to come to the business side of writing for ITV. Bringing in popular characters, giving them smart dialogues and promoting them to the High Heavens. Wonderful trick. But do it in a subtle way. We will gladly let you play us, but only until we realise that we have been played. Subtly manipulate things. Subtly.
And, talking about that, let's also talk about how consistency is really important. Dumping black (or white) paint on characters would not wash away past grievances. It wouldn't remove the impression we already have. So if you want to portray someone in a positive light, work up to that point. Same with negative portrayals. Ease us into the change in perspective.
((Bajaj track in KZK2 is the perfect example of how the writers totally FAILED to follow this rule))
Also, if you are writing comedy, please hire good actors. Comedy is incredibly difficult, and if the performance isn't up to the mark, then it falls flat. And bad comedy is very annoying.
Another thing. If you have a social message, as in if the central theme is a social issue, do NOT forget your theme. And do not shove it down our throats. Don't make it preachy. Strive for balance.
And here, let me remind you that you do need a central theme, that's a very important part of your story. So pick a theme. And stick to it.
Think of your story like a human body.
Skeleton is the theme. The concept.
Blood is the undercurrents, the 'vibe'.
Organs are the characters.
Veins and arteries are the relationships.
Flesh is your plot.
Skin is the sub plots and side plots.
AND TOGETHER, THEY MAKE A STORY.
TOGETHER, THEY MAKE A STORY.
See how I repeated myself for emphasis? That's what you have to do, in a more subdued and complex way. I know you have it in you.
And because I wrote so much about adding sub plots and side characters, let's talk about what you shouldn't do, with me quoting myself:
Even CID, a show I loved to watch because it was a crime drama but less gruesome than what you would expect, could not escape tellywood’s clutches and turned into a chaotic mess with too many new characters and a massive shift in focus - in its last days, it was more of a romantic drama with the crime sprinkled in, and because there were so many new characters (who were boring 70% of time and annoying for the other 30%), I had ZERO interest in the series. The crimes have always been similar, what kept me hooked was the way they dealt with it and their group dynamics, which was ruined by bringing in a hoard of characters who contributed nothing to the story. And the Shreya-Daya track was a bad one from its conception, there was no need to drag it until my mild indifference turned into a major annoyance. And they could have avoided all of this. There was no need to ruin a perfectly good show with lazy, uncreative writing.
^ Bolded are the parts I consider important.
Also, let me take this opportunity to talk about shows similar to CID, in which every episode deals with a mini-plot and it is only the characters that remain the same. Crime dramas, medical dramas (although one the most popular ones on ITV - DMG was less about medicine and more about Jerk!Armaan and his jerk-ness and got rid of this problem in an innovative way that deserves an essay of its own, but I digress).
If the only thing remaining constant is your characters and their group dynamics, then do NOT throw in twenty new characters at once. Introduce them one at a time and limit the number of characters you will use. Keep the same cast for a decent chunk of time. Please. And do not add in multiple sub plots. The storyline is already a little blurry, jumping from case to case, so too much drama between the characters can be either too much to handle or just very, very boring. The focus is on the cases. Keep it there.
A show that did it quite well, was Goyenda Ginni, what with the overarching plot of a homemaker balancing housework and her passion for solving crimes. And because it was always about a family, with limited characters (bringing in spouses for the unmarried characters), it wasn't crowded.
Before I forget, here are some of my common issues with ITV and their writing department ⬇️
EK and her love for the child!track
Portrayal of marriage and relationship
^ And I must add that the Fic Which Must Not Be Named came into being because I couldn't accept the marriage trope for the two characters from the show that has become my latest obsession, even if the trope is shown in a negative light and the people in it are called out and they realise how wrong they are. #shaonHatesDealMarriages
The year 2020 and tellywood marriages
For the most part the last two links say the same things, but the wording and examples and the object of focus is different (this is how you hammer it home, CVs, write long posts on the same thing until the world learns about your hatred for said things. You're welcome 😎)
Also, something I remembered while writing the little note about forced marriages - acknowledge the wrongdoings of your characters, EVEN if they are the leads and you want people to love them. Glossing over the misdeeds wouldn't help, but accepting the truth, pointing out the flaws and then adding the reasoning behind the actions, and later on, writing in the realisation and apology for the act, is a much, much better idea. It is easier to forgive someone if their misdemeanor isn't shoved under the rug. But don't go overboard with the accusations. Repeating the truth multiple times only serves to annoy us.
Have I covered everything? I don't know. Feel free to ask me specific things in case you think I didn't comment on something. It is easy for me to forget about things while writing an answer as long as this. Not to mention, that I framed the first two-three paragraphs in my head while I stood under the shower, so in the rush to jot down everything I had thought of, I might have missed some stuff. Happens to the best of us, eh?
Coming to the second part of your question, I must admit, I am not the best at coming up with original premises. I like to dwell on the thoughts of the individual, delve deeper into their minds and do stuff - as evident in my love for the romance/drama genre, and why I love that ITV has so many shows in this genre. Why my writing (the drabbles I wrote last week), is more about the people than the plot. That's just who I am.
That said, I think I would do good with a team. Together, we can write a lot of things. ((Someone agree to do a collaborative fun writing project right now, I love those. We can make full use of all this free time and write a story of our own)).
No, seriously.
I love writing as a team.
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dearlazerbunny · 5 years
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The Ouran HSHC as Art Students Headcanons
Haruhi Fujioka: visual arts
- Sketching is what she started with as a child because it’s the cheapest; all you need is printer paper and a crappy pencil
- Never walked into a proper art store until her uni classes required it: “You want how much for this sketchbook?!??”
-  Has access to fancy charcoal pencils and whatnot at school now but secretly still feels more comfortable using cheap drugstore mechanical pencils since that’s what she taught herself to draw with
- She thinks the paint and sculpture students are a bit pretentious, but she can appreciate the ceramics because they have a useful purpose (she takes pottery as an elective).
 - Do not even THINK about fucking with this girl’s portfolio, even as a joke. Saying that she guards it with her life is an understatement
- Hidden in a drawer is an unfinished, photorealistic portrait of her mother. Something about it is never quite right; she’s not sure if it’ll ever be truly finished
Tamaki Suoh: literary arts
- Specialises in poetry, particularly romantic poetry, because obviously
- Literally cannot write nonfiction to save his life
- Idolizes the Bard and has multiple, incredibly expensive editions of his complete sonnets. If you pressed him to name a favorite it’d be #19
- Will spend days staring at something simple (a rose, a necklace, etc.) and finally emerge with a poem that is either incredibly poignant and beautiful or laughably bad, no inbetween
- He has a diary full of very personal poems that are only for himself, all written in French 
- Despite being a literary arts major, he’s constantly being conscripted by the theatre department to play parts like Romeo and Orsino because he’s just too perfect for it
Kyoya Ootori: instrumental music/performance track
- Here is where I’d put what instrument he specializes in but uh... he literally plays all of them  
- I’m not kidding. Hikaru once bet a large sum on money that there was no way Kyoya could play every instrument. He smirkingly threw an ocarina at Kyoya and the bastard just raised an eyebrow then casually played a gorgeous 30 minute rendition of the Song of Storms
- Was playing a Stradivarius at age nine
- Personally, he prefers woodwind instruments the best, followed by strings, piano, and then brass. His conductors have to bribe him to play any sort of brass instrument
- Will disappear for days into a practice room until whatever piece he’s studying is p e r f e c t. If you’re looking for him and he’s not answering his phone, that’s where he is. Will sleep in there so no one steals his room; has passed out in there from dehydration/lack of food and been carted out by medics too many times to count
- Secretly a huge fan of twoset violin
Hikaru Hitachiin: theatre/acting major
- Did you really think this Dramatic Boi(TM) would be anything other than a theatre major
- Despite his IRL demeanor, he’s incredibly serious about his acting. Professors who expect him to be a slacker are consistently surprised by his dedication
- Excels in the classics and absurdist theatre. He can be a little too intense for some of the “slice of life” modern plays
- Could probably pull off a Lear monologue flawlessly at age 12
- Always requests two scripts in any production he’s cast in: one that he can scribble on, rip up, lose pages in, etc. and one that is kept in sheet protectors in perfect condition
- He’ll be cast in a musical here and there. He’s got a decent voice and can carry a tune with a bit of coaching, but he’s got two left feet and therefore is usually put in the back in dance numbers
Kaoru Hitachiin: instrumental music, double major in music performance and music education
- Cello is his main. He was drawn to it as a kid because it’s mellow and calm; a mirror to Hikaru’s spastic tendencies 
- I can also seem him liking bassoon for the same reason
- He’s quietly spectacular. You never see him practice, brag about his instrument, etc. but will somehow miraculously show up to every rehearsal with most of their pieces memorized
- Prefers ensemble and orchestral work to solos. Gets a little uncomfortable being the only one solely in the spotlight
- Has STRONG opinions on all the classical composers and one of the few times you’ll see him red-in-the-face shouting is when he’s expressing his extreme hatred for Flight of the Bumblebee
- He’s double majoring in music ed because while he loves performing and wants to work as an instrumentalist for a few years, when he’s done with that scene he’d love nothing more than to have a classroom of his own, teaching six year olds how to hold their bows and leading them through their first rendition of Hot Cross Buns
Mitsukuni Haninozuka: vocal performance
- Ya boy has RANGE. Can go from a gorgeous countertenor to a lovely baritone/high bass.
- His countertenor is his specialty though. Choir conductors across the world will literally fight over the chance to feature him as a soloist or special guest
- Is mostly fluent in just about every language, thanks to the wide variety of languages choir music features. Italian is his favorite, especially the operas
- Always has to stand in the front row of the risers and sometimes on a special-made block so people can see him amongst the other singers. His concert dress always has to be custom made for him as well
- He’s very careful to not abuse his voice, and has eliminated vocal fry in his everyday speech, though it helps that his normal speaking voice is pitched higher naturally
- Though he’d never admit it to his choir peers, he can sing pop and even rap with the best of them, though it’s saved for karaoke nights with his best friends. His favorite things to sing are holiday carols.
Takashi Morinozuka: dance major/ballet track
- He’s been in ballet classes and kendo classes since age four, and refused to give either of them up as he got older
- To him, both ballet and kendo are very similar. They both require strength, grace, and discipline. He attacks the discipline part hard. He’s the epitome of dedicated
- His height and strength makes him a perfect duet partner. All the girls pray they’ll get paired with Mori in partnering class because they know he’ll be a perfect gentleman the whole time and never, ever drop them
- Looks damn good in a pair of tights, and is never self conscious about it
- Keeps a strict athlete friendly diet 90% of the time, but occasionally allows himself a cheat day and will steal a piece of Honey’s cake out of the fridge (because of course they’re dormmates)
- Would definitely be one of the rare guys who practices pointe because A) he finds it a beautiful art form and B) he doesn’t think it’s fair that the women go though the pain of pointe shoes and he not know what it feels like
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makeste · 5 years
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BnHA Chapter 211: Jane, Stop This Crazy Thing
Previously on BnHA: The fifth and final joint training battle began with Team DekuRakaMinaTa VS Team MonoShinYanaYuiShou. (There’s probably a better way to combine those last five names. Maybe it’s time to retire this joke.) Anyways, All Might answered a phone call from Gran Torino and went to go chat with him about OFA, probably thinking to himself that surely he wouldn’t miss much in just the next five minutes or so! So while he was doing that, Shouda, Yanagi, and Kodai attacked Ochako, Mina, and Mineta with a bunch of huge flying objects. And Monoma confronted Deku and started taunting him, first trying to goad him into revealing his friends’ location, and then trying to bait him by snidely accusing his boyfriend of being the one who caused the demise of the Symbol of Peace. Fucking ouch. He almost baited me with that one tbh. Anyway, that really pissed Deku off, but because he’s a smart kid he still didn’t respond and instead went to blast Monoma with his air gun attack. Except that all of a sudden some weird fucking shit started happening and Deku’s right hand basically exploded with black lightning. Ah, well, you know. Just One for All things.
Today on BnHA: Flashback!Monoma (from like five minutes ago) bonds with Shinsou over having quirks that don’t necessarily make one think “hero!” at first glance. He asks Shinsou how he goaded Deku into opening his mouth back at the sports festival, and Shinsou says he insulted his classmates. Monoma is all “!” and we then cut back to the present, where Deku is all “NNNNNGHHHH” and scary black tendrils are lancing out from his arm every which way trying to either capture Monoma or flat out kill him (who can say). At first everyone is all “Midoriya fucking powered himself up again?” not realizing that for once it was unintentional and he has no control over it. Once Deku starts screaming at everyone to run away -- and the “new technique” starts ripping apart the entire fucking stage -- it kinda starts to sink in, though. All Might tells Aizawa they need to end the match, and meanwhile Ochako floats herself up and latches on to Deku and then calls out to Shinsou for help. Probably because she’s learned her lesson about waiting on the teachers to ever do anything, sob.
(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my mostly-unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I’m caught up with the manga now at chapter 224, so any ETAs will reflect that.)
LOOOOOOOOL
so we’re opening chapter 211 in exactly the way that everyone was expecting! with a fucking Monoma flashback lmao
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whoever was telling him that, they’re really fucking stupid by the way. Monoma legit has one of the best quirks in the game. all it means is he would work best on a team, that’s all
so he’s bonding with Shinsou (this is a flashback, obviously, so that first panel was a flashback-within-a-flashback) over them both having quirks that people looked down on
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look at that, Shinsou. even fucking Monoma adopted you
oh my god hold up. do I ship it?? ...lol I’m not sure
lol well Shinsou is saying “that doesn’t make me happy” in response to Monoma declaring they were the same type. so now I know they can banter, and so the answer is yes, I do in fact ship it. this is not a thing I was expecting to happen in this arc. Shinsou I’ve gone from you being in the background every so often popping up to remind us you exist, to me having adopted you and shipping you with at least two people, one of whom is the kid who in the previous chapter was like “hey you know that thing that Bakugou secretly harbors horrible guilt over? let me just go and get in his boyfriend’s face and be all ‘yeah it totally was his fault.’” man. life sure is funny
and apparently this little weasel did it on Shinsou’s advice!
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LMAO Monoma this is the role you were born to play. all you have to do to succeed is insult class 1-A omg. can you do it? it’s gonna be so fucking hard for you, so out of character. you’ll have to dig down deep
anyway so I’m not sure if this is Monoma or Shinsou monologuing here (though I’m leaning toward Monoma because he’s responsible for 8 out of 10 monologues in general when he’s around) (ETA: yeah it’s Monoma), but either way it’s an interesting speech
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ahh, and now we’re back in the present!
ahhhhhhhhh
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goddamn it Horikoshi. I have no idea whose thoughts these are. whatever, I’ll have to figure it out and come back to reanalyze it later
(ETA: so hey, now that we’ve caught up to this point, I finally have access to the Viz translations again! their translation makes a lot more sense, and makes it clear this is just a continuation of Monoma’s speech. here:
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I appreciate the deeper look into Monoma’s psyche, but I don’t know if I buy into this argument that his quirk forces him to act unheroically. Shinsou’s quirk is a different story perhaps, but there’s nothing about the copy quirk that necessitates unscrupulous conduct in order to win the day. it just so happens that he is very good at goading others, and it only makes sense to use that to his advantage when he can. like, it’s a respectable strategy, if one that doesn’t necessarily win you a lot of friends. 
I for one don’t feel like he needs to justify himself; it’s a battle, and you gotta do what you gotta do to try and give yourself the edge, especially when you’re up against the fucking main character. but anyway, maybe he feels a little guilty deep down and has to rationalize it like this. or maybe he’s just trying to bond with Shinsou and be all “yeah I get you man, you don’t have a choice, it’s rough.” or maybe a little of column A and a little of column B, who knows. anyways.)
in the meantime, check out Monoma and Shinsou’s confused and slightly apprehensive expressions! “did Midoriya’s arm just fucking explode”
apologies to everyone reading this liveblog for getting myself spoiled btw. I probably robbed you guys of a delightful time of watching me freak the fuck out and thinking Deku had lost control of OFA again and was gonna blow his arm off or some fucking shit. but instead I’m just fucking excited because this little shrubbery of a boy is about to level the fuck up and he doesn’t even know it yet
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you can see why alternate universe me would have been so concerned. it looks like he’s having a heart attack and being sucked into the void. it looks like Miroku’s kazaana from Inuyasha. oh my god
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Monoma my respect for you just increased tenfold. look at you keeping your cool while not having the slightest fucking clue what’s going on
(ETA: actually this reminds me a lot of Katsuki facing the League of Villains and running his mouth at them and appearing confident but all the while having that one bead of sweat visible the entire time. Monoma has a lot more in common with him than he may think.
...in fact, I would totally read an AU where Monoma does more successfully in the cavalry battle and makes it into the tournament and consequently ends up drawing the League’s attention instead of Katsuki -- because he does do a very decent villain impression, this one -- and as a result he’s the one who gets taken. featuring a bonus rescue attempt led by Tetsutetsu and Kendou, and a Kamino arc that strangely enough ends up playing out very similarly to the one we actually got, in the end. anyways. it’s an interesting What If to think about.)
oh hey I just noticed the chapter title is “successor” and FUCK YEAHHHH are we gonna get the spoiler in this chapter? cuz then I can go back to not being spoiled again, so that’ll be nice
oh SHIT
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“RUN” IS GOOD ADVICE MONOMA, I’D FUCKING LISTEN TO HIM?!
NOW IT REALLY LOOKS LIKE THE KAZAANA. except blasting black lightning shit out instead of sucking shit in
wow this is fucking amazing. I love the potential for future battles, given how powerful it seems to be and yet how he appears to have no fucking clue how to control it and so it consequently becomes a double-edged sword putting himself and his comrades at risk. it’s a lot like Eri’s power in that sense
also Deku is making some amazing faces in this chapter and I feel like we should be appreciative
Monoma is not doing a half-bad job of dodging this maniac who is trying to fucking kill him
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jesus christ. maybe next time we don’t insult his boyfriend, Monoma
now he’s turning to call Shinsou and he looks pretty rattled tbh
but you know who doesn’t look rattled, like at all?
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I burst out laughing in real life oh my god. they’re just like “...must be Tuesday”
I mean, this kid went from breaking all his bones to suddenly having super agility to being super strong without breaking his bones to using fucking wind attacks. they probably have no idea what his quirk is at this point and so they’re just assuming this is just another natural evolution
and the thing is, they’re not wrong
oh shit now Deku’s fucking flying toward Shinsou
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have him brainwash you and command you to turn it off then!
also, I wasn’t sure with the previous chapter but now I am sure that they definitely do have sound (by “they” I mean the teachers and other students watching, that is), because they were able to follow all that stuff with Shinsou’s voice changer in the first match. so they can hear Deku saying that he doesn’t have control. so what I’m saying here is the teachers should definitely be calling this match off immediately
but will they? well, it’s U.A. so I think we all know the answer to that. it ain’t over till somebody croaks
jesus now we’re cutting to the scene from a distance and this shit is even crazier than I thought
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TEACHERS ARE YOU GOING TO DO ANYTHING? NO? OKAY
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TEACHERS, DEKU HAS LOST CONTROL OF HIS QUIRK AND IS SMASHING THE TRAINING STAGE APART AND TRYING TO KILL FRIEND AND FOE ALIKE. ARE YOU GOING TO PUT A STOP TO THIS FIGHT? NO? OKAY
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ALL MIGHT, YOUR BELOVED PROTEGE AND ADOPTED SON IS FLYING AROUND UNCONTROLLABLY AND DOESN’T KNOW HOW TO STOP. ARE YOU GOING TO -- you know what. just, never mind
oh shit
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ffff Aizawa looking at him like “what’s this now? ‘stop’?”
(ETA: Aizawa. Aizawa listen to me. I need you to look me in the eye and tell me honestly -- if All Might hadn’t said anything, would you have just fucking stood there until everyone fucking died? would you have done anything?? how much more of your problem child hupping all around the stage with this bucking bronco of a quirk screaming “STOP!! STOP!!” would you have calmly observed before it occurred to you to fucking do your job. tell me. be honest. listen, I love and respect you, dude, but sometimes you make me a little concerned.)
god I am loving this so much. this is not at all how I expected this last match to go
ahhhhhh noooooo
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he’s scared! he says it hurts! oh shit I’m sorry Deku I didn’t know it was hurting you ah fuck
though that makes sense, because it’s blasting out of your right fucking arm, though, because it’s always that fucking arm, isn’t it. and whatever this new quirk is, it’s at 100% just like OFA was when you first activated it. and we all know that pretty much all quirks can do a lot of damage to the user if used at full capacity for too long
there’s another panel of Ochako staring in horror. there’s been a lot of those. is it just to show her concern, or is she planning something to help him (I have no idea what she could do though), or is she taking mental notes here and this means she’ll be hounding him with questions about his quirk after this and will eventually learn about OFA too?
(ETA: thankfully no one other than Shouto thinks to ask, and Shouto accepts the weakest of excuses without hesitation because this is the densest and most trusting group of kids to ever walk the earth. Deku your secret is safe for life. all he has to do is just shrug his shoulders every damn time. “fucking quirks, though. wild.”)
ahhh now we’re really getting into Deku’s POV and he’s freaking out bad flkajlkj
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no baby no don’t cry it’ll be all right
fuck. he’s scared and he’s frustrated because everything was finally starting to go so well and he was finally getting the hang of things and on his way to being a reliable hero, and now this stupid fucking quirk is out of control again and it’s like nothing he ever experienced before, and it hurts and he has no idea what to do and he might hurt other people and fucking shit, someone help him!!
AHHHH
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ONE FOR ALL YOU BETTER LISTEN TO HIM!!
is he crying blood??!
(ETA: sure looks like it. jesus Deku you’re dramatic as fuck.)
okay WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING
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OH MY GOD
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OCHAKO
girl when I said I had no idea what you could do to help him, that’s because I didn’t think you’d be crazy enough to fucking float yourself right at him when he’s losing it like this
goddamn that’s a ballsy fucking move though, shit
oh shit!
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brainwash him and get control of him and then she can float him down to safety! yes!! do it!!
MY GIRL OCHAKO SAVING THE DAY AND MY BOY SHINSOU BEING BRAVE IN THE CLUTCH AND SAVING DEKU AS WELL AND HOPEFULLY GETTING INTO CLASS A FOR HIS EFFORTS. OH SHIT. THIS IS AMAZING. DOES THIS ARC HAVE HATERS?? I CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHY IT WOULD OH SHIT I FUCKING LOVE ALL OF THIS
Shinsou looks like a deer in fucking headlights by the way. like someone just caught him doing something super embarrassing. haha I love it
oh my god I’m gonna go read the next one
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