#i'm not upset about his redemption arc. i enjoy a happy ending.

[americankimchi]

some days i think to myself about the wasted potential that was essek criticalrole and feel a headache form behind my eyes.

[number-1-kuaidul-fanboy]

Top Ten Arc V Characters (Updated)

I was doing another Yugioh tier list and noticed that my opinions on this changed drastically since I first watched Arc V. So here's an updated top ten Arc V characters. Some of these picks may be partially motivated by spite. Also, I'm definitely gonna go back and forth between sub and dub names. Arc V is about even in dub and sub for me and some of the dub names are easier for me so just bear with me.

10 Dennis Mackfield

Dennis is kind of just funny to me but he does also have a complete character arc that isn't botched or cut off in some way, which is more than I can say for some other Arc V characters. He's a naughty bad guy but an enjoyable one who was kind of just a brainwashed kid with a redemption I can accept.

9 Yuto

The only Yu boy I can comfortably say I still like. He's got a sympathetic backstory that realistically shaped his current personality and while he appears scarcely, I enjoy the times he does. I like his dynamics with Yuya, Ruri, and Shun.

8 Shingo Sawatari

He's a cringe fail boy. I like the cringe fail funny characters that exist to be laughed at. I do wish Sawatari had more of an arc or development but at the end of the day, he's entertaining and that's all a character needs to be sometimes.

7 Sora Shiunin

Rushed as shit redemption arc aside, I find Sora's energetic hyper personality of season 1 entertaining and Sora vs Shun genuinely felt like a huge betrayal. On paper, the reasons for his redemption work and are sympathetic, I just wish more time was dedicated to fleshing it out. Still, wanting more of a character is generally a good thing.

6 Shinji Weber

I like villains/antagonists who have valid reasons for being upset. If anything, they actually made Shinji too valid up until they pulled the "he wants to oppress the rich" thing out of their asses but that's a can of worms on its own. I think Shinji's motivation is understandable, even if, for the writers' intentions' sake he "went too far", and those are the kinds of antagonists I like most. Also, he's canonically good with kids like Crow is and I just really like that. It shows he's got a sweet centre beneath all the gruffness and anger he displays. I like that.

5 Riley Akaba

Talk about wasted potential jesus christ. "This character has known nothing but being a vessel for other people's desires. So let's end the series by forcing her to once again be someone's vessel!"

Horrific treatment aside though, I still enjoyed Riley as a character. I relate to her anxiety, I liked her arc while it lasted, she and Declan have such a great sibling bond, she's still a good character. But yeah... the way the narrative botched her did drag her down a few slots I'll admit.

4 Zarc

One of the only saving graces of the fusion arc as far as I'm concerned. His escalation of wanting more and more violence in his duels as the audience pressured him into harsher duels was interesting and felt narratively cohesive with the better parts of Yuya's arc. And the way he's eventually stopped, not by defeating him but by Yuya understanding him and reminding him why he was duelling in the first place, that's really touching. One of my favourite Arc V moments for sure.

3 Serena

Yeah, I like Serena more than Yuzu. Even putting aside the fact that I loved her Duel Links event and her fusion based deck, Serena stayed a good character. The narrative treated her as badly as it treated Yuzu but her personality, when she was in her right mind, remained the same: headstrong, stubborn, and fierce. Plus she was the first to defect from Duel Academia and she did it best in my opinion.

2 Shun Kurosaki

I like Shun for all the same reasons I like Yuto: his genuinely tragic backstory that damaged him and turned him into the edgelord we know and love him as. He's also just way more badass and has more character development than Yuto. The way he's able to regain some form of happiness and stability over the course of the series despite all the horrors he endured, thanks to his new bonds with characters like Crow and Yuya, was really endearing to me. I'm probably the only person on earth with this opinion but as dumb as the bracelet girls and yu boys fusing together was, I think the one good thing that came out of it was that Shun had to just accept that Yuto and Ruri were gone. I get why people found it unsatisfying, but I think the fact that he was able to move on showed a lot of strength that I have to admire him for.

1 Declan Akaba

Declan is my favourite because I relate to his family situation and I refuse to explain myself further.

....Okay fine. I'll admit, Declan isn't the most well implemented character in terms of Arc V's narrative. I think we can all agree his change in character was out of nowhere and Sawatari made for a better rival to Yuya. But dammit I don't care I like him anyways. I think his moral ambiguity is fascinating. He's fighting on the "right" side and has good intentions and goals but some of the things he does to accomplish that goal range from morally ambiguous to just straight up evil at times and I love that. It's one of the best examples of one of Arc V's core themes: "war corrupts both sides." And while his switch to being a better person is sudden, I can accept it to a degree because in my mind, he always wanted to do the right thing and genuinely cared deep down. It doesn't excuse his early actions but it does help me understand and identify with him.

Also, no, I wasn't joking or exaggerating about relating to Declan's family situation. Without giving away too much, I have an intimidating father who's not around much, a manipulative mother who's around but in all the wrong ways, and a younger sibling who I've had to watch be treated poorly by my mother for years. Declan's situation is more extreme but the similarities are... they're hard not to notice. Declan is number 1 on this list because of how much I relate to and look up to who he is by the end of the series. He'd probably still be on this list either way but he's at number 1 because of how much he personally means to me.

[tylrgalpins]

so thoughts on the ted lasso finale since you reblogged to say you enjoyed it.

i'm going to put them undercut just cause it will contain spoilers!! but yes, i did like and enjoy the finale.

so my thoughts on the ted lasso finale, why I enjoyed it and why I felt the majority of the characters ended up where they should be.

so first let's address ted because so many people didn't like the fact he went back to kansas and left his found family just for henry. I saw loads of people say it was very out of character for ted but I got to disagree.

in s2 we found out that a lot of ted's issues and struggles stemed from the fact his father committed suicide when he was only 16 and that resulted in him feeling like his father abandoned him.

with ted having carried that all his life I understand why he felt he needed to go home to be with his son and be more active in his life. he never wanted henry to feel like he had abandoned him and so he went home to be with him even if it meant sacrificing his life in richmond. ted put his son first. and yes, it's nice to think 'well Henry could come to England' but realistically, to uproot his life like that and take him away from everyone in his life would be a lot for a teenager to go through.

Now let's talk about Rebecca.

I know loads of people are angry about tedbecca, which personally I don't ship so maybe that changes my opinion but I generally don't think the fact them two not getting together spoilt her story or her arc.

To me, the entire arc of Rebecca was for her to finally stop caring about Rupert and what he thinks, to get out of his hold and actually realise how much she loves and care for the club.

And she did that, she stopped caring about beating rupert and cared about the team instead. she realised how much good she had done with the club and how important it was to her and how important she was to the club.

That was her story arc done, and to me it was satisfying.

I know tedbecca shippers are upset and yes it sucks when your ship doesn't happen but to me there was no way they could have worked. ted needed to go back to henry, and rebecca needed to stay. imagine how angry everyone would have been if rebecca gave it all up to be with ted. just look how much everyone hates ross & rachel for the exact same reason.

So the roy/jamie/keeley part.

So this was maybe the part i was least happy about but also I don't think it was that bad.

I loved roy & keeley and it sucked so much that they didn't end up together but I do feel that was best for the characters at this moment.

they broke up because roy didn't feel worthy and then he did nothing to help change that mindset. we finally saw him making strides in the last few minutes and i do feel he needs to sort himself out before him & keeley give it another go because at the moment nothing has changed.

I also kinda liked that Keeley ended up single, for the entire series she's pretty much always had a partner. I like that she's decided to focus on her career for a while.

Sure it would've been nice if they had done the previous two bullets throughout season 3 but they didn't, and I think they are important for the relationship to work.

Now jamie, i do largely want to ignore the comment he made about keeley because he's made the best character progress of the season and I love him. at the same time, while the comment was out of line, i do sort of think it's on brand. a lot of the roy/jamie friendship is based on trying to out do each other and I just don't think jamie thought before he spoke which I also thought was on brand for jamie. that said I don't agree with the stuff he said.

I still love jamie and i don't think that one comment ruins his entire redemption.

other stuff.

I was really happy colin got to kiss his fella even if we all saw it coming. i've really enjoyed his storyline and I thought it was done well.

I am really pleased with where the team ended up at the end of the season.

I loved that sam got to play for nigeria.

i've seen a few people say they hated that nate didn't really move forward, especially as he came back to richmond as a kitman. but i felt this was the whole point of his story. he reached the top and it sucked for him, he lost everything but then realised that actually, that didn't matter anyway.

YES for roy kent as manager.

a little gutted they didn't end up winning the whole fucking thing.

happy with where trent crimm ended up.

loved that beard stayed but not so much that he married jane.

i think that covers everything but come talk to me about anything you want regarding the final.

[shadyreviewengineer]

Sweet Magnolias Season 2

Its here! I have so far watched it twice, and here are my unasked for thoughts, hope you enjoy

Also - SPOILERS, SPOILERS, SPOILERS

So in no particular order -

- Somehow it didn't feel like SM, did anyone else get that? I still enjoyed it, and I don't know what it was, I think maybe because they used different music during transitions, but something felt off (still good though)

- Ok, I find it annoying sometimes when writers need to add something in to a show after the firsts season, but end up doing it jarringly, however I liked that anything they needed to add in the s02 they definitely did due diligence throughout the season, it didn't come out of the blue when Cal lost control and got arrested.

Eg - Cal's anger management issues. They defiantly hinted at it throughout the season, many times, even if they did do it a bit clunkily

- Dana Sue's health issues mysteriously vanishing, I get them not being a main plot point, but the fact they weren't mentioned once? Sus

- Annie and Jackson. Dare I say, maybe one of my favourite redemption arcs since Zuko lol. So, I am definitely team Tyler, however I love this paring, I love Jackson's actor and their storyline.

My issue with the storyline though is that one of my least favourite troupes is when they have two characters cheat on their partners with each other and we're supposed to root for them because they're 'endgame'. It always completely turns me off the characters and I really hope that Jackson and Annie don't end up in that situation and their breakup feels organic. I kind of hope Jackson's family have to move when his Dad's been disgraced and is no longer mayor and thats why they break up.

- I felt like the adult side got more love and screentime this season, and I'm not happy about it. I don't know if the demographic is mostly older so they wanted to lean more to that, but I wish the youngsters had had more screentime.

- Esepcially Cece. How could they do her dirty like this? She was iconic in s01 and she was hardly there in s02. At least her reasons for breakup with Ty felt in charcter for her, but it did bug me when Ty said 'you hurt me' and Cece said 'no I didn't'. Like, yes, Cece may be more hurt and have more right to be hurt, and yes Ty might have blown her off for a bit too, but you can't decide when you've upset someone or not Cece.

- my faves Aunty Helen and Annie had like no scenes together #werevoltatdawn

- Kyle, Ty, and Annie weren't talking for awhile, and I get that things ended weirdly, and we did have Kyle blow up at Annie, and Annie mentioning that there was too much drama with her usual group, but I wish we'd kind of got more explanation on screen? Like seen them together being awkward a bit more? idk, it just felt jarring that these kids that were supposed to be like siblings wouldn't manage to band together after such a big shock and one of them almost dying?

Also wish we'd gotten more of them coming back together? They just kind of made up in one meeting again. Yes it be like that when you've known someone forever, but also, it would have been nice to see a few more meetings

Basically it felt like the writers didn't know what to do/where to take them/didn't want to give them too much screen time and so separated the kids for practically the whole season idk, it might be just me

- Although I did like how they made Kyle and Tyler argue and make up, and Tyler taking the reins as the oldest kid and trying to make nice with everyone was sweet.

- Also Kyle, Sophie, and co making the video game was so sweet and fun

- Although I completely misread Sophie, I thought there was gonna be drama with Nellie and her for Kyle, but actually Sophie recognised Kyle's feelings and encouraged them. Good for her.

- Gutted for Helen, I just wanted to give her a hug.

- Also, Helen's set up for next season is killing me.

OK, s01 Helen was kind of with Ryan, kind of flirting with Erik, and s02, she's with Eric. We've done the Eric/Ryan who will she chose thing, and then Ryan reappears, and I don't know if I'll be more annoyed about them making an unclimactic cliff hanger like this time, or dragging it out all season and basically give her the same storyline as s01 but with more complications, but Helen should've told Ryan about the baby if she wanted to and drawn a line under him and that shoudve been season 2's Ryan, gone for good.

- Also, s01 Jackson makes me completely understand why Tyler would be suspicious of him and Annie hanging out. Jackson sent Annie's drunk, love declaration voice note to the whole school. Tyler being weary of Jackson because he hanging out with Annie is entirely plausible in a completely platonic way. Yes, I want it to be because Tyler has realised his feelings, but also, I think Cece assuming it was just co Ty liked Annie was a but ott, maybe if there had been other instances that could have rose suspicion, but in s02 there wasn't really, and I can't think of many on s01. And I do understand sometimes when you're dating someoen or kow them well you just know when they have feelings or whatever, but we're talking about a couple of 17yo with very little prior expericne (if any) with relationships who've been dating a few months at most.

- Also, no married, never been in a relationship, but I don't understand Maddie's reaction when Bill tells her about Issac? Like, yes I can understand her being upset and furious, but because of the her kids, but she says things which I understand, except that Bill didn't know. He had no idea, and so yes he made the same mistake twice and he is an idiot and moron, but if you didn't know you'd made the mistake the first time, can that really be held against you? and i personally think we can see from the Noreen situation that if he had known he would probably have done his best to do right by Peggy instead of his existing (if 'not serious') gf maddie

I mean, I'm not mad Bill got yelled at, because he can never get yelled at enough , but just some of the arguments I didn't understand where Maddie was coming from

- THE COFFEE THING at least we got to see Aunt Helen with Ty, even if there was no Aunt Helen and Annie

- the costumes were on fire. why am i, a 21 yo, vibing with Helen and Maddie's outfits so much?

- Finally can we takl about the grown up adult woman walking up to a teenager her insulting her? That is so funny

[serafim]

Sephiroth/Cloud for the ship thing (:

The ship is my: One of my favorites.

I consider this ship’s feelings: Mutual | Mixed | Strange | Awkward | Platonic | Sibling-like | One-sided | They don’t really like each other |

I’d consider the relationship: Healthy | Awkward | Abusive | Doesn’t work properly | They��d never get together | Unhealthy

Children: No | Yes | They’d think about it

General Opinion: Boy there's a lot to unpack here. For the sake of brevity, let's say we're looking only at the official compilation timeline and not "what-ifs." One major problem with this ship, especially when centered around the CC-timeline: there's a 6-year age gap between them. When Cloud is 15, Sephiroth is 21. I don't know about others but...yeah, 15 year olds are children and irl super gross and I have 0 interest in that hahah.

Beyond CC, you run into issues with autonomy, disrespect, straight up abuse, and general dubcon scenarios. In the On the Way to a Smile novella the Lifestream Black chapter literally states that Sephiroth retains his individual self in the Lifestream by hating fixating on Cloud in a negative way. I thought it was kind of silly, but Cloud is probably the most accessible anchor to Sephiroth at the time.

In my heart of hearts, I would love some evidence that these two could ever have a healthy relationship (romantic or not) but I don't see it at all. I also don't see Sephiroth ever getting a redemption arc and if Remake actually goes that route I'm going to be so upset because they'll totally cheapen his character lmao.

Not that I don't enjoy exploring the darker aspects of their relationship. I'm just a schmuck for happy endings, so this ship firmly lives in "what-if" territory for anything positive.