#if only i had the time and money to make dragon age fan dragons

[olderthannetfic]

Something that frustrates me about the Harry Potter conversation is a lot of people missing the point behind the motivation to boycott it. They seem weirdly focused on the content of HP when it's actually... not that bad? It's not perfect, in fact a lot of aspects are pretty fucking problematic and worthy of discussion, but not uniquely so by the standards of the fantasy genre. Yes, I know the goblins are clearly drawing on anti-semitic tropes. Yes, the house elf situation is fucked. Yes, lots of not-like-other-girls-style misogyny. Yes, Cho Chang was a fucking disaster of racism. I KNOW THIS ALREADY! I'm not an idiot and Harry Potter fans were talking about this for far longer than JKR has been a TERF. But I'm also a fan of the Elder Scrolls and Dragon Age and the Witcher and a shitton of isekai anime and tons of other fantasy medias which are so much worse. Harry Potter is only moderately problematic by the standards of most popular fantasy media, especially for the mainstream standards of the time period it was written. Worthy of criticism, but not dropping it entirely. And actually reading HP and looking back at JKR's behaviour at the time, much of it seems largely unintentional, just that JKR drew on a lot of fantasy tropes that she didn't properly examine as well as her own unexamined biases and she had some flawed understandings of progressivism that were fair for its day but don't fly now, but doesn't seem malicious. The actual authorial intent at least seems to be pretty progressive at least, even if the execution wasn't the best. And sure, it's not a masterwork but there's a reason it connected to so many people, even if a lot of it was luck and timing. We don't have to ignore that and doing so feels dishonest.

I'm just so annoyed when people try to shit on the contents because they're missing the point and confuse the actual problem in a way that weakens their argument. I don't give Harry Potter money anymore because JKR crossed some lines for me in real life, totally separate from Harry Potter as a piece of media, and I don't want to fund her bullshit because she is so influential it is hurting people. The content of her books is utterly irrelevant to this decision. She could have penned a goddamn magnum opus and it wouldn't have mattered. So I'm sick of people bringing up books that are "better" or ragging on the contents of Harry Potter because none of that is the point and never was the point and it comes across as just taking advantage of a shitty situations to dunk on a popular thing or those who enjoyed it. Yeah, it was a mediocre fantasy series. But it hit the right emotional escapist buttons in a lot of kids even if it had the moral nuance and depth of a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles anti-drug PSA. Having to drop it sucked for a lot of people because it can't be replaced and yelling about how bad the writing was doesn't change that because it never was about quality. JKR's TERF transformation was in many ways a betrayal of JKR's intended audience considering how the text preached acceptance and love and starred an abused, unwanted child getting to go to magic school where he's special. Pretending Harry Potter should be dropped because its content has issues obscures the actual problem of a raging transphobic having money and influence and that not everything created by bad people is poor quality so boycotts might require giving up access to things you actually like or are valuable and that's not always an easy decision to make.

JKR was a probably decent person with fairly liberal politics when she wrote Harry Potter. The books, while imperfect, are not more horrible or full of problems a dozen other popular fantasy properties. JKR become a TERF later in life and while she may have had ingrained transphobia prior to this when she wrote Harry Potter, that is not the same as the virulent hate-movement she's part of now and we should recognize how easy it is for people to get drawn into hate-movements. Any argument to boycott should be about how she's using her money and influence to affect real life laws and attitudes unless you want to try and get people to also drop half the fantasy genre.

--

[nikox400x]

Kung Fu Panda 4-All the budget went to the animation (spoilers)

Hey all, its me, the guy who everyday make a tour around this site but almost never talk. How are ya?

Two days ago something arrived to the cinema's screens, something that me and everyone were waiting for since 2018, the fourth film and the begginig of the new kung fu panda triology.

You know? When I sat on that theather seat with my friends to see what Dreamworks had prepared for us, I told myself; "Maybe that post I made a while ago throwing shit at what seemed like Kfp 4 was going to be was a bit hard, I hope I can come out regretting what I said that time"

And as soon as the credits ended, it was clear to me, I dont regret a shit. Maybe it was a little exaggerated, compared to what a megamind fan would think about the terrible sequel they made, but still: the film is crappy and boring most of the time. But why?

I'm going to explain some points.

1- Po? Is that you?

I don't know you guys, but i don't think the panda we knew in the end of the third film is the same as this one. Seriously, he share more comparisons with the Po from the legend of awessonless than the one from the films, maybe its a personal thing but it feels that way. At least in the beggining of the film feel like that.

And I don't know what he was thinking about when he decided to follow a thief he doesn't know at all and who tried to steal in his own palace, and that suspiciously know who is the chameleon, whose were her plans, her past, where she lived, where exacly they had to pass through avoiding all the guard inside her home, why the others thiefs of the city hate her so much... With Po's experience with criminals this is like a chef throwing water on a pan with boiling oil, it's obvious what is going to happen.

2- Zheng- Female Nick Wilde but without charisma or half of his intelligence.

I knew it from the first moment I saw Zheng's desing, the people who know me can corroborate that; her facial expressions, her tone while she talk, her animal race, her position as thief, her final when she is part of the justice same as the protagonist... it's clearer than water I think.

Everyone could say this is forgivable if she's smart, but surprise, she's not. This character is just an absurd try of this company for """"conect with infant audience""""(I don't know in what sense, I supose for the cute design, idk). But the point is, the supposed objective of the hollywood companies is give the new generetions better things than we got at their age, but what I see is laziness for write a decent scrip only for take an advantage of a known IP and make easy money. Even the children have quality standars, this is not the dragon warrior and of course this is not kung fu panda.

And talking about the dragon warrior, having our deep and lovely Tigress with her magnific development or Tai Lung back from the spirit realm... why in the hell this character exists?! Oh yeah, for being trending topic in twitter for three days. Yay...

3- The furious five and Shifu, for us : our pretty boys, and for Dreamworks: living jokes.

What made Kung Fu Panda what it is, is not the fucking panda, it's them. They're the inspiration for Po, their allies, the royale representation of kung fu and the ones which everything started with.

Po's a comic relief, and his mission is show his development in part using his humor, but the humor in this film barely works because of the lazy script. Something that even the talented Jack Black himself can't fix, beacuse his only role there is dublin his character, unlike the rest of the residents of the Jade Palace except Dustin Hoffman.

Seth Rogen (Mantis) himself even said that he wasn't even contact by Dreamworks in the first place, only for make a scream in the credits, that's sad beacause he really wanted to see Mantis on the screen. And I know and I understand that the five are expensive, but cmon, they could just simply change the voice actors and offset it with a good script but that's not the case of course. Their role in the film is being a counter for Po's constant jokes, for not to saturate the spectator with jokes, now that's not in there anymore, thank you Dreamworks.

4-The chameleoooohhn and her "motivation".

I can't say much, basically because out of her design she's nonsense. She says that because of her size, she was reyected for being a kung fu warrior.

Yeah of course but only one little thing, what about Shifu? Viper, a warrior without tips? Mantis, literally a dawn insect? Master Oogway, a TURTLE? The masters goose? C'mon even there's a fucking master chicken! Don't talk shit chameleon!

Her importance for the plot? Its almost a lie, the others villains had links to important characters; Tai Lung (with his link to Shifu's past), Shen (with his link to Po's past) or Kai (with his link to Oogway's past), all of them related to important characters. And her? To zheng's past and present I guess? But again, anyone know this character. She's like a villain from a Disney show, you know the type of villain who say a lot of things but at the end, she don't support nothing to the lore.

And her personality is like a mix of all the previous villains, and this sounds good right? HAHAH nope. Do you remember when as a child you mixed all the plasticines of all the colors to create the final color and you ended up with a color similar to poop? well that's exacly how her personality feels like.

5- Po's dads; the only reason they're there is because they ran out of characters to make the film.

The tittle itself tell everything, they don't do anything for the script in all the film, and their objective could be done since the start.

The script of the film except for the final looks like a draft which they didn't know how to complete, everyone who watch it can see it perfecly. The animation, the music and the backgrounds are the only things notable here.

6- Tai Lung and the cheapness nostalgia.

Fan service is not necesarry bad, above all if is used in a good way, they sold us Tai Lung as a miracle but his importance for the plot feels just like a Stan Lee cameo, I like Tai Lung I can say that. But this is too weak, Shen and Kai are only characters in the background who don't do nothing except being defeated or make facial expressions (I don't even joke that Shen would show respect to Po considering what we saw in the second movie, and Kai wasn't supposed to be destroyed as a spirit, what the hell is he doing here again? *sign* I'll to stop trying to make sense of this).

By the way, anyone else think that the dragon warrior role is understimated? I mean Shifu obligated Po to transfers the role to another one just because yes, i mean he only has been the dragon warrior for less than 5 years and now they want to replace him with a random. Everything just for at the end, he choosed a thief with at least 30 crimes registred and who was a traitor during the 75% of the movie.

7- The """""""""humor"""""""", except they forgot the parts where I must to laugh.

Seeing nonsense hits only beacuse yes stopped of being funny a long time ago, and no, I don't want to talk about the bunnies of the portrait because I would get sick. I had to go to the cinema drunk to endure the filler that the movie had, no joke, it was the only way to laugh at those jokes.

So I think about applying the same method as in any movie with bad jokes, ignoring the jokes. I tried to do the same thing but with the pace that the film managed, such a thing was impossible, the pace of the movie seems to be made for Tiktoker children with attention deficit. From the chaos in the quarry until Po takes the bitc... uhg fox out of prison, only 10 fucking minutes pass, all of that for what? So that you feel like the baseless information and the nonsensical plot that they tell us is of any use? they could simply make a non-canonical short and that's it, but no, yes or they were going to tell us a story written by rotten old men who spend the entire day watching Tik Tok. It's not going to be that the child who sees this doesn't get bored, we know that much today's children don't have many neurons as they say, but even to make movies for them you have to have a certain talent.

In some point at the beguining Po make a joke about the ausence of the furious five saying that at least he had them in cardboard posters, and this would be a good joke. Only if the stupid film could be prove that the franquise can do something memorable without the furious five, but again, that's not the case.

Don't have any respect for this movie, look what it had with you. I understand that it is enjoyable because of the animation but it does not go beyond that line, it destroys important things about the canon and spoils its teaching about the need for change by treating it in a terrible way.

Coclusion: KFP 4 is just another Po's adventure as Shifu says, it won't tell nothing to you or make you feel different, it's a shame but after Megamind 2 I imagined something like this. It's a dark era for film, expecially the animated one so like Scar said; Be prepare, there're worse things waiting for us.

Do you want something with real quality? You don't even need kung fu panda 1,2 or 3, for make it easy to this film let's take this marvelous example; kung fu panda: secrets of the scroll (2016). You'll say; "An animated short, this is not like-" Shhh Just watch it, you won't regret it.

If you think I'm wrong in something, just rewatch the film. And if still you aren't agreed with me, well, I respect you and I'm happy you like it. I wish I could love it as you do, but that doesn't mean that the movie isn't bad, because if you watch it with your brain on or remembering the previous movies it's terrible.

. Me? I've to write a story, I love you all. Except you, Dreamworks, I'm mad with you, expecially when you do this at the same day as Akira Toriyama's death :(

[fl3shm4id3n]

𝕭𝖊𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖘𝖊𝖈𝖔𝖓𝖉 𝖉𝖆𝖚𝖌𝖍𝖙𝖊𝖗 𝖔𝖋 𝕬𝖑𝖎𝖈𝖊𝖓𝖙 𝕳𝖎𝖌𝖍𝖙𝖔𝖜𝖊𝖗 𝖍𝖊𝖆𝖉𝖈𝖆𝖓𝖔𝖓 𝕸𝖔𝖉𝖊𝖗𝖓!

Tw: child neglect, under age drinking, smoking weed, platonic, reader is a goth and has tattoos, talks of purity culture, angst, Rhaenyra being reader’s mom.

Author’s note: I wanted to do another one, but this time its in a modern setting.

You came from a wealthy family, which means you come from old money.

You have two older brothers and two older sisters, who played at important role, meanwhile you were just their, it was the Heirs and the spares trope.

Your mother didn’t pay attention to you when you a child, you were basically given money to stay out of her sight or out of way.

Since she wasn’t going to pay you any attention, you might as well go somewhere else.

You would run away a lot, you also disappeared for almost weeks but always returned. Sometimes you’d go to your older sister’s Rhaenyra’s house and spend the night there. 

She didn’t mind you staying, she preferred you stay at her house then to be out there exposed to any kind of danger.

Once you got older, you began to rebel more, first thing you did to piss of your mother, you got a tattoo

 A big tattoo on your arm which was a red dragon. She was not happy, she’s said that you probably hung out around people who were bad influence on you.

Later on you got even more tattoos, at some point your body was just covered in them. When it came to important evens, your mother demanded you cover them, but instead you wore attires that showed them off.

Even if that was the case, you didn’t care. You also began to wear dark colors, mainly blacks, greys, and reds. Also wearing wild makeup and you had cut your hair along with dying it.

Your mother was furious, she wanted you to dress like your sister Helaena like a proper lady and not a delinquent but you didn’t care.

Then their was your brother Aegon, who had gotten you into drinking and smoking weed. It was like a tradition between the two of you.

During the week, you both would sneak out late at night, go buy some wine at a liquor store and smoke weed at a 7/11 parking lot.

It was fun, then your brother Aemond began to join the two of you, he was more of the driver since he didn’t trusts you both driving while intoxicated. 

When it came to school, you went to a fancy private school with your siblings. Everyone knew you guys since you were Targaryen's and had the white hair. 

They knew Aegon for his party animal ways, Helaena for being that weird nice girl, Aemond for his looks and brains. You? They knew you for always getting in a fight.

Of course, you got in trouble and your mother would get calls from the principal. She was not happy, everyone she tells you how you are practically embarrassing the family name, but again you didn’t care.

Otto and Alicent have put you in a boarding school for girls to straighten you out but of course, you got kicked out of them all. So they just stopped.

When it came to mandatory family dinner’s, you only attended because your sister Rhaenyra along with her nephews would come. If they didn’t go, you’d never show up until dinner was over.

You’re not a hug fan of fancy foods, you prefer to eat junk food or fast food with Aegon when you guys go out. But Aemond also makes sure you both eat healthy and not live off Monster Energy Drinks.

Your relationship with Helaena was chill, although your mother often compared you to her, it wasn’t her fault that your mother was demanding. Helaena loves you for you, she doesn’t really care about appearances, once she considered getting a matching bug tattoo with you.

Your mother says she ‘loves’ you but you know she has a strange way of showing it. When you got older she tried to be a part of your life but you always ignored her like she ignored you. 

She began to try and get you married, getting you suiters for you to choose. You always rejected them left and right. Once she had accused you of having sexual affairs like Aegon since you didn’t want to get married, you may be a trouble kid but you had never laid with anyone. 

You actually wished on getting married by love and not appearances but since you were a rich girl, it’ll never happen.

Sometimes they would be magazines or news articles of you coming out of clubs, bars, etc. Sometimes with Aegon, of course your mother has told you that you’re putting the family to shame but you didn’t care about the family name or whatever she has to say.

After having issues with your mother, you left to live with your older sister for a while. Her home didn’t feel like you had be someone you aren’t, it felt comforting really, it felt nice and warm.

Rhaenyra sees you as a daughter, and you see her as a mother. She was their for you when you needed someone. She was there the day of your ballet recital, she was at your school’s play, she was always there.

When it came to mother’s day, instead of making a card for Alicent, you always made Rhaenyra a card, even as you got older you still made her a card.

[tyrantisterror]

Fantastic Rants and Where to Find Them

So, back when the Herbie Porber movies were still being made, Warner Brothers saw the cash cow on their hands and decided they had to lock that shit down as much as possible to make sure they could milk it until its teats were chafed and withered to nothing. To that end, they bought the rights to every book the Terf Queen had written by that point - which included all the Henry Pansley wizard school mystery books, but also two gag books set within the Henry Pansley world: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which was presented as an in-universe biology textbook for wizard children, and Quidditch Through the Ages, which was an in-universe book of trivia for a fake magical sport.

And at the time everyone with a brain who'd read those two books was shaking their head and thinking how dumb those corporate executives were to do that because, like, those aren't novels or novelas or short stories or narratives of any kind. They are, and I cannot stress this enough, a fake textbook and a fake trivia book about fake things written in a slapdash manner as a cheap gag. They existed for three reasons:

First, to sell something Herbie Porber related at a significantly lower price point than the actual novels so the Terf Queen could get more of that sweet, sweet Scholastic Book Fair money by having something poor kids could buy.

Second, to give a portion of the proceeds raised from that poor kid book fair money to charity so the Terf Queen could get some nice tax writeoffs.

And as a distant third, to expand the world-building of the Henry Pansley setting a teensie bit.

Now, as far as I'm aware, they succeeded at the first two well enough - tons of kids bought those cheap-ass thin as shit paperbacks when I was a kid, myself among them. Well, ok, I only bought Fantastic Beasts and skipped Quidditch because even during the height of my Herbie Porber fan days I thought the Terf Queen's imaginary sport was really fucking stupid and every time it popped up in the books I was bored as shit and tried to skim it as quickly as possible to get to the interesting stuff. I think I looked over the book once in a Barnes and Noble and thought, "Wow, I knew I thought real sports were boring as shit, but it turns out fake ones are even more so."

But back on track - goal number three was... kind of successful, I guess? Like, I don't know if you know this, but bestiaries of fictional animals are one of my big interests. I love a big book of made up creatures, and have collected many in my long life of thirty-four years. And as I said, I got a copy of Fantastic Beasts - technically several, because those cheap ass paperbacks disintegrated if you read them more than once, and I haven't met a bestiary that I haven't poured over several times, no matter how shitty. And despite how often I read it, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was, well... pretty mid, honestly. It's a book that's 99% world-building, and like all of the Terf Queen's world-building, it's overall mediocre and undercooked.

Like, in pure Herbie Porber style, it's mostly concepts that have been done in fantasy fiction and mythology dozens of times before with no real original spin on them whatsoever, often stripped down to their most recognizable elements alone. There are a smattering of original ideas that are actually interesting an novel, a few more original ideas that have potential but don't seem very well-thought out as is, and then some that are clearly just there to be a joke and are amusing for, like, a second, but also would quickly become annoying if they were given any focus.

I'll give a very me-specific example. As a fan of vaguely medieval european fantasy tropes, one of the metrics by which I judge a bestiary is "How does this handle dragons?" Because, like, I don't know if you know this, but I love dragons a lot, and the sheer variety of dragons in fiction is one of my favorite things in the world. There is a smorgasbord of different dragons a person can choose from just in folklore and mythology alone, and that variety is reflected in a given bestiary, the higher I think of it.

The Terf Queen's bestiary gives us ten dragon breeds... and they're all more or less the same except for scale color and minor variations in size. Oh, and their names, which are all based on different dog breeds because the Terf Queen thought that was funny. It's the worst of both worlds because it gets your dragon-loving hopes up that there'll be lots of unique dragons but no, they're just different colors, ho hum. Even the Chinese Dragon sticks to the same basic bitch wyvern body plan as the rest, when, you know, Chinese dragons have SUCH a different body plan than any of their European counterparts. It's downright insulting to the variety and creativity of this iconic folkloric archetype to reduce it to such a samey-set of monsters. Absolutely the most disappointing dragon entry in any bestiary I've ever read, just infuriating.

BUT, BACK ON THE INCREASINGLY DERAILED TRACK: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was never meant to be a "great" book. Remember goals one and two: it was a cheap cashgrab, a gimmick, a gag book. It was meant to be a disposable bit of fun - "Tee hee, here's a goofy textbook from this goofy wizard story that you kids will likely grow out of in a few years, you can read it in twenty minutes and not feel bad when you pitch it because there's very little substance to it, and it only costs three bucks."

The Terf Queen doesn't write textbooks, gag or otherwise, she writes novels, narratives, and in its original form Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was clearly just her fucking around with something whimsical and stupid for shits and giggles (and money, sweet sweet money). The original version of it was published with notes in the margin written by Henry Pansley and Donnie Stoat themselves, the two wizard hooligans writing little jokes and messages to each other with further references to other characters from the series, both to add more humor and because, again, the Terf Queen writes novels, and it was clear she couldn't commit to the "fake textbook" bit without working in some characters riffing it for her own sanity. And that makes it work as a gag book - you get a few laughs from the wizard hooligans playing MST3K with their shitty textbook, learn a little about the (undercooked and poorly thought out) ecosystem of the wizardy world, and then when you reach the back cover the spine of your cheap as shit pulp paperback book falls apart and, unless you've got a weird obsession with bestiaries, you throw the dying book in the garbage without a second thought. Three bucks spent well enough.

BUT, TO GET BACK ON THE INCREASINGLY DERAILED TRACK AGAIN: Warner Brothers bought the rights to this cheapo cashgrab gag textbook, and goddamn it, they were/are determined to squeeze Herby Porber's sore teats until every last drop of money milk spills from his chapped and bleeding nipples. They announced they were going to make a Fantastic Beasts movie towards the end of making the Herby Porber novels into films, and everyone with a brain sat there and thought, "Well, that's going to be a stupid cashgrab. Bet the Terf Queen's laughing her ass off at how dumb it'll be, too."

But the Terf Queen was not laughing, at least not for long, for once the Henry Pansley movies wrapped up, she was left with the horrifying knowledge that people didn't care for her non-wizard books all that much, certainly not enough to keep her rolling in sweet, sweet money. She needed that mega millionaire cash, and she needed it in abundance and she needed it quick. So when Warner Brothers asked her to write a movie based on her cheapo cashgrab gag textbook, she said, "Yeah, I can make a novel out of that! I - I'm a talented writer! People love my writing! They definitely love my writing and they'd love to pay money for things I wrote that don't directly feature Henry Pansley!"

So now she had to pretend that Fantastic Beasts, the cheapo cashgrab gag textbook about made up animals in a made up world, has a narrative. Not just any narrative, but a grand, sprawling narrative, one to rival, nay, SURPASS Herbie Porbie and the Seven Books of Wizard-Themed Coming of Age Nonsense. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, she assured us, was to be a magnificant tale, and one she planned all along, and CERTAINLY not a marriage of convenience to a completely stupid idea for a film that she was desperately sculpting into a narrative it had no ability to support for the sake of trying to recapture her already passed glory days as a writer.

And I think, in retrospect, this is a great illustration of the Terf Queen's great character flaw. She just can't fucking admit to a mistake, even when it's obvious to everyone that one was made. She will hop on board a sinking ship and keep doubling down on trying to get it to sail even as the water is up to her neck. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is a serious narrative now, not a gag textbook written to wring a few more dollars from school children goddammit!

Recent editions of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them took out the Herbie and Donnie commentary, by the by. They also added many of the new half-baked monsters that were introduced in the movies, in a shoddy attempt to pretend this was the plan all along, and that Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was always meant to be the seed of something great.

But it wasn't, and no matter how hard the Terf Queen pretends otherwise, it's obvious it wasn't. It's a cheapo cashgrab gag textbook, and that's all it really had to be, until greed and ego demanded otherwise.

[zabberzim]

Fic ideas for the LanDot nation

The many LanDot ideas I have but never got to write (it’s midterms now ;-;)

I’ll classify this into spoilers and non spoilers for the manga so anyone can read this :3

No Spoilers fanwork ideas

Dot gets told that his love life will flourish by a prophet and he is HYPED

Based off the official fan book info where he spends his pocket money on monthly prophet magazines.

Astrology guy x Astronomy guy

Shenanigans ensue

Dot has a nightmare where he is surrounded by Anna dolls

The dolls tell him to confess/make sense of his feelings like the Christmas ghost of the past, the future and the present

Could be a reoccurring nightmare or just a one time thing, both give Dot a sense of “???huh???” But being a little bit of a believer, he really thinks about it and what it could mean.

Feelings realisation with the help of a little girl he’s never personally met

Lance makes merch for Anna and made one of Dot to get back at him

It was funny until it wasn’t, Lance feels like he has to make it look perfect and struggles on how none of the pictures he had does Dot justice. Some of them are goofy in a dorky way, some others are just him being angry, and there are just some that he can’t bring himself to make merch of…

A little bit of feelings realisation, as a treat

And or he can try to get a good photo

Established relationship, Dot and Lance try to keep it low, but their matching earrings/accessories gave it away…

and it’s prequel

Established relationship, the origin of the matching accessories

I HC Lance to show affection through gifts or materialistic means more than Dot (see. His merch collection)

Early in the relationship, a pair of matching accessories catch Lance’s attention. He buys it for himself and Dot to wear together.

Dot was initially a bit bashful but gives in.

Their friends begin to notice this and starts to wonder what’s going on between the two.

There’s a little cut out of Dot in the lower right corner of Lance’s pendant now

RPG AU (based off of light novel/choose your own adventure books 2&3) Dot has his tummy exposed, Lance dotes him on it

On the cover of the 2nd LN/CYOA book, Dot, presumably with the class barbarian, doesn’t have his clothes cover him properly. Being the older brother that he is, Lance dotes on him.

An exposed tummy leaves one with a higher chance of being sick , Lance offers Dot his cape.

Dot is flattered by this but ends up getting sick anyway

Established/Developing relationship: meeting the family

Either Dot brings Lance to meet his family to get semi-interrogated by Malta (Dot’s grandma and mother watch from the sidelines, his grandma is also surprisingly capable of being intimidating)

Or Lance gets Dot to meet Anna, Dot gets seriously interrogated by a 12 year old over tea.

The gang gets an invite to Macaron’s Orchestra when Dot gets to perform as the violinist, Lance is surprised and slightly moved by the music

Dot is good at the violin, of course he should perform.

Lance wasn’t there at the scene where he was playing, so I want him to be the only one slightly surprised at this reveal and very surprised that Dot can actually play well.

Fantasy AU: knights and dragons( Dot is the knight and Lance is the Dragon)

In this fantasy AU, princesses being locked in towers is still something that happens, albeit somewhat rare.

Due to her age and politics of her kingdom, Princess Anna was sent to escape with her brother when their kingdom was under attack. Lance can transform into a dragon because of some potion he took in order to better protect Anna. He keeps her in the tower most of the time for safety, but Anna still gets lonely, so she makes paper airplanes and flies them out to try to find people occasionally (Despite her brother’s disapproval, she does it while he isn’t looking)

Aspiring young knight of a nearby kingdom, who wishes nothing more to find a princess of his own stumbles upon one of these planes (after many attempts to save tower princesses and proposing to girls, royalty or not)

When reaching the tower while Lance was away, it was clear Anna isn’t the princess he’s looking for, but he still plays with her before her brother comes back. (Big scare)

Semi-domestic fluff: Since Anna isn’t the right princess, maybe her brother is ?

Demon AU: Demon Dot and Human Lance

Dot, a demon, accidentally gets summoned when Lance, a human, wanted to summon a guardian Angel for his sister.

With no real return button, Dot’s just stuck there I guess. Lance makes Dot act as Anna’s guardian Angel despite knowing the fact that he’s a demon

(Angels, demons, similar spell; this Demon that he summoned is the best he can get atm, and he technically still has to fulfil his wish of keeping his sister safe. Plus, he’s got some little bits of feathers on his wings, it’s like a discounted Angel at worst)

Other people can see Dot, not his wings, tail or horns though

More details here hehe

(WINGS WINGS WINGS

Hi, I was a Destiel fan , can you tell?)

Excessive use of the Ira Kruez makes Dot ill, team mom Lance is here to help

Sick fic! Using Ira Kruez in the rain causes Dot to have a magical burnout. Lance takes care of him in a sick fic way

Alternatively:

Dot falls from the fucking sky because of a broom mishap, Lance takes care of him with bad pick up lines and more

Mash gets challenged by Lloyd Cavill’s goons and Dot takes up the challenge for his friend. The competition was rigged and a broom mishap happened half way through, leaving Dot badly injured.

Lance is the only one who can take care of him periodically because 1. He’s good with class so he can skip skip sometimes 2. He’s the most capable at take care of people amongst their group of friends.

The bad pick up line part came from “laughter is the best medicine”, it’s advice the others gave to Lance when Dot is still in a magic coma, amongst many other dumb suggestions.

“Did it hurt?”

“Huh??”

“When you fell out of the sky and got a concussion “

A little more display of affection, Dot eating it up.

They are both dumb

Modern AU: Doctor Lance and less successful/ failing musician Dot; And they were roommates

Years after graduation, the gang goes their separate ways. Mash becomes an unconventional cream puff baker, Finn becomes a public servant, Lemon works in her family’s bookshop suspiciously close to Mash’s bakery. Lance works at a high paying job as a successful doctor, and no one really knows what Dot is up to…

A chance meeting after work leads Lance to find out (fuck around, find out)

Lance bumps into Dot at a convenience store. It wasn’t a route he passed by much, so it was a surprise to see the spiky red haired boy there, handing in… something and looking dejected.

Upon meeting Lance’s eyes, Dot hopped over with faux-familiarity and an air of awkwardness when he offered to grab dinner, dragging him by the elbow to leave.

Over some fried rice with a few cups of beer, Dot vents his troubles in finding work after his ambitions to start a band failed; he got kicked out from his last apartment for late rent and his sister is starting to nag him to move out of hers. Lance just pats Dot’s back as he wails shitfaced. In the end, Lance brings Dot home so he can rest.

Naturally, Lance paid for that meal.

In this AU, the gang are all adults, so I HC Anna to be in junior/high school.

Anna obviously would live with Lance. Idk if i should make Anna’s illness a thing in this AU.

The Crown family is middle high class, fairly influential,

Despite Lance’s success, they cut ties with him (homophobia? )

Anyways that my idea

TBC

Spoilers to manga)

Lance has difficulty balancing work as a new DV, Dot offers to help out as his assistant DV

Between Anna, school work and DV work, life has been hard to handle as of late. Shortly after a chat with Orter Madl, unlikely help appears in the form of Dot Barrett!

Dot’s reason for volunteering as his assistant :

It’d look good on his CV

He can spend more time at the Bureau of Magic, maybe the three of them can get lunch tgt more often

It’s a good opportunity to poke fun at Lance

Established relationship: PTSD or nightmares of the final battle

The scene was so all too familiar to him: Lance rushing forward to block the projectiles before he could even react; his warm body slumping down on his as the smell of iron, the liquidy feeling of warm blood seeps through the cape into his palms, now stained red. What if Lance died that day? Why is he always putting himself in danger?

Memories of the final battle twist into nightmares in Dot’s mind

Dot finds a pin with his face on it among the many other Anna pins

Short and sweet, possible sequel to Lance making Dot merch fic idea.

Remember the sea of Anna pins that acted as chain mail for Lance? Imagine Lance changing it every once in a while.

As roommates, Dot might notice something special when Lance leaves his cloak on his bed one day

Lance and Dot buy back to school products for Anna

As a newly enrolled student of Easton Academy, it’s necessary to buy new things to get ready for this brand new school life.

After no one else being willing to go, Lance drags Dot along with him with the promise of treating him to something nice

It turns into a shopping date

Future AU :they get married

They get married and boom Ira kreuz

TBC

*funny thing is that I’ve written the start to some of these already, I’ve just never gotten around to finishing them…

[otaku-tyriq]

Do you have top 10 or top 7 favorite (fictional) characters (if you feel like listing multiple) of all time from any media?

That is actually a very tricky question, dear Anon. For you see the list if my favourite characters is CONSTANTLY changing. Similar to my list of my favourite songs haha. So I cannot give you a set "All time Favourite” list but I can offer you a "List of Characters Tyriq enjoys at this very moment on the 18th of March 2024”

1) Nero Claudius from Fate/Extra, Fate/Last Encore, Fate/Extella and Fate/Grand Order

The second I had first heard this woman say "umu” that was it for me. I knew I’d be obsessed with her for the rest of my days. She is adorable, she is loyal, she is THAT GIRL, a queen, an emperess, a goddess, and just seeing her instantly makes my brain pump out serotonin. Who even needs anti depressants when you can have Nero.

2) Vash the Stampede from Trigun Stampede

Babygirl. Princess. Loserboy. Golden Retriever Puppy. Beloved Wife. He’s adorable, pathetic, a wonderfully tragic yet optimistic character. He’s my beautiful little princess and I lay my life down before him.

3)Yoimiya from Genshin Impact

Her absolute happy go lucky attitude and sweet personality is like liquid gold shot straight into my arteries. I had fallen in love with this woman the very second I had laid eyes on her. Also she has been my main for two years at this point she’s genuinly just that fun to play.

4) Kaveh from Genshin Impact

The suffering artist trope CRANKED UP TO ELEVEN! Again like Vash this man is equally tragic as he is kindhearted and despite having been scammed out of his money multiple times he still cannot help but sacrifice his own well being if it would result in someone else’s happiness. Also before you ask: Yes, I do ship him and Alhaitham

5) Ichiban Kasuga from Yakuza

What else can I say about Ichiban other than he’s almost stupidly optimistic and no matter how hard of a curveball life throws at him, he ALWAYS keeps the attitude of "once you hit rock bottom the only way is up.”, always trying to both see and bring out the best in people. Also he’s a massive Dragon Quest fan so obviously I’d end up obsessing over this beautiful specimen of a man who at the age of 42 still is not 100% sure where women pee from.

6) Erik from Dragon Quest XI

Honestly I could have EASILY put the entire main cast of Dragon Quest XI on this list because the characters of that game are simply that likeable and well written, but if I had to choose one, it would have to be your very first party member and the hero’s best friend and totally platonic roommate Erik. This man’s sassy attitude yet undying loyalty and devotion towards the hero is so strong not even the apocalypse itself could tear the hero and Erik apart for long.

7) Ryuji Sakamoto from Persona 5

I think at this point y’all are starting to see a pattern in my favourite characters: Ryuji is loyal like a golden retriever puppy, absolutely adorable and sweet with a severe lack of Braincells.

8) Silver the Hedgehog from the Sonic the Hedgehog Franchise

Silver has literally been my favourite Sonic character since Childhood. His whole stick is that he’s unbeatable optimistic. Despite becoming from an apocalyptic future where everything is covered in flames, he never stops believing that things can become better if you try. His naivety however leads to characters like Mephilis abusing his optimism for their own agenda. But none of that stops Silver from

being one of my greatest comfort characters.

9) William James Moriarty from Moriarty the Patriot

✨Be Gay. Do Crime✨

✨Communism✨

✨Clinical Depression✨

All these things and more describe William James Moriarty and he’s so valid for it.

10) The Professor from Puppet History

He’s just a little guy. He’s a little guy and it’s his birthday

[jellydrawsposts]

as a corvus fan i NEED his dad's lore. you said you had it GIVE IT TO MEE (foaming at the mouth) /nf

I HAVE AN ENTIRE 6 CHAPTER FANFIC HIDDEN IN MY VAULTS ABOUT THIS MAN AND CORVUS’S FAMILY YOU HAVE NO IDEA THE LORE STORM I GOT THIS IS YOUR ONE LONG POST WARNING

Cw: mentions of difficult pregnancies, life altering injuries, and death of loved ones (this ends happy i swear)

So, to start his name is Dionice.

He was born and raised in a small town in the borderland forest with his parents who were both in the military. They lived in a nice two story home and had a happy life.

When he was 12 years old his parents had been summoned on a mission, he had tried to ask them to stay but they promised they’d be back before he knew it.

Three weeks later he was greeted at the door by strangers who told him his parents died Heros. They hadn’t felt like heroes to him.

Dionice inherited the home and his parents money, regardless of course he had to fend for himself.

Because of that he grew resentful of the military, scowling when requiters were in town and vowing to keep his family far away from petty battles and disputes.

He took up a couple of hunting jobs and soon it became his profession, he learned how to set traps, make his own tools and weapons, and to sneak.

It was during one of his hunts that he met Soleil. She was a young woman about his age foraging however she had scolded him on his traps and gave him an earful being mindful of only taking what you need from the land.

She helped him with his traps and techniques and Dionice found himself curious about her. She wasn’t someone he recognized from town, and she seemed to be alone.

As the months went on they fell in love and that was when Dionice found out about her mother, a woman who didn’t seem to approve of him no matter what he did.

In the end her approval hadn’t mattered and he and Soleil married with them deciding to live in his home.

Dionice knew he wanted a big family and so did Soleil. They hadn’t wanted their children to grow up lonely like they had.

When Soleil was 24 years old and he was 25, they were preparing for their first child. She had choosen his name, Corvus.

However as time went on Soleil was finding herself fainter and weaker. She struggled eating and keeping herself upright. And the night Corvus was born she passed.

For a while Dionice struggled as a grieving widower and a new single father, of course he couldn’t leave Corvus alone when he went on his hunts but he had no one else to turn to. Until unexpected help came.

His late wives mother, Aimee. With her help the two raised Corvus for 7 years until one day Dionice met a cello player in town named Linet. They married a year later and had three more children: Letitia, Silas, and Mielle.

For a few years live was good and happy. Corvus was learning how to play the cello with his step mother, Aimee was finally civil with him and adored Corvus, his youngest children all played together, and the house he inherited was finally full and alive.

Then one hunt went wrong, he had traveled much closer to the border then he perhaps should have

He remembered startling awake to a thunderous roar, it was a dragon no doubt.

Perhaps it had a bad day or perhaps something had happened but regardless the sound shook the cave he had been resting in and it collapsed onto him, trapping his legs. It had took time but he had managed to free himself.

He spent weeks trying to return home, injured and malnourished. When he woke from a rest he found himself back home at last, and was told the news that he’d have a long healing journey before he is able to stand and walk on his own again.

They suggested walking aids from Evenere, but the cost alone on them was far too much not to mention the risk of travel. With him out of the job at least for the foreseeable future and his wife being a teacher at the time he knew if would be a rough patch.

One they could get through but not without some difficulty.

Corvus, now 15 years old, had insisted on helping. Searching for jobs in town, and taking up his hunting mantel.

One day when they both found themselves at the shops he had turned and spotted Corvus speaking to a ginger solider. He had rushed over in an instant, pulling away his son from the man. He made Corvus swear he wouldn’t enlist.

Despite the recited promise could see the look in his son’s eyes. It was one that would not waiver.

A few days later he woke to Letitia, his eldest daughter, who held a note from Corvus. It was an apology for the broken promise

He spent weeks trying to find his son he laid awake at night fearing a dreadful knock. One morning a message arrived at his door, from a General Amaya apologizing that Corvus had managed to sneak in under the false impression that he was an orphan.

She also explained although Corvus had deceived them, she’d be happy to train him and invited him to see Corvus offering to pay for the expenses.

When he and his family arrived they watched Corvus spar with his fellow peers.

He had came here ready to scold Corvus, ready to take him home but the smile on his boys face. The pride in which he carried himself as if this is something he had always wanted to do softened him.

Dionice remembered the times he trained with Corvus on how to use the weapon he made him, the nights they spent camping together and learning how to fend for himself, and his son’s brave and just nature.

With a heavy heart he allowed his son to stay and train.

Dionice now works with his wife and her new instrument shop. He uses a cane when he knows he’ll be moving a lot to help minimize the pain.

Though the years passed Corvus sent letters frequently, and despite them doing better Corvus always sent them a little of his pay. They could rarely send letters back since their son is always on the move or hiding.

Although it sounds as if things had been changing and perhaps soon enough Corvus will be settled down.

Dionice is happy at the thought of finally being able to send some of his words back to his son.

Mostly about how he is proud.

[mrdragonageherself]

Also related to dragon age I know I was super critical last night and I still have really low hopes but I do truly love the dragon age series I'm just so disappointed that EA keeps getting away with treating their fans and consumer base like shit thinking we'll lap up anything they give us for massive money when they abused and mistreated their staff and are so out of touch with what constitutes a good game because they don't care if we like it, they care if we BUY it.

But I am interested in Bellara and Davrin especially, with a special shout out to Lucanis and Taash. I'll always be sad they named a character Neve and spelled it that way so it tarnishes my opinion of the character but I am very excited for those characters.

I still maintain my criticisms. The voice acting in the ad sounded bad and low quality, with varric not even sounding like himself. I don't know why they made varric dark haired to show he's greying like... you can make him strawberry blonde and greying it IS possible. Harding sounded weird too and while I'm happy we finally have a dwarf romance option I wish it was a new character not someone we've met already. If they were going to give us someone we met already it shouldve been varric and it should've been in inquisition. (OR DA2 BECAUSE LETS BE REAL HIM AND HAWKE ARE SOUL MATES but varric *was* a new character in da2).

I also didn't love the art style but I didn't love it in inquisition either, i didn't mind if they went more cartoon-like, like they did in dragon age 2, I just wish it didn't feel like a different company made it every time and also I found the art style hard to process while in motion like the FPS was off, like I struggle with halo my brain just doesn't properly process what I'm seeing so I hope it flows better and is more comprehensive in game.

Also when people said they wanted it to be grim dark again we didn't mean literally get rid of lighting. Let's not pull a GOT here. And the criticisms of the script I think are still fair, DA:O and DA:2 were more grim dark than DA:I but they still had humour (it was in fact, a main draw in the game), people aren't looking to remove the humour from a grim dark they're just commenting it feels like very generic recycled and over used Hollywood phrases that lack real personality which is concerning.

I do have some hope and I desperately hope the game turns out to be good, and want to enjoy the characters and story, I just have really low expectations and the ad didn't make me feel much better.

Also whyyyyyy do all the handsome black male characters have a close shaved head like whyyyyy Davrin is an elf they could've given him soooo many cool hair styles, shaved sides and dreads, or long braids with beading, bantu knots, twists, an afro, ANYTHING but we got another shaved head. Which speaks to what we can expect from the character creator hair options as well, I suspect. I'm not even a proper curly girl if you're being GENEROUS my hair is 3A, but mostly 2C and there is never ANY curly options that are decent even a little bit I am always left wanting so I can only imagine how people with type 4 curls feel looking at the character creator options.

Anyways dragon age rant over.

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

Long post incoming...

I guess I'll try to be more reasonable and put things into perspective.

I also happened to come out of FURIOSA earlier today, which to me felt like a nice antidote to what Hollywood tends to pump out when it comes to big franchises. A prequel that really expands the Wasteland world of MAD MAX without feeling like a Glup Shitto-fest. I was pretty much glued the whole time, astounded at what it was going for, the big swings it took and - in my eyes - greatly succeeded at. You can tell creator/director George Miller loves this world, and wanted to expand it meaningfully with both this and MAD MAX: FURY ROAD, after 30 years of the series being a trilogy. And apparently without anyone getting in his way, at that. Rare for a big action film.

Did you know Miller, who also directed the likes of... THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK, LORENZO'S OIL, BABE: PIG IN THE CITY (and pretty much was a huge part of the original BABE), the HAPPY FEET movies, and THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING... Did you know one of his favorite films is Walt Disney's PINOCCHIO? Which had a massive influence on him and his work?

Oh yeah, PINOCCHIO... The second-ever Disney animated feature film, a film designed to be like its European fairy tale-inspired predecessor - SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS - but double that, with its more sprawling story and larger budget. More multiplane shots, whole scenes in the ocean, all that hand-animated, meticulously hand-painted water...

And it was the exact opposite of SNOW WHITE when first released in February 1940. While reviews were generally positive, not really as glowing as SNOW WHITE's reception, it was largely impacted by World War II breaking out across the Atlantic. It couldn't play in the European countries where SNOW WHITE made tons of money, and the money it managed to make in the ally territories - the UK and France - wasn't going to cut it. Its American gross was solid, certainly in the shadows of the huge hit that was out at the time - GONE WITH THE WIND... But again, it couldn't cover the film's astronomical costs. Unthinkable for a film, whose opening song, is pretty much synonymous with Disney today... Once a big flop, now it's absolutely definitively Disney...

The Disney studio would continue to lose a lot of money during this period. FANTASIA did not appeal to audiences, and BAMBI also lost money. Only the relatively-cheaper DUMBO managed to make back its shoestring cost, in addition to appealing to audiences more than the experimental dialogue-free epic and the more lyrical, dramatic forest tale. Disney was deep in debt, and spent the rest of the decade making and releasing movies known as "The Package Features". Anthologies composed of short films/featurettes, with some sort of loose linking device for them. Disney wouldn't return to doing a singular type of story following one set of characters until CINDERELLA, released in February 1950 to critical acclaim and great box office.

Some animation fans and historians divide the Walt years into two halves, the Golden Age covering the streak that began with the runaway success of STEAMBOAT WILLIE and ended with World War II's impact on the studio's first five feature films. (Or six, if you count the hybrid THE RELUCTANT DRAGON.) The Silver Age, covering everything thereafter up until Walt's passing, typically marked at the posthumous 1967 release of THE JUNGLE BOOK. Again, in terms of features. I'd mark it at December 1968, when the 2nd Winnie the Pooh featurette - THE BLUSTERY DAY - was released. The wartime losses took so much out of the studio, that Walt and Roy O. Disney reached some compromises, which - to some - affect the features going forward.

Films like CINDERELLA and PETER PAN avoided the elaborate multiplane effects and minute details of PINOCCHIO and BAMBI, making up for it in their striking art direction and filmmaking choices. The storytelling is also something of a shift. Few of those films attempt to wear the frightening elements of SNOW WHITE and PINOCCHIO, the kinds of scenes that Walt often got angry letters from parents over. After BAMBI, not counting the package features, the death of a major "good" character was pretty much hands off as well. For example, during production of LADY AND THE TRAMP, singer/actress Peggy Lee begged the filmmakers not to kill off Trusty at the end of the picture, following his accident with the dogcatcher wagon. Walt and co. complied. By the time you get to the '60s, Walt's final years among the living, you're a country mile from the early films. THE SWORD IN THE STONE and THE JUNGLE BOOK are very lax "characters exist" kinds of movies, the latter having some danger in the form of the impending encounter with Shere Khan. Otherwise, they are much lighter in tone, much more fun-loving, like romps.

Over the years, I've come to really appreciate those later films for the things my 20-something year-old self tended to criticize them for. When really, it's just a matter of fact. Change happened, maybe had to happen, in order for the Disney studio to survive and keep making animated feature films. Few other studios during the Golden Age of Animation could afford such a luxury. The Fleischer brothers certainly gave it a shot, with GULLIVER'S TRAVELS in 1939 and MR. BUG GOES TO TOWN in 1941, but the falling out between Max and Dave coupled with distributor Paramount's neglect of MR. BUG put a stop to that. Feature-length films would be made in other countries using techniques other than traditional animation, though some studios in America would later get in on it once again - albeit with lower-costing methods.

But when Walt was around, it was really only him producing feature-length animated films on a regular basis. And to keep going with that, and not just making more money off of only the re-issues of SNOW WHITE and such, he and his crew ultimately changed course and... Well... I'll say it, I feel they still put in the hard work on a bad day. Even the films of the '50s and '60s that I don't like as much as some others, there's still... Say, a Milt Kahl head swaggle or something great from Frank & Ollie in there. Or a great score, or a good sense of pace, the late great Robert and Richard Sherman absolutely going off with a banger song somewhere, very inspired background art, etc. No slouching! Something like THE JUNGLE BOOK is very much as important to me as PINOCCHIO.

I've come to love all of it, really, even with perceived flaws or the results of the studio changing gears. The work of the animators, artists, musicians, etc.... They pulled the weight and then some, and even the more "middling" films of decades past hold some sort of special place...

Maybe this situation applies to the apparent mandates that Disney executives are compromising Pixar with.

Pixar went for many, many years without a box office loss. THE GOOD DINOSAUR, which was made during John Lasseter's 11-year reign, was the first film to lose money for them. It was released *20 years* after TOY STORY came out, and it's their 16th overall film. I remember the media trying to chalk it up to the film's troubled production, which is a silly sentiment, because TOY STORY 2 and RATATOUILLE were similarly-rough, rocky roads. That one just... Didn't appeal, no matter what work and effort went into it, and I also think STAR WARS 7 opening mere weeks later kinda cut into it as well. It was kinda tossed off by Disney's marketing department after INSIDE OUT debuted earlier that year.

But, it was viewed as a minor dent in the armor. CARS 3 didn't really break even when released in the summer of 2017, but that was a CARS movie, so a lot of people kinda just shrugged at that. John Lasseter was then slowly ousted from the Disney company as a whole months later... Not because of that film, or GOOD DINOSAUR, but because he was exposed by the Me Too movement that erupted in fall 2017. Lasseter abdicated his leadership roles at Pixar, Disney Animation, Disneytoon, and Imagineering, right before the release of COCO that autumn. With Pete Docter taking over as CCO of Pixar in June 2018, perhaps all eyes were on him. Unlike Lasseter, Docter was only running Pixar. Not WDAS, not Disneytoon (which was swiftly shut down upon Lasseter's exit), and no major presence in the parks apparently... How would he take on such a task?

Docter, I feel, had something going there. Lasseter's Pixar became what Ken called Sunnyside Daycare in TOY STORY 3, he turned the place into a pyramid and he put himself on top. So many directors and animators exodused out of Pixar in the early 2010s, notably Brenda Chapman, who had words upon being taken off of her film BRAVE. All of Lasseter's goodwill completely vanished after it was learned that he made many women at the studio - and at WDAS - very uncomfortable, and when it was very clear that he only favored his TOY STORY colleagues and wasn't keen on letting women nor PoC direct films at his studio. Docter sought to reverse that, and to let the filmmakers tell stories that meant a lot to them. Much in the same way he, Lasseter, Andrew Stanton, Lee Unkrich, and Brad Bird did when Pixar was relatively new to making features. It truly was like old times, and I myself was very excited about that.

And it seemed like the sky was the limit... What could go wrong? ONWARD was cut right off, in its second weekend, by the pandemic. SOUL, LUCA, and TURNING RED went straight to Disney+ in the U.S. and most other territories, and their subsequent limited theatrical debuts - expectedly - didn't do great. I see that situation as similar to World War II cutting right into Disney's animated features in the 1940s, impacting the studio/distributor's ability to give them a wide release (at the time, Disney was not big enough to be their own distributor, it was RKO Radio Pictures who were handling the releases of the movies)... and the way the world is now, how expensive it is to take a trip to the movies, what a gamble it is... Animated movies aren't guaranteed smash hits anymore, unless you're something like Mario or Minions, or some entry in a beloved franchise. Remember how PUSS IN BOOTS 2 literally had to claw its way up to such a winning gross and record multiplier? If that had cost the same amount of money as ELEMENTAL had cost to make? It'd be considered a big failure.

LIGHTYEAR was Pixar's big return to theaters, a summer bow in 2022 that was part of the studio's beloved TOY STORY franchise. It opened great, too. $50m! Quite above what other animated movies had been opening with from 2021 to now... But the legs were terrible, word of mouth was sour, audiences just didn't seem to like it. A rare swing and a miss. Pete Docter pulled a "Walt Disney responding to ALICE IN WONDERLAND's disastrous release circa 1951", taking the blame for the film's box office woes. ELEMENTAL opened blah, but had incredible word of mouth. Even Disney boss Bob Iger seemed happy with its slow-burn ride to $500m at the worldwide box office, until he wasn't... Now that's a failure, along with SOUL, LUCA, and TURNING RED... Which all didn't get to enjoy full theatrical releases due to a worldwide crisis that's actually still going on...

So now, the corporate logic is... Those movies all failed because they're too "autobiographical", the filmmakers' respective catharses being told through 90min animated movies apparently doesn't appeal to audiences... and that in order to be financially successful again, Pixar needs to make films with more "general" appeal. Pete Docter is not John Lasseter, and I feel the press takes advantage of that. Docter apologizes for films not appealing, whereas Lasseter - when his CARS 2 got panned by most critics - defended critical missteps with his chest. It's as if he still ruled at the end of the day and no one could touch him - given his four leadership roles within the company, while the quieter Docter... Not so much. I get the sense that Disney execs can push him around and the press can easily label him a weak leader, while John seemed invincible. Iger, for example, was aware of his erratic, gross behavior at awards ceremonies well before Me Too caught up with the Hawaiian shirt man... And he was very concerned, but... Lasseter kept his job for another decade, almost unscathed.

I get that studios often have these sorts of "Well, we've had trouble, what should we be making then?" moments. I feel that singling out the three films that went straight to streaming during a pandemic, and another that was high budget and was operating in a much different theatrical landscape than before, is not it, though. SOUL, LUCA, TURNING RED, and ELEMENTAL were liked by most audiences. They got good to great reviews. They were all nominated for Oscar.

This isn't like how FANTASIA and BAMBI were perceived by critics and audiences in the early 1940s. The mixed-to-negative reactions to those films back then must've played a part in Walt and Roy focusing on relatively safer films in the future. For example, CINDERELLA leaned into what audiences loved about SNOW WHITE, 12 1/2 years prior, and was one of Disney's huge hits of that decade that also did exemplary in re-issues. There's a reason the two big flops of the '50s, for Disney Animation, were the more experimental films - ALICE IN WONDERLAND and SLEEPING BEAUTY. Nowadays, both of those movies are beloved and like PINOCCHIO, FANTASIA, and BAMBI... Are synonymous with Disney, often ranked among the best, cream of the crop. The time isn't always right for certain movies...

But things are often unfair in these big entertainment conglomerates, who are run by money hoarders who only think in the moment... and if Pixar's gonna try to do this "general appeal" thing, they would still have to let filmmakers have all the fun that they can feasibly have with the stories. The current iteration of Disney Animation is buckled under so much executive interference, and test screenings where 7-year-olds dictate what goes in and what doesn't, and... Well... Look at their resulting output. How they still try to do the job passionately and not merely just pass the grade. It's like I'm watching them struggle to get their creativity out on films like RAYA, STRANGE WORLD, and WISH. It's, to me, much like where things were for them circa 1980-82.

And after nearly 30 years of making features, maybe Pixar might enter such a phase themselves, as executives place the blame squarely on the filmmakers for their own failures and uncontrollable outside circumstances... Like I said, we'll have to see how they navigate this particular set of rules. Does it work out for them? Does it create movies that audiences mostly don't care for? Who knows... Maybe I myself will like the movies still, maybe I won't even notice a difference... Maybe this is will all be moot, every sentence of it... But we'll see...

[lynxtopia]

Can I trouble you for your personal headcannons for the Dolls?

OF COURSE OF COURSE!!

THANK YOU SO MUCH

Well let's see,,, I have headcanons for most bits of the group as a whole (Löwenzahn included)

No particular order, I write them as I remember them lmfao 😭

Im so sorry if these seem all over the place, these are the ones I can remember off the top of my head with a few hours of sleep, I have a big document somewhere with a load of info in it for a project. I'll reference that when I get my hands on it again.

Also most of these are more lighthearted than you'd expect to some degree lol I'm better at remembering the stupid stuff rather than the angst stuff.

I personally believe Enero's got quite a posh background. That little interaction with Karin cemented that in stone for me. She's got a lot of money and likes to dish it out, although she occasionally relies on bribery to get her way.

The Löwenzahn are a mix of former infantry soldiers and kidnapped Doll candidates. The amount of troops is pretty much unknown because Bison likes to spread them out across the globe, moving them about more than the actual soldiers.

Février's visor is a cover-up for bad eyesight. A friend of mine mentioned it in a fic they wrote once and I stole the headcanon for myself. She didn't want to wear glasses because she thought they'd make her look like a nerd. Now she realises they make her look hot.

Santamu used to have a mini wardrobe of coats and other outerwear for Kiki whenever they got send out to colder areas. Aprile wasn't really the biggest fan of the whole thing.

Noembelu is/was very close to März. She knew she was quite shy and not very good at the whole socialising bit so she used to stick close to her to comfort. A bit like a cheetah/emotional support dog dynamic except the emotional support dog is secretly a cheetah with the same issues.

Xiayu, Jianyu, Cammy and Decapre have all tried talking to each other telepathically before, not that it's ever worked. (They got the idea from watching a cartoon about having twin powers or something like that.)

Prior to Kiki, the group had actually snuck another pet into the barracks. A fucking Komodo Dragon... at Satsuki's request.

Enero and Noembelu continuously try to have a conversation in Spanish, although, because of the differences between Latin American and European Spanish it generally becomes a huge mass of "What? Fuck you, slow down. Huh? What does that mean?" Etc.

The youngest Löwenzahn recruit was about 12. How she got there was unknown. All that mattered was that the older ones kept her as safe as they could.

A lot of the recruits (at least past-1991-2 recruits) are actually raised into the system. Same with the soldiers. They're taken at fairly young ages and raised within the facility. The distress this programme caused worldwide continued to feed Bison's never ending joy.

Noembelu hates her original name. After joining Shadaloo, she began to think that calling her family naming her "Little" was insulting. She doesn't see it like that anymore, but she still believes that Little Eagle was a different person to who she is now.

Xiayu frequently scares the others with her Opera makeup + skills. Practising Shua Ya has scared the shit out of Jianyu more than I can count.

Santamu used to do javelin and was really good at it, hence why she chose her weapon to be a spear. Although sometimes she wished she had chosen a weapon other than just that.

There was a group, a test group, prior to the main Dolls. Most of the information on them was burned. Some say there were two, others say three, five etc. Most people accept that the initial group are 6-feet under. However, the sites conspiracy theorists think otherwise.

Juni is forever crushing on at least three girls at the same time, whether she realises it or not.

Cammy remembers a lot of things the others don't, despite her amnesia. Only thing is,is that she remembers them only when under the influence.

Enero and Jianyu scrap constantly. No reason to, they just leap at each other at any given moment.

The rank system in place for the group is kind of complicated. There are a ton (sometimes a rank only having one person in it.) And difficult to go through just by memory. The main Dolls unit typically holds the highest, or highest achievable, rank in their selected area of expertise. The only ones that don't apply to this are Enero, Jianyu, Xiayu and Juni, as the last three don't really have an area of expertise aside from Close Quarters. Enero is excluded because she holds the rank just below General. Bison keeps her there because it keeps her loyal.

Jianyu and Juni hold Colonel-equivalent ranks, Jianyu having hers because Bison was very amused by her and Enero's constant fighting and Juni because she can be trusted enough to hold such an important title.

Xiayu is a Major. Jianyu promises not to tease her about it but sometimes she likes to test how far she can push her luck before she tries to break her nose.

März frequently has to be the one changing the HDMI cables and having to explain all the different channels. (She likes doing it when she has the confidence).

Whilst it is typically Mid and High-Ranks jobs to teach the Apprentice Dolls, sometimes the main group get assigned about a troop to train.

Février eats crayons... dun dun dunnn...

Decapre struggles quite a bit with anxiety. She holds some resentment towards Cammy, but can't bring herself to do any proper damage for fears of hurting her and herself. Although, this mindset changes during Ultra IV because now they've done some weird tests on her.

The girls have combined their weapons before. Satsuki and Février made Murasame (katana #1) into a makeshift bayonet, which worked as well as you would expect it to.

Aprile secretly wishes that she could've done more for the group whilst at Shadaloo, fearing she may have been too harsh on them during their time there. Nobody thinks bad of her, just she thinks they believe she's a failure, just a tiny remnant of her past that she's clung onto.

März' consciousness still exists, although where and what it was put into is unknown. Fangs torture machine? Seth 6.9? A spare body? Cammy has a feeling she's still out there somewhere, much like Bison. Although, unlike Dictator, she believes she'll come back against Shadaloo.

Jianyu and Xiayu currently get their funds via Contract Killing. Who or what they work for is unbeknownst to them. They just get paid... Also the reason why Xiayu still has the face paint. She's ashamed of their current state and wishes for better. Oh and because she doesn't want to be recognised by the police.

Santamu is part of Neo-Shadaloo, although on more of an external branch. She let them keep Kiki because she immediately connected with the drastic amounts of chaos.

Anne and Bess did exist, although, their records were wiped, anybody involved was forced to sign an NDA, and they were buried under the main Shadaloo site to avoid any civilian discovering them at some point.

And that's about it for now. Thank you for inquiring! I'll be sure to have my notes on me for the ones I didn't mention next time lol.

[a-student-out-of-time]

There has been some terrible news. Firstly Rooster Teeth an early success story for indie studios, has been shut down by Warner Brothers in another example of corporate greed. While Rooster Teeth isn’t exactly guilt free as many people have issues with it, it’s still devastating for those who have lost their jobs and livelihoods. RWBY and Red vs Blue are being sold off and the news regarding Death Battle is uncertain (1/2)

//I've heard, trust me. I've been sitting on it for a while now, because I've been unsure of how to react. What I'll say is, no matter their faults, both of them shaped their respective mediums and helped make them what they are now. They were both a major part of millions of peoples' childhoods.

//Toriyama is, of course, the creator of one of the most popular shonen anime ever created. I don't need to tell you about Dragon Ball because you already know it; for the vast majority of people, it's probably what they think of when anime comes to mind.

//And sure, he wasn't perfect. He's had his flaws and some elements of his work haven't aged well, but I'd like to share a story that really cemented by respect for Toriyama as a creator. It was, ironically, when he retired between 1996 and 2012.

//When Dragon Ball: Evolution, the infamous in-name-only adaptation of his work, was in production, nobody involved listened or cared what he had to say about it. They weren't trying to make an adaptation of his work of passion or respect, they were using the name to make money.

//Considering that Toriyama, by his own admission, was a pretty laid-back guy who would put off doing his work until the last minute, the fact they managed to get under his skin is a testament to how god-awful that movie was. I don't blame the actors, I blame the corporate parasites who wanted money.

//What matters here is, after seeing the end result, Toriyama was so horrified at the idea that this would be his legacy, he came out of retirement and went back to creating Dragon Ball. That was how we got Battle of the Gods, Resurrection F, and the Dragon Ball Super series.

//He wasn't doing this for money, but because of a renewed passion for creation. The man could've stayed retired and lived comfortably, but what mattered more to him was artistic integrity. I can't tell you how much I respect that.

//As for Rooster Teeth, well...I have fewer nice things to say about where they went as a company. There's no denying they played a major role in how machinima and internet content as a whole is created, with the style of Red vs. Blue being the most influential.

//Rooster Teeth was, for me and for a lot of other people, a big part of their childhoods with RVB and RWBY. They had some very talented and creative people, who put their all into making things that did have a positive impact in the creative world.

//Just as there's also no denying that a lot of troubling things happened behind the scenes as things went on, from enforcing crunch time to deflecting criticism to other mistreatments of employees. There were times it did feel like they were coasting by on the positive reputation they once had. Things like the controversy involving Ryan Haywood also didn't help matters. That, for me, was the moment I really started to drift away from the group.

//But at the same time, I still think about the day that Geoff Ramsay opened a video they released after laying off 50 employees talking about how it was one of the darkest days in their history. He went on to talk about how much fan support means to them, and how important Rooster Teeth is to him and how he wants people to find something they're passionate about, just as he's passionate about the company.

//Seeing that, hearing how they considered calling it a day, but deciding to instead keep going out of respect for the people they had to let go, I do think it rings of that same artistic integrity. Was it naive? In hindsight, maybe so, but I never doubted it was genuine.

//Thinking about that, about how they've had people decrying their creative pursuits and the very clear passion and interest they all had in wanting to do things, just to see it cut down by corporate greed? It really stings.

//Honestly, it reminds me of this one line from Bojack Horseman:

You know what it's like? It's like that show "Becker," you know, with Ted Danson? I watched the entire run of that show, hoping that it would get better, and it never did. It had all the right pieces, but it just… It couldn't put them together. And when it got cancelled, I was really bummed out, not because I liked the show, but because I knew it could be so much better, and now it never would be. And that's what losing a parent is like. It's like "Becker." Suddenly, you realize you'll never have the good relationship you wanted, and as long as they were alive, even though you'd never admit it, part of you - the stupidest goddamn part of you - was still holding on to that chance. And you didn't even realize it until that chance went away.

//I guess there's a part of me that still holds onto the idea that, no matter how far a creator falls or how bad a work gets, maybe there's a chance they could get better. But when something closes down, gets cancelled or sold off, that chance goes away.

//I've seen so many criticisms of RWBY over the years, very passionate discussions about the show's flaws and how disappointing it is. They weren't just mindlessly bashing it for fun, they were talking about how the show has potential and could be made to work, and they were clearly coming from people who wanted it to be good.

//Now it's getting sold to someone who may have even less care for that creative vision, and that could be an even bigger tragedy than if the show were just cancelled. The fact that nobody on the staff even knew until they saw a Twitter post about it shows how little even the current people in charge cared.

//To the people still working on it and all current fans of RWBY, I sympathize completely.

//Idk what else to say. Between these events, and the news that Matpat is leaving Game Theory, it's been jarring seeing all these hits to my youth and the youths of many others. At least it all came when I was out of my depressive episode ^^;

//So what can we take away from all this? I think the biggest is the importance of artistic authenticity and passion for your craft. Not just enjoying what you do, but being willing to hear criticisms and use that to improve yourself. People who constructively criticize you do so because they want to see you improve your work.

//It's a lesson I've tried to live by and I'll continue to live by as long as I'm creating things. And while these losses might hurt, I'm glad that they were part of my life.

//Do I think that this is somehow the end of all creative freedom on the internet forever, as I'm sure someone may ask? No, of course not. This was an example of corporate greed and a tragic death, things that have happened and will continue to happen so long as capitalism is here and immortality is not.

//But if you look at the clear successes of independent works and passion projects, such as the many fangans I've shared my thoughts on, there's obviously still passion in creatives out there. Passion I hope to continue to be a part of.

//And sometimes, bad things like this happen and you get something even better out of it. From Walt Disney's bad management leading to people splitting off and creating Looney Tunes, to the miserable development of Daikatana being superseded by Deus Ex, to the slump of brown and grey military shooters being outdone by works like Portal in the late 2000's.

//Your creations will outlast you, and that's why I believe in artistic authenticity and improving your craft. Give people something they won't just enjoy now, but they'll have to remember you fondly when you're gone and to have as a source of comfort and joy through the dark moments in their lives.

[lgbtqmanga]

New Releases June 13, 2023

At 30, I Realized I Had No Gender: Life Lessons From a 50-Year-Old After Two Decades of Self Discovery by Shou Arai

At age 30, Shou Arai came to a realization; they had no gender. Now they were faced with a question they'd never really considered: how to age in a society where everything is so strongly segregated between two genders? This autobiographical manga explores Japanese culture surrounding gender, transgender issues, and the day to day obstacles faced by gender minorities and members of the LGBTQIA+ community with a lighthearted, comedic attitude.

The Dragon's Betrothed vol. 2 by Meguru Hinohara

Troubled writer Chiharu Izunome is betrothed to Rin, the local water dragon god. Despite Rin’s gentle demeanor, when a supernatural intruder threatens his husband-to-be, the angry deity unleashes the full might of his beastly fury, injuring Chiharu in the process! With Rin’s destructive power so clearly laid out, fear displaces the fragile affection growing in Chiharu’s heart. Can he truly learn to love someone monstrous?

Even Though We're Adults vol. 6 by Takako Shimura

It’s finally time: Ayano tells her parents that she has left Wataru and has fallen for someone else. And that someone is a woman. When the news breaks, Wataru finally gives up on trying to make things work, which means the wall between Ayano and Akari’s love has now been knocked down. Meanwhile, Eri struggles with her feelings for a married man. Is there a way out of this labyrinth for anyone?

If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan, I Would Die vol. 1 by Auri Hirao

When it comes to idol group Cham Jam, Eripiyo is the oldest — and perhaps only — fan of Maina Ichii. Despite Eripiyo's enthusiastic support, Maina is the least popular member of the group, but that doesn't deter Eripiyo, even though she spends so much of her money that she only has a single outfit of her own. But her love for Maina doesn't waver, even if she knows she might never be noticed for it!

Last Gender vol. 3 by Rei Taki

Welcome to "BAR California", a place where people with different genders, propensities, and sexual orientations gather to find a certain "something".

A transgender bisexual who has been hurt by the voices of others, a pansexual looking for true love, and a person who identities as both male and female. There are as many sexualities as there are people.

FINAL VOLUME

Old-Fashioned Cupcake by Sagan Sagan

A visit to a pancake shop leads to an unexpected May-December romance that breathes life into the monotonous routine of an older salaryman.

At 39 years old, Nozue lives a routine, if not melancholic, life of sleep and work. Togawa, his younger subordinate, finds it troubling and takes it upon himself to shake up Nozue’s routine. During a lunch outing, the two go to a pancake shop full of exuberant young ladies to “do what girls do,” and it’s just the thing to breathe life into Nozue. The two men start an unlikely friendship - and perhaps something a little sweeter!

Qualia the Purple: The Complete Manga Collection Omnibus collects volumes 1-3 by Hisamitsu Ueo and Sirou Tsunasima

Through Yukari’s uncanny purple eyes, all people look just like robots. Her talent is both a blessing and a curse–she’s an asset to the police, with her “skill” allowing her to evaluate humans at a glance, but her strange sight has cost her the friendship of her peers. Luckily, she does have one friend in her corner: Hatou “Gaku” Manabu, a girl at school who cares deeply for Yukari. But when Yukari is recruited to join a secret organization, the real trouble begins. Gaku is thrust into a realm of mystery, quantum experimentation, and alternate universes, with only her wits–and her love for Yukari��to guide her along the way.

The Summer You Were There vol. 3 by Yuama

At Kaori’s gentle urging, Shizuku reaches out to Ruri, the girl she bullied back in elementary school. All Shizuku wants is to apologize, but it soon becomes clear that even that won’t be so easy. Things take a dramatic turn when Kaori faints, and Shizuku learns that Kaori’s been keeping a big secret. Now, with everything out in the open, will things between the two girls ever be the same again?

Why I Adopted My Husband: The True Story of a gay couple seeking legal recognition in Japan by Yuta Yagi

As a gay couple living in Japan (where gay marriage is not yet legal), Yuta and Kyota have found a unique loophole in order for the government to recognize their union: Kyota adopted Yuta.

This nonfiction manga depicts how the two men met and fell in love, their life together for the last twenty years, their struggle to communicate their relationship to their families, their anxieties about the future, and their determination to live happily and carefree as any other married couple, while they strive for independence and equal rights in a changing cultural landscape.

X-Gender vol. 2 by Asuka Miyazaki

Covid-19 has hit Japan, and Asuka is struggling. Not only has the serialization of X-Gender been delayed due to the virus, the closure of Poker Face and other bars means they’ve lost access to their community. Can they find a way to stave off the loneliness, while also dealing with their fear of getting sick?

[mightymizora]

Could you elaborate on what you meant in the tags of the "two cakes" post about things changing a lot in the last 10 years? Sorry to be obtuse, but I just couldn't figure it out and if you had insights on the changing fandom landscape I'd love to hear them if you're interested in sharing.

I am on mobile so apologies that this is a bit rushed, I may revisit with some more in depth thoughts about this but I think the change in the past ten years isn’t just in fandom, it’s in media consumption and the impact that has had on fanspace.

Some of it is positive I think. The feedback from fans into mainstream media has definitely increased representation and there are some incredible writers, producers, and even performers that started in fanspace who are getting access to opportunities that they would never have before. You look back at how things used to operate, especially with things like D&D, and it was literally some white guy needed art and asked another white guy he met at a bar. Sometimes the art was terrible! So we’re seeing more great people find ways through into actual paid roles. And we’re seeing SO much talent in the younger generation, seriously the way some people are writers, artists, modders, thinkers, it’s amazing.

But fanspace has directly been influenced by the accessibility to the creator. How could it not? Whereas before things usually existed as a transformative celebration, now these things could be directly influencing the work itself! It changes the relationship entirely and for somebody brought up in a time where you still had to put a legal disclaimer on all of your work it’s a huge shift, now seeing people cameo actors to read their work leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Technically there is nothing wrong with this! The actor has consented by having this open, they’re making money, but to me it is a bit of a step too far into accessing the creator.

Also, the way we consume media has changed so much and I think we making things so disposable. Even only ten years ago in the Dragon Age fandom, it was completely normal that you would be deeply into a fandom for ten, twenty years, and there would be an audience. People also created for each other a lot more, and importantly, for themselves. I see a lot more, slightly cynical, creating for audience and to me it dilutes some of what makes fanspace really interesting, which is people pursuing what they’re passionate about! It’s also a problem in things like literature where the space for work that takes time, is formally exciting and boundary pushing is shrinking all the time.

I think now there is a pressure for fans too, and it’s a pressure to always be consuming the current trend. This has been directly influenced by streaming and tiktok. We are seeing so much art as disposable, even the passion projects, and to me? It’s very sad to see. I wish people felt they had more time. The best work usually happens a good three years into something coming into existence, when themes etc have really had time to sit and simmer. We are veering towards all fast food and no lovingly made meals.

[rainofaugustsith]

SWTOR.

So. About that news about SWTOR, that it is slated to be transferred to another company - yeah. Let's chat about that. Or I will.  TL:DR version: The licensing agreement for SWTOR was set to expire this year. My own hypothesis is that the Mouse did not renew it and pulled the license from Bioware because they did fuckall with it. Also Bioware has been fumbling a lot of their other games. So this isn't quite a sunny transfer.

My final screenshot of Viri and Lana at home in Naboo (headcanon for the Alderaan stronghold), February 2022, just before uninstalling SWTOR. One thing I have not seen mentioned is the fact that SWTOR's licensing agreement with the Mouse was scheduled to end this year anyway. 2023. It's been said for some time. Is it really a surprise the Mouse would not want things to go on as they are?

Given the near complete lack of attention and care that has been paid to SWTOR for a good five or six years now, I can fully understand why the Mouse would not renew the licensing agreement. Onslaught and Ossus looked as though a fair amount of development money had been poured into them - Ossus, Onderon and Mek-Sha had the same sort of acheivements and datacron hunts you found on the OG planets - but they were bright spots in a very bleak period. 

The amount of content released in a single patch of some other MMOs is more than the collective total of what was released for SWTOR in years. 

The story was haphazard. The companion reunions had no continuity, with some characters not even recognizing NPCs they'd actually worked with before (Nadia Grell and Jaesa Willsaam not recognizing Lana, for instance) or behaving completely out of character (Risha being completely indifferent about the fate of her planet, for instance). The writers killed off almost every character that moved and pulled a "somehow, the Emperor survived" stunt (not with the Emperor). The head writer did not even know a timeline for the story and had to talk it out on the message board. 

The devs tried hard to shove everyone into PvP (both ground and space) and Ops, while alienating other types of players, and made story content ridiculous. Known game-breaking bugs remained in the game for years. 

There's been a lot of turnover in the dev team and numerous reports about management completely ignoring feedback from devs. A few devs were witnessed mocking players on dudebro discords, and the changes they made seemed to benefit a select group of players. A few message board posters were plants trying to deliberately provoke players into inflammatory exchanges or white knighting any and message critical of the devs. Or that criticism was removed outright. 

Players who had invested a substantial amount of time and money into SWTOR and put a lot of effort into developing player guides and fan sites said "fuck this" and walked. The Steam charts show playership of about 3000K players per day. People stopped going to the test server because it became painfully obvious that the devs were completely ignoring most feedback. Problems and bugs test players pointed out made their way into the released patches anyway. 

Meanwhile the staff of SWTOR was getting poached for Anthem and Dragon Age. Anthem failed. Battlefront II went into maintenance after only two years. The next installments of Dragon Age and Mass Effect were proving to be complete clusterfucks. 

Is there really any reason the Mouse would have wanted to keep the license with Bioware? 

I do think this is a way to get SWTOR into a safe place - away from Bioware - but given the profile of the new company, I doubt it means we're going to see a Renaissance. I think it means the game is going to have a safe place to continue in maintenance mode. That's how it is with two other MMOs they have. The number of devs, as someone pointed out, is going to be 50% of what SWTOR has now. 

I do think they will keep it in maintenance mode as long as they can; as long as enough people keep subscribing to make that profitable. But I do think overall, this is it for SWTOR. 

I have not played SWTOR in a year and a half. I uninstalled it on the day 7.0 came out. My characters are all parked in their favorite strongholds with their favorite companions. I headcanon the game itself cut from Ossus directly to Echoes, with the scene at the end of Echoes, with Lana and the PC literally flying off into the stars being the end of the story. I feel it's better that way. Given all that was happening with SWTOR I feel like this was inevitable, too.  All the same, given the positives that SWTOR had - some of the gameplay and class stories, the rich lore, the planets, some of the characters - it leaves me bitterly angry and disappointed by the outcome. It's such a waste. An absolute waste of talent and time and people who were so totally invested in the success of this game. At the end, that's all there is.

Farewell, SWTOR. 

[justadumbasskid]

100%'ed Citizen Sleeper over the course of 21.3 hours, with a three-month hiatus between my first playthrough as an Operator, and my second/third playthroughs as an Extractor and Machinist, respectively.

I've always thought that there should be more zoomed-out images of Erlin's Eye throughout the game. Got this one just in time before the fade to black at the end of my first playthrough. I ended with the DLC content. My Operator playthrough is the longest by far because it was my first one. Going blind. I had no prior test playthroughs before. I took things slow, took me ages to find the Tambour because I hadn't fully-explored the Lowend until that part of Feng's questline forced me to. Took even longer to get to the Greenway because the fee was so expensive, and I didn't wanna spend the credits unless I had an excess. Ended up completing his questline just in the nick of time before Maywick became a problem. Never had to interact with Ethan. Hated that mf. Originally, I didn't know that completing Sabine's questline would lock me out of buying any more Stabilizer. I thought I was so fucked. Rationed out my remaining vials like a dragon, learned to repair myself with scraps, and hoarded those, too. I didn't read Sabine's ending dialogue too closely, and found out from fan piece that organic Stabilizer could be grown in the Greenway. It was my only hope, so I threw myself into that task. Obsessively stalked the Greenway for the remainder of my playthrough aside from the DLC. Foraged, cleaned the Avery, and frequented the Wastes for more scrap to repair myself with in the dimmed lights of the Hypha Commune's dorm. By the time I finally cracked the code and ended the questline, I hadn't even spent a single vial of Essen-Arp branded Stabilizer

Took these pics during my second playthrough, as an Extractor. Learned from my mistakes of the past. With the excess amount of wealth I had accrued from various jobs, I stocked up on vials before completing Sabine's questline, and at the point that I had unlocked organic Stabilizer, I had 16 vials already bought with hard-earned cash, so it became redundant. There is a fairly-large gap between how the player-character is depicted in the fandom and how you can play in the game. The game-version of the Sleeper would take pity on the fandom Sleeper, and the fandom-Sleeper would simply become another side-character in the in-game Sleeper's world. For on Erlin's Eye, a paradise of wires and code and odd jobs and dirty money. The in-game Sleeper is Deus Ex Machina. God in the Machine.

My final playthrough, as a Machinist, was my magnum opus. My speedrun. Completed in only 29 cycles. A little under a month. In under a month, this Machinist-frame Sleeper came onto the Eye, half-frozen, a mechanical corpse bleeding human emotion trundled over by a corporate machine. Just under a month later, it was riding high. Literally, as it escaped on a solo journey on the Sidereal Horizon. I could have completed the task even faster. The only breaks I gave it were when I, needlessly, pursued the first few steps of Feng and Sabine's questline. The latter only to make Stabilizer a bit cheaper from the pharmacy. Didn't even explore the Rotunda, or even bother with the Greenway. I threw myself into the Sidereal Horizon questline. Of course, I had to abandon my emotions early-on. Giving poor Lem & Mina the cold shoulder, and ignoring their needs in order to get the final achievement. When the Sidereal Horizon was finally completed, and en route to the hub. I let myself rest.

[robinfrinjs]

Ask game!

3, 4, 9, 16, 25, 39, 43, 46

Hi! Thanks for the questions.

3. favorite book?

Currently I'm reading "Tramp's Footprints: The History of Supertramp." Which is a book I've been wanting to read for a long time and I finally bought it a week ago (it was 50 euros oops). It's becoming my favorite book and the first book in a while that I just can't put down. Sadly it's printed horribly and there's quite a few spelling mistakes which makes me a little annoyed cuz of how much it cost. But nevertheless, it's very good.

4. favorite movie(s) and/or shows?

I don't really have them, it's hard for me to start liking stuff. I just mindlessly rewatch stuff so many times and I don't even know why. I don't even really like the stuff most of the times. But when I was young I always loved the back to the future movies as it was like the only series we had on VHS.

9. favorite songs/artists?

I feel like it's easiest to just show my Spotify stats. As for actually active bands Imagine Dragons has been my #1 for ages. And overall, sadly they're not active anymore but Supertramp. And then I also like Måneskin, Bon Jovi, Friday Pilots Club, Dire Straits, Fleetwood Mac, Foreigner, Pink Floyd, U2, Metallica, David Bowie etc.

My all time favourite song I think remains Smoke and Mirrors by Imagine Dragons

But I also really like Wish You Where Here by Pink Floyd, Rudy & Just a Normal Day by Supertramp, Walk of Life by Dire Straits and .. much more.

16. are you a good driver?

I have .. never driven a car. I simply do not have the money to get my driver's license. I really hope I can start taking driving lessons sometime in the future tho

25. what did you want to be when you were younger?

When I was really young, a teacher on weekdays and a hairdresser on weekends ..? Idk why but that was a thing for a while. Then I got a real interest in motorsports and I wanted to work in motorsport as an engineer or mechanic. But it all seems a little far away now

39. your favorite genre of music atm?

I guess it's like prog rock with Supertramp but also like pop rock with Imagine Dragons or like alt rock too. Something with rock in the name. Not lying

43. an author you wont read

Colleen Hoover ? Or something like that. Oh and also definitely not JK Rowling

46. do you have any tattoos or want any?

I do not have any, not 18 yet. But I am turning 18 soon and I want so many tattoos so bad. But I'm unsure what and if to do it immediately when I'm 18. I am thinking of getting a shark tattoo, in like a style like this

I'd also want something like lyrics but I feel like that's so iffy especially when it's of an active artist. Like I know lyrics aren't a direct link to an artist always and it can have personal meaning. But I'd just feel weird having lyrics by someone that might turn out to be a disgusting person or whatever.

I know a lot of Imagine Dragons fans have the exact same tattoo and I'd never get that lol. This is also why I'd probably never get a racing related tattoo, I'd love to get like a 4 tattooed or something but I could never when it obviously relates to a very real person.

random ‘get to know me’ questions :)