#it sure feels like they pad out these episodes a lot and keep retreading the same ground i don't know how

[smallhatlogan]

watching His Dark Materials while taking care of the baby, I read the book series when I was ~14, really formative books for me that i only partially remember, been spending a lot of time while watching this going "wait but will they have the budget to do the cool shit that I remember happening in the last book" while getting more and more concerned that they won't. there sure are lots of daemons that hide in people's clothes or are conveniently blocked from the audience's view lmao

and iorek isn't even gonna eat lin manuel miranda :(

[electronickingdomfox]

"Bloodthirst" review

It's Resident Evil, but the zombies are vampires!!

Novel from 1987, by J. M. Dillard. Kind of a retread of her previous novel ("Demons"), but substituting demonic possesion with vampires. Of course, there's nothing supernatural going on, but a scientific explanation behind everything. I found it less scary than the previous entry, though it's in the same spirit of horror story, this time with a political background as well.

The initial setting is intriguing, even though it's fairly obvious what's going on and who are the villains, from the earliest chapters. The ending is also exciting, and reminded me of an actual TOS episode. The problem is the rest of the novel, and by that I mean like 90%. I had the impression of reading chapter after chapter of barely anything but filler. Kirk does little more than talking through the terminal with this or that. McCoy does little more than telling Kirk "they're close to find a vaccine" and fretting over Chapel's sickness. Spock does... nothing, really. The fact that the story was extended artificially to a breaking point is obvious by the fact it takes the crew SEVERAL DAYS to find an intruder in the ship (an intruder who wears a red cape, is sick and insane, and screams in pain every time light touches him). This with a crew of more than 400 persons, and with the full security team activated at all times (what the hell!?).

To add more padding to it, there are lengthy scenes focused on a group of redshirts. Now I don't have a problem with original characters having their spotlight if they're interesting and play some role. But these guys just reflect about their High School dramas, and they don't have a distinct role compared to any other redshirt: that is, being attacked and suffer a lot. The other characters are a mixed bag. The most interesting is probably Adams, the "vampire", and the passages that follow his sinister deeds are the only ones that keep the plot moving, in that stale middle section. Kirk is serviceable. In particular his friendship with Admiral Quince felt like the real thing. And he gets to do some of his cunning negotiations at the end. McCoy on the other hand... Look, this author makes him funny on occassion, but in my opinion, she has a REALLY odd idea of the character. From the "dirty old man" trait, to his clumsiness and cowardice. The guy who would offer himself for torture in "The Empath" is here scared shitless at the prospect of it (well, he's scared of dark corridors too, so...). Fortunately, there's no Mary Sue on sight this time. Unfortunately, there's still the obligatory romance "out-of-left-field" for McCoy, that this author seems so fond of. This time in the shape of... Christine Chapel??? We're suppossed to believe that she's not just the closest person to McCoy (closer even than Kirk!), but that all this time, they've been repressing romantic feelings for each other. And that Chapel isn't really attracted to Spock, but only chose him because he'd never return her feelings... Yeah, weeell, how about... NO.

Other random weird bits: Nobody knows what a vampire is in the 23rd century (only Chekov has heard about this legend, that had survived for hundreds of years so far). And a crippled Enterprise can only manage to go at warp 9! (c'mon Scotty, I'm sure you can do better than this shitty, fast-as-fuck warp 9 speed...). Spoilers under the cut:

The Enterprise receives a distress signal from a scientific station at planet Tanis, but upon beaming down, they just find a deserted lab, two dead scientists missing most of their blood, and a single survivor: Dr. Jeffrey Adams. Adams looks gaunt and is obviously suffering some kind of disease that makes light painful for him. He's brought to sickbay, and needs continous blood transfusions to survive. But when Kirk interrogates him, suspecting the scientists were doing illegal research on biowarfare, Adams says they were just working on agricultural projects and that the other two commited suicide. Nonetheless, the evidence at the station points to Adams as the murderer, and it seems he had drunk the blood of the victims too. The fact that Admiral Rodrigo Mendez, head of weapons research, is awfully interested in destroying any trace of the virus, and quickly bringing Adams to trial, makes it all the more suspicious. However, the landing party is unable to recover any sample of a virus at the station, and records had been destroyed, so the Enterprise starts travelling to the nearest starbase.

After being informed of this, Adams accuses Mendez of being the mastermind behind the virus development, and begs Kirk to not surrender him to Mendez, since the admiral wants to kill him. Kirk is unwilling to believe at first that Mendez, or any other top brass at Starfleet, would be involved in such deadly project. Besides, upon learning that one of the dead researchers was Mendez's son, he dismisses the admiral's behavior as natural resentment. Nonetheless, Kirk contacts his friend, Admiral Quince Waverleigh, at Starfleet HQ, to see if he can unearth some dirty laundry among the top brass.

Meanwhile, Adams attempts an escape from his isolation chamber at sickbay, and injures Chapel, drinking some blood from her head wound. Adams doesn't go far under the light. But Chapel has contracted the disease, which is contagious upon contact, and slowly slips into a coma. In the end, McCoy realizes that Chapel has died, and disconnects life support. And there's a lot of drama about this, but since the reader can probably guess where this is leading to, and what the solution will be, the scene doesn't have all that much impact. Apart from this, Spock has recovered some info from the fragmentary records at the station, that tell about a Vulcan researcher who had also died at an earlier point. This suggests that there was, in fact, two versions of the virus: a first one that was deadly to Vulcans (and thus, Romulans too), and the current mutation (probably accidental) which is deadly to humans. This deepens Spock's suspicions about Mendez, since he had lost his wife in a Romulan attack.

Once in the starbase, Adams is brought to a detention cell, which he promptly escapes again, this time more successfully. First, he attacks a guard and steals her red cape, to better protect himself from the light, as well as a device that blocks tricorder readings. After this, Adams kidnaps Lisa (a redshirt on shore leave), and forces her to ask for a beam up directly to her quarters in the Enterprise, where he also attacks her and drinks her blood. And then comes a loooong period where everyone is searching frantically for Adams throughout the ship. And yeah, he can block tricorders, but it's not like he's invisible or anything... He goes as far as entering sickbay and stealing transfusion equipment to draw more blood! (his next victim being Stanger, another redshirt).

For his part, Admiral Quince starts noticing strange things going around him, ever since he started investigating: sudden personnel transfers, tampering with his terminal, etc. He sends Kirk a quick anonymous message, to warn him that things are looking ugly. Yet Kirk is unable to reach him afterwards, and later is notified of Quince's sudden death in an "accident". This is the last straw that convinces Kirk of Mendez's guilt, alongside a small clique of corrupt admirals. So he decides to lure him to Tanis and catch him red-handed there, with a bluff: he tells him that Adams has been captured and has spilled the beans about the R-virus (the incriminating Romulan strain), and that they have found the evidence at Tanis.

At sickbay, Ensign Stanger wakes up from the dead after having been infected. And even though he shows some early signs of "vampirism", his good side wins in the end, and he's able to protect his friend Lisa and capture Adams (at long last!). McCoy has also developed an effective vaccine, that he administers to the whole crew and Chapel, who's also waking up from the dead (but strangely enough, much slower than Stanger?). The modus operandi of the virus is thus revealed: at first, it sends the host into apparent death (actually, hybernation) while it consumes the bloodstream's heme; once the host is depleted of heme, he wakes up and starts craving blood and infecting others. (But I don't know, as a bioweapon, it doesn't seem so effective to me...).

In the final chapters, Spock and McCoy beam down to Tanis and confront Mendez, who demands the samples of the R-virus (which they actually don't have). But just then, a transporter beam captures them and they appear in a Romulan ship. As it turns out, Adams had contacted the Romulans, promising them the samples of both virus in exchange for his freedom. Kirk forces Adams to cooperate by refusing to give him the cure, until he tells them where's the R-virus, so Adams confesses: the original R-virus had been hidden all this time inside a locket that he wore around his neck. The Romulan commander threatens Kirk, saying that he'll kill Spock and McCoy if he doesn't surrender Adams. Yet Kirk tries to negotiate with him and buy time, now that he has the only sample in his hands, though the Romulan doesn't agree to destroy the sample. However, Spock, McCoy and Mendez had managed to escape from their cells in the meantime. And after a run through the enemy ship stunning Romulans (with McCoy closing his eyes every time he has to shoot, the poor devil), they manage to lower the shields and beam themselves to the Enterprise, which promptly warps away. In the transporter room, Mendez makes a last, desperate attempt to escape with Adams and the sample. But Spock tricks him into confessing everything, and then Kirk informs him that he's been monitored, and now Starfleet knows everything about his involvement in the illegal research. In the epilogue, Kirk reflects about his lost friend Quince. And there's a moving scene where he receives a posthumous gift, with a last message from his friend, telling him to not feel guilt about his death.

Spirk Meter: 0/10*. Kirk and Spock barely exchange a couple of lines throughout the novel.

There isn't a lot either in other departments. Spock and McCoy don't seem to like each other much, though McCoy asks Spock for company while disconnecting Chapel from life support. Though it's hard to read that as Spock/McCoy, when it's evident that McCoy's full concern is for Chapel in this book. Maybe, maaaaybe, one could read some McKirk in the final scene, when McCoy drinks with Kirk in his quarters and comforts him about Quince's death. But at this point, that's like begging for crumbs.

*A 10 in this scale is the most obvious spirk moments in TOS. Think of the back massage, "You make me believe in miracles", or "Amok Time" for example.

tagged: @bonez-artistry

[spottoydog]

In the episode Deep Dive we not only get to see Marco wield Star’s wand (successfully) but we also see something that has yet to happen before to anyone who isn’t mewman or a part of the Butterfly family: the appearance of cheek marks/emblems.

So what does this mean? Does Marco have a secret heritage connected with the Butterflies? Highly doubtful-- since that plot thread is currently tied around another character and I don’t think the writes would retread the same idea of “secret Butterfly,” especially since the other main lead is already a Butterfly royal (and love interest, I don’t think Nefcy/Disney is going to pull a Game of Thrones.)

However, the subjects of heritage and inheritance are some of the main overarching themes of Svtfoe, so the possibly of Marco being tied to something bigger than he is as the “human lead” is more likely than we may think. Already there are two things that come to mind that hint to Marco being destined for greater things that have yet to come into fruition. One being the surprisingly ever looming presence of the Blood Moon, that so far has only been noticed (though never directly acknowledged) by Marco, even long after the Blood Moon’s last official showing (every 667 years.) The other is the still as yet to be explained foreshadowing in the floor carvings of St. Olga’s that suggest to tie together with both Star and Marco: A crescent moon encircling the sun and locking a star between its horns.

In all honesty that could be the ultimate significance of Marco’s moon cheeks, the representation of his and Star’s bond. Marco’s motivation to finally use the wand at the end of Deep Dive was to reestablish the “lost connection” he had with Star when she entered the realm of Magic and is what inevitably snaps her back to reality.

Maybe that’s not the whole story, but it is currently the most complete one we have so far…

Crescent moons are a tricky thing to pin any solid one-to-one symbolic meaning to in this show, since we see them in many places already: King River’s scepter, Star’s pajamas, and in multiple occasions we see crescent moons tied to Eclipsa. Eclipsa’s chapter even has her cheek emblem superimposed on a crescent/eclipse symbol, and considering the effect reading the chapter had on Marco, that may come into play again now that the chapter’s author is an active player in the story (she’s already called Marco “adorable,” but hey that’s been an established fact sine episode one.)

Classically a crescent has been visual shorthand for the moon across cultures and time and its symbolic use has been tied to a multitude of ideas. Ideas such as emotions and the unconscious, maternal and nurturing instincts, nature and the spiritual, and the list could go on. To go through every possible correlation and make an objective statement on how it could or could not relate to Marco would be tedious and lead to a lot of moot points.  

However, there is one aspect of the moon present both in myth and popular culture that I will be elaborating on: The moon as a catalyst for transformation.

Let’s go back to season one, and revisit one of the most foreshadow heavy glimpses into Marco’s subconscious (and a heavy Blood Moon presence) the nightmare he had at the beginning of the episode Red Belt.

Marco emerges from a glowing green fissure, similar to the one created by the cleaved wand, candle in hand and in nothing but his sleepwear. He then notices a rather feral looking Star chewing on an obi (that could be his current green belt or red one he’s searching for, since everything in this shot looks green.) After letting out a high pitched screech, Star runs into a tunnel beneath broken lockers on all fours with the sash still in her mouth. Obviously put off by this odd behavior Marco questionably says Stars name, unsure of what the heck he just saw, but then he turns and notices a solitary locker and panics at not being able to remember his lock combo. After fiddling with it the combination lock begins to shake violently and burst apart on its own, the door swinging open to a cascade of mewberty heart petals that conceal a padded inside and a violet tinged Marco dressed in a suit and tie, hands folded. 

The obvious connotations of seeing himself like a corpse in a casket are comically subverted by Marco’s vocal distress of seeing himself in a suit. Cutting back to the locker/coffin we see the figure in the suit replaced by Mr. Candle who asks him, “What are your plans for the future, Mr.Diaz?”

There it is, the big question of Marco’s season 3 arc and why he came left Earth for Mewni: to discover his future. Marco’s search for his red belt in his dream could be interpreted as an allegory for his search for his identity/development and growth as a person. The red belt is what his heart was fixed on obtaining in the episode and signified the next step of advancement in martial arts, which has always been a core part of Marco’s character and how he’s been able to keep up with Star in fighting evil monsters (Buff Frog has called him “Karate Boy” and a lot of Marco centric episodes in the first two seasons focus this aspect of his.) But by the end of the dream the red belt gets swept up by the Blood Moon, just like all his friends and classmates who have “moved on with their lives,” and Marco is left bare once more.

Marco’s karate while helpful in the first two seasons, on its own is not going to be of use against enemies like Toffee, Miss Heinous/Meteora, or Mina Loveberry. Nor was his normal “safe kid” reason and caution able to bring back Star from the magic dimension. Marco is going to have to use magic again in the future, and I have reason to believe it’s going to drastically change him.

So let’s talk about…mewberty.

Specifically why dream Marco was buried underneath mewberty petals in the locker. Now you could interpret it as Marco’s subconscious being afraid of getting smothered to death by Star’s uh…webbing, which can be symbolically read as him being afraid of getting caught up in and hurt by Star’s confusing teenage emotions. The fact that Star is depicted a feral mess absconding with an important symbol of his identity at the beginning of the dream and as guilty looking party when he failed to obtain red belt at the end of it, Marco’s subconscious seems pretty messed up over Star either way (and that was before he knew Star had a crush on him and realized his own feelings for her.) But Marco’s possibly buried feelings of resentment towards Star aside, while the locker in the dream is presented as a coffin, in the context of the episode Mewberty it has also been thematically used as a cocoon. Remember that Star went through her own transformation in a locker, a thematically appropriate vessel for a teenager’s magical monster puberty. Before Deep Dive and Battle for Mewni I thought that the locker in the dream meant that Marco was going to be transformed by the corrupted half of the cleaved wand and Toffee’s influence (thinking back to the end of Strom the Castle) and that Marco was going to loose agency of his future development. But now that the wand has been reformed and Marco has used the wand of his own volition resulting in a temporary pair of cheek marks, I think it’s even more plausible that Marco’s decisions…

To go to Mewni (for Star)

To use magic (for Star)

…are going to eventually culminate into Marco’s ultimate identity, resulting in the Marco we know to “die” and a new Marco to emerge. Not to mention Marco already went through normal human puberty in ‘Running With Scissors’, off-screen yes but still we’ve already seen what adult Marco looks like. (Side note: being a macho adult and going on adventures with Heckapoo are also things Marco gave up for Star, twice.) The next logical step has to be seeing what freaky magical monster puberty does to Marco, right?

And speaking of monsters, let’s talk next about… Monster Arm.

I think a lot of us agree that this thing is going to come back, and since Marco had just recently used dark magic, that just might be what agitates its reappearance for the second half of season three. I don’t however think it’s going to come back the same way it did the first time as a parasitic appendage, or else Star can just zap it back to normal. Will it try playing the same tricks on Marco again? Maybe… It did try and prey on Marco’s pride and desires to get him to trust it the first time around, but now Marco’s priorities have shifted almost entirely from season one. Marco doesn’t want to beat Jeremy, get Jackie’s affection, or be known as a “misunderstood bad boy” by his classmates. Now he wants to make sure Star is safe and support her as a friend and squire. So I see this possible return going a number of ways: monster arm could point out Marco’s inability to protect Star from Toffee level treats, it could point out how Marco keeps putting Star first, giving so much and getting little in return, it could even bring up Star’s confession and the emotional tailspin that Marco has been burring under “squire duties.” (Gee, can you imagine the irony if monster virus called Star a “bad influence’ for Marco?)

My hope is that if Marco’s monster virus does return it will not remain as parasitic entity trying to undermine Marco, but will reflect more of its last proclamation of being “a part of you now,” that Marco will have to accept and make peace with…and give Marco a sweet full body monster transformation power!

“So what are you saying Spot? That Marco going to go through some sort of Monster version of Mewberty, just because is cheeks glowed crescent moons that one time he used magic? That’s crazy talk, crazy talk!”

Now here me out…I’m about to come full circle with this post. The next phrase you will read in this essay I spent way too much time on will explain everything:

Werewolf Martial-Artist.

“Spot what does Marco’s Halloween costume have to do with this?”

I don’t know reader, what other visual media has spiky haired hand to hand fighters that transform into hulking monsters under the light of the full moon?

It’s a DBZ reference! You know, that thing Marco’s original character pitch was a super-fan of and rival to Star’s Sailor Moon obsession. And if Star dressing up as Ludo end up as foreshadowing to her brief possession of his body at the end of battle for Mewni, then by golly so can Marco’s costume be foreshadowing as well!