#it’s even funnier because the person who actually is like that is Shanks

[kacievvbbbb]

The thing about Mihawk, the thing that really obsesses me, is that he looks like a schemer, the kind of guy who bides his time and then strikes. He looks like a planner . But the thing is…

I don’t think he’s ever made a plan in his life.

Like you look at him and you’re like this is obviously a man playing chess but he’s not! At best he’s playing some really f*cked up game of Uno where he has all the action cards.

It’s not a coincidence that every single time we see him he is making a truly consequential decision…on a whim. The first time we ever see dude is because he chased a pirate armada all the way across the grand line into the East blue because they woke I’m from a nap! He then went on to accept a challenge from another truly ridiculous man and then decided actually I want him to be the one to defeat and surpass me soooooo actually I’m going to let him live, on little else except vibed and the spirit of “I like the cut of his jib”

That is some garp ass logic right there. This is not a serious man! 😭

[thescrapbookingscientist]

Bimonthly Media Roundup

-One Piece Film Red (Movie) - The first of the One Piece movies we've decided to watch despite being the newest, largely because of a reference in the story proper implying it's canon. I've heard this is one of the better movies which is not a great sign even if I did mostly enjoy it. On the good side Uta is an interesting character with a great design and voice, and despite her "self-insert OC" backstory I do actually like her relationship with Luffy and the Shanks pirates, it's cute. I like musicals and while I do feel most of the songs could have been presented better they all sounded pretty good with a few standouts going straight to my spotify. The plot of the movie wasn't at all what I was expecting, though it was pretty interesting, like. damn Uta. On the bad side the story did have middle-drag as it was longer than it needed to be, and featured several batshit decisions from Shanks and Uta's adoptive father figure. I understand that they wanted to reach a certain conclusion (one that I didn't particularly like), but the actions they took to get their were so dumb and mean that I was too busy being frustrated at the writing to be invested in the latter half of the story. I'm still glad I watched it and would maybe watch some of the musical scenes out of context again but I would really only recommend it to hardcore One Piece fans and do so with an asterisk.

-Firewatch (Video Game) - A friend recommended a play through of this to me, and while it wasn't quite what I was expecting it was pretty interesting. The visuals were gorgeous, the dialogue was naturalistic, it had a pretty intriguing mystery and the ending did a good job of cementing the themes of the dangers of too much isolation and escapism, which I can respect. That being said I can't say it's overly memorable: visuals aside it's just too short and only has 1 character with a notable personality, who I wouldn't call particular memorable either. I'd say the experience is like reading a good short story - there's a message there that's well presented and I agree with but there's only enough material for a single 2 page essay rather than a full analysis/fandom experience. Which is fine not everything should be that, It's done well for what it is.

- Fallout (TV) - First season completed and I have to say it was pretty darn good - Video game adaptations have been killing it lately. The 3 leads all did a great job at introducing us to the various factions and perspectives of this world while individually and collectively exploring the mystery of how the world got this messed up. I understand why The Ghoul is so tumblr famous given he's a morally grey monster with a sympathetic backstory, though my personal favorite was Lucy and her determination to not let the cruelty of the world make her cruel in kind, though given the ending she might have a relapse in the second season. I can't say the story was entirely unpredictable though there were a lot of fun twists and turns, the ultimate conclusion we are leading towards is certainly a depressingly realistic one when you push the capitalist mindset to the extreme. It's also funnier than I expected which was a nice bonus. The dried out apocalypse atheistic with an ultra violent world isn't really my usual cup of tea but I don't have a lot of negative things to say about this, it was a solidly enjoyable watch that I would recommend to anyone who can stomach a bit of light gore.

- Land of the Lustrous (Manga) - Wow so it finally ended huh? I'm not really sure I have the right qualifications or mindset to dive into the series as a whole right now but it certainly is one of the most unique stories I've ever read with a truly "suffered more than god" transformation story for its protagonist. The Buddhist philosophies along with the story taking place over hundreds of thousands of years adds a lot to the uniqueness of the story, at least reading as a western fan, and has certainly made me think about ship of Thesus and purpose of creation questions far more than I have otherwise, which I commend it for though it certainly prevents me from recommending it as a light read. It's too bad it likely won't get more than the first season animated anytime soon as it would be a great one to watch people react to with all the insane twists and turns it takes. Anyway I love you Phos, thanks for the story and may you rest.

- Dungeon Meshi (Anime) - Shapeshifter and Nightmare episodes both very good. The shapeshifter taking its appearance based on others perception of you is a very cool concept which is a good puzzle to work out the real one and Marcille's nightmare focusing on her fear of outliving all her loved ones is really heartbreaking and well visualized, Good job all around.

- Six of Crows (Book) - Not much to say at this point, I like the concept as "heist team consisting of oddballs with highly specialized skills" is a great setup. I'm enjoying it well enough as a slower listen, though I do feel I would be more into it had I read it when I was younger as opposed to now.

- Pokemon Infinite Fusion (Video Game) - Really great fangame, had a lot of fun both playing this and looking up the various fusion designs on the website. Will probably post my two teams eventually. Huge props to everyone who contributed, both the sprite artists (for fusions and regular pokemon) and the writing (lots of clever little jokes or quests). Truly a testament to fandom creativity.

- One Piece (Anime) - Shockingly we have finally caught up, at least anime wise and wow what a journey it was. I'll still be obsessed with this for a good while so I'm sure I'll have more opportunities to talk about the series as a whole as I jump into the manga, but for now in short there's certainly many issues with sexism and stakes but despite that it really is an incredible story with loads of great characters, worldbuilding, relationships, comedy, and mystery, I definitely understand why it's one of the biggest media in the world. For the more recent stuff I'll say that I overall liked Wano though the raid really did drag, I'm quite disappointed that Yamato didn't join the crew as I really liked him, big trans win with the bath scene, and I adore everything about Gear 5 and have re watched those scenes many times now. The way it's animated and it's theme are great, but mostly I just love that Luffy's peak is him being a funny little silly guy who makes people laugh, it's very him and is a great final form as the representation of joy. Egghead has also been fun so far, I love the new OP and style change and the island is pretty fun, I also like Bonney though considering her real age they need to stop focusing the camera the way they do. This is long enough so I'll stop here but I hope to make some One Piece tierlists and memes here soon.

- Genshin Impact (Video Game) - Not a fan of the rhythm style games in the current event but always happy to see Itto and Miko show up.

Listening To: Nonsense Speaker by 000, Tounges & Teeth and Metaphor by The Crane Wives, HateKiller by WON, Dream Girl Evil by Florence + The Machine, Imu's Theme from One Piece OST, White Wedding by Billy Idol, GUY.exe by Superfruit, Promiseland by MIKA, All the Boys by Panic! At The Disco, Achilles Come Down cover by Annapantsu, Fences by Paramore, Dial Drunk by Noah Kahan

[where-s-all-blue]

Self Insert AU for your chaotic crack fic needs

When you get transported into the One Piece Universe, you can't choose where you end up in nor in which time. Even your age might be jumbled up.

Depending on where you end up, your memories of your old life will disappear until the crew or group you are in is featured in canon.

If you make a joke about something, it's very likely that the universe will make it happen just to fuck you up. For reference, see C and R making up a lost island that sunk into the sea only for it to re-emergence randomly in the New World right in front of their eyes.

No matter what you do, you can't change the canon plot.

You don't have a plot armour.

Mod specific headcanons under the cut.

Onto the specific headcanons of C and R:

C

C ends up in the same town where Luffy meets Zoro, only days before it happens, hence her memories aren't that jumbled up, but she can't remember her real life friends. She pretty much joins them there and then.

C has the habit of saying cryptic things and accidentally revealing things beforehand, like when someone important is about to join the Strawhats whom she has joined. The crew thinks that she can see into the future.

She also tends to start crying when she meets people who are good but have tragic pasts. Luffy starts to use this as an indicator for people being nice.

During the timeskip, C ended up eating a devilfruit, her devilfruit was Neko Neko Mi, Model: Toyger ver Dwarf. This means that she is essentially a Toyger breed of a regular housecat, who happens to have dwarfism and thus will never grow up bigger than a kitten.

C uses her devilfruit to sneak around, get out of trouble and to get a free lift from her crew members. R uses his fruit power to intimidate people and to fight, he also uses it to go unnoticed while he naps in the dark corners.

The majority of people assume that she is max 14 years old due to her petite form and mischievous nature. However, when reaching Wano, she’s actually 18.

C’s outfit is modeled after a cow; she adores them as she finds them cute. She wears tiny horns on her head and a dotted over dress on top of her blue dress. Her cat form also keeps the horns on it.

Her fighting style includes using these horns to inflict damage. She also has learned how to use armament haki during her training.

She spent three months stuck in her cat form due to not knowing how to control it. She has managed to awaken her fruit powers, which doesn’t really help her much aside from giving her extra speed and durability.

During one of the early calls between C and R, they joked about her having the will of D. Later on she learned that she infact DOES have that secret name and she actually carries the will of Portgas D. Rouge. She also resembles Rouge by her looks and sometimes says things that especially got the attention of Garp as he’d last heard the woman herself say them.

C made up an island just to avoid suspicion, claiming that it sunk to the bottom of the ocean only to find out that the island did infact exist.

She also claimed that R and her are childhood friends before her family moved to the East Blue from the North Blue.

In Wano, she learns about the backstory of herself and is left speechless.

She’s actively trying to set Law and R up for her own amusement, even going as far as claiming that he suffers from chronic anxiety which can be cured by slow socialisation (to earn his trust) and cuddles, but the latter must be done by someone the red head respects. Law accepted this as a fact until his mind caught onto it about a week later.

Her favourite colours are purple and green, she often wears brown and blue.

The fake Strawhats had two sets of her; a feral kitten and a giant hulking man with cat ears. Upon seeing this, C immediately called out how they got her motif wrong.

C often takes selfies in the most inconvenient places like right in front of Katakuri, Oven and Daifuku, which she then sends over to R. She also likes to avoid fighting in favour of watching the plot unfold itself.

R

R ends up 10 years into the past, into the office of the Revolutionary Army where he was found by Ivankov and Dragon. He is also now a child. Until he turns 19, he doesn't have any memory problems.

Ivan looks for a cure for R's memory loss, but she doesn't have much time as she's supposed to infiltrate a prison. She quite literally drops him into the hands of Trafalgar Law, explains the situation and leaves without allowing him to protest.

Due to R's shyness, he spends the next half a year silent, making the crew think that he might be actually mute only to later on burst into a song in an attempt to soothe someone. The crew never realises this though as they're used to hearing weird sounds in the submarine.

R uses in total three names in this universe: Ren (Revolutionary Army), Eli (Heart Pirates) and Nao (C, later on the Strawhats). They joke that he has just very long name and those are parts of it.The joke later on turns into reality making R's name be Reneli Nao much to his embarrassment.

During Ivan’s search for a doctor who could cure him, R ended up accidentally eating a devil fruit. The fruit was Zoan type, Neko Neko Mi, Model: Black Jaguar. However for convenience, he refers to it as panther fruit as that way nobody can tell for sure if it was leopard, snow leopard, tiger, lion or a jaguar (Panther is the class name of each of these large cats).

R has two bounties, one as Ren and other as Eli, the latter being his "pet" bounty. Whenever the marines see him in his human form, they refer to him as revolutionary army member rather than as a pirate. Somehow they never put together the fact that Eli and Ren are the same entity.

His bounty as Eli is only around 100 beries due to the marines assuming that the black jaguar form is his real form, and thus believing that he’s a pet.

Before the timeskip, R uses black sunglasses to block out the light as he is very light sensitive, post timeskip he's seen using a cap.

During a call, C joked about him being the illegitimate son of Shanks, in Wano this is confirmed to be the case and the duo swear to never joke again.

He too claimed to be from an island which sunk, only for it to turn up on old maps.

R is an awakened Zoan user, which grands him higher speed and durability.

He also has the habit of switching into another language unconsciously when he curses or insults people. He most often calls them fools in Hebrew, which the rest of the crew assumes having been the native language of the island he’s from.

Law is the only one who knows what he is saying, which makes situations where someone assumes that they’ve earned his trust because he’s “giving them a nickname” even funnier.

He knows how to use both rapier and a katana, his old sword was a rapier which he called Shoshannah after his mother (this means lily or a rose), his current sword is named after his real life brother’s cat, Mito, which in Japanese means serene water while in Italian it can mean myth.

During Zou, the only reason why he got hurt was because of his fruit powers suddenly activated making him loose his balance.

He calls Ivankov “mom” on multiple occasions.

His denden mushi was a gift from Ivankov, however, he just can’t bring himself to decorate it claiming that he’s waiting for the moment he’ll be able to pinpoint just what would reflect him and his personality accessory wise.

His trademark colours are orange, blue and purple, which you can find from his hat and the scarf he wears around his waist to help him carry his katana.

R is a terrible liar which he tries to make up for by turning conversations overly philosophical. Most often he ends up accidentally blurting warnings to his captain and crew.

He often challenges his captain without even realising it by asking questions like “Are you sure about that?” or calling something the stupidest thing he’s ever heard right to his face.

He seems to be immune to feeling intimidated by people to the point where it’s thought that he simply doesn’t have any self preservation instinct. Despite of this, R is very careful and plans his moves to ridiculous detail, trying to take in any possible threats and any potential change in the environment.

Law has a theory that R is the reincarnation of Corazon because he seems to know things that only Corazon would know. This theory was debunked once he learned that R is only 3 years younger than he is.

Other

C and R meet one another in Sabaody, where they both start to regain their lost memories. While they're running from the marines, they quickly catch up and exchange numbers so they can keep in touch.

C and R call regularly, but have trouble when someone else picks up, they both are very shy after all. This leads to moments where C asks Usopp to ask whoever had picked up if Nao was available and vice versa.

Penguin and Shachi have a stash of photos from the time R was stuck as a jaguar cub (when they thought that he was a lot younger and that the devil fruit was just a black cat). They tend to show them to C out of spite towards R, who still doesn’t talk that much.

There’s a third person (let’s call them K), who’s sailing with Boa Hancock, C and K haven’t met one another in the OPverse, but R has made sure that the two also manage to talk by giving them each other’s denden numbers.

K likes to mess with R and Law by referring to them as brothers or “cat men”.

R reunited with K when his captain was taking care of Luffy. The latter found R’s situation hilarious.

The denden mushi of C has purple and green stripes and tiny horns, K’s radiates  G A Y  because of glitter. K’s denden also holds a tiny pride flag.

[ii-thiscat-ii]

Hmmm, DVD style commentary? That sounds cool! And like an interesting read. Hmm perhaps for the You're Trapped In Here With Me fic? And incandescence? And maybe the Alvie Rosewood Affair? If you got em

Sure, I can do this. It’ll be three different posts though, so I hope you don’t mind that.

You’re Locked In Here With Me

(DVD-style commentary is provided for the author’s own amusement and should never be expected as a given. Please do send requests though.)

The title of this is a reference. If I know TAU right, I know for sure someone’s caught it, because it’s obvious and well-known, but no one has said anything yet.

The idea came about because it is hilarious and @fenerismoon is good at making jokes, and I wanted to put them in a fic. Most of the jokes are his. I still take credit for the words.

“I hereby open the case against Tyrone Larch. Mister Larch, you stand accused of twenty-seven charges of first-degree murder and one charge of cult activity and demon worship. How do you plead?” 

Set the stage immediately. We’re not surprised about the first part, but we are surprised by the second.

Again, Dipper is pretending to be human. This time though, it’s not because he wants to try living a normal life. This time he just wants to fuck with people, which is the perfect setup for a crackfic.

Literally any of the nonsense that usually shows up in crackfic can here be explained away by ‘overpowered demon in a mischievous mood’. It gives me a lot of leeway for crack, crack, and more crack.

I’m not too happy about the courtroom scene to be honest. I like some parts of it, but the whole witnesses thing ould have been handled better, and there were ideas I like that I didn’t manage to fit in. Particularly the part where one of the cops tazed him on the way out of the building, and he just kept laughing, so they kept tazing him.

Still annoyed I couldn’t get that in here.

I do like the fact that Dipper killed a bunch of people with a gun just because he wanted to. Actually, I enjoy the image of Dipper going ballistic with a couple handguns and a slasher smile, laughing all the while. That idea existed long before this fic did.

And of course Dipper fights the charge of demon worship while entirely ignoring the murder part. He’s not ashamed of just having murdered a whole bunch of cultists, but he certainly isn’t a cultist himself!

Oh, if only the judge knew…

And then he goes to jail. Mostly because he finds the idea interesting.

The last thing the prison warden expected early next morning was to have David Halver request to see him on the subject of changing his cell.

I don’t know what Dipper did to David. I don’t know what David tried to do to Dipper. All I know is that whatever you imagine is probably funnier.

I am fond of the prison warden, though. He’s just trying to do his job, and then Alcor the Fucking Dreambender decides to make it more difficult for him.

“Eh,” he shrugged, “I’ve a good sense of taste. Let’s see…” He took a bite of the so-called mystery meat and waved his fork around contemplatingly. “Okay, there’s a lot of mink in here, and definitely a bit of frog, though it’s mostly rat, I think. Maybe some seagull. And oh, nice! Someone’s lost a finger in here!” 

I’m annoyed that I used ‘in here’ twice in the same piece of dialogue. This is why you proofread, people!

Anyways, Dipper’s having fun, and the Circle makes an appearance. One of the things I like best about this universe is that it’s so large in both space and time it’s easy to add whatever laws you want. If I want the relatively harmless circlers to end up in the same place as a 27-times murderer, I can do that. If I later want them to be a completely legit religion, I can do that too. In this one, they’re outlawed, which means Dipper has to clear them out of the way before he can make real shit.

I like to think he does care for them, if only because they’re so devoted to the more human parts of him he can’t help but feel responsible for them. In this fic, that means they don’t get shanked and that’s about it.

He did not say much. A few words here, a carefully disguised insult there, a few insinuations and implications, all said to the right people at the right time. It did nothing now, but he could practically smell the ever-present tensions rising, and he left the cafeteria that day with a full stomach and the sense of a job well begun.

I like this. The more subtle applications of omniscience, if you try, could possibly be to know exactly what to say to the right person at the right time to make them stab someone three days down the line. The implications of this are terrifying, but luckily, this is a crackfic, so no one we care about gets hurt.

The second cellmate was a convicted child molester. It did not end well.

I had to. It’s TAU, after all.

The rest of them nodded, and he opened the door again and yep, curtains. There were also floral sheets on the beds instead of the usual white ones, and a cosy chair with a book open on the armrest in a corner. Larch himself stood by the side table under the window, watering a potted plant. He was supposed to have none of those things.

This part was fun. Dipper might be in prison, but that is no reason he shouldn’t be comfortable, right?

The marijuana plant was for the lols though. Most of what he does here is for the lols, but that one most of all. The guards have already started to understand that nothing he does makes any sense, in context of the laws of nature or the laws of man.

The prison riot. Shooting people in the face is fun. Making people stab each other in the face while he sits and eats popcorn is even more fun, he realizes.

He’s not… entirely sane in this fic. He’s not all the way down, but he is at a point where he finds his own amusement more important than other people’s wellbeing. It might actually be that this incident lets him wind down ehough that he can come back to sanity.

They had to pass through three locked doors on their way to his cell. The last door opened to a plain, white room with little more in it than a simple bed. Tyrone Larch was relaxing on that bed, calmly reading a book he was not supposed to have. As the door opened, he looked up at the closest guard. 

“Was there anything you needed?” he asked. 

You can just hear him laughing on the inside. He’s not actually trying to pretend he’s not a demonic trickster god here, he’s just having fun and waiting until they give up.

“Then what is this?” asked the guard, and raised his hand holding the key he had gotten from Larch.

“That’s a banana on a string,” said the warden.

It was.

Case in point. This joke is actually entirely my own and I am very proud of it. Did Dipper intervene and exchange the key for a banana at the last second? Was it a banana all along, and he’d just made it look like a key, or tricked the guards into thinking it was a key? Who knows! Either way is fun.

This is also the point the warden actually gives up and decides to figure out what the fuck is actually going on, after which the fic is more or less over.

All in all, I really like this fic. I think it was just as long as it needed to be, with just the right mood and just the right focus on just the right characters. I can’t promise I’ll ever be able to write crack like this again, but if I get the chance, I’m taking it.

And then he was gone, along with his book and the view from the window. The window stayed, though, now showing some kind of grey void.

And of course the prison gets a memento. Namely, a prison cell they can never use again because it has a portal into the void on a wall.

Sooner or later, someone is going to find out about this, and Dipper is going to have a hell of a lot to explain.

[thedramafilesblog-blog]

Appearing before the Dramacourt: Man to Man Ep 01

***If this is your first time browsing The Drama Files, please read The Rules section first for our reviewing and rating system***

Issues:

Whether the sniper shooting scene was realistic

Whether the “prison break” was believable

Whether the evil scorpion man villain scene was the funniest thing ever

Whether the breakup with the mob boss’s daughter was legit

Whether ex-fangirls would really make the best managers

Whether the explanation on ‘how to contact a Ghost Agent’ was hilarious

The Rule(s):

Absolutely not. There’s a reason snipers don’t move around and jump across buildings when on a mission.

Somewhat. It started out strong and then its like the write gave up thinking halfway through.

Totally. Cheap, terrible CGI and random NYPD in the most un-New York environment is totally ridiculous.

No. It was totally not legit. So many unanswered questions.

Depends.

Yes. Totally hilarious.

Analysis:

RedRosette J: Finally. A show that isn’t absolutely horrible right from the start. I have to say that I was waiting for this show ever since they announced it. I love James Bond-y spy shows, so this is totally up my alley! It got off to a rocky start with the ridiculous “sniper” scene (See Issue 1) at the beginning but after that the show picked up. There was all the super secret spy stuff, running around Europe, and things blowing up just like in any good spy show. There was definitely a LOT going on in this episode and I had to stop for breaks throughout (this probably has nothing to do with the actual plot though and more to do with the fact that my brain is tired from studying. Exams. Ugh). Park Hae Jin is totally believable as Agent Kim Seol Woo. He’s done previously “soul-less” roles before (Bad Guys and arguably Cheese in the Trap), so there’s no doubt he can deliver. I also like that he brings a little bit of a “I-give-no-shits” vibe to the character. I really liked the introduction of the movie star Yeo Woon Gwang and the people around him. They all seem to have unique and well developed characters. Right down to a Descendants of the Sun spoof! I’m excited to see how Park Hae Jin’s and Kim Min Jung’s characters interact as the show goes on. For right now, it seems to be the typical borderline love-hate situation. As for the political plot line, I got bored and sort of zoned out, but I’m hoping it gets better later on. The production is well done and the OST is decent too. So far, I don’t hate it and I’m really hoping it continues this way and doesn’t disappoint.

Jubiemon J: Overall, I’ve enjoyed this episode. We had a good mix of action and humour. I also liked how the episode showed a contrast between Kim Sulwoo and Yeo Woo Gwang through the transitions. When Sulwoo is suffering in prison, you have Woo Gwang being a jerk to all the workers around him. There’s a nice contrast between their personalities, yet they’re similar in many ways as well. Sulwoo can charm people like how Woo Gwang is great at acting as if he cares about the people around him (not his direct team; other directors/actors). However, Sulwoo seems to be less conceited and has a more serious, responsible personality unlike Woo Gwang who is really the arrogant type that you can’t hate completely since he’s still good at what he does. Also, though the spy scenes in the start were a bit cheesy at first and the long English scenes were kind of excessive, I still enjoyed seeing that setup for Park Haejin’s character. I felt like the crew intentionally had that long intro segment to lightly make fun of typical spy movies too. In spy movies, there’s always that femme fatale and how Haejin’s character ended the relationship he had with that woman in Hungary was hilarious and totally made fun of spy movies.

I wouldn’t say this episode was a 10/10 because there were still some parts that bug me. I did think that how Sulwoo entered the prison was on the ridiculous side; he could have just committed some crime and entered or acted as some prison guard. Instead, he had to go through that long saga with getting kidnapped by some peeps to get to the Russian military leader.  I also don’t particularly enjoy Cha Do Ha as a character. She seems to be the typical Mary Sue. She’s a kind, devoted woman with good intentions and is completely infatuated with Woo Gwang to the point that it’s embarrassing. She’s like at least 30 in this drama . . . and she fan girls like a teenager. I know it’s supposed to be cute/funny, yet I just cringe. Not to mention, did they HAVE to give her the worst bowl cut ever? She also keeps interfering with Sulwoo’s mission which sincerely irritates me. I’d rather watch how his mission will play out than have her believe he is some paparazzi. Even worse, it’s completely obvious how Sulwoo will eventually fall for her. There’s already some hint that something about her “bugs” him; his boss even alluded that there’s always a woman involved. Finally, the political parts were still . . . ugh. Can we just let go of all the corruption dramas going on? -0-‘ So sick of this theme. (I do have to say this drama has done the best so far in terms of dealing with the politics; not TOO TOO much like in some dramas like Defendant. God. No.)

We’d never get anything done if professors looked like this

Fake dating

Tea with a mob boss

Shady shit always goes down in alleys

LOL!

Making sure everything is perfect because you have the boss from hell

Smiles

When someone interrupts your “me time”

This guy tho

“Let me see your equipment” ;)

When you can’t believe he’s so pretty!

There’s some political stuff too…

Issue 1: Whether the sniper shooting scene was realistic

RedRosette J: I get what the drama was trying to do. I really do. They wanted to show him as a rebel who doesn’t follow the rules and does crazy stuff. I get it. But there are tons and tons of other much more realistic ways of showing that! There’s a reason that snipers lay in wait and don’t move. It’s all about precision and timing. It takes time to focus on your target and wait for the opportune moment. It is highly and I mean highly unrealistic for a sniper to be able to pick up his giant ass gun, run across a building, jump down said building and then aim and shoot a man. Seriously? Not to mention, those guns are really not meant to be “portable and user-friendly.” I just found this scene completely ridiculous and thought they could have done much much better.

Pretty sure that’s not how a sniper works

Breaking all the rules

Dude: “He doesn’t listen to anyone.” Dude 2: “Perfect let’s recruit him”

Issue 2: Whether the “prison break” was believable

RedRosette J: Let me just start off by saying that I am a HUGE fan of Prison Break (Season 5 airing now!). So, any show that does anything remotely related to a prison break, I expect Prison Break level standards for the breakout. I was super super excited when things started rolling towards a prison break: stuff got exchanged, soap molds were made, prison batteries were made, shank keys were cut and then the actual breakout was WTF? They just ran. Like ran through the prison. I’m sorry but where were the guards and the locked doors? It’s a prison. Not some hotel hallway where you can casually run down. It gets worse. They get to a grate in the wall which just opens and then they jump into some hole and the scene cuts to them sitting in a car by a helicopter. What? So many questions are unanswered!!! Where did the tunnel lead? How did they get out of the tunnel? Was it even a tunnel? Where was the car? How did they get the car? Did they talk to someone? I don’t know…It was really like the writer got too tired to think about the ending and was just like ‘whatever I’ll resolve it off screen’. No. Brah. You have to see it through!

Jubiemon J: What I did like about the prison break was the start of it, the part where Sulwoo stuffed something on that door which then led to something being lit up. The lights then all shut down. I quite liked that part. I wouldn’t say the prison break was THAT bad compared to the ones I’ve seen in other movies. It was just okay. What bugs me more is HOW Sulwoo ended up in prison. It was totally unnecessary to have to have dated that daughter of some evil guy and then get kidnapped by the dad and thrown to prison. Ha. Like I said before, he could have had a prison guard there. Also that ending part with the Russian military leader being sent off by his crew ? If he could have gotten a helicopter all set up, why couldn’t he have broken out earlier by himself? Was Sulwoo really necessary? I doubt it.

When you in prison but still got moves…

  When you in prison but you still chill af…

What is this? Where does it go?

Issue 3:  Whether the evil scorpion man villain scene was the funniest thing ever.

RedRosette J: I LOL’d so hard at this! This was the funniest thing ever. The dude was wearing like a full on body suit (Batman style) and had a massive scorpion tattoo on the side of his face that glowed! It was completely ridiculous and totally hilarious. The shitty CGI made it even funnier. It was also set in New York (?) but looked like it was actually outside a strip mall. LOL! Dead. So funny!

Jubiemon J: This part really, really confused me at first because I thought there was some supernatural element to this drama. I almost got really mad and wanted to say no to this drama. After I realized that he was just filming as a “bad” Superman, I thought it was all right. I guess they wanted to introduce a popular guy who does action films that can sometimes be cringey yet still popular. (Hinting at lots of those sequels and franchises I bet.)

LOL!

That tattoo tho LOLOLOL

When you famous because you were in a corny movie, but still got swag

Issue 4: Whether the breakup with the mob boss’s daughter was legit

RedRosette J: I totally understand the logic behind why he had to die for there to be a proper wrap up of the relationship. He’s right. You do not want a scorned woman on your case if you are an international super spy. My only issue is with the execution of said death plot. The car explodes with him in it while she’s walking towards it. Cool. But how did he get out? And then he just walks away right in front of the burning car and she’s supposed to be right behind the car. How did she not see him walk away? I don’t get it. Again, this could have been written better, eg: engineered drive by shooting with a fake blood pack and a bulletproof vest or gets pushed off a cliff into the ocean, or I don’t know anything else that seemed a little bit more legit. It’s for the dramatic theatrics, yes, but still I hold spy dramas to a higher standard.

Jubiemon J: I can kind of see how she wouldn’t notice him going away. When someone is caught by surprise and he/she isn’t trained to be immune to these dangerous scenes, he/she would probably be caught up with whatever that surprised the person. It’s sort of how there has been this experiment that has shown that when there’s a fire, most people are way too shocked to even react and run away. They just freeze. I think it’s reasonable for her not to have noticed Sulwoo walking off. I do agree that we’re kind of left wondering how he escaped; I think that might have been the writer/director thinking that this would show us how awesome Sulwoo is as a spy. We’d never know how he escaped. That’s the beauty? A magician doesn’t reveal his/her tricks?

NO.

Issue 5: Whether ex-fan girls would really make the best managers

RedRosette J: You’d really have to make sure that she’s not some psycho stalker first. But in an ideal situation probably yes they’d make good managers. Case in point is Cha Do Ha (Kim Min Jung’s character), who literally picks up the Yeo Woon Gwang’s car with a forklift because he was making out with some random actress in it. Talk about an extreme deterrent. Ex-fangirls would definitely be willing to go to extremes to protect the star…that much I believe.

Jubiemon J: No. You don’t want someone that’s a crazy hormone-filled fan girl to act as your manager. Sure you will get someone who understands your pet peeves and habits, but you also have someone that’s likely fantasizing being with you or stalking you. It’s also unprofessional for her to be going goo-goo ga ga behind the scenes when there are co-workers around her. It’s cringey and embarrassing. I also think that having someone like her who only sees him as that perfect man will eventually end up stunting his career. He treats his closest staff so terribly that they will likely want to leave him later. Also, I think someone would want a manager to be able to bring some sense to the star like keep them grounded. I think the only reason that he has kept her around is that he is a narcissist. He wants someone to idolize him completely. (This is just on the first ep; his character assessment will likely change b/c we have that hint of him being all sensitive when the politician’s wife told him she managed that clothing brand.)

How you react when you an exfangirl and your bias does something cute

This is top notch deterrence

Issue 6: Whether the explanation on ‘how to contact a Ghost Agent’ was hilarious.

RedRosette J: This was absolutely hilarious. The best part was that what Seol Woo’s “handler” Lee Dong Hyun (Jeong Man Sik’s character) was explaining to the Director was totally realistic. You know how they say the best spies are the ones who wear no disguises? This is totally that except the best spies are the ones that act like regular people! The director was all “how do you contact him?” and Lee Dong Hyun is all “I texted him” LOL! Totally totally hilarious. He goes on to explain to Seol Woo later on that the Director thought he was kidding because it was too normal and realistic. I love it!

Conclusion: Appeal Allowed.

Rating: 3 = MM. Okay. Fine. (It was good. Not cookie worthy good, but still good. Here’s to hoping it gets better)

Dissent from Jubiemon J – 3.5 – that .5 comes in because Park Haejin really studied hard to execute his English lines! He executed his lines very well considering how English isn’t his mother tongue. I’d probably would have given this a 4 if it weren’t for the cringey Cha Do Ha. I think cutting her character out would be fabulous.

  File No: Man-To-Man-EP-01 Appearing before the Dramacourt: Man to Man Ep 01 ***If this is your first time browsing The Drama Files, please read The Rules section first for our reviewing and rating system***