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batw1nggg · 4 months ago

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Hi!

If you could rewrite dr3 how would you write it?

Ahhhh . the age old question

im not gonna touch future arc because i genuinely believe it cannot be saved but i will say that despair arc had plenty going for it. the framework is really good i love the part where they expand on twilight syndrome murder case and i love how they frame hajime signing up for the project as all these little events adding up. the kamukoma gun scene. the komaeda bomb subplot ate up it gave him just enough screen time without being too much. ofc i love the izuru characterization scenes. the student council killing scene is one of the only scenes in dr that still creeps me out. i love how they open with happy 77b bonding but then everything spirals out of control and the whole anime has a sense of impending doom to it.

all of this is great its just a matter of there being More of it. despair arc deserved more than 10 episodes imo. it did alright with the budget it was given but the brainwashing plot (everyone in the crowd begins to groan) (STAY WITH ME STAY WITH ME HERE) wouldve been a fine and maybe even good plot had they just. extended it.

before we get into the brainwashing plot im gonna discuss a smaller but also big issue - the hinanami kamukura project retcon. chiaki should NOT have been even REMOTELY a factor in hajime signing up for the project. the point is that he does it for HIMSELF. taps the sign chiaki shouldve been her own fleshed out character her biggest downfall is that her sole purpose is to spur on hajimes character development points at izuru crying scene points at the trial 6 chiaki scene points at the kamukura project retcon poin

now that that is cleared up. this isnt the first time the topic of a dr3 rewrite has come up on this blog and ive had issues with scrapping the brainwashing plot brought up to me, the biggest of which would be it would make putting them in the simulation unethical. if theyre brainwashed the team can go ahead and make the decision for them because they cant consciously make it themselves — but if they ARE fully conscious of their actions and do NOT consent to being put in a potential death trap (even one built with good intentions) then its just. Wrong. putting them in there to reverse the brainwashing is fine, but putting them in there because. just because they are seen as bad people that need rehabilitation? its kinda like those news articles u see that are like Scientists found a way for a prisoner to mentally serve 100 years in just 1 real life minute!

however leaning into this could pose a very interesting moral question, because both munakata and makoto’s solutions to the problem would be unethical, its just the matter of which is better. theres no clear answer. im sure in the canon makoto already feels some degree of responsibility for the killing game, but if we take away the brainwashing plot we REMOVE the comfort of saying “oh well they werent conscious of their actions so its fine that i made the decision for them because this was the only way to reverse the brainwashing” its not as black and white

i have a scene in my head to replace the brainwashing one that ive been playing with where its essentially just the og scene but. longer. theyre trapped in that trial room the only light source being the tv screens theyre watching chiaki be tortured on no food no water for. a week. two weeks i havent decided yet. and then i was thinking about chisa also being tortured so you have the two people that bring the class together dying in front of everyones eyes (also endlessly torturing only one person that long is going to kill them. taking turns with two would extend the amt of time). and after a couple of days of torture junko like forces chisa and chiaki to talk to the class about how great despair is or whatever and in their grieving and desperation to honor their last words everyone turns to despair

HOWEVER the canon realllyyyyyy wanted to paint makoto as ultimate hope good boy munakata WRONG, so. unless we want to change a lottttt of writing we gotta keep the brainwashing. i know i know.

i dont like the idea of junko personally manipulating everyone mikan style either. its too much of her time invested to a class she doesnt care about. she cares about torturing HER class because thats the one shes attached to she couldnt give less of a fuck about 77b

but she also is not LAZY about her despair. shes dramatic like. there was no reason for her to kill chiaki that was literally just for Flare. so i think it isnt unreasonable to find some midpoint between not having her manipulate EVERYONE but have her personally target maybe a couple of people for no longer than one brief scene each, and once shes infiltrated maybe 3 or 4 people Then she lets it spread. or she doesnt let it spread and the 3 or 4 ppl she did manipulate personally serve as lackeys to manipulate the group into falling for junkos brainwashing trap or something. as for who shed target, probably the most dangerous yet most clearly emotionally vulnerable ones komaeda peko etc

i would also try to fit in some of the atrocities they commit into the anime SOMEWHERE. could be in future arc could be as an extension of despair arc. no idea how id fit this in here i just think its important to do some tragedy era worldbuilding (udg tried to do this but failed. because udg sucks)

and also in the bit where chisa gets Banished over to teach at the reserve course. i think it wouldve been cool if she was hajimes teacher and also we saw a little bit of her reaction as a former main course student to the mistreatment of the reserve course students. i wish they wouldve played w that

oh also take away the despaircest. Please . and if we do decide to keep it (which i think junko incestually abusing mukuro could explain mukuros loyalty and have some genuine weight had it been handled right) we gotta explore it without fetishizing it and making it into a weird gag .

ok thats all i got right now i know this isnt a rewrite its mostly just a lot of critiques and disconnected ideas but. ill flesh out all of my concepts One Day.

#that is my two cents feel free to disagree #dr3 despair arc #danganronpa 3 #ko’s danganronpa ramblings

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gemwolfz · 1 year ago

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SORRY IM A BIT LATE FOR THE EPISODE REQUESTS BUT 238B. IT HAS A DINOSAUR GUY. the A part is funny too it involves giroro getting arrested

BY ZIV SUGGESTION: two of the most promising synopses ever

i will be viewing part A first of course because thats how i work

im not sure ive seen this version of the intro yet lets GO NEW KERO MARCH JUST DROPPED (<- several years old) (<- edit i have seen this intro already but only once. durr)

PRESSURE COOK MY GREASY BALLS

arbitrarily chosen- PURURU SPOTTED HIII PURURU. giroro doesnt even fit at the thingamabobber he could fall at any moment. injustice in the court of space law

ohhh i get it this is like. like the movie. the classic movie i haven't watched. i get it

i cant say i understood that reference necessarily but i sure do recognize it!!

PURURUUUU it would probably be nice if i had already watched her introductory episode but who give a shit pururu hiiii <3

really good academic discussion going on on the whiteboard back there. Mfs didnt even refer to giroro by name

Keroro sir im going to fucking lose it what is your problem. has this mf just been waiting his whole life to go to court just to cause drama

what is your problem!!!

YOOOO THEY GOT SPACE PIZZA sorry im tired and adhdridden. Free my mans he has brain damage and should probably see a doctor. I like pururus voice btw its very normal compared to some anime girls ive met

ykw he makes a fair point giroro seems like the kind of person to give himself brain damage out of frustration. still what is your problem

AWESOME. GET HIS ASS. KILL HIM. VIOLENCE

FR9G PHONE REAL i hit image limit hang on

#Autism

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silvercrane14 · 5 months ago

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Kaguya-Sama: Love Is War - two students are in love with eachother but refuse to "lose" and admit their feelings. Instead, they have increasingly convoluted plans to get the other to confess.

Okay I will admit. this Is a romance and also ive only seen the anime. So actually this would fall more under anime recs bcs the english dub voice acting is AMAZING. Anyway tho its a comedy that I really enjoy. Its about romance but like. Idk I dont read/watch romance often so I cant say "its not like the standard romance plot". But its less about them Falling In Love and more about them Overthinking Everything And Being Silly. ALSO !! tho it takes a bit, it does go into the characters a lot. Very centred on the characters relationships !! Not just romantically between the main two, but in general.

Why I think you would like it: similar in "vibe" to nozaki-kun. Funny!! But it has its moments of seriousness and it understands its characters well.

Mushishi - Eye Have Not Read This im sorry 🙏 i havent even seen the anime so I dont actually know much about it but ive been recced it so many times I figure I should pass it to you.

If u like Natsume's Book of Friends you'll enjoy this. Genuinely I think this is my strongest rec for you on this list even tho I've never seen it. I really do think u wld enjoy 👍

Insomniacs After School - IM REALLY SORRY I HAVENT READ THIS ONE EITHER. I HAVE IT KN GOOD AUTHORITY U WOULD LIKE IT I JUST CANT GUVE ANY DETAILS. BCS IDK REALLY.

"Two young teens who can't sleep find companionship with each other. They must learn to overcome any challenges and figure out what's important to them."

Why I think you would like it: Ive heard its similar to Skip to Loafer in a way!!

Girls Last Tour - Two young girls explore a post-apocolyptic wasteland. They go through abandoned buildings and old towns in their journey, battling solitude eith only eachother

This one is a little sad. More likeeee. Meloncholy, yk? I dont have much to say about it. Very good manga.

Why I think you would like it: The character relationship between the two girls seems like something you would enjoy.

Look Back - to be super honest its been over a year since I read this I dont fully remember what happens. Theres this girl wjo draws comics for her elementary school newsletter. Shes funny so every1 really likes her and her comics. at some point another comic appears, but its actually just four panels of background art. Its so beautifully drawn that the other students begin to fawn over it. Angry kver her loss of attention, the first girl goes to meet the girl making these new comics (The background girl doesnt go to school, she works at home). Thr end up becoming friends and the story shows how their friendship develops and changes, growing closer and growing further apart.

The manga is p short for. a manga but its actually just a Really Long oneshot. Its rlly good. not much else to say.

Why I think you would like it: Very similar to Blue Period. About art and how it reflects people. Also very strongly driven by the relationship between the two girls.

The Girl From The Other Side - ive been typing so much i really cant give a whole review on this. Similar to WHA. kinda. beautiful art. read it u will enjoy it

Kaguya-sama I watched the first two seasons of! Maybe I should read the manga too, I did think it was fun

Mushishi I watched maybe the first episode of, but I should definitely try again,,, I don't remember anything about it lol

I've read Insomniacs After School!!! I'm definitely not caught up though, and I've been planning on watching the anime,,,

Girls Last Tour I,,, might have seen? At least part of it a long time ago. I'll have to rewatch/read the manga

Look Back sounds really interesting,,, I'll check that one out!!!

I'm actually reading The Girl from the Other Side in Portuguese rn lol I have volumes 1-5 on my shelf

#crane answers #yaaay ty for these!!!#mourn 🌧

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girlfriendsofthegalaxy · 2 years ago

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tuesday again 2/21/2023

despite two sections clocking in at one sentence each, i had a lot of thoughts about a video game so this one is the normal creeping-up-on-2k-words length

listening

brian david gilbert's rgss must be presented without comment.

youtube

reading

earlier last year a regional gas station chain offered a whopping twenty five cents off per gallon. many terms and conditions applied. the one that made me scoff and delete the app right there at the pump was that location data had to be on at all times. not just when you were using the app or in a geofenced area around the gas stations, all the time. i hate people knowing where i am. i despise my data being sold. do not advertise to me. fuck off.

last year this made me briefly wonder about the loyalty programs i have with the regional supermarket chains, big y and stop & shop. i don't even want to think about whatever instacart was collecting on me much earlier in the pandemic. unfortunately i can choose not to drive as much but i really should not eat less and i do love a loss leader sale. and then i had to move again and forgot about it. earlier this week my favorite data scientists at The Markup dropped a...upsetting article on kroger's data practices, which can include in-store tracking, biometrics, facial recognition, and when shopping on kroger.com: "Third-party trackers send your product page views, search terms, and items that you have added to your shopping cart to Meta, Google, Bing, Pinterest, and Snapchat." did you know they have their own spinoff data company? for why, you might ask?

Experts told The Markup that companies that sell products in grocery stores don’t have much visibility into what happens after their items are placed on shelves. These brands want granular shopping data that only supermarkets have in order to gauge the success of the brands’ products. In recent years, this data has become harder to come by and therefore more valuable.

i try very hard not to be be doom and gloom about tech bc reporting already tends toward the hysteric, and usually there is stuff i can do or a different option i can take to avoid a package of my data being sold and linked to other packages of my data. however, it is unrealistic to leave my phone at home and pay with cash, and financially i can't afford to opt out of these loyalty programs. sucks! sucks real bad! The Markup articles are pretty good at making the american senate take notice, but they are very slow and do not always fully understand tech abuses, bc their average age is sixty fuckin three.

watching

im ticking along in adventure time, in the middle of season six, the last real long season before we get down to twenty and fourteen episode seasons. there has been an amusing string of episodes where finn and jake aren't present or are only present briefly. this show will wander off to tell the most heartrending story about a character you will never see again, and this episode will stick with you for ten years.

ive also been looking at the fandom (i know) wiki page for each episode, bc why not, and it is a very funny fan wiki. a great deal of emphasis on animation errors with the caveats that maybe the miscolored arm of a princess in episode whatever actually means there's two princesses of that kingdom and we're only seeing the second one for the first time now. whenever the show references a classic work, the note in the wiki has the tone of "ugh this weird old thing why is my show making a joke about it". if an episode won an emmy (this show won fifteen emmys btw) it is usually the very last thing on the page bc that's not lore or errors or connections to other episodes why should you care??? either a very specific type of guy or a bunch of young teens wrote this. probably a bunch of young teens that grew up to be a very specific type of guy.

playing

thank u for all ur open world rpg recs, i think horizon zero dawn is the closest thing to what i want but i will probably end up playing Prey first (which has exactly one of the many qualities i want and is not open world even a little bit) bc it is a game i actually own. but im here to say i know im having a depressive episode when im listening to a lot of mother mother and playing f/allout 4. anyway we're back at it again in far harbor, which at least contains the most interesting storytelling in the game. can we all say hello to andre, bethesda's eleventh first gay character?

coming up on this drive-in theater with an incongruous neon heart looming out of the mist and spooky music plus screams from the horror movie trailer that's been playing on loop since the bombs dropped is SO fun. nothing on the mainland is quite this atmospheric. the fog really does heighten the fun of exploration. i know dead money did it first and better but this is less dire than dead money. usually.

also i forgot they're showing a western staring Legally Not Lee van Cleef if u switch the reels. this is not even getting into the delightful enemy encounter at this location bc i have a different location i want to talk about

GOD the MS Azalea (the one screenshot that isn't mine and is from the wiki) is so fun to run around. a rusted out, ripped in half cargo ship with five different sections (guardpost, top of ship, shipping container apartments on top of ship, inner sheltered harbor within ship and floating kitchen/pool table parlor, floating bar and clinic lashed to ship entered by swimming or elevator down from the top of the ship, sheltered harbor between two halves of the broken ship. each of these sections uses vertical space in interesting ways bc the ship is so fucking big. there is a straight up House underneath that boat. and everything feels very lived in, there's clutter and signs of life everywhere. these guys are just vibing with their little stores and their little apartments. a smarter game or a game with more time would have leaned into "you were sent to kill these guys by the townsfolk bc they felt threatened by an unaffiliated settlement" but alas. the trappers on the boat are just xp.

it is very funny that the lighthouse on the south end of the island refuses to load in properly, no matter where i am

this dlc, more than anything else in the game, actually does feel like my choices matter. i do the missions for the mariner and the barricade physically changes. i do enough fairly complex quest chains for enough of the town and they decide they like me enough to go build settlements. seeing the settlement fog condensers off in the distance from across the island feels very different from the mainland, where generally your settlement's buildings don't pop in until you're pretty fucking close.

i really don't care about how big the map is, i want the main game to be this dense and this bold in telling a stories, start to finish, that feel very interconnected and grounded to its location. i am feeling a little conflicted with my playtime, bc i gotta lotta fucking bones to pick with this game, but i am having fun with this dlc. part of it is "what if fallout/the rest of the game was good" and part of it is the depression making any scrap of delight feel weird. so it goes. february will end eventually.

making

did my taxes.

#i feel like this one does not particularly invite commentary or discussion but that's the way the week rolls sometimes #tuesday again #tuesday again no problem

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bmpmp3 · 2 years ago

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I READ a lot of different manga recently and i WANNA talk about em :)

SO LIKE i ADORE stories about the entertainment industry like music actors celebrity whatever i LOVE IT so oshi no ko had been on my to-read list for like a bajillion years now BUT queen bee doing the ending song for the anime (MEPHISTO!!!! LISTEN TO IT!!!!!!!!!! ITS SO GOOOOOOD!!!! LISTEN TO EVERY QUEEN BEE ALBUM RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!! the opening is good too) finally pushed me to read it (not watch it sorry... normally the anison industry has this symbiotic relationship between the songs and the shows where the show makes people get interested in the musicians and vice versa but as a person who cannot watch a single episode of a show ever (jk.....probably) I only ever check out the manga and osts HJKFJFDHKDSLS its kinda cool that the first episode is like a movie length adaptation of the first volume of the manga though from what i can tell) AND its very good!!

i did NAHT expect the reincarnation stuff (all i knew was it was a manga about an idol who has kids in secret) but theres some glimmers of interesting concepts touched on with that (kinda like half way between the modern isekai “i just am the person i was before i died just in a different body” and the 90s shoujo manga style “im mostly the new born person but there is the remnants of someone else in here”, it hasnt touched on it That Much but what they brought up is interesting, like that kid has simultaneously been alive for over 50 years and also is incredibly 15 years old hjkfdsjhfds) but it’s a showbiz mystery thriller with so much tonal whiplash OF COURSE i’d like it those are like. my favourite genres hjkfddsjklfd

so far ive been digging it. OR... well i’ve caught up and the last third has been. a little odd? i know i just said i love my tonal whiplash but it feels a little like its going really fast but also like. dropping some plot threads and character arcs that i was kind of hoping they would go back into? it’s still ongoing though, it could easily bring stuff back and turn around. im assuming this is a symptom of the weekly release schedule? 99% of the manga i read is monthly or occasionally volume at a time so im not as familiar with the structure. is the author like. okay. i know they take breaks but man. i could feel it with the arcs about the manga authors. salutes

that does remind me though. this isnt a manga ive read Recently (i first read it like a year or two ago) but recently i finally was able to collect all volumes of penguin revolution (VERY DIFFICULT FEAT for some reason all the volumes were cheap as hell except people kept listing volume 6 for like hundreds of dollars and i was like. its not worth that. i was finally able to find one for like under 15 bucks after like a year but MAN) and its interesting that like oshi no ko felt like. the slightly bloodier penguin revolution. penguin revolution with more blood and less acting magic hallucination little girls (actually what was that one little girl who showed up for a chapter....maybe they both have equal amounts LOL) JK JK they’re probably not very similar ones an award winning 2020s era seinen and the others a weekly shoujo from the mid to late 10s that was cut off short and while well rated, largely forgotten (not to me...to me its Everything) so they got different things going on its just little blonde boys and their mother situations put me in the mind of penguin revolution...i should reread it again...

ALSO before i started that i read sweat and soap and um. first of all. that man is a little freak <3 second of all ITS REALLY GOOD its a really nice and sweet story about a couple navigating their relationship, the first chapters are a little clunky (i think the author mentioned it was a one shot that unexpectedly got picked up for a full series so thats why the first chapter is a little fast lol) THIRD OF ALL the depiction of bullying and how it can affect one later in life even as an adult was Very well done like especially how the bullies themselves may have completely moved on, thinking nothing of it even while it still consumes you, real ass shit for a manga about a little freak who sniffs <3 also just a very funny and fun manga with pretty great characters. if i ever get physical copies some of those book covers are gonna be. hard to explain

speaking of real ass shit before that i also borrowed sand chronicles from my library (<3 my local library it has so much manga for some reason!!!!) and that was ALSO 99% really really good as like a decade long coming of age character study about this girl and her trauma and how she attempts to navigate it, very realistic in a lot of ways, i mean it was heightened in classic 2000s shoujo ways but so many of the characters had me going like damn. i feel like i know these people jfkdshfds its good!!! EXCEPT. why’d they make that one guy marry his cousin. 99% good and 1% girl why. oh well, im still glad i read it, sometimes i find that something that does most things fantastically and one thing really bad has a lot of value as someone who loves media analysis LOL

OH and i havent finished this one yet, but seeing that little red bespectacled blonde twink and his 2018-ass undercut reminded me that i’d been meaning to read trigun, i watched the original anime when i was like 10 but all i remember is like. the opening theme guitars. something about plants. love and peace SO this is basically a new experience hjkFjdskdjfkds its good so far! I’ve only read like 3 chapters but i like it! i wish i could watch the new show too (i love that style of 3d animation) but as i said before. watching a show is. a monumental task. maybe someday

ANYWAY this has been BEEBEEPBEEBEEEBEEBEEP (news jingle) things i have read in the past couple months thank u and good night

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vulpiximisa · 2 years ago

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bocchi the rock review

So my initial impression was that id be getting something as good as Yuru Camp or A Place Further Than the universe. (Two CGDCT animes but on totally different spectrums). I enjoyed Bocchi the Rock but it didn’t hit anywhere as hard as the mentioned too. It might be a little more in line with Lucky Star, and probably K-On but I haven’t actually seen it.

The first episode was funny seeing Hitori being an absolute mess but the more you watch you realize, oh, she really does has problems. Like anxiety isnt that funny quirky ness. But maybe it is because the girls feel really anime in a way where I can’t really take Hitori’s spiraling seriously and Kita and Nijika just think “haha shes funny”.

I feel bad because I think if I ever had to deal with Hitori as a person I wouldn’t be able to stand it. Which is saying something because I saw a lot of myself in her when I was that age. Maybe not to that extreme but there were times where I wouldnt be able to say what I was really feeling and got dragged into something I didn’t want to.

I thought Nijika and Kita would get some sort of character development or something. Kita seemed almost too perfect and I wished she had some sort of flaw because she’s too pretty and outgoing and friendly and cute and literally she was like too perfect. The only thing she did “bad” was that she submitted the School Festival form without Hitori’s consent but she owned up to it and it was painted in a way that “she did it for Hitori’s sake” and it did turn out for the best. You could say her flaw was being pushy but hm.

Nijika we didn’t see too much of even though she was there. I guess her thing was with her sis.

Oh speaking of, maybe I’m old but I think the older cast really are the best. Love how supportive they were, even if drink girl is tropey as hell. I’m reminded of the sister and teacher in Yuru Camp, but Bocchi’s adults are more anime. Oh, Hitori’s parents are… there I guess. I don’t think they were unsupportive but i dont think they were the best in trying to get her to grow. Theyd really just leave her and go “oh, shes being Hitori again”. They’d really let her grow mushrooms on her head huh.

Ryou might be the fan favorite but I kind of can’t stand her. I don’t mind the kuudere/cool persona she gives off but I hate when the think they can get away with inconveniencing someone because it’s quirky and funny (to the audience). Unfortunately Karakara is one of my favorite songs in all of Kessoku Band album.

The visuals are… a little too bubble for me to take seriously. I looked up a few of the manga scans and I guess they translated them okay but I was hoping it’d be like Yuru Camp where the character designs are just to be anime but the girls feel more real but I just needed to stop hoping for it to be Yuru Camp. The band animation were pretty neat and the jokes when they just do silly stuff with Hitori’s imaginations were funny in a way that I would have laughed more at it 15 years ago if I’d never seen Gintama.

I know the original source was a 4koma and theres probably more content not covered by the anmime, but I kind of wished they’d ended the 12 eps with the school festival? I mean getting her new guitar felt a little anti climatic to wrap up the cour.

Oh, ngl, I was kinda rooting for Hitori/Kita but I don’t think Kita’s crush on Ryou ever went away but whatever.

Bochi the Rock was fine, it’s not the 10/10 Ive seen MAL give it, probably the majority of the audience thought it was funny. It was amusing in places but the humor kind of wore off after a few episodes. (Kinda like Asobi Asobase) I made a mistake having high expectations, but I don’t regret watching it.

#pixi watches anime #re bocchi the rock

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cloverandstuff · 8 months ago

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Episode 21:

Ah, I am so happy Havoc is still alive. And I love his bond with Mustang. I think it's a very underappreciated relationship that should get far more attention. They and Mustangsm's relationship with Hawkeye, both display how Mustang cares for people close to him.

And damn, Winry considering Hughes as a father figure hits so much harder. So many parental figures around her died, and two of her childhood friends are going into the same profession that killed her parents. Winry has every right to cry and be concerned, especially when she's still a kid.

Episode 22:

AHHH FUCK ME, SCAR'S BACKSTORY HURTS ME SO MUCH

God, his anger is justified. I didn't understand as a kid, but it really is justified. He knows where he fucked up, but he watched his entire homeland be destroyed, and saw the tuins and corpses of the people he knew. He had every right to be so mad at the state alchemists who allowed that to happen.

But at the same time, Winry has every reason to want to kill this man. She doesn't have the context, and she shouldn't need to. Her parents saved people, and its hurts so much more that a person they saved was the one who took their lives and not a soldier.

God, but the moment of Ed gently pulling her fingers away from the gun, while talking in a soft and almost pained tone, how her hands were meant to help people live, and not to kill. He truly believes she helped save him, and that she will save many more. Winry needed to be reminded of that.

Episode 23:

May is back and she is just as adorable but powerful ad ever. Love her, and the whole dynamic she has with Scar.

...This is gonna end badly.

BUT DAMM I FORGOT HOW MUCH OF A BADASS FAN AND LING WERE, THEY BOTH ARE SO FREAKING COOL

And the whole thing about the Fuhrer being more human than the rest...god, I feel so bad for this man. He is human, even if he's not supposed to be it.

Episode 24:

Gluttony, the cutie pie he is, is also jusy the most terrifying thing Ive ever seen. Like, dammit, this scene gave me nihhtmares when I was youngeer and it still creeps me out a bunch.

Disclaimer: I love kids. If there is a kid chatacter in an anime, Im usually gonna love them a lot and become very attached to them. Theyre all just so little and naive, trying their best.

That being said... FUCK SALIM, THE LITTLE SHIT

Episode 25:

First off, I love the bit about how gluttony was meant to be an artificial gate of truth and just ended up being the gate to a place between that and reality. Like, that is so fun to think about in terms what that implicates about him.

Ah, but I frogot that despite how much I love how morally grey his character his, Bradley was a bitch about the literal the daughter of a man he caused the death of crying at the guy's funeral. Like god, fuck you, you asshole.

Episode 26:

Envy was a character I remember hoping would end of getting a redemption arc for, but I realise now that the guy was never gonna get that. He caused far too many tragedies to even be allowed that thought. That being said, it is kinda funny how this guy, out of all the sins, is possibly the most friendly to the brothers.

Ling just being the sassy, done-with-this-shit man, is peak character development. This is stilla kid who has had to deal with more oressure than he should have had to bear and he's also probably got a disability that results in his frequent hunger.

Oh, and Envy is terrifying. I am only saying that because i refuse to remember the past.

...god, this terrified me as a 7 year old. Just randomly coming acorss an episode on TV abs seeing this.

I'm rewatching Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood cause it's been literally a decade since I've watched it.

So cheers, I have a reaction thread (because I'm a sentimental bitch)

Episode 1:

God, I've forgotten how it immediately just got to the action in the first episode. Like, it set up everything and gave a glimpse of nearly all important character.

Poor Isaac, was probably manipulated, but ultimately led himself to his own demise. Very bold though.

And god, I think I was too depressed at the time of watching it, but the Eldric brother's backstory was so painful with that small glimpse.

Episode 2:

I cannot for the life of me understand why this shit didn't affect me as much as it should've as a kid. It might've depression that numbed my emotions, but I guess we'll never know.

Anyway, my point is, this is is traumatizing, and that's me saying this as an adult. The backstory and the short glimpses of the mom, as well as the clear love and dedication they had for her? The way that Ed didn't even hesitate to try and find more truth? The way he dragged himself, bleeding leg and all, to the armor to shove it down, and connect his brothers soul to it???

And god, the way I just kept whisper-shouting when they came to recruit him, cause I didn't remember shit, going-

But man, as someone is is now so much older than Ed is in the anime, they make him act a kid. A very smart, powerful and purposeful kid, but a kid nonetheless. He's so young and you can just feel it in the little things he does. He does not have his shit together and is still figuring some shit out.

Episode 3:

I love the comedy this anime has. It has the funny little pauses and the interuption of what should be serious moments without ruining the actual serious moments.

It is exactly my cup of tea, with a silly joke that just poked fun at a kid or being, well. A kid. He's small, and that joke may remind He's small but I can also remind you that he is so much younger than his peers.

I am an atheist so I do have the same kinda mindset about God that Edward has. Rose has this sort of annoying mindset of God and his priests being this answer to all suffering and anyone who disagrees will suffer divine Punishment. It is frustrating at the start.

But I can fully understand where she's coming from by the end. She clung onto this hope, this prayer that someone she loved so much will eventually be revived. Rose then meets the brothers who lost someone they loved, and tried to being back as well. She saw the consequences and felt terrified. But she spent so long just clinging onto this hope that she desperately wants it to be true. So she argues, trying to convince herself that Cornella was telling the truth and she didn't waste so long praying for something that didn't exist.

People can find comfort in the idea of God(s). The idea that there is someone looking after everyone and offering guidance is reassuring for some.

That was not Rose's situation.

Rose's situation is more akin to having a loved one suffering from a terminal disease and convincing yourself that prayers and God will be able to do what science could not. You can not pray for the impossible. You can pray for hope, for guidance or for even a fast recovery. But you need to understand that even if you wish for something impossible, you cannot spend your life wasting away on these prayers and refuse to do anything else.

Rose needed to stop clinging in general because she was clinging on to something impossible that compelled her to try and attempt awful things. She needed to learn to stand on her own. Maybe she could one day find hope in God again, but it wouldn't be anytime soon.

Man, I went on a rant there.

Anyway, I just wanted to type all that put because my mind just felt like analysing for a bit.

I forgot what the philosopher stone even did until now. I remembered that it was powerful but I that was about it. Now I remember, it was shit about defying the rule of absolute equivalence.

I am kinda happy I forgot majority of the lore of this anime, it makes it fun to put all the pieces together again as an adult who can process things and analyse better.

Episode 4:

This hurts.

This hurts so much. They were so happy, and acting like actual kids. They played all sorts of games with Nina and Alexander. It was so bright. They were so bright.

But Tucker, the motherfucker, only saw what he was bound to lose instead of what he had. He tried to work his way through it, but eventually just gave up.

My heart sank when I heard him ask Nina to play the next day. It broke even more when heard Nina say, in that voice that doesn't belong to a kid, "onii-chan".

He sacrificed everything just to save his title pf State Alchemist. He gave up his wife and then his daughter and the respect of these kids.

God, I hate him. I understand him and his desperation and I hate him.

Scar is back though. We love scar man. He's weird but core to the story and has every right to hate State Alchemists.

Again, when I was a kid, I didn't feel much. This episode never hit me as hard as it does now. Back then, I though the Eldric brothers were being dramatic about the whole thing.

Now it just strikes me so hard how fucked up it wad to be willing to experiment on your own kid for a stupid title. To mutate her into an existence that was nothing like her human one.

Brotherhood didn't make it blatantly, but it was mentioned time and again, just how painful it was to be a chimera in the original. Nina was in pain and Tucker knew this.

I fully understand why this hurt the Eldric brothers so much now. That was horrid. And to be able to even see a semblance of yourself in that was painful.

#fma brotherhood #reaction time #fmab #reaction thread #maybe spoilers?#fma #idk this is an old anime #this is on you if you haven't watched it yet but plan on it

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thesylverlining · 3 years ago

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Okay. So. As someone who has now FINISHED the Cowboy Bebop Netflix TV Show Program (and yes, did a very recent rewatch of the whole series + movie), I feel most qualified to say:

It's fucking great, y'all are just mean.

The whole thing's enjoyable AF but the finale? FUCKING SLAPS. FUCKING *NECESSARY,* after the *honestly not that great* specific character-execution (ha, pun) of the original. This was Satisfying AS HELL and lets [SPOILER] be uhhhh, a Person, with a whole Arc and a VOICE and whatnot, instead of a weird passive, featureless idealized Concept of the Past??

Like pretty much everyone is MORE INTERESTING and developed in the Netflix show than the anime (aside from the main trio, who are explored in different but FUN, FITTING WAYS) by virtue of getting more time with them in 45-minute eps, but also because:

They get more than one dimension (Julia. JULIA!)

They're more expressive/fun to watch feast on the scenery/has an actual personality and reasons for doing things, even if they're shitty monstrous reasons (Vicious)

They Uhhh, live and interact, instead of appearing separately for an episode or two and then get fridged Very Tragically for shock/very special episode trans tragedy/never mentioned again/no further bearing on the plot (Ana and Gren, and arguably Shin and Mao)

And the VERY ending? The Ed-shaped elephant in the room?

FINE. IT WAS FINE. The actor (who is also nonbinary and AN ACTUAL YOUNG TEEN IN THEIR FIRST BIG ROLE and I've seen some *ugly* things aimed at them on the hellsites) is weird and loud and there's fish-eye camera and "cartoony" movements - because how in the hell else would you believably play Radical Edward? Honestly. Like if you're going to shit on this, then please... DESCRIBE EDWARD TIVRUSKY IV's mannerisms and speech, and then tell me how you'd do it in live-action. (Actually don't, I don't care, that's not the point; the point is IT WAS FINE, nothing was Ruined Forever, no one's set everyone's old DVDs on fire.)

Like if I hadn't known everyone was screaming about how terrible it was, I would have thought nothing of it and simply enjoyed the cameo/sequel-hook. Over-the-top? Dare I say, Cringe? SURE. HOW THE FUCK ELSE - nah, done.

SO yes. I really, really enjoyed it. Sincerely hope it gets a season 2 (and think it has a good chance because hatewatches ONLY BOOST THE NUMBERS), for the story that's set up, and those that still need to be told (Gren! Earth! The Gate disaster! So many questions!). Cannot wait to see what comes next.

#Cowboy Bebop Netflix #cowboy bebop spoilers #cowbow bebop netflix spoilers #cowboy bebop #yeah i'm putting this in the main tag. picking violence thiis nght.

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soulfairre-slamamancer · 2 years ago

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what if. just maybe. the rift was caused by xornoth?/hj im not serious about this theory, but hey

i mean, in empires s1 xornoth and scott were canonically brothers. pearl was in season 1 of empires, but not s2; she switched to hermitcraft but scott stayed with empires. same with shubble and fwhip, who were the first and most affected by the corruption and xornoth. also lizzie, with connections, but not horribly affected by the corruption.

and after the final battle, they trapped him in a crystal

when the rapture occurred, xornoth escaped the crystal

the rift(at least on empires side) was decorated with crystals, almost like a calling card.

in season two, shelby is the resident witch of the server, the only resident of the evermoore

and, according to her, the evermoore seems to be “haunted”. Similar in fashion to xornoth’s behavior when the corruption was just starting in the undergrove. the first noted instance was in her 3rd episode, when she mentioned she hears weird noises in the mangrove at night and fog that plays tricks, hinting that the fog is the source of the voices

in season 1, lizzie held the book of prophecies; predicting core events that were the negative points in the season. in season 2, she has an amethyst business; the crystals and blocks surrounding and in the site of the rift(empires side). as well the citizens of animalia are animals on two legs, the only call back was the axolotl-enderman creature that she found with the prophecy.

shelby haunted; creepy happenings occuring post dragon-death. lizzie with the cards; bipedal animals and crystals. now how bout fwhip and scott?

fwhip is a goblin, too consumed in creating a booming city beneath the mountain to notice just about anything; but the cavern is exactly what ties him to the rift. a small, unseeming cave on the side of a mountain that cracked and expanded into a massive portal. as well as he sent sniff, snort’s older brother, through the portal. in his pursuit of business, hes created a whole lot of unbalance

and scott? well sorry but i havent watched much of his pov, however i know his portal is covered in tendrils similar to the ones spread by xornoth’s corruption

something common between most of things is the color purple. crittercity and anamalia’s town hall having purple roofs and amethyst. shelby’s shop’s roof and her wand’s aura is purple (according to scott). the end (yknow cuz its just yellow, white and poiple). xornoths lil glowy bits. the rift is all purple, all of it.

this is entirely brought forth by a random thought that flew through my brain whilst i was listen to empires the musical. specifically, “you’re gonna see more of your old friend xornoth”

love adhd lol, also ive only watched empires and not hermitcraft which is why ive only been pointing to examples from empires

#empires #empires smp #theory #LORE #LORE LORE LORE LORE LORE LORE LORE LORE LORE #the rift #empires and hermitcraft crossover #empires season two #empires season one #empires theory #i love empires smp the musical so much can’t you tell

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introvertguide · 4 years ago

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Star Wars: The Franchise

Back in the mid 70s around Modesto, California, it is doubtful that George Lucas could have imagined that his idea for a space opera would become the second highest grossing movie franchise of all time. There has been some questionable content, however, since the groundbreaking original, and the returns have not been as great. There were also some one-offs that a lot of the younger fans might not be aware of. For my own sanity and organization, here is a listing of all feature length movies in the franchise:

Star Wars IV: A New Hope (1977) -

Definitely the most successful film (heck, one of the most successful films of all time) that made almost a billion dollars at the box office worldwide...in the 80s. Amazing. The story mimics the hero's journey as described by Joseph Campbell, giving it basically the most satisfying story imaginable. Nobody except for friend of George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, thought it would be as successful as it was. This kind of popularity meant there was going to be some sequels and, since George Lucas was the man behind the whole thing, only one man was about to get tasked with future success.

Star Wars Holiday Special (1978) -

This was a TV movie that was made to cash in on the massive popularity of the first movie while the second one was in production. It is terrible. I generally try to hold back judgement and point out subjective opinions, but I think I can say that this made-for-TV movie is objectively bad. It is the equivalent of a variety show, a format which was popular at the time, and it was awful. It is widely considered to be one of the worst visual productions of all time. Just to give a hint of its awfulness, the movie follows the adventures of Chewbacca's Wookie family and they only speak in growls with no interpretation or subtitles. Laughably awful.

The Empire Strikes Back (1980) -

Arguably the best of the films as far as story and plot, this film was actually directed by Irvin Kershner with a George Lucas story adapted to the screen by Lawrence Kasdan. This film is legitimately fantastic and not just new and fun. It is so well written and directed with the famous reveal between Luke and Darth Vader. It also is incredibly downbeat at the end that perfectly sets up the next film. I personally think this is the best example of fine film in the franchise, although it doesn't have as much big action and no giant space laser. Well worth watching and makes the third film a must see.

Return of the Jedi (1983) -

Well, not as good as the first two, but still pretty darn good. This film introduced the Ewoks and the Endor moon battle. Many fans thought that the introduction of living teddy bears was a mistake that distract from the story. What really made the film, apparently, was the whole sequence at the beginning that takes place at Jabba the Hut's palace and involves Princess Leia in a metal bikini. We also find out that Luke and Leia are twins, so that kiss in the second film suddenly becomes kind of awkward. This becomes kind of a theme from here on out: should we disavow canon or put in throwaway lines and scenes to cover things that were mentioned in previous movies. It plagues the prequels.

The Ewok Adventure (1984) -

I get a lot of garbage about it, but I love these movies because I grew up with them. They are not that great and the copy that I saw over and over had ads from the early 80s throughout. Heavy nostalgia. Also, some of the Ewoks were played by established actors from what is now called Episode VI, Warwick Davis as Wicket and Tony Cox as Widdle. It was a lot of fun, but definitely a higher budgeted TV movie. It did become so successful that it got a theater release as Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure. This naming style stuck around for the spin off films that were made in the late 2010s.

Ewoks: The Battle for Endor (1985) -

Hot dang, they made a second one with Wilford Brimley! Both of the Ewok films were thought up by George Lucas and sold to ABC. Both films were also given special Emmy awards for special effects. I can't fault either Ewok film as far as visuals since both got the ILM treatment. I have stated that I liked both of these movies more than some of the prequels, and I stand by that.

The Phantom Menace (1999) -

The next three films followed the first three episodes in the Star Wars saga and are now generally known as the prequels. They are also pretty widely hated. One reason for that was the introduction of young Anikan Skywalker (eventual Darth Vader) and his growing attachment to Lord Palpatine (Darth Sidious). The problem with the prequels is that it was a path leading to a result that had been established over 20 years ago in the first film. They also introduced a character named Jar-Jar Binks who was just awful. There was a great pod racing scene and an epic Sith vs. Jedi battle that really were the highlights of the film. The music was also pretty epic, but the film was otherwise not that great. It was completely made under the helm of George Lucas and fans were suddenly starting to wonder if he was the genius they had thought him to be. What I consider to be the best YouTube deep dive movie review of all time, a group called Red Letter Media made a seven part review that explains why the movie was such a problem. You can watch the first part and it will auto load all seven here:

(1) Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review (Part 1 of 7) - YouTube

Attack of the Clones (2002) -

Alright, here is where things really start to go down hill. There is a fine actor by the name of Hayden Christiansen that is just awful in this film. He is given nothing to do for the most part. He is supposed to be this amazing Jedi general, but he spends most of his time walking around speaking in a very monotone voice. He does have some fun piloting scenes, but he is written as such a whiny brat. There are two epic battles (the coliseum and Dooku vs. Yoda) and we get to see a bounty hunter in action. It does seem like a lot of fan service glued together by boring politics and horrifically bad acting.

Revenge of the Sith (2005) -

This is widely considered the worst of the prequel movies and generally laughable at some points. There is supposed to be an epic lava battle at the end, but it is just a bunch of screaming about a failed bromance. We get to see the end of the characters in the prequel and set up the original movies...that were now almost 30 years old. It was unsatisfying and not even slightly worth the wait. It was at this time that George Lucas said that there would never be a seventh episode that would follow the original trilogy.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) -

There was a very compelling series of Star Wars shorts in 2003 made by Genndy Tartakovsky that did very well. George Lucas saw this and decided that a lot of the most interesting Star Wars events had occurred during the time between the prequels and the original series. Lucasfilm put out an animated movie to test the waters and it was so successful that 7 seasons of great animated adventures were made to show the epic battles that were supposed to take place between the second and third episode. I honestly believe that this was the very best space action of the entire franchise.

The Force Awakens (2015) -

George Lucas sold the Star Wars franchise over to Disney and fans got a new movie that was never supposed to happen. Once Disney came on board, the brand became much more prolific. Until the pandemic, there were plans to put out a Star Wars movie every year for a decade. The first was episode seven and was made by J.J. Abrams. It was similar to the first film (episode IV) in so many ways that fans started to think it was just a remake. It even had a lot of the characters from the original trilogy. It was much better received by fans following the prequels and introduced a storyline that was not already spoiled by previous movies. There was a lot of unnecessary fan service for those who loved the original trilogy. This makes since because it involved Lawrence Kasdan, who helped with the screenplay for episode five and six from the original trilogy.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) -

A full big budget release of a Star Wars movie that wasn't one of the episodes was an interesting idea. It was an entire movie to explain a throwaway line from the original 1977 movie. I lot of people died to get some plans for the big weapon in the first film and people wanted to know exactly how that happened. Actually they didn't. But Disney thought it was a good idea and it seemed like it would make a lot of money (it did). It gave the producers a chance to make a movie with new characters and only mentions of the famous story (this was important because the other actors where making the next episode).

The Last Jedi (2017) -

This was an interesting change of pace from the rest of the films because it seemed to drop the idea of the "chosen one" and say that anyone could be a Jedi. It is basically one giant escape story and is closer to Mad Max in space than it is to the other Star Wars films. It was given in full by Disney to Rian Johnson and it shows. This was the first episode film that had nothing in common with any of the production group from the original trilogy. No Kasdan, no Kirschner, no Lucas, all Disney. It was not very well received.

Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018) -

The worst performing of any of the Star Wars live action feature length films, this was the story of Han Solo. That's it. There is not a lot of history about the character and he is so cool, fans needed to have a stand alone movie about his youth. That's a lie, Disney wanted a movie to come out between episode eight and nine. This was the best that the suits could come up with and it definitely made money, but it is lame.

The Rise of Skywalker (2019) -

Well, the movie completely helmed by Rian Johnson was not popular enough so there was a total retcon situation and this film basically picked up where episode seven left off. It was the same team from episode seven (since that film was so much more popular) and they made a final film that wraps up with a bow. Sort of. There was definitely room in the film world for more Star Wars movies to be made (it is owned by Disney) and I really don't believe it is finished as a franchise.

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Just in case there are people who were nervous that this was the end of the franchise, there is currently a stand alone film called Rogue Squadron that is supposed to come out in 2023. Thank goodness. There was also the popular Mandalorian series on Disney +. But the franchise has been making huge films for almost 45 years now, so maybe it is time to stop. We have the MCU that has made almost twice as much money as the Star Wars universe, so most movie goers have picked their setting that they want to see. Maybe there could be a crossover (I am kidding, please no) and it would be the most watched film of all time.

#star wars #franchise #lucas #disney #introvert #introverts #movie franchise

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helenarlett-rex · 4 years ago

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Goosebumps Review #14

So back in January of 2020 I said I would do a review of Werewolf Skin and then I never did it. 2020 sucked. I had other things on my mind. But I guess it’s time I finally go ahead and do that now.

(Spoilers)

Werewolf Skin

Goosebumps (original series) #60

Werewolf Skin was the third to the last book in the original Goosebumps series and the last book in the original series to get a TV episode made of it. The final two books, I Live in Your Basement! and Monster Blood IV would never get TV episodes made of them, or even reprints of the books themselves and would end up languishing in obscurity. In that case of I Live in Your Basement! that’s a real shame because as I said back in my review of that book, it is one of my favorites and one of the best Goosebumps I’ve ever read. And the same can be said about this book as well.

R.L. Stine is kind of a hit or miss author. Sometimes his stuff is great, sometimes he doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing... and sometimes I have to tell him to go fuck himself because he’s body shaming again... But when he is writing about werewolves at least, he never seems to do wrong. And yeah, I still haven’t read The Werewolf of Twisted Tree Lodge, The Werewolf in the Living Room, or Full Moon Fever yet, but the three out of six I have read have all been great. So great that I have to wonder why R.L. Stine hasn’t written about werewolves since the Goosebumps 2000 series... We haven’t had a werewolf book from him since 1999...

Werewolf Skin is actually pretty unique in that it takes a slightly different approach to the whole werewolf myth, but not in a way that ruins it like certain other authors who will remain nameless have done when deviating from established tradition. The story is about Alex Hunter, a sixth grader who is really into photography. His parents get called out of the country on business, so they send him to stay with his Aunt Marta and Uncle Colin in the small town of Wolf Creek for a few weeks. His first week there happens to fall on the week of Halloween so the photography magazine Alex reads is holding a contest with a cash prize for whoever can take the scariest photo and Alex is pretty interested in winning that.

Now we get a bit of weirdness right away in this book, and I don’t mean intentional weirdness... I mean R.L. Stine has forgotten how reality works again kind of weirdness. Because even though Alex is only going to be staying with his aunt and uncle for a couple of weeks, they have arraigned for him to attend school there at the local middle school in Wolf Creek for the duration of his visit. And I’m instantly like... What? I’m pretty sure you can’t just trade schools for a couple of weeks like that... What kind of school lets a student enroll for three weeks? I know R.L. Stine doesn’t usually do much (or any) research when he’s writing these books, but come on... The guy used to be a middle school teacher. This is something I would expect him to know...

But okay... that aside... Once Alex gets there his aunt and uncle tell him there is a cute girl his age who lives across the street named Hannah and that he should make friends with her. And then we get another case of R.L. Stine not understanding how reality works because Alex is all like, “A cute girl...? Aren’t there any boys around?” Uhh... It was clearly established that this kid is in the sixth grade. I remember the sixth grade very well. Unless Alex is gay, no sixth grade boy is just going to turn his nose up at the idea of hanging out with a cute girl. Quit being such an old man Stine... I started dating in the sixth grade... And okay... If Alex is gay that’s perfectly fine, but nothing in the book ever indicates that’s the case.

This hesitation from Alex doesn’t seem to last very long though. The moment he meets Hannah his balls finally decide to drop. I’m not kidding. One moment he’s all upset he only has a girl to hang out with, and then the next moment he’s all infatuated with her and can’t stop describing her “husky, breathy voice” and how much he loves it. I’m not entirely such what a husky, breathy voice sounds like, especially on a sixth grade girl... but from how much Alex’s inner monologue focuses on it, it’s pretty clear that it’s doing it for him.

I should also point out that Alex’s uncle gives him two rules that he has to follow while he’s staying there. Rule number one, stay away from the run-down home next door. That’s where the Marlings live and they are a weird, mean old couple who don’t like anyone coming near their house. And rule number two, stay out of the forest surrounding the town at night. You know... Standard horror clichés that the characters will then refuse to elaborate on, thus driving the protagonist to only be even more interested in doing those things...

Although there’s some conflict between his aunt and uncle about the whole refusing to elaborate on things. When they are first driving him to their house his aunt asks him what he wants to be for Halloween and Alex answers that he wants to be a werewolf. This causes his uncle to freak out and almost lose control of the car. His aunt then asks his uncle if he was thinking about them? “When he said you wanted to be a werewolf you thought about them, didn’t you?” Which of course only makes Alex’s uncle get mad and tell her to stop talking about it. But this situation comes up a few times in the book. Alex’s aunt seems to think Alex should be told about them... we are assuming she means the Marlings... but his uncle is pretty against it and keeps telling her to stop talking about that in front of Alex.

Although his uncle isn’t the only one having that kind of reaction about the topic of werewolves. When some kids from school ask him what he wants to be for Halloween he tells them werewolf as well and they also have similar reactions... Until one kid finally tells him “We already have enough werewolves in Wolf Creek.” And I realize this review is getting pretty long winded but unlike most Goosebumps, this one actually has a lot of detail that builds up the story as apposed to the first half of the book just being filler like I normally see in these books.

But in an attempt to make a long story short, too late, I know... Alex is so dense about everything that Hannah finally just breaks down and tells him that the Marlings are werewolves. It seems to be something everyone in the town knows about but doesn’t seem to do anything about. And of course Alex’s reaction to this is the reasonable one of, Uhh... This is the twentieth century... There’s no such thing as werewolves... Which is why he was so dense about figuring it all out in the first place. He’s not going to jump to the conclusion of, Oh! The Marlings must be werewolves! when he doesn’t believe in werewolves.

This changes when he starts hearing animal sounds coming from next door at night and he watches out his window as two werewolves come crawling out of the Marlings house. I have to give the book credit for actually getting to the werewolf stuff pretty early in the book. While I also loved The Werewolf of Fever Swamp, that one didn’t actually show us any real werewolves until the very end of the book. It was still a great book, but there wasn’t actually a lot of werewolf action in it. This book only give us one night of build up, with Alex forgetting his camera out in the woods and having to go out after it before it gets ruined in the rain, stumbling across some animals that have been ripped apart, and trying to find his way back home in the dark while hearing the sounds of something else out there... But then by night two we have werewolves right out in the open. That’s kind of refreshing.

And I’d like to take a moment to talk about how this book actually puts a different spin on the werewolf myth. Because remember how I said that the whole town more or less believes the Marlings are werewolves? Well this town believes in werewolves so much that they actually teach about them in school. During one of the classroom scenes in this book we get to learn the rules of how werewolves work in this setting. It turns out when you get bit by a werewolf you turn into one when the moonlight touches you. Not just the full moon... Any moonlight. But then when the sun comes up a werewolf actually sheds it’s skin. It then keeps its skin, or pelt I guess... like a fursuit. Then every night after that, when the moon comes out, the werewolf is compelled to put its fursuit back on which turns it back into an actual wolf monster. So werewolves are just furries who can’t stop fursuiting at night. Who knew...? And of course the only way to kill a werewolf is to find its skin while he isn’t wearing it and destroy it. If you destroy the skin you kill the werewolf.

Anyways, Alex gets tricked by some kids at school who tell him they know a place in the woods where the werewolves go to drink out of a pond every night and they want him to meet them there at midnight so he can see it. Now that he actually believes in werewolves, having seen them himself, Alex agrees, thinking that if he can get pictures of the werewolves he can win that photography contest, but when he tries to sneak out that night, he finds that his aunt and uncle have locked him in his room. There is no scene of the werewolves trying to break into his room at night like there was in the TV episode, but we do find out that when he goes back to school the next day the kids are making fun of him because it was all a lie and they didn’t go out into the woods that night, thinking they tricked him into tramping through the woods alone all night. Alex doesn’t tell them that he didn’t go either because he didn’t want to tell them that his aunt and uncle locked him in his room, so instead he tells them he did go and he took pictures of the werewolves. But of course that leaves him with the problem of now they want to see the pictures and he doesn’t have any...

So of course that means there’s only one thing to do. The next night he rigs the door lock with chewing gum and sneaks out to follow the werewolves through the woods to he can take pictures of them. He tries to get Hannah to come with him, but when he knocks on her bedroom window in the middle of the night she refuses to come out. So he tramps off into the woods on his own, follows there werewolves, gets a lot of pictures of them, and actually makes it back unharmed. Not to say it wasn’t a tense couple of chapters... But when daylight finally comes and he follows the werewolves back to the Marlings’ house and watches them take their fursuits off, we get the big reveal.

Oh look at that... Aunt Marta and Uncle Colin are actually the werewolves and the Marlings don’t even exist. It’s just an abandoned house they use to store there werewolf skins in... Although I will say the twist was handled pretty well. I didn’t actually see it coming. But that’s not the end of the book. Like I said, this book had a lot to it. Because now that Alex knows his aunt and uncle are werewolves, he has to decide what to do about it.

The next day is finally Halloween and after he tells Hannah what happened she has an idea to deal with it. They don’t want to kill his aunt and uncle, so they decide that once they leave to go trick-or-treating that night, they will sneak over to the house, steal the werewolf skins, and then wear them themselves. The idea is to go trick-or-treating in the aunt and uncle’s werewolf skins and when the aunt and uncle can’t find them, they will be forced to go the whole night without turning into werewolves. In other words, they are planning to cure the aunt and uncle by making them go cold turkey.

The aunt and uncle figure this out sooner than expected and Alex and Hannah don’t get very far away in the werewolf skins before they show up and start chasing them, demanding they give them back their skins. Alex and Hannah manage to stay away from them long enough that when the full moon reaches the highest point in the night sky the curse is broken and the aunt and uncle are no longer compelled to put the skins on anymore. And naturally at this point I’m wondering why the skins haven’t turned Alex and Hannah into actual werewolves instead. Does it just not work if it’s not their own skins? That seems like a bit of a shame. That would have been a perfect twist ending. They managed to cure the aunt and uncle but became werewolves themselves in the process. Then Alex could have a werewolf girlfriend! But no... It doesn’t seem to work that way...

With the curse broken, they all decide to go back to the aunt and uncle’s house to celebrate and Alex tells Hannah “Let’s go put these skins back in the old house where no one will find them.” Hannah starts getting nervous about that but before she can stop him he’s already gone inside, and once he is in there he finds another werewolf skin still in the house. When Hannah comes in he is confused, wanting to know how there is already a skin there when they are both wearing his aunt and uncle’s skins... to which Hannah tells him that she isn’t wearing his aunt’s skin. She’s wearing her own skin. And when Alex still doesn’t seem to get it, she tells him he’ll understand soon enough, before pouncing on him and biting him.

Werewolf girlfriend!

Honestly this is probably one of the longest Goosebumps reviews I’ve written and there was still a lot of stuff I didn’t even mention. The book just had a lot to it and for once, it didn’t feel like it was filler to pad out the page length. It wasn’t even full of fake-out scares like most Goosebumps are. There were a few I guess, but with actual werewolf stuff happening from very early on in the book, there just wasn’t any need for constant fake-outs. It was pretty nice. And I probably spent more time than I really should have just rambling on about what happened without actually critiquing things... but there just wasn’t a whole lot to critique. Other than a few weird things in the beginning, like enrolling in a different school for only three weeks... the book was more or less fine and I didn’t have anything to complain about.

Definitely one of my top ten Goosebumps books. I’m very happy to see Alex and Hannah get to become a cute werewolf couple. And I’m sure Goosebumps has long been responsible for so many kids discovering new fetishes, so I just have to wonder how many kids developed a suit transformation fetish because of this book?

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yue-muffin · 4 years ago

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well, cherry magic was absolutely devastating and yet another example of why i love jdramas: when they set out to do so, they are full of so much heart and understanding of what it means to be human. i have had so many emotional rollercoasters over the years, but the angst is not usually angst for its own sake; there’s a purpose: to paint a tragedy and make you think ah, if only..., or testing the bonds of friends and family to show that what makes us human can just as easily tear us apart as be the cause for us to overcome obstacles in life.

i usually don’t like romances. i avoid them. which is also why i like jdramas. romance-centric ones are clearly marked and indicated in the summary, if a romance appears in a non romantic drama, it doesn’t often take anything away from the plot or characters. in fact, aside from old bl movies, i’ve never watched a single romance jdrama, no matter how highly recommended.

this got LONG so.

two things: 1) im really glad i gave cherry magic a chance. 2) my mind was blown by how far the japanese romance genre has come in terms of depicting same sex relationships. all you have to do is look to the old bl movies i used to watch- even if the characters are respected within their medium, they all end in tragedy.

so, cherry magic along with several other jdramas coming out or that have come out recently, really impressed me. i stepped away from the jdrama world for a while, and im glad that i slipped back in.

so about the whole drama since ive really been talking about the overall genre - it’s so damn good and relatable, to a painful degree. to me, particularly, who has lived a privileged life and moves through the world without too much fuss, it’s that self-sabotage of adachi’s that really hit me hard. you’re your own worst enemy sometimes. and, indeed, his anxiety is also really relatable. how many times do i always think the worst of my performance, when the grades, the instructors’ assessments, my friends and family, all say i didn’t do as bad as i think in my head? or thinking whatever you do, it’s never going to be enough to match so-and-so’s expectations, and if you fail their expectations you fail them and yourself. man, that spiral of his thoughts in the last two episodes was painful but the resolution of which was so cathartic.

(also, i guess i just have to own up to the fact that i do have some sort of anxiety. i never really talk about myself to others, and to my family who i do, they don’t believe anxiety is even a thing beyond a funny feeling in your gut which is like “wow, really”, but a thing i’ve learned to ignore, except this ongoing pandemic situation has really made it rear its ugly head, which i can normally keep in check ok)

but the drama as a whole...it’s so realistic, and positive. it’s a perfect balance. it handles the “typical” bl tropes well, giving a bit of its original manga flair but taking it to a realistic level. like all the classic kabedons! the mind reading bit is actually really helpful here to break those tropes apart a bit by being able to know kurosawa’s thoughts even tho on the outside he’s mostly as suave as ever

and another thing! it’s so...life-affirming. that it’s ok to not know where you’re going even at age 30, to set little goals for yourself, to pursue happiness in your relationships. the way society is these days, there’s so much pressure to be the best and succeed - even to the point, it’s not just good to be happy with what you’re doing, you must be successful by society’s standard (the minato storyline particularly addressed this)

and i, at least, really need that reminder. i love the career im working towards now, but when i was only 21, i was just about having a breakdown every other week bc i was coming to the end of my undergrad studies and didn’t know where i wanted to go next. it felt like ‘if i don’t make the right choice in these 3 months, it’ll ruin the rest of my life or i’ll just never be happy’. that’s so crazy, thinking back.

and another thing: the characters are all so different, but i found a bit of myself in each of them nonetheless. unlike fujisaki, i do want to be in a relationship someday, but i don’t want one now and i would greatly appreciate people in my life to stop pressuring me into one with their well-intentioned comments. i thought at first that kurosawa wasn’t going to be super deep, just a really nice guy in love, but actually his mask of perfection and need to meet others’ expectations as his self-perceived redeeming qualities really hit hard. and adachi, who is like my spirit animal, his anxiety and worries over whether he’s worth a love that seems so good and perfect, running away rather than face the possibility of getting hurt from that interaction. even rokkaku, who acted all energetic and excited at the drinking party but really just wanted to get the heck out of there

the actors were all just. so good. i mentioned this last time, but they got the perfect balance of comedy moments + realistic reactions/nuanced acting that isn’t exaggerated, for the non-comedy moments. they all did a stellar job of selling this drama!

so, the bad thing is that this has set the bar high on modern romance dramas for me, and considering i don’t give them much of a chance in the first place, lol.

#the muffin's drama watching adventures #cherry magic

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empty-dream · 3 years ago

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So I read 86 LN vol 1

S1 anime covers the entire Vol 1 except for the latter's epilogue, so full anime spoiler here.

And as of this writing, I'm still on Vol 2 so the things I mention here are solely those that happen in Vol 1. Idk if a thing happens in the latter volume, gotta dodge spoiler so I don't browse about it.

There was an interview with a person inside the anime industry that basically said "The point of an anime adaptation is not to be an exact replica of the original material, but to shine as its own medium for a story." I forgot who it was and I can't find the interview anywhere for the life of me, but that statement opened my eyes. I agree with it, that's why I can appreciate the differences between LN/manga and anime, especially if they turn out good and/or interesting.

And that's exactly what happens in 86. I'll start with this: I watched the anime first, and after I read the Vol1 novel, I actually like the anime more. Because there are a lot of meaningful original scenes in it

And because the Vol1 novel turns out exactly what I fear when I first watched the anime: that I won't care much about the squadron aside from the main 5. (Look, the anime promotional materials mostly only have Lena and those 5 only. As shocked as I was in the anime, I did have an idea where the story would go from those alone). The rest are barely mentioned. Not even the girls are named in the novel, even though they do talk and Lecca is even prominent in anime.

For example, the second half of the first episode, the one that shows Spearhead squadron's daily life right before Lena contacts them, is anime original scenes. Kujo already dies the moment the novel starts focusing on the squadron. Simply put, a lot of the squadron members that aren't the main 5 or Kaie get a *lot* more focus in the anime, like Daiya, Haruto (For characters who appear on the introduction page, their novel screen time is less than I'd expect), Kujo and Lecca. While the other members often appear in the background and actually behave like equal members instead of glue-them-on figurines.

(Idk if those other members are named and/or designed in the light novel before the anime is a thing or when the anime becomes a thing.)

The anime also adds relevant information in the Raiden's talk with Lena in EP7, like Kaie receiving racial abuse from 86 (in fact in both versions, she is the first one to get highlighted about this) and Haruto also having prominent Giadian Empire blood like Anju and Shin. These weren't in the novel.

I might be just nitpicking here because I love Kaie and Haruto, but see, this scene is amazing on its own. This is where Raiden and the squad reveal the weight of their motivation all along, that they *each* have different backgrounds and different kinds of sufferings, yet they are all sentenced to die, and they all choose to fight because they know no side is saintly but some things are still worth fighting for.

The prominent characters' deaths (besides Kaie's) are often mentioned with only one or two dry lines. I expected at least Daiya's to be detailed more, but it's just that so matter-of-fact-ly. Well I came from the anime, so I guess it's normal if I expected something as heartbreaking.

I broke down HARD at the last half of EP10 and that is nowhere in the Vol 1 novel. (Having Hands Up to the Sky playing in the background is also an advantage for being an anime. Fuck that song, I now play it 24/7 in despair)

Having a lot of original anime scenes really complement the story's nature. That there are two different sides of life here, it's not just Lena's or 86's only. And those couldn't have intertwined if not for their willingness to listen and communicate.

I know I mentioned this some days ago but really, I can't get over how many of the merch are Lena (and Annette) being cute doing cute stuff while the story itself is actually depressing. Merch staffs know the market lol.

- Novel side -

That said, the novel does have an advantage that the anime/visual media doesn't: Internal explorations and explanations.

It's obvious from the get-go, but Asato confirms that the inspiration of Republic of San Magnolia and its racial discrimination and genocide is taken from Nazi Germany in WW2. The Republic who favors the white/silver haired-eyed Alba drives Colorata out of the 85 sectors, overtakes their properties, and forcibly sends the now-called-86 to either fight their war and die, or work on the wall and die.

The life inside the Republic is also elaborated on. Class always exists, even inside one race only. The center of the republic is for the elites, Lena and Annette's families included. The farther a sector is from the center, the lower the education and economy there is. Most of the military come from these areas, which explains why Lena herself is in difficult situation. Since no one in the military is either capable or willing to bring change.

It's *insane* how easily the Republic could create such vile lies, and how easily the majority of the citizens go along with it.

Gotta admit, Asato does a good job at foreshadowing the fate of the 86, the truth that we can only see after Ep7 of anime. It is mentioned that supposedly, 86 soldiers will be welcomed back once their 5-years term is up. Lena once wonders about it, but ultimately she buys it thinking that surely they must have come back to another sector. She only realizes it's utter bullshit after Annette points out how, 9 years later, they have never seen even one Colorata inside the Republic when they should have seen at least some. This also shows that Lena has never ventured to the other sectors to find out more, probably due to work or maybe she's still a sheltered noblewoman in the end.

And the mentality of the majority of Alba is shown differently. Whereas the anime uses the academy classroom to show how deeply rooted the racism against 86 is, the novel uses Lena's mother who a) more or less does the same as the classroom, and b) presses Lena to get married and preserve their pure noble bloodline. This, when the nobility doesn't actually mean anything anymore. This version shows not only Alba's racism but also Lena's strained family life.

There is a scene of an Alba high school valedictorian who, during his graduating speech, says “My friends died fighting the Legion.” I’m not sure this will make it to the anime, and it’s just a minor scene in the novel, but the weight of that scene is heavy.

The science of Para-Raid is explained, which has something to do with tapping the collective consciousness of humanity and connecting it to one another. A bit far-etched but I guess that works, science fiction and all. But I like the part where despite (or maybe because?) of connecting via hearing only, the other senses are faintly receptive as well. For example, one can sense that the other side is biting their lips in frustration, something like that. Of course, actual real life things like sensing the hidden bitterness or elation in a talking partner's words are present, this being a story where listening matters.

The novel elaborates on Raiden's stay with the Alba old woman. He calls her Old Hag, but it's clear he greatly respects her. The part where she screams and curses in the middle of the road at the Republic soldiers who take Raiden and the other children away stays in Raiden's mind forever, and so it does to me. Ngl it is quite a chilling scene.

Same with the story of the previous Laughing Fox, Theo's Alba commander. It turns out, the entirety of Theo's first squadron didn't like him at all and bet on how fast he'd tuck tail and run back to the Republic. When he faced his death the way Theo explained, he sent a message to Theo revealing he knew about it and knew his place to not ask for acknowledgment or forgiveness. This made Theo regret why he didn't try to talk more with his commander and he keeps thinking about it forever. Now it makes even more sense why Theo, blunt as he is, is willing to listen to Lena and when he snaps, he wonders if his late commander would do the same.

What actually happens in Kurena's backstory is also touched upon. While in the anime some viewers could think "Man, I get where you're coming from but chill out." The novel graphically shows her parents being toyed on by the Alba soldiers while her sister protected her, the two could only watch, and then the same sister got sent to the battlefield to die. Now at that, anyone would think "Man, no wonder she can't chill out. Not with all that trauma."

I also like the addition that Lena can sense Kurena is the one who dislikes her the most.

The novel describes greatly that it isn't just Alba and Non-Alba. Essentially speaking, Non-Alba is called Colorata, and they consist of different race groups as well. Just as Alba is associated with the color silver/white, the other race have their associated colors as well. Asato assigns races to the named members in Vol1 and what their distinguished color features are. This also explains why Anju is exiled despite looking like an Alba.

It's a question that I pondered on when I first saw Shin's armor plates, and that I pondered harder on when Chise died: What happens if there is no armor plate to carve its processor's name's on? So it turns out Shin would substitute it with anything; piece of wood or some random piece of metal. For Chise's case, Raiden, Chise's leader, suggested using the wing of Chise's in-progress airplane model. Which did my heart so bad because I'm strangely fond of Chise and finding out that in his spare time in his limited lifespan, he was working on an airplane model made me sob.

I'm not particularly into mecha, and could care less about how it moves. But Asato did a good job describing the fight between a glorified suicide car and a line of brand-new solid A-grade tanks. Special mention to I-IV because wow the concept arts for all the mechas are so cool, even though I don't really understand. (Asato even said to I-IV "Go draw a tank so horrible it's stupid for the Juggernaut" and I-IV came up with the current Juggernaut)

You know how the Republic greeting is "Glory to San Magnolia and the five-colored flag"? I won't disclose who says this in what situation, but there is someone of Colorata saying "If you hate colors so much, you should have just colored your flag white" AND OOOH THE BURN SO HOT HOT HOT

Tl;dr: Bottom line is, I personally enjoy Vol 1 because I already watched the anime and got attached to it. If I were to read the vol 1 first, most likely I wouldn't fall this hard for the series. Hell, maybe I wouldn't even pick it up in the first place because I knew it'd be depressing. But this is not to say that the LN is bad. It’s very good, it just does not really touch the lives of other soldiers whereas that’s the very thing that I love from the anime.

#86 #eighty six #random saying #not sure if i have put all my thoughts here so maybe ill edit sometime later

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ryttu3k · 4 years ago

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Part 2 of my season 12 reaction posts! Find part 1 (Resolution of the Daleks to Fugitive of the Judoon) here!

Praxeus

Thoughts on Doctor Who - Praxeus!

OKAY FIRST. THANK YOU, SHOW, FOR FIXING A BIG ISSUE I HAD WITH THE FIRST SEASON. So they were doing a thing where they’d introduce incidentally queer characters, have a female character mention her wife, stuff like that, only for them to die. This episode had Jake and Adam, married/separated/it’s complicated couple, who face huge amounts of danger, who both come close to dying, but who survive! And have a Big Damn Kiss! And walk off together holding hands! They survived!!

Plotwise, I enjoyed it a ton while watching, although in retrospect it did feel a bit free of danger. The companions were never in true peril because the Doctor can home in on them automatically, and we never got the true scale of the risk of infection, since the only people we saw get infected were in isolated areas. I would have liked to see, for instance, the threat of Praxeus spreading beyond just the very Hitchcockian birds; all of the peril was on an individual level.

Good message, if unsubtle. Mind you, that’s kind of Doctor Who’s thing, and it pisses off conservatives, so all for it, really XD (They must have loved the core relationship in this episode, too!) Like. Subtle doesn’t work. There are literally climate change deniers that exist. Sometimes you actually do have to tell a message with all the finesse of a sledgehammer because .

(Side note, I was deeply concerned when I saw the cowriter was the guy who did the hot mess that was Kerblam!, so at least this was just an unsubtle and kind of questionably written story instead of an actively harmful one.)

The companions: Ryan seems a fair bit more confident on his own? His initial scenes with Gabriela showed that he’s starting to work well even without backup, and picking up the bird proved to be a damn good call. Yaz and Graham were a fun pair, and Yaz got a lot to do when she and Gabriela (again!) got to explore, and I can definitely understand the conflict between curiosity/doing what’s right and safety when it came to the teleport scene. She does seem to be bordering on the reckless. Intriguing!

Minor plot snag - Graham knows how to set up an IV, presumably because of the shitload of time he spent in hospital! …And yet he doesn’t know what a pathogen is?

Friend note!

“fun fact about graham seemingly not knowing what a pathogen is! in my reading of the scene, i saw it as graham knowing what one was. with "Well, I’m glad you asked that…!” he seems like he’s actually sort of pleased with himself, like he’s about to launch into an explanation, and then IIRC there’s a very brief shot at Ryan giving him a Look and Graham immediately changes tone to “…cause I didn’t want to look stupid.” he immediately changes from boosting his own ego to bolstering ryans and im love"

In which case, good shit gooood shit.

SFX - the infection was creepy as shit. The very obviously puppet bird near the lab was hilariously bad.

Apparently the filming was tricky because it was super windy so all the shorts of Thirteen with her hair Like That weren’t planned, it just kind of happened. Love a fluffy ruffled Thirteen.

So anyway. People calling for more plot focus - literally this is the Doctor trying to distract herself and not focus on the plot! This is her avoidance tactic! Emotional honesty? Who’s she? She’ll get back to it eventually, but for now she needs a distraction after being punched in the emotions. Give her that for one episode, c'mon.

Ryan: “…I do a lot of running.”

Graham: “Whatever is giving off those weird readings… is on the other side of that wall!” Yaz: *silently turns scanner around* Graham, not skipping a beat: “…is on the other side of that door!”

Yaz: “I don’t want you to panic, but… we followed one of those things through a teleport and now I think we’re on an alien planet.” Thirteen: “…well, you don’t do things by halves!”

Thirteen: “That’s why you smell of dead bird! I thought you’d changed your shower gel.”

Thirteen: “I’m having half a thought. Ooh, this one tickles!”

Thirteen: “What can I say? I’m a romantic~”

In conclusion, Doctor Who said gay rights.

Can You Hear Me?

Thoughts on Doctor Who - Can You Hear Me?

Trigger warning for discussion of depression and suicide.

You know you're in for a wild ride when iView warns for horror themes instead of science fiction themes.

Overall: at first impression, it felt sort of mashed together? There's 14th century Aleppo, and there's 21st century Sheffield, and there's a deep space station, and there's creepy monsters and dream villains; I do kind of wonder why Zellin targeted a random girl in Aleppo as source for his pet monster, although targeting people like Ryan's best friend makes sense if he's deliberately trying to lure the Doctor to him.

The theme, on the other hand, of mental health resiliance and reaching out, was done incredibly well. Oh yeah there'll be more comments about it - the Guardian described it as 'adventures in Wokeness' - but damn, sometimes you need to hear it. I loved getting more of Yaz' backstory, about being a desperate teenage runaway at the point of being suicidal, and her reunion with the older woman legitimately made me tear up.

But like, goddamn. Her nightmare - she's still hearing that. She's still hearing her sister saying that she should "do it right this time" and that this time she won't call and that no one is coming and holy fuck. God this makes so many of Yaz' scenes incredibly painful in retrospect, knowing that she was at that point only three years before and that she's still dreaming that shit! It makes her recklessness terrifying!

Ryan's nightmare, and his experience with Tibo - it's quite reflective of the Doctor, too. She wasn't there, and Gallifrey burnt. And Ryan is realising this now, and really thinking about the potential future in Orphan 55. I think this is absolutely foreshadowing Ryan leaving at the end of the season (there's been a lot of speculation given Tosin's new TV role), and I think Ryan and Yaz' discussion at the end of the episode was a definite hint in the direction of Ryan choosing to going back to Earth.

Would have really liked Graham, during his talk with the Doctor, to gently remind her that she can talk about her own problems, although I can understand the narrative choice on why she didn't (although, yeah, would have been good for Graham to ask). Because, yeah, if anyone needs a sympathetic ear (...sans fingers) or a shoulder to lean on, it's her!! The entire theme of this episode was like... reaching out. Conquering your fears with the help of others. Sharing your fears to lessen them. Getting help. And the Doctor deliberately... not doing that makes it into an actual Thing that I think is going to seriously be addressed by the end of the season.

It's been such an ongoing theme. A bunch of episodes have started with an obviously depressed Doctor. The Fam has tried to raise the issue multiple times and have discussed it amongst themselves even more. Scenes like Yaz' reaction after being abducted in Spyfall (...which makes her, "I thought I was dead" part even more worrying) and being comforted by Ryan, not the Doctor... her whole reaction to Graham being like, "I'm glad you talked to me but I literally can't do the same in return" - if it's not addressed by the end of this season, it's at least going to have to be an ongoing theme, because it's becoming very deliberate now.

An interesting note: the actor who played Zellin (an immortal manipulator of nightmares) also voiced the Remnants (who were the first to mention the Timeless Child in The Ghost Monument). Coincidence or deliberate?

Assorted thoughts:

"I'm still quite socially awkward." There's socially awkward and there's emotionally repressed... (I saw a description of it on Tumblr as 'weaponised dissociation' and... yeah. And also yikes.) Also the way she was so closed in on herself, basically hugging her arms to her body! On a semi-related note, talking to herself in Aleppo was a bit depressing. Like it's continuing the theme of The Doctor Does Not Like Being Alone.

The finger thing - ew ew ew ew it's in their EARS ewww D:

Stylistic comment: the traditionally-styled animation for the Immortals' game was gorgeous.

"Try not freak out, yeah, but you're on a floating space platform trapped in a gravitational pull between two colliding planets."

"Thanks for lending a helping hand!" Companions just being, "...Doctor p l s."

On an old lore note, loved the callback to Eternals, Guardians, and the Toymaker! On a concerning note, man, the Doctor has so many issues with immortals. They abandoned Jack, there was the punishment they gave the Family of Blood, they had those Issues with Ashildr (from what I've read), now this, an eternal punishment with no chance of redemption, perhaps because she knows what immortality does? Parallels with the Doctor as quasi-immortal too, which Zellin even pointed out.

"You're wrong about humans. They're not pathetic. They're magnificent. They live with their fears, doubts, guilt. They face them down everyday and they prevail. That's not weakness. That's strength. That's what humanity is."

(Contrast: "That's what humanity is." The Doctor isn't human. She's not prevailing against her fears, doubts, and guilt.)

In conclusion, literally everyone but the creepy immortals needs a hug.

The Haunting of Villa Diodati

Thoughts on Doctor Who - The Haunting Of Villa Diodati!

tfw you think you're just going to get a nice spoopy historical and instead get major plot?

Overall impression: Well, Jack is going to be pretty miffed, given that the Doctor had to do precisely what he didn't want to happen - giving the Lone Cyberman what it wanted. To save Shelley, and also to save the future, although that does bring up the question on if the death of one person can rewrite the future, why doesn't that apply to literally everyone? Fletcher the valet and Elise the nurse died too, do their deaths have the same impact? Either way, the Doctor takes the Cyberium for herself - then realises that the Cybermen are inevitable, and returns it. And now she's trying to go and stop them. So... a bit conflicting in the message there, I think.

Yeah. Bit of a Trolley Problem there.

The characters were really fun. I did enjoy seeing Mary's sense of morbidness, but also her kindness and sympathy towards the Cyberman; you can see the foundations of Frankenstein there. I'm seeing some criticism of how Byron was portrayed as a coward, but eh. Nice little callback to Ada. Also I love how one of the rules was 'no one snog Byron'. Put that dirty boy back, you don't know where he's been! Glad Claire realised that too, although historically, she was already pregnant with his daughter at that point (and that didn't go well at all)... Either way. Good display of all these bright young reckless things.

(And yes, they were young. Byron was the eldest at 28. Shelley was 23, Polidori was 20, Mary and Claire were just 18. And while Claire lived to 80 and Mary to her 50s, the three men all died young, too - Byron at 36, Shelley at 29 - yes, from drowning, Polidori at just 25. Also wasn't mentioned that Polidori also created something on that Dark And Stormy Night along with Mary's Frankenstein - he wrote The Vampyre, the first modern vampire story!)

The Lone Cyberman (and I am deliberately using that instead of 'Ashad') - creepy as shit. Not just the whole Frankenstein look, but the way he acted! Not emotionless and blank, but actively manipulative and sadistic! Mary showed empathy and he actively threw it back in her face! I mean, yikes.

House was terrific and also spooky as hell. (Am lowkey miffed that no one went "VIBE CHECK!") The jumbled layout was quite Castrovalva, and I actually really dig that Graham got to see some actual ghosts. Ghostly sandwiches!

I think we got actual confirmation here that Yaz does have feelings for the Doctor? (Bleeding Cool News is pretty sure that it was for Ryan, but... lmao no.) BBCA twitter certainly thinks so!

Claire: "His answers only increase the enigma." Yaz: "I know someone like that." Claire: "This enigmatic person of yours... would you trade them for reliable and dull?" Yaz: "My person's a bit different..."

I MEAN.

(It got deleted. So. There is that.)

Thirteen: "Hmm. Fourteenth... no. Fifteenth century... touch more umami." (Doctor, have you been playing Detroit: Become Human again?)

Mary: "I don't think they're really from the colonies!" Byron: "No, she... is from somewhere much, much stranger." Polidori: "The North."

Thirteen: "YOU HAD ONE JOB."

Cyberman: "You appear courageous. But your vital signs betray a heightened state of anxiety." Thirteen: "Or as I like to call it... Tuesday."

Thirteen: "Yeah, 'cause sometimes this team structure isn't flat. It's mountainous, with me at the summit, in the stratosphere, alone. Left to choose. Save the poet, save the universe. Watch people burn now, or tomorrow. Sometimes even I can't win."

Claire: "You pursued Mrs Doctor without a care for my presence, belittled my thoughts and opinions... and then proceeded to use my person as a human shield." Byron: "...And?" Claire: "And the spell is broken... my lord." Polidori's face: "haha you fucked up dude"

Next week: Shit Hits The Fan.

Ascension of the Cybermen

In lieu of a proper post for Ascension of the Cybermen, here are a list of questions we need an answer for.

Will Graham and Yaz survive, on a giant carrier full of Cybermen?

Who is Brendan, and what is his relevance to the story?

What is the Boundary?

How is Gallifrey in the Boundary?

How was the Master in Gallifrey, and not trapped by the Kasaavin?

Who is Ko Sharmus and why am I getting Yana vibes?

Who is Ashad and what is his story? (And why is his theme such a literal banger?)

Is he an actual Cyberman? Because I'm totally getting this impression he's human in armour?

How did Brendan survive being shot, and why did his non-ageing father and mentor do that?

Why did it look like a chameleon arch?

Is Ethan's tech-savvy just warzone familiarity or something more sinister?

Are there any other large human populations left?

Was I detecting a hint of romantic tension between Graham and Ravio?

What's up with Yaz?

Why did the Cyberium get sent to that time period?

Who or what is this alliance Jack is a part of?

How do the Time Lords and the lie of the Timeless Child come into it?

WHO THE FUCK IS BRENDAN?

The Timeless Children

WELL THEN.

While I gather proper thoughts on The Timeless Children, here are the questions I had from Ascension of the Cybermen, now with answers!

Will Graham and Yaz survive, on a giant carrier full of Cybermen?

Yup! Disguises for the win!

Who is Brendan, and what is his relevance to the story?

Brendan is a filtered overlay memory of one of the Doctor's former lives.

What is the Boundary?

An anomaly, as far as I can tell.

How is Gallifrey in the Boundary?

No idea!

How was the Master in Gallifrey, and not trapped by the Kasaavin?

No idea!

Who is Ko Sharmus and why am I getting Yana vibes?

A big damn hero.

Who is Ashad and what is his story? (And why is his theme such a literal banger?)

We're still not actually sure. Either way, he's an action figure now.

Is he an actual Cyberman? Because I'm totally getting this impression he's human in armour?

Yeah, sort of.

How did Brendan survive being shot, and why did his non-ageing father and mentor do that?

Because Time Lords.

Why did it look like a chameleon arch?

It's probably related technology! If the chameleon arch rewrites memories, this one just wipes them.

Is Ethan's tech-savvy just warzone familiarity or something more sinister?

Just warzone familiarity. Poor li'l bean.

Are there any other large human populations left?

Possibly! If the Boundary really did send them to random places, there still could be surviving pockets elsewhere in the universe.

Was I detecting a hint of romantic tension between Graham and Ravio?

Maybe a bit XD And now they're all on Earth, who knows?

What's up with Yaz?

Who knows?

Why did the Cyberium get sent to that time period?

Ko Sharmus sent it. Didn't send it far enough.

Who or what is this alliance Jack is a part of?

Same organisation Ko Sharmus is part of. Also, young!Ko Sharmus/Jack please.

How do the Time Lords and the lie of the Timeless Child come into it?

In so many ways.

WHO THE FUCK IS BRENDAN?

The Doctor!

More thoughts later!

Thoughts on Doctor Who - The Timeless Children.

...Actually, first thought is the title. Timeless Children? Hmm.

Anyway. That is... sure a literally mind-blowing revelation for the Doctor, yes! Like, damn, the discovery that you're not even the species you thought you were, that your adoptive parent spent lifetimes abusing and experimenting on you, that your memories were routinely erased by people you thought you could trust (including your adoptive parent), that you're literally the progenitor for your entire species, that you've lost who knows how much time and who knows how many memories... yeah. Damn.

What's an appropriate birthday present for someone turning ten million?

Also, huh. Amidst all the old lore and casual mentions (like Borusa!) that got mentioned - were they taking hints from the Cartmel master plan? About the Doctor being some kind of founding figure for Gallifrey? Not exactly written as Cartmel had it, but that big main concept of the Doctor as a sort of... foundation piece of Time Lord culture was still actually there.

Brain of Morbius Doctors confirmed, I guess. I guess even Four was going, "...the fuck?"

Cybermen = still scary. Regenerating Cybermen = felt somehow obscene. Like, no, that's just fundamentally not right. Like the TARDIS responding to Jack by noping the fuck out kind of not right. God. And the Master was completely and utterly magnificently batshit, like, more than usual, come on, dude, you know they'd kill or convert you the second you turned your back.

Still. Deeply, deeply entertaining to watch just from a villain perspective, completely Chaotic, and like... I do understand where he was coming from? His entire life is a lie. His entire life is because of the Doctor, who, I think it's fair to say, he has Complicated Feelings regarding. (Their entire interaction this episode was a giant power play. Like damn guys just get into BDSM and leave the would-be genocide and universal takeover.)

Tecteun = Rassilon, I'm assuming. Goddamn. Like they were a pompous abusive asshole from the outset, this just kind of makes it worse. I also wonder if Rassilon chose the Master specifically to get the drums because he was friends with the Doctor? That actually may have been something the Master worked out himself, too. I mean, I'd be pissed off as well :-\

Also, how many people know about this? I assume Gat knew, since she was implied to be responsible for the mind wipes, but was it like... a super tightly-held secret or was it something a lot of higher-ups knew? Because that's fucked up tbh

Thought on the Master. Okay, he's hugely furious that he's been lied to, that the entire origin of his people is based on a lie, that his greatest friendrivalloveenemy is incredibly special and that a part of her is in him and not in the fun way, but like... I'm also wondering if he's looking at the Time Lords, the way they turned him into their puppet, how they drove him insane for their own purposes, then looked at the Doctor - someone who has also been used, abused, experimented on, manipulated, controlled, and went, "No. This is an injustice and the Time Lords need to be punished for it."

Oh, saw a nice theory regarding the TARDISes - Ruth!Doctor had the original busted police box TARDIS. When she was eventually taken in to be mind-erased, they sent the TARDIS off to storage to be eventually repaired. The Doctor manages to steal that one, goes to Earth, and it immediately gets stuck again because it's still broken. Explains how Ruth!Doctor can have the police box while also being pre-everything.

I really want the Doctor and Jack to sit down and have a nice chat about being timeless undying constants of the universe. Also for Jack to get one of the spare TARDISes around. Be kinda funny if he got the Master's old one, given the Year That Never Was, but it really is just sitting there. (Poor TARDIS stuck as a tree on a random wartorn planet in the far future, though!)

Also, Jodie was fucking magnificent in this episode. The hurt, the absolute fury, the almost glee when she's telling the Master he can't break her, her refusal to press the button at the end (so much like Nine's "coward or killer?" moment!)... just... so good.

Beautiful post I saw here on Tumblr - the Doctor as the Timeless Child, making the choice to help.

Amazing post here on Tumblr about abuse and repressed memories. Even if the Doctor doesn't remember it all, the abuse they underwent at the hands of a beloved parent figure still informs a hell of a lot of their behaviour, but it doesn't define them. The Doctor's need to run = informed by abuse. The Doctor's desire to help crying children = informed by abuse. The Doctor being an inherently good person = being their own person, no matter what their upbringing, no matter what their past was. They made the choice to be the Doctor, and that's a hell of an important thing.

Extremely painful post I saw on Tumblr about the Doctor being 'hip with the kids' by calling her companions her Fam but hell if they're not more family to her than her actual adoptive mother ow my heart.

Also, the scene between Yaz and Graham was so sweet <3 I do want to see Yaz, at some point, admit that sometimes she's so terrified she can barely move, and to tell him what she came so close to doing when she was sixteen, and Graham to just go, "Yeah, but you keep going." Also I'm trying not to think about how Yaz would respond to the Doctor going off on a suicide mission when Yaz was suicidal just three years earlier because ow my heart. She knows that Ko Sharmus went after her, she knows the Doctor might be alive, but either way, she's just seen someone she loves leave with the intention of dying (and Ko Sharmus too, actually). Someone please give her a hug. Actually please just let the Fam have a big group hug in general.

"Have you ever been limited by who you were before?" "Huh. Now that does sound like me talking."

So, remaining questions to be answered next season!

What actually is the Doctor? Since they were found near the Boundary, they could be from anywhere. It's fair to say they now are recognised genetically as a Time Lord, but what were they originally, why were they abandoned in the first place, and are there any more of their original people out there?

How do the Remnants know about the Timeless Child, or were they just picking up on that unconscious knowledge from the Doctor's own mind?

Like... we're generally under agreement that the Master, the eternal cockroach, survived, right? Despite definitely being lowkey suicidal like oh, was hoping the Death Particle would kill me? Like the Death Particle was made by the Cyberium, it could have gone, "Nah, keeping this one."

What's going on with the Kasaavin? Remember them? Still out there, stationed all through time and space? And are we going to see Daniel Barton again?

Is something going on with Yaz?

Will the Fam stay on? (I personally think Ryan will elect to stay on Earth to account for Tosin Cole's new TV role, and if Graham and Ravio enter a relationship, he might too.)

When will we see Jack again? If he was connected to the Lone Cyberman arc, that seems... pretty conclusively finished, unless we're going to learn more about it?

Is it Christmas yet?

............so the Christmas/NY special is going to start with Jack using his vortex manipulator to bust the Doctor out of prison and get back to the Fam and it'll never be mentioned again, right.

"At least buy me diNNER!!"

#doctor who #companion love #best enemies #long post

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