#like It's one thing I think if they're running concurrently or even if they're a couple years apart

[lordlyhour]

Dungeon Meshi has been coming out for 10 years. The Very Latest Episode, at time of posting, depicts events from a manga chapter that is One Month Shy of Seven Years Old. There are human children in their first year of elementary school who are younger than those plot points.

[zoe-oneesama]

The Kwamis! Some of these came easier than others, but since Angelic Layer has no magic involved, all the kwamis became human~ They won't be very prevalent, they're mostly here to fill in background character roles - shop clerks, MCs Tournament Directors, fans - so they won't have a whole lot of speaking roles (aside from, you know, the MCs who're there to commentate on the fights lol). But I thought I'd give them all a nice nod in the story somewhere.

As expected, Tikki and Plagg are the main MCs. Marinette and Adrien's fights will be going on concurrently so Tikki will be commentating Marinette's fights while Plagg commentates on Adrien's. They'll have the most dialogue of the kwamis, so I do want them to have unique ways of discussing what they're seeing.

Pollen will be working directly for the Bourgeois'. As a VIP with a direct relationship with the international director of Angelic Layer, Chloe has her own private practice layer in her home and Pollen is in charge of it's upkeep and maintenance. She matches Armand the Bulter's levels of competence.

Trixx is a Rena Rouge mega fan. They've been following Alya's blog for as long as they can remember and are mega stoked that Alya moved to their city. When Alya starts to doubt herself, it's Trixx's voice that can be heard cheering her on to not give up.

Nooroo and Duusu are servants in the Agreste Estate. Unknown to Adrien, they are fully aware of his sneaking around to play and the two do what they can to make excuses and deflect Nathalie when Adrien isn't where he's supposed to be. They're rooting him on from the shadows!

Wayzz is the adult son of Marianne and Fu. He brings them to Angelic Layer fights against his will because the two really enjoy them. The two seem to be really invested in Ladybug and Chat Noir's career (and the behind the scenes shenanigans that they secretly spy on).

Longg is Kagami's bodyguard. Like Nooroo and Duusu, they are fully aware of what Kagami is doing behind her mother's back and feigns ignorance when Kagami pulls something..."sneaky" to get to a fight secretly.

Here's where we get into some existing jobs from the show:

Orikko and Kaalki are the "Layer Hot Girls (and boy)". lol I just thought it was funny that Angelic Layer even has them.

Mullo is the sales clerk at the Princess Piffle store (the store where you can buy your Angel and all the accessories). All of them lol. Mullo and her many many sisters who look just like her.

Barkk and Fluff take similar but still different roles (the uniforms are ALMOST the same but there are some tiny differences). So Barkk is the receptionist at the Practice Ring (literally you pay to reserve a mini-layer to practice on) while Fluff is the waitress/cashier at the cafeteria at the Tournament Center.

(and back to making shit up lol)

Daizzi is a nurse where Rose goes to the hospital and she has segmental localized vitiligo. Rose is particularly close to Daizzi since she helps Rose make her donations to the hospital.

Sass is the backstage directory, aka, the guy who makes things run. He has an earpiece that has the same diamond pattern as his pants on it! The anime does show one person who helps backstage, but I wanted to have a little fun with Sass's look and tie in to him being "in charge" of the kwamis.

Ziggy works at Socqueline's family art supply shop, which is frequented by Angelic Layer players who are on a bit of a budget. They love talking with the customers about their angels, though mostly the design part.

Stompp is Ivan's foster mother and Roarr his foster sister (Stompp's bio-daughter). I actually didn't think of what kind of job this outfit would be good for, but I think she'd make a good security guard - usually working at rock concerts, which she bonds with Ivan over, but she's also been hired for Angelic Layer tournaments. Sometimes sore losers get a little...violent.

Roarr falls in love with Juleka's Angel Purple Tigress immediately thanks to her pre-existing love of tigers in general. She's even bold enough to proclaim her love to Juleka herself!

Xuppu is Ondine's sibling and a fan of King Monkey, though they'll go out of their way to make fun of Kim himself. Secretly, they're very invested in Kim's career and get very upset on his behalf when he loses.

[kinardsevan]

What is your opinion on Tommy coming back or not? And in they case we see him again, do you think it’ll be just for closure (ex: Abby in season 3) or maybe for a BuckTommy second chance?

fun fact: i was considering doing an entire breakdown with a bunch of Oliver's interviews from the start of this arc until now to point to my opinion:

Tommy is coming back. The romcom theme is still in effect, and we're only about midway through the 3rd act.

Long story short (and without sources right now), I think that the interviews were actuallly pointing in this direction with the wording for a hot second. We have OS telling us that he thinks the best relationships have a "will they, won't they" bit where the audience and the characters are pining. We've seen this play out on the show. And we also have to remember that Oli knew during this interview that the breakup was coming. We also have the interview (I believe it was the Decider one I linked last week) where he mentions choosing to fight for the relationship or not. I feel like a lot of people have taken the context of that and twisted it into "they didn't do it right away, so they're not going to". Except, there's ANOTHER quote of relevance, which is Oliver talking about how Buck's queerness isn't tied to Tommy or Eddie, and only to himself.

Obviously, there have been things said since 806 that would point towards me being delulu, except, here's the issue: TM, OS and LFJr are NOT going to tell us that Tommy is coming back if that's the intention. It would spoil the surprise of it all, and the win of it all. What fun is there in that? What TM has said is that Tommy is Buck's romantic past but that doesn't mean he won't turn up again in the future (all relevant and true facts which do not shut down a reconciliation). Lou never out-and-out said he was done with the show. He's said time and time again that he wants to come back. TM has mentioned Tommy coming around again. OS literally said in an interview "they may run into each other on scene and have it be awkward".

Now obviously we don't actually have the full story with how things went down and the show decided to go with splitting the boys up. I think the fact that Lou has called out the bullying but says he wants to come back suggests that it wasn't him saying it was too much. I have two theories that could honestly run concurrent with one another:

Evan and Tommy break up in 806 at the end of the episode. With 911 having 18 episode seasons, this quite literally only makes up the first third of the season. It set up the beginning of the year for us. We're now two episodes into the second part of the season with a pretty clear idea of where the next three will go and suggestions (by fans, nothing official) that the "soonest" we could see LFJr again is 812. This is reasonable, as it would be the end of the middle of the season. Knowing that TM has suggested he might do a multi-episode season finale, pushing LFJr back into the show in 812 (or even the end of 811 if we go with my theory that Eddie could possibly leave around this time and Tommy helps them pack up/his and Buck's first time spending time around each other again), there would still likely be something around this time period that would be around when they would open the doors to this. As it is, we know that 809 and 810 go together, and then we'd have 811 to really flesh out the end of Buck's fling. I think there's even more possibility of LFJr being in this episode as well because if the plan is to bring them back together (which everything has been suggested so far ON screen in terms of keeping Tommy "in" the story), three-episode arc gives us several things: a. it allows the show to make the point that Buck's queerness is not intrinsically attached to Tommy; that his interest in men is as equal as he know his interest in women is. b. it gives them the ability to also show that his feelings for Tommy are not based in Tommy being his "first", or Evan needing to "discover" more about himself. They're in love with each other, and the show has given us the pieces for that. LFJr has acknowledged it in an interview, Tommy loves Buck. We also know that Tommy's line to Evan is "you'd end up breaking my heart, and I don't think I could deal with that". When I hear that sentence, what I'm actually hearing is "I'm already in love with you, and if I let myself fall more in love with you by being with you every day all the time and this ends, I won't survive it". By relation, we have Josh ask Buck if he loves Tommy and Buck waffles, but I think this has more to do with his lack of understanding of what a healthy love is in a relationship, given his past relationships. He never got to tell Abby. Ali left. and saying I love you to Taylor wasn't about the core of actually being in love with her, which I think is another important piece for BuckTommy: they don't just love each other, they're in love with each other. Still, sometimes it's hard to quantify that feeling, and I think (as I've referenced before), for Evan it was easier to ask Tommy to share a living space with him than to share how he feels about him because historically, things haven't worked out well for him when he's been in love outwardly. Further, the questions Josh asks Evan are directly correlated with loving someone, and Evan answers yes to all of them. (I don't think I need to add this, but he also sees a future with Tommy, talks about being engaged or married. He's serious about Tommy in a way he never has been before.)

There's also the theory that the breakup happened because of scheduling conflicts. Now obviously the show could've found other ways to work around LFJr's scheduling issues by having Tommy go on a trip or what-have-you, but let's remember OTHER things that have been said by OS in prior interviews: a. back in June, he did an interview where he stated that he wanted and hoped that BuckTommy would go through issues that couples normally go through in their first year together. He wanted normal issues. This storyline IS normal. b. he didn't want to repeat Tarlos. By the very definition of what the show is doing right now, we're not. Tarlos and BuckTommy are their own things with their own reasonings.

One of the other things I also keep being pulled back to is these issues: first of all, we know how LFJr plays with the 911 demo, given that they got to see it last season. It's why he was written into more episodes after his initial four episode arc and brought back. ABC has also used BuckTommy in their own adverts, which suggests that they are very supportive of the relationship continuing because it draws in viewers. Truly giving that up for good feels like dousing yourself in gasoline and then considering striking a match. Second, people also keep calling out that TM only plans a few weeks in advance. I believe this is true with story beats. We know that the writers room has a general idea on character arcs, thanks to some of the discussion on the cheese page post-806. I really struggle to believe that TM didn't know going into going forward with the breakup whether or not he wanted to bring LFJr back. We know he waffled back and forth on the idea of the breakup, meaning he probably had other solutions on his mind for whatever LFJr's schedule needed adjusting for, and this is what he decided on. Also, even if 8b hasn't been broken down yet (we know it hasn't), they would still know at this point what they do or don't want, what their ideas might be. Solidification for why Tommy should be brought back is directly shown in the reaction by the GA and the fandom to the breakup. They may not know exactly how that reunion happens yet, but what they have suggested is that Buck's new relationship will be short-lived. That he's using it to cope. We also know he's still processing the break-up and still misses Tommy. These are all things that point to the story not being over. Plus, I feel (once again), if the story really was over and they didn't have plans to continue this in 8b, LFJr wouldn't be talking about wanting to go back. It be far more "yeah that sucked, but it's over now and what can you do? I'm off to this new show and I'll never be back." (I've commented also on the fact that the fangirlish interview comment about his "i'm going here, doing this, have some opportunities" statement is very run-of-the-mill. Obvs I could mean something. Or it could literally just be a canned answer.) (This might feel a little off-center, but I think his commentary on trusting TM and knowing what he's doing in one of his post-806 interviews directly suggests that he believes the story is going to be handled properly.)

I realize at the end of the day, all of what I'm piecing together could mean zilch and Tommy could possibly never come back. They could truly just drop the story and never circle back around, set fire to a beautiful arc and lose thousands (possibly millions) of viewers. I've certainly suggested myself being one of them. But I don't see BuckTommy only getting an Abby fix for two reasons. LFJr wants to come back and continue the story, and Connie Britton only ever intended to do one season. Also, the fling has been called out as being planned to be short-lived. Why bother mentioning that if you don't have other plans for the story.

The last thing I'll leave you with is my commentary from the interview Oli and Aisha did with the guy from Chicago. That reporter obviously liked the BuckTommy storyline and said he's choosing to believe that the relationship is paused, not over. By relation, we had Oliver say three things: (1 and 2) Buck is still looking for love, both in himself and with another person. (3)The season is only half over. Circle that back to 806-808. Buck is finding love in himself by dealing with it in a healthy way (so far) with the baking. We've also seen the "cracks" Oli mentioned with his continued urge to want to text Tommy, as well as him fighting it off by baking (referencing the "pendulum swinging"). Looking for love in others will likely be this arc where he tries to deal/move on. I feel like we collectively watched the end of 806, and then 807 and 808 yelling at the TV "you're in love with him, piece it together already!" (or maybe that was just me???). But truly, whether it's a fling, his therapist, or Bobby/Maddie/Eddie who finally spells it out of or him, I think there will be a point at which we see that come to fruition. The seeds were sewn in for it in the scene with Josh. Now it's just about watching those seeds sprout.

Final note: we've had a good run up to this point with these two. Did we truly thing that the honeymoon phase would last forever? (I didn't. Conflict and the pink bubble popping have to happen eventually.) If we really want to suggest that what BuckTommy has is real, they have to go through this and come out the other side. I think everyone is justifiably frustrated due to the 4 month wait on new episodes (I personally would not have left people hanging quite like this, but that's just me), but the narrative does lead us toward what the show is doing with the suggestion that it does have a natural (and good) conclusion. (Possibly with a helicopter/truck/jeep crash?!)

And just as my singularly LAST note, here's my other thing: Evan and Tommy both have abandonment issues. (Tommy's are clear based on the break up and we know Buck's.) By that correlation, when these two finally get back together, they're never going to fucking let the other go.

(This was so much longer than I intended it to be, but that's my answer 😂😂😂😂😂😂)

[lurkingshan]

Things That Have My Attention in 4 Minutes Episode 4

Congrats to the Dome is Tonkla's brother truthers!

Let's talk timelines again. I still think we're working with two timelines, but I no longer think they're cleanly separated. Because if they were, you could not have some of these things happening concurrently. If we only had an Original timeline and a Redo timeline, then everything Great changes should be part of the Redo timeline. But in this episode Great saved Nan in the same timeline where Dome was dead, which we know because Great got Nan's location by getting Korn trashed after Korn fought with Tonkla over his abandonment in the aftermath of Dome's death. These things are all connected, so we can't cleanly sort events into one timeline or the other.

Which means it's most likely that the two timelines are bleeding together, making things unstable. This would explain Great's experience of overlapping moments last week, and Tonkla seeing Dome briefly before things went all weird and he disappeared at the end of today's episode.

By the way, it turns out those cold opens are not of the future--Tonkla has already done the murder in the same timeline where he's messing around with the cop. ETA: @my-rose-tinted-glasses pointed out that this is not necessarily true if the scene of Win getting the fingerprints and the phone call is also in the future. So back to square one on that!

Speaking of, what is up with Win? He is fully engaging in an affair with a murder suspect and doesn't seem to be investigating Tonkla at all. And I cannot let this pass without comment: why on earth did Win not put his pants back on during the long scene of him listening to Tonkla and Korn?! Was this really an appropriate situation to Winnie the Pooh it???

The flashback to Tonkla and Korn's beginning gave good context for why Tonkla thought he might be able to have more with Korn. I appreciated the details there: Korn was giving him money before they even had sex the first time and was lying to him about his intentions from the start, while Tonkla had zero experience when they met and didn't know how to recognize the signs of Korn's lies. Korn basically groomed this kid to be his sidepiece and has strung him along for years.

Tonkla definitely feels like a tragic character heading for a bad end, though perhaps he will also be saved eventually by the timeline shifts. In the timeline where Dome is dead and he's fucking Win, Tonkla is being incredibly reckless. I couldn't believe he just moved a new man into the home Korn pays for, he's gonna get caught.

I was grateful the show did not actually go all the way with Korn assaulting Tonkla, but it was clear he would have if Tonkla had not managed to distract him.

I continue to find the emotional tenor of Great and Tyme's scenes kinda weird. I don't understand why Great is so willing to betray Korn to help Tyme after just meeting him, I don't understand why Tyme revealed his face only to run away and then accused Great of being in on the conspiracy after already confirming he's not, and I don't understand why they were acting all blushy and awkward in that sex scene rather than leaning into the adrenaline high for a more sultry tone. They have been on one (1) date so the emotional investment is not really tracking for me for two experienced adults, but I can't tell if I am supposed to find this all weird and confusing or just go with it. It feels like the show just wants me to accept the shortcuts and buy into them as a serious romance, so okay I guess!

Speaking of betraying Korn, Great's plan was abysmal. He steals the information from Korn's phone (so considerate of him to spell out his criminal conspiracy including names and locations in one convenient text chain), tells Tyme everything without any knowledge of what his brother did, then walks right into an active hostage situation in his designer whites and shows his face to all Korn's goons. Korn is gonna know you did this, bro! Do you care?

It seems that Nan has a friend who was killed in a similar fashion to Tyme's parents, though I'm still curious how they connected and came up with this plan.

I still got nothing on this Lukwa connection. Why are she and Great the only two experiencing this phenomenon, and why did they see each other in this liminal space?

Also noting that there were several sex scenes this episode and no condoms or lube anywhere. I guess this show only depicts safe and realistic sex when they have a sponsor paying them.

[unpassive-viewer]

Nosferatu (2024)

I have seen Nosferatu and am here to report that I liked it (of course).

Spoilers ahead, and trigger warnings SA.

Eggers, as usual, establishes incredible atmosphere and well-fleshed out characters. As much as the film is a retelling of the classic Dracula story, it develops several allegories concurrently - the focal point being the individual and social impacts of trauma (specifically CSA). Typical of Eggers' work, the film can mean a lot of things - between the supernatural elements, the allusions to homosexuality, the existence of Nosferatu as Ellen's "shame", etc., viewers can import their own meaning into the film pretty easily if they're actually watching. "If they're actually watching" refers to the fact that this movie is over two hours long.

Viewers like me drink that up - watching this on the big screen was like living in 1800s Germany and Romania. The sound design was incredible, I had an out of body experience - I was there. That's Eggers' charm; his atmosphere is unmatched. Between his use of natural light, and the way he balances tight shots and wide shots that show just how vast and dark the world around the characters is, it makes for an incredible theatre experience.

That said, Eggers re-uses the same motifs so many times it was a little nauseating. Wide shot of character running away, they run back, they stand in the middle of the frame, we see their horror. Or a slow pan away from the scared character to what they're looking at. A slow zoom in to a coffin, a window, a shadowy figure. Horns blare. You listen to someone's shaky breathing for 45 seconds (oh my god there were so many scenes of just the sound of breathing or footfall). Something scary and then poof! Character is back in bed. About half way through I thought to myself "I get the point, get on with it".

So it was a slow gothic horror, which is not everyone's cup of tea. My impression is that lots of casual moviegoers were expecting a pop-horror flick typical to bigger studios, but Eggers does not and has never delivered such a film. I personally think it was scary, both in the way that it used jump scares and the way that it developed such a tragic and horrifying circumstance for the main characters. There were a handful of jump scares that startled the hell out of me, despite not being "scary" on paper. What really got me is seeing Ellen fall apart, and knowing that feeling of being sure you're going crazy. Eggers really did his research - her pain felt so personal (or he pulled from reality, I'm not willing to speculate - point is it felt very real). My stomach sank during a few of her monologues. I don't love Lily Rose's acting, but she definitely gave it everything she's got. Girl went all in.

Similarly, I love how Eggers establishes his characters. I've mentioned this before, but in his commitment to having historical accuracy in his films, they often come across incredibly feminist. The men in his stories aren't monsters because they live in an era where women had fewer rights - Thomas is incredibly empathetic to Ellen. So is Eberhart. They work with what they have. Even the misogyny of other characters isn't one-dimensional. Nosferatu is a commentary on child sexual abuse and its aftereffects during the period where CSA was thought to be something that happened with vagrant populations, and surely not high-class, white English families. Although it's a tough topic, I think that the filmmakers accomplished what they set out to do. The message carries to the modern day, showcasing how trauma reverberates through all of your relationships, and lives in the parts of your mind that even you cannot see.

Eggers described Ellen's story in an interview, suggesting that instead of her developing into a protagonist by the end of Dracula, he chose to establish her as a protagonist at the beginning. She is a victim of circumstance. He was also very upfront about the way out of that kind of trauma loop is to acknowledge the darkness within us - Ellen was not evil, something evil happened to her. Confronting Nosferatu (her shame) meant freeing others from the impacts of similar shame. That said, I thought the allegory was a little too "on the nose", and I did not like that Ellen effectively became a human sacrifice. I know the story of Dracula, I understand what the filmmakers were attempting to do, but a woman committing to the ultimate self-sacrifice is such a cliche.

Finally, I appreciate how much the actors seemed to like this movie. Despite the film being entirely too long, everything I've seen from the actors suggests that they found the project really interesting. I love movies that let actors be actors. Dafoe looked like he was just happy to be there. Lily Rose had a breakout role. Simon McBurney (Knock) was genuinely the best part of the entire movie - all of his scenes were absolutely captivating.

So overall it was pretty good. Great film for the movie nerds (me)... just do not watch this with your family. And also look up the trigger warnings before you go, this was a difficult one to watch after going into it blind.

[utilitycaster]

Sorry for the rant. I think the fact that they didn't wait until after the Candela finale was a missed opportunity that would have felt less, jarring 1. they could breathe and RP for a session after coming back from the moon reconnaissance mission (this is also considering that whether or not Matt made the party fight Otohan and have a PC death) Matt could have told them to end that particular session at Keyleth's camp and even tell Liam to wait and call Dorian at the end, and then have the party switch. it's also so strange to split the session in two for whatever reason

2. having the party switch after Candela would allow for a good window of time for the Crown keeper to do what they need to in case they can't reach a good point to return to BH in 2 hours, maybe a session and a half at most

3. assuming Dorian, and maybe others with him, come back to the group after whatever this intermission is done, i think it would be hard for them to split the attention between Keyleth encampment and debriefing - mourning FCG - guest players in a way that wont feel like it makes a disservice to another one of these topics (focusing on Guests and FCG's death could make it so the debriefing for the mission they spent 10+ episodes on feels lackluster, and vis versa)

As someone else said, it feels like they are giving us a palate cleanser as i was halfway through a good meal, but also they gave us another meal and after two bites they took it away so i could finish it in two weeks

there is also this limbo feeling of that we are getting late to the airport (freeing Predathos) but also we are taking a stop for sightseeing, and snacks, and bathroom and- it's like they are trying to convince us that "there is an urgency and we have to get there now now, but also nevermind that, lets catch up with these other characters for a bit"

It's just an ODD choice no matter how you look at it

So the urgency doesn't bother me. This was a weird thing in the fandom during the Solstice Split too (god i blocked so many people for constantly shrieking ARE THE OTHERS DEAD in the main tag every week, like no they are fine, they are narratively on pause) but like. Time is frozen for Bells Hells right now. We are following another group. We are not going to get snacks; we are looking in on what other people are doing, concurrently with this campaign. Indeed, that's not a bad idea. In a good campaign, there is this sense that the rest of the world exists and is doing things as you go about your own business - you are heroes of the story but you're not the only people who matter or do things.

It really is like. In some fantasy in which I were personally asked "hey, we want to do this thing where the Crown Keepers show up midway through the episode, and we follow them for that half an episode and then the beginning of the next episode, where would you put this?" I would, to be honest, say "maybe just do it as a standalone episode itself" but if I had to it would just be, again, Not Now. Cutting away while the party is on the moon! Cutting away while they're headed to the moon! Cutting away a week from now! Cutting away just before the Otohan fight! Hell, I even think that while I would have initially been far more annoyed if we started the episode and it was the Crown Keepers the whole way through this week, it would feel more coherent. But like, on a list of 20 places to insert the Crown Keepers scene, "halfway through an episode following a particularly dramatic and tragic character death" would be 21st.

(I also do want to push back against the idea that Sam needs more time and so this is why; you could just. run more episodes without him. Travis voluntarily sat out of almost 5 episodes. It took 2 episodes for Caduceus to show up. Team Wildemount had more episodes than Team Issylra. It is literally fine if he misses a few more episodes.)

[pluckyredhead]

Time for more Fourth World posting that no one asked for! I've previously written about the Fourth World comics of the 1970s and the 1980s, so here are the 1990s:

New Gods (1995): I FOUND IT! I FOUND A GOOD NEW GODS COMIC THAT ISN'T BY JACK KIRBY!!!

Okay, so the art is 1995 in the worst way, but the first 11 issues (written by Rachel Pollack) are actually excellent? The problem with previous New Gods runs was that it's hard to write about a utopian world at any length, but writers tried to introduce conflict by having the people of New Genesis be shitty, which undercuts the whole...utopia thing. Pollack has the corruption come from outside, which makes all the difference.

Basically, Darkseid manages to invade the Source (God, essentially, but more of a place than an entity) in an attempt to conquer it, but Orion follows him, and, desperate to stop him, kills him. However, committing patricide within the heart of the Source corrupts it, causing natural disasters on Earth and making everyone on New Genesis go evil or crazy or both. Which was all part of Darkseid's plan (he regenerates himself out of Orion's flesh, which is both very gross and a total mic drop moment) but now the cosmos are in upheaval and that's bad for everyone.

The other thing this book does that most post-Kirby New Gods books don't manage to do is treat Orion like an actual goddamn hero. Yes, he is angry and violent and makes bad decisions driven by destructive impulses. But he also loves Highfather and Lightray and New Genesis deeply, and this book allows those things to be stronger in him than his rage, and I'm crying about it. HE IS ACTUALLY A GOOD PERSON HE'S JUST ALSO A VERY CRANKY ONE.

The last few issues are by John Byrne and the plot and tone diverge pretty sharply but that's a lead-in to a different series so I'll talk about that in a bit.

Mister Miracle (1996): The universe tends towards balance and so because New Gods (1995) was good, this comic sucks. It sort of fits into the same continuity (it takes place after Darkseid dies), and so everyone on New Genesis is kind of being an asshole. But a lot of it just doesn't make sense and isn't explained? Like, they want Scott to be the new Highfather, even though Highfather is totally around in the concurrent New Gods series, and also this is presented as just a thing that everyone knew would inevitably happen, which...no? Honestly, the things that happen in this comic are so bizarre and arbitrary - characters appearing out of nowhere, continuity errors, random and baffling changes to the lore - that I kept thinking they were going to reveal it was all a dream. Bad.

Jack Kirby's Fourth World: So in the last 4 issues of New Gods (1995), Bryne takes over and long story short, Apokalips and New Genesis are smooshed together into one planet split down the middle (and also Orion dies). This series picks up from there and also ties into the Genesis miniseries. Byrne's art is always great, but the stakes are so exhaustingly high (the planets are smooshed together! now they're separated! Orion's dead! now he's back! now Highfather's dead!) that I started feeling numb pretty quickly.

It also relies heavily on the whole "god" thing, which means way more religious themes than I'm particularly comfortable with. (And yes, Kirby also drew very heavily one biblical themes but more for worldbuilding. He didn't have everyone on Earth "lose faith" because of issues with Source, as if atheists are just fooling themselves.) I just don't need that much Thor and Odin in my Fourth World comics, and the two of them repeatedly saying that they are "the closest to the Old Gods" is way too literal. (A commonly accepted version of events is that one of Kirby's biggest frustrations with Marvel was not being able to write a Ragnarok story and kill off Thor and his supporting cast, which is why he came to DC...where he immediately opened his book about NEW gods with the words "There came a time when the old gods died!" and a clear depiction of Ragnarok. This fan theory has several holes in it, not least of which is that Kirby did draw a Ragnarok story for Marvel, but the aggressively obvious allusion here just feels like Byrne is elbowing me in the ribs going "Get it? GET IT?")

Also, there are weird changes to the lore. I've mentioned before that in Mister Miracle #1, Scott is clearly already familiar with Earth, meaning some time has passed between his escape from Apokalips and our first sight of him...but Kirby has him living on Earth for two hundred years before Mister Miracle #1, including marrying a woman who isn't Barda - as if the idea that Scott and Barda had spent that long apart or that it took Barda that long to decide to leave Apokalips makes any sense at all. Tigra, Orion's mom, spends issues and issues claiming Orion is the result of a one night stand she had with some guy and thus not Darkseid's kid, and nobody really believes her but it's never actually resolved. Also, Infinity Man turns out to be Darkseid's brother??? What the hell.

This series also has a lot of Takion, a real Original Character Do Not Steal of a guy if ever there was one. He's Paul Kupperberg's OC, not Byrne's, but he shows up and is sparkly and more powerful than everyone and can talk to the Source and all the other characters ask him for advice all the time even though he literally just showed up and Beautiful Dreamer is in love with him and then he becomes the new Highfather. Big Mary Sue energy. Also he looks like a ripoff of Waverider, who is already firmly in Original Character Do Not Steal territory.

Anyway the series ends with Apokalips and New Genesis gearing up for a final, major clash...and then the last issue is literally just Byrne retelling a mashup of Forever People #1 and Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #147, but setting them in the post-Crisis universe instead of their original pre-Crisis framework. And then it's over. What? What???

Anyway on to the 2000s and the series I've been looking forward to since I started this project, Walt Simonson's Orion! See you in the next post!

[elliepassmore]

Within the Sanctuary of Wings review

5/5 stars Recommended if you like: adventure, light academia, dragons, epistolary narrative

A Natural History of Dragons review

The Tropic of Serpents review

Voyage of the Basilisk review

In the Labyrinth of Drakes review

So...I still enjoyed this book, but I'm not totally sure how I feel about the big discovery made in this one. I do think it's a little odd and abrupt, but I can also see how the groundwork was laid in prior books.

This book opens 6 years (I think) after Labyrinth with Suhail giving a talk on Draconean linguistics and translation. The 'Cataract Stone' Isabella found in Mouleen provided a bilingual transcription that Suhail and other linguists were able to use to begin cracking the code of the Draconean language. Since the discovery of the stone and the bigger discovery of the mostly intact ruins in the Labyrinth of Drakes, there has been a huge boom of all things Draconean in Scirling society. For those familiar with the Victorian era, this tracks very closely with the Egyptian boom that occurred and, obviously, the Cataract Stone here is analogous to the Rosetta Stone in our world--Draconean art has always been described in a way analogous to Egyptian art, so I thought this was very nice continuity.

Toward the end of the first chapter, a Yelangese rebel and mountain climber, Mr. Thu, approaches Isabella to tell her about a dead dragon he found in the Mrtyahaima mountain range (i.e., Himalayas). Due to her past with Yelang, she's obviously wary, but it involves dragons, so obviously she, Tom, Suhail, and Andrew take off for Mrtyahaima. Caeligers are much more prominent now and there's even an event called the Aerial War that's occurring concurrently in the world. Thus, traveling to a remote and treacherous mountain range is a bit easier than when Isabella and Tom did it in book 1. Of course, getting to the mountain range is one thing, getting around once there is another.

Suhail's archaeological and linguistic work plays an important role in this book, but Isabella's theory of reproductive lability comes back in a big way as well. I liked seeing the convergence of some of these ideas, and I did appreciate that language was a bigger aspect in this one than in some of the other books (while I did study anthropology and find it fascinating, linguistics is my passion).

It's hard to talk too much about this book without giving away some very big spoilers that have been building for the entire series. I will say though that Isabella spends much of this book separated from her loved ones, and that a lot of her scientific work is done via observation. While this is true of most of the series, we were treated to some of her hands-on work in Labyrinth, so really this is just her going back to her usual style of fieldwork. The discovery and actions she takes in this book are the reason she goes from Dame Trent to Lady Trent, and is essentially a household name in Scirling forevermore.

I will say, for all her grumbling about not being good at politics, Isabella is actually very smooth when it comes to political maneuvering in this book. First she has to convince the Scirling government to let her go to Vidwatha (India) and Tser-nga (I am guessing Nepal) on the word of a Mr. Thu who, in exchange, wants her to pledge support to the revolutionary movement in Yelang. Then she runs into political problems later on with another group she runs across, and then she finds a surprising, but completely Isabella, way of following through on her promise of supporting the Yelangese revolution.

When the whole group is together, I enjoy their interactions and the way they're all familiar enough with one another to essentially read each other's minds. As usual, Suhail and Tom both have academic interest in the same/similar things as Isabella, and so the three of them are excited at the prospect of new discoveries. I like that Andrew has essentially become a member of their little group despite not being an academic. He's able to provide support in interesting ways.

Overall, a good and surprising ending to the series that combines the work Isabella and Tom have been doing for 5 books with Suhail's work. I'm definitely excited to read the spinoff/sequel/companion and see how the discoveries here have impacted things down the line.

[ariadnelives]

The update I have on the writing process:

My current draft of the fourth book is on track to be about the same length as the third, possibly a bit longer! I'm noticing a trend in this one towards longer chapters, with sections within the chapters

The short story anthology about Blue is coming along nicely. I have most of the stories for it completed, a few that still need some work, and a prologue and epilogue that I need to write. While most of the stories focus on Blue, she's not the central character in all of them. The anthology is intended to flesh out some of the parts of the world I might not have space for in the "main plot" of the books.

The anthology will run before the fourth book, since elements of the stories in the anthology will be pertinent in the plot of the fourth book. Since I'm writing both things concurrently, I can make them function in tandem. The short stories are, by and large, set in a two-year period between Force Majeure and the beginning of the new book.

For clarity, I am specifically writing the fourth book so that it isn't mandatory to read the short stories before reading it. I think certain things will be more rewarding if you've read them, but my goal is that you can go directly from Force Majeure to Book 4 without missing a beat. Anything relevant from the short stories will be explained

I have a long road to go before this stuff is ready to share-- but not that long, it's much closer to "finished" than it is to "started"-- but I'm very excited to share it with you all, and go on our next adventure together. The handful of readers who've been with me for the whole ride, you know who you are and how glad I am for your continued support.

Everyone else, if you want to offer some support, I don't ask for money or anything like that. I don't even charge for the books themselves, they're available for free, in full, on ao3 and tumblr! The best way to support me, and the series, is to read, and talk about, the books. It warms my heart whenever I see people discussing the story and characters, and fills me with drive to keep writing more stories to share with you. Share them with your friends, talk about them, and feel free to send me any thoughts or questions you might have via ask!

I'll also be working on a post for New Readers fairly soon, to sorta give a basic rundown/pitch for the series, in case anyone is interested in giving it a shot. The other best support you can give would be to reblog that post to high heavens, so that more people have the opportunity to read it!

Thank you again for all your support and patience, and I really look forward to sharing more updates really soon!

[ouroborosorder]

My belief that Maribel is Yukari is based on reading a few RenMerry fics I really liked a few years ago that used that assumption but I'm curious what other theories exist about that connection. It used to drive me so insane before Len'en gave me much more to drive myself insane over (turns out I'm addicted to getting attached to plot threads that aren't getting resolved anytime soon).

okay so i'm going to level here. I really don't know what they are. I honestly also really don't care. I'm sure the evidence is good, I'm sure the theory is fine.

But when I say I hate the theory that Maribel is Yukari, I mean I hate it on a conceptual level. Not only do I think it adds nothing to the story, I think it takes away from it at a fundemental level.

Part of why Maribel and Renko are so important to me is that they're so... weird structurally. They're completely disconnected from Gensokyo and Touhou in general, but are undeniably linked to it. They feel like echoes of Gensokyo. Maribel and Renko are iterations of Marisa and Reimu the same way that every Gundam series echoes Char and Amuro. It's the same heart and narrative sensibilities, applied to a different angle, a different part of the world, expanding outwards in a way Touhou can't always do - the comfortable dystopia of modern life.

When I first found out about them, that was the thing that made me compelled by Touhou as a series. That this world felt suddenly so big. The story's point felt so distinct. Touhou is a story set in Gensokyo, a fantasy world running concurrent with our own reality. But there's sidestories set in Tokyo, but in a distant unnamed future. There is no reality here. There is only two different fantasies, adjacent to the reality we live in, and yet undeniably shaped by it.

So if Maribel is Yukari then... it undoes... everything I love about them.

The world is not bigger than you think. The story is not about the fantasy layered over our reality, there is no grander scope to the world beyond the setting. It's all about Gensokyo, and always was. Not even Gensokyo, but about the central characters in Gensokyo.

And then... What's the point of the Hifuu Club at all?

This is why I like Sumireko so much, ironically. Because she feels like an echo of Renko the same way that Renko feels like an echo of Reimu. The layers of fantasy echo back in on each other. And the result is the one character who is most closely tied to reality itself. The girl who is escaping it, and drifting deeper and deeper into the fantasy.

As time passes by, we're destined to become the future depicted in the Hifuu club. A smaller, comfortable dystopia. They're building apartments on Mt. Fuji. Nobody can eat strawberries due to climate change. We escape into this dreamlike fantasy, bringing reality and the fantastical future we're inevitably running towards with us.

maybe this is just me justifying shit because Sumireko is my favorite Touhou but idk it feels tangibly different

[rharyx]

Okay, so I just gotta say, every time I hear RTD speak, I get hit with psychic damage. Dude talks like he wants to be this hero of marginalized communities, but he doesn't seem to understand any of the issues he's trying to champion?

"We didn't want to make fun of drag culture, so David didn't wear Jodie's outfit upon regenerating."

"We realized that Davros being disabled was offensive to people who use wheelchairs, so we took away his Dalek components."

"We want to make sure people know we're progressive, so we're going to have Donna and Rose mock the Doctor for being male."

"It was important to address the Toymaker was racist in the 60s, so we gave him a German accent and had him make a rude comment to someone."

"If we didn't address this stuff, we'd look ignorant, and I'm very aware of that. I'm an ally!"

He just misses the point of all of these topics and ends up making himself look worse in the process? And it makes me genuinely wonder if RTD actually asked any person who he thinks this stuff affects before deciding on these things.

Cuz it's like he doesn't actually care about the issues he's tackling, he just wants people to see how CLEVER~ and INCLUSIVE~ he is.

Which is how you get moments with him explaining the "Rose getting deadnamed" scene. The deadnaming was requested by the actor herself, so I have no issue with that...but RTD just takes it as an opportunity to explain that her deadname is *super important* because the name means "healer" and healer = doctor, so SEE HOW CLEVER I AM, HER DEADNAME IS WORDPLAY! IT'S ALL TIED TOGETHER, GUYS!

Or the Davros-wheelchair thing, which (and I may be speaking out of my ass here) but I doubt any person who uses a wheelchair actually cares about? Like, the idea of Davros was "he's part-Dalek," not "disabled people are evil." He's evil because he's evil, not because he can't use his legs.

I thought it was really cool to see a younger Davros, but then RTD had to say things like this and make a mountain out of a molehill, addressing a problem that didn't exist. He just comes off looking goofy. Davros had an iconic silhouette, and now if he's brought back under RTD...he'll just look like some regular dude? Why?

Meanwhile, Jodie's outfit was gender-neutral in the first place, and already worn by the Master earlier in that same episode. In The End of Time, RTD had the Master wearing women's clothing as well when he took over every person on the planet. So is RTD saying it's alright for a guy to wear women's clothes if they're a villain?? Because I doubt that's the message he's trying to convey, but it's what it ends up looking like.

(I'm sure if this was brought to his attention, he'd just apologize for being an ignorant man back in 2009 and he's sorry for upsetting everyone -- even though no one was upset.)

(I'm still waiting for an in-universe reason why Tennant got new clothes in the regeneration, btw.)

And the Toymaker was only seen as racist in the 60s for out-of-universe reasons, he wasn't actually racist in the story. Addressing that by making him ACTUALLY racist is just like...bruh, what??

And I don't even want to get into the bi-generation thing, but I will.

This is a different topic, but still related to dumb shit RTD says. Namely that he thinks the bi-generation retroactively caused all previous Doctors to split and now they're all running around space and time concurrently. Apparently, this was said as a joke and not something established in the lore yet (thank God), but it's still a very weird thing to ever fantasize about.

Because Doctor Who is a show about death. And moving on. And new beginnings. Capaldi said it himself in an interview once that "death" is one of the core components of the series, thanks to the Doctor needing to die for the series to move forward. "Everything ends and it's sad, but everything begins and it's happy."

That's the thematic point of regeneration. You're supposed to be sad about the leaving Doctor, but be happy about the new Doctor coming in.

It completely removes the emotional weight of the series to even joke about saying something like, "Oh, all the previous Doctors are alive again and off having adventures." It's like bringing Iron Man back in future MCU movies. It's bad, and it undermines the stories and emotions that came before.

The Doctor needs to die, and a new Doctor needs to come in.

And what makes it even more annoying here, is that Ncuti's introduction is now overstepped by the fact that, no, David Tennant isn't leaving. We're not letting him go. The series will NOT move on from the super-popular 10th Doctor. It not only makes Ncuti's Doctor look like an offshoot of the "real" Doctor that continues to be David Tennant, but it also undercuts that core theme of the show.

Furthermore, while I do like the idea of the Doctor settling down for a while to process his trauma...did RTD just simply ignore the entirety of Moffat's era? Saying the Doctor's just always wanted a family or home is a super strange read on the character, but especially since he already had a family with the Ponds, and lived peacefully with River for 24 years, and spent 70+ years as a teacher and got to become a sort of grandfather to Bill (to say nothing of his actually literal granddaughter that he basically abandoned.) He's settled down multiple times. Maybe the idea was that *this* Doctor never got that, while 11 and 12 did -- but even then, it's a flimsy take that excludes 13.

I see people saying, "Yeah, but in all those situations, those characters died, and that's why it'll be different here." But will it? Donna and her family will still age and die while the Doctor barely ages at all, and it'll still be super sad for him. The nuance is kinda different, but not by much. That's the entire excuse he always gives when asked why he doesn't simply stop moving.

"This is the happiest I've ever been in my life," just...doesn't feel like a thing that's real to me?? Maybe the happiest 10/14 has even been, but the Doctors in general? I don't know about that.

Anyway, this has gone on long enough.

RTD is a good writer, and I love his first era of Doctor Who, but dude needs to get his head out of his own ass and stop jumping at ghosts and getting worked up regarding issues that don't actually exist in the way he thinks they do. If it was just one example out of these, I don't think I'd care, but as they accumulate you just realize how strange RTD is being and it gets tiring.

Doctor Who has always been political, and "woke," and I enjoy laughing at upset right-wingers and much as the next guy, but I think there's a line between being political/progressive...and RTD just being a straight weirdo about issues he clearly doesn't understand or care about and acting like he's everyone's savior when he's just being obnoxious and making everyone raise their eyebrows at his decisions.

[asgardian--angels]

Taika and OFMD

thinking about Taika's new interview where he's said the season 2 ending seems like a natural conclusion to the show.

We know that David wrote the season finale the way he did in case it didn't get renewed for s3. And we know that David does have a season 3 storyline in mind, as he's envisioned Ed and Stede's love story as having three acts. And I know that the fans believe there's more story to tell, too, because they haven't resolved their communication issues, their trauma, or lingering plotlines.

The interview mentions that one of the limits on the show's capacity to keep running is Taika's schedule. To me, that may be the biggest holdup of anything when you get down to it. We're so lucky to have had him for two seasons of this show, given just how many projects he has going concurrently. But it gets more and more difficult to block off months of his time - and when looking for a season 3, David is going to need to produce an exceptionally compelling reason to bring him back in again. If Taika believes the show could end where it is, as much as he's adored being on it, he may prioritize other projects.

To me it felt as much of a risk to end s2 on a 'happy ending' note than to end on a cliffhanger, because it leaves the door open for cancellation on the basis of 'good enough.' I get why he did it, and I do think it was the right choice, but still. It makes the season 3 setup harder, because as Taika even said, he wouldn't want a situation where Ed and Stede have to leave their idyllic life behind. Which would have to happen to some extent - pulled back into the fray at least temporarily when the crew needs their help or the larger conflict of the pirates vs the English comes to a head, otherwise there'd be no drama or excitement. And if the storyline was simply Ed and Stede running an inn and having domestic mornings and working out their feelings, that's just not enough for Taika to clear his schedule and sacrifice other potential projects.

I trust David Jenkins to have something in mind that can convince tptb a third season would bring them great ratings and streaming subscriptions. I honestly don't think that's the part of this process that would hold (is holding?) the execs' decision up. Rather, it's whether the premise for season 3 is deemed compelling and necessary enough for our big name actors to sign on and commit their time to. For all we know, it's taking more time than anything to just figure out if Taika has any time in the next two years to devote to this (have you seen the sheer number and scale of his upcoming films?). They're not going to greenlight a third season if Taika can't commit. And Taika's so busy right now with Next Goal Wins that maybe they haven't even been able to sit down with him to have a lengthy contract discussion.

I'd like to think that Taika and David have discussed the three-act story premise for OFMD thoroughly, since it's something David's been saying since season 1 and if Taika didn't think he could do three seasons then I'd think the show would have been a nonstarter unless it was a 'cross that bridge when we come to it' situation, so the potential difference in opinion here is interesting. But it leads to some possibilities such as a season 3 where Ed and Stede aren't main characters - the focus turns more to the crew, with only half or even a third of the episodes featuring the main duo. Or an even shorter season 3 such as a 3 or 5 episode miniseries to reduce the time commitment for Taika. If the timeline for the show's production has to get pushed out an extra year to fit with his schedule, HBO Max might just decide it's not worthwhile to pursue. So there's a lot of things that can happen, and as much as we want an expanded season 3 with more episodes and a bigger budget, that may very well not be compatible with the reality of Taika's long-term availability.

We have to consider these possibilities. As I've said before, season 3 is in no way guaranteed, even from streaming analytics and critical success - but this is another dimension to this conversation that I haven't heard anyone talking about, and quite possibly the most important one because it's very concrete. No Taika, no OFMD. The fact that he said the show could perhaps go on without him and Rhys shows me this is where his thoughts are as well.

I don't want to make anyone despair here - I want season 3 more than anything. I do believe the show, and the story, deserves the full arc and natural conclusion that David has planned. We absolutely need to keep campaigning for renewal, harder than ever as we move into the one-month-post-finale window. But we should also realize that a big part of the renewal decision is out of our hands, and comes down to the ability of the show's star to actually stay involved. I think Taika will try his best to shuffle things around, but as I said David needs to be able to pitch him a season 3 that convinces him Ed and Stede's story isn't finished yet.

So fingers crossed. We may not hear anything for a while, as negotiations have to involve Taika and he's a busy busy man right now. I am optimistic, but I just wanted to remind folks of this aspect of the process.

[samobservessonic]

(I've only read up to issue five of your retrospective, so some of this is probably outdated) but there's one thing I'm curious about. I recently found out about a run of sonic the hedgehog Sunday strips for British newspapers that are vaguely connected to sonic the comic, given the fourth wall breaks, robotniks egg puns, having robotniks be redesigned around the same time as the comic, and even having Richard Nelson do the art for most of the run, so id be curious to see if youd cover them at some poont too, given that they ran concurrently with the comic. And on a similar note, there are the sonic yearbooks that weren't made by fleetway, but they do still seem to be vaguely related to sonic the comic.

Thanks for asking! I do want to cover the Sonic Sunday Strips at some point, since like you said, they are largely StC-related. Sadly, I didn't learn about them until after making my reading order and passing the point where they would've appeared in that reading order if I'd been doing them alongside the other comics as they came out. Which is a shame, because they're very short, so it would've been easy to throw them up and go "Here's what the sunday strips were doing that week" The other drawback is that the site I'm using for scans does have them, but not in the correct order. So I'd need to figure that out or else see if I can find them elsewhere. But I do hope to cover them, probably after finishing the mainline StC, since there are a few "optional extras" I'm thinking about including The yearbooks I did cover though, since it was easier to add them in after the fact and they are "basically StC even if they're not officially StC". If you're following the tag from the beginning you'll get to them anyway, but all the same, here's the 1993 Yearbook and the 1994 Yearbook

[dragonsongmakhali]

10 fandoms, 10 characters, 10 tags:

Basic rules: choose 10 fandoms that you are part of/support, and choose a favorite character from each of those. Then, tag ten folks!

Tagged by: @jigschosai @sealrock @reikatsukihana and @sasslett! Thank y'all :'D

This is not ordered by how much I'm into them, they're just in whatever order came to mind :) I will caution that I don't tend to choose favorite characters, I'm more of an OC maker. Feeling chatty, so I'm putting the actual list under a cut. You're welcome.

1. FFXIV : Pretty self-explanatory for the xiv sideblog. Since I'm not as in to the MSQ, I don't think I actually have a favorite character (which I know is illegal, I'm sorry :<). I really love seeing what the community does with the characters, though!

2. Halo : The storyline went to hell long ago, but I do still adore the original trilogy and constantly mine it for gpose captions. It was basically what I lived off of in high school. If I had a tumblr back then, I'd have been insufferable. Favorite character is easily Rtas 'Vadum.

3. WoW : Kind of. Asterisk. I really only know Classic, and even then, I'm way more Horde than I am Alliance. I have approximate knowledge of many things. No favorite there either - I'm all about the world and making OCs. We have two concurrent WoW tabletop games running at the moment, so this is where most of my headspace is. Their shared timeline is different from the canon, so I'm not really in the fandom per se.

4. Mass Effect : Alien dating sim, my beloved. I even enjoyed Andromeda (jump jets implemented perfectly, fun combat, the Jardaan reminded me of Forerunners). If you ask me to choose a favorite, I'll cry. How is a mother supposed to choose between her two sons (Legion and Grunt)? Drack also gets an honorary mention for his 100s of low res pictures of guns email.

5. Elder Scrolls : Mostly Skyrim, some Oblivion. I know, I'm one of those fans. Anyway, I've probably played over 1k hours of Skyrim by this point and yet. And yet! I don't have a favorite. The entirety of the Companions? I just wish that the faction questlines in Skyrim weren't "you killed 3 wolves and have been here a week. You lead us all now", but it does give me good scaffolding which. As an OC fiend. Grabby hands.

6. The World Ends With You : This game made me good at calculus in high school. My favorite character from here is Sho Minamimoto, and I was a completely normal teenager who dealt with that by doing calculus problems for fun. Turns out, the trick to get good at math is repetition.

7. Pokémon : Probably my earliest fandom. Still play the games now and again, just got Legends Arceus (super late, I know), and that's been a lot of fun. My favorite character from the franchise is Sinnoh's Rock type leader, Roark. I had a long-running sideblog dedicated to the Sinnoh region because gen IV is my favorite in general! It's inactive at the moment.

8. Guild Wars : 2, to be more precise. I started playing about a month after release, and since it's f2p, I still drop in from time to time. Like every MMO, I have no favorites. I really love playing Sylvari, though! (The glow!! The nightmare!! The [[Heart of Thorns spoiler!!]] They're just so neat)

9. Star Trek : we're now getting into "shows I watched and didn't hate" because I'm definitely not in the 'fandom' for Trek. We've been going through the old series as a way to wind down before bed, starting with TNG. We're on Enterprise now, and I'm sad that it got canceled. Still will probably have a better ending than Voyager. I don't have a favorite, but I can tell you that the writers' collective favorite must be either Seven of Nine or Data.

10. Uh. Various anime? I can't say I've recently loved any particular series to the point of fandom, but as a whole, I've been a weeb since I was in middle school. "Recent" series that I've enjoyed have included Mob Psycho and Love is War. Coincidentally, they both saved the most banger opening for their third season.

We had to stretch a little bit, but we made it to ten! Proud of this community (this community is my brain desperately trying to remember 10 things I like)

Have no idea who's been tagged in this, so if you've done this, please ignore! Or reblog it again!

@miqojak @airis-ray @wilanserulia @ahollowgrave @blackestnight @starstrider @iron-sparrow @sumifinalfourteen @jump-n-dive @otherworldseekers

[jmeldog]

Wow thank you so much for that very detailed reply! That was such a fascinating read, I had no idea this was how the series is atm. I really thought that Win's middle school arc was done and Lost was the sequel, I wasn't aware at all that they're co-existing series. I was really worried and sad for the last few months that Win had the same terrible fate Shobu did so this is a bit of a relief for the time being.

So is this the same case for the anime as well? Both the middle school and Lost arcs have their separate anime adaptations at the same time as well? Win having these darkness powers seems really dark for the show considering the screenshots I've seen of certain eps, is the anime going to go down that route at all in your opinion?

No problem! Again, I am always happy to infodump. I can infodump about duema as much as anyone wants. Just ask me to elaborate on near anything and I very gladly shall.

Long story short for this ask:

Honestly. I have no clue what they’re gonna do with the mainline adaptation 😭 darkness and horrors aren’t new to duema at all, even when seasons seem silly. But they handle Win weirdly. They drag their feet a loooooot.

However, the door still seems open for it to continue with what the manga’s doing. Even though Nonno didn’t show up, the monster that messed with Win’s friend had a woman’s voice, and said it’d come back. So. Shrug. She could be related.

We have no clue when Duewin anime is actually coming back, it’s on hiatus. But the Duelost anime is coming to YouTube this fall. It’d be awesome if it wasn’t region locked, but my hopes aren’t high, per se. YouTube uploads of the TV airings have always been region locked, but an anime exclusively to YouTube could be different.? But again. Idk.

Now the ramblings… (i really really rambled a lot whoops……… but there’s a lot that goes into how I think about this series………….)

But yeah, it’s is kinda strange to have Duewin and Duelost running at the same time, but like I think I get why. Dai-sensei wrote a letter about why he wanted to make Duelost, and basically he wanted a story for all the adults who grew up playing duema who still make time for it throughout the struggles of adulthood. So in that sense, yeah I can see why they’re existing concurrently—one for kids and one for adults.

In regards to how Duewin and Duelost anime counterparts are going… I honestly wish I could say what’s going on.

We know for certain Duelost anime is getting an anime adaptation by JC Staff in fall this year. Seems like it’s gonna be uploaded on YouTube.

As for mainline Duewin anime………? I don’t think we know anything about when it’s coming back???

Afaik, we’re in a fucked up purgatory of

Duewin anime: hiatus

Duewin manga: currently monthly

Duelost anime: coming out in fall

Duelost manga: hiatus

So anyway, in regards to the statement

“Win having these darkness powers seems really dark for the show considering the screenshots I've seen of certain eps, is the anime going to go down that route at all in your opinion?”

My answer is… maybe…? I don’t think it’s too dark for duema at all…….With an incredibly large asterisk.

Yeah, duema’s absolutely goofy, but it also gets pretty fucked up too. So much so on both ends that I’d say the violent emotional whiplash is a feature of the series.

The powers that Win has—disintegrating living things—are pretty similar to the powers that a king of darkness character from a different era had. And that character literally killed the MC’s best friend, killed the best friend’s dad, killed tons of other bg randos, and tortured many with those powers. So. Eh yannow.

Here’s my friend, Ze-ro. From Joe era duema.

Here’s some kids getting tortured and killed by him (burning in flames, turning into sand)

And here’s Joe in the Minecraft parody ep.

But honestly, maybe they just don’t want their protags to look bad. In the manga, the previous protag, Joe, also had a breakdown, started using dark power, and killed the guy who killed his dad.

But um. Granted I haven’t seen all of the anime adaptation of this half of Joe era because I was warned that it sucked in comparison. . . But I went to watch the “you killed my dad” revenge match in the anime and Joe just did a magical girl transformation on him 😭 no murder.

Later Joe has a depression arc, and looks horrible and unwashed in the manga. While in the anime they kept him squeaky clean. Among many, many other changes that I’ll spare you the paragraphs about.

However, it’s not like the anime never adds things that are fucked up. They’ve done horrible things to my sanity. But I’m trying to prevent this essay from getting any longer, so for this section I digress…

The manga’s prolly always gonna be darker when it wants to be, because Dai-sensei is a visionary who’ll put his protags through whatever the hell kinda horrors he wants. Though it is generally because he believes in a light at the end of the tunnel.

Sorry for the but rambling about the prior seasons, but they all kinda play into what I expect from following duemas.

So anyway

They were building to Win snapping in duewin anime, but just kinda…? Pussied out??? Put it off??????? I guess????????????

Because they wrote the story so it could be cut off quite cleanly literally before Win snapped. It’s such a strange and slightly frustrating decision after they dragged their feet the entire 47 eps of the season. Like 🫠 I guess they can’t outpace the manga but… wagh who knows. Maybe it’s just one of those things that’s frustrating to have watched live, but if I were to binge it I wouldn’t be as annoyed. Maybe.

But what gets me tho is the anime even added some extra stuff to torment Win. The anime gave Win mommy issues + made him canonically atheist (really funny, btw) because his mom wouldn’t come back after leaving him no matter how much he prayed. But despite Jashin poking Win with it over and over, they didn’t do much with it in the season. (While the manga just never touches on how Win’s mom isn’t around)

But like I said at the very very beginning of this rambling.. yeah the door’s still technically open to follow the manga route.

So like I mentioned in a previous ask, in the manga Nonno messed with one of Win’s friends, Ugata. In the anime, it was just the monster that Nonno gave him. And a possessed mouse.? But in the anime the monster had a woman’s voice and said it’d come back, so………

But alsoooooo I really wonder how they’d get Win as pissed in the anime as he was in the manga 😭 he was so pissed off at her cuz he was fresh off finding out Ugata had been bullied in elementary school and was jealous of Win, and that Nonno had taken advantage of that. She’d gotten Ugata to destroy the school, attempt to kill Win, and hurt their other friend, and afterwards she was like “lol lmao whatevs why r you even so mad over something like this xD” while Ugata was still unconscious on the ground with tears staining his face, yannow? Like yeah they could always try to build the tension back up, but the moment was just really good.

(Also I’m 99% sure Ugata getting bullied in the past just wasn’t apart of his backstory in the anime. Weird.)

While the anime on the other hand had a really happy ending lmao. Everyone was around Ugata welcoming him back to being normal.

The difference in Win’s vibes between getting Ugata back to normal in the anime vs manga is well…. Well it’s pretty dang noticeable, alright!

Like obviously if they want to continue Win era they have to go somewhere with Win being a king of darkness, but if they’re being so deliberate with dragging it out I really wonder what they’re gonna do.

There’s a lot more I could get into over studio changes, amount of volumes being adapted per season, and shit like that but um I think I’ll cut myself off here. I rambled enough.

I think I lost the point of what I was talking about a while ago. Whoops.

This is like all speculation. thanks for reading I’m not proofing this anymore 👍

Fun fact this hiatus after Duewin anime is the first hiatus in the history of the show. Which tbh I’m happy they’re having a break, because the animation industry is hell and adapting an ongoing manga for 20+ years seems insane.

[utilitycaster]

@villadiodatis replied to your post “I know it's Nein lockdown but in practice for me...”:

I’ve been really hostile to the daggerheart c4 idea because it’s mostly come from the same people who fearmonger about how “c3’s got the lowest viewing numbers ever” but the magic shifting thing does make me wonder—it could also be a justification for the changes in 5e 2024, and my prediction remains 5e c4 with a daggerheart campaign in the current candela slot with some of the new regular guests, but we’ll see!

​Moving this out of the replies because this is a very valid point. To be honest a lot of the Daggerheart C4 people of that nature have apparently stopped believing it because somehow it hinged on the gods definitely being killed off (as opposed to the current state where it's been made pretty clear Bells Hells gets to decide what happens and it is not a foregone conclusion) and also it being a d20 system specifically (no idea why) but yeah. I will say: I don't see any specific reason to switch to 5e's changes/OneD&D. I mean, they could if they want to, but people played D&D 3.5e throughout the entire existence of D&D 4e; there are still people out there who stick with AD&D. A lot of the people claiming C3 has lower viewership than ever also kind of hated Campaign 2 and really have hated everything since Campaign 1. Right now they're blaming D&D but earlier they blamed the switch to pre-taping or the "meandering plot" and like, in the end, I'm pretty sure a lot of them were ultimately just fans of Vox Machina and of the cast being more accessible to a small fandom and they will never be happy with Critical Role again.

I will freely admit: I do not know if a campaign 4 is guaranteed to happen at all. It's a massive commitment and it's not out of the question that after this campaign Critical Role won't shift into EXU and various miniseries alone. During Campaign 2, Campaign 3 wasn't a guarantee either. But if there is another long-form campaign in the channel's immediate future, I feel like Daggerheart makes it more likely, and to be honest I think what you mentioned seems really unlikely:

A smart way to avoid the loss of audience when switching out of D&D (the recognizable brand) is to keep all the other things the same. Keep the setting of Exandria; keep the main cast; hope that people will stick around for Matt's GM-ing and the main cast and the world even if the mechanics change. There's plenty of reasons why I think Candela has a lower viewership including that horror is a totally different genre and a harder sell, but I also can't help but think that some people are specifically not checking it out because their favorite cast member or favorite cast dynamic isn't present.

Daggerheart is explicitly intended to support long-form play with level progressions, and I think they'd want to showcase that. Running two long-form games concurrently on the channel is really tough to the point that if they did both a 5e/OneD&D campaign and a Daggerheart Campaign, I think they'd probably have to have none of the original cast members in that as main PCs simply for reasons of time commitments and would definitely lose viewers if they did that. Candela is arc-based and can be presented sufficiently in 3-episode chapters in a way that I think Daggerheart cannot.

Again: fully speculative; but if I were say, in Marisha's shoes, and the cast had decided to do another long-form campaign after C3 I'd go with Daggerheart, still using D&D 5e for any EXU games set in the past, and keep Candela as a mini-series on the off weeks.