#main characters! side characters! HIDDEN SHIT! the puns

[starry-beetle]

Gravity Falls got me entranced, I am enjoying. So much of it.

[wishfishy]

When I first heard that a new Endless Ocean was going to be released, I was incredibly excited. Just absolutely over-the-moon excited. You see, Endless Ocean 2: Blue World (also called Endless Ocean 2: Adventures of the Deep) is one of my favourite games of all time. Scratch that: it is my favourite game. It was far from perfect, but I loved it dearly and happily sank hundreds if not thousands of hours into it.

EO2 is a diving game for the wii that was released in 2010, and I have never been able to find a game quite like it. The main story was a bit cheesy, but charming and engaging, with a bevy of likeable if occasionally one-note characters, and the game itself had surprising depths (diving pun fully intended). The game had 12 different diving maps in 6 locations and while the specific areas were fictitious, they were based on very real places (the South Pacific, Mediterranean Sea, Red Sea, Arctic and Antarctic Oceans, as well as a freshwater river in the Amazon) and this was reflected in the species found in each area, with a few exceptions here and there.  You could explore shallow coral reefs, a sunken castle, ancient temples, abyssal depths, a kelp forest, sandy beaches, riverbanks, hidden coves with murals, and much more. You also had a small private island as a hub location, a personal reef you could decorate, and a public aquarium which you could fill with any of the non-legendary species you discovered.

Speaking of which, the game featured 340 different species of marine and freshwater fish, sharks, rays, marine mammals, penguins, shore birds, reptiles, crustaceans, cephalopods and other invertebrates. Some of these also had different models for young or different genders. You could find truly miniscule species that most other diving games overlook entirely in zoom-spots (such as gobies and nudibranchs), and you could interact with most by feeding, touching or even riding in the case of large marine life. And on top of this you could also find legendary creatures, which could be individuals of extant species with unusual colouring or size, or even extinct species, and could be exceedingly hard to find but entirely rewarding.

This is already getting to be much too long but on top of all this you could customize your diver character, buy things for your island hub, decorate and populate a private reef to propagate and release fish, create various aquarium exhibits, discover a great many side-quests, upgrade equipment, take and sell photographs, heal sick animals, search for and sell salvage, find collectable coins, train dolphin partners, take requests for guided tours, dolphin shows, salvage and photos, dodge or placate aggressive sharks, and more that I am probably forgetting. It’s been a while since I’ve played the game, as I no longer have a wii and don’t have the first clue on how to emulate games on my PC. All this is to say that this game was something special, and I have never been able to find anything remotely close to it. And seeing as how the last one was released almost 15 years ago, I had long given up hope for an Endless Ocean 3.

And then lo and behold, a trailer dropped from out of nowhere for Endless Ocean Luminous! And it was releasing in a month! Holy Shit! What!? Yes!

But alas, the more information came out about the game, the more that excitement started to wane. A focus on multiplayer? Procedural generation? Only one map? The only character being an AI that sounded like all those awful tiktok voices? To be clear, I wasn’t expecting Luminous to be the next GoTY. I wasn’t even expecting it to be an exact replica of EO2, or continue the storyline. If it had even a fraction of what I liked about the previous game I was going to be one happy camper. I assumed that the marketing was focusing on the multiplayer aspect instead of the single-player story, that hopefully the procedurally generated map was exclusive to that multiplayer. Surely the single player mode would extend past what little was shown in the trailers. Some things seemed promising, such as an advertised 500+ species, and even more prehistoric marine life. But again, alas, what I have seen since the release is the barest and palest reflection of what I enjoyed about the previous game. I could understand cutting some content, such as the dolphin training and shows, considering the controversy of cetaceans in captivity. But it seems like there is no aquarium, no central hub of any type, no characters beyond the aforementioned AI and a single faceless diver, salvage reduced to a single click, an incredibly reduced story consisting mostly of scanning fish, no ability to feed or interact with fish and fish behaviour also seems to be quite reduced. At least photography still appears to be in the game, though its unclear to what point. Are there still photo requests? The ability for some critters to swim along with or attach to your diver looks cute at least. But everything I’ve watched so far just feels so… lifeless. Empty. As if the whole game was AI generated, which I’m at least %75 sure isn’t the case.

But I’m left kind of baffled by the direction that this game was taken in. I’ve been trying to find any information about it’s development with little to no success. Why the focus on multiplayer to the exclusion of a single player story beyond the bare minimum? What lead to the choice to have a single, procedurally generated map instead of separate, smaller, but more scientifically accurate maps? Or even a single smaller but purposefully designed map? Was this game more like the previous games at any point in its conception or development or was it always intended to be such a departure?

[edasnest]

Might you have any Raeda headcanons you'd be willing to share?

Oh shit I didn’t see that you sent this to me until now oh man.

But you better believe I’ve got some Raeda headcanons >:D

[Spoilers for Eda’s Requiem and Knock Knock Knockin on Hooty’s Door! Also a little bit of a character study regarding those eps lol]

Raine is constantly in awe of Eda. Eda’s desire to learn every kind of magic and buck tradition and societal norms sometimes leaves them breathless. When they were young, Raine always admired Eda for the clever pranks she’d pull using different kinds of magic despite being in the potions track. They also admired Eda’s boldness when it came to standing up for herself and her sister.

Eda found Raine to be interesting considering they were in the bard track despite their stage fright, but once Eda watched them perform and saw how they’d lose themself in the music was, no pun intended, magical. They had a fierce grip on Eda’s heart and she didn’t know why; she was fascinated by Raine and made it her goal to be best friends with this oddly shy bard (which she achieved pretty quickly).

After Eda’s curse caused her to unintentionally disable her dad, she was terrified of what it would mean if she was caught off guard like that again. So she started putting up walls. No stressful situations, no hard conversations, no sudden bright lights or loud sounds that she wasn’t the cause of. If she could be in control of her surroundings, she could control the Owl Beast. The elixir she’d discovered that could keep the curse’s side effects at bay helped maintain her sanity and her chill demeanor, but Raine was able to tell she was always slightly on edge. Raine knew about the curse; after Eda had transformed on the Grudgby field the first time everyone had been talking about it, but they didn’t know the extent of it. Everyone just said she’d turned into a monster and then fled; but what kind of monster?? But every time Raine tried to get more information about it, Eda would brush it off and change the subject. It broke their heart watching Eda brush off something that was clearly bothering her, and eventually it all came to a head. She was lying more and more often to Raine and they just couldn’t take it anymore. What happened to their best friend??? Why would she lie to them????? It was maddening and all the frustration and aching in their heart became too much. They needed to focus on something other than Eda. They weren’t nearly as bold as Eda, even after all these years, so they joined the Bard Coven in order to start teaching and building a career for themself. They’d happily welcome Eda back if she’d just tell them what was going on. But it never happened. Burying themself into their work and then, eventually, into the BAtTs helped keep the heartache at bay, but only sometimes.

Eda and Raine caught glimpses of each other as the years passed. They’d spot one another in the market or Raine would see a flash of unmistakable ginger hair dashing around a corner; sometimes they’d hear Eda yelling at some Coven guards and quietly hope she’d make her escape. Eda would occasionally see posters advertising a performance starring Raine; she’d either buy a ticket or sneak in just to listen to them play again. She could never stay for very long though because listening to them play made her heart hurt so much she’d be at risk of turning into the Owl Beast. Raine grabbed one of Eda’s wanted posters and keeps it hidden under some other paperwork in their desk, pulling it out sometimes and going over every detail of the artist’s rendition of her. One day, a new wanted poster came out - this one with a weird skull dog now part of the image and the bounty having increased significantly. Raine would always smirk whenever they saw the new version, although they were alarmed the first time they saw her drawn with all-grey hair. When had that happened? They weren’t that old yet, right??

The day Eda saved the BAtTs and figured out Raine’s secret was maybe the best day Raine had had in years. Their best friend was talking to them again, helping them with their plot. Raine didn’t bother pushing Eda about the last 20 years; their last conversation proved enough that Eda didn’t like it when people pried. But Eda had become not just older, but so much more kind and open. To a degree that sort of shocked Raine. When they asked Eda if she had nothing to lose and Eda took their hand, it was like they’d gone back in time. As if they were both 20 again and daydreaming about a world they’d create for themselves where covens weren’t there to shackle witches down and stage fright didn’t exist; where Eda’s curse never happened and they could stay there on that hill forever.

Eda of course was warring with her own emotions during all of this; she was under the impression that everyone in her life was leaving her again. And not because she was pushing them away this time, but of their own volition. She got her big sister back only for her to go back home to their parents after just a few weeks. She overheard King talk about leaving to find his dad and her apprentice - the first person to ever break down all of Eda’s defenses and show her how to love again - was constantly working on ways to go back to her own home. Eda would be left with Hooty and Owlbert and absolutely nobody else and that hurt so much more than she cared to admit. So when Raine showed up in the town square with their BAtT mask on, using their magic to turn some coven guards into bumbling fools, Eda was a little shell-shocked. The first person to leave her of their own volition was right there in front of her and needed help. So she helped them. And when she became invested in their plots to free wild witches, she felt like she was a teenager again, plotting out pranks with Raine in her secret shortcuts room at Hexside, blushing at every interaction they had because even after all this time, Raine was still Raine. Her Rainstorm. It was like she was starting over, like the last 20 years had faded away, except they hadn’t. Because Luz and King were competing in a race that she needed to be there for. Her past and her present were all different types of painful but finding Raine like this again gave her so much hope! Until she realized she wouldn’t see the end of that race, not if it meant stopping Belos. And she was ready for that, ready for the pain to just stop already, but Raine wouldn’t let her.

Losing Raine again was so much worse the second time. But what they said stayed with her and Eda needed to get back to King and Luz. So when she got back and discovered they’d lost, of course her first thought was to help them. Anything to take her mind off of what she’d just lost. And when King announced that he wasn’t leaving at all, he was legally changing his name? She was “stuck” with him forever? That was too much and she just couldn’t hold it in anymore. Someone wasn’t leaving her. In fact he was legally binding himself to her. No one was leaving, at least not any time soon. Eda definitely still cried more that night after King and Luz had gone to bed.

In the future, Eda and Raine agree to start from scratch: Eda explains the curse to them in detail, all the things she’s learned about it over the years and specifically with Luz and King and Hooty’s help. She explains that Lilith was the one that gave it to her to begin with and why (Raine is appalled like???? Raine specifically worked with Lilith in that last year before they had been made head of the Bard Coven?? And Lilith showed maybe irritation at best at the mention of Eda, so like?? What the fuck???). Eda also explains how she’s come to accept the curse as something that’s part of her and the history the Owl Beast has that she got a glimpse of which is super intriguing to Raine. Also Harpy Eda was a thing which was maybe the most surprising part of it all.

Raine in the meantime tells Eda about their time working their way up the ranks of the Bard Coven, how they met each of the BAtTs and recruited them, the façade they had to maintain to stay on track to become the head of the Bard Coven (something that greatly impressed Eda given Raine’s history with being an awkward actor).

Eda introduces Raine to Luz and King to which both of them start shooting rapidfire questions at them and overwhelm them pretty quickly. Eda has to shoo the two away before Raine just bursts out laughing, saying something about how they’re definitely Eda’s kids (all of them blush while Raine is laughing). Luz is just as fascinated with Raine’s Bard magic as Eda was when they first met and the similarities between the two are striking. Raine tells Eda as much later on and Eda begins gushing about what a great apprentice Luz is and everything she’s done during her time on the Boiling Isles.

They fall easily back into dating once they reconnect properly and everything’s calmed down a little - Raine will still be humming a piece they’re working on and suddenly grab Eda and begin dancing to the tune, Eda laughing the whole time and making their heart soar. Eda will still play with Raine’s earring when they’re cuddled up together just chatting. Raine will start asking Eda again for her opinion on musical pieces they’re working on and Eda will make suggestions along with some jokes or snide commentary. They both still love watching the clouds overhead on their hill, sometimes playing music, sometimes just holding hands.

Raine loves watching Eda interact with Luz and King. They love watching how easily Eda loves them and how much she’s changed since they first broke up. Once they’re alone together, in a moment total admiration for how far they’ve come, Raine tells Eda they love her. Eda immediately kisses them and starts crying, repeating Raine’s words back to them and mumbling about how she’ll never let Raine leave ever again.

A canon Non-binary love interest to a main character that uses They/Them pronouns??? In my kids cartoon???? It’s more likely than you think.

Anyways I fucking love Raine and I love how much Eda and Raine love each other and I can’t wait to see what ends up happening with Them™️

[starbuckie]

𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐰

challenge: 200 followers challenge by @angrybirdcr

prompt: “there may have been a slight misunderstanding, but nothing we can’t fix.” and locked in the trunk of a car

pairing: bucky barnes x reader

words: 5,504 words

warnings: post-endgame, bucky’s kinda a dick, enemies to friends(?), swearing, angst, mentions of violence, talk about sexual assault, guns, bickering, jealousy

summary: bucky had been adjusting to the new familiarity of having a stable routine, right until she walked in.

a/n: I DON’T NOT OWN ANY CHARACTERS ALL CHARACTERS BELONG TO MARVEL. okay, great, done that, but congratulations on 200 followers!! i had so much fun taking part in your writing challenge, so thank you so much. imma be honest, there’s not a lot of romance in this, it’s some enemies to friends type of shit and i genuinely did not think this fic would get so angsty and dark and actually long, but i had an idea and ran with it mid way through the old fic with this prompt. also i had an idea for an epilogue to this, so tell me if you want that part 2 because i am on the verge of writing it. this is not proofread by a beta, but i edited it myself and hope it is okay. anyways, now that we’re done with that, please enjoy this rollercoaster of a fanfic i’ve written.

main masterlist || sebastian stan characters masterlist

Life in the twenty-first century was strange, Bucky concluded. Though he’d been free of HYDRA for around nine years technically, being a fugitive and in another realm didn’t give him much time to learn about the modern world. As soon as he came back, Steve had left him and he had to move on without his childhood best friend. It was hard for him to adjust to this century, with the new rules and the whole scene in general, but he seemed to make it through just fine. He’d come to peace with the fact that there was no escaping the fighting at all, falling into a steady routine that became his holy grail. 

In the new Avengers compound in Upstate New York he felt content and more sure of himself than he’d felt in a very long time. Everyone in the tower was quiet and kept to themselves mostly, still dealing with the aftermath of losing so much in so little time. But in that silence Bucky felt like a free man, able to walk around without fear of being hunted down every second and time to really look about this new world.

There were still times when he woke up in a sweaty panic, disoriented and terrified until he realized he was in the safety of his room in the compound. He’d flinch at loud noises in the quiet and his heart would stop, something that went by unnoticed by everyone else, though he didn’t blame them for it. Bucky felt extreme guilt for the horrible things he had done as the Winter Soldier, memories of bloodied and dead bodies, bodies he had made fall to the ground motionless. It wasn’t him, he knew, but his hand still had pulled the trigger. When he found something new a smile would split across his face, ready to tell Steve what he had discovered, until he remembered that the rambunctious blond boy was gone, a wrinkled grey man with a new family in his place. It still hurt him to think that he had left him so easily, with barely a goodbye. Bucky still had days where he felt so incredibly tired, left still on his bed as horrible thoughts ran through his mind, anxious about the future.

But then he found new things everyday, things that seemed to outweigh the bad by a whole lot. He’d found cool ranch Doritos were the best chips and that he really liked the season of fall with the leaves falling around him as he took a serene walk. He found that he really loved Frozen, the songs and Sven the reindeer making him crack a smile every time he watched it. He found that he could sleep in on his days without missions and Wanda liked her pancakes with an unhealthy amount of syrup on the side to dunk them in. He found that Sam was actually really funny, always making the worst puns or the dirtiest jokes at the most inappropriate of times. He found a new sense of respect and warmth in the family they’d built together, learning how to go on without those that they loved. He found that he was really enjoying his new routine and his new sense of peace with himself.

All until she walked in.

Bucky could still remember the exact moment she flipped their world upside down. Sharon had fawned over her, talking about one of her old SHIELD buddies who was finally coming back to the states. After the organization fell in 2014, Y/N L/N fled to Hawaii, running away to the one place she knew no one would find her. She was done fighting, or that’s what she believed until Thanos showed up. 

It was shameful, really, that Y/N was aware of all the problems that went on, yet did nothing to help. They needed her help, she knew they did, but she couldn’t bring yourself to go help her friends. Originally she was trying for a settled down life, planning to retire from the constant fighting, but after a few failed relationships Y/N realized that she wasn't cut out for that white picket fence life. Those had just been the dreams of a fourteen year old Y/N L/N, left empty and hollow by the horrors she had seen during her time at SHIELD. There was nothing left waiting for her, no family, no friends, but she was too stubborn to get back into the fight, so she stayed in her humid Oahu apartment and waited for something interesting to happen.

Well, maybe Y/N shouldn’t have wished so hard, that “interesting thing” showing up in the form of being snapped out of existence by a large, purple grape.

When she came back she felt nearly indifferent, knowing that five years had passed by her, and though Y/N felt nothing but emptiness she knew that it was time to go back. It was her duty when she had joined SHIELD to always be there and protect, and she had failed that job. But Y/N was more than ready to make up for it. Nothing like Thanos could ever happen again, so she called Sharon, one of her closest friends and previous commanding supervisor at the organization. She was ecstatic to have Y/N back, probably a bit too much, and before she could have second thoughts the girl was on a plane overlooking JFK, ready to land in New York.

So when Y/N walked in, with a tight-lipped smile and butterflies anxiously fluttering in her stomach, Bucky couldn’t help but despise her. Maybe he had formed his opinion off of Sharon’s explanation of her past, but Y/N got the life of settling down that he didn’t and he was infuriatingly jealous. 

“Hey, Bucky, Sam, come meet Y/N!” Sharon said excitedly. Her hair was put back in a headband neatly, two suitcases in hand as she looked at the two tall, muscular men. Of course Y/N recognized both of them, she hadn’t been living under a rock. Keeping up with the news of the Avengers and remaining SHIELD officers had been one of the only things keeping her from coming back, hearing of the terrible fights and destruction done to whole cities. She recognized Sam Wilson, the infamous Falcon being marked down as a “war criminal” in 2016. She never believed that crap, if he and half of the other Avengers were locked up there had to be a good reason behind it.

Then, there was James Buchanan Barnes. Now, she knew him from her eighth grade American history books, reading about the brave Howling Commando who had given up his life for saving the country, but Y/N knew him better as the Winter Soldier from her time at SHIELD. The fight in 2014 had been brutal, hectic in all forms, but she’d caught a few glances at the metal-armed man. He hadn't been in his normal state, with being controlled and tortured by HYDRA at the time, but the kid inside of her freaked out, remembering memories of gossiping with her friends about how hot he was in the textbooks and how much of a hero he was. That man was still in there somewhere, hidden by decades of reprogramming and mind-wiping, and Y/N was finally seeing him in the flesh. She would be working with him daily, living in the same space as him. The thought made her giddy like a middle schooler with her first crush,though his presence was intimidating as well.

“Hi there, I’m Y/N L/N, it’s a pleasure to be working with you.” Sticking out her hand, she gave a bright smile, already growing out of her nervous state. 

Sam quickly shook Y/N’s hand, giving a warm greeting in response to her introduction. Then she turned to Bucky. “It’s nice to meet you, Bucky.”

His cold, dead glare locked onto Y/N, staring straight through her soul. It felt like he could see every insecurity and guilty action she had, and she didn’t like it one bit. “That’s Sergeant Barnes to you.” Without another word, he walked out of the room like a petulant child, leaving Sharon, Sam, and Y/N flabbergasted. 

“I’m sorry, Y/N, he’s usually more friendly than that, I’ll go check in on him,” Sharon furiously said with a painfully fake smile. Sam grabbed the new girl by the arm, linking it with his own and led her in another direction as he explained the usual training routine and schedule for the week. 

And while she was completely enraptured by Sam’s comforting words and the exciting compound, her heart still felt heavy from Sergeant Barnes’ cold greeting. 

-

She had tried to be nice. She really had. But after two months it was pretty clear Sergeant Barnes wasn’t getting any better, and Y/N was beyond pissed off. Childish, is what he was being, fucking childish. 

It started off with leaving every room she came into, blatantly ignoring her presence. When she would say hello every morning he’d grunt or even worse, he wouldn’t answer her at all. Y/N had begged Sharon if she knew why the sergeant was acting up, but she didn’t know either and just asked her to ignore him and his “crappy, old-man behaviour”. Sam wasn’t very helpful to Y/N’s cause either, but he was a great mentor and an even better teacher.

Sharon was really the only person Y/N had in her phone, her parents dead and no boyfriend accounted for. The rest of her family had wanted nothing to do with her when she joined SHIELD, but that was okay with her. She knew what she had gotten herself into, and it was an extreme risk to even be acquaintances with her. But now, living with several others in a compound that seemed so large after the great loss, Y/N became part of their family as well. 

It was nice to have friends again, as years of solitude on an island where she knew nobody had made her nearly desperate for more human interaction than with the teenagers who worked the cash registers at the grocery store. Y/N became an integral part of the Avengers (she could actually say that aloud now), going on missions and kicking ass just like she used to. Of course, Sergeant Barnes’ behaviour in and out of missions stayed the same, but she usually tried her best to not take it to heart and move on. After all, she couldn’t have everyone like her.

But one day they both snapped.

Y/N was sitting with Sharon and Wanda, eating lunch and talking over their most recent mission with them and Barnes in Cairo. It hadn’t been a necessarily bad mission, per se, but she had run back into the building to get Wanda out from under a fallen pillar, which apparently was “severely dangerous”. Looking back, she could see how it was, putting her entire team’s secrecy and mission in volatile danger, but Wanda was like her sister and in Y/N’s heart she knew that she had to. Bucky had had to grab them both, nearly dragging her back to the jet before the building had collapsed. He’d been beyond angry with Y/N for the stupid decision, but when they landed he just huffed and stomped away. The redhead was grateful for her and so was Sharon, but lunch was just for a simple stern talking about mission protocols. 

“Y/N, I know that you’re a fantastic agent and even better friend, but when we’re on missions we need that agent. You can’t let your feelings and outside life get in the way of our objective.” Sharon said in a firm voice. Y/N dropped her head in her hands and rubbed her face tiredly.

“I know, Sharon, I’m sorry, Wanda could’ve probably gotten herself out but I just let my instincts act too fast and ran back in without another thought.” She groaned. “Plus, I just caused more damage than anything else. It won’t happen again, I promise.” Wanda and Sharon nodded in understanding just as the Asshole Supreme walked into the kitchen.

“You talking ‘bout how Y/N fucked up the mission yesterday?” Sergeant Barnes grunted. While Sharon and Wanda gasped in shock, Y/N’s eyes were trained at the plate on the table in front of her, not daring to make a sound. She muttered out a sorry and got up to put her dish in the sink. As long as he was here, he was going to make her life a living hell, and as much as she wanted to lash out, it would be cause for her dismissal from the team. While her old, solitary life was what she had once dreamed of, Y/N now saw her future among these people, this family, somewhere she finally felt a part of despite Barnes’ horrid behaviour. “Sorry?” He scoffed, “Sorry doesn’t make up for the fact that I had to run back in for you. Sorry doesn’t make up for the extreme risks we all pull to save your ass out in the field.”

“Bucky, stop.” Sharon yelled.

But he ignored her words and sauntered over to Y/N with a knowing smirk, leaning down to meet her level. His warm breath hit her face and she could stare into his deep eyes, swirling like a raging storm of blues and greys. “You shouldn’t even be out there, L/N. I mean, you haven’t had training in years, it’s not like you were anything special either. Just another agent, hoping to get to work in the big leagues.”

“Shut up.” Y/N whispered meekly. Tears were just barely being held in, her chest feeling empty and hollow with anger and guilt. Is this what it felt like to want to kill someone with so much vengeance? 

“Where were you when Thanos came? Where were you, L/N? We needed all the help we could get, but there you are, in fucking Hawaii, with you little fucking margaritas on the fucking beach-”

“Shut the fuck up!” She screamed. The room went dead silent with her voice. None of the team had seen Y/N look so angry, so sad, so vulnerable, at one time. It was easy for her to hide her emotions and Wanda refrained from trying to toy with her mind, but shame was overwhelming the girl by the second and Sergeant Barnes was right, as much as she didn’t want to say it. She was a coward, thinking she could run away from the “hero life” so easily. They’d caught her, and Barnes was making her face that truth right now. “Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I know, that I was absolutely scared shitless of returning here, facing all of you after what you endured for so long?” 

Y/N took a deep breath, laughing mirthlessly as tears ran hot down her cheeks. “I’m sorry that I came back, I really am, but I’m trying my damn best to make up for what I did. Being scared is no excuse for why I ran away, I was fucking terrified of having one more thing to lose. My family is dead, SHIELD fell, and I had no one to lean on so I ran as far as I fucking could. But I’m back now, I’m ready to serve up to what I left behind, and you better fucking deal with it because this,” she jabbed a finger into his broad chest, “is not fucking it. I’m not going to live with your shitty behaviour anymore, Barnes.”

He, Wanda, and Sharon all watched as she slammed the plate into the sink, storming out of the room. They could hear her door slam shut, and the two women glared at Bucky.

“What the hell is your problem, Barnes” Wanda hissed in a scarily low voice. Fuck. He knew he’d messed up then, gone farther than he ever dared to with insulting Y/N, and both of the women were severely overprotective of the new Avenger. 

Sharon walked up to Bucky with large strides, delivering a slap to the side of his head. Yeah, he definitely deserved that. It was dead silent in the kitchen, the tension still high strung from the fight seconds before. “You better go apologize, Barnes, I swear to God this has gotten far too out of hand. You two have a mission tomorrow, estimated a month, and wheels are up at 2300 hours. I need you two to go get the intel quietly and undetected and we can’t have both of you arguing the whole damn time, so you better fix things by then.”

The blonde agent walked away, Wanda trailing behind her, but not without the middle finger from both of them. A mission? Tomorrow? With Y/N? This was going to be horrible. Bucky ran a hand over his face and trudged off to his room. 

It was going to be a long month.

-

Y/N stared out of the window as they flew over the clouds above the Mediteranean Sea. Eleven in the morning in Italy gave a clear view of the skies, light blue as far as she could see. They were ready to start their descent into Azzano and the woman glanced to the man beside her, his stormy blue eyes glaring in any direction but hers. The sergeant had avoided her all he could up until they boarded the jet, and even then he only spoke to her when necessary. “Hey, Barnes, we’re starting to descend, go get ready.”

The brunette looked over to Y/N and grunted in response. Oh well, it was better than him yelling at her. His little outburst in the kitchen had her pissed at him more than ever, but the words thrown around still rung true in her head. But now wasn’t the time to think about that.

She paid careful attention to where she was supposed to land, a shaded facility almost five miles south of where they had to get the intel from an old, but rebuilt HYDRA base. The same base where James Buchanan Barnes was once held captive, experimented on and tortured until Steve Rogers came to save him. Y/N didn’t care much for Barnes usually, but she also didn’t know how he’d react to being in a location with such horrible memories attached to it. They had both been at the mission briefing the day before of course, he knew what it entailed and he seemed unfazed, and he was always good at hiding his emotions. As the jet touched down finally, the agent thought back. Well, sometimes he was good at hiding his emotions.

Making sure her comm fit snugly in her ear, Y/N unbuckled herself from the seat, heading back towards the wall of weaponry they kept in the back of the jet. Barnes was already there dressed in hs black kevlar tactical suit, hugging his body nicely and vibranium arm on display. When he was around her he tried to hide it, and she saw him joking around and being comfortable in other’s presence with it out, wondering what made her so different. She personally found it fascinating, the beauty of the gold and black metal with the incredible Wakandan technology, but she respected his privacy and tried to not think too much about it. 

Y/N threw a vest on over her own navy blue tac suit, tightening her combat boots before she fully zipped up. Were they finally ready?

Three guns perched in holsters by her waist.

Two taps to her earpiece and Barnes’ breathing in her ear.

One mutual nod with the sergeant himself, and they were off, slowly making their way to grab the intel, not a trace to be left behind. 

-

Getting stuck in the trunk of a car was not in the plan. It definitely wasn’t. Bucky remembered every single inch and cranny of that meticulously planned out schedule, every move, every kill they had to make, but not once was it mentioned that Y/N was to get stuck in Baron Zemo’s car without any weapons on her.

“L/N, what the hell do you mean you’re in the back of Zemo’s car.” He seethed, already searching frantically around the large remains of the building for her. It had gone smoothly, she was just supposed to quickly check inside his car as he searched the base. It’ll be so much quicker if I do it, L/N, is what he had said, but now he regretted it. Like the incompetent fool she was, she was spotted and ended up shooting out half of Zemo’s goonies before dropping all her weapons to the ground and running when she ran out of ammunition.

“There may have been a slight misunderstanding,” Y/N whispered into her comm, “but nothing we can’t fix! Just come find me, Barnes, and all will be well.”

She could hear his angry curses and jostling, which she assumed he was running to come find her. It wasn’t entirely Y/N’s fault she had run out of ammo. Some of it must have fallen from her pockets during the shootout and when she saw the car she thought it’d be the perfect place to hide. Until she realized that no one else was at the partially burned down HYDRA base besides Baron Zemo, the person who Sharon had told her to avoid at all costs, and she was in his damn car. Practically her death note.

“If you had just listened to me you wouldn’t have been caught!” Bucky furiously whispered through the comms. 

Y/N rolled her eyes, though he couldn’t even see her, and groaned. “I did listen to you, Barnes, I checked the damn car, but we weren’t expecting his guards to find me so I killed them and hid. Is that actually so bad?” 

“Yes it is!’ He explained. “Give me your coordinates.” She checked the small watch on her wrist, pushing a button on the side that gave a small holographic image of the time and her coordinates on a world wide map. Reciting them for him, Bucky followed, continuing to berate her as he did so. “And you’re right, L/N, I asked you to check the car, not fucking jump inside it!”

This time Bucky could envision her rolling her eyes as she groaned even louder in very Y/N L/N fashion. “Would you rather I be dead?” She asked. It had been a few seconds, but she still received no response. “Barnes?” Crackling. “Sergeant?” Absolute nothingness. “Sarge?”

The trunk of the car opened as the woman let out a squeak, the broad frame of James Barnes hovering above her, some dirt smudged around the annoyed expression on his face. “Don’t call me that.” He grumbled.

He reached his hand towards her, grasping her own tightly before pulling her to a sitting position. “Why, you had all the ladies calling you that back in the day?” She mimicked a much higher tone, nearly resembling Snow White if the princess were high on drugs and had a Brooklyn accent. “Hey, Sarge, we goin’ dancing? Sarge, you goin’ to give me some sweet lovin’ tonight? Oh, how I’d just love for you to shove your fat, ugly head up your a-”

A loud beeping from his wristwatch cut her off. With a glare, the man let go of Y/N’s hand, checking to see what the problem was. A small red tracker on the map moved, and both of them knew they were in deep shit. “Crap, Zemo’s coming this way. That’s one of the trackers I set up on the ground and we gotta go quick.”

Faint whistling from Baron Zemo made both of them panic as Bucky tackled her back down and quickly shut the door behind him. Footsteps were approaching, the whistling getting louder and a door opening let the two Avengers know that they couldn’t get out anytime soon. Y/N could feel Bucky’s racing heart against her chest, hers beating just as fast. He turned to face her, a lot closer than both of them expected, lips dangerously close and noses nudging against each other. Ther breaths mixed together, the hot air of the car doing nothing to help her current close quarters with the man. 

“Can you bust us out of here?” She whispered hurriedly, rather uncomfortable with the present situation.

“We’ll die if we leave now. He’s much more prepared than we thought and with half his men down he knows something is up. Zemo wasn’t even supposed to know we were here so we’re far too unprepared and you lost your damn weapons. There’s no way we can go out so we’re going to stick in here until he gets out.”

Truth be told, Bucky was terrified and had no clue what to do next. Being stuck in a small confined space with Y/N had to be his worst nightmare, especially after he didn’t apologize for his shitty behavior last night. And the night before. 

And the several months before that.

From his view Y/N seemed to be uncomfortable and as the car started moving, she wiggled around, struggling to get as far away from Bucky as she could. He too was extremely uncomfortable, but as her wriggling continued, his already tight fitting pants seemed to get even impossible tighter as she practically grinded on him. 

“Would you stop squirming around?” Y/N shot him what would’ve been a questioning glance if not for the pitch blackness of the trunk, and heard his loud sigh, warm breath fanning across her face. “I’m sorry, I’m having a situation, uh, down there and your wiggling isn’t helping it too much.”

Her face heated up, not knowing what to feel after he said that. Was he… flustered? Y/N had never seen Bucky Barnes anything less than grumpy or professional before.

When she said nothing, he assumed the worst and thought she saw him as a disgusting and creepy person. Before that moment he’d never had any particular care about how Y/N felt, but he knew that there were still a lot of perverts, if not more perverts than back in his day. With his four little sisters always getting catcalled and the crude men who thought women were their property, Bucky knew it was definitely terrifying to be assaulted or any situation such as this. 

There wasn’t much he could do, but he shifted so they weren’t lying down hip bone to hip bone. “Sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable, I don’t want you to think I’m a pervert or anything, it’s just been a while since I, well, y’know…”

“I understand, Barnes, but thank you for apologizing.” Y/N said carefully. It was weird to hear the now shy and surprisingly considerate sergeant apologize to her, but she had to admit that her respect for him had gone up. 

He cleared his throat in return, trying to turn in any other direction besides hers as they listened to the tires of the car bumping along the road, heart wildly thumping. 

It was quiet. Far more quiet than it had ever been when either of them were in the same room. As Y/N stared down at Bucky’s head, almost resting on her stomach, she saw the man she’d read about in middle school. For a moment she was able to look past the last few months of fighting and hatred, and see the noble sergeant she’d admired for so long. 

“You can rest your head if you want to, I knew keeping it up like that must be hurting your neck. I promise I’m okay with it.” She reassured him. With a small hesitation, Barnes submitted to his screaming neck muscles and laid his head on her stomach, the vest providing cushion. A few more seconds of silence and gathering courage, and she finally asked him the question she had been wondering since her first day at the compound. “Why do you hate me?”

I’m jealous, he wanted to say, but he wasn’t brave enough to say it. With a small sigh, he managed to get out, “I don’t.”

“Then why are you so cold to me all the time?” Emotions that were borrowed so deep inside Y/N’s chest seemed to come barreling out, seeping into every question that she asked. “Am I really that horrible an agent? Do you not think I’m trying my best? I know I made a mistake, I wasn’t there when you all needed me, but I’m trying so, so damn hard to make up for it. I swear on my life, and every one that comes after it, that I’m-”

“It’s not you, it’s me, God damn it!” Bucky exclaimed angrily. Both of their blood ran cold in fear that Zemo might have heard them, but the radio continued to drone on in the background, nothing seeming to have changed. He took a deep sigh and tried how to best explain it to her. Even though he’d probably never have Y/N’s forgiveness for insulting her so plainly and hurting her so much, he felt as though she deserved as much as his reasoning as to why he “disliked” her so much. It was difficult for him to say, having to also put his pride away for once to just admit it. “I’m jealous of you, Y/N. You got the sweet life for a while, and that’s all I’ve ever wanted. When you look at us who remain, not a single one of us was planning to be an Avenger. You were getting the dream home, the kids, the family that I’ve wanted since I was a boy back in Brooklyn, and all you had to do to get it was run away. It was so simple.”

Y/N’s eyes widened, not at all expecting that. “It wasn’t all too much ‘sweet life’, you know? It was my dream when I was younger, I thought being an agent was temporary and then I’d move into a big, old house with a loving spouse and have millions of little carbon copies of myself to occupy my days. But the truth about what we do is that we can only stay away from it for so long, Barnes. With people like us,” she squeezed her eyes shut, letting the final tears roll down her cheeks, “there’s no running away from the hero's life. It's just who we are. We’ve already done too much to change that part of our lives.” 

Y/N felt him nod through the fabric on her skin, sniffles letting her know that he was crying too. They were connected. All the shouting, all the yelling, the pain, the battles, the fore, the blood, the years of torture, all led to this moment. This historic moment in Y/N and Bucky’s relationship where they both waved white flags, wet faces and hearts filled with sorrow for the life they never had. 

“I’m so sorry for the way I dealt with my anger and jealousy, Y/N.” Bucky croaked. 

“I used to idolize you when I was a kid.” Y/N recalled with a faint smile on her face. “In the eighth grade I wrote a history paper on you, Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes, American hero and inspiration to all. And you know, I always kinda had a crush on you. Wondered what it would be like if you were still alive, if you would’ve gone home after the war, if you would’ve had a family. No matter what wild thoughts ran through my head, though, you were always my hero.” Bucky took her confession in shock, pure amazement and surprise coursing through his body. Maybe a little bit of sadness, longing for that old life, maybe a bit of bashfulness of her having a crush on his as a schoolgirl. “And then I met you and you were this grumpy, irritable old man who seemed to despise me as soon as I walked in the door. Definitely not what I had expected.” He opened his mouth, ready to apologize again, when her next words cut him off. “I want to start over, don’t you?”

How was she so calming? Her words were exactly what he needed to hear and didn’t need to at the same time. Her voice brought back all the old memories of running around New York with Steve as a kid, reminding him of his wise ma in a way. “There’s nothing I’d like more than that, Y/N.”

Y/N smiled to herself, looking towards the top of the car. “Perfect.”

And with the twinkle in her eye and his head resting on her stomach with a small grin, it really was.

[popculturebuffet]

Ducktales: Terror of the Terra-Firmians!  (Lena Retrospective) (Commission by WeirdKev27): Launchpad Looses his Last Brain Cell and I Loose My Patience

Welcome back Weblena Warriors to the second part of my look at everyone’s favorite Emo Teen Shadow Lesbian Duck... and probably the only one but hey, semantics, Shadow Into Light, which was made possible by viewers like you, the ultra humanite and a commission from WeirdKev27. Picking up where we left off, we have our first episode that has a different intended order than airing order. 

As most of you probably remember, but some of you who joined later might not be aware of the broadcast order for the first half of season one is, in the academic sense, pretty fucked. It’s not Darkwing Duck’s entirely fucked by a web of badger spiders and a queen snake on top to make it some sort of train situation, but by just sorta airing whatever episodes they wanted to, Disney messed with the character balance so Huey got less focus, not that he got a ton of focus this season but still, as well as leaning into the episodes focusing more on the kids with less involvement from the adults which gave the wrong impression about the series. While it IS very focused on the triplets and webby, the show isn’t entirely about them, but as Frank has mentioned a few times, Disney Channel apparently has this WEIRD thing where they assume kids won’t like stories starring the adult characters. 

Yeah I’ve been wanting to talk about this for a while. Mostly how it’s so dumb I could swear Pauly Shore was an exec at Disney Channel. And he might be I don’t know what he’s doing these days and i’d like to keep it that way. For starters, the Scooge comics, while barely published in the US these days, are still popular globally and have appealed to kids and adults for generations and are mostly focused on him, with the kids in a supporting role and Ducktales, you know the thing your directly remaking here, was also mostly about him with the triplets supporting, if a bit less than the comics. Most of the Disney Afternoon was about adult characters, with any kids in side roles in the main cast. And it comes off entirely hypocritical of them to say this when the MCU is easily marvel’s biggest cash cow at the moment, and marvel properties have appealed to both kids and adults, like the duck comics, for decades. And if it’s because the marvel cartoons weren’t doing well , I’ll let you in on a little secret: Those didn’t do well because they looked bland and from what I’ve seen of them felt kind of bland, though I haven’t seen enough to fully judge. Kids LIKE adult characters as much as kid characters, and also like teen characters despite not being teens. Focusing on either is valid and while I LIKED Disney’s youth starring shows I also want another X-Men cartoon before I turn 50, and I bet kids would like that too, with the last one only failing because you bailed on it because you were throwing a hissy fit over fox having the movie rights, and do not get me started on that. Point is this argument is horse shit and should stay in the stables. 

So yeah I do think this episode came too soon and it’s placement effected it at the time and as such it dosen’t have the best rep with the fandom aside from the Lena bits and that includes me. The fact it was very early in the series and the characterizations hadn’t yet sunk in really hurt this episode in places but is it really that bad? Join me under the cut to find out

We open at the movies! Which scrooge apparently hasn’t been too since the 1930′s or seen any on video despite Della existing and being really stubborn. 

A rant for another episode. But the kids just got out of a Mole Monster movie, along with Lena, Beakly and Launchpad. Their reactions are as follows: Lena, Webby and Dewey really enjoyed it, Huey found it unrealistic... says the boy whose uncle fought a dragon made of gold a month or two back but we’ll get to that, and Louie was bored and felt it didn’t have enough of the ultra violence, kids these days it’s not about the gore it’s about the tension. And Beakly.. is just pissed Lena tricked them into seeing this and said it was educational. And the more I think about it the more this sounds like BEAKLYS fault than Lena’s. BEAKLY is the one who likely bought the tickets, who saw it was likely an r or pg-13 and who as we’ve seen HAS A PHONE, and ulnike scrooge probably isn’t so stingy she wouldn’t spring for a smart phone, so she could’ve just googled it, or whatever bird related pun is in this version.. gandered it.. yeah let’s go with that, gandered it, and SEEEN it wasn’t appropriate or walked htem out of the theater and ate the cost if she was that bothered by it. Sitting through a Horror Movie you didn’t research, didn’t pull the kids out of and dind’t bother to even check the poster for or use basic common sense is YOUR fault. And this could’ve worked fine, had Lena talk the kids into begging for it or had launchpad take them and have Beakly find out after, having driven to pick them up as she didn’t trust launchpad to take them home. Instead it makes the former super spy look REALLY stupid and feels really out of character for a SPY to not to do research. And it wasn’t like they decided on this later, Bentina being a spy was part of the character’s backstory from day one and its made clear as early as episode 2 in both airing orders. This is just lazy writing to justify the episode and I expect better from this crew. 

But an argument errupts between Huey and Webby over the Terra-Firmians, a hidden race of rock people living in Duckburg’s discontinued sewer system, allegedlys. So Lena suggest simply going down which gets a disapproving look from Beakly, despite you know this being their bread and butter, and the fact that if she had a problem with Scrooge not being involved.. she could just call him. Exploring fabled rock people is something he’d be into. I mean there’s a low profit margin but it also costs him almost nothing to walk to the theater or have launchpad swing around and pick him up. Just gas which given how much he pays for jet fuel isn’t a big ask. But Beakly soon gets distracted by Launchpad whose convinced the film is real and is attacking the poster a grim sign of things to come as while Beakly annoyed me in this one on rewatch, especially after realizing the above... Launchpad annoyed me both times and for VERY good reason we’ll get into. This provides a distraction and allows the trio to escape. Cue titles. 

After the title sequence, our heroes head deeper underground, there’s too much panic in this town... I mean props to Donald for trying something new but he really needs to rethink his cologne choices. Sex Panther is just.. not a good smell on.. anyone. 

So our heroes journey through the depths of the subway system, and we find out part of why Huey’s so skeptical, as he finds anything that isn’t in the Junior Woodchuck Guidebook to not exist, though the cracks in this already show as he’s added anything that does. We’ll get back to this later but as you can tell the basic dynamic for 24 minutes is Webby being a wholehearted True Believer and Huey being a Skeptical Sally. And Lena is just sorta “Eh gives me an excuse for shenanigans” about it. We also get a peak into webby’s mind as we see her notes .. which really just come off as Terra-Firmian fanfiction involving a war of succession between two sides, the terra’s and the firmies, something based on previous media, and also some doodles of a fictional candy called webby-dings and herself as a superhero, both things I want to see. 

But yeah the first third of the episode is pretty simple, just them journeying, the occasional shift in the firmament, and it’s not bad, and there are a few great bits: Huey nerds out about rocks, and finds them way more interesting than a possible rock monster.

Which leads to the best gag of the episode as when Huey tries to pick up a big sample Webby, annoyed at his hyperfixation on the JWG, asks him to ask his book for help.. which he does by reading it and actually manages to pick the large rock up. This is halted though when Lena screams.. though she really just did it to draw them to an abandoned subway car full of glomgold posters for glomgold products because of course a failed subway project has his name plastered over it. You can’t spell glomgold without failure.. the failure is silent. Glomgold is not. 

The fun is interuptted though by a livid Beakly who had realized they were missing in an earlier scene, after telling the Manager that McDuck Industries would pay for the poster.. and then found out Launchpad also destroyed the toilets “They come up thorugh the sewers!”. Launchpad that’s CHUDS, Ninja Turtles and Rats who raised Ninja Turtles like their own sons, mole people dig or use old mineshafts. It’s basic mole science. Also Beakly really shouldn’t sweat it, I just assumed the city has had a runnig bill witht he company for “McDuck Family and Employee Related Accidents, Mayhem and Shenanigans”. I mean he’s had Gyro on his payroll for at least a decade and a half by the series start, Gyro has leveled whole sections of city in an afternoon more than most giant monsters. Of which several have destroyed Duckburg. It got better. 

Point is she’s livid about them sneaking off with Lena pointing out their some sort of adventure family and Beakly.. saying she won’t see them again, or at least implying it hard. I’ll put a pin in this, as the train buckles and a bit of seismic, or rock men, activity means their stuck. So they divide into teams: Beakly will go try and unhook the train car from the busted cars so they can ride out, Launchpad will go try and fix it, and we get this lovely exxchange as a result

Launchpad: Cool never crashed a train before Beakly: Can’t you try driving it without crashing it? Launchpad: Wha? 

His face in that scene is priceless. He takes Dewey along. More on that in a second. Webby, Huey and Louie are told to stay put with Beakly only bringing Lena along because she dosen’t trust her. So since we have three split plots for a second... let’s split up gang, starting with the most aggrivating, middling with what you all came here for and why this is part of the retrsopective, and ending with the plot that directly heads into the final part of the episode. 

Launchpad and Dewey: GAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Okay starting with the most infamous plot and easily the worst part of this episode, probably the worst plot in any Ducktales 2017 episode. That’s not hyperbole it’s really that bad and really pissed people off, as fans of the original launchpad felt they made him overly stupid. This is where the airing order’s a problem as putting an episode with a subplot where one of your characters is obnoxiously dumb right up front means they assume this is his charcter and not just one poorly written chapter in a very dumb but very loveable characters life, likely because the writers hadn’t figured out how to properly scale his stupidity with comptience. 

So as a result we get a good 3-4 mintutes if not agonizingly more of Launchpad assuming something he saw in a fucking movie film was real. That.. that’s his actual plot. Need I remind you, he’s in his late 20′s early 30′s. He’s not much older than me. While other episodes have him as dim this one claims he CAN’T TELL FACT FROM FICTION. 

There are lines you have to keep with your characters to keep the audience from hating them. They crossed it about 80 times with this plot and make Launchpad into a gibbering dunderhead who can’t do anything right versus a regular dunderhead whose good at one or two things and loveable enough for us to like him and not care about his numerous safey violations and child endagerment charges. Thankfully this is the ONLY episode that gets this bad and they clearly learned from this, but it dosen’t make it any less of a tough sit. 

Dewey spends most of the subplot with a look on his face that just screams that he’s as done with this bullshit as we are, as Launchpad assumes he’s a mole person and brought along a pipe to presumibly bludgeon him, because wanting to cave his best friends skull in over stupidity is a GREAT look> Thankfuly he does not. And when the lights come back on Launchpad.. assumes he’s a monster because of bright light, GAH, and locks him out before they end up outside and the plto resolves itself by Dewey pointing out by Launchpad’s utterly baffling logic that he could be a mole monster, so Launchpad.. assumes he is. 

The subplot’s later buttoned up as he claims “I love being a mole monster”, again diffrent subteranian creature launchpad, she says he’s not and my suffering is thankfully at an end. This plot just sucks, it’s bad, overly stupid and dosen’t work with an adult character. Someone like say Ed from Ed, Edd N Eddy, or someone who belivies in weird conspiracy stuff like Dale Gribble or Stan Pines. with either of them this plot would’ve been fucking great. I could buy it from Dale and it just comes off as his normal paranoid weirdness. With Launchpad it comes off like he seriously needs help because the episode frames it as if he can’t tell ficton from reality, and his splotlight episode later would directly contridct this and make this episode even more aggrivating, as he’s a fan of Darkwing Duck, and KNOWS it’s acted out by an actor, so why wouldn’t he get this? It’s just....

It sucks, it sucks and I thankfully get to move on to a better subplot

Beakly and Lena: What You Are in the Dark

Beakly tells Lena she’ll never see Webby again after this.. then chastises her when she won’t help despite you know having just said she’s going to force their friendship apart, which Lena points out. She then gets mad at Lena making a sarcastic comment at her. Okay she’s lived with Louie for at least a week in airing order and a month or two in actual order. She has to be used to this by now. She’s insolent.. because you show her no respect, blame her for something that while sure she talked you into, you should’ve known better, and top it off by saying you want to keep her from the kids because they have bright futures and come from good familes and asks who rasied her and her face.. well.

Yeah wheras Launchpad and Huey, more on that in a second, were hurt by this being some of their earliest big roles, Bentina wasn’t.. until later when we found out just HOW bad Magica is to Lena and how much she dosen’t care about her other than as a tool to use. At this point we didn’t know just how much Lena was playing webby, how much she was only manipulating her, and even with her heroic act here we didn’t know if she only saw Webby as her way to break free. The next episode makes it clear she dosen’t and genuinely does care, 100%, so in hindsight it makes Bentina come off as ghoulsih for horribly asssuming about a girl she dosen’t know, and even if she did know about Magica wouldn’t know the full story, just like us, and then BERATING her after already saying she’s going to rip her away from Webby, which itself is PRETTY bad as she’s the only friend the girl has and sh’es doing so on... talking them into a horror movie, which as I outlined was more Bentina’s fault than Lena’s, and leading the kids into a dangerous place whicha gain, Lena pointed out is something she lets Scrooge do. And trust me i know that she actually knows Scrooge, and we later find out, as we’ll cover next month, that she isn’t ware HOW dangerous things are with Scrooge. It dosen’t change the fact she knows they do dangerous stuff to a point and that Lena may just be acting out. It also dosen’t change the fact she drove three children, yes including launchpad, down here with her instead of sending them home with Launchpad.. granted that option isn’t the safest but it’s safer than taking her with them thena cting like it’s ALL lena’s fault when three of the children, again including launchpad, are down there because of HER. Not Lena, HER. I’m harder on her because she’s older, wiser and was “raised properly” apparently. Though given the way she treats a random teen off the street she again knows nothing about and dind’t bother to ask... it begs the question. 

IT’s a good question. I could see the classism coming from being raised in 40′s and 50′s britain, judging by the timeline.. but even then she’s seen the world, and while her nature is supscious, the classit bullshit makes no sense after presumibly working with, and later spymastering for, various agents of various backgrounds. How has she not dropped this in decades. Scrooge very clearly dropped the racisim and homophobia of his time, so it still stands  on her for not dropping this. And Lena’s hurt shows under hte mask for the first time, that beneath the snark and secrecy.. is just an abused teenager with nowhere else to go and no way out being bullied by an older woman whose cutting off the only light at the end of the tunnel nto for good reason but out of classist, overprotective mallice.  My issues, which to be fair probably were intentional in the episode but sitll are a bit overblown, aside we do get an absoluttley tremendous moment later as a car falls on top of Beakly.. and Magica, speaking once more urges Lena to leave her, let her die and let their plans progress. And while that iself is.. dumb, what if someone finds her or her corpse later, especially since Scrooge would likely perosnally want to retrive the body to give her a proper burial as she’s his only friend at this point, or the rest of the family questoin the story?, it fits Magica’s lack of foresight we see throughout the season. But Lena... saves her. While she later gives an explination, and a valid one at that, it’s clear from her expressoin, her actoins and how she does it... that this is her. Part of it is defiance, as she glares at Magica before doing it, her own stubborn nature mixed with her hatred of her “aunt”, meaning Magica just made it all too easy for her to do this. But the real reason is clear: It’s the right thing to do. While pissing off her aunt and getting away with it is the cherry on top.. the real reason is that unlike Magica.. Lena is not a killer, not a monster, and not a heartless vacum ofa person. Even if she doesn’t like Beakly, for good reason.. she can’t, she WON’T leave her to die and leave Webby an orphan again. She loves Webby too much to do that to her and while she may deny it.. she’s too good a person to leave someone to die for something so petty. Even if she never sees webby again and the plans ruined. It’s better than the weight of knowing she let someone who wasn’t trying to harm her and whose actions, while terrible, were out of misguided protection of her granddaughter, die like this. She saves her. And as we’ll see it pays off.. but before that. 

Huey, Webby and Louie: Into the Unknown This plot’s a bit shorter, as Webby and Huey continue their argument, with Louie eventually making it clear, and not even hiding it when directly asked by Huey, that he’s playing both sides with a delighted expression on his face as the movie was boring but this, this is interesting. Which it is. But it’s interupted by dings on the roof and while Huey assumes i’ts just a regular rock, it moves while their not lookiung.. and soon red eyed, horrifying beasts look out at them and the kids flee back to the car. This dosen’t pan out as the car starts to shake and is clearly going to collapse.. and while Webby and Louie are prepared to flee, rock monsters or no, Huey, in an utterly heart shattering image.. stays in place, terrified of moving. 

This is where this plot goes from mildly aggrivating, as Huey’s Skeptic shenanigans can get on the nerves.. to BRILLIANT. See at the time this was more annoying because it was assumed the skepticsim would be a part of Huey’s character and we’d get more episodes of him being annoying only to be proven wrong, as he semeingly dosen’t learn his lesson at this point, looging the terrafrimians in the guide book. But on rewatch.. this plot is amazing.  For starters the plot subtly introduced the defening characteristic of Huey’s personality, one that’s become more prounounced in Season 3: His need for Order. He needs things to make sense: He solves stuff because he likes there to be order in the world and something he can understand, he can put in a box in his head. Like a lot of neurotypical people, myself included, he struggles horribly when the clearly defined boxes of his life and things he undestand have wrinkles or complexities he can’t get. I for instnace easily got it when I was introduced to the concept of trans people or being non binary.. they just make sense in hindsight: given how our brains are messya nd complicated it makes sense some people would be born in the wrong ones, and tht with all the science and medicine we have to correct that, should be allowed to transition if they so choose. It makes equal sense that some people just don’t have a gender or are gender fluid, being both or neither. Despite struggling with non binary prounouns due to force of habit.. I get the concept with no real difficulty. But when it comes to accepting I don’t have to apologize for everything and that everyone is not angry or that anger is natural and people sometimes get mad and you can’t and shouldnt’ fix it.. it’s something I STRUGGLE with even knowing it’s not right, because my brain is just wired that way. 

That’s how Huey’s struggle comes off here.. he reveals he’s willing to stay and die.. because he’s SO scared of the unknown, that the idea of dying from something he at least knows what it is versus something he dosen’t.., so paralizyed by his own brain he can’t figure out the obvious.. it takes Webby reaching out to him figuratively and literally, to show him that sometimes you have to face the unknown. The unknown is fucking terrifying.. but it can be good and it’s better than sitting there, scared and unable to move. You have to try, to grow and take that risk that things may not go well to really LIVE. 

So he does.. and they reunite with the rest of the group.. and soon find the terrafirmains.. who as it turns out once we get some light on them... are actually just goofy looking,  brightly colored, each one matching one of the kids, kids themselves, and Huey reaches out and touches one, which by ET logic means their friends now, and the terrafirmians help them get out. And this lesson sticks. While sure Huey catalogues it and it seems it didn’t.. he’s never this skeptical again. This douchey skepticsim was only for one episode, his fear of the uknown replcaed with boundless curosity and from here on he’s CURIOUS about new stuff as long as it’s not trying to kill him. He loves taking in new experinces, maybe not to webby levels but he does actually try them and study them instead of just fearing them. 

Before we wrap things up, obviously we need to talk about the JWG not having entries on a lot of stuff. This would be corrected next season as it returns to being a big book of everything, but dosen’t completely contridct this as Timephoon! shows there’s stillcgaps.. which i’m fine with. While it knowing EVERYTHING was fine for the original series here, with things being slightly more groudned, it’d just be an obvious plothole if Huey didn’t use it every single time they ran into something and that’d get boring. Instead it’s simply that it dosen’t know everything, and really in the comics at times it didn’t and the triplets found out new things. It knew almost everything mind you, but having some gaps for dramatic tnesion is fine with me and Seasons 2 and 3 decided on that instead of just having it being a scouting manual which wa sfor the best. And even by later in the season hit has guides to getting a small buisness loan, so they already course corrected. 

So everything’s wrapped up and while Magica berates Lena for disobeying her.. Beakly interputps, thankfully not seeing magica and admits she was wrong and invites Lena for pancakes, even taking a crack about if their actually pancakes or english muffins with syrup, which sounds like my own living hell, in stride, having clearly grown. And Lena explains to Magica that this was the better approach: now she’s got the in theyw anted, and is above suspcison for now. Still not so much that an obvious act won’t be detected but enough that she dosen’t ahve to work actively around her anymore. Magica scoffs.. and while part of it is probably rage.. part of it is deep down both of them know she did it out of defiance.. and only Lena knows that she did it for the right reasons... she just dosen’t get why. She probably justifies it as playing the long game.. but deep down she knows something’s changing about her.. and she’s not sure if that’s a godo thing or not. 

Final Thoughts: This episode is as you can tell a mixed bag. It’s 2/3 of a good episode, with the Lena plot, my issues aside, being excellent and the Terra-Firmian plot likewise fun, even if Huey can get grating the payoff is worth it, and the jokes are really high quality. It’s just bogged down by that fucking launchpad plot that just crushed my soul in it’s palms every time it came back. I went on at length why i hated that one but boy oh boy was the hate of that subplot warranted and I stand by calling it the worst plot of the series. It is: it’s not funny, it makes no goddamn sense, and it drags down what’s otherwise a pretty solid epsiode.

Next Time on Lena: Jaws the shark, lurking in the dark, in the depths of the bin one day of a lark decides to get rowdy, get real violent takes a vacay out to Duckburg er.. Island.. also Scrooge faces his greatest Nemesis.. a PR Tour to clean up his image after an unfortunate giant Beanstalk Incident. Be there and be hip to be square. 

Next Time on This Blog: I Tackle a DCOM for the first time for another commissioned review as we take a look at racisim, specifically Apartheid and breaking indoctrination, with The Color of Friendship. See you next Rainbow. 

[snowdice]

Folds in Paper (Chapter 7: Not Much Has Changed but They Lived Underwater)[Folds in Time Universe]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Janus/Patton, Remus & Roman, eventual Logan/Virgil (maybe more)

Characters:

Main: Janus, Patton, Remus

Appear: Remy, Emile, Virgil, Logan, Roman

Summary: Janus, a disillusioned senior agent working for the Time Preservation Initiative, struggles to find meaning in a world where time travel could change everything about your life’s history in less than a moment. When time distortions start popping up, threatening the timeline and the fabric of reality as he knows it, it becomes a race against the clock to fix the damage before everything unravels. And the problem with time travel… you never how long you have before the clock strikes 12 and your time is up.

With a partner who has more mysteries in his past than Janus had anticipated and an enigmatic free agent time traveler mucking about time always with a clever pun or a time appropriate pet name on his lips, Janus will need to figure out what went wrong with time, and more importantly, how to fix it.

Chapter Summary:  

Stood there with my neighbor called Peter

And a flux capacitor

He told me he built a time machine

Like one in a film I've seen, yeah

He said

“I've been to the year 3000

Not much has changed, but they lived underwater

And your great-great-great-granddaughter

Is doing fine

Doing fine" 

-”Year 3000″ by the Jonas Brothers

(Can you spot all of the horrible, horrible puns and references??)

Notes: Time travel AU, mystery, enemies to lovers, alcohol

This is a fic I’ve been writing on study breaks that you have probably all already seen at this point. I’ve slightly edited it for wording and grammar, but not for content from my previous posts. Feel free to send in asks to direct it because I’m not 100% sure where this is going and you can help decide if you feel so inclined! You can see the process I went through to build this at this link.

I also have a playlist on youtube (because Spotify didn’t have one of the songs I wanted).

AO3 Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

“Him,” was the only thing Janus said before taking off after the figure who had just disappeared into the games area.

“What?” Remus’s voice followed after him. “Janus! What?!”

Janus did not pause, continuing to run after Pat and bounding over two barricades as a shortcut to the protest of some of the workers. Janus cursed when he lost sight of the man for just a moment near the prize table filled with colorful goldfish, but he was able to spot him once again walking into one of the game tents. Janus blasted into the tent after him.

The game taking place in the tent was apparently one where they raced rats, and when Janus entered, Pat was cooing at one of said rats. “Who’s a tiny little squishy precious baby?” he was asking while wiggling his pointer finger at it.

“You,” Janus growled stepping up to him.

Pat turned and tilted his head at Janus with a frown. “Um, me?” he asked, pointing to his chest, all sorts of innocent, but Janus could see a spot of hidden amusement in his eyes.

“Where is it?”

His eyebrows drew together, but it was an act. It was clearly an act! “Where is what?”

“The…” he glanced around at the people surrounding them. They were already getting odd looks. “Thing you just took.”

“I didn’t take anything,” Pat said with a frown.

“Oh, no,” Janus said. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fooling me twice is not an option.”

“I’m sorry sir,” Pat said. “I really don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Bull. Shit.”

Just then, the colorful blob of paint that was Remus jogged into the tent. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“It’s him,” Janus said pointing. “He took it. He has it.”

“I… don’t know what you’re talking about,” Pat said. He looked over to Remus with a confused frown.

Remus looked at Janus. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Janus said. “It’s him. It has to be him. He’s the mask guy.”

Remus squinted at Pat. “He is?”

“Whoever you think I am, I’m not. I haven’t worn a mask all night. I just did the face paint,” he pointed to his cheeks.

Remus raised his wrist and his timepiece lit up green. He looked at Janus.

“I lost sight of him for five seconds. He must have stashed it somewhere,” Janus said. He turned on Pat. “Where did you put it?”

“…Are you,” Pat asked, his eyes going back and forth between Janus and Remus, “… the police?”

“We are, actually,” Khalid said as she stepped into the tent. Remus must have called her. She inserted herself between Janus and Pat. “Agent Khalid,” she said, offering a hand with a smile. Pat looked at it in surprise and then smiled back hesitantly as he took it. “Apologizes, one of the big game prizes was stolen by someone matching your description. Would you mind coming down to security for questioning? Just to clear it up.”

“Oh,” Pat said, hesitant. Janus expected him to refuse outright, but then he said. “Uh, sure.”

“Thank you very much, Mr…”

“Jonas,” Pat told her earnestly. “Do I need to be handcuffed?”

“No,” Khalid said. Janus frowned at her, but she ignored him. “It’s just a talk for now.” She gestured to the tent entrance. “Come with us.”

He did without argument, and Remus and Janus followed behind the both of them. Khalid did not lead them back to the base, but to a little spot that said “security” near the center of the event. Remy was already there waiting for them at a desk.

“Remy, would you please take Mr. Jonas to go sit down?” she asked.

“Sure, boss,” Remy said, standing up. He led Pat away.

Khalid turned to Janus and Remus once they were out of earshot. “What is going on?”

“It’s the mask man,” Janus said, “the one from 1923, and my scanner said the time bomb was on the Millenia Bird outside the games entrance, but then it was gone the next second, and I saw him, and then he ran away.”

“So, does he have it on him?”

“No. I lost sight of him, and he must have stored it somewhere, but I know he took it.”

“He’s the man from 1923?” she asked.

“Yes! Remus, that’s him, right? You recognize him.”

“Well,” Remus said thoughtfully. “He was in a mask, and it was dark in the room with the necklace. Other than that, I only really saw his back, and he was wearing pants. Mr. Jonas is wearing a dress, so I can’t really tell if their asses match.”

“Okay, but I was with him for hours. I swear it’s him, and I swear he took it,” Janus just about shouted.

“We’ll question him,” Khalid placated, “and Fred and Lena will keep looking in the meantime.”

“He knows where it is,” Janus insisted. “I swear.”

“Okay,” Khalid said, before leaving to follow where Remy and Pat had gone. She stopped Janus with a hand on his shoulder. “I think Remus and I will do the interrogation.” He opened his mouth to argue. “You know the most about him, so observe from the sidelines and see if he makes any mistakes that indicate you’re right.”

“That’s just to placate me and you know it.”

“Observation’s over there,” she said pointing.

He got a thumbs up from Remus as he walked by, and Janus glared at his back before walking off to the indicated location. He watched as Remus and Khalid entered the room, and Remy left it. Remy joined him in the observation room after leaving and leaned against the wall.

Pat was sitting at a table and watched Remus and Khalid with that same rubbish placid confusion that he had before. “So,” Khalid said, “Mr. Jonas.”

“You can call me Nick,” Pat interrupted.

“Lia,” Khalid replied. He smiled at her happily. “So, are you enjoying your day?” she asked.

“I am!” he replied. “It’s a big day. You only get to see the turn of a millennia once in your life, and so much as changed in the last 1,000 years. I’m a bit disappointed we can’t live under water yet though.”

“Ah, yes,” Khalid said. “Doing anything special for it?”

“Um, not really,” he said. “other than the city block party. I’m going to meet up with my roommates after dinner. Kevin doesn’t like this sort of thing, and Joe couldn’t come.”

“Your roommates,” Khalid said, considering him. “Do you live around here?”

“Uh huh,” Pat replied.

“Do you have any ID?”

“I do, want me to get it?”

“If you wouldn’t mind.”

Pat unzipped one of the bubbles on his waist and handed her a chip. “Clockson, would you mind going out and getting the ID scanner?” she asked, even though her timepiece would be able to read it.

“Ah, shit,” Remy said. “Props. What do those things even look like?” As Remy scrambled to find something that would pass for an ID reader so ‘Nick’ didn’t get suspicious of Khalid using her timepiece, Janus watched the two alone in the room like a hawk.

“I see you’re wearing a dress inspired by the 2770s,” Khalid noted, as Remus came to stand next to him.

“Yeah!” Pat replied. “Joe made it for me. He’s really good at fashion design!”

“Can I see?” she asked.

With a happy smile, he reached over the table to let her get a look of the sleeves. Janus saw her subtly scan the fabric, probably to make sure it was from the 2990s and not actually from the 2770s. Considering she didn’t mention it, Janus assumed it checked out.

Remy came back with some sort of device then and handed it to Remus who saluted and wandered back into the interrogation room. Khalid pretended to scan the ID in her hand. She handed it back to him without comment. “So, you said you live with your roommates: Joe and Kevin?” she asked.

“Yep!” he replied. “We’re practically like brothers.”

“Would you mind calling them?”

“Erm,” he titled his head like he was confused by the question. “Well, like I said, Joe is a bit busy, but I could definitely call Kevin.

“Here,” Khalid said, “use my phone.”

“I have my own,” he said with a frown. He took out a phone which checked out as being from 2998.

“Humor me,” she requested shoving her own phone at him.

“Uh, okay,” Pat agreed. He took the offered 2999 phone and dialed a number on it. Khalid reached over to put it on speaker.

“Hello?” a voice asked after a few seconds.

“Um, hey Kevin, it’s Nick.”

There was a sigh on the other end. “Hello Nick, is something wrong? Why are you calling me from someone else’s phone?”

“I’m fine, I think.” He looked up at Khalid. “Why am I calling him exactly?”

“Hello, I’m Officer Khalid,” Khalid said. “I just wanted to confirm that you are Nick Jonas’s roommate, and he does live in Manaus.”

“Yes, we live together with our other roommate,” the man replied flippantly. “Officer? Is something wrong?”

“I believe there was just a case of mistaken identity,” Khalid said.

“Bullshit there was!” Janus hissed, though she could not hear him.

“No need to worry,” Khalid continued.

“I’m good Kevin,” Pat said.

“Are you absolutely sure?” Kevin asked.

“Don’t be Paranoid, Kevin. I’ll see you Tonight for the New Years Celebration. You know I Live to Party.”

“I am hanging up now,” Kevin said.

“No! Comeback.” The line went dead. Pat handed the device back to Khalid.

She took it and smiled at him. “Give us just a couple of minutes,” she requested. He nodded easily, and she and Remus exited the interrogation room. “I… think we’re done here,” Khalid said.

“No, he’s lying,” Janus insisted, and got a dubious look in return. “I know he is! Remus!”

“The alibi is pretty solid…” Remus said, “and he doesn’t have the bomb on him.”

“Oh, come on,” Janus said. “You can’t say there is nothing fishy going on here.”

Khalid and Remus shared a look. “Janus,” Khalid said. “I respect your intuition. It is usually very good, but you have been a bit intense about the man from the 1920s, and I think that may be blinding you a bit...”

“I am not imagining this!” Janus said. “That’s him and he took it.”

“You only met him once while he was wearing a mask,” Khalid pointed out with a frown, “and you didn’t see him take the bomb, did you?”

“No, but he looked at me and I knew,” Janus argued. They both gave him a skeptical look. “Oh, come on!”

“You know that’s a little weak, Jan,” Remus said.

“Let me talk to him,” Janus requested. “Just give me five minutes to talk with him.”

Khalid raised one eyebrow. “Fine,” she agreed. “You have five minutes, but after that, you have to let it go. We can’t waste any more time.”

Want to read more? Click below!

AO3 Part 8 Part 9

[sdpafanblogofsupremefunk]

Season 1, Episode 1: A Different Place

Where better to begin talking about a show than the beginning? Like most shows, Sítio do Picapau Amarelo has a pilot episode.

...Okay, in this case, “pilot episode” is just a fancy way of saying “first episode”. Much like Rick & Morty and DT17, SDPA doesn’t really have a pilot episode that isn’t just the first episode (unless you count Doc and Mharti as R&M’s pilot, which I’d rather not), so to begin the series, we kinda have to jump right into the mess of things.

It’s like A Quiet Place, but not stupid.

As the episode begins, we are introduced to a two men on a horse-drawn cart. The man in the red box is a book salesman who’s a little down on his luck in terms of profits.

A little.

This guy isn’t really given a name, and I don’t want to call him “The Salesman” the whole time because that’s stupid. So I’m going to give him a name. Mr. Simmons will do nicely.

Anyways, Mr. Simmons falls out of the cart when it hits a patch in the road, and when he picks himself up, he sees a quaint little house on a farm, with an old woman knitting on the porch.

Here, we are introduced to the first of our main cast, Dona Benta, a kind elderly lady who owns this little patch of heaven known as the Yellow Woodpecker Farm. Yeah, didn’t take us long to get there, huh?

So Mr. Simmons sees this old woman in the middle of (what he believes to be) nowhere, and decides it’s the perfect opportunity to make a quick buck believing that:

Which, I dunno, man, she seems pretty comfortable just sitting in her rocking chair, knitting. Like, even as an outsider who doesn’t know a lick of what goes on in this farm, I’d say she’s content as she is, but anything to make some cold hard cash, I guess.

Also, I would not ever call this place a desert, even for the sake of exaggeration. There’s grass everywhere, bushes, trees, flowers, the works. If this where anything like a desert, I do not think this woman would be here, to put it simply. But, I digress. And I hydraulic press, but we won’t be seeing that.

So, Mrs. Benta goes inside to call for the kids, and here we meet 3 of our other actors:

Here, we see Pedrinho (or Little Pete, the boy in the blue overalls) and Narizinho (or Lúcia “Little Nose”, the girl in the red dress), cousins and Mrs. Benta’s grandchildren. They’re playing tag, I think, but they’re stopped in their tracks with their Grandma in the way, and-

Hang on, I feel like we’re forgetting something.

Oh, right. I almost forgot Emilia. She’s basically the reason I watch this show, no biggie.

Anyway, she’s in a race with the kids, when they’re blocked by Grandma. Emilia makes the smart move and cuts right under Mrs. Benta. It looks like this:

Another reason I like this show so much, it’s rife with smears, which I feel like any good cartoon should have. Like here, where Emilia friggin’ nyooms right under Mrs. Benta like a comet.

Emilia reaches the finish line at the bookshelf, where we see the Viscount of Sabugosa, a puppet made out of an ear of corn who’s very smart and polite. (His name is a pun, “sabugo” means corncob in Portuguese, and it’s a parody of the Count of Sabugosa, of which there were 9, the first being Vasco Fernandes César de Meneses in 1729- but everybody calls him Viscount and so will I because blah)

In this show, the Viscount is the actual size of an ear of corn, which makes sense, he is, after all, a puppet made out of one. I think it’s really funny that the cartoon is slightly more realistic than the live-action show it’s based on in this regard, because in the 2001 series, for whatever reason, the Viscount towers over everyone:

And he has a sick mustache.

Like, I don’t get it, out of all the characters, you made the guy made out of corn the tallest one in the cast? I get that the technology to make him actually small probably wasn’t all there yet, Grandpa in My Pocket was still 8 years off, but you really couldn’t find a guy that wasn’t the same height as Shaq?

Yeesh, only 2 minutes in and I’m getting sidetracked this often. Well, I guess it’s better than having nothing to talk about.

Anyway, Emilia wins the race, but the other two kids run into her, smooshing her against the bookshelf-

-and pwning her so hard she briefly grows fingers on her hand (and turning it into a left hand apparently, because the thumb is on the wrong side)

Mrs. Benta explains that Emilia and the other mystical beings must hide from the impending salesman.

Oh brother, I was wondering when we’d get to this guy. This is Marquis of Rabicó (Portuguese for Short-tail). Literally the first thing you read about him on the show’s Wikipedia is that he’s fat (which you think would be a given cuz he’s a pig), and his part of the Characters section isn’t much better, stating that he’s a “gluttonous, selfish, cowardly and lazy pig” and most of his episodes involve him getting himself and/or others into trouble by being a gluttonous, selfish, cowardly and lazy pig. He’s only ever onscreen to cause problems, either directly or by proxy. If I were to sum him up in one meme, it would be this:

Now, I don’t hate Rabicó, I’m actually quite indifferent towards him, but he does bring down a lot of the episodes that he’s a major part of. Thankfully, there aren’t too many episodes featuring him in the first 2 seasons, but from what I hear, Season 3 goes ham with that shit (pun intended) and it brings down the quality of the season as a whole, so it’s a good thing that’s as far off from now as it is. I want to enjoy the lack-of-pig while it lasts.

But hey, at least he doesn’t look like this:

Don’t do drugs, kids.

Rant over, Mrs. Benta explains that she wants things to look normal because the Yellow Woodpecker Farm is a very peculiar place, where all kinds of weird and wacky stuff goes on, and if word gets out about it, the place will be filled with tourists wanting to get a peek of the action.

Something that Mrs. Benta probably didn’t consider is that there’s a bigger threat to being exposed than just filthy tourism. That’s right, I’m talking about the GOVERNMENT.

I mean, think about it. How many movies have you seen where the government tries to hunt down an unnatural being? E.T., the Sonic Movie, a third one I can’t think of right now, etc. (Lilo & Stitch does not count) Now, I can’t speak for Brazil’s government compared to the U.S., but I know there’s gotta be a division dedicated to dealing with unnatural things that would no doubt arrest Emilia, Rabicó, Viscount, etc. and run experiments on them. Then again, maybe this cartoon takes place in a world where the government doesn’t even exist. I mean, we never really see any urban settings in the show (aside from a brief mention of “the city” in the finale), so for all I know, the world of Sítio do Picapau Amarelo is run by Vermin Supreme.

Real talk, you should all be ashamed of yourselves for not voting for this guy back in 2016.

Initially, Emilia won’t go into her box, but then she gives in and is dragged there by Aunt Nastácia, the housemaid of the farm with a knack for making dolls (so she’s essentially Emilia’s mom). She doesn’t really do much in this episode, but the Fat Bastard does even less, and I still mentioned him.

So Mrs. Benta lets Mr. Simmons into the house and he does this whole spiel about how great the books are, how they can take you to worlds you never imagined, fantasy and action, yadda yadda.

Meanwhile, the kids are off to the side and they’re all like “Well, we met the actual Hercules, get on our level scrub”. And of course, Emilia is watching with them, instead of in her box.

As Simmons keeps on rambling, Emilia is being a little peeping tom, not realizing that one turned head could lead to her being dissected like a high school frog.

Apparently, Emilia thinks she’s a regular Bart Simpson, with shit like spitballs and pulling out the man’s leg hairs. She’s really pushing her luck here, and for little reason. Sure, Simmons called the place boring, but that’s how it’s supposed to be to him.

Of course, Pedrinho and Narizinho are nice enough kids that they bail her out on this one and pretend it was them.

And before Simmons can ask what the hell is going on, Mrs. Benta gives him the money for the books and sends him out the door. And once he’s out...

I’ll give you a hint: it rhymes with go.

Of course, they’re not out of the woods yet, cuz Simmons is getting a little suspicious.

Busted. The truth is revealed, all laid out for Simmons to see. A talking rag-doll? Inconceivable! And yet, there it is.

Come on, Viscount. I would expect you of all people to uphold what Mrs. Benta said and stay hidden. You’re smart enough, you should already know what’s at stake, or at least that something is at stake. I mean, I understand that the cat is already out of the bag, but you’re not helping.

Also, you’re thumb is clipping into your bowtie, you should get that checked out.

Rabicó, I hope you get turned into salami. Not out of spite or anything, but just because I like salami.

Naturally, Simmons believes he’s struck gold and found the ultimate tourist trap. But when Emilia points out that if he tells anyone, he’ll sound like a crazy person-

-he straight up Villager Neutral B’s her,

hails a horse, and books it.

Wow, Viscount. Dick move mangling Mrs. Benta’s glasses like that. And all for an impromptu magnifying glass, which is pointless-

-because we can see the horse tracks perfectly fine without them.

(The Viscount isn’t this much of a jerk in the rest of the series, I swear.)

So, the gang follow the tracks until there are no more, which leads them to a corn store.

Wait, a... corn store? As in, a store that mainly, if not exclusively, sells maize and maize accessories? Compared to vegetables in general, that’s quite a niche market, I can’t possibly imagine finding a success in building an entire business around one type of vegetable. Corn is simply not as versatile as something like chocolate or cheese.

Oh no, wait, it’s just a bar. I guess this cartoon takes place in the middle of Prohibition 2: Return of Jafar, and the whole “corn store” thing is just a set up for a speakeasy. (I mean, you could also argue that it’s a diner, but I’mma go with bar because it’s funnier.)

And I’m guessing Simmons expects the place to put all of the meals on his tab, considering he’s going to get the money later with all the tourism. But then, why doesn’t he just pay with the money he got from selling Mrs. Benta those books? So he pulls Emilia out of his bag to show everyone that he has a talking doll and...

Hm. Probably should have put some air holes in that bag.

Anyway, the gang comes in, and Mrs. Benta asks for the doll back, with Narizinho hamming up her Oscar-worthy performance:

So everybody’s giving Mr. Simmons a mean glare:

Including this gentleman who looks like someone just insulted his favorite MHA character (it’s probably Tsuyu):

So Mr. Simmons desperately tries to convince everyone that the doll indeed does talk, and that she comes from a wacky place, but Aunt Nastácia intervenes and says that it’s just a normal doll.

She just straight up roasts Emilia, who (big surprise) does not take it very well. To the point that she is very visibly angry, which you think the barflies would notice.

I mean, look at that and tell me that you wouldn’t notice anything weird.

But anyways, they get the doll back and we get this cute group hug.

D’awww.

So they leave with Emilia-

as Mr. Simmons is beaten to death offscreen for stealing from a little girl.

As the gang walks home, Viscount bends Ms. Benta’s glasses back to normal. Took you long enough, ya jerk.

Not even close, my dear. This is only the beginning.

Well, that was a very good first episode. It introduces the world and many of the main characters very well. And while there were a few issues I had with it, they’re really just nitpicks that don’t detract from the episode as a whole. Overall, a good effort, 8/10.

So, yeah, that’s the first episode down. Join me next time when we watch episode 2, and meet a very vile villain.

Very vile indeed.

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball GT Retrospective (1/7)

[Note: This was originally written on January 10, 2013.   My leg was broken, and I decided to kill some time watching GT all the way through.]

My leg is still broken.   On the bright side, this gives me time to catch up on crappy anime.   My Tenchi in Tokyo DVD arrived in the mail a while back, and I had already resolved to use my convalescance to watch every episode of Dragon Ball GT.   So now I can have what I like to call a Marathon of Crap.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LyNFxnv78w

I've written about the problems with DBGT before, but now that I've sat through the first fourteen episodes, I feel better informed about them.  I think the experience of GT for any fan basically goes like this: STAGE ONE: You finish watching Dragon Ball Z, and you're hopeful that GT will just be 64 more episodes of awesome, even if everyone else who saw it thinks it sucks.   STAGE TWO: You start watching it, and quickly recognize why everyone hates it.   Nevertheless, you remain hopeful that you'll find some hidden quality that redeems the series in some way.   STAGE THREE: You get to the part where Goku is thwarted by a metal grate in a sewer, even though he's spent the entire series performing superhuman feats of strength.   You wearily accept that this show refuses to adhere to even the simplest level of continuity.   STAGE FOUR: Cool!   Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta!  They can't possibly screw this u--ohhhhh shit they just did. STAGE FIVE: You refuse to recognize GT as anything remotely resembling canon.   STAGE SIX: You buy the DVD box set anyway, because you're a completist and it was on sale.   STAGE SEVEN: You watch the series again, now properly aware that it was never going to be a worthy continuation of DBZ, but it's probably got some decent camp value.   And that's where I am today.  When they rolled out GT for American audiences, Funimation didn't even bother releasing the first twenty or so episodes, because even they knew how lame they were as a followup to DBZ.  Instead, they edited together a single episode which recapped them, then later released the uncut editions as "The Lost Episodes".   So these are the worst of the worst.  Later on, the series evolves into a watered down parody of what Dragon Ball Z had been, and I think that's what most American fans are complaining about when they talk about the show.    But these early episodes are the real crap.   The original premise was that a secret set of "Black Star" Dragon Balls is discovered and accidentally used to de-age Goku into a child.  At first, the goal seems to be getting Goku back to normal, except the Black Star Dragon Balls have an added side effect of blowing up the world one year after they're used to make a wish.   Worse, they scatter all over the universe with each use, so the only hope is a space mission to find them and return to Earth within one year.   

Frankly, this is the stupidest thing ever.   The Dragon Balls are artifacts created by Namekian craftsmen, and they were introduced to Earth when a Namekian skilled in the art came to this planet.   Why would he construct Dragon Balls that blow up the Earth, where he is?  Why would he fashion them so that they scatter into space, when he is essentially stuck on his adopted world with no practical means of searching for them?   One could argue that this was a faulty job, an essay in the craft, abandoned when the Red Star Dragon Balls turned out to be much safer and more convenient to use.   But no one ever says this.  Also, no one ever explains why they can't use one of the other sets of Dragon Balls to retrieve the more volatile Black Star set.   Anyway, the space expedition goes haywire when Goku's granddaughter Pan sneaks aboard and carelessly launches the ship before it's ready.   This leaves only herself, Goku, and Trunks on board to carry out the mission.  For the first leg of the series, these are the main cast of the show.  I'm not sure how they picked that lineup, except that they were clearly trying to echo the dynamic of Goku, Krillin, and Bulma back in the old Dragon Ball series.  The idea was to go back to the adventure concept of the original series, as opposed to the heavy action focus of Dragon Ball Z.   This doesn't work, mainly because the characters are simply too powerful to function as adventure heroes doing Indiana Jones style stories.  Back in the old days Goku and Krillin were superhuman fighters, but they were still inexperienced, and there was room in the world for stronger enemies to menace them.  By DBGT, Goku has repeatedly proven himself to be the most powerful mortal being in his universe, and most of the other characters are right behind him on the Top Twenty.  GT keeps doing episodes where the trio land on a planet, explore the situation a little, then stage a lopsided confrontation with the bad guy.  There's no suspense to it because Goku can blow up the whole planet if he wants to, and the bad guy is usually some tin-dictator who doesn't realize what he's up against.   To compensate, the writers keep employing what fans call "GT logic".   For instance, this one episode had a bad guy called Lord Luud, who's a giant robot shaped like a kewpie doll or something.    Goku and Trunks fight it, but the robot is pretty durable.   Despite the difficulty, they never bother turning into Super Sayians, even though they can both totally do that at any time and it would even the odds.   Luud then steps on the heroes, and then they finally transform, mostly for the big dramatic moment where they have their Superman comeback and toss Luud on his ass.    Then they change back and start beating up on Luud as if he suddenly got easy.   Luud's handler gets desperate, so he adds Pan's to Luud's power supply, giving him a boost.   Pan's weaker than Goku or Trunks, but for some reason Pan+Luud  is way, way stronger than Goku and Trunks put together.   Well, whatever, but the situation is now looking pretty grim, and Goku and Trunks still keep fighting in their base forms.   They never explain this either.   It really doesn't make sense, because the Super Saiyan transformations were one of the most popular elements of the franchise.  I think they wanted to hearken back to the days before the Super Saiyan concept was introduced, but they never bothered to rationalize it.   So they compromised and made the transformations really really brief and infrequent for no reason.    Pan never transforms, although it's not clear if she just doesn't know how, or she just refuses to for the same mysterious reason as everyone else.  I could sort of buy that Goku's younger body is too weak to handle the transformation, or that Trunks is out of practice, but they still do it, just not very much.  It'd be like a whole episode of He-Man where Prince Adam fights Skeletor and has a really hard time, but he only uses his sword when he needs to lift heavy boulders.   The bad guys suck ass.   The first real villain is Lord Don Key.   Get it?   Do you? Because it's a pun.   He's a plutocratic fop, so he hires thugs that know how to use hand energy.  Goku beats them all in like two minutes, but for some reason his team farts around for like four episodes gathering information.  That's really what's wrong with the show.   It wasn't a mortal sin to go for a sillier tone or back off the fighting, but the pacing ruins whatever they were going for.  A lot of these GT plots resemble early episodes of Dragon Ball, except they get stretched out to two or three episodes of GT.   Gags that might have been cute in two minutes get stretched out to six or seven.  The next major bad guy is Master Dolltaki, who turns Pan into a doll while he tries to get Lord Luud operational.  Dolltaki's gimmick is that he's a total perv with toy dolls, and he spends something like three episodes talking or thinking about what a cute doll Pan is and how he can't wait to dress her up in all sorts of adorable little doll clothes.  Remember that scene from Spaceballs where Rick Moranis plays with action figures in his quarters?  It was what?  Two minutes of the movie?   If Toei had made Spaceballs, they would have dragged that out to half an hour, and added a heapin' helpin' of pedophilia just in case it was too subtle.   Admittedly, there wasn't a whole lot of places left to go as far as Dragon Ball villains.  Majin Buu was an indestructible shape-shifter, and how do you top that?  The first credible GT villain was Dr. Myuu, who was basically an outer space version of DBZ's Dr. Gero.   Baby had some potential, but his main advantage was his power to possess Goku's friends.   So he wasn't really a challening bad guy so much as he was a plot device to force the good guys to fight each other.   After that, they just decided to bring back all the old villains by having them stage a mass escape from hell.    Cute, but not very innovative.  The series ends by having the Dragon Balls themselves become the final boss of the franchise.   That was a smart idea, but it was pretty poorly executed.  Ultimately, Goku beats the Evil Dragon using the same move he used to beat Majin Buu at the end of DBZ, so it really forces you to ask if this trip was really necessary.   But by then, I think everyone in Japan had recognized the obvious: Dragon Ball could only be stretched so far.  The franchise still has life in it, but the specials and videogames and other merchandise generally sidestep GT.   I think everyone at Toei understands now that GT was a failed experiment at best.  Of course, the recent Bardock special feels a lot like the same sort of watered down crap that GT was, but at least they were applying the formula to good ol' DBZ lore, instead of going in directions no one wanted to see.

[obsidiancreates]

Could you please explain your Oc's looks? I would appreciate it if you could be a little detailed? :)

I’m afraid I still don’t know entirely how Malum and Haley look, but I’ve got the other three down!

I have some drawings of them on here! I’ll reblog them later for reference!

Carter is black, and has curly black hair that’s just a little too long to be considered tidy. When I first drew him I drew his hair as straight and going just down past his ears, and then a little while ago I realized “Oop, wait, his hair would be naturally curly, wouldn’t it? Whoops.” His eyes are also yellow, though I’m considering maybe changing that sometime.

He wears a yellow suit, not a bright yellow but not quite pastel either, just soft. His pants are the same color. He has a white button-down undershirt, and an orange tie that he keeps tucked into his suit so that the end of the tie isn’t visible. His shoes are just normal brown dress shoes. He has a hat, it’s one of these ones that’s like a really short top-hat, kind of like a bowler hat but not exactly. Like um... like Bert’s hat during the little animated carnival sequence in Marry Poppins! But it’s yellow, not made of straw, and has an orange stripe just above the brim!

(I just started on Malum and realized I should probably include about cheekbones and jaws.) Carter’s got a good jawline. His cheekbones are average, he didn’t care much about them when making the body.

Ashlyn is quite pale. She has bright ginger hair, which she usually keeps in a ponytail. It would go just past her shoulders if she wore it down. Her eyes are a sort of blue-green. 

She wears rather basic clothes. A gray hoodie, a solid color t-shirt (usually a light pink, she likes pink), blue jeans, and some kind of sneakers, color doesn’t matter there she just cares if they’re comfy. She also has an apron that she wears while baking, it’s pink and says “Made With Love” on the front in red bubble letters. Her grandma made it for her, it’s a little stained and has seen a lot of use.

(Editing to add about them cheeks...) Ashlyn is a little soft. Not a lot, because all the adventures are both good workouts and sometimes they will result in not eating enough for a long time, but she’s on the softer, chubbier side. I didn’t have this in my original drawing because I didn’t decide that then. Anyway, her face is more round and soft than everyone else’s. 

Evelyn is also quite pale. She has black hair, the ends a bright sky-blue. It’s rather short, going down to just above her shoulders. Her eyes are also blue. When she’s in human form they’re a normal blue, maybe a little brighter than typical, probably quite close to Jack’s eye color for reference. When she’s in her magic form, her eyes are a bright, kind of glowy sky-blue, like her hair ends (I only have one colored pencil close to what I imagine so I have to use the same one for bother her hair and eyes).

She wears a black leather jacket, a purple t-shirt underneath, ripped jeans (usually black, gray, or dark blue), and nice sturdy boots (black or gray) with criss-crossing straps on the front . She also has a necklace with a silver chain and round sapphire pendant, but that’s usually hidden in her shirt.

Her magic form includes: the previously mentioned glowing blue eyes with slit sort of cat or snake like pupils, four black horns coming from her head ( two closer to the front that curve in like they’re trying to touch each other, two bigger ones that curve outward like they’re trying to get away from each other), long and lithe claws on her hands, pointed teeth, and two wings. The wings are... damn, I forget their color. I think a sort of gray-blue? We’ll see when I find the drawings.

Cheekbones and jaw. I am shit at drawing face structure, but oh my goodness. She doesn’t even need claws with her cheekbones and jaw, honestly. In a good way though.

I... may have been feeling extra gay when I decided how she looked. It was before I knew I was Bi but... I’m a little gay for my own character, not gonna lie. Even when she’s in magic form.

Haley... she has brown hair and brown eyes, I know that. Her hair is sort of wavy, and it goes down to her shoulders. Not above, not past, right at her shoulders. She usually wears it down. She’s also pale (I didn’t realize that Carter was the only character of color until after I made the main five, so most of the other sort of side-OCs are characters of color to make up for it). 

She wears dresses a lot, usually with shorts or tights underneath. Her parents made her wear flats all the time, and while she does genuinely like them, she mostly wears sneakers because they have less uncomfortable memories attached. The dresses are usually sort of like t-shirt dresses or something, simple and loose and comfy! And of course her necklace from her aunt. I haven’t settled on a design, but it’s definitely gold. 

Her cheekbones and jaw aren’t crazy, they’re just average. She was kind of gaunt for a while, with the stress of her home life at her parent’s and them not exactly taking the best care of her and not letting her take very good care of herself... but she’s healthier now, her face is more full, and she looks pretty normal!

Malum. I have no fucking clue with this man. Very pale, because he’s kind of... dead-ish? Not exactly, but he is a demon, and his blood isn’t blood-blood it’s demon blood. I think he’s got a strong jaw, just good bone structure in general, though his cheeks are probably a bit gaunt so he looks more tragic. His eyes are dark, dark brown when he’s in human form, orange when he’s in demon form.

His hair... probably black, mostly neat but long enough to get in his eyes sometimes. Maybe like, layered? I don’t know. 

He’s really tall. I know that. Maybe muscular? Maybe not? I can’t decide. I mean, probably not very, at least visably, because that wouldn’t look very tragic, but I also had this idea about his design that I make him look like a sort of stereotypical “bad boy love interest” character, because he’s not a bad boy at all and he’s actually super sweet and soft, so that would be a funny contrast. But yeah, can’t decide.

Um... in terms on clothes, a lot of elbow length sleeve shirts I think. I think he has a maroon one he really likes. Probably a few normal t-shirts as well. I bet he’s got at least one with a cheesy pun or something on it, but he’d never let Carter know that. A lot of jeans, black and blue and maybe gray. Just sneakers really, for shoes. 

I’m sorry this took forever! I hope this was satisfactory! 

[keelywolfe]

FIC: Pick Up and Put Down

Summary: It’s another day at the Embassy. Edge is accustomed to getting texts from a number of people but not quite like this.

Tags: Spicyhoney, Established Relationship, Flirting, Undertale Monsters on the Surface, Prejudice Against Monsters, Threats of Violence, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Hurt/Comfort

Warning: This chapter has a reference to suicide. It is NOT, I repeat, NOT any character from any Undertale universe. It is also NOT any of my OC’s that you may have grown to know and love. No one that has made an appearance anywhere before, okay? That said, if you find a reference to suicide triggering or upsetting, skip this one.

part of the ‘by any other name’ 

Read it on AO3

or

Read it here!

~~*~~

The first text came only a few minutes after Edge arrived at work. He parked in the secure lot, walking through the side gate that led to the main entrance without taking him past the protestors. Distantly, he heard the rising shouts as they caught sight of him and if he bothered to glance in their direction, he would see them waving their signs. For Humans who claimed they were concerned for the safety of their children, they didn’t seem particularly worried about them seeing their hate-filled rhetoric and vulgar demands. Edge ignored them. He was too far away to even make out what they were shouting, much less for them to harm him even if they could, and he doubted they would make an attempt. Janice had been an easy target for their hatred and as much as he knew it would only make things worse in the long run, something ruthless at his core wished they would try him. It wouldn’t teach them anything about love, but the part of him that would never leave Underfell behind thought they could use a lesson about LV. The chime of his phone distracted him from those thoughts and Edge paused in the lobby to check it. if you were a juice, you’d be fineapple Unwillingly, a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. A little charming ridiculousness from Stretch was more than welcome this morning and instead of answering, Edge only noted that the message had been read. Partly because he had no affection for emoticons and partly because Stretch would be aggravated by it. An aggravated Stretch was by far the most entertaining and it was going to be a long day. He could use the promise of playful harassment. With a short nod to the security guard, Edge scanned his ID badge and made his way to the third floor. Janice was already at her desk, typing furiously when he walked in. “Good morning,” she said briskly, barely glancing up from the screen. “You have a meeting in an hour, I left the informational packet on your desk.” “Thank you,” Edge told her crisply. He left her to her work and went on to his office to prepare. Before the door was even closed, his phone chimed again. are you a banana? because i find you ap-peeling With a head shake, Edge put his phone back in his pocket and hung up his coat. Next to the folder there was already a cup of coffee waiting, steam wafting gently. That was the benefit of always being prompt, it gave his assistant the foresight of knowing when to get coffee. Two pages into the report, he was a hell of a lot more grateful for the coffee. This meeting was going to be thrilling, he could already tell. An hour and a half later, Edge was damning himself for being proven right, listening to the presenter droning away. Even Papyrus, who was sitting on the other side of the table with the other diplomats, had to jerk his head up when it started to bob drowsily. Edge was thinking idly of sending for a pot of coffee for the room when his phone buzzed. He never turned it off anymore, not after the attack on New New Home, and no one gave him so much as a glance as he discreetly checked the message. i know you’re busy today, but can you add me to your to-do list? This time, his smile almost broke free. It was an effort to school his expression to attentiveness, staring at the PowerPoint with polite interest. Another half hour dragged by, but his phone stayed unfortunately silent, and in the end, a round of coffee was brought for everyone. It almost helped. It wasn’t until he was back at his desk, his lunch set out so that he could eat while he worked, that his phone chimed again. He took a bite of his Greek couscous salad before he looked at the text, savoring the rich flavors. Absently, he wondered what Stretch was having for lunch; there were plenty of options in the refrigerator to choose from, even if he usually preferred simpler, often greasier, fare. baby if you were words on a page, you’d be what they call fine print His smile was reluctant, but it was there even after he finished eating. Throughout the day, the texts came. While he was talking to Antwan about an upcoming court case regarding Monsters rights in private businesses— are you an astronomer? because i want you to study this heavenly body When he got a cup of coffee from the lounge to help him get through the afternoon, already thinking longing thoughts towards the Beanery’s reopening and being able to get his preferred coffee beans again— if you were a chicken, you’d be im-peck-able And during his brief meeting with Asgore to discuss the construction of a new Embassy that was being planned in California and housing requirements for the Monsters who were in need of warmer climes. if nothing lasts forever, will you be my nothing? It was close to the time he normally left that his phone finally rang, and Edge answered it, already anticipating a flood of puns and ridiculous lines to carry him home. “babe?” Stretch said and Edge stiffened instantly at the shakiness in that single word. “What’s wrong?” he asked sharply. There was a quavering breath on the other end of the line, and Stretch asked, “have you seen the news at all?” “No, I’ve been in my office. Hold on.” He started pulling up the local news on his laptop, but Stretch hadn’t stopped, his voice low and trembling, “they caught him. i mean, they didn’t really catch him, they found him.” “Found who?” Edge was scrolling, scanning the webpage, trying to find what had him so upset. He saw it at the same moment Stretch blurted out, “the guy! the guy who burned down the beanery. it…it’s the same guy from the bus. the one who…who attacked me.” It was. Edge recognized him from police report, the court documents, and the one time he’d seen him in person. There was nothing remarkable about him, only a middle-aged Human, and Edge couldn’t see into the souls of others, couldn’t see their sins. This Human kept his hatred hidden beneath a veneer of civility, invisible at a glance to most. It didn’t matter, Edge could sense his LV even without a Check. This man had hurt plenty of others before Monsters had even stepped from beneath the mountain. He remembered seeing this Human in court when Antwan was defending Jeff after the attack on the bus. He’d been there as the injured party, claiming he’d been the one attacked. Edge had no doubt that was exactly what he believed. To him, Monsters had attacked simply by existing and Stretch being in his space was nothing short of an assault. He usually enjoyed watching Antwan in a courtroom as he calmly and ruthlessly disassembled the arguments of the other side. Edge hadn’t stayed that day, wanting to be as far from that Human as possible. For the Human’s protection, not his own. The mental picture of him trying to strike Stretch for the simple act of being made his own LV stir in uncomfortable ways. And now according to the news article, he was dead. “the police aren’t saying much yet,” Stretch rushed out, something close to panic lacing his words. “but...but…there’s plenty of rumors online. so far they’re saying it looks like a suicide. edge, they’re saying he had a plan to plant a bomb in the embassy, they—" “Shh, calm down,” Edge soothed, reading with narrowed eyes, even as he typed a quick message to the Intel team. He wanted information about this, and he wanted it now. Stretch’s breathing was too quick, his voice thick and hoarse, and more than a little unsteadily . “i know you guys have great security and everything, i mean, your brother is usually on this shit. Fuck, i’m surprised he wasn’t already.” A trickle of coldness ran down Edge’s spine at the mention of his brother, like tiny icicles prickling up his vertebra. “Suicide…” Edge murmured, reading through the news article avidly. It wasn’t possible that the police had released this much information so quickly, Intel would need to see if they could root out their source. “yeah,” Stretch swallowed hard enough that Edge heard the dry click through the line. “i guess his landlady found him, said he hung himself. left a note and everything.” Edge was sure that he had, and a detailed one at that. “he had a bunch of anti-monster stuff, they found his plans for the arson at the beanery. and his note mentioned the embassy, but…but…why would he kill himself before he did it, that doesn’t make sense, does it? i mean, i haven’t seen the note but, babe, what if he tried something, what if there is something there, what if—" “He couldn’t have gotten onto the grounds without being detected,” Edge reminded him, still reading. “We’ve got plenty of magic and technology preventing it.” Stretch exhaled rattlingly loud. “yeah. yeah, i know, i get it, i was just worried, you know? this is all so much happening, and it had to be this guy, didn’t it, why the fuck couldn’t he just leave us alone, we never did anything to him and—” his voice broke, faltering. That attack on the bus had shaken Stretch badly at the time and now he was trapped reliving it, only to discover the perpetrator had stolen more from him than he could have possibly guessed. “I’m coming home,” Edge told him abruptly. Listening to this, knowing Stretch was dealing with it alone, was growing too painful; he could work from home if needs be. “what? no, i’m okay.” To his relief, Stretch calmed a little at that, breathing deeply. “andy is on his way over, he’s kind of shaken, too. he knew the guy from court and he ain’t crying over him, but it’s still fucked up, yeah? stay there, you’ve probably got a ton of things to do now that this shitshow is starting up.” He did, he would, but leaving Stretch to deal with this on his own, even with Jeff at his side, did not sit well. “Are you sure?” “yeah, yeah, we’ll watch some movies or something, spend the night chilling out. babe? be careful, okay? just…be careful.” “I promise,” Edge said softly. A message was beeping through on his phone, but Edge ignored it for a moment. “holding you to that. i love you.” “I love you, too.” He hung up and sat back in his chair, pressing the hard case of the phone against his forehead for a long moment. Then he looked at the message. It was from Red and Edge felt his soul pulse once, one white-hot flareup of LV, as he read it. why did the man trapped in the burning house start swinging a baseball bat? because three strikes and you’re out. For one brief second everything was too hot, his vision wavering. Then Edge let out a long, slow breath, flexing his hands as he took back control. First, he deleted his brother’s text. Their cell phones ran through Monster servers and until Humans had access to magic, they were unhackable by any of their means. It was nothing more than a ridiculous joke, no reason to keep it and that was exactly what he would say if he were asked. He wouldn’t be, the chances were infinitesimal, but Edge preferred to be prepared for anything, including near impossibilities. That done, Edge silently opened one of his file cabinets and took out a thick folder, filled with reports. They were all written by his brother in a language that very few Monsters could read. He honestly wasn’t sure if Stretch was one of them. There was nothing truly incriminating in them. Edge had read them all and while they stated some of Red’s suspicions, he hadn’t been able to prove anything concrete, certainly not enough to take to the fickle Ebott police. He pushed them through the shredder, anyway, meticulously. Five sheets at a time and watched as the cross blades turn them into confetti. Chances were that no one would ask him any awkward questions. But if they did, Edge could in all honesty say he didn’t know anything. This was nothing more than plausible deniability coupled with healthy caution and it was nothing but the truth that Edge didn’t know anything. He could look his husband in the face and repeat that truth. He could. There were lines he wouldn’t, couldn’t cross, not even for his brother. When he was finished, Edge went back to his desk and got to work. He was going to be here very late, messages were already pouring in and he could hear Janice’s phone continually ringing. There would need to be press releases and statements despite the fact that Monsters had not been involved. It would be officially ruled suicide eventually, Edge had no doubt. The Security team would need to assess the threat as well; as confident as he was in their security measures, arrogance was a quick path to catastrophe. Before he could begin opening the multiple messages and emails that were pouring in, Edge caught sight of the darkened screen on his phone and hesitated. He picked it up, his fingers resting briefly on the screen, and then quickly he typed a message. How can other people love when I'm using the world's supply on you? He pressed send quickly before he could second guess and set his phone aside. Out of the corner of his vision, he saw a flurry of emoticons explode across the screen , an eye-searing expression of delight and affection. Stretch was all right, Jeff would be there soon. He wasn’t alone and he was safe in their home, and when Edge finally returned, he would be able to kiss him, hold him, with nothing between them. He could. The ring on his third finger was a comforting weight as Edge got to work.

-finis-

[elliepassmore]

Last of Her Name Review

5/5 stars Recommended for people who like: sci-fi, retellings, Russian-esque settings, rebellion, lost princesses, Anastasia I was intrigued by the concept of an Anastasia retelling, mostly because it is Russian and I like Russian mythology/folklore, and was even more intrigued by the idea of said retelling getting set in space. I was a little wary because I've never really liked the idea of Anastasia and how she died and all the people who claimed to be her. Obviously, I really enjoyed this story. Khoury really went all-in with the world building, more than in her other books, I think. Each of the world's we visited throughout the story each had unique features and peoples and trades populating them. I would be content with stories taking place on each of the planets. Amethyne gets the most attention in this book, and is seemingly a world with rolling hills and vineyards. I'm curious about the aeyla and mantibu that populated the planet and definitely wanted to know more of their history and culture. Diamin is the planet we spend the next most time on. I was intrigued by the snowy, hidden world and the tightly-controlled, gyrokinesis society. I thought it was interesting that Diamin seemed to be a colder, darker mirror of Amethyne. Sapphine also seems to have some promise, though we don't get to see a lot of it, and I wanted to dive deeper--pun intended--into the world. Some of the other worlds, such as the sky world with floating kelp and flying whales also seemed like it would be a good setting for further stories. Another interesting note that the four main planets we see/are mentioned, seem to be inverted mirrors of one another; although, Rubyat is a desert and none of the others seem to be a desert of any kind, so maybe it's a coincidence. Either way, each of the planets has its own set of adapted people--horned people on Amethyne, people with gills on Sapphine, flying people on Emerault--and I'd be very willing to dive into each of the rich histories, cultures, and settings Khoury has set up on the periphery of the main story. In terms of people, I enjoyed following Stacia on her journey, though she was sometimes willfully ignorant, it seemed. I liked her mechanic's mind and, while the situations she was in were awful, I did enjoy that there seemed to be no clear-cut 'right' decision--I much prefer messy morality. The big reveal toward the end of the book was incredible and such a shock. I could physically feel the pain Stacia felt upon the realization, and I honestly think I took longer to get over it than Stacia herself did. Her character growth and arc was gradual, and I was almost sad to see the peak of it, but I also really enjoyed how she changed and grew as a person from the first page to the last. If there were a sequel detailing what came next--even though the book ended rather definitively--I would happily read it. I also really liked Stacia's relationship with everyone. She wants to protect Clio, she both loves and disagrees with Pol, and she cares for people who might be considered outsiders. Pol was another character I enjoyed reading about (I am perhaps becoming redundant, but I'd like more information about him and his background and future). He's one of Amethyne's aeyla, and the concept of horns and a thicker bone density are aspects I'd like to have seen more of. Pol is another one who deals with differing moralities. He's torn between the vow he's made, Stacia, and, of course, the ever-present risk of death. I definitely got the impression that he was blindly following orders and faith originally, but unlike some of the other characters, he sees through to the truth much faster. Clio provided a more innocent, complex side to the story. She's only in the story in bits and pieces, since she gets separated from Stacia and Pol at the beginning of the story. The interplay between the three of them is super interesting. Stacia and Clio are obviously the closest of the three, which made me feel bad for Pol for a while, it was almost like he was on the outside a lot of the time. Despite this, she still has a clear relationship with Pol that...plays out surprisingly later on in the story. Clio drives a lot of Stacia's actions throughout the story, so learning bits and pieces about her and their history together answers a lot of questions. Riyan is another interesting character I'd like another book about (shocker). I want more background about why his sister Natalya chose that moment specifically to run away and what the straw was that made him go after her. I'd also like to know more about what happens with both of them after, since I kind of get the impression going back to Diamin isn't really an option. I felt really bad for Mara and everything that happens with her, but I did see a glimmer of hope for her at the end once she connects with Natalya. Naturally, I also want more of Natalya, we barely get to see any of her, but she's also been through some shit and from the pieces of her we do get to see, I think Khoury could probably write a full novel about Natalya. Another thing I found super refreshing and really liked about this book was that each of the villains each thought they were heroes, had genuine points, and different goals, and yet were ultimately still villains. Volkov was genuinely afraid of the Prismata and thought it needed to be destroyed in order to save the Nine Jewels and the people who lived there, even if it meant sacrificing some people. Zhar believed in the Imperial Family and wanted to restore them to power, believing it would overturn Volkov's rule and that her way was best for the planets. Each side had people who genuinely believed in their cause, who were willing to do just about anything to achieve their goals and bring 'prosperity' to the planets and their citizens. Stacia has the opportunity to 'get in' with both sides and see what they think and what they wants, and ultimately decides that, despite some of their points, neither has a truly good solution to the proposed problems. In each case, we get to see that the villains want more than just power--or, they at least want more than just power superficially. Overall, I really enjoyed Last of Her Name and would be extremely happy if Khoury decided to write more about some of the characters and places in this book.

[theonceoverthinker]

OUAT 3X07 - Dark Hollow

After the BEST WEEKEND EVER, I’m back! Just giving you a heads up -- to say on the timeline, I’m gonna pump these guys out a bit faster than usual, so my reviews may end up a lot shorter.

Anyway, I hope your week wasn’t too...HOLLOW in my absence!

The puns return!!!

Anywho, smart stuff under the cut!

Press Release

Mr. Gold and Regina send Ariel back to Storybrooke with an item that will allow Belle to locate a hidden artifact that could help take down Pan. But unbeknownst to them, two men have broken into the town with the intent to stop them - at all costs. Meanwhile, Emma, Neal and Hook attempt to find Dark Hollow, where Peter Pan’s shadow dwells, in order to capture it, and Mary Margaret is upset with David for keeping his poisoning a secret from her.

Main Thoughts - Characters/Stories/Themes and Their Effectiveness

Storybrooke

Conflicts where Belle gets to be in the role of hero always have the potential to be great, and while some *cough “The Outsider”* fail, this one does a fair amount better! Belle’s last conversation with Rumple and the little help she can provides makes her moping understandable (Albeit a little annoying) and Ariel’s encouragement and need for this to be successful acts as a great contrast.

I do wish that more went into Belle’s story here. As is, it’s Belle mopes, she hears a keyword or sees something, and she just solves the problem. There’s no either moment of realization on Belle’s part or a conversation that is communicated to Belle that states that she’s already a hero. Well, sort of scratch that because of her conversation with Archie at Granny’s, but it’s never reinforced by anyone. Because of that, while not badly put together, the problem that Belle had at the start of the episode isn’t really solved. It’s just dismissed. For an example of this done right, look at “Bear and the Bow.” There, Merida doesn’t believe that she can save her family on her own, needs to be pushed into solving the problem on her own, and when she does, there’s that moment of realization that she had that potential. This is a flabbier version of that story.

Neverland

“The fact that they both have feelings for you is dangerous, too.” Oh, the love triangle episode. Look, I’ll level with you. The best part of this segment is the end where Emma nips this in the bud and tells them both to fuck off until the mission is done.

And I get that the framing is supposed to be like that. Killian and Neal are so invested in their romances with Emma that they endanger everything, but it’s in no way anything less than an utter pain in the ass to watch. And it leaves such a bad mark on both men, having them prioritize a romance over Henry -- Neal’s son and the motivation of Killian’s redemption! What I would’ve done is stated that Dark Hollow would enhance feelings of bitterness towards one’s companions, making the pettiness here work better. That way, the almost cartoon-y and sabotage-y lengths that the guys went to would’ve been much better. As it stands, it’s annoying to watch and because the segment is from Emma’s POV, it doesn’t even serve to deliver a theme like some other stories of its ilk do for other characters.

Part of me feels like this episode was supposed to be a callout to shippers to tell them to focus on the main story over the ships, but for that to be truly effective and not make Neal and Killian come off so badly, there’d need to be either a lot more self awareness from the two guys (Which would end the story prematurely) or some agent that would artificially push those issues to a place of greater importance than Henry’s safety.

On the flip side, I love Pan’s gambit. It’s amazing seeing Pan and Felix plant the seeds of Pan’s next scheme in a way that makes it look like Henry’s solving the mystery. It’s such a treat seeing this and actually having the knowledge of knowing precisely what Pan is doing beforehand. We see how sharp Pan is as he checks the boxes of exploiting Henry’s goodwill (Wanting to be a hero, the connection between Henry and his father, the love of fairytales) and all the while making him feel clever. It’s not frustrating, but because of the POV, it makes an aspect of this kind of story that’s been so ingrained into our skulls at this point feel fresh! His use of Wendy to paint himself as a hero is fantastic, doing a great job to tilt Henry’s thought process.

Insights - Stream of Consciousness

-”They saved us.” I really love how much everyone cheers over the heroes saving them. Look, the heroes have their faults, but there’s a reason why the town at large stays loyal to them.

-I also ADORE scenes of Storybrooke at large working together. All of the major players are so great!

-I love the overall BIGNESS of the cloaking spell. It something that follows our characters throughout the rest of the series and it’s appropriately epic and not just in the sense that its an obstacle for our “villains.”

-I can’t look at that “Leaving Storybrooke” sign. I just can’t. It makes me so sad!

-”She’ll know exactly what to do.” Rum Rum, just because you can perceive vague shit doesn’t mean everyone else can!

-”Guess you’ll just have to trust me.” Reggie, you are lucky that Ariel is a trusting person because this is shady af!

-”Someone is leaving Neverland.” This line is utterly fantastic, especially with how subtly it’s said. You get a real sense of how embedded Pan truly is with Neverland as a whole.

-*Seethes in anger as fucking C*leman shows up* Fuck you, C*leman.

-”No giant stepping on my Miata!” If Anton were here, he’d take offense to that. ...Also, where IS he? Does he not show up for the rest of the series? If so, I honestly regret not honoring him in my last overview.

-I love how Archie was just anticipating slipping into therapist mode, hungry for that session like I am for that cheeseburger!

-”Now you’ve got a dress code? I seem to recall some Ruby outfits that are seared into my brain.” Grumpy! Bad!

-What is it with red-haired characters in this series ROCKING the color green? Ariel and Zelena just make it look so good!

-”He’s really into being cryptic, isn’t he?” Honey, you have NO idea!

-”It’s good to see you inherited his tunnel vision.” Snowy, you have NO idea.

-”I’m not holding your family prisoner.” I love that subtle bit of gaslighting. No, he’s not holding Henry’s family prisoner, but he is holding HENRY prisoner.

-”It’s a corkscrew, but it’s not what Rumple needs.” I don’t know about that, Belle. He could stab a Lost Boy or two. *shrugs*

-Wow! Some subtle acting from Emiliee! Look at her hands as she holds Pandora’s Box! The subtle shaking is amazing, saying so much about how powerful the box truly is!

-Pan is such a sneaky little bitch. I love how as soon as one plan is discovered, it only takes him another moment to create another plan that accounts for the failings of the last one.

-*Emma almost decapitates Killian with her sword* I’m pretty sure Colin said that that was a blooper that actually made it onto the show! XD

-Hey pre-Underworld Underworld filter! Good to see you!

-I can also understand why David wouldn’t want to tell Snow: For Emma’s sake. She just gets her parents back and then she’d have to lose at least one of them. David was trying to spare her from losing both of them too.

-”You want to tell me how that coconut works?” You should probably tell Jen too because WOW, she hated that prop!

-I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that 99% of Emma’s relief in that scene was Jen’s relief in finally closing that fucking coconut!

-”Providing motivation.” “For what?” “For doing what needs to be done.” Wow. Looks like Rumple’s cryptic-ness is rather genetic.

Arcs - How Are These Storylines Progressing?

The Mission to Find Henry - We now have a way back AND a way to defeat Pan! Things feel like they’re chugging along again, and it works pretty naturally with how the last two episodes went.

Killian’s Redemption - “Why would I have done that [Not tell the group about Neal]?” I like how even as he’s in this love triangle with Neal, Killian doesn’t regret saving him for even a second. That really speaks to Killian’s growth!

Regina’s Redemption - Regina keeping her part of their bargain is a BIG deal in terms of her redemption!

Rumple’s Redemption - Rumple actually says that he will do his best to honor Belle and Ariel’s request to help Wendy and that also is a BIG step! Also, Rumple pointing out that Regina’s jealous of having someone shows a fair amount of self-awareness!

Favorite Dynamic

Henry and Pan. I’ve gone on about them above, but Pan’s understanding of Henry’s personality and subsequent manipulation of that for his own gain is fascinating to watch! Despite only knowing Henry for less than a week, Pan’s got him pegged! He knows the qualities that Henry wants to see in someone he’ll trust and his own aspirations for himself. And though manipulated, Henry is so careful about Pan, showing a lot of intelligence. His “weakness” here is hs kind heart and it’s the perfect aspect on Henry to exploit once it’s clear that method of lying won’t work.

Writer

Kalinda Vazquez and Andrew Chambliss are up again, and I found their storytelling here to be a bit lackluster. The Storybrooke segment was enjoyable, but flabby in terms of delivery and the exact opposite could be said for the Neverland main story. It’s not terrible, but just a little half baked.

Rating

7/10. I wish things had been a bit tighter here. As it stands, this wasn’t OUAT’s best. BUT that’s not to say that there weren’t things I liked. Everything with Pan, Henry, and the Darling siblings was magnificent and Ariel (As usual) is simply a delight)! Also, Emma’s speech at the end where she put the issue of shipping to rest to focus on the mission was just fantastic and an utterly badass moment! I just wished they played more of (Or in the case of Emma’s speech, a better) a role in the main stories.

Flip My Ship - The Home of All Things “Shippy Goodness”

Grumpy Beauty - Once again, we get to see bits of these two working together early on and it’s just the best!

Captain Swan - Okay, I love how Emma’s big point in Killian’s favor was how he told her about Neal. That’s such an earnest, sweet, and Emma-like thing to adore. Also, “so when I win your heart, Emma -- and I will win it -- it won’t be because of any trickery. It will be because you want me.” I love that resolve of Killian’s to not only be with Emma, but to be with her honestly. It speaks to sentiments she values and shows his commitment to his own redemption. ALSO, “I’ve yet to see you fail.” Killian honestly does believe in her!

Swan Fire - I really enjoyed Neal’s apology at the end of the episode and I love how you can see how his returned resolve to focus on Henry had its effect on Emma and was so sincere! <3

Rumbelle - Just look at the way Belle basically blubbers as she first sees Rumple’s face through the sand dollar. It’s so beautiful. Honestly, this whole episode is a love letter to Rumbelle and just how much they mean to each other and trust in each other. “Tell Belle I love her. And that she’s right. I WILL see her again.”

Snowing - I love Snow and David’s argument. It’s so raw and it so clearly comes from this place of love.

Swan Queen - There’s really something to be said for Emma succeeding thanks to her understanding of Regina whereas both Neal and Killian sort of failed her! <3

-----

Again, thank you for your patience with these more rushed out reviews. I really want to stay on schedule and thankfully, there wasn’t a hello of a lot to say here.

Also, thank you to @watchingfairytales! It was lovely meeting half of you guys at the con!

Season 3 Total (66/220) Writer’s Scores: Adam and Eddy (19/60) Kalinda Vazquez (17/40) Andrew Chambliss (17/50) Jane Espenson (10/30) David Goodman (10/40) Robert Hull (10/40) Christine Boylan (10/20) Daniel Thomsen (10/30)

Operation Rewatch Archives

[theradioghost]

hey my dudes. I know a lot of you followed me for things like TAZ, or, back in the day, Undertale. I know lots of you like movies like Thor: Ragnarok and Pacific Rim and Mad Max: Fury Road. So u know I’m a big fan of media that’s going to deliver color and humor and good writing and defy genre expectations and make me feel a little better about the world I live in and the people I share it with. Consequently, im gonna talk for a minute about Pushing Daisies.

if you’re not familiar with Pushing Daisies, I’d summarize the plot like this:

As a boy, Ned discovers that he has the power to bring the dead back to life. This power comes with two caveats: if he touches them again, they are dead forever; and if he leaves a dead thing alive for more than one minute, something else nearby will die. As an adult and the proprietor of a pie shop, Ned makes spare cash on the side through a bargain with the only person to know his secret, a private eye who has him ask the dead who killed them to collect rewards. It’s through this arrangement that Ned discovers that Charlotte “Chuck” Charles, his childhood love whose father he accidentally killed in the accident where he discovered the consequences of his powers, has been murdered.

The result is almost impossible to categorize. Pushing Daisies is a murder mystery show. It’s a comedy. It’s a fairy tale. It’s a love story. It’s the best goddamn piece of television I’ve ever seen.

First off, it’s by Bryan Fuller. Yes, that Bryan Fuller, who somehow turned viscerally horrifying gore into visual art in Hannibal. Pushing Daisies has the same amazing cinematography, but in vivid colors and whimsical designs. Looking at this show feels like eating candy, I fucking love it.

The whole thing is narrated by none other than Jim Dale, with the dry humor and warmth that makes the whole thing feel like a fairy tale. It’s a world of knitting detectives, candy-shop entrepreneurs, windmill keepers, friends-for-hire, reclusive beekeepers, and competitive synchronized mermaid swimmers, and all of them are out to murder each other brutally, and yet somehow those two things never clash. There are puns. There are absurdly named businesses and characters. It’s got the whole shebang.

The characters are just as good as the world, and just like it, they have a lot of hidden depths. There are some genuinely traumatized people in this cast, dealing with heartbreak, abandonment, isolation, abuse, past mistakes, mental illness. The show treats all of that seriously and sensitively without ever becoming grim or dark. Olive Snook is madly in unrequited love with Ned, but her feelings aren’t a joke, and she’s more than that. Chuck’s agoraphobic aunts Vivian and Lily have a compelling storyline all their own about secrets and loss and mental illness. Ned deals with losing his mother, with being abandoned by his father, with a lifetime of guilt and secrets; Chuck is trying to find a way to make up for a first life spent in isolation and unfulfillment. Emerson Cod, PI, is tough, witty, and primarily motivated by money; he also knits when he’s stressed and discovers a passion for designing pop-up books midway through the show. But all of them are funny, all of them are endearing, and above all, all of them are healing. (And if you’re into that found family shit, this is the good stuff, guys.)

The show’s main focus is on Ned and Chuck’s relationship, and honestly the fact that this romance existed in 2007 just eliminates any excuse for the general inability of TV writers to make me care about straight couples. There’s no will-they-won’t-they; it’s pretty obvious from episode one that Ned and Chuck are an item instantly, and they genuinely love one another. What provides the narrative tension is the two of them working through their problems, absurd as they might be: abandonment issues, accidentally murdering someone’s dad, having to hide your identity because you’re legally dead, never being able to touch the person you love most. It’s about both of them working to become better people because they are the most important people in each other’s lives. And it’s so healthy, yall. They talk about things. There’s a whole bit where they talk about space and Chuck decides to move out of their apartment to try independence for the first time and just, in general, everything these two do makes me melt. You will be emotional about plastic wrap, guys. You will cry about gloves.

And what you get is a show about love, and friendship, and family, and healing, about life and death and what they are and why they matter. Above all, it’s kind, and it treats the dark things in the world with hope. Time after time, it’s the thing I come back to to laugh, to feel good, to watch something colorful and joyful and fun. Do yourself a favor and go watch both seasons right now.

[moonbelt]

I don'tknow if you already answered this but do you have any anime recommandation?

i’ve never been asked for anime recommendations in my inbox before usually i just recommend some to ppl that message me or my friends irl but IM ACTUALLY REALLY EXCITED TO DO THISSS -

okay here are 15 anime i’ll recommend to you anonie :)

these are in no specific order 

1: Boku No Hero Academia - character develoment? check. Non-neglecting of side characters? check. Bomb af graphics? double check. Loveable best boy? yep yup. Great fandom that collectively hates Mineta? yesh

2: Diamond no Ace - sports anime that actually shows the struggles of different teams? yesss. epic scenes that are so great it could be a meta anime but it still retains the basic functions of baseball? huehue double yes. the mc is such a ball of energy and genuinely wants to be the Ace and has so much development as a character that you honestly start wanting him to get that number? yes yes yes yes yes

3: Nichijou - one of the greatest work anime has produced. really its so effing hilarious and it really pinpoints the things everybody does in everyday life. like flip a police officer for mistakenly confiscating your boys love manga. accidentally stabbing your thumb with a mechanical pencil, the struggles of ordering at Starbucks or even..

yeah.. ordinary life ha

4: Magi - a smol baby boy tryna bring peace to the world? check. fucking strong girl that can beat any kind of wild beast there is? heck yeah! magic? yup. loads of backstory that actually makes sense and relates to the arcs? checkity check. villiains that really arent villains and good guys that truly are the bad guys? ho boi yessss. a magical recorder? you got it. also the graphics are great

5: Mob Psycho 100 - another smol baby boy just tryna navigate middle school. blessed with amazing psychic powers but powerless in terms of popularity and friendships. truly such a great anime that teaches a lot of moral stuff and has A M A Z I N G fight scenes. our boy mob is such a freaking god and the art style is very different but so expressive 10/10 would recommend

6: Danshi Koukousei no Nichijou - [Daily Lives of High School Boys] like nichijou, this is another anime that is at the height of comedy gold. every episode is such meme worthy. the main protag really isnt the main protagonist, so many puns, great side characters, and i cant express how much of a feel good anime this is

7: Bakemono no Ko - okay this is a movie. and when i say this is such a fascinating movie, i mean it. this really smol boy gets adopted by a bear after he runs from home. this big bad bear™ is actually so pure and best dad. the uncles are great and so punny i cant. okay, they also have some really epic sword fights.. i really cant explain this movie without giving spoilers lmao but go watch it if you want, you wont regret it

8: Hunter x Hunter - young fisher-boy and young assassin-boy walk into a hunter exam together, who survives? friendship.. and the newly acquired dads they found along the way [honestly go watch it, i was skeptical at first but i never loved anything more in my life] also the arcs are so monumental, really great plot and friendship!!

9: Yuri On Ice!!! - edgy ice skating and gay couples that reaffirm what love is? check. little smol bean yurio tryna act all mighty and tough? yep. amazing soundtrack? heck yeahh! great characters that in no way hate on homosexuals? you got it. amazing graphics? best boys? well dang, you got it!

10: Shokugeki no Soma - food. food. food wars. great scenes that have food giving you orgasms? basically a sports anime but about food? great mc that really deserves all the love he gets. when they tie a bandana on their forehead, shit is about to get started. food. food. food wars.

11: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood - as i write this, i cry. this was so good and i was wary of watching it bc there was/is so much hype around it but alas IT WAS SOO GOOD I CANT. like two brothers? amazing morals? the fact that nothing is as it seems? kickass female characters. alchemy. the hype is real with this one, but its so worth it and i 10/10 would lower you down FMA hell.

12: Katekyo Hitman Reborn! - [also known as Reborn!] i found this by mistake and my life really hasnt been the same. mafia story. first few eps are just comedic and really dont tell you jack shit about the storm thats coming afterwards. holy heck, a main character that set standards for how to demolish your enemies? friendship! fight scenes that make you wanna fite anyone? so many powers that actually make sense? checkity check. friendship!!

13: Bungou Stray Dogs - hidden powers that main character doesnt know about? check. good dad dazai. another mafia story. a mafia boy tryna kill the mc because of his powers and dazai has become mc’s dad instead of his [okay i’m trolling lmao] but really this is a great mafia anime. theories. villainous characters that have been blackmailed into being bad.. really it has it all

14: Haikyuu!! - small chibi boy just wants to play volleyball in peace. “i can jump™” meets skyscraper black-haired blue-eyed god who rules the court. [trollingg] but honestly, this has to be one of the most accurate sports anime i’ve watched. spiky main and side characters that are completely adorable and its kinda hard not to get sucked in, but you will

15: Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! - gamer dude dies [by mistake] and on his way to the afterlife, he’s given a chance by a goddess to go to another world and defeat the demon king. grants him the possibility of taking any one thing to this new world, my guy picks the goddess [fukin dead] and whoops there ya go lmaoo. but no honestly, its great and funny and the explosion/action scenes are beyond E P I C. also best girl, Megumin, is there so you should def check it out

— obviously these recommended anime are in my opinion. im not some anime god but thanks anon for giving me a reason to finally do this *finger hearts* —

[andagii-writes]

Orchard Party

For @aperturegaming011, mega request indeed!

You’ve been waiting for so long, and the number of characters made the entire project a lot more involved than its initial conception. I really hope you enjoy it, and that I captured your characters! It had to be its own short story so I’m slapping it under a... 

"Good grief, Rhei. You didn't say I'd be having a festival in my front yard."

With a scratch at the light stubble along his chin, Rhei grinned, and neatly skipped up the steps of the Breezy Banks veranda. He threw his arm around Kutone's shoulders. "You specified no guidelines for this event." Nodding to the sprawl of tables and vineyard decorations, as well as the townspeople marveling the spread of autumn fare, Rhei gave his friend a fond squeeze. "A bit more gratitude would be nice."

Shaking Rhei off, Kutone squared her shoulders, letting her suit jacket settle back into a comfortable position. Despite Rhei's amused snort, she tugged next on the collar of her blouse. Routine, for old business. She crossed her arms. "You told me you had some guests for me to talk to?"

"Sure do." Rhei offered his hand. Rejected, of course, as Kutone slapped away the offer, and descended the veranda steps. Still, he chuckled. "Otherwise, you wouldn't give a shit about the other farmers around the valley--ah, no, sorry--was that too much?"

She glared as Rhei matched her pace. "Oh, do carry on. Business as usual."

"So I'm not getting an earful from your fiance?"

"Business. As usual."

"Come on, Kutone. He's become something of a little brother to me. I like pissing him off."

Golden rays spilled over the visible fields of autumn fare, and glinted through amber glassware offering candied yams, cranberry sauce, homemade stuffing, plum pudding--and even more than Kutone knew she'd requested for the event. Instead of reflecting her confusion, however, Rhei maintained a proud smirk. "It's amazing stuff," he said, "when a local farmer is also a top-tier chef."

A sweet laugh answered. "Mr. Young, you realize I'm not sitting on a cake, right?"

"That's not..." He masked his exasperation well, with an amused chuckle, as he waved someone over. "I'm not talking about cake tiers, Catherine."

"I guess that one was a little obscure of me." Catherine, bright green eyes sparkling, stepped away from the table and accepted Rhei's firm handshake. Then offering her hand next to Kutone, she laughed again. "Kind of a sour face, aren't you? Life's thrown you too many lemons?"

Kutone tried a light smile, as she shook Catherine's hand. "The day's making my face pucker, maybe," she said. "Having Rhei as an associate does that sometimes."

"Hey!"

"Quite the opposite, actually!" The strands of Catherine's blonde hair bounced as she nodded toward Rhei. "The man sponsored and got me out of the sour patch known as Joja. You don't need me to say more, do you?"

"I'm not here to dredge up awful memories," replied Kutone, "for my sake or yours." She gestured to the orchard party. "Rhei tells me he invited you on business? You must have prepared the spread here."

Catherine gasped, and cast an impressed expression in Rhei's direction. "She's a sharp knife, that's for sure! Tell me that you're enjoying it so far!"

"I unfortunately haven't had a chance to try it yet, but," Kutone paused and turned in her spot, nodding to the Pelican Town residents gaily tucking in, as well as the amber ambiance. "This is beautiful, top-floor restaurant fare here. Do you have your own location?"

"Maybe I should sit on top of a cake at this point!" Catherine laughed. She clasped her hands together, as though in prayer. "Though, it is my dream to open up a restaurant. So when Young told me an old friend of his had a fantastic vineyard in the works, I had to come check it out. I understand, you'll be unveiling an original blend soon?"

At this, Kutone shot a glare toward Rhei, who uneasily averted his eyes and pulled at his collar.

Catherine pressed a hand over her mouth. "Oops, I guess I spilled some milk here? Please don't mind me!"

"I don't, and I won't," Kutone replied, digging a sharp knuckle into Rhei's side. "I'm surprised no one else has asked me, really, with this great flapping mouth of his."

"I was talking business!" Rhei whimpered, cringing and curling away from Kutone's jab. "Catherine wanted to pair some of her signature autumn dishes with your drinks, so I told her about testing your new blend!"

"He told me nothing more than that, I promise," Catherine added. "Since I had no idea if it was even a red or white wine, I prepared a variety here to take the guessing out of the picture!" She offered her hand again. "Kutone, when I make my dream come true, I'm hoping you'll let me carry your wines on the menu?"

If not her puns, her enthusiasm was infectious. Kutone accepted a second, eager handshake, as she chuckled. "So long as you're okay with Rhei being our go-between."

"I wouldn't have it any other way!"

They exchanged business cards, Rhei adding he'd send a mock-up of a wine menu for Catherine's consideration, before Catherine turned next to Gus and Elliot. Both in awe of the artistry and taste of the dishes, they already had wine pairings to discuss with the up-and-coming restauranteur.

Meanwhile, Rhei guided Kutone past the banquet tables, toward the vined arches leading to the farm's main orchards. They weren't permanent, Rhei assured, unless Kutone wanted to keep them. "Don't get me wrong," she responded. "They're a nice touch, but once this event's over, they're gone."

"Sometimes I forget you're a minimalist."

"You forget a lot of things in your age, Mr. Young, sir."

At this, Rhei crossed his arms, and turned up his lip, mocking an offended pout. "Stand yourself corrected, miss! I remember that cruel tone of voice very well!"

Cackles answered in Kutone's stead. "Big, bad businessman just got one-upped by the wino!"

Hardly the description Kutone would have used for Rhei, but it was comical enough to grab their attentions, and a legitimate frown from Rhei. Following the voice, he turned to one of the benches nestled between the arches, where two girls sat giggling.

One of them, at least, was familiar to Kutone. "Lay off, old friend,” she said, laying a hand on Rhei’s arm. “I told you about Jane, didn't I?"

"I'm assuming she's the one currently not laughing at your supposed one-up?"

"Still giggling, but yes." Kutone lifted a hand in greeting, as she approached Jane and her friend.

"You've some explaining to do," said Kutone, mocking a patronizing tone. "I don't take kindly to people other than me giving my old friend a hard time."

Rhei ground his knuckles into Kutone's shoulder. "I'm hearing the word 'old' too many times, Kutone."

While Jane, face hidden behind her curtain of black hair, giggled helplessly at the banter, her friend shrugged. Her fair features held a perpetual smugness that, when she spoke, added to her playful tone. "Well at least it's obvious who's wearing the pants in this partnership."

"It's why I don't wear skirts," said Kutone, smiling. "But giving Rhei a break for just one second here..."

Jane pressed her hands together, nodded, and pulled her phone from her pocket. After a bit of typing, she flashed the message to Kutone and Rhei.

My friend, Glaser, began the message. weve been enjoying the party and talking video games this entire time!

"Just sucks that I don't know the language to talk to you so you don't have to keep typing and playing charades, y'know?" Glaser huffed and crossed her legs, directing her attention to Kutone. "What a sharp-lookin' bitch though--you're sure you're a farmer?"

"And businesswoman," Kutone added. "Rhei here is basically my mentor."

Jane gasped, and quickly tapped out another message. It's very nice to meet you, sir!

"Good grief, finally some shred of good vibes in my direction," Rhei replied. Accepting Jane's amiable handshake, he flashed a handsome smile. "You're also a valley local?"

With a deep nod, Jane threw an arm around Glaser's shoulders.

"Both of you, eh? How do you like the Banks, then?"

"Makes me feel good to know a chica's running the place," said Glaser. "Or maybe I should be more respectful, senorita?"

Kutone shook her head. "Say whatever you want about me. I don't particularly care."

Jane landed a light but purposeful slap on Glaser's shoulder. Cheeks puffed and brow furrowed, she leveled a meaningful glare.

Glaser rolled her eyes and shrugged. "Fine, I'll be nice, just because she's your friend. And because she runs a fuckin' winery from her backyard." She shot a calculating glance toward Rhei. "And also 'cause the old man's not nearly as annoying as I thought he'd be."

Rhei threw his hands up. "Kutone, if you need me, I'll be on the other side of the estate arranging your other meetings, okay? Okay."

"Hey now, no rage quitting!" Glaser jeered, "You can't go AFK and ghost us like this! Hey!"

Kutone snickered at Rhei's retreating back, meandering back through the banquet tables on his way to the farm's entrance. Noticing Jane's concerned frown, she gestured toward him. "No need to worry about him--he's used to far more cruelty than that."

"Bet you really jerked him around, huh?" Glaser leaned back against the bench, and sagely shook her head. "You can't get to be a powerful girl without stomping over some stupid chicos, y'know? Is he your bitch?"

Jane pressed both hands to her face and deeply sighed.

But Kutone snorted. "Far from it. I'm his producer, he's my distributor. We've known each other in too many ways for too many years for us to have some better-than-thou relationship here."

"That's almost boring."

After a contemplative silence, Jane's fingers tapped out another message on her phone. She considered the words with a cock of her head, but with a nod, showed it first to Kutone, then to Glaser to fill her in on the conversation.

i think its amazing how u get along with ppl, kutone. esp when youre as close to a business partner as you are. like... it feels like u and rei are so much more than what youre saying.

As Glaser pulled a grim, suspicious expression, Kutone simpered. "We were. Once. Before we stabbed each other in our backs and realized we just weren’t meant to be.”

"So how do you get to be buddy-buddy-business-partners without killing him or being friends with benefits, huh?"

Kutone winked. "I have a fiance who's a far better match than Rhei could ever be. Rhei's already come to terms with that."

rei's kind of amazing in his own right?

"Now, why would I ever be so kind as to admit that?"

"Tell it like it is, senorita!" Glaser laughed. "You and me could have drinks sometime and talk more about this type of shit!"

She could appreciate that refreshing sort of rudeness, especially over drinks at the Stardrop Saloon. Definitely in moderation though--Glaser seemed like the type to easily rub off on people. Heaven forbid Kutone started talking to Rhei, or even her lovely boy like that; they'd surely crack and break down.

Leaving Glaser and Jane with a wave, Kutone followed Rhei's path: back across the banqueting area, along the stepping stones to the farm's entrance. Seeing Rhei in conversation--heated conversation--with other suits, she squared her shoulders stepped into the ring. "Problem, gentlemen?"

It was a rhetorical question, but an effective one to get the suits off of Rhei and on to her. Not that Morris, bespectacled pudgy face creased into an ever-worsening scowl, needed the distraction. Neither did the other two suits with him, but Morris stood to his fully unimpressive height, and adjusted the bright red, oversized bowtie at his neck. "A pleasure to see you, Kutone," he sniffed. "It's been some time since I last saw you and this community--I found myself wistful, you know."

The lie through his teeth couldn't have hissed harder, but Kutone shrugged and gestured to the party behind her. "Pardon my bluntness here, but I remember my colleague saying participants needed invitations to attend this event. Did he extend you one?"

Rhei, keeping an easy expression over his restrained irritation, crossed his arms. "Well, no," he started. "Morris here never saw your products as worthy of his attention so, I saw no point to inviting him."

"Yet I am a member of this community," said Morris, face already turning pink. "Certainly, I've been away awhile, but once a soul of Pelican Town, there's no leaving it, yes? I believe I deserve a spot in this party!"

Kutone gave a low, sage nod. "Duly noted, so, I'm keeping this short, Morris. Get out."

"I've even forgiven the assault Pierre made on me--you notice I never charged him!"

"Yes, and I'm not interested in making any deals with Joja either."

"Mighty words from someone using a Joja turncoat as her distributor! I'm saying lose the middleman--you'll find we can offer more benefits, a greater network, than whatever Young can muster!"

"An accomplishment and a half," said Kutone, Rhei snickering next to her. "Do come back some time to prove it though; I'd love to see how you can do Rhei's work better than he can."

"Brat. You think you're untouchable, don't you? You just happen to be on these people's good sides--which isn't that hard to do, might I add; country bumpkins and their magnanimous stupidity were always the easiest to manipulate--but wait until I tell them everything you kept in the dark!" With an evil snigger, Morris pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "After all, Miss Kutone, you know a thing or two about a tarnished reputation?"

"I do, but you wouldn't dare--"

"Wouldn't I now?"

Rhei stepped forward, shoving hard against the suits protecting Morris. "Can the threats. You can't do anything until she signs your agreement, anyway."

"Which she'll end up having to do when her rotten name brings down revenue!" Morris reached into an inner pocket and pulled out his phone. "Just one call, Young my friend."

"Don't--!"

"All's fair in the war of business!"

At the moment Morris looked down at his phone, however, a tall silhouette behind him grabbed the collar of his dress shirt and lifted his entire body from the ground. Feet dangling, Morris flailed like a swinging sack of flour. "Who--?! Put me down! Put me down, or I'll press charges!"

Unfazed, the man lifted Morris higher, reducing the Joja Sneer into a babbling squeal. Morris flailed harder, pointing at his bodyguards. "Do something! Get this man off of me!"

Morris's men weren't moving anytime soon. That much was a certainty to Kutone, mouth agape at the metallic sheen of the mystery man's hand holding Morris aloft. Not just his hand, either--both of his legs looked like they came out of a sci-fi superhero movie. Even his eye, for crying out loud, flickered a dangerous red.

Rhei whistled. "Now I've really seen it all."

But there was, Kutone thought, a certain softness to the man's dark hair and fair features, even as he whispered, "She said leave. So leave," and dropped Morris with a dull whump.

Morris couldn't have scrabbled away any faster, bodyguards in tow and cursing something about coming back to make the deal again.

While Kutone stared, Rhei gave her a nudge and turned to their benefactor. "Appreciate it, sir. Sure felt good to see him squealing like that."

Sir? Kutone tried, but failed, to figure out how this man could be Rhei's superior.

Luckily, Rhei filled in the gap, as the man averted his eyes from Kutone's baffled expression. "If you want to know how the Empire's tearing up the Republic, you're staring at that answer. Defectors like him are the only reason why Ferngill's hanging on to what little edge it's got."

"A soldier," murmured Kutone. She pressed a hand to her chest, and smiled. "Then I have to thank you even more."

The red light in his eye faded to a curious green, as he glanced up momentarily to meet Kutone's gaze. "It's nothing."

Another man, summer-sun-caramelized features practically glowing with his amicable smile, jogged through the party area as he waved for attention. "James!" Finally catching up, he let out an exasperated gasp, and laid a hand on James's shoulder. "Good grief, James, that jump over the whole venue nearly gave Harvey a heart attack, you know! And--and now you're making friends with the hosts?"

James turned away, apparently refusing to regale his companion with a response. Rhei offered his hand to bridge the awkward silence. "Rhei Young," he said. "And the vintner herself, Kutone."

"Pleasure." The young man accepted handshakes from both Kutone and Rhei. "I'm Jake--Harvey let me in on his invitation; James through Abigail."

How all these people knew each other despite the valley's isolation was beyond Kutone. Her attention, however, fell on the metal bits poking through the skin of Jake's left arm. If James was anything to go by... "You're a soldier too?"

"Was," Jake corrected. "Can't do much jet piloting with a busted arm and cruddy grip."

"At least it's an honorable discharge," Rhei replied. "Thanks for your service."

"Flying across Hell and back was well worth it, I'd say," said Jake, "since it meant we protected the lives and magic Stardew Valley has to offer. I mean, all this good food, and good wine? You're an inspiration, Miss Kutone."

"Nothing compared to two men who've been to Hell and back," said Kutone, simpering. "I'm guessing you're local to the area as well?"

"Along with James here. We'll be sure to stop by and offer some of our goods too. Right James?"

James had finally settled on watching Kutone with a placid expression. At Jake's question, he nodded, the flicker of a smile barely ghosting his features. He needed some work, thought Kutone, but she found him likable enough. Somewhat and adorably reminiscent of her fiance.

Rhei, checking his watch, pressed a hand into the small of Kutone's back. "We've got an unveiling, Kutone," he said, gesturing back to the orchards. "Time to bring up the barrel and tap, don't you think?"

A spirited glint sparked in Jake's eyes. "Maybe I can help in some way?"

As Rhei and Jake marched off, Kutone laid a light touch on James's arm, and offered him space to walk with her. "I could use your help again as well," she gently murmured. "If you'd be so willing?"

Another small smile. He wordlessly matched her pace, slow as she was in her pumps, down the stone path leading to her veranda. Rhei and Jake were already inside heading into the cellars, as Kutone and James ventured after them.

It was then he spoke again. "What did you call it? Your wine?"

She stopped at the threshold, turning to face James, as well as the orchard party before them. Sunset skies burgeoning into the deep indigo of twilight, the scenery, she admitted, matched the mood of the wine she'd created. Behind her, inside the house, Rhei's and Jake's voices echoed up from the cellar, as well as her fiance's voice irritably bantering with Rhei.

"Rosé Memoria," she replied, pressing a hushing finger against her lips. "Like the semi-sweet recollections of a bygone summer. Or of meeting new people. Catching, isn't it?”

[baradorable]

My opinions on the current anime season. I’ll go over come popular shows and try to warm you up to some hidden gems.

Attack on Titan (Season 4)

I ended up liking this show a lot more than I thought I would. I ended up binging the first three seasons in like a week. Now I’m impatiently waiting for more episodes.

I will say that I’m kind of mixed on this one, though. Like I know they want to flesh out the country of Marley, make the war less one-sided and establish how villainous Eren is later, or whatever. I preferred it when the characters were fighting the enigmatic, monstrous force of titans. The political drama was like the least interesting parts of season 3. (That, and Eren being kidnapped for the millionth time.) Regardless, I’m still liking what we have so far, and there’s only one thing that makes me hesitate.

Gabi Braun. Fucking Gabi Braun. She’s so fucking obnoxious. She’s like Eren, except without the character traits that made him interesting. We have less reason to care about her, and her story is mostly just a retread of Eren’s. And I’d tolerate that if she wasn’t such an obnoxious cunt all the damn time. “But euuhughhg Gabi is a kid and she’s brainwashed! She’s actually really well-written!” Yeah, but she’s still an annoying little shit and less sympathetic than the other Marleyans we’re focusing on. She shouldn’t be the main focus character.

“Did you see it happen?” BITCH. There’s being brainwashed and there’s being a fucking moron. And don’t give me that “Well, in real life, brainwa-” Yeah, I don’t care. She’s not real. The only thing real about her is the headache she gives me.

So she’s this unlikable kid who came in and killed a fan-favorite character. I loved Sasha. Everyone did. But I’ll live. (Unlike her.) But she just HAD to be killed by fucking Garbage Braun of all people. Honestly, if Falco killed Sasha, I’d get over it. He’s a way better character than Gabi. I could go on and on about how he works better on a fundamental level, but none of you are even reading this post in the first place. So whatever.

8/10

Beastars (Season 2)

It’s good. I don’t like it as much as season 1, but I’m enjoying it a lot. It’s not a show I actively wait for, but it’s always pleasant to see.

7.5/10

Cells at Work!! Code Black

I never saw the original Cells at Work, but this show makes me not want to. Because I don’t think it would be as good as Code Black.

For those who haven’t seen it, Cells at Work is basically about humanized cells working in a body. You follow a red blood cell as they deliver oxygen, and you encounter all sorts of issues and quirks you see in a body. From sicknesses, to infections, to even cancer, you actually learn a lot. It’s genuine edutainment.

Black is set in a body that’s incredibly unhealthy. The characters are scrambling to survive and keep a failing body going. There’s this growing sense of dread each episode as the body grows worse and worse. You get frustrated because these characters don’t deserve the Hell they go through, and you just want to shout at the human to eat healthy, quit smoking and shape up. Because you care about the cells and want them to have a better work environment.

It’s really fun and makes me feel guilty for my unhealthy habits.  

7.5/10. Maybe 8/10 if these last few episodes keep up the momentum.

Dr. Stone

I really liked season 1, and I’m liking this season so far as well. I prefer the set-up and use of tech in season 1, season 2 is kind of moving too fast with tech while the story is a little slow. But despite all that, this show is still great and is on track to becoming a classic. If it weren’t for Attack on Titan, it would be Anime of the Season for me.

8/10

Jobless Reincarnation: 

A 40-year-old NEET gets isekai’d into the body of a baby. You watch this child with an adult mind grow up and learn about this magical fantasy world. It’s pretty good, I like it. It has good humor, nice characters, interesting lore, and a fun magic system. 

If you ever watched Isekai Cheat Magician? (Of course you didn’t. No one did.) This is what Isekai Cheat Magician wishes it could be.

I give this show a 7/10. It loses points because it made me think of Isekai Cheat Magician just now.

Ex-Arm

No words. Except four words: Go watch this show.

Oh boy. This show is. This show is a doozy. If I had to explain, I would say it’s like... shit. Because it is shit. But it’s very entertaining shit.

The story and characters are cool, but unimportant. You just can’t get into them because the animation is the highlight of the story. It just blows every other aspect of the show out of the water.

What kind of animation are we talking about? If I had to describe it, it would be the visual equivalent of that girl on Tik Tok who made a video series where she plays a Jewish girl during the Holocaust. It’s like a present you would give your eyes, if you hated them and wanted them to die.

Some characters are 2D, but the rest are 3D. And not even good 3D, because this shit is worse than those bootleg mobile games with stolen assets that don’t fit together. They had to censor kisses because they couldn’t animate lips moving, and pushing their faces together would just make their models clip. One of the characters has a wide-eyed smile all the time, no matter the situation, because there’s like no animation for her expressions. This show makes the 3D Pokemon games look like fine art.

Another thing I’d like to mention is the opening song, if only because I can’t tell if it’s good or terrible. I genuinely can’t tell if I like it ironically, or unironically. Either way, it’s perfect for this show.

So yeah, I love this show. It’s such a fucking mess in the best way. It always brings a smile to my face. I just wish the story was bad, so I can have another level of awfulness to enjoy. This show never fails to make me smile. Anime of the fucking decade right here.

HELLO, HELLO/10

Kemono Jihen

It’s kind of like Inuyasha, except without the humans, Naraku has big boobs, the Shikon Jewel/life stones aren’t that important yet, Bakugo from My Hero Academia is on the cast, everyone is a 12-year-old with bad fashion sense, and it’s a lot more generic in premise and execution.

So, nothing like Inuyasha. Honestly it’s more like My Hero Academia in terms of vibes. I still enjoy it though. My favorite character is probably the little fox girl because I like her design. But I also like the little fox boy because I’m not entirely sure what game he’s playing, but I’m into it. 

6.7/10

Redo of Healer

It’s basically just rape hentai with a budget. Honestly, I appreciate the boldness of the show, if anything. (Aside from the fact that they don’t show any dick or vag. How cowardly.) The sex scenes are decent and frequent, so no complaints there. I’m not really into rape (been there, getting raped isn’t fun), but a true hentai connoisseur can still appreciate it.

Plot-wise, it’s neat. Making the main character a revenge-seeking rapist fighting even worse rapists is an interesting take. And there’s a lot of fun creativity in how he uses his powers, though I wish they explained them more. Like I get how he’s doing everything, but breaking it down would make them feel more intriguing. He’s also a broken self-insert power fantasy, but it’s nice seeing one that’s smart, evil and methodical. 

In execution, it’s a pretty generic story with generic settings and plots. The lead’s carrying the whole thing, though I can’t help but like the villains for being so over-the-top evil. If nothing else, the audacity and sex scenes make this show worth watching. Pretty entertaining.

Re: The harem. Setsuna is too young and innocent for my tastes, but I like her. The white-haired girl is cool, she’s my favorite even though she hasn’t really done anything yet. Freia’s meh, but I like the idea of her being a major cunt despite the memory wipe. 

I give this one five rapes out of ten. And if you like this show, I recommend reading that one Megg, Mogg & Owl comic where the characters become obsessed with rape-based puns.

Re:Zero (Season 2, second half)

I love this show. The first season was pretty good. The second half of season 2 was also pretty good, and the plot was shaping up to be great. But now we’re in the second half of season 2, and it’s meh. Which is really disappointing for such a great show.

Like, I get what they’re trying to do: they’re shaping up alliances, digging into the characters’ pasts, moving everyone forward, yadda yadda. But this arc is so slow now. It feels like we’ve seen nothing but flashbacks, characters standing around and talking, flashbacks, more talking, flashbacks. There’s so little action to break things up. The mystery and exploration from earlier episodes is gone, since we pretty much understand the important things. We’re just left waiting for the things they’ve been building up to, to finally happen. 

“AEUUGHG You’re Just an action anime fanboyyy, this is serious plot and excellent story!!” It’s endless exposition, flashbacks that go on way too long, and characters standing around and repeating the same points over and over. Compare how the story was delivered in the previous season. 

6/10

The Promised Neverland (Season 2)

Boy, did this show go off the rails in only a few episodes. What the fuck is even going on in this show anymore?

I ranted about this show on Twitter, but it pisses me off. Season 1 was a well-crafted, suspenseful show about these kids using their brains to unravel the mysteries around them, plan a daring escape from their captors and try to survive in a world of monsters. It was easily one of the best anime of 2019.

Season 2 skips about 80 chapters and off-screens tons of development. Like Norman fucking shows up in season 2, all fine and dandy with his own personal army of freaks. Also he lead his own escape, learned a ton of info AND found a way to auto-kill all their enemies, and we didn’t even get a flashback of any of this. Now Emma’s bitching about saving demons, even though they’re all assholes who probably wouldn’t change their ways even if they could. But she’s an iDeAlIsSTTT!!!!! But she was an idealist last season and had to learn how to compromise when faced with the reality of the situation? And the whole William Minerva plot, which was a major driving force in the last season, was handwaved away and unceremoniously dropped?

So yeah, I dropped it after episode 4 or 5. It’s not even fun to hate-watch I’d give it a 3/10 on its own, but it gets a -2/10 for ruining a great legacy.

Sk8

Free!, except they’re skating instead of swimming. It’s a well-animated show with an interesting premise: undergound gay skateboarding. The battles are fun, the characters (while cliche) are appealing, and it’s fun. And yeah. 

But I dropped this one because Langa is boring as a lead. Canadians, they don’t deserve representation. He’s a fine character besides that, but he’s gotten way too much screentime over the other protag, Reki. Reki was just pushed aside and the show quickly became about Langa. Which is sad, because I feel like this show would have benefitted from making them both stars. Especially since the characters’ friendship is a key selling point.

Ended up dropping this show. I read through later comments that they’re making a plot point about Reki falling behind, but even the fans are having their doubts that he’ll have a satisfactory story. And even if they make him a real protag again, the show’s been so imbalanced that I don’t think it’ll matter. Especially since we only have like 4 episodes left.

6/10

Yashahime

The sequel to Inuyasha, staring Sesshomaru and Rin’s twins, and Inuyasha and Kagome’s daughter. Except 2/3rds of the main cast are dull, and most of the stories are blatant retreads of Inuyasha plots, starring retreads of Inuyasha characters.

Think I’m kidding? The first episode was about Mistress Three-Eyes (Mistress Centipede but with three eyes instead of two) coming to eat the character’s magic sacred jewels. Rainbow fucking pearls, what the hell is this shit plot. Fuck you.

“Euhrghhghgh but they’re just paying homage to the old show!” Nah, they’re fucking ripping it off every step of the way. 

The most frustrating thing about this show is how Moroha, Inuyasha and Kagome’s daughter, is such a great character. She has great dynamics with other characters because she’s so lively. She has the best traits of her parents, while still being unique on her own. Then you have Sesshomaru’s kids, who are just Kagome 2 and Tsundere. The latter has more depth than that, but she’s  not that great anyway.

Guess who’s the focal point of the series? The fucking Kagome knock-off, followed by the tsundere. Moroha is a minor character who is often forgotten by the plot, or reduced to a joke. The already-boring plots are exacerbated by them ignoring best girl to focus on 

And I’m not alone on this, too. Read all the anime forums, pirating websites, and pretty much anywhere talking about this show. Moroha is the most popular character, far and away. People like her way more than the twins. 

4/10