#moon literally canonically has multiple complaints about him

[chloesimaginationthings]

Michael knows FNAF Moon is a lawsuit waiting to happen

[luki-fanfic]

Helluva Boss 5: The Harvest Moon Festival

Huh, Helluva Boss usually drops by mid month. Wonder why this episode is taking so long to put toget-

*Episode airs*

0_0

Oh. That’s why.

I’ll admit it, my interest in HB was waning. Episode 3 and 4 honestly didn’t do much to keep me interested. Spring Broken had a lot of plot and writing issues, and I felt the concept could have been better executed. C.H.E.R.U.B was more solid, but did have some issues, and just wasn’t that fun to watch.

Harvest Moon on the other hand? Oh boy, now there’s an episode. I am, if you’ll pardon the pun, back on this horse. World building, the action scenes, incredible animation, relationship development of the bad kind, more worlds, interesting characters! It gives us so much to work with.

Spoilers abound, so read carefully.

That said, I will start this with my biggest complaint – and it’s one I’ve had for several episodes, but this one really rammed it home due to the ‘sneak peak’ clip we had of the opening. In the black and white boards, the swearing was limited, and honestly the writing was pretty witty. Then we got the finished product – certain lines were missing, and several words had been replaced with random swearing. Considering what the scene was, it felt like the finished product was a step down – I really wish the scriptwriters would realise random swearing isn’t always funny, and they’ve given proof that their writing is snappy as is.

Anyway...onto the actual episode. We learn that I.M.P seems to be building up their business as Blitzø has 15 clients looking for a kill. Considering he had to do a sale to get a multiple kill, and the other episodes show him basically going out straight after getting the job, they’re clearly building up a name for themselves.

This is further shown with the arrival of Striker, who compliments his decision to go into business for himself, since most Imps don’t. This is new information, since we’ve seen Wally attempt to start his own business – although clearly it wasn’t going well – but if Striker is to be believed, most companies in Hell, even Imp City, don’t have Imps as the owners. Maybe it’s a financial capital thing, maybe it’s partially Hell’s racism, or maybe Imps just generally prefer to follow, which Striker seems to allude later. It’s hard to say with the information we’ve got at this point, but it does put I.M.P in a slightly different light – and probably explains why Blitzø is fairly incompetent when it comes to running the whole thing. He has literally no one to ask or use as an example, and the society he lives in generally assumes he’s going to fail by the nature of him being an Imp.

In fact, even though Blitzø owns I.M.P, he is still completely dependent on Stolas and his Grimoire. Without it, I.M.P is screwed – the reason they’re even at the Harvest Festival is because they can’t work. And that’s what Striker tells him in the final act. Their society has made sure that he can never truly be successful on his own merit, no matter how hard he tries.

I’ve seen some debate on whether what Striker told Blitzø was true or just an attempt to let his guard down. It’s hard to say, because Striker says and does some very conflicting things, but I’m going to believe it was genuine. Why?

He lets Millie and Moxxie live to have leverage over him. He does insult Blitzø to their faces, but why would he need leverage once his job was done?

When Moxxie learns the truth, he doesn’t even try to talk him round, just kill him. Millie is also tossed to the side – possibly because neither of them are ‘superior.' Blitzø gets a full on speech about their superiority and how much he respects him, even if he’s hiding a knife in his tail for if he can’t talk him round.

When he has Blitzø on the ground at his mercy, he doesn’t mock him. Instead, he tells him he genuinely thought they’d be a good team. He had the advantage, but doesn’t take the chance to continue the insult.

Like most Imps, Striker seems to dislike the demon royalty, but at the end of the day, is also working for one (and can I say that twist was brilliantly well done? It made SO much sense but I honestly didn’t see it coming). What is his end goal? Is he envious that Blitzø has some kind of power of Stolas while he has to be obedient? Is he aiming to kill Stella once Stolas is down? Maybe opening an assassination business to take out anything Overlord and above? We just don’t know.

And with that, we’ll step off this train of thought to speak about something else very important in this episode. Stolas. Specifically his relationship with Blitzø, and precisely how wrong it is.

I admit it, I future-shipped them, especially thanks to the Instagram (which become a bit of a bait and switch when the insta-accounts were declared ‘non-canon’). I acknowledged that the relationship was problematic and needed some serious work on both sides before it could really be a functioning relationship, but this episode hammered home exactly how much needs to happen in a way the other episodes didn’t. The pilot and Murder Family treated Stolas as a gag, and then Loo Loo Land made us all care about him and his actions. But Harvest Moon showed the other side of it, and I'm not sure the ship can realistically recover.

Stolas considers Imps as inferior, to a ridiculous degree, and Blitzø is no exception. He has absolutely no respect for Blitzø, and holds all the power in the relationship. We saw this a little in the previous episodes, but they were either alone, or Blitzø was working for him, and surrounded by people aware of the relationship. His actions could be somewhat explained away.

In Harvest Moon, Stolas proves he treats Blitzø this way even in public. Blitzø has very obvious issues regarding his name, so Stolas persistently using a nickname and treating him the way he does around people who aren’t aware, says a lot about how much Stolas doesn’t care about Blitzø’s opinions. Even if Blitzø does have some feelings for him – which I do suspect due to his panicked attempt to explain it as transactional. If he didn’t care, he would probably find it easier to explain. At the same time though, he’d be happier if he could get the book without the monthly visits, because what he has with Stolas isn’t a relationship, no matter what Stolas tries to pretend. Any feelings Blitzø develops puts him even further under his control.

Part of me wonders if the relationship evolved between the pilot and the first episode in planning, and that’s why we have such a disconnect between the Insta relationship and the canon one. I’m really hoping the series addresses it in the future.

Finally, lets talk about that final reveal. Stella has hired a hitman to kill Stolas – even armed him with two angel-tech guns.

(Which, also finally gives us confirmation that Imps/Hellhounds/Succubi can die from conventional weapons, but the higher ranked native demons need angel weaponry to off them).

Stella is also confident enough to scream it over the dinner table. Stolas either doesn’t care, or isn’t paying attention – if he doesn’t care, if definitely puts his motives regarding the original invite up in the air, but if he isn’t paying attention? Then it’s another point in the anti-Stolas tab.

That said, this scenario does ask a question. Why don’t these two divorce? Stolas is clearly not in love any more, and living together clearly isn’t doing Octavia’s mental health any favours if she’s literally hiding behind her music rather than interact with her parents. He should be the first to offer a divorce, but he hasn’t brought it up. And if he hasn’t, maybe the reason Stella hasn’t is because they can’t?

It’s generally assumed that the two of them have an arranged marriage, and that Stella’s anger at his relationship with Blitzø is due to his status more than the cheating. But then wouldn’t it make more sense to hire a hitman to kill Blitzø rather than Stolas? Choosing to kill Stolas, even if it would hurt Octavia, suggests it’s the only option left to her.

I’m guessing we’ll (finally) get some Stella development next time Striker appears, and get an idea of what makes her tick. But for now, I suspect the two of them regularly had lovers on the side, but kept it discreet until this point. Stolas refusing to keep his relationship with Blitzø quiet is causing untold damage to their name and status. Stella wants rid of a man who not only doesn’t love her (if he ever did), but is constantly humiliating her for not hiding his much lower class lover (which we know by this episode he doesn’t even attempt), and since the rules of Hell for demons of their status doesn’t allow divorce (or perhaps their arrangement doesn’t), assassination it is.

Hell, maybe the plan was to kill Stolas, and frame Blitzø for it. Striker clearly knew about their relationship before they met (which should have been a red flag now that I thing about it), so Stella probably mentioned him. It would also put the recruiting on another level, if Striker actually did get Blitzø involved at the final moment and teamed up.

Oh, and as a final amendment? If that angel-gun that Striker left behind is not now in the hands of I.M.P and becomes a key piece when Asmodeus, Mammon and the real Fizzarolli show up? I will be very disappointed.

[sexycraisinthanos]

I’m gonna infodump about my favorite movie

Rise of the Guardians

It’ll be under the readmore, but TL;DR: Watch Rise of the Guardians and read the books

Rise of the Guardians is a 2012 animated film released by Dreamworks. The story is childhood figures (Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, Sandman, and Jack Frost) trying to defend the children of earth against Pitch Black, (The Boogeyman) 

It’s based on a book series called Guardians of Childhood, written by William Joyce. Who, if you don’t know, writes children’s book. Guardians of Childhood is more of a “Young Adult” series compared to his other Guardians books (The Man in the Moon, Sandman: The Story of Sanderson Mansnoozie, and Jack Frost are all part of the series, but they are picture books.)

He’s also written other books you may be familiar with.

The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs and A Day with Wilbur Robinson 

Sound familiar?

Maybe you’d recognize them as their movie counterparts, Epic (animated by Blue Sky Studios) and Meet the Robinsons (animated of course by Disney)

Also Rolie Polie Olie, which was a favorite Disney Jr cartoon growing up for me, and was also a book series. 

I could honestly go on and on about William Joyce, his work was a part of my childhood a LOT (even credited for working on some of my favorite films like Buddy, Robots, Toy Story, and A Bug’s Life) and that’s probably why I love ROTG so much.

I read all of the Guardians books and own all of them save for Jack Frost and The Art of Rise of the Guardians and the books are not cheap, but what books are? I have HARD COVER BITCHES. Half of them were gifts and I also own the ROTG DVD.

The art in the books (all drawn by William Joyce himself) is really good (this is my favorite art from the books)

And the animation in the movie, as expected from Dreamworks, is beautiful. 

You get to see all their unique homes and they’re such varying types of environments. Of course, you have the North Pole, where it’s chaotic and wonderful. Just look at this concept art 

And then you have the Tooth Palace, where the Tooth Fairy does her work

It’s very obvious that there are some Indian inspirations in the design because Tooth herself is actually Middle-Eastern (in the books it’s explained in depth more and one of my complaints about the movie is that they whitewashed her even though her concept art in the ending credits shows her with brown skin)

The Warren, where the Easter Bunny paints his eggs

Which is something you never really think about because people only focus on the North pole so seeing so much thought put into it is really nice

We never see where Sandy works/lives (in the MOVIE. But the GAME on the other hand lets you explore EVERYONE’S homes and that’s a whole nother story)

We DO however see Pitch’s lair and

it’s rightfully spooky. When you actually see the scene play out in the lair, you get all confused and don’t know which way is which and it always unsettles me which is GOOD because that’s what it’s SUPPOSED to do

What’s really unique about ROTG is that there’s a source material (and as of now there are eight books (five novels, three picture books) and the series isn’t DONE yet) and instead of turning the books into a movie even though the plot is literally RIGHT THERE, they took the source material and turned it into a prologue. The movie takes place about 300 years after the books do and since the books are supposedly still ongoing, and William Joyce was CONTINUING to write the series while the movie was in production. (Three books have come out since the movie came out.)

I love how challenging that must have been for William to try to include stuff from his previous books in the movie AND to try and link the movie to his newer books despite some continuity errors (also worth noting that he has written a book about Santa and his wife, but Mrs. Claus is YET to be seen or even mentioned in the movie) but I appreciate the effort he put into it and I can’t wait to see what else he’ll come up with.

The characters look a BIT different from their book counterparts

Jack is voiced by Chris Pine and his voice is WAY TOO DEEP and the creators can’t agree on an age for him (book age is 14, but he can age himself up and down to a certain point and some producers said they imagined him 17 or 18) and (imo) I think Jack’s design was pretty lazy (a blue jacket with brown pants) compared to everyone else’s. I mean you have North, who is 

BIG

His design is based more on the worldly Father Christmas than the Saint Nick/Santa that we know. 

When he’s not in the Pole he’s wearing his big red fur coat and a cossack hat

Because he’s Russian

I’m pretty sure he canonically was raised by bears but that may have just been me imagining it. His book appearance is way different because when we meet him, he’s not Santa yet. So he’s still young

Of course, as the books go on, he looks like Santa

Bunny has the most drastic character change from his book design, as depicted by this fanart (which i couldn’t find a credit for that wasn’t pinterest so if anyone knows please tell me)

And there’s a CANONICAL reason why he looks so different (two actually)

Once they put Hugh Jackman in the role, they wanted a more dry Australian ranger-type design for him, and then the robes got in the way because of how he was moving, even when they changed him to just a lab coat, so they decided to forgo clothes altogether

Fun fact about Bunny. He’s a Pooka, a shapeshifting folklore creature that can turn into either a rabbit, goat, cat, dog, or horse. (or even a human with animal like features) Which actually gives a lot of people the headcanon that Pitch uses the souls of all Bunny’s dead people (yep he’s a sole survivor) as Nightmares

But he’s a different kind of Pooka. He’s an alien technically. And this breed of Pooka CANNOT eat chocolate because it does things to their body. Like giving him six arms. Or making his ears into helicopter propellers. 

This is relevant because he uses chocolate in battle multiple times. So the canonical explanation for why Bunny looks so different is that he ate too much chocolate and it permanently changed his body.

Which I love. I could go on about him but all the characters are interesting

Tooth has probably the second most confusing design

She’s based off a hummingbird with dragonfly wings, which aesthetically makes so much sense, but in the books she has regular feather wings. I also don’t like how weird her proportions are. Her feet are tiny nubs, her head is too big for her body (her body is actually pretty nicely designed it’s just every other part of it that bothers me) and I already mentioned the whitewashing

PITCH on the other hand had the biggest glow down compared to the books

He’s just wearing a black robe and, apparently, he doesn’t even have sleeves, which you can’t even really tell because it’s just all smudgy and shit

I mean I guess that’s the point, that he looks like he’s clothed in shadow, but it’s frustrating to look at especially compared to his book design where he’s wearing a FABULOUS coat

Meanwhile Sandy has the PERFECT character design

He’s just ROUND and wears a bathrobe made of sand. Like it’s not even that different from his book design (his hair has more frills than the book version) because it’s such a perfect design and I love how he’s animated. You can’t see it that well because the gif quality, but the sand also sparkles and it just makes it so fun to watch on screen 

The movie itself has its share of flaws. (the movie likes to pick and choose the rules it wants to follow about its universe, a huge plothole, and some cheaply constructed arguments between characters that really just make me annoyed because I don’t want to see the easter bunny making a child cry I want to see him get into a fist fight with Santa it’s like you don’t even KNOW your demographic) But I love it and there’s SO MUCH I could talk about. There are characters in the books that weren’t in the movie and there were characters in the movie that weren’t in the books (because they weren’t born yet but IRRELEVANT) 

It was a HUGE flop despite critics praising it. Like 8,000 people lost their jobs over it that’s how big a flop it was. But it’s such a dear movie to me and it’s clear that William Joyce holds this series close to his heart (dedicating it and the movie to his late daughter) which makes sense because it’s based on stories he told her when she was young and I’m so honored that he chose to share these stories with us. I just love the series and I should do a re-read at some point

[lost-eternity]

Match Up Requests: CLOSED Please read the pinned rules before requesting

Match up for: @ happythoughtfulstarfish

Okie dokie. I match you with...

Peter Parker/Spider man!

First of all, girl, you're very pretty :). Just thought that I would say that. Right. On to the match up.

Like, from appearances alone. You two would compliment each other so well. 🥰

With heels on, you'd most likely be taller than Peter Parker. 

Like. How dare you! He would do his best to one up you.

You occasionally catch him standing on his toes to try and match your height. And you look over at him like "???"

Cue mumbled excuses and awkward laughing

Then one day your heels go missing. And as you're looking around, you notice Peter is standing surprisingly tall. Upon further investigation you notice that he put on your heels. 

Would this guy actually steal your own heels just to one up you? He'll, yeah he would. It's all in fun and games though and he isn't too serious about it. 

But personality wise? Even better.

You are both serious nerds

It's not technically official but I head-canon that Peter Parker is a theatre nerd as well. I could just be Tom Holland seeping through but he gives off those theatre kid vibes.

You know how I mean.

He'd be wholly supportive of your hobbies. He would love to go and spontaneously buy random tickets to musicals on Broadway, even if you two don't get the best of seats. 

Just be prepared to watch a lot of cult classics with him.

Like. A lot.

Especially Star Wars. You two will watch those movies so many times. And every single time he will be dramatically (poorly) mouthing the lines along with the film because let's be real- he has all of the movie scripts memorized. 

He would also love to learn how to play an instrument from you. He'd be really bad at it. Honestly, he would be playing horrendously with this puppy-like jubilation that makes up entirely for his horrible pitch. It's adorable, really. 

Your morals also align perfectly and that works out very well because the both of you are incredibly stubborn and steadfast in your resolve. You both strive to see the best in people, even if it puts you in jeopardy. Critics would call it gullibility. But you would be able to keep each other in check.

Sometimes.

You would be a massive headache for those in SHIELD or anyone assigned to manage you.

I can imagine Peter roping you into one of his elaborate schemes after getting hyped on caffeine and the two of you raising hell together. With the best of intentions, of course.

Like, "no. You cannot kidnap an ice cream truck and drive it to the orphanage for the kids. That is called theft and that's illegal."

"I don't care if it will make the children happy!"

You both have an incredible drive to help others. Peter's just manifests in a way that is a lot more... potentially lethal. Whereas you are content enough to simply volunteer your time. 

Just. Don't ask to go with him on one of his super hero missions.

Trust me.

Peter has already lost people in his life. The poor boy would never forgive himself if he lost you as a result of his ineptitude on a mission. 

Don't put him through that

Because he is awkward as well, you two would do very well to motivate each other and encourage one another to step outside of your comfort zones.

Meet to new, make new friends

Honestly, you’d be perfect together

~

You probably met Peter's sophomore year of College.

It's a funny story actually. 

You volunteered with a charity service who was hosting a musical, "The Adams Family" The ticket revenue collected during the performances would be put to relief and conservation efforts in foreign countries.

Everything was extremely low budget. All of the cast members were volunteers and very few actually had much theatrical experience. 

But you did not mind too much. You were cast to play the role of Morticia. So no complaints there!

The venue you were performing in was actually lent to you for free. It was on a college campus, and the auditorium was actually decently sized.

The previous performances went off rather smoothly. The turn-outs had been decent as well, thankfully.  

It was closing night. Your final performance for the night. The audience was slowly filling into the room, that was when it happened.

One of the crewmembers on hair and makeup, completely new to the theatre environment actually asked out loud: "Wait, why can't we say 'Macbeth' again?"

Silence 

Dead Silence 

So quiet that the muted chatter of the audience could be heard from behind the heavy oaken doors of the female changing room.

The shit storm that followed would have been absolutely hysterical if everyone were not so panicked.

Those in the cast who actually had experience in theatre arts were whisper-shouting at the offending crewmember.

The others looked on, an expression of complete confusion plastered onto their brow

It's not like you could have sent her out to run around the entire college campus. You were on in 5.

Collectively,  you all decided to let it go.

It was just a legend after all.

"We'll be fine."

At least, that is what everyone told themselves. 

~

The night, surprisingly, went off without a hitch. There were a few technical difficulties with the lighting (the spotlight "affectionately" named Big Bertha refused to fully open its iris) and a few missed cues, but otherwise, the performance did not terribly fail as many feared. 

~

You and the rest of the cast were now hurriedly darting back from the bathrooms after intermission. It was a frenzied sprint around the back of the building to avoid the audience catching a glimpse of you. 

That was when you heard something that caused you to peel off the rest of the group.

It was this peculiar scuttling sound, followed by a darting figure.

You initially thought it was an audience member who had lost their way and turned down the winding path.

The narrow road itself was completely innocuous and actually just led to a dorm site. However, under the dark of the new moon, illuminated by few stray streetlamps, it felt kinda ominous. 

Having to remind yourself that you weren't actually in a horror movie, you continued down the path towards the figure, asking him if he were all right.

Then he stepped into the flood of light from a lamp, his movements kinda janky and angled.

This "person" was not a person at all. Rather it was a humanoid beast covered completely in rippling grey fur. Like 'Cousin It' jumped right out of the play and appeared on the street. But this wasn't your cousin. You knew the little girl who played him and she was much... much shorter. This thing cleared 213 centimetres! 

You wisely decided to run. 

And it gave chase, scuttling after you like some malformed beast.

So here you were, still in complete costume, being chased down the street but a Cousin It lookalike and screaming your lungs out.

You didn't get really far because Morticia's sprawling mermaid dress did little to help you move your legs. 

Cousin It caught up to you, a clawed appendage swiping against your ankles.

With a loud rip the dress tore and you fell. Pain flared through your elbows made contact with the grated pavement. 

Rolling onto your back,  you gazed up at the creature. Its purple fur glowing dimly under the backlighting of the street lamp.

For the first time you noticed its eyes, multiple gleaming plates meshed together to form one bulging eyeball,  like a fly or moth. Its mangy hair, overgrown and matted, reeked with a permeating stench you can only describe as rotting eggs. 

So maybe you were in a horror movie. And the horror movie was 'Mothman'... or maybe the curse of Macbeth was here and this creature was coming from retribution.  

Regardless of the reason, you did not have too long to think about it as the creature took a lumbering step towards you.  Then another... and a third... then it paused. 

It pulled against something, like a dog heaving against its leash. But it couldn't move another step 

"Stay where you are, Mothra." A trilling voice called. 

Blinking, you noticed a figure perching on the top of the lamp post, hanging upside down from a glistening web. Another web was attached around the creature's waist, preventing it from advancing. 

The blue and red was unmistakable. 

This was spider man! 

But why is he here? 

Cousin it gave a roar of complaint and swiped for the spider. He nimbly dodged out of the way, laughing the entire time. 

It was not long before he had Cousin It wrapped up in a thick cocoon of webbing, and was absently dialing something on his phone. 

You heard him mumble something about how much of a nuisance "A-Chiltarians" were. 

A-Chiltarians?

What was that supposed to be?

Spiderman seemed to notice you for the first time, and apologetically offered to escort you back to the play.

Which was practically ruined as intermission was over and no one seemed to be able to locate you

The audience was beginning to get antsy

To make up for lost time, Spider man grabbed you round your waist

Before you knew it, the two of you were flying 

Swinging from tree to lamp as you glided across the ground back towards the theatre. 

He dropped you off, literally dropped you, onto the stage, just in time for your next scene. 

You could hardly act through the confusion of WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED TO ME

The rest of the night, you were understandably preoccupied 

~

After the performance, the cast stood along the hallway, allowing the audience to meet and greet with them and pass out gifts.

A young man garnered your attention in particular 

With hazel eyes and mousy hair, he introduced himself as "Peter" and handed you a bouquet of flowers

And you find yourself looking at him like "Do I know you?"

He seemed rather apologetic for whatever reason and praised your performance 

Getting suspicious, especially after the events of that night, you had a feeling that he knew something he was not letting on to.

So you asked for his number.

And to your complete shock, he actually gave it

So. Over the course of one night, you were saved by the legendary spider man and got the number of a cute boy.

Maybe the curse of Macbeth is not so bad after all

[doctordisaster]

Okay, so about the space movie: it is not good. I haven’t come out of a star war feeling this disappointed since the prequels. It’s worse than revenge of the sith. I think it must be better than phantom menace, but I’m not sure. That’s how bad it is: I’d need to rewatch the worst installment in the series to confidently rank the newest.

I’ve seen some people say they enjoyed it in the theater but liked it less the more they thought about it — which was more or less my experience with Solo. That was not my experience this time. I was numbed, bored, or annoyed for most of the movie’s runtime. There are a few good moments, but it is by and large just not fun to watch.

It also appears to have been plotted by an angry mob of reddit incels. Bad fan theories, unwanted redemption arcs, and pointless throwbacks rule the day. Assholes drove Kelly Marie Tran off of Twitter; JJ Abrams drove Kelly Marie Tran out of Star Wars. Every moment of character development from the previous film was actively and loudly reversed. As a matter of fact, every status quo change in this very film was reversed, usually within seconds of screen time. At every point at which the movie ought to have turned right, it turned left.

Below the cut I’m going to list things I liked and things I didn’t. Don’t read it if you want to be surprised by the movie's disappointments live in the theater.

Good things in space movie no. 9:

The little goblin who works on droids is cute

Lando’s scenes are all very nice

Chewie trying to hide in a crowd was funny

Wedge! I love Wedge!

I loved the design of Kylo Ren’s space office

The moment where literally every spaceship that has ever been in a star war shows up. Also the moment where literally every person who has ever played a Jedi speaks a line. These are each a nice gimmick, although I am not sure both should have been used, and certainly not that close together.

I like the moment where Poe and The Female Person Poe Put His Definitely Heterosexual Penis Into At Some Point In The Past have a whole conversation just with their facial expressions. It’s especially impressive because The Female Person Poe Put His Definitely Heterosexual Penis Into At Some Point In The Past is wearing a metal helmet that entirely conceals her face.

The scene where Finn and The Female Person Finn Is Going To Put His Definitely Heterosexual Penis Into At Some Point In The Future bond over the shared elements of their history was very nice.

The scene where force ghost Luke explains that he was wrong to isolate himself from the universe is nowhere near as good as any of Luke and Rey’s scenes in TLJ, but it’s definitely necessary considering how confused some fans seemed to be on this point.

Some of the banter between the main three is quite fun

The scene of young Leia and Luke doing Jedi stuff is lovely and I wanted more of it.

Bad things in movie 9 from outer space:

Everything about Palpatine. Bringing him back is stupid. His plan is stupid. His inexplicable motivations are stupid. The fact that he has apparently just been sitting on his ass for 40 years is really stupid. Not explaining how he survived being thrown down a bottomless pit, exploding, and then the station he was on also exploding is extremely stupid.

Speaking of stupid, Rey Palpatine is the single worst idea that has ever been in any of these films. One of the most obnoxious things about JJ Abrams “mystery boxes” is that the mystery he deems the holy grail of box mysteries and buries deep deep down at the bottom of the mystery box is consistently something obvious and bad and not even slightly clever. There were literally two dumb fan theories for Rey’s parentage — Kenobi and Palpatine — and Palpatine was the one that was dumber.

It’s worse than midiclorians, because now Palpy fucks. Palpy canonically fucks.

Gross.

The only potentially good thing about bringing back Palpy is getting to enjoy Ian McDiarmid’s gloriously campy performance again, but for some goddamn reason they trap him on an empty soundstage lit only by strobes, then color grade everything to pure gray so you can’t fucking see what’s going on.

I get that it’s supposed to be the heart of evil and darkness, but good production design can evoke that without making it impossible to see the actors and unpleasant to look at the frame

Speaking of which, how is this movie so ugly??? There are maybe three visually nice locations and everything else is just hideous. This is a complaint I’d never even consider leveling at a previous star war. Even the shittiest ones were beautiful to look at.

Every Star Destroyer has an onboard death star superlaser now. I started by booing, saw that the superlasers are just a metal cock and balls, and then laughed my ass off through the rest of the supposedly serious scene where it blows up a planet.

The way you kill a star destroyer now is you shoot it in its dick

The only people who will be pleased by this movie are Reylo shippers and that is a horrible thing to be true

The macguffin chase that constitutes the first two thirds of this movie is pointless and boring. I especially loved the multiple times when someone lost a macguffin only to go “oh I forgot I have a spare in the glovebox”

Can we even list all the times something supposedly momentous happened only to be reversed moments later?

chewie dies! wait it was somehow the wrong ship even though they were in the middle of a literal fucking desert and there was no other ship around

The Female Person Poe Put His Definitely Heterosexual Penis Into At Some Point In The Past just got obliterated along with her entire planet by a different penis, this one attached to a star destroyer! oh wait she didn’t. no explanation she just didn’t die.

also the droid gremlin is with her

hux turned spy for the resist— oh wait he’s dead

Rey killed Kylo! But she feels bad so she heals him back

Palpatine just killed Kylo! Oh wait he didn’t. No explanation he just didn’t die, because JJ needed him to immediately reverse another supposedly momentous death.

Kylo smashed the macguffin! we’re doomed oh wait glovebox

Palpatine just electrocuted the entire rebel fleet to death! oh they got better

There’s absolutely no way to get across these waves! Oh wait Rey just... went across them

Well maybe it’s because she has the force and was able to oh wait Finn just went across them too

Well maybe that’s because The Female Person Finn Is Going To Put His Definitely Heterosexual Penis Into At Some Point In The Future is such an expert at navigating the oh wait Kylo is there as well

If only this movie took place in a universe with vehicles that do not touch the ground, we could have skipped this entire stupid subplot

3po makes a massive sacrifice by allowing his memory to be wiped! oh wait he had a backup

I also hate that 3po’s memory wipe is treated, before it happens, with pathos and gravitas, and then the moment he actually loses everything about his life and all his friends, it’s IMMEDIATELY treated as a joke

I love the way Rey is briefly dead but then Kylo goes “oh no!” and uses the last of his life force to bring her back. I wanted her to go “oh no!” and then use the last of her life force to bring him back. And then he’d go “oh no!” and use the last of his life force to

When the emperor dies, they show a montage of star destroyers blowing up elsewhere in the galaxy. Including one over endor? Why did they have a star destroyer over endor. How did the ewoks blow it up? Did they tie a log to one of the other moons and another log to another other moon and then cut the vines and the logs went smoosh

At the start of the movie Palpy promises Kylo his throne and limitless power in exchange for the one thing he wants most desperately in the world, which is for Rey to be dead. Then Rey shows up and Palpy goes “ah good you are here, I need you to kill me so my spirit can transfer to you” as though these demands aren’t utterly contradictory on every level. Then when she refuses he’s like “oh well, I suppose I can suck your and Kylo’s life forces out and rejuvenate myself to rule anew” as though that isn’t vastly preferable to plans A and B from his perspective

why is he in this movie

Having the knights of ren in this movie really justifies Rian Johnson’s choice not to have them in TLJ.

Every time the knights of ren appear, the timpanist bangs out the music cue for the sand people, so I think John Williams just decided that they ARE sand people in different hats.

Remember the eerie moment in TLJ where Rey and Kylo were connected across a vast distance through the force and Rey was in a monsoon and when the connection closed Kylo found some raindrops on his glove? Remember when Luke used a similar ability, without any physical transference, and the strain was so great that it ended his life? Now do you remember when TROS turned that into a totally mundane effortless 3d fax machine so they could pass necklaces and macguffins and lightsabers back and forth constantly, and even have whole physically real saber duels even though the script was too lazy to put them in the same place? Hey that fucking sucked

Remember Rose Tico? JJ doesn’t

The scene of Poe “micro-jumping” the Falcon is awful on so many levels. First of all, it’s just a one-off joke from Guardians of the Galaxy, but played straight for some reason. Second, changing the setting of the chase every few seconds makes the action just as numbing and impossible to follow as Michael Bay’s worst. Third, it makes no sense that the TIEs are following them through the microjumps, and the fact that they can do so makes the microjumps completely pointless. Why are you even microjumping if they can just follow you? Then the characters spend several scenes going on and on about what a big deal microjumps are, only for no one to ever do it or refer to it again.

Rey asks “what was snoke’s deal,” as though reading off a card with questions from our most obnoxious audience members, and Palpy goes “Snoke was my creation” which makes sense, like he trained the guy and equipped him and pulled his strings from the shadows and no, wait, the camera is panning over to a literal Jar O’ Snokes that Palpy just has handy in his empty strobelit soundstage.

I wish the camera had kept panning to show a Jar O’ Phasmas and a Jar O’ Huxes and maybe a Jar O’ Unkar Plutts so that all the characters from TFA could have an Offically Explained Back Story

If he put all the jars in another jar he could have a Jar Jar and the circle would be complete

I liked the part where they were having a lightsaber duel on a pier and the swings got slower and slower and finally they stopped and just kind of stared at each other like “wtf is even the point of this” because that was exactly how I felt at that moment.

tbh that was exactly how I felt for most of the movie