#not all engagements are listed on this post

[redacted-metallum]

Sometimes i see posts that are like. Making fun of the fact people draw the line for a lot of stuff in horror media at incest and im like. Well yeah it's a little odd to treat this one taboo as uniquely awful, all of those things listed can ruin someone's entire life, that's why it's in a horror story. It's supposed to be horrific, right? Incest and CSA ruin your ability to make proper relationships as an adult-

And then I look at the notes and people are calling incest cute and wholesome and saying there's nothing wrong with it and i go. I need to leave immediately actually you aren't engaging with this topic in a way I'm comfortable with.

[fookinhellcurlyy]

Larry in Jamaica Masterpost Pt. 2

This whole 1st quarter of 2017 was messy af and here's where the debunk thread from an anti I previously mentioned comes into play.

As I said in Part 1, "Since I don't have a full reference of what had transpired during that period, I decided to take on the responsibility of collating information across the internet, including this account's own debunks for transparency."

I will piece things together from the beginning of the year to have a clearer view of the timeline.

[PS: Don't go RT-ing / engaging with the debunk thread of the anti. The important thing is we're taking their claims into consideration so as not to 'intentionally miss' any pertinent details for this timeline.]

—

March 2017

January to early May 2017 HL Timeline Summary by @wesharethatreallyy | x

NOTE: I didn't take a screenshot of the whole thing as I only mainly wanted to highlight the 1st quarter + a little bit after. There are some stuff listed in the screenshot that might have been debunked already—fyi. I only took the ones I needed for my consolidated timeline (other half of this post). Lastly, the dates might be a bit different to my other screenshots below due to timezone differences.

—

Other events based on my own research + info from Larry accounts

The rose ring timeline by @skepticalarrie | x L followed Dover Street Market on 18 Feb - where he presumably bought the rose ring (from The Great Frog). 'Louis was also seen very close to a The Great Frog store in Soho around that same time.'

Note: I couldn't find other links about the fan photo with L in Soho to doublecheck the date.

Always You posts on 26/27 Feb. Do check out the Full timeline for 'Always You' for the bigger context.

The Sun reported on 27 Feb that Elounor was back and the two were on a holiday in Jamaica l | x

—

Timeline references used in the debunk thread.

NOTE: I crossed checked the references listed and added the links below.

Harry in London on 13 Feb | x

News on L being spotted at the airport by fans on 25 Feb (date of the photo could've been taken a day or two prior) | x x x

Note: The other two screenshots came from the source's tagged photos. They already deleted the original post. Take these fan accounts with huge grains of salt.

Daisy (sort of) confirmed on IG Live that L is bound for Jamaica on 24 Feb

H with a fan in London of 24 Feb | x

L arrested at LAX on 4 Mar

H spotted leaving a studio in London on 4 Mar | x x

Note: The rose ring appeared for the first that day.

—

Consolidated Timeline

Pre-Jamaica March 2017, mixed with the debunk thread's resources (color coded based on the references above)

⊹ 1.19 L and D broke up ⊹ 2.1 H's 23rd Birthday Party ⊹ 2.12 L and E papped in LA ⊹ 2.13 H in London ⊹ 2.18 L followed Dover Street Market on IG ⊹ 2.19 L and E 'rekindled' / official again | x ⊹ 2.23/24 L with fans at the airport (allegedly with E) ⊹ 2.24 Daisy confirming L was bound for Jamaica ⊹ 2.24 H with a fan in London ⊹ 2.27 L posts Always You ⊹ 2.27 The Sun reported E and L were official again + together in Jamaica ⊹ 3.4 L punched a pap at LAX ⊹ 3.4 H spotted leaving a studio in London + Rose ring appearance

—

Other Dates

H and L liked these photos in Feb 2018. | x

Receipt 2017 with Mitch (actual date unknown) | x x

—

Debunk Claims

Important: These were all from the debunk thread. OP's original handle can no longer be searched on IG. I'm not sure who contacted them back then as well. With a grain of salt, as always.

ON LARRIES SAYING THE MAR 2017 PHOTOS ALIGNED WITH H'S STAY IN JAMAICA (as stated in the circulating Jamaica Photo Timeline); AND THAT THE PHOTO WAS RELEASED IN OCT 2017.

TL;DR: Apparently, the OP claimed that the photo was taken on 1 Mar and posted on 5 Mar, as opposed to what larries knew (Oct 2017).

RESPONSES:

1.) Extra take about the anti's claim ("this girl confessed to seeing Louis and el making out"):

If we're looking into the actual words used in the convo with OP, the question was to confirm a couple of things. 1.) Did she actually see L and E? 2.) Making out? 3.) Walking? ETCETERA?

And looking into OP's answer, it was quite vague. She basically just said that she DID. But what was she confirming though? Was it that she did see them together? While they were walking around? Did she actually saw them make out? Or was it just assumed? (I'm not saying they weren't; they probably did tbh, knowing people would see and they needed them to - for that stunt).

2.) @twopoppies' post on Aug 2021 clearly stating that these were just rumors (THEORY) and that it was openly discussed that H was probably not there. | x

3.) And based on the timeline I've consolidated, it is possible that H was not there during L and E's getaway stunt in Jamaica. Could even be damage control thing considering how media outlets like Yahoo UK could easily piece things together (if an info of H&L being together in Jamaica ever leaked).

Yahoo UK's tweet (funny tweet bait tbh lol) on 19 Mar. | x

Actual Headline of the article posted on 19 Mar. | x

Note: L sighting in Jamaica earlier was stated in the article—E/'gf' not mentioned.

EXTRA:

There was this claim by larries I found that was also mentioned in the debunk thread: "In May 2017, Louis has a session with the same producer who works at Geejam Studios, where Harry recorded in Jamaica."

I don't have the energy to look into this anymore lol I don't think it's super relevant to my current timeline anyway. Please feel free to add it in if you know anything about it.

End of Timeline (as of 1/21)

PART I: Jan 2014 / Sep 2016

[the-nettle-knight]

@merthwyn unfortunately you're exactly the sort of conservative person that people in general think are the only ones interested in folklore and traditions. The first point of my post was that traditions and folklore are for everyone, from queer people to imagrants and acknowledging this is the first step in being able to celebrate the history of the poor people in this country and use it to reinforce class solidarity against racism, xenophobia and the rampant anti-queer sentiments this country is facing.

The second point of my post was to emphasise that the deliberate eroding of our folklore/traditions by conservatives (both big and little c) is allowing for the insecurities weaponised by the types of Tommy Robinson against imagrants. These traditions and folklore do still need challenging from a modern critical lense (like how blackface has been removed from Morris dancing). Nor should they be preserved exactly how they used to be, because folklore and customs have always changed with the times. Having a good understanding of our past, critically understanding and accepting of the problems in it will absolutely contribute to decolonisation. Hopefully, having a solid grasp of our own traditions and folklore in a meaningful positive way will allow us to step back from clinging desperately to the parts of Welsh, Scottish and Irish culture we cling to because we don't think we have our own. Doing so will also hopefully allow for more support of the Welsh, Scottish and Irish independence movements. Also, it will hopefully stop the rampant cultural appropriation of other sacred traditions - it's ridiculous that modern wiccans believe that smudging with a non native plant (white sage) that's being driven to extinction by over harvesting will clear any sort of bad luck.

Obviously I wasn't clear enough in my original post, so I will edit it to include these bits.

While I understand your enthusiasm for the topic, I'd recommend do some critical thinking into why you were disappointed by your uni course and by extension missed the point of my post. Accessing syllabus information and reading lists before picking your topic would have shown what the aim of your course was. Folklore studies is a thing you can actually do at university, but it probably would have been from the view that I took.

Being proud of our traditions isn't wrong but you have to acknowledge the racism and antisemitism that does exist in folklore to engage with it properly. It's ok to be uncomfortable with that cognitive disonnence, in fact, I encourage letting yourself sit in it and interrogate it further. Learning to be uncomfortable is a good thing, the same way learning to be bored is a good thing. It allows you to have difficult conversations and grow as a person. I know I still haven't figured out how to mesh the two feelings yet. Surely, if you're so proud of our traditions, you would be proud to share them with everyone and would be eager to see how they can be updated for the times in a way that would allow more people to engage with them?

To be clear, I am queer, trans, pagan and an archaeologist, all of which have informed my position on this topic

To other English people, stop saying "England has no culture", it is actively harming us. There is a reason the Tories defunded the arts and heritage sectors whilst scapegoating immigrants. The fear that immigrants will come and destroy Englishness is only working as the government is literally trying to actively wipe it out. If we a) recognise the things that are distinctly cultural (eg architecture styles) and b) actively participate in the traditions you're always told are silly (Morris and Molly dancing, scarecrow competitions and folk songs), it will actually make us better as a country and more difficult to divide via classism, racism and xenophobia

[torturedtypewritersdept]

a fucked up sort of eden - pt. two

✯ pairing:

firefighter!rafe cameron x fem!reader

✯ summary:

Rafe Cameron was good on his own, steady and sure, despite his adrenaline based nature; he was good on his own. His sisters long line of blind dates on his behalf leads him to you and from the very moment you walk out on the dinner, he knows he will never be the same again.

✯ warnings:

mature themes, mentions of anxiety, nostalgia, heartbreak, domestic violence (not rafe), injury, ghosting, fluff and fear, firefighter!rafe, past abuse, awkward!rafe, firefighter lingo, smut, etc.

✯ a/n:

nothing!! please don't engage if you have a hard time with any of these topics <3 this first chapter was originally posted on my old blog @/illicitfixations, @/lovelornanonymity and i have rewritten + reshared it here and will finally be continuing the rest of the series :)

The firehouse had become Rafe’s home long before he ever became a firefighter. It began with his incessant need to fix things, his sister’s broken arm at age nine the first of many things on a long, long list of things that he felt responsible for. His moral responsibility led him to the army, where he had become a marine, a sniper to be exact. He had seen a lot of things for a skinny kid just trying to defy his father. Coming home had been an adjustment, living in a world where every noise wasn’t a threat, the biggest one of all. His moral compass led his course again like a broken compass stuck in the one direction. This time, it had led him to a life of volunteering with the men he now called his family. 

Rafe lounged quietly in the living room of the firehouse, his copy of John Steinbeck’s East of Eden draped casually against his long fingertips. It’s a book, a story, that he knows well. He had identified early in life with Adam Trask, its main character. Adam is good-hearted, much like Rafe and his kind nature gets him into trouble. Again, much like Rafe. He cursed his sister in the same way that Adam’s brother cursed him for being his father’s favorite. But, with Sarah it was different. He wasn’t jealous of her. No, he cursed every hair on her perfect blonde head for being wrong about you, for not telling him that you were well – you. He cursed her for convincing him that you wouldn’t hurt him. His reality was very different as he watched you walk away from him, away from the corner booth in the hole in the wall restaurant he had met you at. Yeah, Rafe’s good nature got him in trouble quite a bit, but for some reason he found himself hopeful; hopeful that he’d run into you or he could convince his sister to give him your phone number. He hoped you’d give him a do-over. He hoped you were different in the way that he thought you were. He was brought out of his thoughts at the sound of the fire alarm sounding off, signaling to his brain that it was time to work. He sighed in contentment, a lazy smile plastered across his lips as his best friend, Topper, came into his view, smacking him across the head with the book that was previously in his hands. 

“Let’s go, Cameron. Can’t you hear the bell going off?” 

Topper asked, his lips turning up into a cocky, but annoyed smirk.

“I heard it, bud. I thought you’d do me a solid and handle this one for me.” 

Rafe inquired jokingly and Topper responded with a low chuckle as Rafe rose from where he previously laid. 

“Oh, come on, Rafferty! Don’t you want to go rescue a beautiful woman and let her stroke your savior complex or – your dick, whatever works.” 

Rafe couldn’t help but roll his eyes at his best pal, following his suit as he slid down the pole and into the locker room, layering his body with his uniform and climbing into the rig. 

— 

Your morning had been simple, a cup of coffee and your favorite book, Irene Hunt’s classic The Lottery Rose. Though you didn’t know it, you were much like Rafe in regard to your ability to empathize and place yourself within a character’s proximity. In the same way that he related to Adam’s character, you related to Georgie’s as the novel carries you through his life as a child experiencing domestic violence and his journey to healing as he escapes its hold. You felt it mirrored your life in a way – Georgie’s broken arm and your broken heart seemingly two shards from the same cut of glass, melding together like only broken pieces can. The book had saved your life in a lot of ways, the most prevalent one being that a kind nurse had given it to you to read in the hospital after your attack. You’d had a lot of feelings to work through and the book – it just helped in ways even you couldn’t understand and you’d reread it once a month ever since. 

You lounged on your sofa, dog-earring the page you were set to stop on as you read the last words of it before you rose easily from where you sat, grabbing your coffee cup in search of another round of caffeine. You made your way into the kitchen, placing your cup underneath the hood of your keurig as you placed another coffee pod into the canister and latched it closed, a resounding pop could be heard against the low hum of the wind as it brustled through the french doors just off of your third floor balcony. You listened to the sweet sound of your coffee pouring, the echo against your cup sending you into sweet bliss as the smell simultaneously hit your nose. As it finished and you began, stirring the french vanilla creamer into your cup of joe, you heard a faint meow and suddenly realized you had no idea where your cat, jackson, currently resided. You continue stirring your cup, when you heard it again. Though, this time, it sounded more like he was whining. Your feet padded across your living room quickly, the plush white carpet melding into the curve of your feet, following the other faint meows that you heard coming directly from your balcony. You thought nothing of it, moving quickly to open the doors and bring him inside. But, to your surprise, he wasn’t laying in the patio chair or on the rug. No – he was nowhere to be found and as your heart began to race, your anxiety-inducing feline meowed again, this time, rather loudly. It sounded like he was calling for help and as you looked up, you met his green eyes where he stood – in the tree across from your balcony.   

“Hey, buddy. You’ve gotten yourself in a predicament there, huh?” 

You asked, amusedly. He only responded with a meow that sounded more like a screech from a banshee. 

“Okay, okay, okay — I’m coming, buddy. Stay right there.” 

You said in trepidation. 

You moved quickly, not caring about anything other than getting your sweet boy back into your apartment safely. You slid only the white bunny slippers that sat next to your couch on your feet and ran out of the door with only your phone in your hand. 

— 

You stood underneath the oak tree that Jackson sat in, peering up at him through the leaves with one hand attempting to shield your eyes from the sun. The emerald colored leaves shook gently as the wind blew through them and Jackson's fearful meows echoed through your ears bringing tears to your eyes for the third time. You had tried tirelessly for the last hour to get him to jump down to you, assuring him you’d be there to catch him. But, he wasn’t interested. He was scared of everything, just like you and you couldn’t blame him really for taking after his mother. 

“Jackson! Goddamit — please, baby! Just jump. Mama’s right here.” 

You yelled exasperatedly, throwing your head back in defeat as you pondered finding a ladder and potentially breaking your neck was worth it. But, just as the thought crossed your mind, you felt a hand on your back, physically jumping at the foreign assault. 

“Remove your hand from my back. Now.” 

You gritted out, turning around to meet the eyes of a firefighter. He was cute in a I-go-the-gym-seven-days-a-week kind of way. But, he was currently crossing your boundaries so you weren’t interested, in fact, you were fucking disgusted. 

“Calm down, princess.” 

He does his best to soothe you in the middle of your freak out, though he does it in such a condescending way that it reminds you of your arch enemy, Taylor and his fists and just as you’re about to have a full blown panic attack you hear a voice you recognize. It’s sweet, yet savory, similar to a crepe on a Sunday morning. You turn toward the sound, your vision slightly blurry at the stress due to trauma that your body is responding to. The stranger that you now know as Rafe stands in front of you, his voice coaxing you out of the thick cloud of stress that lingered over you. 

“Hi, y/n. How are you?” 

He asks, smiling politely and you can only nod as you swallow thickly. 

“I don’t like this guy very much.” 

You whisper to him, your eyes looking in Topper’s direction and Rafe chuckles lowly. 

“Sometimes, I don’t either.” 

He whispers back to you and it elicited a deep laugh to erupt from the volcano of your belly. 

“Rude!” 

Topper groans, throwing his hands up in response and Rafe isn’t sure what it is, but the way your doe eyes are pulling him, is other worldly and all he wants to do is protect you; currently from his very best friend. 

“Top, i’ll take it from here.” 

He warns lowly and you smile at the way the man known as Top scurries away with his tail tucked between his legs. You wonder if Rafe is some kind of boss of the firemen that now lingered in the parking lot of your apartment complex. 

“What seems to be the problem, sweetheart?” 

Rafe asks and for a moment, you almost let the pet name slide with how good he looked in his uniform, yellow and grey had never looked so good you were convinced. 

“Please, no pet names. It’s just a personal preference.” 

You said, voice more weak than you had intended. He swallowed thickly and nodded. 

“Sorry, it’s just a habit. I like to use words like that to help calm people down when they’re scared. But, you seem to be okay. I’m sorry for overstepping.” 

He responds with a kind smile. 

“I understand. No worries. My problem is crouched on four legs up in that tree.” 

You said, pointing toward the leaves above your heads and he nodded. 

“Well, don’t fear, y/n. I’ll take care of it for you, i’ll get him down. I’m glad you called us. It’s nice to see you again.” 

He said politely. 

“You too, Rafe. But, I didn’t call. I think it was a neighbor. I was debating whether getting on a ladder and breaking my neck would be worth the trouble when your buddy came up behind me and put his hands where they shouldn’t be.” 

You bit out, aggressively. 

“Oh – well, I’m glad we got here when we did. I’d hate to have had to visit you in the hospital, don’t need you all broken, sweet girl.” 

Blush rose to your cheeks at the nickname. 

“Shit – sorry. You said no nicknames.” 

He said, annoyed with himself. 

“I tell you what – youc an call me sweet girl, i think i like that one. But, I need a nickname for you too.” 

You said, eyelashes fluttering. 

“What did you have in mind?” 

He asked, chuckling. 

“Hmm, let’s see. You’re a Cameron, right?” 

He nodded in response, a crooked smile on his lips. 

“How about RC? Do you like that?” 

You asked. 

“I’ve never liked anything more.” 

He said with another roguish crooked grin. 

“Okay, RC. Go rescue my kitty.” 

You replied and he saluted you. 

“Yes ma’am. Be back in a jiffy!” 

You could only giggle in response as you watched three other fellow firemen bring Rafe a ladder and he climbed to the top of it. You were nervous that he’d fall, the nervousness of his sway at the restaurant at the forefront of your mind. He returned only moments later with Jackson in his hands and you watched with a smile as he soothed your feline friend’s anxieties with his words. 

“All good, not a wound in his pretty little fur.” 

He said, handing him over to you. 

“You’re in so much trouble!” 

You playfully scolded Jackson and Rafe giggled. 

“Don’t be too hard on him, he’s just a curious little guy.” 

He replied sweetly, rubbing the fur under Stumpy’s chin. His loud purr could be heard from a mile away, you were convinced. 

“Well, sweet girl. I’ve got to go. But, I hope I see you again soon.” 

He said, his blue eyes meeting yours again. 

“Rafe, what time is your shift over?” 

“About an hour, why?” 

“I’d like to make you dinner, as a sort of do-over or a thank you, whatever you'd prefer.” 

“I’d prefer the do-over I think.” 

He responded cheekily. 

“Me too. Come back here at 7. I’m apartment 3B.” 

You said. 

“Will do, sweet girl.” 

He smiled at the notion that you really could want him after all. 

“See ya, RC.” 

You replied, giving his bicep a squeeze before turning and heading back into your building, Jackson in tow. 

—

taglist:

as always, if you'd like to be added to or removed from the taglist, please send me an ask or comment on this post so i can keep track!!

@maybankslover @inthelibrarybtw @luvrcndy @silkylovey @yagirlwrites @obxbabygirl @rafeecameronsbitch @klutzy-kay24 @roseczbalt @allsmilesreally7 @akobx @pogueprincesa @hannaa20002000 @olymosity @stoned-writer

[ordinaryschmuck]

Why I Love The Owl House: Part Six-Praises, Problems, and Perotations

Prev Part

…Perotations is a synonym for “Conclusions.” Had to stretch for illiteracy, there…Anyways.

Salutations, random people on the internet who are already skimming past this! I am an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and draw comics and cartoons.

Here it is, friends and followers. The very last thing I have to say about The Owl House. Or things, plural. You see, this isn’t like the previous parts. In the past, we’ve discussed the show in every possible aspect all while circulating around a common theme, whether it’d be the characters, their relationships, the arcs, and the messages that the series is trying to tell. However, there’s a lot more to discuss about The Owl House than just those four things. It’s just difficult to find a theme for each topic because, well, I don’t have much left to say. That and there’s nothing these last few points have in common with each other to lump into a shared post. So this final part of this whole long ass thing is sort of me just me listing out the last few praises and problems I have with the series before reaching that perotation. And yes, I’m still sticking with perotation. Might as well commit.

Also, to keep things fair, each praise I give the show will be immediately followed up with a nitpick—I mean, problem. That’s how it’s gonna go for this whole part, as we go back and forth from praise to problem, praise to problem, and so on and so forth until we reach the end. We’re in the homestretch here, folks, so let’s stop stalling and finally wrap up a review that’s three years in the making as I finally answer WHY I love The Owl House.

Praise: It rewards multiple rewatches

That’s the best thing to say about a serialized show like The Owl House. Knowing about big reveals or the direction of the story is going helps make rewatching it a little more fun. You get to pick up on all the little clues that the writers left behind or how moments can be recontextualized. There’s little stuff like how Amity tried running away from Luz in the ROMANCE section of the library or the proud look in Alador’s eye as Amity fends off the abomaton, showing that there were ideas that the crew were planning to set up but left behind these hints, both subtle and not, and making fans realize that the writers thought that far ahead (Most of the time). Even the little things like seeing a Grom poster in the background in an episode leaves a nice teaser for something fun that’s to come while making fans smile at that particular attention to detail.

But it gets better with the bigger reveals. Raine especially is a great example of this, as they have two big moments that recontextualize how they interact with Eda in previous episodes. In “Eda’s Requiem,” it’s clear that there’s some romantic tension between the two, with Eda particularly being a blushing mess. It leads viewers to believe that the two share feelings for each other, but never admit it, with a few fans even joking that Eda isn’t that suave if she’s so flustered around an old crush. Then in the VERY NEXT EPISODE, we learn that Eda and Raine aren’t old crushes but are instead exes. It makes all the romantic tension in that episode feel more engaging now that you have that information in mind, as it tells you that these two still have feelings for each other, with Eda’s being the strongest seeing how she didn’t want the relationship to end but willing to keep quiet because she’s not willing to admit it. It’s a great utilization of recontextualization that makes the text more engaging, with the crazy part being the writers do it AGAIN in the same season. In “Follies of the Coven Day Parade,” we’re led to believe that Raine’s brainwashed by some potion Terra gives them, with Eda’s attempts to break Raine out looking like they’re WORKING but not hard enough. The biggest sign that Eda broke through was a tear from Raine, but even then it didn’t look like much as Raine went right back to chugging Terra’s concoction. Only for “Them’s the Breaks, Kid” to reveal that Raine was NEVER under any hypnosis or spell. They used bard magic to change the mixture with just a whistle, which we see Raine do when they first drink something Terra gave them. Not only is that a brilliant case of laying down the groundwork for a bigger reveal down the road, but it makes all of Raine’s actions in that episode have an extra sense of drama to them as we now know they’re faking being brainwashed and are trying to push Eda away from the oncoming conflict. “Follies at the Coven Day Parade” is already an engaging episode, especially with the Eda and Raine subplot alone, but the prior knowledge of what’s really going on with Raine just gives it an extra bit of edge that it didn’t even need but I’m appreciative of it anyway.

The same applies when fan theories turn out to be true. Now, there were a LOT of crackpot theories in this fandom, some of them going so far as believing that Luz would be possessed by The Collector (Remember that?). As for other theories, the show didn’t have much that was as big as that. There was Hunter being a grimwalker, but the show basically spelled that out to us with how it practically shoved that spell book into our faces. There was King being a Titan, but that originally felt like a crack theory based on the SLIGHTEST things with no follow through only for the show to give us all the information we needed in one fell swoop. The only real theory that had any weight, large in part because the clues felt subtle enough to glance over and were frequent enough to remind fans of its possibility, is Belos being Philip/a human. I personally picked up on the possibility as early as “Young Blood, Old Souls.” He didn’t cast spells like other witches and his staff and parts of his robe looked more mechanical than magical. It made me think he had no natural magic of his own and, with humans being the only beings who lacked magic, the logical conclusion was that HE might be human too. Sure, his face revealed he had pointy ears, but they were noticeably smaller than most witches. Almost as if he sliced up his own ears to help make them look more like a witch’s. And I know you can’t SHOW something like that in a kid’s show, but you can heavily imply it…which the series did through a portrait in Belos’ mind. Regardless, the show always left the validity of the theory as a possibility, with new information being thrown into the mix of whether Belos used to be Philip. They certainly sounded similar and, upon meeting Philip, a lot more of the pieces started to fall into place. His charm, inflections, and demeanor all pointed to the signs that these two were the same guy, with “Hollow Mind” only confirming it to the audience. With all this proper build up and explanations of who Belos is and why he acts in a certain way, not only does it make forming and reforming the theory more fun, but it makes rewatching Belos’ actions become more engaging as you get a better idea of what he’s going for. We know why he’s vague about his plans for the Day of Unity, why he treats Hunter so disrespectfully, and why he wants a portal to the Human Realm. It makes an already threatening villain more vile and intriguing all because we know exactly who he is, rewarding fans who already got close to predicting the truth by giving them more than what they bet on.

This is the fun of watching a show like The Owl House. With its tight continuity and story consistently building off of itself, it makes you appreciate all the finer details and see how it all mostly lines up. Not everything was planned out, but, for the stuff that was, it makes rewatching the series feel better and better as you know the writers spent so much time making sure everything they make lines up perfectly as they could. By knowing the truth, it can make fans appreciate even the TINIEST of moments in Season One that would HEIGHTEN the experience once you you got to Season Three…Unfortunately, though, there is ONE thing that the writers didn’t fully work out, to the point where it kind of breaks the series when we get to that final season.

Problem: The timeline is all kinds of wonky

I don’t mean all the stuff in the past. Caleb running away with Evelyn, Belos’ rise to power, Eda’s curse and all the consequences that came with it all line up well enough. What I’m talking about is all the things that happened in the present. From “A Lying Witch and a Warden” to “Thanks to Them,” a lot of the show’s attempts at making a timeline of events falls short.

At first, it seemed that they were doing a good job of it. They said that “I Was a Teenage Abomination” and “Covention” were a week apart from each other, with the same being the case with the ladder episode and “Lost in Language.” There, the writers were explicitly giving us an exact timeline of events, being relatively easy to follow. But either they realized that they’re making the summer move along a little faster or they stopped caring about consistency, because they stopped mapping things out after “Lost in Language.” From there on, the writers become noticeably vague about how far apart these events occurred. “Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances” has Luz assume that summer is over, so it’s definitely been months since the first episode, meaning we’re probably in Fall…but then it gets trickier. Because by the end of “Reaching Out,��� it shows us this calendar next to Camila that it’s currently the last week of August. Now, some summer camps don’t last the WHOLE summer, I’m sure…But Camila, in the very first episode, specifically said, “The next THREE MONTHS will fly by.” If it’s been three months, depending on the school Luz went to, we would be in August by “Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances.” However, it’s weird that we’re STILL in August in “Reaching Out.” In order for that to make sense, every episode after “Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances” would be a day apart from each other. Is that plausible? Probably. But ONLY if camp ended at the exact time as “Keeping Up A-Fear-Ances.” What we saw in the ending could have been a few days, maybe a week at some random point of August. 

And even IF events were a day apart, that still wouldn’t work. Assuming it’s the middle of August, that either has not enough episodes or not enough days. And even then, to think that all of these episodes, EACH ONE, takes place a day after the other is INSANE. It definitely doesn’t do Hunter’s redemption arc any favors if it took less than a month to change his perception of reality. Plus, something Raine said in “Follies at the Coven Day Parade” makes things MORE confusing. They said they’ve spent a MONTH in bed. Could be a part of the “brainwashing” that’s making them say that, but still, a month WHEN? A month BEFORE or AFTER “Eda’s Requiem?” Because if it was a month BEFORE, why would the Emperor’s Coven make Raine think they’ve been taken care of BEFORE becoming an official Bard Head? And if it’s a month AFTER, then HOW?! IS IT?! STILL AUGUST?! I’m telling you, it HURTS the brain to think about, and it hurts even MORE when there’s a frickin’ scrap book in “Thanks to Them” that explicitly says the Hexsquad spent a  SUMMER together, WHICH THE PHOTOS PROVE TO BE ACCURATE! When’s the last time you’ve seen people go to the beach in the mid to late September? Or go tubing when we’re getting close to October? Or relaxing in the sun or enjoying your time in the garden when it’s the middle of FALL?! The math is NOT mathing in this scenario, and it really almost breaks the series.

Now, the question is this: HOW did this happen? Well, there are two theories, one generous and the other reasonable. The generous theory is that, given most of the timeline started getting broken in the second half of Season Two, it’s possible that this was a result of the story getting shortened (Yes, I’m playing that card. Stick with me). The writers confirmed that the first half of Season Two was already written and put into production before Disney decided we can’t have nice things and shortened the series. There were a LOT of things that were likely to happen in that longer version of The Owl House, with a “summer” in the human realm being something they thought up as a way to make the story more interesting despite the constrained time limit. However, like I said, that’s being generous. Because the reality, in what I can assume, is that writers didn’t do the math right and failed to properly communicate with the art department. Stuff like the calendar and scrapbook is something made by the background, prop, and storyboard artists, likely trying to clean things up and add more fun to the story, only for it to turn out that they didn’t get the proper notes they needed. The results…doesn’t fundamentally destroy the series, but it does break things everytime you think about it. If you’re not paying attention, you won’t be bothered by any of it, but if the only solution is to tell people not to think about something in the series that’s so broken…is a bit of an unfair suggestion to make. You can’t tell people to ignore something wrong with the story, no matter how good the rest of it is. It’s still worth being brought up, even if it’s something small that turns into something BIGGER down the line. That way, it could help future writers, or people working on this show moving onto bigger things, to avoid facing a similar issue and make the NEXT story end up being a little less broken…But I can tell you what ISN’T broken in THIS series.

Praise: The Characters all feel solid.

“What does that even mean?”

Good question! Because I don’t know.

Yeah, this one’s more based on a FEELING I get when watching the show. It’s something I notice when watching it alongside Amphibia, Gravity Falls, or most other 2D shows. It’s even something I noticed with MoringMark’s comics, which often nails a close approximation of the show’s art style, but SOMETHING always felt a little off. And it’s not when looking at the show do I realize the reason WHY is because The Owl House has a certain…volume to it. Like, I can almost TOUCH these characters when they’re on screen. As for how, again, I have no idea. It could be how the characters are colored, the weight in their lines, the way they’re shaded, or even the ways they’re meant to move. I don’t know how or why The Owl House accomplishes this feeling I get from it, but I feel like it’s something worth mentioning, even if briefly.

See? Not every part of this final review will be long winded. Sometimes, I just gotta bring up small things that enough people talk about, to show how I appreciate The Owl House in most facets. Certainly helps when I bring up something that might get people angry.

Problem: The animation’s a bit too stiff at times 

Not all the time, mind you. There are a lot of scenes where the series goes all out and adds so much fluidity in such a short scene. The problem comes when you realize how great THOSE scenes look causes the rest of the show to…NOT look like that.

To be clear, the animation’s not AWFUL. I’d say more times than not, the show looks good. It’s just that you can see where most of the budget went into for certain scenes. It’s a tactic that action oriented shows use all the time, to have the dialogue heavy and character focused scenes be slow and stiff so that they can save the best work on the  weekly fight scenes. However…The Owl House isn’t an action oriented series. It’s a fully character driven one, as I’ve thoroughly established for five frickin’ parts now. There are only a handful of big fight scenes, with only a quarter of them having that smooth as butter animation. Yeah, while hype up the big battles like Eda’s duel with Lilith, there’s actually SOME fights where it’s the usual standard for the rest of the series, looking a bit stiff and slow. Sometimes, the same episode can have different animation for fights, with “Follies at the Coven Day Parade” having a stiff fight between Eda and Raine and a smooth one with Luz and Amity teaming up against Kikimora. The difference is noticeable and, the crazy thing is, I don’t dislike either battle, regardless of its quality. I think both are still good in their own right, but the noticeable difference sticks out and makes you realize…how the rest of the series looks. Again, it’s still good, especially in Season Two where it feels like most of the stiffness got cleaned up a bit. It’s just a thing where, despite how good some things look, it makes one almost feel that they’re watching a different show when it suddenly turns up the quality. It feels weird that the show looking amazing is a problem, but it only is when it sticks out like a sore thumb…That being said, though, the show DOES look frickin’ awesome when it wants to.

Praise: It has AWESOME fight scenes and cool uses of magic.

Is this contradictory? Only a little. And, to be fair, while there are times when the FLUID fight scenes DO stick out, they deserve all the praise in the world. Because unlike a certain book series that has magical fights in it, there’s more of an attempt to go NUTS with the action outside of “I’m pointing my wand as hard as I can!” Shout out to How It Should Have Ended for nailing that, by the way, because…Yeah, it’s accurate. If the best magical action you can come up with is characters pointing their wands at each other, it’s not really that visually compelling. Now, for The Owl House, you get a LOT more than pointing wands. You have characters dashing themselves away from big, magical blasts. Abomination goop being used as a shield, fists, or swords. Our plucky protagonist flying at the seat of her pants to try and defend herself from an evil emperor throwing everything he has at her. When the series wants to go hard, it does, regardless of how noticeable the quality difference is. And I appreciate the fact that The Owl House crew try so hard to make all magic that characters can do look awesome, regardless of it being an action scene or not. Outside of Oracle Magic, which never really got that much of a spotlight, all the other eight magical tracks are often shown to be–To put it bluntly–super cool. “Eda’s Requiem” has a ton of moments like that with bard magic, giving us an actual idea of what it’s capable of and, albeit briefly with a guard putting on earmuffs, imply that it’s limited by people being able to HEAR the tunes bards play. Plus, the final act shows the capabilities of Abomination and Beast Keeping Magic with Darius being able to teleport people with goop and morph his body into goo while Eberwolf has better tracking skills and being able to summon beasts. Sure, it adds intensity to the scene and proves just how powerful these two are, but it also shows us–Without telling us–what their magic types can do and how powerful one can get with a type of skill. Even something as simple as Viney casting a shield through healing magic or Bria making stone columns through construction is enough to tell the audience what we need to know about these types of magic and infer what ELSE witches like them can do in their respective tracks. It creates fun speculation on top of making the magic more interesting to watch as compared to the film adaptations of the unspoken book series. You should know which one by now.

However, as cool as the magic CAN be, how it’s casted could use some more punching up.

Problem: The magic system is kind of boring.

KIND OF. There being eight magic tracks is interesting and, as established, how those different magical spells are used can look visually intriguing. They definitely avoided the problem of characters just pointing wands for a fight, but they ran into this new issue of how the magic is casted. For every spell in every single track…it’s just the characters drawing circles. Sometimes big circles, sometimes small circles, and sometimes multiple circles at once. The only time a circle isn’t drawn is when a character uses a staff…most of the time. Even then, there are instances when a circle needs to be drawn, even if they’re not as frequent as a character casting magic without a staff. And I’m not gonna lie, this is an issue I’ve had since the first few episodes of Season One. It’s just such an uninteresting  way for characters to cast magic, especially since it’s done by everybody, regardless of what spell it is. And you wanna know the worst part is? The show offers a more INTERESTING magic system than what most witches have.

Luz’s glyphs, much more than the spells, sucked in a lot of fans’ attention. There were people drawing their own ideas for glyphs that matched what COULD be in the show, or coming up with possible combinations when Season Two established that glyph combos are a possibility. And the reason WHY is because the glyphs are a more fascinating concept. They offer more variety of what they can do for Luz, and look more visually interesting than a circle in the air. What also benefits the glyphs are the limitations they have. They can do anything Luz wants, but she has to draw them EXACTLY as they’re meant to. No line can be out of place, and the circle has to be perfect every single time. Amity proved what happens if you draw the glyph wrong in “Reaching Out,” and that was just with ONE glyph. When it comes to drawing glyph combos, not only do you need to combine the right kinds of glyphs with a specific amount, but you need to draw them in a specific way. It’s more than just drawing two glyphs on the same page, it’s drawing one on one part of a circle that connects it to another. It’s complicated, and gets more so, depending on the spell. Belos’ teleportation glyph proves that you need more than paper to draw the whole thing out. And that’s not getting into the other limitations Luz has with glyphs, like how the invisibility glyph can only work for as long as the user holds their breath. That’s a cool concept and makes one wonder how other glyphs can be limited despite the power they present. Which is more than I can say about spell circles.

Spell circles are just missing that little extra OOMPH. It’s interesting that performing magic is more like a skill that a person needs to train themselves how to do. Like learning how to whistle or learning how to balance on one leg. Nothing strenuous, but nothing easy, either. Plus, the fact that there’s occasional strain from doing a spell too big or characters collapsing after doing one for too long does at least SHOW that magic’s not easy to do. It just doesn’t always LOOK hard, not from a viewer’s perspective. Maybe if something like Beast Keepers needed to make claw marks in the air or Plant Witches needed to draw squiggly lines to mimic vines. Or even if a spell requires a different colored circle, and being able to mix spells means you have to draw a variety of circles. Just…ANYTHING to make it seem like there’s more of an effort outside of drawing circles, all while impressing audiences with how cool the magic system could be. It doesn’t kill the show in any way, but it does feel like there could have been more creativity. It’d be difficult, but the show isn’t afraid to present something engaging through visuals. And not just through the fight scenes…

Praise: The show does great at showing development  through outward appearances.

It might not be on the same level as an epic action scene, but this IS a nice attention to detail. You know why you often see characters wearing the same clothes in every episode, often with little variety? It’s because doing so makes it easier for the animators, giving them a sense of consistency to know how to draw a character each time throughout the series, only changing it up for one episode, specific scenes, or even a quick gag. So to either make a permanent or even gradual change to the character’s design as we reach a certain point in the story, it’s got to take a great attention to detail and continuity to make the change stay. Not only that, but there has to be a GOOD reason to do it. Sometimes, there isn’t. Like, for Eda, I feel as though some higher ups started to discover the lewd art fans were making and told the animators to show less skin on her (Didn’t work, they just made her look hotter). And for Gus, it’s just because the voice of his VA started getting deeper so they gave the character an older design to reflect that…even though, to this day, it makes me question what the hell “witch puberty” is. But while those are small cases that are either done “just because” or “for convenience,” there are some design changes that are often used to help tell the story and show how characters have grown and developed through the course of the series.

In a more permanent case, you have King and Amity. In “Echos of the Past,” King regains a piece of his old horn that Luz then glues back onto him…It’s weird that the horn fits perfectly and that it continues to grow as he ages, but, eh. He’s a baby god. There’s probably some god magic they’re that we’re not aware of.

Regardless of how the horn’s apparently magic, there’s significance to why this horn is now reattached to King. In that episode, he learns that there’s this new part of himself and his history that he wasn’t aware of before. Because of that, he wants to TRY to connect to his roots, even though he doesn’t know who or WHAT he is. Having his horn back is the first step in that journey, making him look more like what he EXPECTS his species to look like. It’s a small thing, but it still does so much to represent King’s character and the journey he’s about to take.

As for Amity, her big change is a bit more significant. After finally wanting to be her own person, she decided to change her hair to help reflect that. Instead of a colder shade of green that makes Amity look like her mother, Amity had it dyed into a warmer shade of lavender. Even how Amity has her hair made up offers this more welcoming appearance as opposed to looking like a smaller Odalia. Whether Anity wears her hair long or short, it frames her face in a much friendlier manner, showing off how much she grew into a kinder person. When I often think of Amity, I think of the nicer young lady with adorable cotton candy hair, as opposed to the snarkier, more intense teen with a colder appearance. It actually breaks my brain a little when I rewatch earlier Season One episodes, because I don’t associate that look with Amity anymore, let alone her behavior. It proves how much she’s changed, inside and out, all while trying to be her own person instead of a carbon copy of someone worse. Sure, the change was a bit jarring and, admittedly, I missed the green hair upon the big reveal, but it’s a necessary change to make the fandom’s favorite white girl happy. It’s not like everyone can have a more gradual change like the fandom’s favorite white boy.

Hunter’s interesting because he’s the only character in the show who has a different appearance in almost every episode. Whether it’s something subtle like a new emblem being added to his cape or something drastic like…whatever you could call his outfit in “Labyrinth Runners.” Either way, he never really sticks to the same style, and that’s fine. His whole character is about discovering himself and who he wants to be instead of becoming the soldier and symbol Belos wanted. It’s why, during the final season, he starts wearing messier, looser clothing that is an outcry to the more professional outfits he went for. And while he ends the series the most scarred he’s ever been, it’s a nice detail that it looks like Hunter is the happiest he’s ever lived through his smile, lack of eye bags, and more loose body movement. It’s a mix of subtle and obvious details that showed how Hunter became a changed person despite all the hardships he went through. It’s beautiful and he’s not the only character that goes through this kind of change.

When I saw what Lilith looked like in the past, and how the bright vibrancy clashed with Lilith’s cold presence in the present, I was hopeful that her road to redemption would be her trying to look more like her old self. And while her redemption was rushed in more ways than one, it is great that the art team did lean into the idea of Lilith slowly shedding her old design for a warmer, kinder one. She ditches a proper set of robes for some spare rags Eda had laying around, eventually gained a uniform when she found stability in her life, allowing her hair to curl once more while adding a pair of specs, and ends the series with her red hair fully returning. At the start, she looked like the most blatantly evil antagonist with how much darkness encompassed her design. By the time skip, she still wears those cold colors, but the short orange hair, the specs, and even how loose that outfit looks gives this sort of eccentric professor appearance. Sort of like she’s Miss Frizzle’s cousin, but one that goes against dressing brightly and colorfully. It definitely fits the vibe Lilith’s current personality goes for, and it works. It’s another case of a character’s improved behavior reflecting in their appearance. However, sometimes the show can do well in the opposite direction by showing how WORSE a character has gotten.

Luz and Belos are the main instances of this. Luz was more brief, as she looked disheveled during “Thanks to Them.” Her clothes were baggier, her smile is basically gone, and it looks like she’s stopped caring about herself or her appearance. It perfectly shows us the mental and emotional state that Luz is in throughout the special, caused by her stress and guilt formed by Belos’ manipulation. Speaking of, through the final season, Belos gradually looks more monstrous and decayed as he continues his quest to kill all witches. It appropriately reveals how much of his true self started taking physical form and overshadowing the charismatic manipulator, all while his body melts and breaks apart to show that time is catching up with him every second. It’s the best kind of visual representation of what Belos has become and this final season will be his final moments. Both him and Luz have perfect visual representation for how worse they got this season, even if Luz’s change was more temporary than Belos’. But, even then, she spends the rest of the season dressed as her hero Azura, making her look like everything she wanted to be in the Boiling Isles as she gains determination to save it. So even though this season started with Luz at her worst, she still managed to evolve into becoming her best self while Belos continued to devolve into his worst self. There’s some hero/villain symbolism for ya.

The art and animation team work their hardest in making the show look as good as they possibly could, often aiding the equally great writing. Changing up the characters outfits and designs can say so much without needing the characters to say anything at all. It’s the perfect cooperation of writing and animation that makes some of the best animated shows function so well. In this case, it offered a great attention to the story at play and made for great visuals at the same time…Though, those same visuals aren’t exactly PERFECT…

Problem: The color scheme is a little off.

“That seems subjective.”

Oh, it’s VERY subjective. I’m not one who knows color theory or what some colors represent (Honestly, I find the whole thing nonsensical). I’m a guy who goes off of gut feeling and thinking to myself “Do these assortment of colors look good?” And the colors in The Owl House don’t look AWFUL, as there’s never a point where I feel like the show is unwatchable. I’ve seen uglier looking works of fiction, all because the creator or director thought it might “improve” the film. Whether it’s to hide the obvious CGI or because the director wanted to match the “grittiness” of the real world, there have been clearer cases where artistic expression or intent tends to harm how a show looks. Even things I like, such as Hazbin Hotel/Helluva Boss, run into the problem where the red and black characters tend to blend too much in the red and black backgrounds. I get that we’re in Hell and the shows often look gorgeous otherwises, but holy hell this must be torture for people who are colorblind. But again, The Owl House never gets THAT bad, even though it matches a similar intent.

Dana Terrace wanted to make a magical world that isn’t as pretty as your usual fare. Doing that means you have to avoid using bright and inviting colors, allowing viewers to appreciate the beauty in what others considered ugly. A nice sentiment, sure, and they don’t completely use unappealing colors. For the most part, the orange, red, and browns of this world create this sort of Fall atmosphere, while the blues, greens, and also browns of certain creatures and characters look devilish and/or ghoulish. The intent is clear and it’s not a bad look at all, but there’s something a little off going on.

I THINK it’s how the colors mix with the characters? It’s hard to explain, but when I look at a character like Gus, who frequently wears his Hexside uniform, something is off. Like…the cold blues and blacks of his uniform clash with the warm hues around him. Or how something like Willow’s original casual outfit had colors that blended in the rest of the world. Or how Luz’s bright white and purple hoodie contrasts her dark jeans and leggings. I guess what I’m getting at is that the colors of the character’s outfits are the problem? They either clash or blend in, to my eyes, at least. Again, NOT a color theorist, I’m probably just talking out of my ass here and going too much into detail about something that’s basically a nitpick. The colors of The Owl House don’t ruin the show for me, I still like the majority of how it looks. This is just a little thing that stops me, personally, from saying it looks perfect. Don’t take it too seriously, this is, again, totally subjective. It’d be the same as me complaining about the show’s comedy or music…Speaking of the music, though, I have NO complaints regarding that.

Praise: The Music is amazing.

Told ya.

And again, this is totally subjective. A show’s soundtrack is either going to strike a chord in you (ha) or not. And while The Owl House doesn’t have an AMAZING score, it’s still one that often fills me with delight no matter what episode I’m watching. Composers TJ Hill and Brad Breeck do a great job in giving The Owl House its own sound. There’s themes that can fit a certain character, like with how The Collector has this very bouncy yet very off-putting base whenever they’re doing wacky nonsense. There are also motifs that suit a relationship, like how Luz and Amity had this little tune that got warmer and gentler as the two got closer to becoming an pair. And, there are cases where there are songs that play just for a certain episode or theme, like that beat that played during “Echoes of the Past” when Jean-Luc was on screen. There’s a lot of effort put into the music of the series like there is in a lot of the show, and it’s often pleasant to the ears like how the visuals are pleasant to the eyes. There’s a total of ONE case where the score got a little lazy and that’s when they played the same track for when Lumity became canon during the scene where Gus introduces Cosmic Frontier to Hunter. That’s a very specific score that never got used again, and works well for the FIRST scene it’s used in. To reuse it for such a minimal moment is baffling, but it’s at least the ONLY time the composers did it. In a lot of other cases, they go hard with the instrumentals, with TJ Hill’s theme for the show being a pretty good listen. Wouldn’t rank it among some of the best theme songs for cartoons, but definitely better than most.

The closest I can find to a problem with the show’s music, outside of the one weird reuse of a specific track, is that it almost sounds TOO similar to Gravity Falls. Like, if you were to play a few notes from the background, half the time, it’s gonna take me a minute to figure out if it’s from The Owl House or Gravity Falls. I can let it go, of course, because both shows share a composer and The Owl House has a bit more of a…magical feeling to its sound, I guess. You know it when you listen closely, and it helps give The Owl House more of that unique feeling…But since I brought up similarities, there’s more to notice than just the music.

Problem: The show feels…similar to other modern cartoons.

Though, to be fair, almost every huge show since Adventure Time and Gravity Falls feels similar. There’s definitely been a trend where modern animation tends to start as comedic and mostly episodic, becomes gradually serious over time, starts telling a more cohesive story arc, and shocking twists that even surprise a few adults a lot of the time. It’s a trend tiring for some while exciting to most, with The Owl House being one of the better examples of this pattern done RIGHT. I have no problems with what the show wants to be, but I can’t help but notice instances where it does something similar to other shows that came out. Dana Terrace and her writers have put their own spin on ideas, but don’t stop these feelings like how The Collector’s playtime is a chiller Weirdmageddon, or how the final season is a repackaged version of Amphibia’s. I already went over that ladder two parts ago, so I’m not going to repeat myself here. As for the former, I’m not going to dwell on it because more than enough people did when “For the Future” started. The Collector is NOTHING like Bill Cipher, so they both go about causing chaos in different ways, with The Collector’s actions being unintentionally messed up while Bill fully knows what he’s doing and loves it anyway. The differences lead to two apocalyptic scenarios that are unique in their own right. Still, the similarities ARE there and are fairly noticeable.

I don’t like giving problems like that attention, though. It’s a nitpick at best and it’s always people using surface level similarities just to make a nonsensical argument about how nothing is original anymore. As someone who believes that originality is a myth and that it’s near impossible for people to make something wholly original, I find it pointless to point out how similarities are a problem, especially if what’s being made is still good.

“Then why bring it up at all?”

Well…because it does stop The Owl House from standing out, just a little bit. If you offer a story that’s too similar to others, you need to offer some differences that make it more appealing. To make it STAND OUT more from the crowd of great cartoons that tell their own great stories. Otherwise, why bother watching a show when there’s another version of it that’s just the same, if not better? And sure, whether something is better or not is purely subjective. I personally enjoy something like The Owl House more than Amphibia, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who thinks that. But there’s also people who disagree with that and treat Amphibia as untouchable where it’s The Owl House that’s flawed. Trying to be better isn’t a big enough difference because not everyone is going to believe your story stands higher than others. But keep in mind, that doesn’t stop the show from being GOOD. Even if there are some familiarities with other things, you’ll still have a good time with what you watch. But think of it like this: There are dozens of sitcoms out there, each of them following a certain formula or character dynamics. Yet the ones people remember the most aren’t just the funniest but the things they did differently. Boy Meets World sort of grew up with its audience by having its main character grow up, going from simple plots of Corey painting his neighbor’s fence for a super soaker to him defending the right to punch a guy who sexually assaulted his girlfriend. Malcolm in the Middle forgoes having a simple, caring family household for a messy family of a-holes that are often at odds with each other but still look out for one another, even if it causes chaos for themselves and others. And The Office, instead of having people go through extreme and almost cartoonish situations, has real types of people living out realistic scenarios and laughing at how stupid and secondhand embarrassing they can be…At least at first. Things get a little bit off the rails later on in the series. Regardless, shows tend to stand out in pop culture due to the differences they presented, not just the quality. The same applies for cartoons like The Owl House, which has a similar vibe to other shows, not just ones produced by Disney. Now, it has differences that make it stand out ENOUGH, but I can’t really blame people for thinking that the series is a little similar to others. I only draw the line when people treat it as an actual detriment when, again, it’s nothing more than a minor nitpick. YOU might not think it stands out, but there’s an entire fandom that says otherwise. And to keep things fair, let’s go over a few differences to prove how well the show stands out.

Praise: The look of the world is great

I said it in the colors section, but Dana Terrace didn’t want a PRETTY magical world. She wanted something a little spooky and demonic, taking art inspiration from paintings by Heironymous Bosch. And while things never get to that level of intensity, let it be known that The Owl House tries to match the same level of weirdness. Or, at least, try as much as Disney would allow. Because if you’ve seen Dana’s non Owl House art on her socials, you can see for yourself how much she was restrained by making something family friendly. Hell, by the time I’m posting this, the teaser for her next big show came out and it definitely looks like Dana Terrace unfiltered. But no matter the limitations, the final result makes for a pretty unique world. By the second episode alone, the show reveals that everything takes place upon the corpse of a Titan. That’s already an awesome idea that I’ve never heard of before and things just get crazier as we see the many demons, witches, and creatures that exist in this world. You have obvious reimaginings of classic beasts and monsters in mythology, with the series putting their own spin on both the designs and what they can do, making these creatures fit with the mythology that the writers are trying to make for this series. As for the NEW creatures that exist solely in this series, there’s not a LOT of ideas that the show puts a lot of emphasis on aside from slitherbeasts and those…weird butterflies, but there’s still a good amount of random one-off monsters, both friendly and menacing, that have a good amount of creativity that puts into how they look. Even that tentacle monster Luz said good morning to in “Witches Before Wizards” has a lot more effort put into its design despite showing up once for the entire series. In fact, that brings up another positive in the look of this world: There’s a lot of effort in making EVERYONE look unique. Every single character and demon that Luz interacts with has a different design to them, with it being rare for the show to reuse character models to fill out a crowd. Now, most of them don’t have a consistent VOICE, but at least the animators and artists did good in making the people of the Boiling Isles look as weird as possible. None of them really look horrifying, but that might help the series more than you think.

The whole point of The Owl House is finding beauty in the bizarre. To accomplish that, you need to create a world that’s weird but not horrific. Make the people odd but not creepy. Have the creatures look dangerous but not horrendous. Basically, it’s all about finding that balance of looking off-putting to any normal person but never to the extent that it isn't something you can’t get used to. The show applies this to characters and the backgrounds, creating a world that’s odd everywhere you look but in a way that’s almost inviting. The Boiling Isles isn’t a place that the main character would want to escape from, but wishes to stay in because of how “at-home” she feels. It’s handled well in every episode, giving the series a look that allows it to stand out on its own just well enough…I just wish we could have seen MORE of this world.

Problem: The world feels small.

I said this before when talking about the arcs, but The Owl House doesn’t really have that expansive of a magical world. Granted, it’s a character driven series, it doesn’t NEED to have a GRAND landscape filled with adventure, it needs a place that the characters can interact and hang out in. It’s totally fine to tell small-scale stories in a small, contained area. There’s just two problems with that: For one, Dana Terrace clearly wanted a larger narrative near the end of Season Two, and doing so led to realizing how little we’ve seen of the Isles. More than that, it makes a fan like me realize I simply don’t care about the rest of the Isles. I care about the primary characters and I don’t want anyone to die, but I also realized that I don’t have the same strong connection to the Isles that Luz does because I haven’t much of it.

As for problem number two, it feels like a waste to limit such an interesting realm. Everything is either near or in Bonesborough, while occasionally moving through forests during SOME adventures. There’s an entire ISLAND to explore and we mostly stay in one area. What’s crazy is that, after Season One wrapped up, Dana Terrace did a Q&A where she promised that Season Two would have more island exploration. And all we really did was see a new city and a FEW islands that were only made for one-off adventures. Granted, I think she promised this BEFORE being told that the show would get cut down, and it’s possible that plans had to change at the last minute, but it doesn’t change how the Isles feel smaller than they are. And with how interesting this world looks, it’s a shame we only get to see it in a microscope view instead of seeing it expanded. The story isn’t RUINED by this, it’s just a missed opportunity caused by spending most of Season One in the same five places and having no time to explore more. Fortunately, the show’s good at a lot of other things regardless of limitations.

Praise: They made something OUTSTANDING despite restrictions

And there are more than just THE BIG ONE. I’ll admit that The Owl House is one of the few shows that adjusted well to a forced cancellation, knowing exactly what to keep in the original plan, how to combine one plotline with another, and come up with an epic, satisfying ending even though it wasn’t the ending the writers originally planned. In all regards, The Owl House managed to soar past expectations and still make some really great episodes and specials when, for other shows, getting a shortened series may as well have been a death sentence (Just look at what happened to Danny Phantom). But as much as the show deserves this kind of praise, it’s also worth mentioning that a shortened series is NOT the only restriction the writers had to deal with. They also managed to surpass expectations when you remember EXACTLY what The Owl House is.

The Owl House, first and foremost, is a children’s cartoon on the Disney Channel. Because of that, there are ideas and elements that the writers and artists can’t go all the way with because Disney still wants to appeal to that family-friendly crowd. So when the show gets away with something that you wouldn’t expect, it makes you appreciate it all the more. Sometimes it’s getting incredibly dark, both in the story and it’s humor, and other times it’s as simple as showing two girls in love. This is a REALLY LGBTQIA+ friendly series produced by DISNEY, and that’s somehow more surprising than ninety percent of what happens in “Hollow Mind.” And that’s an episode filled with death, torture, and destruction, so that says a lot, really.

The Owl House, much like Gravity Falls and Amphibia, really tries to push the envelope of what’s okay for kids or not. To me, though, it feels like it managed to push things further, mainly because cartoons of the past really helped in pushing boundaries too but also because of how deeply it managed to strike a chord in me. Like, I was an ADULT by the time the first episode premiered. I was NOT in this show’s age range and yet I managed to be both impressed and invested with every episode and what it managed to do. And keep in mind, that’s not an easy task to accomplish. As I get older and older, the more I realize that cartoons meant for children aren’t meant for ME (Shocking, I know). Themes are fairly simple, stories are becoming predictable, and the humor’s definitely more for younger audiences and not just ME. So if a series made for children still manages to get strong reactions out of a schmuck my age, it’s clearly doing something right. That effect isn’t going to be the same for everyone, but I personally see it as the show doing something incredible. Dana Terrace wanted to tell a GREAT story with wonderful characters, all with themes and imagery that certainly challenge younger minds, and created JUST that…Though, the story itself isn’t exactly PERFECT.

Problem: There are noticeable retcons caused by the writers wanting to go in a different direction.

This isn’t new for ANY show, let alone serialized cartoons. Adventure Time basically improvised its lore and backstories on the spot, and every reveal and change is almost perfect with only the SLIGHTEST retcons to make it coherent. And don’t even get me STARTED on the things comics have done. Did you know that Alfred wasn’t Bruce Wayne’s family butler? He was just some wannabe detective that actively chose to work for Batman and Robin.

The point is that I get WHY retcons happen. Large or small, subtle or blunt, it’s all because the writers decide they want to tell the story differently and try to change things around so it can fit with everything else they’ve already written. At its best, you barely care that it happens. At its worst, it’s blatantly obvious and you can tell that the writers decided at the last minute that they didn’t like the direction they were going in. And The Owl House…is right between that.

Keep in mind, the changes the show made is almost never towards the story. The narrative is often kept intact regardless of forced shortenings and censorship. The only times the writers decided to make any changes was towards antagonistic characters that the writers wanted to be redeemable. Amity, Ed and Em, Alador, and The Collector are VERY MUCH different characters from how they were introduced and how the writers decided they SHOULD be written soon after. Amity is definitely the best written out of this lineup, as the writers already knew that she had to be redeemed sooner than later and laid out a plan to make it work. However, the plan kind of falls apart when they reveal Amity feels regret for being mean to Willow only to show no form of regret at all in “I Was A Teenage Abomination.” I went over that scene enough, but it still shows how flawed The Owl House is in changing course when it comes to these characters.

Even with changes that I like, it comes across as something more sudden instead of an idea they had from the start. If Edric and Emira were meant to be Amity’s support system, then why would they do something so heinous as leak her diary onto the internet? That’s not tough love, that’s reprehensible. And if The Collector was just a child who didn’t understand how dangerous they were, then why make him act so malicious in their introduction. Yes, it was in a memory and you could argue this is how Belos remembered the scene, but everything else was exact so why would JUST The Collector act differently? These are very clear cases of the show wanting to do something different but only AFTER they were too far into production with certain episodes and soon decided to change course when we see them next. I at least LIKE these changes, I prefer them, but there is ONE case where this type of decision making did NOT work out in everyone’s favor.

Yeah, let’s go ahead and beat the dead horse that is Alador’s redemption again. I originally said that I’m not TOO bothered by this. I get the intent and, to Dana’s credit, she DID state beforehand that Alador is more complicated than fans might think. So I get that redeeming Alador was always part of the plan, but given the strong negative reactions this decision had, especially from fans who have had BAD experiences with parents like him, it’s clear that the writers didn’t plan far ahead enough. You can defend this decision all you want. I’VE definitely tried. But there’s no escaping the fact that showing us Alador acting just as bad as Odalia only to LATER say he’s not is a bold and flawed choice that feels worse the more you think about it. 

Who knows why these particular changes were made to these characters after introducing us to them. Maybe it’s a decision of the writers that they didn’t think through or maybe it’s Disney influencing how some characters are written. One thing’s for sure, I don’t want to use the “There wasn’t enough time” excuse for this one. These were sudden retcons that weren’t properly done when it came to changing these characters. At the end of the day, I still PREFER these changes but I would have loved it if they were better eased into the series. Especially since the show IS good at taking its time for other things.

Praise: The writers waste no time giving fans exactly what they want in a timely manner.

Do you want answers to your fan theories? Do you want to see if a ship you love becomes canon? Do you want one narrative to be continued instead of pushed to the side to the point where it’s basically forgotten? Well, good news! The Owl House gives you pretty much what you want to see and you don’t have to wait that long to get it!

It always amazes me with how little time is wasted in The Owl House. Almost every episode has SOMETHING going on with it, whether it’s a story thread being continued, a relationship being developed, or a character you love making another appearance. The series is often good at delivering what the majority of fans want and doing so without really having that much input to work with. The first season and a half of The Owl House was being developed before any of the cast or crew were aware of how big of a fanbase they’d get and were already on their way in making fans satisfied. I mean, there were already Lumity fans hyper fixating on the ship LONG before “Enchanted Grom Fright” confirmed that they WILL become canon at some point. And even then, the writers still planned to feed the fans well by making it canon halfway through Season Two, potentially hoping to have more episodes in the series dedicated to these two nerds being in love. They planned something this special, not knowing how popular a ship Lumity would be. Just like how they planned to give Hunter a lot of attention without knowing he’d be a fan favorite character or make Steve the most lovable coven guard without expecting fans to love a SINGLE interaction he had with Lilith. I’m sure Dana Terrace and her writers went in hoping to make every character, relationship, and story excellent, but when you’re making something, you can never be too sure what fans are going to gravitate more to. So the fact that they managed to hit a bullseye over what the majority wanted is VERY impressive. Now, not EVERY fan is satisfied. There are some underrated concepts, characters, and relationships that some fans wished would have gotten more attention, both in the show and the fandom. I can certainly understand that, but I can also argue that it's more of you wanting more from The Owl House instead of appreciating what it already gave you. And yes, I know I just complained about not seeing more of the world not that long ago, but there’s a difference between wishing to see the creator of this insane world create more insane things…and wanting an episode dedicated to Emira Blight. Yeah, I’d like that too, but sometimes you need to judge what the creator and their writers gave you and not so much what YOU wanted.

When I say that The Owl House gave fans what they wanted, I’m almost always talking about the vast majority, and they certainly seem pleased enough. Especially with how they didn’t have to wait long to get what they wanted. There’s a total of TWO episodes that I’d consider filler because of how little they offered, both for the series and fans (You probably know which ones). The rest of the time, the show is perfect at delivering what it needs to, and it’s almost always at the right time in the series. Things are constantly moving forward, and it sometimes leads to a small complaint about how the show is badly paced. For me, though, I always describe the series as differently paced. We’re so used to shows that take their time building up to a ship becoming canon, carefully integrating characters into the main cast, or slowly writing out this big arc that when something like The Owl House practically speedruns the whole process, it causes this idea that its pacing must be off. Except that I never really think that it is, as almost every interaction these characters have often feels like a natural progression as you’re watching these people improve themselves and the relationships they have around them. Or the way they’re running out of time to solve these BIG problems leads to feeling the intensity of the situation as there’s not much room for error left for them. It creates a new experience compared to other shows and it makes sense why The Owl House in particular wastes no time. Some say that the writing was on the wall that the show wasn’t going to get that third season, I say…that Dana Terrace knows how things work with televised animation at Disney. The average lifespan of a Disney cartoon is three seasons. Very rarely does anything get four and it’s even RARER to get up to five. Not everything can be like Big City Greens where it’s basically The Simpsons but for kids. And keep in mind, this is a problem BEFORE streaming made things ten times worse for televised animation. Disney does NOT play the long game when it comes to their shows, with it often being inconsistent with what lasts long and what doesn’t. Dana likely expected her show wouldn’t get much time so she planned accordingly, getting to those big moments for the characters and story as quickly as possible without it feeling TOO quick. For the most part, I still say that the final result is handled well, giving fans exactly what they want with little to no fluff or filler…However, there are SOME cases where I can’t help but admit–

Problem: The series clearly needed another season. 

Stop me if you heard this before: This aspect of The Owl House would have worked better–

“--if the show had enough time.”

Yeah, you get it by now. EVERYONE gets it by now. It’s the main criticism thrown around a lot, being applicable to a good amount of the show’s problems. Not EVERY issue, mind you, as Lilith’s redemption in particular is still all kinds of rushed BEFORE the writers were told they only have a season and three specials to wrap up the series. Regardless, The Owl House is a series that is BURSTING with potential with dozens of characters, story concepts, and themes, only to be restricted with how much they can cover. And oftentimes, the end result is still GOOD. I almost never feel like there’s an aspect of the show that was handled poorly with the time that the writers were given. Yet, as good as everything is, I can’t help but often feel like it could have been handled better. Luz’s conflict about choosing the Isles or the Human Realm, Willow and Amity’s friendship, and Raine’s rebellion are just SOME of the things that would benefit with a longer series. And the thing is that I’m not blaming the WRITERS for most of this. They were given a bad hand and tried to deal with it in the best way they could. I still stand by that what they made is AMAZING regardless of how little time they had, even if it’s clear that some ideas had to be cut out entirely or get rushed to an adequate conclusion. It isn’t perfect, but our favorite media rarely is.

Still, I won’t say this fixes EVERY problem in the show. An extra season would have benefited in giving more characters and narratives focus, allowing the writers to further explore these ideas they had better, but not necessarily helping the OTHER problems in the series, especially ones I’ve mentioned before in this part alone. Having more time just allows the writers more of a chance to let the series BREATHE and fully expand on what was necessary. As is, The Owl House will forever be one of the most popular cases, to me, where a show reaching perfection got held back by a network limiting how much they could have done. It’s not the first, it likely won’t be the last, unfortunately, but it’s still one that comes to my mind frequently. And a part of me can’t help but wonder what could have been if the series was allowed to go on longer. As well as make assumptions as to why it wasn’t, because so far the best bet is that it has to do with the NEXT praise I have with the series.

Praise: It has GREAT diversity.

Before you say the shortening ISN’T because of diversity, Disney is currently trying to scrub out any sense of transgender storyline out of its popular programming and seems a bit too keen to end shows early that continues to diversify casts and normalize certain aspects in society. So don’t F**KING tell me that there’s not any other reason The Owl House suddenly didn’t fit the brand, when the higher ups are making it clear that they want the brownie points for being inclusive but don’t want to go too far to scare off their conservative audiences! Well, guess what! THEY’RE not getting the brownie points, Dana Terrace and the writers are…And they really do deserve it.

The Owl House has a pretty colorful cast, to say the least, with the majority of the primary characters being people of color with only a handful of white people thrown in. And pretty much all of them are on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum, highlighting and normalizing different sexualities, genders, and gender norms with the show explicitly stating it, implying it, or having the cast and crew come in to confirm or deny certain headcanons. I know we should take Hunter and Willow being bi and pan with a grain of salt because DANA confirmed it instead of putting it in the show…but is it really going to stop anyone? I think when your show has two thirds of your main trio be confirmed bisexuals, I say it’s perfectly fine to believe that anyone in the show can at least be a LITTLE gay, confirmation be damned. The show is very LGBTQIA+ friendly, like I said earlier, with several characters that many people can see themselves in. Though, some viewers to have notes about how…perfectly accepted races and sexualities are, as that’s not exactly realistic or it ignores the experience that many people tend to go through. To that I say…valid, but I get why it’s not exactly handled here.

Dana Terrace has gone on record that she wanted to create a world without any REAL discrimination for the sake of escapism. Kids likely get too much of that crap enough, and this is a way to appreciate watching characters who look like them, act like them, and seeing it without being reminded of what the real world’s like. The Owl House is a series to help children feel seen without reminding them of the stress they have to go through. Would it be a BOLD choice to talk about the homophobia and racism in the Human Realm and the culture shock Luz faces when she realizes that doesn’t exist in The Boiling Isles? Absolutely. But I do feel like, because The Owl House is a kids’ show, you gotta keep the kids happy. Doing that means showing them that who they are is NORMAL and they shouldn’t feel shame for it. I don’t hold it against the series to do things like make Camila accept Luz’s sexuality, I just think it's beautiful that this series is telling kids they can and WILL be accepted by the right people. Unfortunately, that’s not going to be the case for everyone, but I still say it’s good to tell kids that there’s nothing wrong with who they are.

Another benefit is that because The Owl House is a kids show, it teaches kids, specifically white and/or straight kids, that there’s nothing wrong with ANYTHING The Owl House presents. The color of a person’s skin does not stop you from seeing yourself in them. That person’s sexuality also doesn’t stop them from being nice or welcoming. Gender? It doesn’t matter because this show goes out of its way to prove gender’s a social construct, if anything else. A girl can dress up as a boy, a man can dress up more flamboyantly, and some characters can just say “screw two genders” altogether and be non-binary. Heck, one of the short-term antagonists has He/They pronouns, that the characters inexplicably respect despite not knowing The Collector has he/they pronouns, proving that no matter what a person is like, you should still acknowledge what labels they go by. And that’s GREAT! Normalization educates kids who AREN’T part of these races or sexualities that they should be ACCEPTING of it. It’s okay if two girls want to kiss, it’s okay for two men of different races to raise a daughter, and it’s okay for a Black kid to be one of the highest performing kids in his grade. Even if SOME parents get so mad at these ideas that they break their child’s TV and Funko pop collection (That happened, by the way. It’s a core memory I have when seeing this show trend on Twitter once).

The Owl House doesn’t NAIL the full experience of all these groups, but that’s not entirely a HUGE detriment to the series. A kid is going to see Lumity become canon for the first time and feel happy to know that they’re not alone in this world. They’re going to see great characters like Raine and see that it’s good to look and be a certain way. It’s less about educating kids about the culture of lives these types of people might have, but it’s perfect in teaching children that there’s nothing wrong with being a certain way. I feel like the writers deserve SOME type of credit for what they wanted to do, because that in of itself is ADMIRABLE…But admittedly, there is ONE note that can’t be denied.

Problem: It puts a LOT more importance on the WHITE characters.

You remember that handful of white characters I mentioned earlier? Well, they seem to be the writers’ favorites with how often they get more attention than the POCs.

“But the main protagonist is an Afro-Latina!”

That she is…but how much do we know about Luz’s history and family compared to Eda’s? Or compared to Amity’s? Hell, you could argue that we know more about BELOS than Luz. We learn it through portraits in the background of his mind, but we still learn.

“So, what? You think that the writers are RACISTS?!”

I did not say that. I never said that. NO ONE who brings up this criticism has ever said that. The writers aren’t racists for putting a lot more attention on their whiter characters as opposed to the NON white ones. The non-white characters are still well-written and highly regarded in the fandom, with some having more popularity than most of the white characters. In fact, I think I see more fan art of Skara than I do of Viney, despite both having very little presence in the series. The writers did good at making us love the characters who are POC and wrote them to be endearing to anyone regardless of race. There’s just this imbalance between them and the white characters, and it gets more noticeable in Season Two when the fandom’s favorite white boy gets a prominent role in SIX episodes while his half-Korean girlfriend is forced to share one with him. And share HALF a role with her white best friend. And keep in mind, I…wouldn’t willingly trade away Hunter’s screen time. I love Hunter, and so does the majority of the fandom. INCLUDING the POC fans, who don’t like it when white critics talk FOR them in saying that only racists can like Hunter. I’ve seen it. But as much as I love Hunter and his story, I would ALSO love it if Willow got just as much attention in the show as he did.

“Well, maybe if the show had more time—“

Don’t do it. Don’t even try it. Alright? Because I told you, the extra season would have fixed a lot of problems but not ALL of them. This imbalance started becoming more of an issue as early as the FIRST half of Season Two, a portion of the series already written before the writers were told that the show would get cut down. In that first half, fans were already pointing out how little screen time characters like Willow and Gus were getting despite being in a close, chaotic friendship with Luz. The first season started with them being major characters, and now it felt like they were being written out of the plot. In an episode where Luz, Gus, and Willow are ALL expelled, it’s mostly about the family drama Amity has with her parents while Willow and Gus do nothing to save Luz so AMITY can look the most badass and Luz gets a crush on her. In an episode where Luz is too sick to go on an adventure, AMITY gets to go and help reform HUNTER, while Willow and Gus have to stay behind and look after Luz. And even then, they don’t do anything. They just sit there listening to whale songs with Hooty as they remain ignorant to a crisis. Plus, while Gus may have HALF an episode to himself, he’s playing second fiddle to Lumity getting closer to canonicity. Meanwhile, Willow got squat, despite being the third person Luz met in the Isles that became an important part of her life and having a ton more prevalence in the previous season. I first dismissed it as maybe it’s because Willow’s arc of finding confidence came to a complete end in Season One, so maybe they didn’t know what else to do with her…but looking back, that’s a pretty flimsy excuse. A completed arc doesn’t mean a show should just STOP using that same character. You just need to find more uses for them other than being someone defined by their relationships.

“Well, what if people thought Willow was boring?”

I mean…Fair? Kind of? Not everyone’s going to like the same characters and if one isn’t your cup of tea then you’re not really going to miss seeing them, regardless of what race they are. I remember seeing Schaffrillas’ review of the first half of Season Two, and he definitely didn’t shed a tear to there being not much Willow content because he found Willow so boring. However, just because it’s not YOUR favorite character, that doesn’t mean it’s NO ONE’S favorite. And after just going over how important it was that this series makes kids of any race feel seen in this dumpster fire we call a planet, it still feels unfair that those same characters are often pushed to the side so that the whiter ones can take more attention. The cast, crew, and FANS pride themselves on how good the representation is, but as good as things are, the imbalance is what makes it imperfect.

WOOF…That was heavy. Maybe we should move onto a lighter topic?

Praise: Its drama is SUPER compelling.

I said LIGHT–Aw, screw it, this is good to talk about.

As I mentioned earlier, I am a grown-ass adult man. So the fact that this show made for literal children managed to get me so invested in its drama is a TESTAMENT to how good it is. When a character cries, I’M almost moved to tears. When someone’s in danger, I feel nervous for them. When the main character is dying before my eyes, I’m screaming like The Punisher as he’s strapped to the chair while begging for these masked men to not kill his family! That is NOT an exaggeration, I still remember the trauma and it’s the main reason I don’t willingly rewatch “Watching and Dreaming” most of the time. And no, that’s not a joke either, it’s…it’s a heavy scene from a heavy episode…

But that’s my point. This show often leaves me an emotional wreck in a way that’s on the level with a few shows that are meant for adults. Again, THE SHOW FOR CHILDREN is making me feel the strong emotions that I would for any adult series. Not all of them, mind you, and it’s entirely possible that not everyone would feel this way…But you want to know WHY it works so well for ME? The same reason why everything else works in The Owl House: The characters.

That’s more than just a fourteen year old biting the dust, that’s my FAVORITE CHARACTER. Hell, she’s probably one of my favorite characters in all of fiction, one I was endeared with through forty plus episodes of her wacky hijinks and lovable antics. So when she goes through something heavy like the cold embrace of DEATH, I’m naturally going to feel worried and sad over her going through it. And that’s just the SERIES FINALE! All the way back in Season One, my heart cracked in half at the end of “Agony of a Witch” when Luz collapsed and started crying her eyes out over Eda being gone. I love this character, I love the relationships she has, and I love the characters IN those relationships. And it’s a good thing I do, because otherwise the drama would not have hit as well if these characters weren’t likable.

Even the personalities of the cast often helps aid the drama. If a happy and optimistic character like Luz is starting to feel doom and gloom, you KNOW things are starting to get dark. And if the usually confident Eda is bursting into tears because she’s feeling the pressure of being unable to protect her kids, then that just proves how bad things really got. It’s not only proof of how good the characters are, but how genuinely good the writing is. These writers aren’t messing around, making something adults can appreciate but never really going TOO intense for kids…most of the time. “Hollow Mind” is STILL very messed up.

And it’s good that the drama is so well-done because the comedy…sure isn’t.

Problem: Its comedy is often hit or miss

I’ve said it once, I’ve said it again, and I might say it once more in the future. But The Owl House…just isn’t that funny to me. Not always.

When the jokes hit, they’re hilarious. My mind always goes to “The choosey hat” bit or Hooty’s…general Hootyness when I think of what makes me crack up with this series. When it’s good, it’s great. When it’s not…it’s like a C-Grade MCU movie.

*Dodges gunshot*

More specifically, it’s sometimes what the internet THINKS a C-Grade MCU movie is like.

*Dodges several gunshots*

Yeah, hate me all you want, it really does feel like that at times. Not ALWAYS, but often. There’s just a lot of moments that a joke feels forced in because we gotta make the kiddos laugh between all this magic and adventure, and it’s awkward every time. Gus noting how Luz must run fast because humans have dorsal fins is on level with that glob thing in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantummania wishing he had holes. Or how Luz, after making this big hero speech being met with nothing, says, “Not the response I was expecting…” That’s on the same level of someone going, “Well, that just happened.” It’s pretty much the show’s humor at its worst, and it often makes me roll my eyes instead of smile.

“Well, maybe your first mistake was expecting a kids show to make you laugh.”

Okay, fair point. I DID just say that these are basically jokes to make kids in the audience laugh, so maybe it’s just a thing where I’m too mature for these jokes…Counterpoint: Hilarity knows no age. Because Gravity Falls, a show meant for the same age range as The Owl House, still makes me laugh as an adult, just as much as it would when I was a kid. And if you wanna go further than that, an episode of Bluey, a show for MUCH younger audiences, manages to crack me up far more easily than The Owl House ever has. Being a kids show isn’t what holds back The Owl House’s humor. It’s just…not that funny. Not to me. If it is for you, more power to ya. But for me, I feel like the reason why it didn’t work so well is because Dana Terrace didn’t put too much of a priority on humor. There was more attention put on the characters, themes, and eventually telling darker narratives that the show being FUNNY became something they didn’t worry too much about. Everything else seemed to have come first, with jokes being on the bottom of the list. There were some great laughs to have, and a few cute chuckles sprinkled in, but most of the time, it’s just not that uproarious.

And that’s it…That’s the last thing I have to say about The Owl House…And it’s a nitpick that’s more subjective, if anything else…That’s not fair. After spending six parts and about three years talking about why I love this series, it’s unfair to end it with “The show’s not funny.”

So, instead, let’s end it by finally answering this big ol’ question that’s at the beginning of every post: Why do I love The Owl House? Really, why is it THIS SHOW that’s stuck with me for so long and one that I’ve obsessed over for about five years now? It’s not really the best animated series ever made. It’s not even the best made within the last five years (Have you SEEN Arcane?!). So why is it that it’s The Owl House the show I obsess over? The show that I’ve written fan-fics, analysis posts, and entire reviews to show my appreciation for it? The show that I’ve dedicated FIVE YEARS of my life hyping up as one of the biggest things of the decade? Well, to put it bluntly…It just is.

That’s not a BIG answer, I know, but it’s the truth. The Owl House is something that I love because it did all the right things in all the right ways at the exact right time. And it did it for me and MANY other fans who came together and voiced their LOVE for this wacky series produced by the company everyone hates. It’s not perfect, NO show is, but the imperfections never really mattered. They exist and I can’t blame people for feeling the need to point them out, but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying the series. NOTHING can stop me from enjoying the series. Dana Terrace would have to come out as a transmisogynistic Nazi who loves the tears of puppies for me to turn away from this series, and even then…it won’t be an easy thing to do.

The Owl House is exactly why I’m here right now. I’ve gained friendships, followers, and had expressed my creativity because of this show. A show I NEVER expected to like and who KNOWS what would have happened if I decided to NOT watch that first episode late one night during college. For all I’m concerned, I might have become the…Lily Orchard to the Amphibia fandom or something…*Shudders*

Will The Owl House stand the test of time and be fondly remembered in the animation hall of fame? To be honest…not sure. Not a future seer. But will it stand the test of time in my heart? Most definitely. Because I may forget some shows and I might forget some aspects of this series like who was the voice of Luz or certain fan-made projects that got drowned out over the years (Remember the “Little Miss Perfect” Animatic?). However, I sincerely doubt, in the deepest part of my soul, that I’ll forget moments like THESE:

The Owl House is FAR from a perfect show. I know that’s true. But to me, no matter what people say, no matter how much better shows will come out…it’ll always FEEL perfect to me.

Thanks again to Dana Terrace and her crew for doing more than changing my life. You changed it for the better, and I’ll always be grateful for that…

[aimeedaisies]

The Princess Royal’s Official Engagements in July 2023

01/07 Princess Anne accompanied by Sir Tim, opened the 30th Scottish Traditional Boat Festival at Portsoy Harbour. ⛴️

03/07 As Chancellor of Harper Adams University, visited the University’s Future Farm, Edgmond and met the 2023 Marshal Papworth Foundation Scholars. 👩‍🎓

As Patron, Scottish Fisheries Museum’s Reaper Appeal visited the Scottish Fisheries Museum in St. Ayles, Anstruther. 🎣

04/07 Visited Strathcarron Hospice, Denny. 👩‍⚕️

As Colonel-in-Chief of the Intelligence Corps, attended a 5 Military Intelligence Battalion Training Night at the Army Reserve Centre, Edinburgh. 💂

05/07 As part of Holyrood week in Edinburgh, Princess Anne carried out the following engagements;

Opened the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People and the Department of Clinical Neurosciences, at NHS Lothian as part of #NHS75 celebrations. 🧸

Opened King’s Buildings Nucleus Building at the University of Edinburgh. 👩‍🎓

Launched WETWHEELS EDINBURGH Accessible Boat at Port Edgar Marina. 🦽🛥️

Attended a Dinner at the Waldorf Astoria for Eric Liddell 100 programme. 🍽️

06/07 As President of the UK Fashion and Textile Association, attended the Textile Institute World Conference at the University of Huddersfield. 🪡

Opened Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust’s Maternity Theatre at Bradford Royal Infirmary.🤰

As Colonel of The Blues and Royals, with Sir Tim, took the salute at the Household Division Beating Retreat on Horse Guards Parade. 🫡

07/07 Attended a Charity Polo Day at Cirencester Park Polo Club for the Spinal Injuries Association 🐎

11/07 Visited Flintshire Adult Day Care Centre, Hwb Cyfle in Queensferry, Wales. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

HRH, as the new Patron of BASC (British Association for Shooting and Conservation) visited their Headquarters at Marford Mill, Wrexham, Wales. 🦡

12/07 Visited St Helena’s Nursing Campus at the University of Derby in Chesterfield. 👩‍⚕️

Opened Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust’s new Urgent and Emergency Care Department. 🏥

Attended a Reception at Rolls-Royce Learning and Development Centre for the Motor Neurone Association. 🚘

13/07 Sir Tim represented the Princess Royal at a service of thanksgiving for the life of Admiral of the Fleet Lord Boyce at Westminster Abbey. ⚓️

Princess Anne opened the King’s Arch at Government House, visited the Tortoise Takeover Trail at Gorey Castle and subsequently opened the Tortoise Tunnel at Jersey Zoo. 🇯🇪🐢

Princess Anne with Sir Tim, later attended the Royal Academy of Engineering Annual Awards Dinner at the Londoner Hotel in Leicester Square, London. 🏆

14/07 Opened the new Southampton Citizens Advice Bureau and visited DP World Shipping Container Terminal. ⛴️

15/07 As Colonel-in-Chief of the Intelligence Corps, attended their Annual Corps Day at Chicksands. 🪖

18/07 Princess Anne and Sir Tim carried out the following engagements in Kent;

Opened a new affordable housing development at Bartlett Close, Staple, Canterbury, followed by a Reception at Staple Village Hall. 🏡

Visited St James’s Cemetery in Dover in her role as Patron of the Remembrance Trust 🫡

Visited Folkestone National Coastguard Institution Station in Folkestone to mark its 25th Anniversary, followed by a Reception at Folkestone Yacht and Motorboat Club. 🚨

19/07 In South Wales, visited Barry Citizens Advice Bureaux in her role of Patron of the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux and later visited HM Prison Cardiff in her role of Patron of the Butler Trust. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

20/07 Joined the ship’s company of HMS Albion and visited Clyde Marina near Glasgow, Scotland. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

21/07 Princess Anne and Sir Tim attended a Dinner at the Royal Ocean Racing Club Clubhouse, to celebrate the 50th Edition of the Fastnet Race in Cowes, Isle of Wight. 🛥️

27/07 Attended the Tall Ships Races Captains’ Dinner at Lerwick Town Hall, Lerwick, Shetland Islands. 👨‍✈️🍽️

28/07 Visited ships in Lerwick Harbour taking part in the Tall Ships Races. 🚢🏁

29/07 With Sir Tim, attended the King George Day at Ascot Racecourse. 🏆🐎

30/07 Princess Anne and Sir Tim visited Cowes, Isle of Wight for Cowes Week and carried out the following engagements;

Viewed Cowes Week Racing and met Squadron Staff at the Royal Yacht Squadron. 🛥️

Visited HMS Tyne and The Royal Navy Stand. ⛴️

Attended a Church Service at Holy Trinity Church. ⛪️

Attended a Reception for Members, Racing Crews, Flag Officers and Sailing Associates at the Royal Yacht Squadron. 🥂

Total official engagements for Anne in July: 42

2023 total so far: 304

Total official engagements accompanied by Tim in July: 14

2023 total so far: 70

[mintedwitcher]

Clearly I forgot that I was speaking to a demographic who have lost - or never gained - the ability to think critically. Let me be clearer.

Americans on tiktok make hateful comments at a higher rate than any other demographic. When Americans went bye-bye, the hate comments virtually disappeared. We - the rest of the world, hi, we exist - were having fun. We made little jokes about how nice the comment sections were. We had people auditioning to replace big American creators and influencers, as a joke.

Americans came back, saw this, and promptly began to bully everyone again, because how dare we have fun without including you.

"It hurt to see yall celebrating," and it hurts us to see you constantly belittling and insulting our countries, because you don't think we matter. It hurts us to see you making endless, ceaseless, careless jokes and taunts about our countries and our cultures as if we don't exist, as if we don't see you, as if we don't hear you. You experienced ONE DAY of the world being fine without you, and you lost your minds, and immediately began threatening and bullying people again. We had fun without you. And you cannot tolerate that.

American exceptionalism at it's finest.

Now, let me add my exhaustive list of disclaimers, since again, critical thinking is a weak spot: this post is not about politics. This post is not about Trump, or Elon, or any of their toy soldiers. This post is not about the rampant fascism spreading through your country. This post is not about any one individual who has never been mean on tiktok. This post is not about any one individual who has never posted a hate comment. This post is not about any one individual who engages with and enjoys multicultural content. This post is not about any one individual who wants to see more multicultural content online. This post is not about any one individual who returned genuinely hurt and unhappy, but did not lash out.

This post is very specifically about the Americans who left the app in tears, then returned and decided to get angry because their FOMO took over their rational thought processes.

If it does not apply, it's not about you.

Just as the rest of the world having fun together was not about you.

You can call me unempathetic. You'd be right, I do actually have very low empathy. However, you stand there all righteous trying to defend your people sending death threats to the rest of the world for simply having a joke amongst ourselves. You are part of the problem.

Was that clear enough?

in all seriousness, the tiktok ban is something that people should be concerned about in the US. censorship at this level is a major red flag and a surefire sign that you are living in a fascist state. the fact that this ban was also an act of political theatre is also something to be genuinely concerned about.

however.

the very few hours on tiktok where the Americans didn't have access, were genuinely some of the most peaceful hours on that app since its creation. for hours, there was no political infighting, no bots, no ads, no hate comments. I saw content from creators in countries that I never usually see, because my feed is usually so flooded with American content. and yes there were a lot of jokes at the Americans' expense, jokes about the metric system and people "auditioning" to "replace" popular American accounts. but none of it was aggressive, none of it was cruel.

meanwhile, today, with the Americans back on tiktok, I have seen nothing but anger and rage and hate. not levelled at Trump or the government, but at other people on tiktok. hate comments are back in full force. I scrolled past eight ads in the span of ten minutes.

and it's not just me. other people (non-Americans) have been trying to talk about how their feeds instantly got flooded with American content as soon as the ban lifted. there are videos now talking about how their comment sections have become full of cruelty again as soon as the Americans returned to the app.

all this to say. Americans, you might just be the problem. I'm not saying the ban is good, or that it should be reinstated. what I am saying, is that Americans need to seriously contemplate how they engage with content online, and how they engage with other people online, especially people who are not from America. because we had fun while yall were gone, and now you're back and all you want to do is scream in every single one of your videos about how we're so mean and so heartless and so hateful, when literally the hate disappeared - and reappeared - with you.

log off. disengage. consider your behaviour. and please for the love of all things good in this world, stop fucking yelling all the time. lower your goddamn volume, please.

[trek-tracks]

Trek novels when an alien race is talking to or about Bones: Makoi, Mack-koy, Makhoi, Ma-Koy, Makhoy

Me, clapping my hands in delight because I love that trope: Boy, I could sure go for some

[shatouto]

i did a dumb friendly fire and blew off nearly half of astarion's hp (i'm so sorry astarion)

[emry-stars-art]

Was inspired to draw kisses and of course they’re royal au flavored

Find the royal au masterpost here 💕

[reasonsforhope]

Btw, if anyone cares to know, my position on Biden and the 2024 election is this:

Starting September* 1, 2024, I will be doing whatever I can to make sure that Trump does not get a second term as president

Until that day, I'm going to be doing whatever I can to push for an end to the genocide in Gaza and an immediate ceasefire, and that includes criticizing, protesting, and lambasting Biden for funding and providing weapons for Israel's genocide

ETA: I will still be posting about significant good things the Biden administration has done, though, because some of it is a really big deal that people deserve to know about

ETA: But I will not be defending Biden from any criticism around Palestine/Israel/war crimes

*This originally said October 1st but someone pointed out to me that there are a few states where early voting starts in late September, including a couple swing states, so I changed it because that's a very good point

I don't plan to tell anyone not to vote for Biden in the meantime, myself, because shitty two party system and I'm really serious about Trump not getting reelected

But I'm also not going to do anything to discourage people who are seriously rallying against Biden, because he is, you know, literally bypassing Congress to make sure he can fund crimes against humanity

I never want to diminish that reality.

And more than that: If we want genocide to actually be a dealbreaker for politicians and presidents... then we need to start acting like it could be.

--

Details/related thoughts:

I will still be posting about good things Biden and his administration are doing, because they are the ones running the US government and Congress is super deadlocked, so a lot of the national-level good news in the US has been done by his administration, and I'm not going to stop posting about that good news

Shout-out to the anon who accused me of being a US government propagandist with a whole PR team bc I posted about Biden a few days in a row. I promise you I'm blogging from my bed in my pjs and do not have a PR team lol

Also, for people who don't think we should be spreading serious criticism about Biden, for fear of Trump winning in 2024: I hear you--that's an incredibly valid fear. I've struggled with that myself, in the process of coming to this(/these) decision(s). But consider this: it's better that we really pile on the criticism and pressure now, because a) people are dying, and b) Biden's chances will be much worse if Israel is still bombing/decimating Gaza on election day

Relatedly, for anyone who's tempted to think Trump would be better when it comes to the Gaza genocide, again, it's really understandable to want to put your hope in any viable alternative. However, I promise you that is not going to happen. Joe Biden at least conditionally gives a couple shits about human life. Trump doesn't. Remember Trump's Muslim ban? In all likelihood, Trump would just tell Israel to bomb Gaza harder and ban Palestinian refugees from entering the US

Last thing on Trump: maybe this is naive of me, but for a lot of reasons, I'm not actually particularly worried about Trump winning in 2024. If I was, I might have made some different calls here. I have a few asks about this in my inbox and will probably make a post at some point about the reasons why, but yeah, Democrats have mostly been wanting to run against Trump instead of DeSantis or Haley or whoever for some very real reasons

You're welcome to disagree with me/this post in any direction, btw

Seriously, I'm just a random person who doesn't speak for anyone besides myself and my own blog. I'm not saying these are categorically the right answers, or that any of this is what everyone should be doing. This is simply the system I have settled on (right now) for how I personally want to handle all of this

You're welcome to disagree with me but please don't send me any angry asks about any of it. Not that I in any way get a lot of those, thankfully! But yeah, this isn't something I'm interested in debating, this is mostly for notification/explanation purposes

[batsplat]

hello, i have a question. what is the difference betwwen a hard and a dangerous racer? is there some sort of characteristics like how succesful a racer is or is more of a "a dangerous racer races on the limit and that's dangerous. a hard racer races on the limit but. its just a hard racer". thank you for answering!

completely in the eye of the beholder, I'm afraid. it's a perpetual debate, and one where everyone draws the line differently... very much a case of one man's dangerous manoeuvre is another one's hard but fair overtake... that being said! I'll have a go at coming up with a general framework with which people assess this stuff

let's bring in two strawmen, which feels like the most direct way to illustrate the possible stances you can take on this debate. to be clear, nobody really fits neatly in either ideological category - but, well, these are pretty much the two most extreme positions anyone could have:

when people are describing something as 'hard racing' (as opposed to... idk, 'clean' racing), they are usually talking about a) contact between the two bikes, and/or b) an action that forces the other bike to take evasive action. what constitutes forcing evasive action? well, this is all very nebulous and hard to define - there's crossing another rider's racing line, making them pick up the bike mid-corner, forcing them wide/off-track, not yielding in situations where one of you will have to yield to avoid a crash... but this is always an assessment that will depend on the specific circumstances. not every block pass is considered hard racing, for instance, even though you are quite literally 'blocking' the other bike. contact is the more straightforward one... if you initiate a move that leads to contact, then most people would agree this is 'hard' racing

so say you are in the 'A' camp. according to this line of thinking, pretty much every contact is 'dangerous' riding and should not be allowed. here's what gibernau said about jerez 2005, included in the sete post:

let's not discuss the merits of the jerez 2005 move specifically here - this is an expression of a broader ideological position. "this is not a contact sport" "it's not about hitting another guy"... so, according to this stance, actions that knowingly result in contact should not be acceptable and as a result need to be penalised. taken to the logical extreme, any and all 'hard racing' is dangerous

let's go to the other extreme, 'B'. let's say you're very pro-hard racing, to the point where you think that contact is more than fine and that it is unreasonable to call it 'dangerous'. sure, of course it is dangerous, but inherently all motorcycle racing has a lot of risk attached. racing that involves contact is basically acceptable. even within this extreme, my lovely venn diagram allows for some actual 'dangerous' riding - either behaviour that is wholly irresponsible during races... or stuff that doesn't count as hard racing because it's not 'racing'. here are some examples:

stuff that happens during races but is like... egregious misbehaviour. cf romano fenati pulling a rival's brake lever during a race - obviously dangerous and no longer really exists within the confines of actual racing

in either races or non-race sessions - not following proper safety procedures like for instance ignoring yellow flags. again, should be pretty obvious why that's dangerous

poor behaviour in non-race sessions,the general tag for not exhibiting appropriate care, awareness for your environment, all that stuff... the extreme example is marc barrelling into the back of another rider after the chequered flag had been waved in friday practise at phillip island 2011 (more on that here). it's also things like faffing about on the racing line, see the pecco mugello dramatics

so, yes, everyone will agree that there's some stuff that counts as 'dangerous riding' that's distinct from 'hard racing' just because it's not actual racing. that's the most straightforward stuff... but yeah, anyway, those are basically the two extreme positions you can take. you can say that all contact is bad and dangerous, that any time you're forcing another rider to take evasive action and are making a pass that isn't 1000% clean, you are putting others at unnecessary risk. or, you can say, hey, everything goes, rubbing is racing on steroids - sure, there's a small category of things that aren't acceptable, mainly stuff that isn't actually racing, but otherwise you should be allowed to brute force yourself past riders whenever you please

obviously, they're strawmen for a reason. basically nobody holds either of these positions in their entirety - and in race situations, there's always going to be actions that are seen as hard racing by some and as dangerous by others. so, unfortunately, we're going to have to dig a little deeper here, and figure out by what metrics people draw the line between hard and dangerous. let's... hey, how about we bring in casey stoner, just this once. as a treat. here's what he said after laguna '08:

“I’ve been in hard racing all my life, some very aggressive racing, but today was a little bit too much. I nearly went in the gravel so many times and I don’t think it was necessary.”

hard racing? casey's done that before. some very aggressive racing? no issue. but what valentino did at laguna was "a little bit too much" and not "necessary". the specific thing casey cites is nearly going into the gravel - and indeed, forcing other riders wide/off-track is one of the types of racing behaviour that most finely straddles the line between 'hard' and 'dangerous'. for other examples, see suzuka 2001 in which biaggi forced valentino off-track and valentino flipped him off when he eventually got past (a few more details here), qatar 2012 where marc forced luthi off-track and got slapped after the race (here) and sepang 2015, where... uh. you know. or how about argentina 2018 where... look, I think you get the point - plenty of controversy comes from forcing your opponent's bike into places where it's simply not supposed to be

while we're at it, let's throw in a little excerpt from casey's autobiography about the race:

A lot of it was fair racing, he was out-braking me on the inside and riding better than me around a lot of the track. If it had all been like that I would cop it sweet. But a couple of moves off camera added to my frustration. I risked running off the track, and racing at the limits like that as we were I even became worried about my safety.

(does have to be said that the pair of them spend... relatively little time off-camera, never when the bikes seem to be particularly close - but of course the problem this statement creates is that by definition you can't judge any footage you don't have access to)

so, let's strip away the details and think about what casey is actually talking about here. it's a risk/reward calculation. this is what's at the heart of this riding standards debate: what level of risk is acceptable for what level of reward? there are situations in which there is inherently a higher level of risk in a way that isn't caused by either party - influenced by the circuit layout, what the weather is like, how hard you're both pushing aka how much on the 'limit' you are, and so on. but even if that risk isn't your 'fault', if you are riding at very high speeds on a dangerous track, you can still be considered a dangerous rider if you're not exercising appropriate levels of caution

so, let's break it down even further and try and come up with some basic criteria by which people judge whether a specific move is 'hard' or 'dangerous'. how about this: (1) does the action have a reasonable chance of coming off, (2) is the risk you're taking proportionate to the reward, and (3) is the move likely to cause serious harm to you or the other rider. let's take them one by one

listen, it needs to be plausible that you're going to be able to pull this move off. if you're firing the bike from fifty miles back into a gap that doesn't exist, then this is by definition an unnecessary risk. you are not going to do yourself any good and you are also not going to do the other rider any good. (sometimes it might be in your interest to crash the other rider out so you might as well, but unsurprisingly this is frowned upon. see the 1998 250cc title decider.) obviously, this is going to be affected by your skill level - if you're a mid rider, there will be fewer moves that are 'plausible' for you than for the best riders

this is basically the common sense metric. if you are riding in a pack, make sure to keep in mind that crashing in this situation could get ugly. if you are fighting for p5, maybe a different approach is fitting than fighting for p1. if you can make an overtake a lap later as long as you're patient, in a way that's a lot safer than doing it now, perhaps just do that instead. don't be silly in the wet! this comes down to stakes, whether it's worth it, how likely the move is to succeed... and also what the consequences would be if you got it wrong, for both yourself and other riders. you're making an overall judgement based on all of those factors... sometimes you need to take risk, but it's better to make sure that risk is reasonably sensible

however high the potential rewards are, there's a certain level of risk that is no longer acceptable, where the 'risk/reward calculation' stuff has to be thrown out of the window because the reward no longer matters. this is basically the catch-all for 'wholly irresponsible riding' - anything that's just going too far

so, uh. obviously everything described above is super subjective... but that's what people are judging in my opinion, this is the standards they are using in their head to determine where they draw the line. so, as an example, to bring back the stuff from this post about the inter-alien ideological differences:

and again, this is also what the debate after aragon 2013 was about:

if you think aragon 2013 is unacceptable to the point of being dangerous, then you probably take quite a hard line view and think pretty much any action that could lead to contact needs to be stamped down on. while that contact did have unpleasant consequences for the other party (dani wasn't able to walk for several days and his title bid was basically over), it is perhaps a little worse than could have been reasonably expected in that situation. in that sense, there's a bit of surface level similarity with jerez 2005... there, valentino made the pass for the win at the last corner, knowing he would probably bump into sete while doing so. neither rider is knocked off their bike (though sete has to leave the track) and it is at a slow corner, with relatively 'light' contact. unfortunately, as a result of where valentino's bike impacted sete's body and sete's preexisting shoulder issues, it ended up injuring sete (see here for valentino learning of this perhaps a little later than was ideal and only after he'd taken the piss out of sete for dramatically clutching his arm). at aragon 2013, marc was harrying dani and sticking very close to his rear tyre as he applied pressure to his teammate before he made a small misjudgement, getting his braking a little wrong and clipping the back of dani's bike. he happened to cut a crucial wire in the process, causing dani to highside a few moments later

these aren't equivalent situations and each have their own risk/reward profile. but the basic point is this: inviting contact with another rider will always generate more risk, and can always have unintended consequences... even when the action is relatively innocuous and the rider would not have expected this outcome. if you are in the 'all passes should be clean passes' school, this risk is fundamentally unacceptable. even trickier - what if contact is made as a result of a move you initiated but the other rider could have avoided? of course, you started it, but they could have yielded... and maybe they should have, maybe that would have been the wise, the sensible thing to do in that situation. it's always important to remember that at least two riders are involved in all these situations - and there are many cases where contact and/or crashing is not 100% the fault of any one party. so, for instance, there are several moments in laguna 2008 that are so risky in part because casey is also refusing to yield. that's not to necessarily imply any blame or fault! of course, it might not be ideal for the most aggressive riders being able to bully everyone else as they please because they know they can generally rely on everyone else being more sensible and yielding. but the differing outcomes resulting from the choices made by the 'other' rider will always help influence perception of any race situation - a move that is seen as 'hard but fair' might have been seen as considerably more dangerous if the other party hadn't yielded

and yes... yes, there is absolutely a question of your success rate. this links back to point (1) - is the move plausible? there are moves that aren't really considered examples of 'hard racing' and certainly not dangerous... because they worked. take valentino's last corner move at catalunya 2009, at a corner where you don't traditionally overtake (remember, before the race jorge was going around tempting fate by saying that if you're ahead by that point you're sorted). sure, he goes for a gap that exists, but it could easily have gone wrong - and if a lot of other riders had tried that, then it would have. how do you think yamaha would have felt if valentino had taken both yamaha riders out at the very end of the race to allow ducati to claim an unlikely victory and an increased championship lead? here's another one: misano 2017 and marc making a last lap move in treacherous conditions to snatch the win. no contact required to make that risky as shit - and if stuff like that goes wrong too often they call you an idiot at best and dangerous at worst. of course, both valentino and marc have had moments where they very much did not pull off moves they were intending, which is how we get ambition outweighing talent and 'I hope he can learn from this one and improve for the future', among other hits. but, relative to the amount of risk they're regularly taking in their racing, they get a lot of reward for their troubles... because they're very good at what they do. the risk/reward calculation is one that they... uh, can both be very adept at, but it's also one that's fundamentally easier when you're skilled enough to pull off a lot of moves that would be beyond the capabilities of other riders. it's when you don't know how to judge your moments, when you keep trying moves that you can't pull off - that's where other riders will start having a problem with you

which is where we get to reputation! how different incidents are judged will also depend on the existing reputations of the riders involved and whether they are seen as 'fair' racers or not (an even more nebulous term, if possible), versus hard racers, dangerous racers... often, this is a question of quantity too - with certain riders on the grid, you will notice they're involved in controversial incidents disproportionately often. how likely people are to pay you the benefit of the doubt... how likely they are to believe you as to what your intent was in a certain situation, perhaps the most nebulous concept of them all. 'hard' and 'dangerous' aren't assessments that are made in isolation, and how severely riders are judged will often depend on their pasts and how those pasts are perceived by others

where you get into really sticky territory is... okay, both valentino and marc have more often than not (arguably) been able to stay on the right side of 'the line', where their moves might be hard but aren't putting anyone else in active danger - but that's because they are at least theoretically capable of exhibiting a good sense of judgement and are also good at what they're doing, as covered above. here's a question: do they bear any responsibility for when younger and/or worse riders copy their moves and/or general approach to racing, with worse consequences? when they have been criticised, when they are called dangerous, at times it's not just what they're doing in the moment... it's what they're inspiring. so you've got stuff like this from sete:

even more drastically than that, after the death of a fifteen year old rider in supersport in 2021, one of his fellow rider said this about marc (which marc unsurprisingly strongly pushed back on):

(just worth remembering, this is a rider who did walk away from the sport as a result and was clearly deeply affected by what happened - the marc comments were part of a longer statement that got overshadowed by this part and the resulting controversy)

setting aside the merits or lack thereof of these specific assertions, what of the general questions they raise... can you be a dangerous rider in an indirect fashion like this, by the very nature of your legacy? are riders who helped bring about a more aggressive baseline standard of racing in any way responsible for anything that happens as a result of this standard? (even worse, there's a line of succession here - after all, who was marc's biggest inspiration?) or does individual responsibility reign supreme here? athletes are by design only interested in their own successes, aren't they - and 'legacy' is so abstract, how can anyone know how others will be influenced by what they do? how can we even begin to assess how big an influence individual riders really are? let's not forget that there will be other factors - riders in the past have discussed how particular characteristics of the moto2 class have bred more aggressive racing, or the influence of the size of motogp bikes, or how difficult it is these days to overtake in a completely 'clean' manner, or the rules themselves and to what extent they have actually been enforced etc etc... maybe there's also an element of people focusing on the easiest, most visible explanation in the form of star riders, without giving proper consideration to the underlying factors that will influence an era's style of riding. again, how you feel about all of this will vary from person to person - but part of the hard vs dangerous debate is inherently forward-looking. and it's hardly just legacy... your hard/dangerous moves may also be setting a precedent in the present. to what extent is it the duty of riders to worry about that?

so then, that's what I've got. how you draw the distinction between hard racing and dangerous riding will come down to your individual ideological position and what you think racing even entails. do you think all contact is objectionable? do you think only the most extreme of transgressions - most of which don't qualify as 'racing' per se - should be labelled dangerous? somewhere in between? everyone will draw the line in a different place, according to the situation and their individual biases and understanding of events. it comes down, generally speaking, to how you judge the risks and rewards of a certain move, whether you think what a rider attempted was 'worth' it. all of which depends on whether the rider could realistically have managed whatever action they were attempting, whether the potential rewards were proportionate to the risks, or whether the whole thing was just too flat out dangerous to ever be worth it... of course, none of these are objective standards by which you can assess the racing, but they should give you a rough indication of what people are even talking about when they're distinguishing between hard and dangerous racing. riders as individuals are also far from consistent in their stances (surely not!) so you do have to play it by ear a lot of the times... and while there are plenty incidents where the majority can agree whether it is 'hard' or 'dangerous', there are plenty more where you're going to get a lot of contradictory opinions. no definitive answers here - unfortunately a lot of the time you'll just have to make your own mind up

[puppppppppy]

i wanna post my skip to loafer art but i cant do it knowing ppl are gonna put it on tiktok and pinterest bc itd be like. bringing an invasive species ykwim

[ir-abelas-vhenan]

Oh cool you're a gamer? Normally I'd claim such a chill and nebulous label for myself, but thanks to a helpful anon I now know instead that the proper term is "piece of shit"

[cator99]

I always get detained at da border because PROFUNC never ended but basically I'm like if a targeted individual didn't even care

[aimeedaisies]

The Princess Royal’s Official Engagements in May 2023

03/05 In preparation for her brothers, King Charles III coronation, Princess Anne carried out the following engagements in central London;

Unofficial HRH along with King Charles III, The Prince and Princess of Wales and Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis were at Westminster Abbey for coronation rehearsals 👑

As Colonel of The Blues and Royals, HRH met Officers and senior Non-Commissioned Officers of The Household Division during a visit to Wellington Barracks. 💂‍♂️🫡

As Patron of the SS Great Britain Trust, HRH visited SS GREAT BRITAIN in Bristol, where she toured the Future Brunels Showcase. ⛴️

04/05 The Princess Royal, accompanied by Sir Tim attended the Victoria Cross and George Cross Association Dinner at Fishmongers’ Hall in London 🍽️

05/05 On the eve of her brother, King Charles III’s coronation, Princess Anne, her husband Sir Tim, the King and Queen and all working royals (except Pss Alexandra) carried out the following engagements in central London;

Held a Luncheon at Buckingham Palace for Realm Governor-Generals and Prime Ministers. 🥪

Held a Reception at Buckingham Palace for visiting Heads of State and Overseas Guests. 🥂

Separately The Princess Royal as Colonel of The Blues and Royals (Royal Horse Guards and 1st Dragoons), visited members of the Household Cavalry preparing for the Coronation of King Charles III at Hyde Park Barracks. 🐎

Unofficial Princess Anne, Sir Tim, other members of the BRF and other foreign royals went out for a pre coronation dinner at Oswalds, a private exclusive club near St James, London. 🥂

06/05 The Coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla took place in Westminster Abbey. 👑

Their Majesties left Buckingham Palace at 10.20 o’clock and proceeded in State to the Abbey. Princess Anne, Sir Tim, working royals and other members of the british royal family, foreign royals, leaders, dignitaries and other guests were all in attendance. 👸🤴

Their Majesties returned back to Buckingham Palace in the Gold State Coach, closely followed by the Princess Royal, on horseback, in her role as Gold-Stick-in-Waiting. 🐴

Order of the following coaches;

Australian State Coach - The Prince & Princess of Wales, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis 🇦🇺

Irish State Coach - The Duke & Duchess of Edinburgh, Earl of Wessex and The Lady Louise Mountbatten-Windsor 🇮🇪

Scottish State Coach - Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence and the Duke & Duchess of Gloucester 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

State Car - Duke of Kent and Princess Alexandra 🚘

Combined Guards of Honour of the three Services (Army, Navy, RAF) were mounted outside the Forecourt of Buckingham Palace and took the salute, Princess Anne joined. 🫡

Their Majesties and working members of the royal family stood on the balcony of Buckingham Palace and witnessed a fly-past by aircraft of the Royal Air Force. ✈️

07/05 The Princess Royal, accompanied by Sir Tim visited a Big Lunch Community Street Party at Belmont Crescent in Swindon. 🥪

Prior to the BBC Coronation concert The King and Queen held a reception at Windsor Castle. The Princess Royal and Sir Tim Laurence, The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh and The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester attended. 🍾

08/05 The Princess Royal attended a Big Help Out Service and Reception in Gloucester Cathedral. ⛪️

09/05 The Prince and Princess of Wales held an Afternoon Party in the garden of Buckingham Palace to celebrate the Coronation of The King and Queen. The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, The Princess Royal and The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester were present. 🍰

10/05 As President of the Royal Yachting Association, HRH visited Budworth Sailing Club on their 75th Anniversary. 🛥️

Attended the Young Enterprise UK Start-Up National Final at the University of Salford Business School. 💼

As Patron of Woolf Institute, HRH held a Twenty Fifth Anniversary Dinner at St James’s Palace. 🍝

11/05 As Patron of the Butler Trust, Princess Anne visited HM Prison Pentonville in London where she met rehabilitated ex-offenders who have found employment through the Trust and later attended a reception held by City and Guilds at the Prison👮

12/05 Visited St Hilaire Avenue, Coleford, to mark the town’s twinning with Saint-Hilaire-de-Riez in France. 🇬🇧🇫🇷

HRH later visited AccXel Construction Skills Accelerator Centre, Whimsey Industrial Estate in Cinderford. 🔨

15/05 As Past Master of the Worshipful Company of Butchers, HRH attended the Annual City Food and Drink Lecture at Guildhall. 🥗

16/05 As Past Master of the Worshipful Company of Carmen, HRH opened the new Carmen Hall and then attended a Service of Dedication. ⛪️

In her role of President at the Royal British Legion Women’s Section, Princess Anne attended a Service to mark the 60th Anniversary of the end of National Service at the National Memorial Arboretum. 🌷

17/05 As Patron of the (WRNS) Women’s Royal Naval Service Benevolent Trust, attended the Annual General Meeting and a Reception onboard HMS Excellent, docked in Portsmouth.

As Royal Patron of the National Coastwatch Institution, visited Gosport Station in Hampshire and later attended a Reception. 🛟

As Commandant-in-Chief of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (Princess Royal’s Volunteer Corps), HRH attended a Recruits’ Passing Out Parade at Wellington Barracks. 🫡

18/05 Princess Anne departed from Heathrow Airport for Canada and later arrived at Fredericton International Airport in New Brunswick 🇨🇦

19/05 Princess Anne carried out the following engagements in New Brunswick, Canada. 🇨🇦

As Honorary Deputy Commissioner of The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, visited their “J” Division Headquarters and after attended a Reception on the occasion of their 150th Anniversary. 🎂

Laid a wreath at The Royal Canadian Mounted Police Memorial. 👮‍♂️

Attended a Civic Reception at Moncton City Hall. 🏫

Visited Vitalité Health Network’s Veterans’ Health Centre. ⛑️

As Colonel-in-Chief of the 8th Canadian Hussars (Princess Louise’s), HRH attended the 175th Anniversary Concert at Wesleyan Celebration Centre. 🎺

20/05 Princess Anne, as Colonel-in-Chief of the 8th Canadian Hussars (Princess Louise’s) carried out the following engagements in New Brunswick, Canada. 🇨🇦

Attended and took the salute at the Freedom of the City of Moncton Parade. 🫡

Visited Moncton Garrison. 💂‍♀️

Attended a Reception for the occasion of the 120th Anniversary for the Canadian Forces Communications and Electronics Branch. 🍾

Princess Anne was invested with the Canadian Order of Military Merit (Commander) by the Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick, on behalf of the Governor General and after attended a Reception and Gala dinner for the 175th Anniversary of the 8th Canadian Hussars. 🎖️

21/05 Princess Anne, as Colonel-in-Chief of the 8th Canadian Hussars (Princess Louise’s), carried out the following engagements in Sussex, Canada. 🇨🇦

Attended a Service at Trinity Anglican Church, 853 Main Street, Sussex, to mark the 175th Anniversary of the Regiment. ✝️

Attended a Freedom of the Town of Sussex Parade. 🫡

Visited the Regimental Museum in Sussex. 🪖

Visited Sussex (Milton Gregg) Armouries. ⚔️

Departed Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, Quebec, for Heathrow Airport, UK arriving on 22/05. 🇬🇧

23/05 The Princess Royal held an Investiture ceremony at Windsor Castle. 🎖️

24/05 As Royal Colonel of the 1st Battalion The Ranger Regiment, HRH visited the Battalion near Dublin, Northern Ireland 🇮🇪

26/05 As Patron of Battle of the Atlantic Memorial, the Princess Royal and Sir Tim attended a Service and unveiled the Garden of Reflection Memorial at Liverpool Parish Church, opened an Exhibition at the Western Approaches Museum and attended a Reception at Liverpool Town Hall. 🏅

Total official engagements for Anne in May: 51

2023 total so far: 222

Total official engagements accompanied by Tim in May: 9

2023 total so far: 50