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analysis-by-a-muffin · 4 years ago

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YGO Analysis: Protagonists and Rivals, the Pivotal Relationship (Part 1)

There are a variety of relationship archetypes that come with any genre. Their importance, meanings, and depiction come with a strong and wide variety even from within their own genres or franchises. Rivalries are a constant across several media; only coming with different faces depending on the reason for the competition between two characters. Action movies, shows, etc tend to have major rivalries between the protagonist and a character that is both their opposite and their equal (whether or not they’re actually an equal truly depends on the piece of content but shhh). This relationship can be a strong driving point of plot related events, and one of the finest examples of that is the Yu-Gi-Oh franchise with its growing number of rival relationships that are distinctive in their own ways— even while they’re following a very set pattern.

General Overview

Compared to many other rivalries— in shounen works especially— there’s a lot about the way Yu-Gi-Oh goes about theirs that struck a surprising chord with me. Thankfully, each spinoff doesn’t give the viewer an exact clone of the rivalry that started it all, regardless of how popular Seto Kaiba and Pharaoh Atem are. There’s also a notable lack of anything feeling generic or far too in line with tropes, following them safely down to a T. Each one has a flavor that allows for viewers to have their own favorites which can range from cold and intense to warm and soft.

Duel Monsters crafted certain characteristics and behaviors within each dynamic.

Obsession: Each rival has a focus on the protagonist that they don’t really give to any other character. The intensity of it changes with each pair, however, and can sometimes involve stalking the main character, oftentimes thinking about them, or more mildly, simply talking about them a lot in private to someone else. Another staple to their obsessive behavior is going to absurd lengths to get the attention of the protagonist, something which they’ve displayed as a thing the rival can get pretty greedy for.

Plot Importance: If a YGO series isn’t well made or structured, the main rivalry is likely not going to be a very good one. When done spectacularly, their relationship can be what causes major events to unfold and hinge on which is par for the course with this franchise. Basically, rivalry quality and series quality play very important roles.

Friendship: Typically, they start out as enemies or strangers. Whatever it is, they’re not on great terms right away, but through a connection/understanding of each other that no others have, they become unlikely (and even unconventional) friends. Their bond is meant to be seen as one of the strongest in each series and are often each other’s greatest influence. On top of all of that, it’s normally the protagonist who longs to befriend the clearly broken inside rival. Which has a high tendency to end up with them being upset at offers to help and understand them being harshly rejected.

Soulful Connection: Duel Monsters is a card game with in-universe lore heavily pertaining to duelists’ souls, and the concept of them in general. It’s no surprise that the protagonists and rivals can end up with bonds that cause them to feel like soulmates. Yet, there are times when that connection becomes extremely apparent and more overt. First duels between them tend to have the protagonist being able to read the rival, seeing parts of him that don’t line up with what he says and leaving them to wonder why they’re so closed off or who made them act this way. Of course, this comes as a huge shock to the rival along with their ego. This in turn fuels the need to aid the rival; meanwhile, this character zeroes in on the protagonist.

Key Similarities: Regardless of how seemingly dissimilar they can be in beliefs, attitudes, intelligence, and their very dueling styles, these two are meant to have something that draws them to each other unlike anyone else. This showcases a common unbreakable thread that keeps them bound. It can be anything from pride to shared background experiences to having a hidden heart of gold.

Paralleled Features: Red versus blue is an age old trope that makes itself known in YGO. If the two aren’t clearly in line with that, they have several other opposing color differences such as one wearing darker colors while the other wears lighter ones. One of each of them could also be paler than the other either slightly or blatantly.

Sun/Moon, Light/Dark: Another common trope, that comes with some diverseness across the board. The protagonist can be made out to be something bright and life-saving similar to the sun, and this can be openly stated or strong hints to this can be thrown in. In the eyes of the rival, the protagonist can be seen as their light in the darkness. Someone who thrills them, serving as this unique person who can make them feel more alive and can even stop them from sinking too deep into metaphorical darkness.

Respect and Trust: These two are cornerstones of every dynamic. Without them, everything falls apart. The rival has a lot of difficulty navigating the idea of trusting others but commands respect he often doesn’t receive. The protagonist comes in to teach them better and be a guiding force much like with aiding them in friendship.

Separately, the rivals share traits modeled after Kaiba.

A lust for power (usually the result of never having any true power in their own lives)

A physical design that depicts them as being bigger, taller, and overall more masculine (in a few cases they’re even a year or two older)

Dramatics in their gestures, speech, fashion sense, dueling methods, and interests

A cold and aloof personality in which their stoic nature causes problems in whatever relationships they have

Cards are mainly very imposing and dark creatures

Difficulty with honesty and containing aggressive feelings

Being a part of a higher social or economic class (something which weighs on them and can be the source of a huge portion of their grief)

Dueling style will almost exclusively be focused on dominating the opponent through beat down

Experiencing a tragedy that forever changes parts of themselves in ugly ways

Protagonists are similar to Yugi and/or Atem, but unlike their less kind and closed off counterparts, there're plenty of times in which they’ve deviated far from the norm.

A more open heart to kindness and letting people get close, along with the urge to help others

Designs make them smaller and shorter than their rivals with a softer appearance that welcomes instead of rejects

A warmth and hope that can irritate the rival

Are more likely to use cards that feature cute monsters

Tragedy can strike them, but it’s treated like a source of strength or something that greatly influences what they do (can come with less hurtful coping mechanisms)

[There seems to be a common tactic when it comes to hiring the Japanese voice actors for the protagonists. They don’t have the experience of several roles, and voicing a YGO lead character is their first big hit].

These dynamics are easily my favorite part of each series, and one of the things I look towards the most when a new series is announced. Finally taking the time to write out an analysis and composing my thoughts feels nice. The next parts will be dedicated to actually looking at the specific relationships instead of talking about them generally.

#yugioh #prideshipping #gx rivalshipping #kingcrabshipping #sharkbaitshipping #pendulumshipping #datastormshipping #on my previous account I talked occasionally about protags and rivals #but this is where I decided to finally go more in depth with my analysis #while not inherently about them as a romantic pair #I did find it much easier to tag ships even though I kind of want to do a queer reading of their relationships and YGO as a whole #but really I’m not even too sure of what all I could say there #also I’m not really bringing up Sevens here because I don’t know it well enough #the series is still ongoing too #b u t there are things I’ve seen in it that still fit stuff listed here #primarily with their opposite character designs and the protag VA not being a super experienced one

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itsybitsylemonsqueezy · 4 years ago

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Tachibana/Kiryu/Majima is a good ship and ur right and u should say it and always bring it up!!!!!!!! Also like same abt the crying abt Tachibana like lord. I get emotional thinking about him holding Kiryus hand ffs

Soft boys are too sofffftttt. 💕💕💕

And, since you have so kindly encouraged me, it’s OT3 time bitchesssss.

I’ve got a lot of feels about Kiryu and Majima being fated lovers, don’t get me wrong. And canon sure as fuck does too. (I find it constantly hilarious that they Won’t Say It’s Gay and then put Majima in every spinoff and in EVERY spinoff he’s in love with Kiryu. And also what if people asked Kiryu he’s gay sometimes and he just doesn’t answer??? And what if we tanked every het romance option Kiryu could ever have??? Like... canon ain’t saying it’s gay but they ain’t saying it’s NOT gay and I’m just. Y’all are... so much.)

See, I love Kiryu/Tachibana and Kiryu/Majima, both are so Satisfying. But, if I was going to write post-Zero fic with Tachibana alive, I was gonna have to choose whether I just ignore Majima entirely and pretend That wasn’t happening or, somehow, code Majima’s relationship with Kiryu another way and... I didn’t really want to do that either. They could of course be platonic soulmates, but now I have to do relationship balancing and intimacy issues and asdkfhfkjdsahfkjsd blahhhh... rough times. I didn’t like either of these options, but I love my boy. So, what to do?

Well, the old favorite for solving love triangles is a threeway. So I began to think... Kiryu has very obvious reasons for being in love with both of them (His type is: horrifically-powerful, secretly-good human being who is Absolutely Batshit. Fight me.) And they both have reasons for loving him. And that’s when it struck me... they love him for the same reasons.

You see, Kiryu is an impossible thing. He is a miracle-worker. He is strong, sure, and kind. He takes a licking and keeps on ticking, so to speak. And, what’s most damning for both Tachibana and Majima, while a lot of their goodness must be hidden or disguised, Kiryu’s is entirely out in the open. He’s like a creature of light standing alone in the darkness and these two shadow creatures cannot help wanting to cling to him. He offers safety and protection, in different ways. He is incorruptible, he is impossible and that gets both of them.

Now here you may notice that it’s a relatively exclusive group of people who are head-over-heels, madly in love with Kiryu. It’s just those two. Oh, everyone likes Kiryu, but to really be in love with him like that, you have to be crazy. Because Kiryu is crazy. It’s harder to spot, he’s not as flamboyant as Majima or as terrifying as Tachibana. But anyone who would take on the entire Tojo Clan single-handedly, anyone who would Turn Down the chairmanship for no other reason than he didn’t want it, anyone who would run away to Okinawa and start an orphanage without any fear of reprisal, anyone who just Does What They Want regardless of consequence or risk... is crazy. That’s what seduces Majima and Tachibana, the kindred they all share, they are fucking WILD for it. And Kiryu, lowkey, is wild for them too. They’re all like that, screw the consequences, I do what I think is right regardless. They’re all SO FUCKING HARD for that shit, I can’t even explain. So you don’t fall in love with Kiryu for the normal reasons one falls in love. You only fall in love one way and it is soul-wrenching and everlasting. It breaks you. So lots of people like Kiryu, but you gotta be crazy to walk the path he’s on.

And then I thought... wait if that’s what they love about Kiryu... then they would love that about each other. Each of them is crazy enough to be a good person. Each of them has had a shit start in life, has lost much, has had to build themselves up and survive. And each of them is so fucking ready to marry the first good person they see... there’s absolutely no reason why they wouldn’t all marry each other.

So, it’s obvious with Kiryu that he’s a good person. It’s harder with Majima and perhaps hardest of all with Tachibana. So it would take some time getting to know each other and trusting each other, but god, if you could do it...

And here’s where my boy comes in. Because he is good at reading people. And, even better, once Tachibana has decided something, it will happen. If he got one look, just one good look, at Majima, just for a minute... fate sealed. Because Majima is good at misdirection, he’s an excellent magician. He can keep your attention in the left corner pocket while he’s dallying with the right side and you wouldn’t know the difference until you lost. But anyone trying that hard to keep everyone away, anyone trying that hard not to be mistaken for a good person, is hiding something. Tachibana would spot that a mile off. And, lord, if he saw him just LOOK at Kiryu, even once. Done for. No questions. Tachibana knows that look inside and out.

Would he be jealous? Tachibana isn’t really possessive by nature. A great deal of his wealth and resources are used to support those that don’t have enough. Never being covetous is one of his precautions against becoming a greedy tyrant and antithetical to his aims. Tachibana would be an irredeemable monster if not for the fact that he never loses sight of what money is and what it isn’t. His ideas about the value of money extends to other things. He doesn’t think of Kiryu as ‘his.’ He adores Kiryu, cherishes him, and would protect him from any threat. But, part of his promise and his love for Kiryu is embedded in Kiryu... being Kiryu. Kiryu has to be free to be himself. Tachibana knows he would love him less if Kiryu stopped being Kiryu. So it doesn’t hurt him to see that someone else is interested in Kiryu, or KIryu is interested in them, on the contrary... Someone else being interested in Kiryu means something fascinating.

Because, as I’ve said, you gotta be crazy to love Kiryu. If you love him, then you know what he is. Tachibana can’t share Kiryu with anyone else by the simple fact that no one else knows what he is. But someone else being interested... that means someone else sees it. No, quite to the contrary, Tachibana wouldn’t be jealous, he’d be overjoyed. If you adore Kiryu, you can’t want to own him, you just want to be close to him, be part of his life, help him. And Majima... adores.

Majima, though. Majima barely thinks of himself as a person right now, much less worthy of having wants, much less worthy of Kiryu. He does want, terribly, he loves so badly all that Kiryu is and does. But if he saw, if he thought Kiryu was already with someone else, Majima would back away without a word. He was never worthy in the first place. And all that matters is if Kiryu’s happy. No reason to interject himself. So he’d be tricky if he thought he was competing or interfering with something established because he feels no right to his own desires. But Tachibana can work fast to counteract that, especially if he’s already decided Majima is going to be a part of this, and he most certainly has.

And then there’s Kiryu too. Kiryu who is entirely ignorant of his own role and position in life, but who greatly looks up to people who are strong and do good in spite of great difficulty. Kiryu thinks Tachibana is a god to have come from so little and built up so much, to be so powerful and yet so kind. He’s blown away by what Tachibana is and does and hardly feels like he has anything to measure up. And Majima, well. At first, Majima is annoying, fierce, brash. He’s fun to fight, because he’s so fucking strong, and that’s a little bit intoxicating if he’s honest. The way he feels seen by Majima sometimes just... it itches under his skin, if he’s perfectly honest. Makes him want... things. But it’s the first time Kiryu sees Majima, the first time he realizes that Majima’s been lying all along, the first time he gets just a glance at that tender heart, that’s the nail in the coffin. Kiryu can’t let that go no matter what. Knowing that Majima is doing all this shit just to protect himself, which Kiryu has wrong, but knowing that beneath Majima is... unbearably sweet and kind, would burst Kiryu’s heart. And he’d never understand why someone so deserving would feel so unentitled. Out of his own sheer kindness, Kiryu would insist on being nice to Majima, insist on showing Majima he was worth something because it would break his heart to think of Majima’s nonexistent self-esteem.

So out of profound mutual experience and values, they could be unstoppable. If given half a chance, they could rule Kamurocho from both legal and illegal business. A trifecta of CEO, chairman, and hand of the king. They’re all fucking nuts and they all get off on the fact that each other is the softest, kindest, strongest fuck. Just... I need a Minute.

#OT3 essay #Tachibana/Kiryu/Majima #it's a GREAT ship and I'm sad every damn day that there isn't more content #I didn't invent this ship so it could be mine #It is a gift for everyone to share ^^;#narutomaki

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whateverthedragonswant · 4 years ago

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More proof in the pudding for 15x20 breaking the fourth wall theory

I kind of already discussed this theory on this post here but in going over the last two seasons of GoT to add to this dark!Dany meta I’ve got going, I noticed something that I think is worth taking a look at.

GoT 8x06:

We all remember what happens after this weighted ominous walk of Jon’s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XhfGY5pIPg&t=254s

“When I was a girl, my brother told me it was made from a thousand swords of Aegon’s fallen enemies. What do a thousand swords look like in the mind of a little girl who can’t count twenty? I imagined a mountain of swords too high to climb. So many fallen enemies, you could only see the soles of Aegon’s feet.” “This is our reason. It has been from the beginning since you were a little boy with a bastard’s name and I was a little girl who couldn’t count to twenty.” “You are my queen, now and always.” -- this is dialogue meant to call back to the Dany the audience has known since season 1 - this was done in an effort to keep her character sympathetic to the end but it’s problematic since she just torched an entire city that held a million innocent people, and it completely negates the true moral of her story - her brother is mentioned who we haven’t seen since season 1, who by all means is not a good influence or a hero in this story but in this last season, she has started to embrace the Targaryen side of things (that we’ve seen reflected in her wardrobe, I see you Michele Clapton, you brilliant woman, you) - the dialogue even invokes season 1 Jon in that one line, though obviously the focus is not on Jon but Dany herself - Jon who had just been acting as the audience mouthpiece in the jail scene with Tyrion (acting as the writers’ mouthpiece - again breaking the 4th wall), saying “You are my queen, now and always”, something the split audience (the ones who felt betrayed by Dany’s dark turn and still stan her to this day) keep saying - yes “now and always” was a common saying in the North, but this wording is purposeful as is this piece of dialogue for essentially what is Dany’s death scene, the most controversial death to come out of this episode, the end of this series I would even argue

15x20:

We all remember Dean’s monologue that took close to 10 mins to happen as he was “fading pretty quick”, so much so that Sam couldn’t call for help

youtube

“There’s a few things that I need you to hear. Come here. Let me look at you. There he is. I am so proud of you, Sam. Do you know that? I’ve always looked up to you. Remember when we were kids, you were so damn smart, you never took any of Dad’s crap. I never knew how you did that. And you’re stronger than me. You always have been. Hey, did I ever tell you that night that, uh, that I came for you when you were at school? You know when Dad hadn’t come back from his hunting trip? The woman in white, that’s right. I must’ve stood outside your dorm for hours because I didn’t know what you would say. I thought you’d tell me to get lost or get dead and I didn’t know what I would’ve done if I didn’t have you. ‘Cause I was so scared. I was scared. ‘Cause when it all came down to it, it was always you and me. It’s always been you and me.” “I can’t do this alone.” “Yes, you can.” “Well, I don’t want to.” “I love you so much. My baby brother.” -- notice anything...familiar? -- this is dialogue meant to call back to season 1, to the original audience that started out with the brothers in season 1, that may not have stuck with the show for all 15 seasons but maybe ducked back in for the finale just to see how the show chose to end the boys’ stories - John is mentioned who is not a good influence nor a hero in the story which the show has gone out of their way to show time and time again, despite 14x13 - this is the result of one of their dad’s old unfinished hunts from season 1 including the “villain” - Dean mentions events of the first episode when John hasn’t come back from an old hunt, when he goes to get Sam from school, the woman in white being their very first MOTW of the show, even the dialogue from that first episode where the lines are reversed and Dean tells Sam he doesn’t want to do it alone - the dialogue is meant to invoke nostalgia of that pilot and that time, that version of the boys’ stories, where it was Winchester only - Dean’s death (outside of Cas’) is one of the most controversial deaths to happen this episode, even this series (though it has a lot of problematic deaths, i.e. Charlie but I mean in the main character arena) - this was done to keep season 1, specifically the pilot, in the viewers’ minds and as a callback to the beginning of the show, the dialogue was very purposeful, it’s also no coincidence that Sam is the focus here and once Dean is finished telling him goodbye essentially, he looks away behind the camera and talks about how he didn’t think today was going to be the day but it is (which adds to the pudding even more, because this is later season Dean talking who did not want to die on a hunt and wanted something different for himself, season 1 Dean always knew he would die young on a hunt)

And let us not forget this:

Andrew Dabb: “If you thought Game of Thrones was bad, just wait” (x) - this is said in a joking manner but where is it said? Comic Con 2019, the same Comic Con D&D canceled their appearances at & left the cast who did appear to deal with the fallout. This isn’t a man flipping off people and being like “Ha! Crybabies, we’re doing what we want to do and that’s that! Ha!” He said it in a joking manner when he talked about how only 30% of people would be pleased after seeing the finale and Jared joined the conversation. This is the same man who pushed hard along with Bobo Berens for a spinoff that featured women and women of color as well as having proper queer representation but got shut down by the network in the end. The same guy who worked to separate Dean and Sam from their toxic co-dependency and bolstered the found family theme in the narrative, while also taking the baton that Carver started with of Dean and Sam thinking of what they would actually want for their endings, and running with it, developing that even further.

What did GoT have? 2 final seasons as it were. To be fair, season 7 cannot be considered an alternate ending, it had way too many open endings but here (x) it’s stated that D&D did want to end GoT with season 7 initially before being convinced by the network to go to 8. They wanted to move onto other projects (that never happened because they’re egotistical greedy idiots, but I digress) and their rush to end the series showed. HBO wanted 10 seasons but they didn’t want to move forward without D&D. GRRM thought at least 13 seasons would be appropriate.

What did SPN have? 2 finales. 15x19 is not only the finale that closes up the mytharc but also the found family finale. I’m not sure if they knew this ahead of time or found out last second (Misha’s line of “Cas’ ending was supposed to be different but I don’t think we’re supposed to talk about that” still haunts me), but ultimately, that’s how it worked out. 15x19 was for the later season fans, the found family, the mythology fans (meaning Heaven, Hell, angels, nephilim, Lucifer, Jack, etc). That’s why we get the huge montage of characters at the end of the episode, the initials on the table, Dean demanding Cas be brought back in the beginning of the episode and Lucifer’s phone call, Dean and Sam wanting Jack to come back to the bunker but he can’t, Dean and Sam driving off in Baby together with “Running On Empty” playing. 15x20 was the series finale for early season fans, Kripke fans, Winchester-only fans. That’s why there’s no big montage in the beginning of the SERIES FINALE that they had done every season premiere, every season finale, and every mid-season premiere. They didn’t want the found family (yes, including Cas and Jack) in the viewers’ minds. But they couldn’t remove those two characters from the narrative completely (they were too integral later on in the series plus later season fans are watching this too) so they get mentions. This is why the Carry On My Wayward Son twice, Sam married to Blurry Wife and having Dean Jr., the Winchester-only mantle, the MOTW that calls back to one of their big bads (vampires) in season 1 (outside of YED & any demonic forces), why the brothers-only ending. This is why Dean is all ‘Cas who?’, why Eileen disappeared, and why Jack is off shooting a new spot for Architectural Digest. They only wanted Sam and Dean on your minds in 15x20 with the extension of John, Mary, Rufus, Bobby, and Baby with a touch of the Roadhouse in the background. This is also why no pictures of Blurry Wife on the Winchester-only mantle either. This is why Sam’s son was named Dean. This is why after putting on the Party City wig, Sam goes to sit in Baby and cries, thinking of Dean.

I’ve said it before and I will say it again: 15x20.👏 Was.👏 A.👏 Vehicle. It’s no coincidence that W*lker was more heavily promoted during 15x20 than any other time before. That what happens in 15x20 for Sam and Dean (and that Sam is once again the focus after having the story split between the brothers for years before) parallels somewhat to what happens in Jared’s new show and his character. This is the same network that uses its shows to backdoor pilots of spinoffs and other shows time and time again (think Green Arrow and The Canaries, Legacies, etc). It’s also no coincidence that W*lker is in the same time slot as SPN had been in, that they intersperse the use of #SPNFamily and #W*lkerFamily on Twitter, that the C*W SPN twitter account is used to steer followers to their other content, that the C*W YouTube account for SPN no longer has any clips or promos available for that show, almost as if it doesn’t exist. You know why? Simple, they don’t want SPN on your minds anymore. They want you watching W*lker and any other new content they are cooking up and throwing at you. Don’t be surprised if they start heavily promoting another new show (besides their returning ones) during W*lker episodes now. That’s just the name of the game, how it works. They already pushed the audience they wanted from 15x20 to W*lker and now SPN is an officially closed chapter for them. Dabb and the actors had other projects to move onto. In their minds, it’s done...until they try to reboot it in some way in a couple of years. And it will not only feature a younger generation of actors but will have what they consider to be appropriate queer representation as well as POC representation in the new cast. It may be the same Winchester story though changed or a whole new story in that universe. You laugh but watch. It’ll happen. This network is not known for its quality or originality, only for their brand. There’s a reason they keep on showrunners to head up new content if their original source of content works and they become “favorites” (i.e Julie Plec).

Ultimately, GoT was referenced many times on SPN, in dialogue between characters whether it applied or not. GoT was mentioned by the actors when discussing watching it, at cons and in interviews. SPN (and Dabb) was very well aware of GoT and what happened with that show. Not only because it was all over the media everywhere, being a pop culture phenomenon that had HUGE backlash, but also because they were there at the Comic Con where the backlash was felt strongest. To the point where even other people mentioned it in their panels (i.e. Seth Rogen). I’m obviously not in Dabb’s head nor was I on set when they filmed the finale or in the writers’ room with J2 and the writers when they pitched the ending so I don’t know. But isn’t it odd that 8x06 of GoT features a scene that has been confirmed by Kit Harington as breaking the 4th wall to speak to/get the viewers’ attention, make them think, and SPN is a show that has featured that same concept (usually in a comedic fashion) time and time again? And in 15x20 they have Robert Singer make an appearance? And the infamous bridge crew shot, J2 talking to you while still in costume as Sam and Dean from that same shot, and the voiceover “And cut” before it cuts to black?

I don’t think we’ll ever really get answers. I think any we get will always be complimentary to the network, or “we can’t talk about it”, or “it was always planned that way”. I’m not saying those people are being less than truthful (and seriously, I don’t blame any of them, it’s PR and they need to protect their careers, feed their families, if you speak out on anything in this universe, something really serious or the tiniest thing, you risk ever getting hired again, you will be blacklisted, it’s not right and it’s certainly not fair, but this is the way this particular business works) but something is not adding up (a lot of somethings actually). I think there was definitely a different ending for Cas, possibly even Jack (meaning he might have made at least one appearance). I do think there may have been a different resolution to Destiel and Saileen (unless they truly planned to keep it ambiguous all along). I don’t know if Dean would have had a different ending, I think he might have at one point as suggested by the narrative during Carver’s and Dabb’s eras, but I’m not sure what their “true ending” was going to be regarding him or Sam. To have Sam be the one that died would have been redundant from Swan Song (5x22) so I doubt they would have gone in that direction. I hate to think it but I don’t think we’ll ever really know. As far as death scenes go, Dean’s death in 9x23 was way more meaningful and impactful for me when he tells Sam that he’s proud of them, than what we got in 15x20. No offense to the guys’ acting or to the boys themselves, but the 9x23 scene was more appropriate imho. And that also leads me to believe that Dean’s manner of death may not have been what they planned all along. But until we get answers (which again I don’t think we will), we’ll never truly know for sure.

As for me, this is just more proof in the pudding. I’m not saying Dabb & Co purposely sabotaged 15x20 at all but I wouldn’t be surprised if they kept the reaction to GoT’s finale in mind at a couple of key points while getting these last two episodes shot. 15x19 was our finale, sad to say. 15x20 was the network’s finale, meant to induce nostalgia and callbacks, bringing the boys’ original fans over to Texas to watch a certain ranger do roundhouse kicks. Sad but true.

#The15YearShow #spn #spn posts #got mention #got and spn parallels #spn 15x20 #who's she #the rancid nutwork #daenerys' death #dean's death #season 1 callbacks parallels #for each

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scoutception · 5 years ago

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Final Fantasy Type-0 review: Depression central

If there’s one Final Fantasy subseries whose fate gets me feeling down, it’s the Fabula Nova Crystallis series, a novel and ambitious concept based around various games and stories of different settings and casts of characters, but sharing common themes and mythos, putting them in different contexts in each. While a fascinating idea, it ran into nothing but trouble with each of its entries, with Final Fantasy XIII and its sequels being very divisive, to say the least, Final Fantasy Versus XIII running into an infamously extended development hell, only to finally emerge as Final Fantasy XV, now almost completely separate from its original concept, and the final big entry, Final Fantasy Type-0, vanishing until 5 years after its announcement in 2006, as a PSP exclusive that only came out in Japan, a rarity for the series when it comes to its higher profile spinoffs. Thankfully, in 2015, Type-0 got a remaster on the PS4, Xbox One, and PC, finally allowing other audiences to enjoy it. Was it worth the almost 10 year wait? Well, that’s something we’re about to find out now.

Story:

Final Fantasy Type-0 takes place on the world of Orience, divided into 4 great nations blessed with Crystals: the Dominion of Rubrum, a place for the study and teaching of magic granted by the Vermilion Bird crystal, the Kingdom of Concordia, a female led monarchy able to communicate and control monsters and, more importantly, dragons, and home to the Azure Dragon crystal, the Militesi Empire, a technologically advanced state able to produce great machines of war known as Magitek Armors, or MAs, through the power of their White Tiger crystal, and the Lorican Alliance, whose citizens are much larger and powerful than any other in Orience thanks to their more direct connection to their Black Tortoise crystal. Orience is, unfortunately, not a place of peace, with each of the 4 crystal states wishing to unite Orience under them, and making plenty of attempts to in the past. The motive behind this is the legend of the Agito, a messiah said to appear during Tempus Finis, an apocalyptic event prophesied in the somewhat dubious, yet widely believed, Nameless Tome, with every crystal state seeing it as their divine duty to create Agito, to the point of Rubrum training so called Agito cadets from its brightest and most magically adept citizens.

The story opens with yet another war being started in the year 842 by Milites, whose emperor has been deposed by the brilliant and ambitious Imperial Marshall Cid Aulstyne (Final Fantasy games have a tradition of having a character named Cid somewhere, and finally, he made it as main antagonist), who immediately sets out to attack Rubrum. What would otherwise be a “normal” invasion quickly turns disastrous for Rubrum when Milites unleashed a new device called a crystal jammer, which cuts Rubrum’s legionnaires from their connection to the crystal, rendering them helpless before the Militesi invaders. Even worse, Milites also deploys a l’cie, a human chosen by their nation’s crystal to become its direct servant, in exchange for immense power and near immortality, the use of which in warfare was mutually banned by each of the 4 nations. Just when Rubrum seems doomed, the mysterious Class Zero arrives, 12 cadets who are unaffected by the crystal jammer, raised by Rubrum’s even more mysterious archsorceress, Arecia Al-Rashia, who proceed to liberate the capital, Akademia. Now, with the addition of two promising but otherwise normal cadets, Machina Kunagiri and Rem Tokimiya, Class Zero becomes a vital part in Rubrum’s efforts to reclaim their lost land and defeat Milites, once and for all.

To just come out and say it, the story’s biggest weakness is the cast, or, more specifically, its use of the cast. While the playable cast alone is certainly large, at 14 characters, and the supporting cast only grows from there, almost nobody gets proper focus. The main 12 members of Class Zero, named after playing cards, consists of Ace, Deuce, Trey, Cater, Cinque, Sice, Seven, Eight, Nine, Jack, Queen, and King, and despite being the “proper” members of Class Zero, they all only have a few character traits each. Trey is a knowledgeable type that tends to ramble, Sice is an arrogant loner, Nine is a violent muscle head, Cinque is nice, but downright weird, and so on. While after a while they all grew on me, it’s still pretty unsatisfying, especially when Ace, the face of the game, gets neglected just as badly. The supporting cast gets it even worse, as outside of Arecia and Class Zero’s commanding officer, Kurasame, most of everyone else that’s notable either has minimal at best story presence, or doesn’t show up in the story, period, being relegated to sidequests. Ultimately, the most focused on characters are the two “normal” people in Class Zero, Machina and Rem, which kinda makes sense, giving a more grounded air compared to off how putting the others can be to begin with, but even they don’t work out quite well. While Rem is fine, she doesn’t do very much interesting with the time she gets, while Machina, on the other hand, is very, very unlikeable to the point of hurting the story, whether it be his own cold attitude or broodiness to put the usual RPG protagonist stereotype to shame, he ends up way more unsympathetic than near anyone else in the story, even most of the antagonists. While the cast overall is definitely flawed, though, they’re definitely entertaining at a lot of points, whether they come from the main cast, mostly Trey or Cinque, or from some of the side characters, mainly the extremely greedy Carla and, most memorably to me, the paranoid, bombing throwing Mutsuki.

Since the story doesn’t focus on the characters very much, the main focus is instead the war itself. While it definitely has a few twists and turns, especially starting in chapter 4, overall, the battles and events of the war aren’t the most interesting subject by itself. More interesting is the elements around the war. This is by far one of, if not the darkest game in the franchise, and it doesn’t shy away from showing just how messed up Orience is. Rubrum’s main strength comes in the form of its Agito cadets, meaning, teenagers, as young as 14, at that, and the tactics the military uses means they tend to die in droves. Even when it’s technically pragmatic, between magic proficiency peaking at teen years and decreasing with age, plus not having many other means to resistance, it’s still very uncomfortable, and keep in mind, this is what the good guys, or the relative ones, get up to. Milites, meanwhile, is all too happy to deploy superweapons, such as literal nukes, and its soldiers are disturbingly fanatic, being more than happy to massacre towns, and even refer to Class Zero as demons. Class Zero themselves were raised to be soliders, and feel almost nothing in battle, and Rubrum’s leadership are paranoid and petty, to the point of the military commander actively trying to get Class Zero killed out of pure spite. Eidolons, extremely powerful monsters able to be summoned by mages, demand the lives of their summoners, and there are outright suicide squads of cadets who are only meant to summon more powerful Eidolons. Additionally, a very important plot point is that the crystals automatically erase the memories of anyone who dies from everyone’s minds, to the point Rubrum’s citizens need to wear dog tags just so it can be confirmed they even existed after they die. While they try to justify it as a blessing from the crystals that allows people to move on and not be held back by the dead, all it’s done is completely desensitize Orience to death, and having characters casually talk about being informed of their friends or family dying, and not feeling a single thing, is pretty disturbing, especially when it’s named character involved. It does a very good job of showing how constant warring and lack of reverence for the dead has corrupted this world, even when many of the characters affected still remain sympathetic.

Unfortunately, the biggest flaw of the story to me is that there simply isn’t a lot of it to be found, at least in regards to the main story. While the game is comprised of 8 chapters, that’s more than a little inaccurate, as half of those consist of a short introduction and a singular mission, rather than the 2 or 3 missions in the rest of the chapters. The story only really gets moving in chapter 4, and even then, many important points aren’t addressed until chapter 8, which is a downright bizarre and sudden change of subject and tone compared to the rest of the game, to the point a second playthrough is required because of how many holes are left otherwise, and even then, it can be a bit difficult to figure out just what is going on. The biggest achievement of the writing, on the other hand, is the lore of the setting. Orience is a fascinating world, with a detailed history of each nation, plenty of info to find on the various characters, and examinations of the various enemies of the game, all stored in a book in the hub called the Rubicus. It’s also quite interesting seeing the perspective flip compared to Final Fantasy XIII; instead of l’cie “merely” being granted the use of magic, and quickly going through their usefulness, at least by their masters’ consideration, along with the main cast being comprised of them, l’cie in Type-0 are near demigods who often live hundreds of years, and are just as fearsome to the party as to everyone else, for instance. Overall, though, while there are certainly many problems with the writing, I can’t help but say it works quite well regardless. Even with the limited time for both the story itself and the characters, it still builds a cast worth rooting for throughout the horrible situations, and an effective atmosphere that’s quite good at leaving you feeling somber. Moments like the entirety of the opening chapter, showing the utter devastation inflicted on Akademia in a mere three hours, and the various costly, large battles are very effective moments, and the ending is easily one of the saddest endings I’ve seen in a video game, for all the right reasons. Even the final chapter, odd as it is, has a lot of cool revelations and setpieces to me, at least now that I comprehend it.

Gameplay:

Type-0 is an action RPG that has you control the 14 members of Class Zero on various missions, each one possessing a different weapon. Ace uses cards, Deuce uses a flute (I swear they aren’t all this weird), Trey uses a bow, Cater uses a magic infused pistol, Cinque uses a mace, Sice uses a scythe, Seven uses a whipblade, Eight fights with his bare hands, Nine uses a lance, Jack uses a katana, Queen uses a longsword, King uses dual revolvers, Machina uses dual rapiers, and Rem uses dual daggers. Each one possesses a vastly different moveset and playstyle, such as Cinque being slow, but strong and tanky, Sice encouraging an aggressive hit and run style of play, even getting stronger for the more enemies she defeats while taking minimal hits, Trey excelling at range to a much degree than anyone else, while being near helpless up close, and Deuce being more of a supporter, having great support abilities, while her attacks are fairly weird to get used to, though effective on their own once you understand them. Despite the huge amount of characters, they’re actually fairly well balanced, all of them having important strengths and weaknesses, and while some can definitely be better than others, with Trey in particular coming to mind, possessing absurd range and the ability to charge his shots, it’s never quite game breaking. You can have up to three characters in your party, though their AI isn’t exactly great. They can certainly distract enemies well, and will make sure to heal you if your HP gets low, they don’t tend to be aggressive, and are terrible at avoiding the attacks of most enemies more complex than your average imperial trooper, and are near guaranteed to die to bosses. Speaking of which, the main wrinkle is that, while it varies, overall, your characters are not very durable, and in fact take hits about as well as wet toilet paper when faced with most enemies. This is balanced by the sheer amount of people you have. One person dies on a mission, don’t sweat it, you’ve got 13 backups. Of course, this also encourages training them all up and learning to play them as well, which is complicated by only characters in the active party gaining experience. Leveling up, in addition to granting the usual stat boosts, also grants ability points, which you can use to purchase or upgrade command or passive abilities and moves.

While just attacking enemies normally is decently effective, it can put you in unnecessary danger, and while you do have items like potions you can use to restore your health quickly, the most efficient way to fight is to use breaksights and killsights. Every enemy has at least one attack that leaves them vulnerable for a short time either before or after using said attacking. Hitting them during this period will trigger a break, or, if their health is low enough, killsight. Breaksights take a good chunk of their health away and stuns them, giving you a chance to attack them freely, while killsights just kill them outright. This one mechanic adds a lot to the gameplay, encouraging you to learn enemy patterns and attacks to see when they are vulnerable, and getting the timing down can make otherwise fearsome enemies easy to take care of. Of course, some enemies won’t take this very well, and may counterattack or even go into berserk states after recovering from breaksights, so you still have to be careful. Every character has 4 commands: regular attacks with their weapons, 2 slots that can either hold abilities or offensive magic spells, and a defensive command, whether it be the cure spell to restore health, putting up a magic wall to nullify some attacks, or just flat out blocking, which, while still causing you to suffer damage, prevents being knocked down, letting you score breaksights easier than if you were to simply dodge. Magic can be upgraded by harvesting phantoma from dead enemies, coming in various types like red for fire magic, green for defensive magic, and purple for unique spells. While powerful, magic usually takes a large chunk out of your magic points, meaning it’s better to save it for more dire situations, though harvesting phantoma restores small amounts of MP. As for equipment, aside from weapons, you have access to accessories that do things such as increasing HP by a certain percentage, giving immunity to status effects, or raising defense, though everyone can only have 2 accessories at a time. You also have three different squad commands: triad maneuver, which simply causes the party to do 3 powerful, rapid attacks, Eidolon, which summons an Eidolon you can control for a short time, in exchange for KOing the character that summoned it, and Vermilion Bird, a powerful spell that, to actually become powerful, has to be upgraded using crystal shards, which, while fairly easy to get most of the time, aren’t very numerous.

Type-0 uses a mission system, throwing you into various locations to complete objectives, though it usually equates to to reach the end of the area and kill an enemy commander. Most locations are pretty linear, though they all have a few side areas you can go to, usually for more items. You get graded based on how fast you completed the mission, how much phantoma you harvested, and how many party members got KOed during the mission, with getting the best rank on all three categories getting you an S rank, which gives a bonus item. Beating each mission on a difficulty above easy also unlocks other bonuses, whether they be additional items up for purchase or unlocking new spells or Eidolons, or just flat giving you a rare item. Completing missions also gives you money, with more the higher the difficulty and the higher your rank. Speaking of difficulties, there are 4 of them: cadet, which is just easy mode, officer, normal mode, Agito mode, which is a hard mode that makes every enemy 30 levels higher than on cadet and officer, and Finis, which is only available after completing the game once, and is, just plain absurd. All enemies have their levels increased by 50, they’re in permanent rage mode, causing them to move twice as fast and hurt twice as much, and you’re restricted to only being able to use one person per mission. It’s not much worth the effort. Aside from completing missions, your main source of items, magic, and Eidolons is from completing special orders, optional objectives that can pop up in various areas. While there’s various generic, white orders that only give items at the end of the mission for doing stuff like not getting hit for 30 seconds or not using magic for a few minutes, there are also specific, red ones with more specific objectives like taking out certain enemies, that give out better rewards. The main problem with accepting them is that, if you fail to complete them, you risk instant being killed over it, though you can avoid it you’re fast enough, as it’s delivered through portals on the ground.

In between missions, you’re allowed to explore Akademia, chatting with NPCs or party members, or engaging in “free time events” which are either conversations with random people, or cutscenes that tend to have much more interesting information. You only have a limited amount of hours until the next story mission starts, with each event taking two hours away, though time doesn’t pass just running around and talking to people without events. While a neat concept that could easily be like Persona, in practice, it doesn’t add much. While you can get some interesting information at times, and doing events also gives you items, it’s not very in depth otherwise. Even the sidequests with the more prominent side characters just consist doing their events whenever they’re available and doing a sidequest for them, eventually getting admittedly very good bonuses at the end of their little storylines. The other thing you can do with your free time is go out into the world map, where you can visit extremely small towns, get into random encounters, visit dungeons, and... not much else. While the world map isn’t tiny, there’s just not much to find. While there’s many towns, they are, again, tiny, only consisting of a single small area with a shop or two, a sidequest, and a little unofficial side quest to get a l’cie stone, which can be traded into a certain NPC to unlock lore entries in the Rubicus. There’s just not much of interest, and you’re very heavily restricted in where you’re allowed to even go on the world map, only being able to go to areas officially reclaimed by Rubrum, or that are the destination of the current story mission. Only in chapter 7 do you finally get some kind of freedom, to the point of being able to gain an airship to allow easy traversal of the world. Plus, most dungeons aren’t even meant to be explored on a first playthrough, with only about one or two being reasonable at that point, not that there’s even much to find besides l’cie stones and a chance at a rare item, emphasis on chance, since they’re always in a specific chest at the end that can only be opened once without reloading your save, and the chance of getting the most valuable item from them is rather low.

As for other activities, you can train in the arena, for downright piddly gains, or take on sidequests, most of which just contain of going out and defeating a certain amount of specific enemies, giving over items, and so forth. Most rewards aren’t great, but a few, namely from the more notable characters like the leaders of Rubrum, Kurasame, and Arecia, give very notable rewards. Sidequests don’t take time to do, but often require you to leave Akademia, meaning you need to weigh the time lost going out to do the quests against the time you could use doing events, which is difficult when you don’t know just what rewards either give out. When it comes mission time, though, you gotta venture out on the world map to your next destination. Speaking of the world map, along with the regular missions, there are also RTS style missions, where you, controlling a party member on the world map, help the dominion army reclaim forts and towns by taking out enemies and having units generated by controlled areas weaken said areas until you can invade them in a regular mission style. Instead of being graded on phantoma harvested, you’re instead graded on objectives completed, as occasionally you’ll get orders to do stuff like defend a fort for a specific amount of time or taking out a large enemy. While technically optional, you get bonuses for completing them beyond mission grade, such as access to “hero units” and direct control of certain areas. There’s a decent amount of these missions in the game, and they do make for an interest change of pace, but they aren’t much notable. You’re even allowed to skip participating in them, though obviously you miss out on rewards.

The highlights of the game are, rather sensibly, the end of chapter missions. Not only are they much longer than typical missions, they have much more unique settings, and, of course, bosses. This game has some very enjoyable, if difficult, bosses, ranging from the giant mech Brionac that is more than capable of wiping you out in a single attack, to the highly mobile mech of Qator Bashtar, Cid’s second in command, to several fights with the near invincible Gilgamesh (another recurring character in the series). My personal favorite is the boss of chapter 5, the dragon Shinryu, which is also all too happy to instantly kill you with most of its attacks, even more so than Brionac, and spend most of the fight enveloped in the darkness surrounding the arena you’re in, only being visible by the lights of its glowing red eyes. It makes for an amazing setpiece, and losing to it is almost more enjoyable than winning simply due to the failsafe implemented since the devs expected most players to lost, the details of which I simply cannot spoil. Finally, on a second playthrough, two new types of missions are available for you: expert trials, and Code Crimson missions. Expert trials are optional missions you can do during your free time, which you’ll likely have a lot of since events you see on a previous playthrough can be viewed again at no time cost on repeat playthroughs. While technically available in the first playthrough as well, they are way too difficult for the average player, i.e who isn’t insane like me. Code Crimson missions, on the other hand, are replacements for the end of chapter missions, consisting of you going off to do other stuff. While an interesting concept, in practice, they aren’t anything special, especially when they’re replacing the most interesting parts of the game, and they barely give any more story context either. The chapter 7 mission is the one exception, being very short, but an interesting concept and adding a bit more to the story. Plus, completing them all on one playthrough unlocks an interesting alternate ending, so that alone makes them worth a go.

As for the hardest challenges to be found, they’re a bit lacking. Aside from the regular optional dungeons, there’s one notable bonus dungeon and two notable superbosses. The bonus dungeon is the Tower of Agito, which can only be reached by airship, which consists of 5 floors where you need to fight 100 specific enemies, such as tonberries and behemoths, with plenty of chests to open in between, ending off on an extremely disappointing end boss that is just a Malboro that happens to be massive. While it certain sounds difficult, and pretty much everything is capable of one shotting you, once you get into a good pattern, it’s really just boring. Most of the time, they just spawn so slowly, and while after a while more of them come out at a time, it takes about an hour and a half at best to get through even if you’re otherwise efficient. As for the superbosses, there’s Nox Suzaku, only available in a second playthrough and onward, who has a chance of appearing whenever you harvest phantoma, stealing everything you try to harvest until it decides to go away. Aside from making it go away on its own, you can beat it up, which is quite a doozy. Instead of fighting you directly, it summons phantoms of various enemies to fight you, and while you could just defeat them all, this doesn’t do anything to Nox itself. Instead, you have to let the enemies defeat you, causing Nox to appear for a short time, allowing you to attack it until it retreats. Rinse and repeat, it’s not that difficult, and the rewards aren’t that great, so the main reason to beat it up is just to make it go away, because it stealing your phantoma is extremely annoying, especially when it can show up during missions, since you can’t just leave to fight it, and it’s entirely possible for it to flat make it impossible to get an S rank on that mission it decides it doesn’t want to leave. Not exactly a fun mechanic. The other superboss is, per tradition, Gilgamesh, in a stronger form than in the story. He only shows up on a third playthrough, at a few different locations on the world map, in the form of a portal. Entering said portals causes him to randomly select one of your characters to challenge. If you win, you get that character’s ultimate weapon, but if he wins, he steals your character’s current weapon. The ultimate weapons are kinda underwhelming, especially considering you may well have everything else done after a second playthrough, and it’s annoying getting specific people picked, but it’s actually a fun and fair fight, if easy to figure out.

Overall, Type-0 has some of the tightest gameplay among all the Final Fantasy spinoffs, and is the main thing that holds it together. It has a fast, hectic pace to it, interesting enemies to tackle, and a wide variety of people to try out. Really, the main criticism I have is the actual missions you have with which to try them out. The other main story missions aren’t much to look at, and same goes for the expert trials and Code Crimson missions. I’m sure this is at least partially due to originating on the PSP, and having to deal with its limitations, something that’s about become a theme in this review. Overall, though, it’s still more than satisfactory.

Graphics:

The visuals of Type-0 are a very mixed big, unfortunately leaning more towards negative. More than anything else, they make it very apparent that Type-0 was originally a PSP game. While the members of Class Zero themselves have decent looking models, if rather unemotive, everyone else, except a few important characters like Arecia, are much lower quality, especially the faces. Here’s a comparison between Ace and Carla.

The textures don’t fare much better, looking very blatantly stretched and blurry, especially on the world map, where bridges are just one long, hideous texture. Most locations outside of, again, the end of chapter missions don’t look anything special, and so many areas are just reused over and over. You go into a town, it’ll look like every other town, at least of that region. You invade a fort, it’ll look like every other fort. Repeat for almost every mission in the game. Thankfully, the big story missions look quite impressive and creative, my favorites being chapter 5′s, taking place on frozen clouds that end up near breathtaking, and especially the setting of the very final mission, which is, to avoid anything too specific, downright insane, in a good way. Another positive are the enemy designs, more specifically, the actual monsters, with enemies such as bombs and flans resembling their earlier FF designs much more than most modern entries. Unfortunately, there’s just one problem: the actual variety of enemy designs is rather lacking, with the majority of enemies being slight alterations or palette swaps. It’s a more minor point than most, but still something. The original enemy designs are quite inventive though, and overall, this is a game that excels more in general design than actual fidelity, like the spiraling Concordian capital surrounded by a sea of clouds.

Sound:

The music of Type-0 is plain great, as is usual for the series. The boss themes especially are fantastic, along with the main theme, The Beginning of the End. It also sounds quite distinctive compared to most of the rest of the series, having a greater focus on metal, fitting the more modern aesthetic. The English voice acting, on the other hand, isn’t quite great. It’s pretty obvious the dub was a rush job, considering Type-0 lacked the simultaneous localization process of the main series games, resulting in it being very lackluster overall. There are some notable voice acting names in it, like Cristina Vee as Cinque, Bryce Papenbrook as Machina, Danielle Judovits as Carla, Cassandra Lee as Mutsuki, and even Matthew Mercer as Trey, and they all do good jobs, but the rest of the cast varies, especially Class Zero itself. Ironically enough, the side characters tend to have much more solid performances, with special props going to Steve Blum as Cid, giving a very menacing perfomance, as well as other characters like Aria, Class Zero’s orderly, and Kazusa, the resident mad scientist. Corri English as Sice and Heather Hogan Watson as Queen also fair quite well. Beyond that though, the performances can be rather forced, like Nine and Cater, or just weak overall, like Rem and Deuce. This is not helped by the normal, in game cutscenes themselves, with their structure causing many long, awkward pauses nearly every sentence. It does, however, improve as the game goes on, to the point of the final cutscenes not being hurt by it near at all.

Conclusion:

Overall, this is a solid recommended by me. Even with the weakness of elements like the graphics and the short, underdeveloped story, the core gameplay just holds up that well, and there’s quite a bit to enjoy in the weaker elements even beyond that. Overall, this is one of my favorite Final Fantasy spinoffs, and the fact that it will most likely never get a sequel due to the departure of its director, Hajime Tabata, makes me very sad. With that unneeded note, this shall be the last of the Final Fantasy spinoffs I play in some time. The next time the name Final Fantasy pops up as the subject of one of my reviews, it shall be about the main series. Till next time.

-Scout

#Final Fantasy #final fantasy type 0 #game review #long post #action rpg #JRPG

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swanwinged-princess · 5 years ago

Note

The Hunchback of Notre Dame owo

@wouldhope// Disney Headcanon Meme

The Hunchback of Notre Dame - What is your muse’s religious beliefs? Have they ever experienced oppression at the hands of religion?

//Ok well FIRST of all

youtube

//And also this is;;; probably gonna be long;;; made twice as long because i’m gonna do one for standard!tutu (the one where she’s basically swan jesus) and one for verses/aus where she’s… at least a LITTLE bit more normal (see: her dad’s not a LITERAL DEITY)

I’m actually gonna start off with the latter here bc i think the former is probably gonna be longer anyway SO

(continues under cut)

In verses/aus where Tutu’s father isn’t a literal, actual spirit/deity/entity/god/what-have-ye (BNHA/affiliated spinoffs; duckverse/anthro/etc.; wizarding world; etc.):

She is… SOMEWHAT religious; definitely not overly so (see: not an asshole about it) but believes in angels/miracles/god/heaven and-or the afterlife. Definitely christianity-adjacent but not any particular type of christianity; possibly believes in hell/purgatory/some sort of punishment system after death but doesn’t really like to think about it, and her qualifications for GETTING there are stuff like, say, ‘committing many horrible murders’ or ‘being an unapologetic bigot’ as opposed to ‘not believing in jesus’ or ‘enjoying having sex’ or whatever.

She doesn’t really even, say, go to church regularly (she’s heckin BUSY come on), but does enjoy being IN church, especially alone; it’s like a bit of a meditation for her/helps her clear her head and feel closer to god/spirituality/the universe/heaven/her mom.

She also prays pretty much every day- specifically once in the morning and at night- but also prays informally whenever she feels the need, and probably wouldn’t own much religious iconography besides maybe a few cross necklaces– you know, small, tasteful, very expensive; delicate, real silver or gold, maybe a single pearl right in the middle of the cross but that’s about it.

Whereas on the OTHER hand

//HOO BOY//

In main verse and associated, she’s… um.

Ok, so the Swan King may not technically be an actual GOD per se, but, well… He’s close. And people DO worship him. Not as many as there used to be, but they’re still there, and generally speaking basically everybody in the kingdom and round abouts that area observe it (swanianism or something idk) at least casually, by at least saying ‘swansdown’ and ‘swanfeathers’ and ‘by the swan’ instead of, for example, ‘oh my god’.

There’s, like, one official church, with stained glass and pews and everything, where all the high-class weddings and funerals and etc. get held there, but there aren’t really any ‘priests’ and they don’t really hold services.

There are lots and lots of old swan statues all over the area from centuries back, and while some of them got moved onto the tops of buildings/in fountains/ended up centers of various village squares, a lot of them had sort of… had temples built around them over the years- it just sorta happened- and that’s mainly where the average people observe their worship.

Also, the Schwanensee royal family featured pretty largely in the theology, being sort of… the same thing as saints in Catholicism; whenever anybody was born/died on the sacred island a messenger dove got sent over to the mainland and there was an announcement made about it to the village. The sacred island/lake wasn’t really thought of as a real place- it was more like if you could see heaven a little bit from a high window, or if you climbed a really tall tree.

So when the island was basically burned to the ground and almost all the royal family was killed, it was… um…..

Kind of a big fuckin’ deal.

When Tutu was rescued from the ruins, and everybody saw her, and everybody knew who she was, it was an even bigger deal. Everybody, in unison, basically decided that this tiny, traumatized, soot-covered, gray-feathered 6-year-old was the chosen one who was going to save them from everything from minor disagreements to, y’know, being ripped apart alive/having your heart and emotions pulled out and eaten by flocks of devil birds.

People even started… worshipping her.

After the initial adjustment period, she actually handled it pretty well; at least externally. Of course, anyone who knows anything about actually being royalty knows that the whole trick is to be royal on the outside and a cobbled-together mess sustained by stress like that physics thing where you hold up a legless table by strings and the buckets of water on it, but as she got older she actually managed to get more of a handle on it.

All in all, she’s…

I mean, she’s more or less got it. Apart from sudden attacks of crippling, soul-crushing anxiety. But she really, really, really wishes that people would stop, or at least give the whole actually worshipping her a rest a little. Generally speaking, everybody in the kingdom (or at least in the castle village) does genuinely like her, but sometimes she gets people who want to, like, kneel at her, or try to touch her dress/feathers as she walks past, and when she tries to talk to them they start flinching away and holding up their little carved swan amulet necklaces like they think it’ll protect them and she’s just like dad dammit i am trying to be friendly do i have to say ‘be not afraid’ or something every time i go up to introduce myself to someone???

But yeah, generally speaking it’s not really a problem from the swan-leaning side. Where it starts going wrong is the raven-leaning side.

The swan-leaning people are all in all, y’know, normal fucking people, and their religion-worship-belief-etc. only ever gets to obnoxious-christianity levels.

But the raven-leaning people can generally be qualified altogether as a crazy ransacking-and-pillaging murder cult.

And they actually have backup from real, actual infernal blood magic demon stuff, a seemingly infinite supply of flocks of murderbirds and various and sundry quirky miniboss squad-types, whereas the normal people really only have Tutu and, allegedly, the faerie folk (those affiliated with the Lilac Fairy/Queen, at least) but they haven’t been seen in generations so it’s really anyone’s guess on that.

They do a lot of, you know, general murder and mayhem- or at least they did, but the last really big thing they managed to pull off was the massacre on the sacred island, and technically speaking they actually failed to complete their objective because Queen Leda put Tutu to sleep with some ~magic~ and hid her in the hollow base of a swan statue in the middle of a rose thicket, which, by some sort of ‘coincidence’, didn’t seem to catch fire very much, and they were all too drunk on moonshine and bloodlust, and generally crazy and stupid, to actually look further for any survivors when everything was on fire and there were crows everywhere and they just sort of decided ‘yeah that’s it let’s go home’ and fucked off.

At the current time, most of them aren’t actually too much of a threat because most of them are the stupid crazy ~3edgy5me~ idiot types– y’know, the kind who’d, say, march around waving factory-produced tiki torches at night and demand a police escort if they’re gonna be shouting in the general vicinity of a pride event because they’re ‘fearful of their safety :’(’

so, like, nowadays they’re really only like Team Rocket-level nuisances on a day-to-day basis because the kingdom had learned from their history and swore in a lot more ‘guards’ and ‘knights’- enough to mostly keep the peace in pretty much every town unless things get really, really bad.

Uuuunfortunately, it’s not just idiots who want to wear black cloaks with pointy hoods to look like beaks and wave big curved swords around– i mean, it’s MOSTLY that, but also a lot of very smart, very greedy, bored, evil, and/or scheming people end up gravitating towards anything that’ll give them a lot of dumb people who they can tell what to do.

So occasionally- very occasionally- they actually do something that’s… actually impactful, and everybody who gets out of it in one piece talks about how fucked up that was and ‘curse those raven bastards’ and etc. etc., but the crowmen (as they’re informally known) are also surprisingly good at apparently vanishing without a trace so it’s hard to catch them or do anything really constructive about the problem as a whole.

Weeellllll, okay, ADMITTEDLY a few various gangs of them HAVE managed, by coincidence or the type of brief narrative luck that dumb people like that seem to have sometimes, to briefly kidnap Tutu, but she either gets rescued very quickly OR escapes by herself while they’re arguing with each other about HOW to kill her, WHETHER to kill her, and what the prospects of killing her now or maybe ransoming her and then killing her LATER would be, or they all sort of trip over their own and each other’s feet, cloaks, and swords and blunder their way into harmlessness in one way or another.

TL;DR Tutu sort of... IS a part of her religion like how Jesus is a part of Christianity/associates and all things considered she’s handling it pretty well. Her entire family was murdered by basically a crazy satanic cult who still run around causing problems, but not as much as they used to, so.... Does that count as religious oppression???

#wouldhope #{ask}#{I'll Be Your Lucky Girl; mun tag}#{headcanon}

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thekrawra · 5 years ago

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the marvel vs sony deal

so tradegy struck when it was announced it looks like spiderman will be leaving the mcu as sony and marvel have not succeeded in remaking a deal.

big disclaimer here: i’m in school studying film production and generally studying to be a producer myself and have some rudimentary knowledge or business, corporations, film financing and stock markets and IP and all the stuff that’s going into this. i’m no genius and this is just where my minds at as a loyal mcu and spiderman fan and how i see this issue shaping out after readying like every article i can find. another note is that there is tons of conflicting information about what deals were proposed and who said no to who. so it’s hard to get a read on it and put someone at fault without that. but yeah, this is just my thoughts on the situation based on what i think makes the most sense but like honestly who knows when company executives are involved.

—

there’s been a lot of talk over who should be blamed for it and really: neither side can be defended right now.

on the one hand there’s marvel/disney: who came in asking for a huge increase on their portions of the profits from these movies. we don’t know the full details of the deal they proposed but most of what i read seems to suggest marvel wanted to up their current percent of profits (it’s 5 or 10%? i’ve seen conflicting reports) to 50%. i’ve also ready though that with this in mind, marvel’s deal included marvel sharing production costs with song rather than sony paying the full bill, and also opening doorways to tie sony’s spinoff works — their spiderverse — into the mcu. is 50% a lot? yes. but in marvel’s défense they do bring a lot to the table. so we’ll get back to that.

on sony’s end: yes disney asked for a lot. but reports also say sony didn’t offer a counter offer, and that a 70/30 deal in sony’s favour had been offered was also turned down. at this point, we don’t have any confirmation on what’s true and what isn’t — but we do know that sony wanted to keep the deal the same, and really wasn’t convinced that they needed marvel to continue making billion dollar spiderman movies (which we will also get to). and ultimately, i do think disney should be getting at least a bit more of the profits: as long as they are willing to take on production costs as well that is.

so who’s wrong? who’s to blame? and who stands to lose the most if they can’t work out a deal?

first thing to clarify: disney/marvel is 100% being greedy. they don’t need a larger financial stake in these films and the deal would’ve work fine. they just believe sony stands to lose way more if disney backs out of a deal. disney never would’ve pushed for more money otherwise. they see the position sony is in and are trying to take advantage.

disney is no saint in this deal. and it’s no surprise that like all big corporations, disney is basically trying to intidmidate sony into giving them more money.

so is disney right? does sony stand to lose if they don’t make a deal.

i mean, kind of.

disney will be fine, there’s no doubt about that. yes they will most likely be throwing more work at kevin feige to retcon every spiderman story thread he had planned out, but the mcu is big enough it probably won’t take a huge hit, especially now that they’ve acquired xmen and f4.

so sony will definitely lose out on more, but is it enough to make a deal with disney worth it?

maybe.

the issue sony’s facing is they are facing a massive risk. they either sacrifice profit to keep spiderman in the mcu, something that has been going very well for them or they go at it alone, which their track record suggests isn’t a great plan.

yes, they’ve gotten a taste of how feige works and have had modern success with their spideyverse films. and there’s no doubt into the spiderverse was a success critically - but didn’t do as well financially, more of an underrated beauty than a huge hit. sure it once the oscar, but it made less money in the box office than ralph breaks the internet or incredibles 2 its biggest competitors. and venom was a success, but not on the same scale marvel movies tend to be - black panther and infinity war both made more money that year, and all three of marvel’s releases this year have made more.

and there’s no doubt spiderman made as much as it did because of endgame. ffh is a good movie but it’s box office dollar benefited from when it was released. i’m almost certain that had it not been the release right after endgame it wouldn’t have made a billion. marvel placed it right after their biggest movie ever, and ffh got to ride out the endgame hype. people wanted to know what happened next, so they went to see ffh.

taking that into account: sony can’t reach the success of the mcu without it. the numbers and track record don’t match. but can sony settle for a bit less money if they get to keep more of the profit. perhaps.

but here’s where we get into the thing that will be sony’s downfall: longevity.

it’s something the mcu offers to sony that i just don’t think sony can achieve on their own. the mcu has ten years under their belt and is clearly showing no signs of slowing down. by pairing with the mcu, that’s another 10 years of spiderman movies and spinoff that get that mcu treatment: the hype, the connections and from that, more money. even if they don’t connect their spinoffs to the mcu, people will still watch sony more closely. be more interested. because of ties to the mcu. not only are spiderman fans going to see spiderman movies, but mcu fans are too. and while often one in the same there’s a huge boost in profits by being tied to the mcu.

sony could maybe make a couple blockbusters and make some money over the next couple years but i just don’t see a way for them to successfully compete against the mcu, and the mcu is a much better friend for them than it is an enemy.

so now sony’s choice is make less movies with more profit, or make more movies with less profit of the overall profit. and originally they seemed to feel the former was true. they’ll work with disney if the deal stays the same but they felt like they could walk away and be fine.

so disney makes a play: leave negotiations. tell sony to have it their way and let the fans do the work for them. let sony sit on it and get a taste of what the backlash of pulling spidey from the biggest film franchise pretty much ever would do.

and it’s started. people are angry at sony, not disney. people want spidey in the mcu. sony’s stocks drop. all the response has been negative. no one likes this news and it’s only going to hurt sony.

i’m sure disney is trying to wear sony down. make it so sony is desperate to salvage the situation and then disney can get some more money.

so sony can stand down and accept a deal disney has proposed, or at least make a strong counteroffer. or they can ride it out and take a major risk at likely ruining their most profitable franchise.

neither company has played all their cards and right now, i feel like calling of negotiations is really just a strategy to make the other sweat for a while.

and also there’s a huge factor of publicity. this falling out has been the talk all over the place, it’s huge news. it seems like a bad time and negative publicity but people are panicking and reading and watching and trying to stay updated. people are tuned in.

and in result they are tuned into the mcu. and they are tuned into sony, for better or for worse.

people who are mad at sony know all the sony movies being released in the next while and have shared it. mcu fans are desperately looking for announcements of what comes next after this fallout.

now think of what happens if they announce a deal for spiderman again. it’s the hype from 2015 all over. and people care, people are invested, people are happy again. presumably stocks go back up (it’s hard for a read because i’m basing this all of my rudimentary knowledge of these subjects, but they could even jump higher—you really don’t know with stocks though) and both companies are talked about and got a bunch a free advertising basically.

so i think talks definitely aren’t over: because both companies are overall better if a deal is worked out. my best guess is what this is right now, is them just seeing what sides fans take and how much they can make the other guy sweat. this is a case of who cracks first.

all mcu fans can do is hope someone does.

#spiderman #marvel #sony #disney #ffh #spiderman far from home #marvel sony deal #this is why corporations suck

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lalka-laski · 4 years ago

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Do you or have you ever owned a cup with your name on it? I’m sure I did at some point as a kid

What’s the most expensive crafts tool that you own? All of my craft supplies are relatively cheap. The biggest waste of money though was the laminator I bought on a whim. I’ve had NO use for it since lol. Oh well.

Have you ever woven baskets of any kind (wicker, paper, cardboard etc.)? I think I did some kind of basket making class at the library when I was little? I did all kinds of arts and crafts classes.

How do you like Great Balls of Fire by Jerry Lee Lewis? It’s fine I guess?

Speaking of Jerry Lee Lewis, have you seen the biopic about him? Nope

How about the biopic about Tina Turner? Also no

Do you like the TV-show Frasier? I don’t think I’ve seen a single episode

What’s something you know by heart? Every Killers song known to man

What is something you’re greedy about? I’m great at sharing.... actually to the point that I could stand to be a little more possessive and protective of myself and my belongings. I think it stems from being the middle child in a house full of girls. NOTHING was solely mine, and everything had to be shared between us. How valuable does a coin have to be for you to bother to pick it up? I always pick up dimes ‘cause they’re messages from Heaven

What would be something you would wait in line to get for free? Pizza

Has there ever been a leak anywhere in your house? Uh yeah I guess?

Have you ever slipped in the shower? Surprisingly no!

Have you ever made any decorative crafts? If so, are they displayed? Mhm, quite a lot of stuff! I wish I crafted more often though.

Is it very humid where you are right now? Lol no, although it is unseasonably warm for February in Rochester. And by that I mean it’s like 35 degrees. HEATWAVE!

Do you have friends who you playfully flirt with? Nah

Doesn’t the Z in the Bzoink logo look like an L to you, too? What in the world?

Did you ever take that 5000 question survey that was circulating Tumblr? No, although I’ve seen it here and there.

Have you ever had to change a zipper in your favorite article of clothing? Oh no, that’s way too tricky!

Do you prefer buttons or zippers in general? Zippers I guess

Did your grandma have a box full of pretty buttons? Oh yes!

What’s the most exotic spice in your spice rack? Ha, I’m as white as it gets so none of my spices could really be considered ~exotic. That’s kind of a troublesome term anyways, is it not?

Do buttons tempt you to press them? Ha, sometimes.

Do you have a favorite television host? Anderson Cooper

What’s your opinion on celebrity chefs? I love me some Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay. Oh, and my girl Ina Garten!

Back when it first started, did you watch ANTM? Oh bitch I LIVED FOR THAT SHOW.

Did you know, that there was even a Finnish version of ANTM? I’m sure there were several international spinoffs.

Are you accident prone? It’s my middle name.

Have you ever broken something really valuable? Oh yes, quite often growing up.

What is something that you own, that has sentimental value? I’m a huge sap so almost everything I own has some kind of sentimental significance to me.

Have you ever had your own website? Oh yes What’s something that you finished recently? A whole freakin pot of coffee. And then I wonder why I don’t feel good...

What’s the smallest town you recall visiting? The town my grandparents grew up in

What’s the longest distance you’ve had to go to work or school? My first college was roughly an hour away, but I lived on campus so I wasn’t commuting.

Would you learn a new language, if you didn’t share one with your lover? Well that’s a moot point now

Do you have friends who are constantly tagging you in challenges on FB? Nah not really

When it comes to chocolate, do you prefer nougat, jelly or caramel filling? Caramel! Although solid chocolate is my preference.

Are you more concerned about winning than just participating? Nah, I’m not competitive and I don’t have much of a drive to win.

Has somebody you know taken their own life? Yes

Do you prefer onions, leeks or chives? Chives!

What’s the most adult thing you have to do every day? Go to work, I suppose. But I half-ass all my responsibilities and that’s not very “adult” of me.

What’s the most immature thing you like to do every day? Everything?

Have you seen the movie, Clue? If so, isn’t it fab? I actually don’t think so

Do your cheeks get flushed easily? Oh lord YES!

Are there any social cues you miss entirely? I like to think I understand social cues and norms pretty well. Certainly a lot better than some people I know... *cough cough* MY FIANCE

When someone doesn’t smile back at you, what’s your first thought? THEY HATE ME AND I’M THE WORST PERSON ON THE PLANET

Is there a person who melts your heart just by looking at you? Glenn

Have you ever had tom kha kai? No clue what that is

Have you, or anyone you know ever been rude to a server? I have not, and I absolutely don’t associate with people who are. Eat shit.

What’s something you’re opinionated and very vocal about? Plenty of social justice issues. Oh, and the very hill I will die on: MOE’S > CHIPOTLE. DO NOT @ ME ^When’s the last time you had to verbally defend your stance? Ha, thankfully I don’t associate with such low-lifes :P

Have you ever played BitLife? Nope

What’s something you regularly order online? Books, and all sorts of random odds & ends that I don’t need but can’t resist

Do you often make friends online? I did back in my teenage years, although they all remained exclusively online friends. We never met in person.

Do people ever try to get something from somebody through you? Wait what?

What do you think when you see a couple holding hands? Generally I think it’s cute. And I’m in no place to judge or comment on another couple’s PDA because me & Glenn are obnoxious lol

Is there anything you’re forced to share with someone else? Well as I said earlier in the survey, I grew up forced to share everything with my siblings.

What’s something stripy that you own? I think I have a striped shirt, and that’s about it. Oh, maybe some socks?

How about something polka dotted? Again, socks.

What is something you find absolutely appalling? Saliva

Do you like elevators? I don’t dislike them

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say “midnight madness”? I’m blanking

When you’re angry, does it ever get physical? No never. Well, maybe I’ll punch a pillow or something just to relieve my aggression but that’s it.

What do you do, when you’re immensely happy? Squeal!

What made you scream out loud the last time you screamed? Who knows, I’m always getting scared and startled by shit, so it could’ve been anything!

Can you hear your neighbors through the wall? Yes, our downstairs neighbor and his lady friend have very entertaining arguments. Glenn & I literally lay on the floor to listen because we’re just that immature and bored. (To be clear: the fights are never actually serious!)

What is something that frustrates you to no end? My own anxiety, my lack of drive, my clumsiness and absent-mindedness...

Do you wear shoes indoors? I hardly even wear shoes OUTDOORS.

Who is your favorite stand-up comedian? Jim Gaffigan is one of my faves. Though I give almost any stand-up special a shot. What’s the weirdest video YouTube has suggested to you? Oh I don’t even know where to begin

Is there a drink that just goes right through you? Coffee!

Is there a food item you can’t eat because it doesn’t agree with you? It’s not so much the types of foods I eat but the AMOUNT I eat of them. Restraint just isn’t in my vocab.

Do you playfully compete with someone about something? Nah, not really.

Would you rather swim or run? Swim

Do you like the smell of tar? Actually yeah. It’s one of those distinct summer scents!

Have you ever been to a sauna? Yes, although I can only handle a minute or two. They are not for me!

Does your doorbell ring unexpectedly often? Never

Is your favorite fictional character a human, an animal or something else? Humans

Have you ever helped a stranger? If so, what did you do? Of course, in many ways. Random acts of kindness make the world go ‘round, people!!

Do you share hobbies with any of your friends? What do you do together? Reading, writing, listening to music, crafting, etc etc.

Do you have any flags on display? If so, what flag(s)? Nope

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the-desolated-quill · 7 years ago

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Let Star Wars Die - Quill’s Scribbles

You may recall I was less than impressed with Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It wasn’t a bad movie, but, let’s be honest, it wasn’t very good neither. It was far too derivative of the original trilogy, in particular A New Hope. and the new characters just weren’t very interesting or well developed. The only character I was even vaguely invested in was Finn and even his story didn’t really make sense under any close scrutiny. The only thing this movie really had going for it was that Luke, Leia and Han were in it. In fact whenever I find myself talking about The Force Awakens, I often refer to this quote from a review of the movie written by Andrew O’Hehir for Salon:

“This is the work of a talented mimic or ventriloquist who can just about cover for the fact that he has nothing much to say."

That pretty much sums this movie up perfectly. I’m fully aware I’m in the minority, but I honestly just don’t see what makes this movie so special. Yes it’s competently made and somewhat entertaining, but only on a purely superficial level. In my opinion the only reason The Force Awakens became so successful wasn’t because of any inherent good qualities it possessed. It was because it cynically pandered to a nostalgic fanbase.

Now look, if you like the movie, fair enough. I’m not criticising you for your taste in cinema. Everyone likes what they likes and that’s okay. It just wasn’t my cup of tea. And I’ll be the first to admit my opinion may be slightly biased because I never actually wanted to see a sequel trilogy in the first place. Return Of The Jedi was a good ending to the Star Wars story and there was no reason to carry it on. I didn’t even see the point of a prequel trilogy, although I was mildly curious as to how exactly Darth Vader became Darth Vader (pity they didn’t do it very well). As far as I was concerned, a sequel trilogy was little more than a cynical cash grab, and The Force Awakens did very little to change my mind of that. And judging by the trailers to The Last Jedi, where everything looks like a rehash of The Empire Strikes Back, my opinion doesn’t appear to be changing any time soon.

Now we could debate for ages whether or not the sequel trilogy is a cynical cash grab (it is), but one thing cannot be denied. This new trilogy Disney have announced is most definitely a cynical cash grab.

Oh yeah, Disney have announced that a new trilogy is being made. Perhaps I should have led with that.

Yes it appears Star Wars is going to become a franchise without end, with movies and sequels and spinoffs being churned out year after year like a fucking assembly line production. Why? Because Disney is Disney and Disney is the fucking worst. These are the people who originally started making live action remakes of classic Disney movies from the villain’s perspective, but then after Maleficent somebody in Disney said ‘Hey. Here’s an idea. Why don’t we just remake the original Disney movies?’ These are the same people who own the increasingly convoluted Marvel Cinematic Universe whose movies have become more and more bland and homogenised every year. These are the same people who are currently making a sequel to Mary Poppins. Yeah! I’m sure that’s something we’ve all wanted to see, right? I don’t know about you, but whenever I watch Mary Poppins, I often wonder what happened to her after she flew away on her little brolly and the story was over.

It couldn’t be any more obvious at this stage that Disney clearly doesn’t have a single original thought hovering around their little media empire, but this is also a problem inherent with the entire film industry right now. Sequels and remakes have always been a thing in Hollywood, but it’s never been at this scale, and that’s largely down to the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Since then everyone has wanted a slice of that pie, hence why it feels like every movie franchise is being turned into one great big giant sequel factory. It’s this thinking that made Warner Bros. extend The Hobbit into a trilogy when it really didn’t fucking need to be. It’s this thinking that made Universal Studios try to lump all their horror movie monsters like Frankenstein and the Mummy into a shared universe only for it to backfire when they realised that (gasp) not everything works as a shared fucking universe. It’s this thinking that has essentially stripped the once promising Marvel Cinematic Universe of any creativity and artistic integrity, reducing it to the shallow and soulless franchise it is today where every movie has become virtually identical to each other.

Now I’m not saying that sequels or franchise or even shared universes are inherently bad. Provided the quality remains consistently good and there’s proper narrative and artistic justification for it, I don’t have a problem with it. What i do have a problem with is movie studios churning out sequel after sequel for no reason other than to make money. Let’s not deny that is the motive behind these new Star Wars movies. That is most definitely the motive behind this new trilogy we’re going to get. It feels as though everyone in the movie industry has forgotten how to tell standalone stories with a beginning, middle and end (you know? Like proper stories?). I can’t think of a single reason to justify a sequel sequel trilogy, just like there isn’t a single reason to justify the sequel trilogy. And don’t you dare give me that bullshit about how George Lucas always intended Star Wars to be 9 movies long. For one thing, I don’t think anything George Lucas has to say holds much weight anymore because, you know, the prequels exist. And second, there is literally no reason to continue the story after Return Of The Jedi. The baddies are dead, the Empire has been destroyed and Luke has finally completed his journey and became a Jedi Knight. There is literally nowhere else for the story to go, as evidenced by The Force Awakens effectively repeating A New Hope again. What’s the point of carrying the story on? I couldn’t give two fucks what happens to Luke after Return Of The Jedi for the same reason i couldn’t give two fucks what happened to Cinderella and Prince Charming after they got married and lived happily ever after (although Disney showed us anyway with their direct to video bollocks). The story is over.

Actually, going back to the whole 9 movie thing, let me throw that argument back at you. If George Lucas really intended Star Wars to be 9 movies long and Disney are merely respecting his artistic vision, why the fuck are we now getting 12 movies? Could it be perhaps that Disney are a bunch of money grabbing arseholes who don’t actually give a shit about Star Wars and just to want to squeeze the brand for every penny they can get? Because that’s the thing, isn’t it? It’s one thing to have a movie studio earning some of your money for a well made movie, but it’s another thing entirely when a movie studio feels they’re entitled to all of your money for a continuous stream of mediocre crap.

Now it’s very easy to lay the blame at the feet of the greedy corporate bastards that are draining the franchise dry, but I think we the audience deserve a portion of the blame too. Don’t forget, we’re the ones that paid to watch these movies. We’re the ones effectively enabling them to produce more cynically made and hollow products. The movie industry wouldn’t be able to pull off half of this bullshit if it weren't for the more gullible members of the audience that simply don’t know when enough is enough. Case in point, Frozen. I loved Frozen. Everybody loved Frozen. It was a good movie with a proper beginning, middle and end. There’s no need to make a sequel. In fact making a sequel to Frozen would be quite possibly the dumbest thing you could do because there’s no way you could top the first one. But what did fans say in their droves? ‘Sequel! Could we have a sequel please?!’ And now we’re getting Frozen 2. Bugger.

The reason these sequel factories exist is because we enabled them to exist. The fans wanted this, and this is something I’m going to keep reminding people of when this new Star Wars trilogy comes a calling. You wanted this. All you people that kept saying it would be a shame when Star Wars ends with Episode 9 and that you hope there would be more. When Disney keep finding more and more excuses to keep releasing annual Star Wars movies, once they’ve strapped the suction tubes onto the udders of the Star Wars cash cow and drained every last drop from it until it becomes a shrivelled, lifeless husk before they grind it into the dirt, just remember... you wanted this.

Finally, just to add insult to injury, Disney have announced that Rian Johnson is going to be directing the new trilogy. Yeah. That fucker. The guy who’s directing The Last Jedi. The guy who has been constantly sidelining all the characters of colour, including Finn, the main character. The guy that believes that Kylo Ren, the villain, is in fact a dual protagonist with Rey. The guy who insists that Kylo Ren, a 30 year old man who killed off one of the most beloved characters of the original trilogy, is in fact a confused adolescent who deserves redemption. Now I’m not saying that Rian Johnson is a racist moron who seems to have taken up permanent residence in Cloud Cuckoo Land. I’m not saying that at all. We’ve all seen the interviews. We’ve all heard the bullshit. I’ll let you come to your own conclusions. But if you don’t mind, I think I might give this new trilogy a miss.

Now you could easily just dismiss everything I’ve just been saying as the pessimistic ramblings of a cynical snob, and you have every right to do so. However I ask you to at least consider the bigger picture here. The announcement of this new trilogy I think is indicative of the much larger problem both within Disney and within the entire movie industry. Yes filmmaking is a business, but there did used to be art in filmmaking too. From my perspective, it feels like the art and passion has gone right out of it. The emphasis is more on making as much money from existing brands as possible rather than putting effort into creating good quality content. It’s gotten to the point where studios have become reluctant to take a risk on original stories, and that’s both tragic and stupid. Let’s not forget there was a time when Star Wars was an original idea that a studio decided to take a risk with, and it paid off big time. The fact that Hollywood execs don’t seem to recognise that is deeply frustrating and just a little bit sad.

Producers and studio execs keep saying how much they love Star Wars, hence why they keep making the movies. I’d like to propose a counter-argument to them. If you really love Star Wars as much as you say you do, then here’s the best thing you can do. Stop making Star Wars movies. Come up with your own ideas. Make something else. Stop dragging this franchise out and let it die with dignity. To quote a recent and popular Disney princess: “Let it go. Let it go.”

#star wars #anti disney #quill's scribbles

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