#one review of the engages said it’s better than the experiences cause it doesn’t make your chewing echo the way the experiences do and I’m

[boomerang109]

spent my birthday money on replacing my loops cause somehow i lost them and this world is too loud

[papers4me]

Fruits Basket, Se03, ep10 (part 1)

“ What to do? & how to do it? the answer & the method are so simple, so simple but difficult as hell. it was hard for me to get them, & that’s exactly why I treasure them/ makes them valuable”. kyo~ This is my favorite quote in all anime.

How many times a domestic abuse victim was told just leave this abusive partner? report them? easy. just make a call. Report your abusive parents? tell someone. easy. Just speak up. It is true. It is easy but difficult as hell. To believe it is your right to fight. No, to believe you deserve to fight. to Live. This abuse is not a punishment you must endure. Hope is not dead. How simple yet so difficult to do that. ugh! my heart!

- Seeing Death vs Facing Death: ( The abuser who was stopped):

Abuse is a form of slow death. An actual intentional murder of an innocent soul. Abusers suck the life out of their victims & kyo’s biological dad is the poster monster for that. His appearance:

thin deathly demeanor, lack of nourishment, excessive drinking, lack of desire get out of the abyss, wide eyes, tiny pupils, manic laughter. shaky body movement. pathetic outlook at things.

heavy breathing, lack of logic & distorted facts, blurry speech, bizarre mentality, toxic behavior, tendency to hurt, injure, both physically & verbally.

inability to grasp reality, desire for inflecting pain on others, finding joy in that as it justifies his entire toxic mentality.

Fear of being hurt like he hurt others & being paranoid since he KNOWS he should receive punishment.

Kyo stood watching this man spit, rage, shake, scream. The man from his past, the authoritative figure in his early tender years, the person who must always be right: a parent. Facing his dad, Kyo’s entire gradual change was fantastic:

Kyo went from feeling utter fear from this man, hatred towards him, grief at the loss of a father & a mother, to force himself to stand his ground & not leave” easy but difficult as hell“ , to talk ” easy but difficult as hell“ , to announce that isnt gonna die ” easy but difficult as hell“ to say I’m loved & I want to to be with someone ” easy but difficult as hell”

to then realize the source of his mom’s misery isnt him after all, but this jerk! & not crumble at this realization ” easy but difficult as hell“ to grief over his mom’s tragic life & still announce again that he’s anit throwing his life away ” easy but difficult as hell“ to still look at his dad with pity rather than immense hate & anger ” easy but difficult as hell“ to remove his hand & leave him behind in the past while he moves forward ” easy but difficult as hell“ to say “ i’ll come visit again, cuz I anit afraid of you anymore, I’m not running, but I’ll try to extend a hand if you wanna do the same one day. It is your choice to be the abuser who must be stopped or the one who is atoned! you can choose, dad! We heard his choice as kyo was leaving, didn’t we? locking himself in an eternal cage that he made for himself. After all, he is the monster in his own story by his own choice.

-Seeing death (1): Kyo watching his mom’s suicide is a traumatic experience especially considering she chose such a graphic way to exist this world. Kyo once said to tohru “ mom went flying”, he now said“ mom threw her life away” very graphic ways to explain her death both literally & figuratively. This alone coupled with his father accusing him, resulted in a 4 year old screaming” I’mma yuki & kill myself, this would make you happy, dad”. This explains kyo’s 2 meetings with yuki as kids“ I hate you” at the sohma estate, the 2nd meeting “ I hate you” at the street. Mimicking the toxic behavior of the dad. Why didn’t kyo mimic kazuma? cuz trauma doesn't work like that. Kids can live safely for time then one traumatic experience shatter their self-worth into an endless cycle of self-hurt, low self worth & anger issues or withdrawal. The writing that set kyo/yuki against each other is perfect.

-Seeing death (2): Kyo watching kyoko’s death hammers all the insecurities of child kyo deep down into teenage kyo. Kyoko too, went flying, blood everywhere. too much pain happening again, crashing hope & killing his fighting spirit over & over. Be with tohru? why? to kill her, too?

-Seeing death (3): Kyo watching tohru’s injured body. Yup. You caused this. not by pushing her or failing to catch her. No. but by hurting her with harsh words. by forcing her away from you.

-Facing death (1): Kyo facing his dad, the symbol of deadly-abuse. To stand & announce to live is huge. -Facing death (2): refuse death: being caged till death, -Facing death (3): To say, I wanna be loved & love someone, life is not just being outside, heck! kyo was outside for 17 years! life is abt being with those who give it meaning! -Facing death (4): To not demand others to die as a punishment. Walking away from his dad without igniting the cycle of revenge & hate. ahhhhhhhhhh~~~  Chef’s kiss!

-Seeing eye to eye: ( I don’t need to be you, but I appreciate you):

Kyo & yuki toxic relationship has been ongoing since their birth. The moment kyo’s dad was dismayed that he got the cat of all zodiac & the moment yuki’s mom was delighted she got the rat of all zodiacs. From that moment it became: look how lucky the rat parents? You shamed me? Look how pitiful that cat? eww! stay away from his filth. The explosive nature of kyo’s tragic fate tainted him with the blood of his mom & the daggers of his father’s hateful words, while the nature of yuki’s sheltered & locked fate tainted him with fear & isolation. They meet & both carry out the feelings of rejection & hate all while envying the other. The toxic nature of their relationship consist of fights & condensing words. Tohru connected both. Through her, they became civil. Even talking abt perverted shigure. Now that she is hurt, they are lost without her. Their lives are empty.

Yuki’s “ kyo has his own pain & reasons”  (to not see tohru) is my fave line! even better than all the epic lines after they confess their feelings. cuz this like happened before they connect. it shows that, I see his pain, I get he has his reasons. But whatever issues he have shouldn’t hurt tohru. this is when yuki interferes in kyo’s choices. For tohru. This is also when kyo really allows him to. For tohru. Had tohru nor be part of the fight, kyo wouldn’t even engage in it & yuki wouldn’t initiate it.

-“I wanted to be you!” : Kyo said it first. I loved this so much! Cuz kyo said I hate you first! it is so fulfilling that the truth is now out. From kyo first. Cuz really... that hate was all toxic inheritance from a toxic father & a toxic system.

- “Why do you have to say it firs!” Yuki was mad, cuz he was struggling with it for the longest time. to be kyo. He even mused on how kyo interacted with ppl in school, got himself his own mini kyo. lol. studied how kyo filled tohru’s world just by existing. yuki can't do that for tohru. he looked for someone whom he could do that for! yuki/machi scene at her house paralleled kyo/tohru scene at her room when she was sick (se01, e023) & when they eating the somen together (se02, e02), yuki/machi chalk scene paralleled kyo/tohru scene at the beach where he coaxed tohru to tell her mom’s story (se02, e07). Yuki really was having a hard time finding his true self & accepting it without needing to learn from kyo. It is hard to say “ i admired you” after being rejected by you! so kyo saying it first helped yuki say his after. Also, both boys were hella shocked they admire each other. Like both were deeply shocked! stupid boys! XD

Side Notes:

Kyo’s confrontation with his dad is furuba’s most powerful scene & most well-written one! From the fear of facing him, to talking to him with low voice, to physically stopping him, to the exposed last piece of locked memory abt the mother, to the freedom gained by walking forward! Heck, even how it was weaved psychologically to perfectly mimic children’s self-defense mechanisms & children copying their parents theme. The realistic depiction of abusers both in their most powerfully menacing moment & in their weakest cowardly moment. Top-tier writing! Hands down my fave furuba scene! Can’t ask for better! Can’t even imagine better! genius- writing Takaya-san!

The boys had a necessary fight & confrontation & the yuki’s entire speech was valid & perfect speech. However, as usual, I’m not a fan of how violence is depicted in furuba. I was actually “warned/ ordered” by an anon to not “ sh*t” on the boys fight scene. I don’t know why someone who’d read my reviews would think i’d have anything but love for both boys. I criticize the writing not the characters. Also, furuba fans have always been good to me, I state my opinion frankly & they talk to me! “ talk!”. You don’t have to throw virtual fists over different perspectives on fiction. Talking kindly does magic, also having different opinions is natural & normal for humans.

I love yuki so much, he’s one of my top faves in furuba & I get why the boys would quarrel & throw fists. I get the history between them, the current state of mind, their emotions & mentality & I get it’s fiction & drama that needs its “ OMG” moment. However, I cringe when I see violence used as a bonding moment in fiction in general. That’s just me. I wish the fight was done in a more artistic style without showing that scene where yuki corned kyo & punched him in full view of the screen. (again not hating on yuki nor the fact that they needed to fight). I’m jus saying I didn't need to see a one-sided beat up from a character I love to another one I love. That’s just me again~ feel free to enjoy this moment to its fullest. It’s fiction & I’m not judging anyone at all, nor hating anyone from real life or fiction <3<3<3.

Yuki’s last piece of character development is in my part 2 review! Along with machi. Also, yuki’s Japanese VA was awesome!!

Also, let yuki have deep various facial expressions!!!! ugh! In the fight scene they did yuki so dirty with his hair covering his eyes all the time! then followed by low quality shots of him breathing! Why?! The voice acting sold the entire excellent emotional rage more than the animation! Yuki can look pretty even when mad, heck! screw looking pretty! just give him deep facial expressions to mach his feelings! boy was hella mad like he never was his entire life! always forced to wear a mask or be diplomatic! now he’s screaming his lungs out, you hide his face??? really?? Sigh~ the anime always do this wit yuki, replace facial expressions with hair on eyes or having his eyes without light. I wanna see them expressive eyebrows so bad!!!

Another powerful VA performance was both kyo’s dad VAs! both the Japanese (with his excessive breathing) & the English VA (with his range). They sold the mad abusive character! they gave me chills!

Also, I sound like a broken record, but kyo’s both VAs did phenomenon in the dad’s scene & tohru’s scene. Honestly, I only watch the dub to hear Jerry! I learned his name & would watch the dub for him!

Akito, Arisa, Kureno in part 2 of my review as well.

Shigure/yuki returning home scene is call back to ep1. Ok, everybody loves a call back scene & the full circle thingy. but C’mon! you dont have to copy everything! the walk, the scenery, its purpose, dialogue & all! The anime really took advantage of kyo being missing. XD

Tohru’s dress/top color matches the color of kyo’s old hat (The hat). symbolic of him finding her? As if he did find her when they were children? cool. I love this detail. But i do NOT love this color on tohru at all !! lol. it is so dull on her. The dress style/ design mimics her same dress in se01, ep26 as she was talking to kazuma & kyo fought him. Their first intimate moment after nearly loosing the other. Heck! tohru was even hurt on her hand as well. but the color was a nice pastel yellow. It suited tohru. The hat’s bluish-greenish color matches tohru’s own pajama at home!!!! & kureno’s hospital pajama! T_T... why couldn't the hat be red!!!! a color that both represent kyo & yuki! both were compared to red before~ oh well~~ minor issue~

[wannabe-fic-writer]

Natasha Romanoff x Reader : Prove Me Wrong

Summary: She can trust you, even if she doesn’t know it yet.

Warning: 18+ Mental Health, Mentions of Death, Mentions of Violence, Smut

Chapter 5

****** 

The presence of the weekend always raises the question of “what to do.”

You specifically don’t make appointments on the weekend or on Monday’s. The team deserves a break just like everybody else and nobody wants to do anything on Monday’s and you didn’t want to deal with the team while both you and them are grumpy.

So here you are, on a Saturday with nothing to do. 

You’d already been to the gym, you really just used the treadmill, despite all the state of the art equipment in there. Admittedly you aren’t the athletic type but you do enjoy the occasional cardio workout. 

Then you showered and made breakfast for the team which they have already demolished.

Just as you’re choosing between going for a walk and watching the next show on your Netflix list, there’s a knock at your door.

“Hey Y/N.” 

You look up and immediately smile when you see Bucky leaning into your room.

“Hey Bucky, what’s up?”

“Well Steve got tickets to a baseball game and I remembered the talks we had about the game and figured maybe you’d be interested in coming with us. If not that’s fine just, there’s three tickets and-”

“I’d love to go.” You cut him off before he can start to nervously ramble.

He nods and tells you that you’re leaving in a hour before disappearing. 

Already having showered, you pull on an an outfit you deem suitable for the event, and leave out, stopping at your office for something and then going down to the common room. 

Steve and Bucky are already waiting in the common room when you get there and you figure they gave you the hour just as a curtesy.

As the three of you head over to the garage and climb into the black SUV, you mentally admit to yourself that you’re nervous to be hanging out with them.

Despite living with them, you haven’t hung out with anyone from the team. Which is equally you’re fault and theirs. You aren’t the most outgoing person and the team is pretty intimidating. Also none of them have really reached out in that way.

You figure you’ll have to step out of your comfort zone and reach out to them.

Before you know it Bucky is pulling into a parking spot in the structure across from the stadium.

You all climb out and walk over to the venue. 

“Not gonna lie, I’ve never been to a baseball game before.” 

Both men freeze in their steps, looking over at you as if you said you just committed murder. 

“You’re lying.” Steve says, eyes still wide.

You shake your head.

The man turns to look at his friend. You hear Bucky mumble ‘I don’t know what we’re gonna do’ and you’re tempted to laugh. But you know they’re serious about this.

Quietly you watch them, waiting for them to say something else.

Except they don’t.

You quickly learn that the two are ‘Show Not Tell’ kind of guys. 

They drag you into the stadium and deck you out in Yankees merch: a shirt, a hat, a foam finger, and a cup that they promise to keep filled during the game, then buy you “classic” game day snacks. 

By the time you find your seats your arms are full.

“Guys, was this really necessary?” 

“Yes.” Bucky says instantly.“ It’s all apart of the experience.” 

“He’s right.” Steve nods.

Chuckling, you ease into your seat and start situating your snacks and drink in your lap. 

Just before the game starts you thank them both and they smile at you and say ‘you’re welcome’. 

Watching the game here in the stadium, the guys all excited beside you along with the crowd, and the surprisingly good concession snacks, makes this so much fun. 

As you’re finishing the last of your popcorn you remember what you grabbed before you all left. Digging down into your bag, you pull the four boxes out. Pulling them apart in pairs, you nudge Steve and shake them.

“Buck.” Steve taps his best friends arm excitedly, grabbing his attention from the game.

For the first time since you’ve met him, a bright smile takes over the man’s face. You can’t lie and say it’s not adorable.

He looks up at you with a question in his eyes and you immediately nod.

Both he and Steve grab the snack from you and you have the privilege of watching them open it with childlike excitement. 

It seems as though that makes the entire thing better for them. Not once do they stop smiling and laughing. 

The highlight of the whole thing comes when the Yankees hit a home run in your direction and Bucky jumps up and snatches the ball out of the air. Before offering it to you with a grin on his face. 

By the time you all get back to the compound the air that surrounds you makes you feel as though you’d known them for years. The hat they bought you sits crookedly on Bucky’s head and Steve is waving the foam finger around as you toss the homerun ball in the air repeatedly.

It’s obviously unexpected since when you all step into the common room, everyone raises their eyebrows at you. Sam is sporting a very amused grin, Vision and Wanda smiling just cause you all are, and Natasha is watching you all with narrowed eyes.

“What’s got you three smiling all hard?” Sam asks.

Steve is the first to answer,“ me and Buck just took Y/N to her first baseball game.” 

“It was so much fun! Like way better than watching it on tv.” You tell them. 

They chuckle, amused by your excitement. 

“Who won?” Sam asks.

Steve starts walking over to talk about the game and you turn to head to your room.

Bucky frowns at that,“ you’re not stickin around?” He asks.

“I am, I’m just going to put all this away.” You smile softly in reassurance.

He nods, taking the cap off his head and playfully slapping it on to yours. 

Laughing, you turn and leave. You put your souvenirs on your desk, happy to have reminders of today.

With the way Steve and Bucky kept to themselves, even more so than anyone else on the team, you hadn’t expected them to be the first people you connected with. Today had proven you wrong.

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t love getting to know them outside of your office. It wasn’t about all the traumas they had experienced and were dealing with. It was about their friendship, all the fun they had, and how much fun they were having with you.

And it was about you too. The men were eager to ask you questions about yourself and your preferences. You didn’t know it for sure, but the men found themselves enjoying your company more than they had anyone else in years. 

When you get back to the common room you’re expecting the conversation to still be about the game, instead you find everyone’s focus on a new presence.

The blonde woman stands in front of the group in a blue and red, possibly leather, suit. Her hands move as she speaks and her short hair sits disheveled on her head.

You’re drawn closer when a bright smile lights up her face and her voice gets louder in excitement.

Her brown eyes land on you as you come to stand behind the couch and her words falter on her lips, effectively causing everyone, who didn’t already know you were in there, to turn to look at you.

Her smile reappears,“ hi, I’m Carol.” She waves.

“Y/N. Nice to meet you Carol.” You reply with a friendly smile in return.

It goes quiet for a moment, everyone looking between the two of you.

Sam is the one who breaks the silence,“ Danvers was just telling us about her mission. You know, if you want to finish that.” He started talking to you but turned back to the blonde.

It’s almost as if she waits to see if you want to hear it to continue, only doing son after you give a small nod. She gives you a quick review of what she’d already said. 

You find yourself completely immersed in her story. The woman travels the universe for crying out loud.

The most you’ve ever seen is y/ht and New York, if that. So when she finishes and everyone breaks off to a different topic you excitedly ask the woman more about her space travel. 

All the while as she smiles charmingly and talks to you, who wears an amused smile, Natasha watches. 

She can’t dismiss how out of character it is for you to just approach someone that you’d just met. She remembers noticing how you didn’t make any efforts to engage the team until days after you’d arrived. 

In fact she knows, apart from today with Steve and Bucky which she’s still trying to understand, that you have yet to actively build a relationship with anyone. 

Natasha would never say that you were rude to anyone because you aren’t and haven’t been. You simply keep to yourself and it just so happens that you are surrounded by people who tended to do the same.

Apart from Tony, who you had a previous relationship with, and Sam and Peter, who are as genuinely outgoing as a person could get. 

That being said, she wonders why you’d chosen Carol to suddenly be invested in. 

Was it the woman’s knowledge of space?

Her inviting smile?

The confidence that seems to pour off her broad shoulders?

Or maybe her charm? No one, Natasha included, could deny that the woman was charming.

And then Natasha stops herself. She shouldn’t care. Why does she care that you and Carol are talking more now than you and she had in the months you’ve been here? Why does she care that you seem to be laughing so freely at whatever the woman is saying?

With a frown pulling her brows together Natasha tells herself that she doesn’t care. And then she’s up and out of the room before anyone can even acknowledge that she didn’t want to be there anymore.

******

taglist: @username23345 @muffliat-o  @aaron-despair @natasha-danvers  @nat-km-mh

[kittasune]

“winter warmth”

“WINTER WARMTH”

“WINTER WARMTH”

📘┊pairing. akaashi keiji x gn!reader

🔖┊tags. post-time skip, fluff, co-worker friends to lovers, mutual pinning, holidays, seasons abloom

📚┊wc. 4.3k

📖┊note. I wrote this for akaashi’s birthday but i’ve been meaning to write this fic for a long time now. well, here’s my first fic posted on tumblr! feel free to message me your thoughts! i plan to make this an on-going series of small one-shots so… please expect more in the future.

The biting cold that accompanies the change in seasons looms over the metropolitan city of Tokyo, the city where Akaasji Keiji was born, where his career is, and most importantly; where the love of his life is – the International Library of Children’s Literature. Literature has always been one of Akaashi’s passions to pursue as it opens endless doors of opportunities that could grant him success in the future. The majority of his stress stems from his work,

“Having a job and a stable career makes you successful!”

“You should have a steady income first before you pursue your passions so you have a stable foundation to fall back on just in case things don’t work out, Akaashi-san.”

He can hear the string of back-handed compliments and empty advice he’s received from co-workers and relatives alike echo in the back of his mind, clouding his thoughts and possible future realities he wishes to envision. Literature is one of his hobbies that became his career due to his love that caused him to become attached. Manga, novels, plays, poetry, and even textbooks sometimes caught Akaashi’s attention and he couldn’t help but consume the knowledge and navigate the uncharted waters that flow through the pages in inky waves. The beautiful thought of literature that had once been untouched and pure in Akaashi’s child-like wondrous mind has now become something as lifeless as house-hold chores to check off a list.

Now, as he sits at his desk in his office cubicle eying the unsurmountable manga panels that consume more than half of his desk with their shiny patent ink and crisp lines framing the edges of each page – he can’t help but sigh.

“You know, I’ve always been told that it’s bad luck to sigh.” Akaashi perked up at the sound of ceramic hitting the surface of his white acrylic desk. He looks up to see you holding a matching mug brimming with the café nectar that he so desperately needs. 

“Is that so? You sound so sure of yourself considering that your break ended 5 minutes ago.” Akaashi hid his face in his hands to mask the upturned corners of his lips pulling into a smirk.

“Thank you for the coffee, I know that I’ll need it considering that Hide x Seek’s 100th Chapter is going to be released in this edition of Shonen Jump.”

“I heard that from Udai-san, he seemed so excited that he wanted to make this chapter special by making it holiday-themed with all the holidays being piled all together at the end of the year.” You said with a look of contemplation as you sipped the burning liquid in your mug.

“Have you read Hide x Seek before?” Akaashi leans back in his office chair and sets his gaze upon you while placing the cup next to his lips, the creaky sound apparent from the quality of wornness and evidence of sleepless nights he’s spent hunched over reviewing and editing the work assigned to him.

“I think I’ve read it once before, it’s the one where the high school students hide from an intruder but they don’t know who’s the intruder… but it ends up being the ghost of a former student that seeks to kill out of revenge and spite the higher-ups who have wronged her, right?” You said while fixating your gaze to the edge of his desk as if to recall the synopsis from memory, your coffee mug was left forgotten on Akaashi’s desk as you appear lost in your thoughts.

“Not quite, you just said the plot summary of Peek-a-boo? not Hide x Seek.”

Akaashi said while looking pointedly at your mug on his desk that would surely leave a faint circle as he knows you tend to haphazardly spill its contents as you “vigorously” stir your coffee to ensure that all additives are well-mixed. He recalls asking as to why making a vortex in a cup smaller than his hand is necessary, to which, you responded,

“I need everyone to get along harmoniously and seamlessly blend with one another, imagine drinking a cup of coffee that you’ve prepared and longed for only for it to have lumps and chunks at the bottom, no-thank-you!”

The dim grimace on your face spoke volumes of a less-than-happy experience you must have gone through and as a result, the chaotic meticulousness of your coffee shenanigans intrigued Akaashi to befriend you.

He was so lost in his thoughts that he doesn’t notice you flush red at the realization that you’ve embarrassed yourself in front of your co-worker, friend, and “potential suitor” as your friend lightly put as a shallow jab at your private love-life *hint – it’s practically non-existent.

You sigh. “Maybe I’ll give Hide x Seek a read during a vacation or something.” You mumble the words, cursing yourself for looking like a fool in front of your longtime friend, Akaashi Keiji.

The image of you grumbling and lamenting in front of Akaashi mirrors a panel sitting on his desk that has him fondly reminiscing the same image of you from last spring about how you had no one to accompany you to the Hanami Festival and so, he acquiesced to your invitation thus, establishing a tradition in your friendly relationship.

“I think it would be best to return to your desk, y/n, wouldn’t want to lose the privilege of seeing you every day and being the object of your admiration.” Akaashi propped himself up on his desk, resting his head on his forearms in a lazy slouch peering up at you with one eyebrow raised and a ghost of a smile playing upon his lips.

“You should really stop flirting with me at work, Akaashi. One of these days I might get the wrong idea and think you’re into me or something…” You chastise him while walking back to your desk which is conveniently next to Akaashi’s.

“I’m hopelessly enamored at the thought of you and it frightens me to think of a day where you’ll be missing from my side…”  Akaashi thought as he proceeded to leaf through the panels laid out strategically on his desk. He looked over at you as you started to situate yourself with your work and said, “I wouldn’t sigh if I were you, I heard that if you sigh it brings you bad luck.”

“Stop mocking me and go do your work!”

          ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The clock struck at 5:00 P.M., then at 6:00 P.M., just right before the clock struck at 7:00 P.M. you blearily glance at the time blaring in the corner of your monitor and drift your eyes to the decorative hourglass sitting on your desk. The intricate gold timepiece hid tucked away in the corner of your desk hiding behind a framed picture of you and Akaashi posed in front of a bookstore where a work-related event took place. A faint memory surfaces from the back of your subconscious from earlier this year.

“Akaashi, why do you have a plastic apple on your desk?” You glare at the object as a red plastic apple seems so peculiar to associate with Akaashi, in your mind at least, so you questioned its purpose. Is it for sentimental reasons? Are apples his favorite type of fruit? Do apples have an artistic appeal or is it just a trend?

“It’s a tomato.” He responded, not once looking up to acknowledge your effort to engage in conversation. As Akaashi is seemingly focused on the task at hand, you further prodded with your innocent questions wanting his attention so you could lose yourself in the oceans that reside in his deep blue eyes.

“Then, why do you have a tomato on your desk?”

“Keeps me focused on the task at hand. Have you heard of the Pomodoro technique before, y/n?” Akaashi still focused on his work while you continued questioning.

“The time management one, right? I think I’ve read about it somewhere before if I’m being honest…” You lose yourself in your thoughts as you attempted to recall the correct definition from an online blog you briefly glanced at.

“Then you should know about how it helps you complete your work in a timely manner while balancing the efficacy and quality of the work produced.” Akaashi stopped in his ministrations and averts his attention to the now glaringly pointless object occupying space on his desk that was a prize Bokuto won at the Momiji-gari festival they attended together last October.

“Yes, that’s the time management aspect after all.”

“If I may then, why is it you stress about not having enough seconds in a minute, enough minutes in an hour, and not enough hours in a day to complete your work and yet have all the time to talk to me well over your allotted break time?” he swivels around in his chair to face you, steel blue eyes locked in a heated rage-ridden gaze with yours.

Too stunned to talk from the blunt harshness of his words, you reply, “Quite snappy today are we? At least I know now you pay attention when I mindlessly make a fuss about my workload.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you with my statement, I was going for light-hearted banter at best… I guess I can blame it on the weather. The heatwave must be getting the better of me.” Akaashi said while pulling at his necktie, an excuse to keep his hands preoccupied and mind distracted in avoidance from the awkward silence beginning to build between the two of you.

“Tell me about it, I never really liked summer as a season or the heat.” You crinkle your upturned nose in an act of disdain as you face the glass windows doing nothing to shield you from the overbearing sunlight pouring into the office.

“With summer comes the sun, with the sun comes light, and with light comes warmth,” Akaashi says so matter-of-factly that makes you wonder what’s his favorite holiday. He interrupts your train of thought by asking, “What’s your favorite holiday, y/n- san?”

“Winter, I like the snow. Or more of what snow symbolizes…” you trail off towards the end of your sentence deep in thought.

“Usually people like winter because of the holidays and spending time with their loved ones under a kotatsu. What’s so enchanting about snow? When you touch it, it just melts… not to mention it’s cold.” Akaashi looks over at you inquisitively that could almost be mistaken for scrutiny if a stranger were to eavesdrop between you two.

“If you are out in the first snowfall of the season with someone you like, true love will blossom between you.” You recite from memory what the old woman who owned the corner store grocery near your place told you during your times as a highschooler.

“Besides love, if you make a wish when the first snow blankets the city your wish will come true.” You swing your legs to-and-fro underneath your desk covered from the public’s eye but Akaashi can tell it’s one of your habits you do when you’re excited. The sparkle in your eye accompanied by the ecstatic hand gestures would also giveaway your feelings of excitement but Akaashi knows better. You stop in your motions and jerk towards him almost like you’ve had an epiphany, the sparkle in your eye flashed again mimicking that of a light-bulb going off.

“Snow also signifies that all lies will be forgotten, isn’t that refreshing? The thought of new beginnings with the first snow sounds so romantic! I wish I had someone to enjoy it with…” You take a chance and glance at Akaashi to gauge his reaction to your statement, he already beat your intentions by turning back to face his desk at lightning speed so you wouldn’t see the faint flush of red on his cheeks that bloomed after your profession of love for snow. He didn’t want you to know he was flustered because of the way you turned to him and uttered the words ‘besides love,’ to his face, and the realization that he was going to respond with a simple, ‘hm?’ had him leaning further into his desk in embarrassment.  

“Akaashi, what’s your favorite season? You know mine and my reason now.”

“Same as you, I like winter.”

“Why?”

“The holidays.”

“Boring!”

            ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

You shake your head in strong efforts to clear the fog that clouded your mind during that flashback.

“Nodding off so soon?” Akaashi’s voice startled you back to reality as you whip your head towards him.

“It’s almost 7:00, we were supposed to get off work an hour ago like someone said..” you fix your steely gaze on his figure hoping he could feel the mock-resentment radiating off you in waves. “I hope we get overtime pay for this as this isn’t the first time this has happened.” You lean against the back of your chair raising your arms above your head in a half-stretch with valiant efforts to hear the satisfying pop of your back.

“I made no promises, I was going to tell you this when we got off but Udai-san said we have the day-off tomorrow. The reason behind it ‘to reward you guys for your dedication to the company’ were his exact words.” Akaashi said as he began to clear his desk wanting to get to his apartment as soon as possible to sleep. This week took more of a toll on him than he would like to admit, the endless piles of work, deadlines to meet, and the cold that accompanied the winter months were taking a toll on him. The holiday season’s cold seeped into the bitterness of Akaashi’s hidden emotions, like an ice pick scratching the surface of Akaashi’s lonesome facade he tried to hide under cool indifference. In stark contrast, you acted as sunshine that brought the warmth that he desired to thaw his endless winters.  

“Done with your work, too? Let’s go home.” His sunshine that spread light and illuminated the darkness that clouds his mind.

            ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The walk from the subway station to the shared apartment complex was only a 10-minute walk but tonight it seemed never-ending to Akaashi. The time was almost 8:00 and the streets seemed less deserted than usual. The city lights glimmer looked dim in comparison to past nights and the mood almost felt too solemn with the holidays around the corner. Akaashi was lost in his thoughts that he failed to notice the crosswalk light flickered to red signaling the oncoming traffic to cross the road, if it wasn’t for you pulling him by the back of his jacket… he ignores the thought that briefly filters across his mind.

“Akaashi, are you alright? I wasn’t going to mention it but you’ve seemed more aloof than usual.” You said while gripping onto the back of his jacket tightly almost grasping him in a silent plea.

“I’m fine.” He responds curtly while maneuvering his tall frame in an off-handed demeanor that cues for you to let-go. This action only fuels your act of defiance to pull him harder in your direction causing your bodies to collide clumsily disrupting the systematic ebb-and-flow that is pedestrian traffic. As you and Akaashi apologize and wait for the crosswalk sign to turn green, you can’t help but laugh which makes Akaashi let-out a small chuckle as he realizes what a commotion your exchange must have looked like.

“We make for entertaining crowd spectacles,” He spoke softly through a genuine small smile that washed over his handsome features that could have rivaled ‘any top celebrity that calls themselves a pretty boy,’ in your words, not his. The cold weather combined with the hotness radiating from his silent chuckles caused a light layer of condensation to form on his glasses’ lenses. As the haze rendered him sightless, he took off his glasses, pulled out his handkerchief he kept tucked away in his inner jacket pocket, and proceeded to clean his square frames. You took this opportunity to admire the man before you. His brown hair fell gracefully in a light tousled manner as a result of his hands raking through them from stress. Your gaze shifted to his hands, his hands easily engulfed the metal frames balancing delicately in between his slender fingers that looked natural holding the awkward position for prolonged periods of time. Your eyes flit over his face that was normally impassive and difficult to read, now his cool indifference shifted to a look of frustration. The furrow of his thick brows and the faint vertical lines creasing in the center of his eyebrows almost made Akaashi look younger.

‘He looks like a petulant child being told what to do’ you mused to yourself. When he felt content with the cleanliness of his glasses, Akaashi scanned his surroundings to see where you led him to. He realizes that you stopped right in front of the steps to his favorite place in all of Tokyo – the International Library of Children’s Literature. Even with the library being closed as evident by the lack of people and dimmed lights, he still found this place breathtaking.

“The architecture of this library looks similar to the Palace of Versailles don’t you think so, Akaashi? That was one of my first impressions when you first brought me here, I just forgot about it but remembered after seeing this place again” You said as you stared in awe at the smooth concrete walls and tall glass windows with lattice fixtures intricately lining the tall double doors that greeted over 1,000 visitors each day.

“The International Library of Children’s Literature, originally called the Imperial Library, was constructed by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government under the Meiji era in 1906. The artistic movement that inspired the architect was the Renaissance movement which explains the Western-like elements incorporated into the building’s design.” Akaashi recited from memory and turned to you after he finished his statement only to find you already facing him, eyes widened and mouth agape in surprise. After seeing your reaction he turns back to the building and says in a soft whisper, “This place brings back fond memories,” while unconsciously playing with his hands, fingers intertwining with one another in a playful open and close. He can feel your gaze openly assessing his figure standing awkwardly in the library’s pathway, he knows that you want the answers as to why he’s acting less like his “usual” self. You find yourself confused by Akaashi’s paradoxical behavior, sometimes he’s willing to let small cracks appear in his otherwise smooth facade of coolness, and other times he shrugs you off in efforts to maintain his cool indifference. His true emotions are caught and given to you in minuscule pieces and this frustrates you as you wish to be with the man that’s always beside you and occupies your mind all the time.

Akaashi can’t help but feel the subtle self-conscious feeling starting to arise after pondering how out of place you and him look at the moment, two people standing alone in front of a closed library engaged in a heated silent exchange. His heart sank when he realized that you two could almost be mistaken as a couple with the way the both of you look now, he wishes for this to be real, his wish is to be with you. Akaashi wishes for you to know his true feelings and declare his love for you and yet, he finds himself biting his lips to silence himself in spite of his friends saying he has a chance of being with you.

The shuffling of feet is heard as you shift your weight from right-to-left and your avoidance of all eye-contact are all tall tale signs of your unsureness, your actions break Akaashi from his own thoughts as he raises his head to see you standing closer to him than earlier.

‘You’re so close I could kiss you right now.’ He wants to say, even in a playful manner but is too afraid to be caught expressing his true feelings even through teasing comments.

“Akaashi, what are you thinking about right now?” You ask in a futile attempt for him to confide in you what thoughts occupy his brain that’s causing him to both distance himself from you emotionally.

Just as Akaashi begins to open his mouth he’s interrupted by an abrupt shout that causes the both of you to stop all conversation.

“Look mom, it’s snowing!”

Childlike excitement blanketed the distanced onlookers frolicking the crosswalks as snowflakes kissed the cherry red noses of daily commuters and people doing last-minute gift shopping. You and Akaashi fix your gazes up to the dark depths of the night sky now obstructed by the white flurries of snow clouds now hovering over all of Tokyo.

‘It’s now or never,” Akaashi thinks to himself, ‘if I can’t do it now, when will I ever get the chance again?’ Akaashi takes a deep inhale and closes his eyes to bask in the brisk coolness the winter air has brought with the changing of seasons.

“I think about how seasons shift out in a cycle of four and I find myself not being able to cope with each change.” He breathes out finally and continues, you stare at him in silent apprehension while anticipating each word.

“Seasons change, people change, and yet I find myself coming back to you… meeting in the same place where we first met each other. Fate has a funny way of telling us that we’re supposed to be together. Coincidence has a hand in pushing us together hinting that we’re meant to be. Destiny is telling me that you’re the one but, choice whispers it’s harsh words of reality only permissible when conditions are met that echoes in my thoughtless mind every sleepless night.” Akaashi locks your eyes in a steady gaze, your eyes widened in shock while his eyes portray a deep-rooted passion now surfacing after being hidden for so long.

“Our love is blossoming like the sakura trees in the spring, a love that mirrors the perennial endless summer hydrangeas in the courtyard in front of our apartment building. A love in which I catch myself falling for you like the leaves during the autumnal months. A love that engulfs me in the warmth of the fire, with its ember flicks illuminating your faint silhouette as we embrace each other in the moonlight. Falling in love with you was experiencing a life I have not lived before, for the first time I welcomed the uncertainty, my fears, my doubts never once clouded my mind. You are my moonlight that illuminates my path in the inky depths of nightfall. My starlight when I look to the sky brimming with untold stories in your constellations that guide me back to you. I want to be with you during the first snowfall of each winter. I want to experience each change of the seasons with you, I want you by my side to accompany me as we live our lives – I wish to be together with you.”

Akaashi finishes his confession of true feelings for you and a sense of relief washes over him as a weight has been lifted from his chest. Akaashi starts fiddling with a loose thread in his pockets starting to feel anxious at the sight of you as he begins to anticipate your response since you haven’t spoken since it started snowing. The feeling of temporary relief was now replaced with a sense of dread fueled by his self-doubts and the thought of rejection, he averts his gaze downward to avoid meeting your eyes.

Akaashi stayed cemented in his place with no signs of moving, so you decided to close the distance between you two. Feeling bolder after Akaashi’s profession as you were reeling from the excitement of seeing snow paired with your feelings being returned by the one you love, you grab his jacket sleeve to signal for him to remove his hand from his pocket and slowly begin to intertwine hands. He shifts his gaze from your interlocked hands to look at you, as he scans your face to gauge your reaction, he finds himself surprised by the beaming smile matching your bright energy and warmth that rivals the sun during the summer months. Your actions and the bright reaction is all the confirmation he needs to know if you reciprocate his feelings so he steers you, hands intertwined, in the direction of your shared apartment complex.

“What about your wish, did it come true?” Akaashi asks while he notices you started to swing your joined hands unconsciously, ‘probably out of habit,’ he thinks to himself silently while a smile threatens to breach his lips. You stop him and take his other-hand so now he’s facing you, you want his full attention as now, it’s your turn to confess.

“My wish was always to be with you, you’re my happiness and the reason for me to continue to live and grow. When I’m with you I’m at my happiest and your constant presence has always been comforting. The sureness in your voice and actions speak volumes about your reliability and the love you have for others. My wish was for you to see the light in yourself and for you to realize that you are loved and needed, not just I think this way but your friends Bokuto, Kuroo, Kenma, and everyone else you’ve met and encountered will agree with me on this point I’m trying to make. I love you, Akaashi Keiji and I wish to be with you… if you’d let me.”

Compared to the shuffling of footsteps and avoidance of eye-contact from earlier that hinted towards your unsureness, Akaashi can see the confidence in your stance and actions as you grasp onto his hands, the unwavering sureness you exude while maintaining eye-contact has Akaashi falling in love with you over again. The brightness in your eyes and cheery playfulness reminds him of the reasons he fell for you in the first place and he senses that he will keep finding reasons to fall in love with you over and over again.

“Let’s go home now, sunshine. I’m afraid that your warmth will melt the winter snow.”

[ichika27]

Mairimashita! Irumakun s2 ep11

Alright... this is late again lol. There’s more than 15 images gonna be on here, I think. Like 2 or 3 more which usually causes errors if I try uploading that much but the twewy finale post miraculously handled more than 20 so maybe it’ll be fine.

This episode has 2 parts!

The exams are finally over and everyone is worried about their grades. Kalego-sensei very disappointedly tells them that... they all passed! He was hoping they won’t lol.

Some of the students ranked up because of their exam results and Iruma got praised for being the one to have improved a lot. While everyone is celebrating, Azz tells Iruma this all happened thanks to him. Iruma is confused as to how and Asmodeus tells him that the others saw how hard Iruma was working on studying that they got inspired to work hard to. Iruma is amazed by this information.

(While I do appreciate Azz being a one-man cheer squad for Iruma, I do hope he doesn’t inflate the guy’s ego too much cause it feels like it’s actually slowly happening and it scares me cause in other stories, such a thing would be a red flag signaling something bad happening. That’s just me though.)

Iruma runs off to look for Baram-sensei so he could tell him about the exam results and the stuff Azz said. He bumps into the guy on the way and sees that Sensei is now sporting a new haircut. (I think he looks better this way. More teacher-looking.)

Sensei is happy to know Iruma’s hard work paid off and spins the boy around happily. Iruma thanks him for all his help but Sensei said Iruma did his best and it’s why the results were good.

He gives Iruma a congratulatory present which made Iruma panic a little as he recognized the plant as a salamander flower. This made Sensei happy as this meant Iruma’s studies were successful and that the boy could recognize these stuff now. All of these knowledge would help Iruma survive living in the Demon World which is what Sensei wanted. He then mentions the flower he’s holding is made safe.

They talk a bit and Iruma tells him about Azz’s observation. Sensei then tells Iruma about why he changed his hairstyle. He says it’s to make himself look less scary so he could try and get along with other people. Iruma asked if it was because of him that he wanted to change (like Azz said earlier about how he affects people) and Sensei answered that it’s not exactly the case. It was thanks to Iruma that he wanted to change because Iruma’s words had a good impact on him especially cause he knew Iruma was sincere and not lying.

On the way back, Baram-sensei passed by Kalego-sensei who immediately notices the hairstyle change. Kalego-sensei laughs a bit and says he’s glad that Baram-sensei’s new hairstyle made him look more regal as it fits their ranking. It is now revealed that only the two of them in the school have the khet rank which is the 8th highest.

It’s also revealed what Baram-sensei’s ability is: Buzzer. He can tell when people are lying and could detect when someone is cheating which is why it’s impossible for students to cheat on the exams. He has the entire school covered, too and will immediately have any cheater caught.

Iruma and friends had their mini celebration for passing the tests by the way! Iruma asked where their Senpai is and Asmodeus informs him that the guy got caught cheating and is now taking remedials.

On the 2nd part of the episode, Ameri is waiting for Iruma so she could hold a mini celebration of her own as Iruma passed the tests but Clara shows up instead to tell her the bad news: Iruma had been dragged by the others to their own happy get-together at a karaoke... er, screaming room.

We then see the boys having fun and one is singing season 1′s OP!

Ameri reads Iruma’s text apologizing about not being able to come. She’s disappointed but she understands although she’s confused as to why Clara had to show up to tell her about it when Iruma could just text her like he had actually done. Clara then drags her, alongside the tea and snacks she prepared for Iruma, and brought her to the other girls.

Awkward.

They decide to do an introduction to start things off. Elizabetta also decided to finally talk to the popular Student Council President and ask a question she had been wondering: what shampoo does Ameri use? This started their little convo about shampoo and conditioner.

After Kerori tells what she uses, she remembers the commercial she did for said products (lol she’s sponsored) and is embarrassed. Ameri sees this and is confused as to why Kerori looks like she’s panicking.

Clara reveals that hers is soap. She uses just soap on her hair and body and everyone is surprised and kinda horrified by this information. They offer to give her some extra shampoo they have so she could try them out next time.

Meanwhile, back to the boys! It’s Iruma’s turn to sing and he can’t just say no. He worries as he doesn’t know any song... except one.

He then chose to sing the Kuromu song he sang with the idol last season - complete with dance! Everyone cheered on and sang along as well! No one suspected anything and just thought that Iruma is probably just a big Kuromu fan.

Back to the girls... it's time for the inevitable: talks about romance!

Elizabetta asks who they all like and Clara didn't miss a beat and answers "Iruma-chi". Ameri is shocked and also worried since she now realizes she has a rival who is closer to Iruma than she is (and one who is more feminine than her to boot!).

When it’s Kerori’s turn to answer, she suddenly remembered Iruma in his evil cycle (being the cool edgy boy that he is). Ameri is internally pissed and is wondering how many other girls might be into Iruma.

She is then reminded of a scene from the manga Iruma reads to her and realizes she can now relate to the female rival lol.

Hang in there, President! You’re better than this haha.

Everyone then continues with the love talk and assumes Ameri probably has some romantic experience with her being popular and all and asked for advice. Ameri, not actually having any and not exactly knowing what to say just answered the only things she know: stuff she’s read from a shoujo manga.

Kerori on the other hand is confused. Is it that hard to get a guy’s attention? In her experience as an idol, even just smiling at a guy would get them to like you. after all.

Clara later mentions how she likes Iruma... and everyone. Ameri then had to ask for clarification and explains the “like” they've all been talking about all this time is romantic in nature. To explain, it’s like wanting to marry Iruma.

Clara’s imagination quickly went to work and she thinks of her wedding with Iruma. Here’s a cute picture of Clara realizing her feelings lol.

Kerori and Elizabetta starts arguing about the whole marriage thing. Kerori thinks they’re too young to even think of marriage (yeah, like, aren’t they all 14-15?) and Elizabetta thinks that it doesn’t matter cause love is love. Ameri gives her own perspective and says proposal and being engaged first would be good (and she thinks of Iruma). In the middle of their argument, they wonder why they all suddenly got aggressive about this. It is revealed (to the audience only) that it’s the effect of the relaxing tea. They’ve become too relaxed that they were able to say what’s on their minds easily.

They finally calmed down later that afternoon and realized they actually had fun and got along. Ameri then tells them that if she’s not on student council duty, they may call her by her name which made the others happy. The girls exchanged phone numbers afterwards.

--

This episode is pretty peaceful. I like all the little things that happened and the conversations that let us learn a bit about many characters. The boys having fun at the karaoke was nice to watch and the girls becoming friends is so cute!

So, I usually don’t really mention the “Interval” chibi segments of the show but the one for today’s episode gave a bit of behind the scene at something. Eiko, the girl who has a crush on Iruma (and Ameri) wanted to help Iruma study so she did what she could: she herself studied and made easy to understand reviewers. She had Asmodeus pass them onto Iruma (in a past interval segment, the two became friends due to their shared love of Iruma).

Come exam results, Eiko got really high marks from all the studying she did for Iruma’s sake. :)

Nothing too intense happened this time around so this is pretty short. If I had known I wouldn’t get errors, I would’ve gotten a few more screenshots. I wonder what the next arc is gonna be like though?

Well, thanks for reading!

[seyaryminamoto]

Masterpost: answering a single anon in a single post

So. I wasn’t going to answer asks today but frankly, considering what I should be writing I’d rather answer asks, might actually get a laugh out of it. Most of all, because of what I intend to answer here.

To spare y’all from the pain and annoyance of having to read through any of my answers to we-know-who, I’m going to do it differently this time. All in one post. Because frankly, filling my blog with their TWENTY asks, no less (and it’s official this time, used to be sixteen but then I reblogged that post about conflict in stories and they went wild, as usual) isn’t worth anyone’s time. Hell, it’s not even worth mine, but procrastination is overpowering.

Here we go. If you’re not the anon in question and still want to read this, I hope you have fun.

This is a free world. That means multiple things some people can’t seem to accept. One such thing is that people have no obligation to even interact with each other, let alone to do what others demand of them, especially when they don’t want to. The fact is, being harassed (because, yes, there’s no other word for it) by someone has been a pretty irritating and stressful thing for me, to the point where it has impacted my ability to write...

And the harasser doesn’t give a single fuck about it and just keeps going :’)

With such introduction, I decide to engage my least favorite person in this site once again because clearly, ignoring them, blocking them, closing asks, deleting and rewriting reviews, is still not enough to get across the message that reiterating an opinion a million times doesn’t automatically make it more valid. So let’s see just what’s going on with this very much desperate person who apparently can’t stop seeking my attention:

First of all, I asked this person, point-blank, to address their asks, if they would continue sending them, to my main blog. Let’s see how that request turned out:

Oh my, astonishing! They sent it to Gladiator’s blog instead! And what a bigger shock: they’re, as usual, trying to control and direct what I write and how I write it. While sprinkling empty compliments that don’t mean a thing, such as claiming RESPECT for me and my work when every single ask they’ve sent is an outright disrespectful act against me, considering how many times I’ve requested, directly, that they stop this, and how many times they’ve ignored me. It even is extra poignant considering my request for them to send asks to my main blog instead, and yet they deliberately sent it to Gladiator’s blog. This is what RESPECT looks like, in this anon’s head. Fascinating stuff, isn’t it?

And then comes the mad onslaught that left me facedesking for days:

... I mean. Can someone please read this and tell me the person on the other side, with their vague condition, whatever it may be, has any idea what an apology even MEANS? 

For someone who’s so obsessed with alleged consistency, you’re damn bad at it yourself, Anon. You can’t send four asks in a row, to the WRONG BLOG, demanding for explanations you don’t even care to read, because every single time I’ve taken your whining seriously you’ve disregarded all my responses and gone right back to the same BS as before, and THEN pretend you’re here TO APOLOGIZE.

You don’t feel any remorse. To this day, you don’t even KNOW what you did wrong. This is NOT expressing yourself: THIS IS HARASSMENT. Need me to define the word for you to understand what it means, seeing as it’s becoming abundantly clear your reading and interpretation skills are not the greatest?

Definitions of harassment:

1. (n) the act of tormenting by continued persistent attacks and criticism 2. (n)  a feeling of intense annoyance caused by being tormented

I’ve said it before: PEOPLE HAVE HAD COMPLAINTS ABOUT THIS STORY, FAR MORE VALID THAN YOURS, AND I’VE NEVER REACTED THIS WAY. Care to guess why?

Because you NEVER stop. Because you keep going, constantly, never slowing down to think YOUR behavior is affecting a REAL LIFE HUMAN BEING. You’re obsessing over what happens in a fictional story that, by the way, is a fanfic, ergo, it obeys certain rules that general fiction does not. Among such rules is abiding by ORIGINAL characterization to a certain extent, and that means, hahaha, that Azula ISN’T an experienced character in any social or romantic situations because she ISN’T in canon, and there was no reason to change that, especially considering the worldbuilding I crafted, which makes it CRUCIAL for Azula to be careful with her virtue, despite she doesn’t want to be and realizes the whole notion of female virginal purity is absolute BULLSHIT.

But why am I explaining anything anyway? You won’t understand it, because you don’t want to. You claim, constantly, that you’re asking things OUT OF CURIOSITY, as if that makes ANYTHING better, when the truth is you’re just here to impose your cursed opinions on everyone else, especially me, and pretend you somehow own this fic and ship and your demands mean more than anyone else’s. Meanwhile, oh, I understand you PERFECTLY: you don’t want Sokka to ever have any experiences with any other women because you only believe in pure, untainted love of virgins who wait for each other and don’t ever make mistakes or are forced into unwanted situations. Because, again, you can’t understand that those sorts of things CAN happen. Because you don’t see there’s nuance to human beings, nuance I attempt to capture through my characters too.

I said it semi-jokingly, back in my past answers, now I say it directly: IF YOU CAN’T STOMACH THESE SITUATIONS AND CAN’T ACCEPT THEM, THIS STORY IS NOT FOR YOU.

An M-rated story doesn’t owe you any apologies for being what it is. An M-rated story, at the end of the day, is a STORY. You are a human being who should be capable of controlling not only your impulses but your reactions to things, at least to some degree, and yet you refuse to. You, in fact, continue to prove you CAN’T control yourself in the least because hey, just now, halfway through writing this post? I got THREE MORE ASKS by you. No less than three. And you finished them off, again, with a pretense that you’re going to stop pestering me...

... But hey. You said that at the end of the last ask I pasted up there. Hmm. And yet...

You came back, over and over and over again? :’)

RIGHT ON ALL ACCOUNTS! So... how do TWENTY ASKS, after claims that you’d finally stop, count as “regret”? You’re not changing at all, anon, because YOU DON’T WANT TO. You don’t, to this day, see what you did wrong. You don’t get it. And you won’t get it. So how about we just keep going with the next four?

Oh! But hey, you actually switched blogs this time. Super sweet of you to finally listen to ONE thing I said. Very nice.

I’ll just point out: I received the last NINE asks I’ve pasted here in a SINGLE DAY.

Nine. In one day.

I only ever got that many asks in a single go during review parties (admittedly, there were more than that, but still). The fact that you felt the need to send me NINE ASKS, to beg for forgiveness with a completely dishonest apology, is all the proof of harassment anyone could possibly ask for, right? If you weren’t an anon and at least had the GUTS to own up to your opinions, which you seem to consider absolutely sacred and completely correct, you’d have never gotten away with this. Ergo why you don’t have those guts, and why you keep sending anon reviews and asks too.

The fact that you’re so obsessed with this problem, to the point of believing Sokka’s best sex was with JUNE? We’ve literally finished an entire arc of Sokka and Azula banging across the Fire Nation with no restraint, with the two of them repeatedly remarking this is the best time they’ve ever had, and you’re so completely obsessed with this problem that you apparently think Sokka angrily fucking someone WHILE DECEIVING HIMSELF INTO THINKING IT WAS SOMEONE ELSE is... better? Are you FOR REAL? Are you seriously THAT BAD at reading?

Please, click here. I can’t even stand it anymore. It’s not even for my own sake but yours. You need it.

Also... you’re projecting so bad. Like, so bad. June’s teasing in that chapter is 100% intended to piss them off. The fact that she starts asking for Azula to lend her her “second boyfriend”, AKA Rui Shi, should tell you just how much stock June puts in what happened between her and Sokka: SHE DOESN’T GIVE A DAMN. She’s honestly more entertained by pissing off Azula as a consequence of it than over the sex she had with Sokka, especially considering she even lost her temper with him after he started apologizing in 28. You’re so completely beside yourself you can’t see ANYTHING clearly?

If you REALLY need it spelled out, no, Sokka wasn’t June’s best sex. June has probably done anyone and everyone she ever wanted to, and chances are she absolutely found someone, or several someones, who actually wanted HER, for HER, just as much as she may have wanted them. And that, you insecure mess of a human being, would absolutely make for a much better lay than what she got with Sokka. Why don’t I outright state this in the story, you’ll ask? Because despite what you may believe, this story ISN’T a love triangle between Azula, Sokka and June! Oh my, the horror! We’ve literally spent 198 chapters building up the story and developing Azula and Sokka’s relationship but the ONE TIME encounter with June apparently makes her that pivotal for your whole existence?

Dude, I literally don’t look at 28 AT ALL these days, because I don’t care to. Because even when I wrote it, it hurt me so bad having written it that I was crazy about getting to everything else so I could put it behind me. Whenever I reference it, I do the same way I reference ANYTHING ELSE. The only person who seems to think I’m doing it to further torture anyone IS YOU. 

And yes, did I just say it hurt me too? Oh, my, what a SHOCKER! The fact is, that scene is only as intense as it is because I literally couldn’t bring myself to write it. It wasn’t until it came to mind that Sokka COULD imagine Azula in June’s place that I finally found the way to do it: it wasn’t just Sokka imagining Azula instead, it was ME. Because if it had been anything else? I wouldn’t have been able to write it at all. I basically wrote it as hatesex Sokkla because I NEEDED to in order to write it. “THEN WHY DID YOU EVEN WRITE IT?!?!?”, you’ll scream, I’m sure: BECAUSE I TREAT MY CHARACTERS AS HUMAN BEINGS WHO MAKE MISTAKES AND DO THINGS THEY SHOULDN’T HAVE. BECAUSE SOKKA WAS IN A DARK PLACE AND DIDN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT AZULA WAS FEELING OR THINKING. BECAUSE AZULA WAS IMPULSIVE AND CONTROLLING AND COULDN’T REALIZE THAT THE MORE SHE TRIED TO FORCE SOKKA TO BEND TO HER WILL, THE MORE HE WOULD TRY TO BREAK FREE.

But all this is clearly too complex for you. Can’t even fathom understanding anything remotely close to characterization and conflict within relationships, no. You’re something else entirely.

And so, we move on to the post-apology Anon: you DO realize that forgiveness is something earned? I mean, it’s kinda funny because Sokka actually earned his own. He spent ages working for it, and even AFTER Azula told him he was forgiven, he still feels so bad about having hurt her that, to this day, he regrets it. Being FORGIVEN was not a condition for him to feel remorse. He regretted his actions because HE KNEW THEY WERE WRONG. Because he’s an actual, decent human being who, when faced with a catastrophic mistake, actually wants to amend it and wishes he had acted differently despite he can’t take anything back anymore.

But you? You can’t even begin to understand what regret means. I guess another dictionary definition would help?

Definitions of regret

1. (v) feel remorse for; feel sorry for; be contrite about

2. (v)  feel sad about the loss or absence of

3. (v)  express with regret

4. (v)  decline formally or politely

5. (n)  sadness associated with some wrong done or some disappointment

So, your attempts to beg for forgiveness fall completely flat. And I say it in plural, ATTEMPTS, because in case you think I’m daft and forgot your old reviews and asks, I didn’t: THIS ISN’T YOUR FIRST ATTEMPT TO APOLOGIZE FOR THIS BULLSHIT. I thought I should clarify that, because heh, you have claimed you won’t come back, you have claimed you’re sorry, you have said many platitudes in the past that actually had no meaning... and I could tell they didn’t, which is why I never answered them. Because there was no way someone who had exhibited such obsessive behavior would actually control themselves and get over their issues after MONTHS of persistent harassment.

And so, you didn’t disappoint, because I had zero expectations that you’d actually abide by your apologies. Empty apologies, again, because to this moment you don’t even know what you did wrong. You don’t get it. To put it in the way I did for someone else who talked to me about this mess:

You could be complaining to me about something else entirely. You could be here, demanding that I explain why I’ve been writing Sokka killing people, for instance. You could be disregarding all sense, reason, historical precedents and what-have-you as to why a warmongering, canonically genocidal nation like the Fire Nation would ever have a system like the Gladiator League and enslave other cultures to do their bidding. 

And if you came back with those complaints PERSISTENTLY, FOR A YEAR, I’D BE JUST AS ANGRY AS I AM NOW.

It’s NOT about the situation you’re throwing a fit over. It’s NOT about me having it out for you. It’s about YOU not knowing limits or boundaries, going as far as you constantly, consistently have, ever seeking to twist my story into whatever warped, fucked up perception you’ve developed over it, without ever slowing down to think that your actions and your behavior are affecting someone else. I’m not just a rambling robot who can’t seem to stop talking or writing or whatever you may think I am: I’m an actual person with a FUCKLOAD of problems, who literally just had the WORST year of her life, and you just decided to continue adding to the pile, never slowing down to consider that your feelings, and your opinions, and your pain, does NOT invalidate other people’s, let alone does it make you EXEMPT of hurting others. Which, heh, if you knew how to read, you could’ve even LEARNED this from Gladiator! :’D 

Because Azula, so hurt as she was, took to hurting Sokka too, in many, many ways. And Sokka, once he understood how wrongly he had judged Azula, simply let her hurt him because he thought he deserved everything she threw at him. Later on? Azula realizes all the pain she caused Sokka COULD have led him to choose the White Lotus over her. She’s in a life-or-death situation, unable to fight back, and the ONLY reason she doesn’t get screwed over and captured by the enemy is because Sokka decides she matters more to him than joining forces with sketchy people who are out for revenge. But what if she’d hurt him more than she had? What if she’d done WORSE than she did? Maybe he would’ve been so hurt too that, at this point, he would’ve chosen the White Lotus and not only abandoned her but handed her over to her nation’s enemies! :’) oh, the horror. Is it really that unthinkable? Why, it’s not to me. And why not? Because if Azula had been as unforgiving and unyielding as you are, if she had been so obsessive over whatever caused her pain and refused to move on... this story would SUCK. BADLY.

Makes you wonder what that says about your mentality, doesn’t it?

Alas, after all this digression as to why your behavior is absolutely appalling to me, let’s see what you did indeed, right after your absolutely shallow apology that was obviously not sincere, because you don’t regret having bothered me at all, you just regret that I won’t abide by your whining...

Is THIS what an apologetic, remorseful person looks like? Really, now? Honestly, if Sokka were half as bad as you are, he would’ve slept with half the Fire Nation by now while constantly coming back to Azula like “Oh woops did it again, sorry!”

Yes, I can honestly make the link pretty easily. Must be why you keep assuming he’ll ever be with someone else, because if you were in his place, you would do exactly that :’) beautiful how things just come full circle, isn’t it?

That ask came as a response to another, potentially ill-intended one, potentially sent by you too. An ask I answered with a whole list of unique things Sokka has done for Azula. Not only did you NOT understand the list’s purpose despite you may have even been the one to ask for it... but you took a line directly referencing OBVIOUS events like chapters 64, 69 and 93, moments in which Azula either put a stop to opportunities where she and Sokka might have ended up going too far, and he accepted it without complaint... or Sokka himself put a stop to them, KNOWING that Azula would be taking a huge risk if she gave herself to him completely as she does from 97 onwards. That you literally took something that was SO VERY OBVIOUS, and twisted it into chapter 28 again speaks LENGTHS of how absolutely messed up your perception and interpretation of this whole story is. You have issues. Serious issues. And I’m not saying this just to be an ass, I’m saying it because it’s clear as day that if you CAN’T stop linking absolutely everything I say or do to chapter 28, whether it’s being referenced or not (and in this case, it was NOT), the problem isn’t me, IT’S YOU.

And here we go again. You are actually trying to POLICE the Sokkla fandom at this point? An ANON? And hey, you returned to the Gladiator blog! Which means you were so pissed that I didn’t answer your previous asks and your phony apology because I KNEW you’d come back that even your teeny, tiny behavioral correction was pulled back because you were MAD. And you HAD TO MAKE YOUR OPINIONS KNOWN, AGAIN.

Do tell, are you the same ass who harassed a pretty new friend I’ve made in this fandom? An honestly solid writer who happens to feature Sokka having other, prior relationships to Azula because, haha, if you work with CANON settings, that’s basically guaranteed since Sokka already has canon relationships before even knowing Azula exists? And then, even if in those experiences Sokka ends up going “... I bet it’d be better with Azula”, you STILL take this as a slight and you consider it a reason to go around harassing writers and potentially even THREATENING to report their content because you’re mad that Sokka isn’t exclusively Azula’s in every single story you pick up?

The worst part is, I actually wrote at least 2 stories in my Saturdays’ oneshots where Azula and Sokka are each other’s first everything, absolutely so. And I got nothing from you for it, not even a teeny tiny “HEY THANK YOU YOU FINALLY WROTE WHAT I WANTED TO SEE!”. No, you only come out of your hole to ATTACK writers. To tell us what to do when you think we’re not doing it right. As if you had the SLIGHTEST right to tell ANYONE what to do.

I literally have been here for EIGHT YEARS. I’ve been creating content for this ship for that long, when nobody else was anymore. I won’t take credit for the ship’s rise in popularity, despite yes, it’s far from a major ship no matter how far we’ve come... but my story didn’t reach the heights it has out of sheer dumb luck. I worked my ass off with Gladiator in every way I could to make it a story of the scope and depth it deserved to be, and the fact that people who didn’t even ship Sokkla were interested in reading the story all the same has always been something I take pride on. A ton of multishippers read this story, and support Sokkla too: neither you nor ANYONE has any right to demand or claim or pretend that someone else has no right to be part of this fandom or to set guidelines as to what their content should be. There’s LITERAL stories out there of Sokka having a goddamn HAREM, just so you know, with Azula included amongst the women involved in it... and you’re here, throwing a fit over people featuring Sokka having one-time encounters and brief relationships with other girls before committing completely to Azula.

I’ve been here, working my ass off for Sokkla, not only in writing but literally developing my art skills to the best of my ability so I could ONE DAY create the visuals and images these two evoked for me... 

And yet I don’t feel I have any right to tell ANYONE how to make their content. 

If there was a set number of words in fics or artworks someone needed to make for a ship to prove themselves worthy of obtaining the skill of GATEKEEPING, I am 100% positive I have more than outdone that limit.

And yet I DON’T play gatekeeper. I NEVER have, and I NEVER will. People can create whatever they want to create, whether I enjoy it or not is up to me, and if I DON’T enjoy it, I DON’T read it. If there’s Sokkla content out there I can’t even STOMACH? I would ignore it and move on with my life. You? You make it your whole life’s crusade to attack people over anything that tickles you wrong. That’s how it works, isn’t it?

Unless you’re planning on pulling a Scooby-Doo-esque twist where you remove your mask and reveal you were a known Sokkla fan and content creator all along, which I find ABSOLUTELY unlikely, then this means you haven’t done anything, ANYTHING, for this fandom beyond sending anonymous harassment to people who are actually taking time out of their lives to create content for this ship. The main reaction I’ve seen at you from ANY of us, whether anons like yourself or actual content creators like myself, is that you have too much time on your hands and need a better hobby. And I agree, completely.

So, where people like me and my fellow Sokkla creators are actually making content that convinces people, if not to ship it, to at least CONSIDER this ship a possibility... you’re out there, in hiding, pretending you have any right to tell us what to do and going ignored on most accounts. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: if I had any respect for someone, and they either stopped responding to me or started responding by telling me to leave them alone, I’d feel like such stain of garbage I’d never even try to interact with them again. While people absolutely can be different and react differently to things... I can’t see how, exactly, you have any respect for me when knowing you’re a problem for me has never stopped you and most likely never will.

I’ll admit, this one actually made me laugh. Like... you’re seriously trying to tell me that a sex scene was way too good and that’s why I have to change it. I actually disagree on every account, because the last time I revisited 28 I thought the scene was absolutely distant from my best work? I’ve written soooo much smut recently and literally any of those scenes kicks 28 out of any “best smut” contest by MILES. But... heh. This one, apparently, was too good.

I mean... thank you? For telling me that my smut skills are apparently that great they need to be toned down? Fascinating, really.

But again, “it sadly seems to be a too late to write chapter 28″. Sadly?

SADLY?

You can stick your sadness up where the sun doesn’t shine, dude: 

SOMEONE WHO THREW SUCH A FIT OVER THEIR REVIEWS BEING REWRITTEN SHOULD

NEVER

TELL SOMEONE ELSE THAT IT’S TOO BAD THEY CAN’T REWRITE ANY OF THEIR CONTENT.

EVER

You can’t pretend, again, that you were EVER sorry for ANY of what you did... while still trying to tell someone they should rewrite their content. Honest to gods, you’re an asshole. You are. And if you think I’m one too, great, I own up to it gladly. But you’re the one willingly intoxicating their brain with my content, only to consistently go MAD over it, and then unleash this kind of illogical nonsense right back at me. I know art can generate a myriad of responses, but I am NOT responsible for your immaturity and inability to handle serious subjects and topics that SHOULD MAKE YOU UNCOMFORTABLE. If you don’t KNOW how to deal with the fact that there’s a lot of questionable, dislikeable things in this world, then my damn story is the least of your concerns because you’re well on your way to leading a VERY miserable life, Anon. Better get ready for it, will you?

And again, the Gladiator blog. Again, pretending to be well-mannered, and also, again, using the world “sadly”, same as the ask above. Like... man, what on earth is wrong with you. Are you seriously this masochistic? Do you also drink arsenic for sport? What on EARTH brings you the belief that asking how far or how much was done between Sokka and his previous one-night-stands would help you IN ANY WAY, WHATSOEVER? 

I think I’ll answer that question, for once, with actual quotes, taken right from some of your favorite chapters, no less:

"When you and Ruon Jian got married, was he…?" she asked. Mai only raised a confused eyebrow, and Azula had the distinct feeling that Mai knew what she was talking about, but would force her to blurt it out anyways. She sighed: "A virgin."

Ty Lee's hands flew to her mouth as Mai raised her eyebrows. To Azula's astonishment, she merely shrugged.

"I don't know. I never asked," she said. Azula snorted.

"Then you're smarter than me. By far," she grunted. Mai smirked.

And as things digress there into Azula explaining what happened, let’s skip that and go straight to Mai’s direct answer:

"I've never asked Ruon Jian about whether or not he had anything serious with other girls before me because I seriously don't care," said Mai. "If I knew about it, I'd probably have a bout of jealousy like yours, I suppose… but it's in his past, and he left them behind to make me his present and his future. So, whatever he might have experienced before, with however many women there were, isn't something I'm overly concerned about."

"You're awfully mature compared to me if that's the case," said Azula, slipping her fingers through her hair again. Mai smirked.

"You've been complimenting me quite a lot today, Azula, that's not like you…"

"Shut up," Azula grunted. Mai chuckled.

:’) 

This is the only answer this ask warrants. The fact that you’re so immature and so obsessed as to want to know more about what happened with something you HATE is completely cringeworthy and absurd. If you want to get angry imagining Sokka having wild sex with every woman who crosses his path, go ahead and do it, but do us both a favor and torture yourself, and yourself alone, with those thoughts rather than coming back TWENTY TIMES to my inbox looking for MORE reasons to get angry. You’re honestly unbelievable.

You know, that reading comprehension site I linked up there? Courses, 20% off! Seriously, perfect fit for you. You need it, direly.

Like... how can someone read a story built on the premise of Azula literally defeating Sokka painfully in battle to the point he’s left unable to move, taking Sokka away from home, turning him into a slave, being objectively responsible for the WORST TWO YEARS OF HIS LIFE... and then come to my inbox asking if Azula will ever hurt Sokka?

Dude, you’re off the deep end. You can’t even pretend you have a grasp on reality if you SERIOUSLY THINK Azula has NEVER hurt Sokka. Like, seriously, it feels like you’re reading this truncated version of Gladiator that’s only chapters 28, 111, 112 and perhaps 123? Is that what’s going on?

I’ve had Sokka and Azula arguing over ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING, whether for humorous or for serious purposes, since the very beginning of the story. Their first serious falling out is LITERALLY caused by the direct conflict of their worldviews clashing in chapter 12. Their second falling out was indeed caused by women: by Azula’s discovery that Sokka didn’t want to fight women, which of course, doesn’t bother you in the least because you and I both know that’s NOT what your problem was.

I could literally run through the whole story listing every single argument they’ve had, every single time they’ve hurt each other if that’s what you want: their first time? It literally comes from a very serious argument where Sokka believed he had reached the pinnacle of his potential as a fighter and feared Azula would need someone else to achieve her goals instead of him.

AND YOU’RE SERIOUSLY HERE ASKING IF THEY’LL EVER ARGUE OVER ANYTHING ELSE.

You don’t read this story. This ask absolutely proved it to me. You only read chapter 28 and everything potentially connected to Sokka having anything with other women. You don’t CARE about anything else, simply. Because if anything actually had ANY impact on you? You’d say something about it. But the only thing that touches your weird heart is Sokka sleeping with anyone else or having any potentially romantic interactions with someone else, whether he rejects them or not. 

You don’t care about Gladiator. You only care about your ego, and the validation of your worldview and puritanic morals.

And to that I say, fuck that noise. I write whatever the hell I want to write, and you’re not going to rope me into playing it safe just to please insecure harassers who don’t know boundaries and are completely incapable of empathizing with anyone while demanding everyone should understand their feelings.

Final note on this matter: you, also, have no idea what love is. You plain and simple don’t understand it. You’re even more confused by what love should be than Azula was at the start of this story. You don’t get it, AT ALL.

All you want is for them to get even on things? You literally asked me, when I was in my angry spree of deleting your bullshit, to make Azula and her future husband have happy consensual quality sex with who knows how many orgasms... because it was only fair!

AGAIN: YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND LOVE IN THE LEAST.

If you think love is about getting even, you’re seriously an asshole. If you think love is about both people being 100% equal in social regards and experiences, you don’t even UNDERSTAND human relations. Do you live in a bubble, by any chance? Maybe you do! You must have zero contact with anyone other than people with your same puritanic beliefs, right? So that means you assume everyone who’s different from you is fundamentally a bad person? I take it?

Like... literally at this point I think you’d hear about someone who was abused in their childhood, molested, and your reaction would simply be “Oh wow I hope someone molests whoever they end up marrying too, so that way they may be even in the future and been molested by the exact same number of people, otherwise it’s not really love”.

This is fucking sick. I’m not holding back at this point, it’s SICK. It’s TWISTED. It’s VILE. Your mentality is absolutely repulsive to me. You don’t know what love is, and you have the most literal, obvious change to understand it better by reading this story properly, but instead you just read chapter 28 over and over and over again, isn’t that right?

And here’s the evidence of that. You really want me to answer that last question?

No, it doesn’t bug me to read that AT ALL. Because unlike you? I don’t obsessively reread 28 while disregarding everything else in the story. Unlike you, I don’t revisit the chapter every day to pick apart every line to look for reasons to get extra angry at those developments.

Most of us, when faced with things we DON’T like in fiction? We move past it. You, instead, dig yourself into a hole and continue digging, and then pretend to hold other people responsible for whatever impact this may be having on your psyche. Because yes, you’re holding me responsible for whatever trauma or insecurity this is awakening inside you when you continue to pester me as you have: if you’re an adult, you should have the tools and brains to determine what is and what isn’t acceptable behavior, as well as to curate your own experiences with media, with fandom, with EVERYTHING to do with these communities. If you choose to look for things to hate instead of things to love, THAT’S ON YOU.

And if you’re allegedly looking for things to love but can’t find ANY that suit your purposes (which... is bullshit. Clearly, your only priority is “Sokka must be a virgin who never had anything with anyone else”, and such stories DO exist, which I guarantee considering I’ve written at least THREE of them, where it’s absolutely stated that Sokka’s first and only one is Azula)...

Well, it’s funny. Because when I got here? I was looking for some very specific fics so I could explore whether or not Sokkla made any sense. And I didn’t find them.

Which resulted...

... In me writing the very stories I wanted to see.

Oh, my. Imagine taking your impulses and channeling them into something productive rather than looking for reasons to get angry 24/7! Must be such a NOVEL CONCEPT for you!

Seriously, you have no right to dictate what anyone does. Again, worth bringing up because you INSIST on the rewriting matter. Even if you’re claiming you’re done asking for it, you somehow KEEP bringing it up. And then you act like me mentioning 28′s events here or there in the story is absolutely outrageous... but you just go right on ahead and do the same thing yourself, don’t you? Funny how much of a hypocrite you really are, isn’t it?

The fact that you’re bringing up something I have NEVER written, and have NO INTENTIONS of ever writing, as some sort of stupid, ridiculous argument to be made AGAINST the post I literally reblogged TODAY... is just absurd beyond belief.

The fact that I ever even wrote Sokka cheating on Suki with Azula, which I DID, still bothers me. Because yes, it made for a good story, but the truth is, it doesn’t sit well with me. It worked in The Reason, worked in my collab story with a friend, but it doesn’t mean I feel 100% happy with that choice. Even if the cheating only amounted to a kiss in The Reason, and then a lot worse than just that in the other story, it’s still not cool! :’) I know this!

... And yet no one, NO ONE, has ever caught me writing Sokka cheating on Azula. In fact, when my collab story with my friend seemed to start moving towards that angle I BEGGED her not to do it, and then she didn’t, and my heart was deeply relieved and blissful for it. Because not only did it mean we wouldn’t have to deal with the very controversial and unsettling notion of someone in a good relationship cheating on their significant other... but because in that story, it also showed how much he had grown, and how he was truly devoted to Azula despite he hadn’t been to Suki.

But alas, I have my qualms with that concept, of course I do. And I don’t like it. Ergo, I’ll never write it.

Which begs the question as to WHY, exactly, you’re so obsessed with the notion of Sokka cheating on Azula? Like... do you get off on it? Are you wanking at the idea of Sokka and June every single night and then wake up feeling like crap and then take it out on me, by any chance? Is that what’s going on? Because I’m seriously starting to believe it is.

You clearly don’t understand anything about storytelling, which is probably why you don’t have the guts to create your own content in the first place. But the fact that I reblog a post about how conflict in a story is GOOD, and your first thought is “THEN THAT MEANS YOU APPROVE OF SOKKA CHEATING!” actually says A LOT MORE about you than it says about me. You need help. Clearly, the therapy site I was sending you to the last time wasn’t much good, was it? I guess you just ignored it in the end. Hopefully the reading comprehension one will suit you better, right?

Fuck you, seriously, for coming to someone who has been working this hard for this long, for a ship that they’re completely devoted to, to spout this kind of senseless shit. To think you seriously ever believed I’d accept your half-assed apologies when you’ve been doing this sort of bullshit for this long... you’re a piece of work. If you have the time to write that BULLSHIT into my inbox, at the very least use that time to look INWARD and ponder just what your damn problem is, resolve it on your own, AND LEAVE ME THE HELL OUT OF IT. Someone as immature and unstable as you has no business reading M-rated fiction, and I honestly rue the day you ever clicked my story. Both your life and mine would be countless times better if you simply had scrolled past it.

And on and on we went today. The THREE MORE ASKS that arrived as I was typing this insanely long response. Which resulted in you bumping the total, successfully, to 20. MIGHTY NICE OF YOU TO PROVE ME RIGHT! :’)

Now then, getting serious here... I must say your priorities are fucked. Like. Really fucked.

You’d rather Sokka tries to KILL AZULA than have a one-time sexual encounter with someone?

Like... you’re here, condoning VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN to that extent...? :’D and then you... you actually have the balls to whine because apparently him  hurting her feelings is WORSE?!

Are you EVEN LISTENING TO YOURSELF???

You know, I think I have to offer you some REALLY good advice right now: go watch Naruto. Seriously, all of it. Go watch it, and enjoy your sweet loins’ release once Sasuke and Sakura start trying to kill each other, ONLY TO END UP TOGETHER AT THE END! :’) They were both 100% faithful to each other too, in the sense of Sakura getting depicted as a girl who can’t ever get over the guy she had a crush on when she was 6, no matter if he tries to kill her or her friends once he starts to go off the deep end, and Sasuke getting depicted as a guy who treats everyone like garbage, even the people he loves, because his manpain story somehow validates him being absolutely toxic to everyone he knows, so that’s absolutely up your alley! 100% the love story you’ve been looking for! You’re gonna LOVE IT.

Man, I just can’t believe you. I really can’t believe you. You’re seriously asking me to feature Sokka trying to kill Azula because that’s more acceptable to you. There was a story out there, you know? With Azula basically using Sokka to commit suicide, impaling herself on his sword and dying? You should just go look for that too, perfect fit for you (though it may be gone from the depths of this wretched site by now, which tbh I’d be grateful for, since it was the most unsettling, disturbing read).

Also? Thank you, truly, for all  the remarkably shallow compliments you’ve thrown at me to “soften” your “criticism” (which, again, is whining, not legitimate criticism). Calling me a capable writer is super NICE of you, especially after all these months of persistent harassment and constant repetition that I should rewrite whatever you don’t like. I mean... that’s definitely the way someone treats a capable writer, isn’t that right? 

“The problem isn’t conflict it’s what the conflict is”, the anon says. I’ve been writing a story for 8 years, 198 chapters and counting... and I’ve had a ton of different types of conflicts for Sokka and Azula to deal with. If your problem is “I don’t like this conflict”, FINE. But... hey. There have been THOUSANDS of other sources of conflict across the story, so many I don’t think I can even promise I’d ever take my time to count them all... there’s whole ARCS with conflicts regarding world politics and the war’s consequences and both Azula and Sokka completely changing their worldviews as they realize their realities are soooo much more complicated than they ever knew...!

Ergo. There ARE other conflicts. There are SO MANY of them that there’s no point in even listing it all out.

And yet you are obsessed with the one conflict you didn’t like, outright acting like THIS IS THE ONLY CONFLICT THERE EVER WAS, as proven by that preposterous and mindless “when will Azula ever hurt Sokka” ask. The one development you were pissed at, because it tickled your loins the wrong way. Oh yes, I’m a capable writer, I could’ve done things differently...!

BUT I DIDN’T!

And aren’t you thrilled that I didn’t? You would be a complete nobody in this fandom if this hadn’t happened, because otherwise what would you POSSIBLY have to complain about?! To harass someone about?! You’d be SO BORED! You’d be so unknown, nobody would even be aware of your existence...!

Though.

Wait.

You’re an anon.

You’re unreachable and nobody really knows who you are.

... So never mind, you actually still are a complete nobody in this fandom and your only attempt to even take part in it is to be a negative, irritating presence that literally makes people facepalm, laugh and ridicule you to the extent I and many others have laughed at you.

And yes, that post I reblogged was 100% worth reblogging. Why? Because it hits the nail on the head:

I DIDN’T WRITE 28 SO YOU’D BE HAPPY WITH SOKKA.

I DIDN’T WRITE THAT CHAPTER TO MAKE PEOPLE THINK “OH WOW WHAT A WHOLESOME SITUATION”.

I WROTE IT BECAUSE IT WAS MEANT TO DETONATE CONFLICT AND SPEED UP CHARACTER GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT, WHICH IT DID.

And the thing is? Maybe, in the future, I’ll write other stories, just as I wrote the Saturdays’ stories, and Sokka won’t have either meaningful or worth mentioning encounters with anyone else in them. Maybe I’ll write original fiction, and there won’t be any twists like what happened in 28! 

But you will never get over this.

You will never care about any other content beyond this.

And that’s your failing, not mine.

If you would rather obsess over what makes you angry, that’s on YOU. But I’m damn sure I wrote a pretty reasonable conflict, character-wise, that was not only consistent with characterization but with the slightly darker take of the Avatarverse I’ve been working with. Not only that, but I NEVER skipped the consequences of their actions. I literally had them facing those consequences for whole arcs. Sokka assumed he’d never have a chance to be with Azula and made his peace with it, WITHOUT EVER PRETENDING HIS DEVELOPING FEELINGS FOR AZULA WERE ANYTHING THAT ENTITLED HIM TO HER LOVE IN RETURN. But oh, that’s too complex for you to understand, isn’t it? The fact that Sokka actually loves Azula for her, and not for himself, that he devotes himself to her in every imaginable way, that he fights people who dare disrespect her, that he would stop at NOTHING, even coming close to killing someone, to keep her safe despite he’s completely against killing people? That all means NOTHING to you.

And again? THAT’S YOUR PROBLEM. THAT’S YOUR FAILING. THAT YOU’RE SO OBSESSED WITH 28 AND CAN’T MOVE PAST IT IS NOT MY FAULT, IT’S YOURS.

Because I damn right moved past it. I’ve moved so far past it I literally don’t ever THINK about that damn situation until your stupid asks start arriving. Heck, maybe if you didn’t ASK so much about it, I’d stop bringing it up in recent chapters of the story :’) how do you feel about that particular kernel of unexpected information? Maybe you’re impacting the story in a whole shocking manner by inception-ing 28 into my head all the time and that’s why I can’t seem to stop throwing in lines referencing it for you to go completely BONKERS over. How about that? :’)

Say... how exactly do you think this fic is special? Literally all I know is you think I’m a capable writer who can create something perfectly catered for you, and yet ALL the feedback I’ve ever gotten from you is “REWRITE 28 AND EVERYTHING ABOUT SOKKA HAVING ANYTHING WITH OTHER GIRLS I DON’T UNDERSTAND ANY OF THIS I’M GENUINELY CURIOUS THIS IS LEGITIMATE CRITICISM SIGNING OFF BYE”. Your compliments are completely devoid of meaning because they’re literally just a handful of “you’re a good writer” and you don’t even say WHY you think I’m good. You don’t ever come here to tell me how much you enjoyed a certain scene, or how happy you are with a certain development... No.

Because when Sokka and Azula got married? What did I get?

“HOW CAN YOU LET SOKKA AND AZULA GET MARRIED NOW WHEN HE SLEPT WITH SOMEONE ELSE IN CHAPTER 28?!”

I wish I had screenshots for those, but you and I both know the truth, you irksome anon, and the truth is you did exactly that. And with every new development in Shu Jing, I got yet more reviews and ask(s), persistently whining about how UNFAIR it is that now Azula apparently is locked in marriage with this unfaithful man who has been unfaithful to her a grand total number of ZERO TIMES ever since their relationship began! How DARES he even think about marrying her?! Scourge of earth, let’s murder him in cold blood because DEATH IS BETTER THAN CHEATING!!!

If you think highly of Gladiator for ANY REASON, you’ve kept those reasons well and safely tucked away in the depths of your broken heart or shared them with anyone but me. Look at all these asks, damn you, and tell me at what point in time did you convey ANYTHING beyond “why don’t you write what I want you to write?”, huh? Because hell, I don’t see it in any of them. Literally nowhere. No backwards (: emojis are compliments or evidence of how much this story allegedly means to you. All I know is that you hate 28 and everything about it.

And you see...

I don’t give a flying fuck. 

I don’t.

You can hate 28 all you want.

You can hate June.

You can hate Sokka.

It is, INDEED, a free world.

But you have no right, NONE WHATSOEVER, to commit to this level of harassment as you have, for A WHOLE YEAR, and pretend the problem is that I, Seyary, the “evil super-sensitive author who writes Sokka sleeping with other people and doesn’t even break a sweat but then crumbles to pieces when “negative” feedback arrives”, can’t handle your comments properly.

I’ve said it before, damn you: NO ONE NEEDS TO REITERATE THEIR OPINIONS A MILLION TIMES. NO ONE. NOT YOU, NOT THE PEOPLE DEMANDING FOR THE PLOT TO KICK INTO HIGH GEAR, NOT THE ONES WHO THINK THIS SHIP IS GARBAGE, NOT ANYONE.

NO ONE HAS ANY RIGHT OR REASON TO COME BACK PERSISTENTLY THORUGHOUT A YEAR TO HARASS SOMEONE NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES THEY’RE TOLD TO STOP IT.

Point being: HATE WHAT YOU WILL! But keep it the fuck off my blog. And if you CAN’T? Get used to these responses. Because you’re going to get them, constantly. I guarantee it.

I know your damn opinion already. I know it by heart and I damn wish I didn’t. You are perfectly free to go read all the other stories where I’ve had Sokka staying faithful to Azula, with Azula being his first, or with Azula being much more experienced and sleeping around while Sokka stays mostly chaste... but you don’t. You come back, every time, to my miserable inbox that must cry every time you show up in it, to make these demands and pretend you have any power over what I should be writing.

Again, no, I have no idea why this story matters to you at all. And at this point? I’d rather NOT know. Because I’m 100% sure the only thing that matters most to you is chapter 28. So you know, go ahead, wank to it again and cry yourself to sleep. It’s kind of fascinating to have written something that has such a visceral emotional impact on a complete and total stranger. Makes it clear I’ve made a lot of progress as a writer if I can fuck up someone’s life to this extent with what I’ve written.

Yeah. Sure. You really think I’ll buy it? You really think this is goodbye? Oh, no, Anon. You can’t stay away. You’ve been told to, you’ve been asked to, but you can’t.

So no, I’m not wishing you good luck back. And I’m certainly not wishing you any fun with my fic, because it’s more than clear that the only source of entertainment it provided you was chapter 28, seeing as it’s the only impactful thing I apparently ever wrote. And someone who’s that obsessed with one of the chapters I most disliked writing despite I knew the plot would benefit from it in the long run simply can’t deserve to have fun. So... good suffering over Gladiator, if anything? Go ahead and continue to wrack your brain while trying to unravel why, oh, why would ANYONE ever write what I wrote and still call themselves a Sokkla shipper?! 

I dunno, maybe go on and write something similar yourself. Could be you’ll finally figure out what your problem is if you take to writing the cheating storylines you’re so very much obsessed with. Only, heh, I can guarantee I’m not touching anything you write, out of principle more than anything. I plain and simple don’t want anything to do with you... but as I don’t intend to close my inbox again, it seems I have no choice, do I?

Good fucking luck sticking to this alleged goodbye... but we both know you’ll be coming back very soon, won’t you? No worries, Anon, I’ll be waiting this time. Let’s see if you can break your 20-ask-streak record next time, shall we? :’)

It’s December 13th, at 2:32 PM, in my location. Let’s see how long it takes you to come back, shall we?

EDIT: I neglected to check constantly so it definitely arrived earlier than this, but officially received a response at least 2 hours after this post went live.

Didn’t I call it? Yep, absolutely called it.

[vaguely-gestures-to-the-void]

Hindsight: My thoughts on Loki (2021)

Welcome back folks. Read the innocence dying inside me as I accept that this show eats my expectations for lunch and leaves me like it's going to buy milk.

As a side note from what I said in my first review, here’s an interesting article. Apparently I was clowning because the Gobi desert scene was filmed (probably? idk) with the tech from the Mandalorian. I think the studios were the same. Oh well. https://www.atlasofwonders.com/2021/06/loki-filming-locations.html

Episode 4: THE NEXUS EVENT

Pre-title scene

The new perspective of Asgard is incredible.

Oh baby Sylvie, what did they do to you. Also, RAVONNA??

The TVA through a child’s eyes is heartbreaking. The mixed use of shots that were familiar (the feet walking into the TVA) and new (the TVA logo on the floor) convey how though routine, this is an alien experience for Sylvie.

She too wants to help the man being dragged in. Maybe Sylvie was a better person than Loki, the TVA taking her away was what changed it.

We don’t see Casey, but iIt’s the same ‘sign here’ guy. The changing perspective and music really alters the mood created, contrasting the whimsical procedure we followed in episode one.

She hadn’t even said much in her life. They knew how to influence the audience’s emotions, that's for sure. Props to the actress, I felt genuine concern for her before I remembered that she’s acting.

TVA

Ravonna probably underestimated Sylvie as a Loki, a mistake that cost her greatly.

The golden doors.

Ravonna looks tense and a bit fearful.

Scattered throughout the episode are eyes watching. George Orwell’s 1984, anyone?

Big Brother is watching.

Mobius! He’s a good friend to Ravonna, but there’s a power imbalance.

Ravonna is shaken. Her past failure is haunting her.

Someone edit the “What? How?” into “Wow.” It’ll be a service.

Lamentis - 1

Loki’s apology and Sylvie reflecting on her childhood are the conclusion to the previous episode. Faced with death, Loki realises that her goals were hindered by his actions. His apology is the first time he acknowledges he had something to do with it. Sylvie’s offering her emotional vulnerability in the form of memories. Her mind and experiences are her most prized possession because they’re all she has of the person who she was as Loki, her childhood and what she was supposed to be. Her glorious purpose, what really makes a Loki a ‘Loki’ was her life.

THEY TRUST EACH OTHER. THIS WAS WHAT CAUSED THE NEXUS EVENT.

C H A R A C T E R D E V E L O P M E N T.

Ravonna pointed out that Loki will always be a “lying scourge” but they went against this. In any timeline, this could cause a nexus event. They found a middle ground.

“That should be setting off alarms if someone steps on the wrong leaf.” I had a whole idea about entropy and the timeline being an isolated system but I struggled to define an isolated system, and thus I couldn’t use the whole irreversible process causing entropy to grow causing a br- if you have a clue of what I’m going on about, or want to know more, I’ll explain my thoughts. I can understand why this isn’t scientifically accurate and I’m no physicist.

The unbranched timeline means all the things that were speculated - Wanda’s kids, what happened on Saakar, all of it - is gone.

“Any news on C - 20?”I called it! B-15 is having doubts! Her subtle unease building up throughout the ep is perfect!

Most settlements have a street design that can be from space. Sharru doesn’t.

“No. We may lose... ...you’re amazing!” Damn it literally took the end of a world for Loki to change as a person.

“Their smiles. If that isn’t people accepting their deaths I don’t know what is. Man, I just want both of them to be happy.

Please don’t let that be the love theme, it’s so pretty.

The music fading into the TVA theme as they get separated is so sad.

Time Theater 25

Back to square one in terms of trust with these two, but now they have history and hurt feelings too!

Oh Mobius.

Cycles are a part of who Loki is within Norse mythology (from what I know, correct me if I’m wrong). This scene is conflict.

Loki needs both Mobius and Sylvie to incite change. One can empathise whilst the other believes in him.

Mobius believes in Loki like no one else in the TVA. He treats him like an individual, they developed a bond in episode 2, so his disappointment and anger were genuine. This is reflected in their dialogue.

Even when Loki was going through all the Feels in ep 1, he didn’t shout at Mobius. It makes it more heartbreaking when Mobius laughs and dismisses him after the “TVA is lying to you” thing. His laugh was so bitter, it’s like his belief that Loki would be the variant to prove that variants were individuals had been shattered. What Mobius doesn’t realise is that Loki was genuinely trying to warn him. The trust between them was fragile but Mobius needed to come to his own conclusions before he could see that Loki had broken out of the mold the Time Keepers set for him.

“Just kind of an asshole and a bad friend.” Y’all, Mobius doesn’t rise to Loki’s baits. He’s so hurt.

I can’t be the only one that thought Loki was going to be brainwashed when they saw the red door. Turns out it’s just a time cell.

I love Mobius but he makes me feel so conflicted. Oh shit, he’s my problematic fave.

Watching Loki get his ass handed to him by Lady Sif shouldn’t be this funny.

This particular memory reflects what Mobius will talk about later, Loki being abandon by the people around him.

Putting Loki through a memory that was physically and emotionally painful was nasty. If you hear something horrible, over and over especially from a friend it would take a toll on your self-perception. Mobius was hurt by Loki leaving him, he’s getting revenge whilst doing his job and getting into Loki’s head.

Ravonna’s office

Ravonna has hang ups from failing with Sylvie. Who she is and what she knows is going to be interesting.

Heck I just realised are Mobius’ lapels not real? They look fake.

I wonder whether the “mastermind” thing was foreshadowing the next ep.

Am I the only one who thinks this isn’t the first Loki Mobius has dealt with? Could that mean there’s a reunion next ep?!

“Variant pet.” There’s a culture of dehumanising variants within the TVA.

The cuts showing both B-15 and Mobius’ faces reminds me of ep 1, but now there’s a new angle to things. B-15 certainly sees things differently.

Time Theatre 25

Lady Sif would kill with short hair. Or long hair. It’s Lady Sif, she’s a badass.

Loki’s exhale reminds me of how he tenses before a fight.

Notable things about this scene:

Heavy use of metaphors to trade jabs.

The lights are shifting in a consistent pattern, scanning the room almost.

Shots are constantly moving and cutting.

Loki’s speech pattern changes when he’s lying. Nice touch there.

When they start arguing in earnest, the shots are close ups of their faces, not circling around each other.

Loki was at first willing to talk to Mobius if he was treated with respect, the way they engaged in episode 2. He also wants to trust that Mobius won’t kill him. Mobius dismisses him (rightly so, his trust is gone) and Loki’s pride about ‘not working for anyone’ gets in the way rather than listening to each other. Loki’s behaviour is cyclic and his lying about Sylvie affirms Mobius’s understanding that Loki won’t (or maybe can’t) change. I wouldn’t be too surprised if Mobius is a Loki, the man’s uncannily good at reading him. He deduces that Loki and Sylvie have a bond and unsettles Loki to get answers out of him, because he knows that’s the only way he can force Loki to reveal his cards. He definitely wasn’t expecting Loki’s earlier admission to be the truth. What Mobius did was not right, but it sure was effective.

“No. Not partners.” I believe this. They had an understanding, but their goals differ. Maybe just give Sylvie her own show.

“Guess you don’t do partners.” MOBIUS WHY ARE YOU SO BUTT-HURT? Probably to make Loki feel bad ik, but it’s still funny to think Lightning McQueen is salty.

That memory really hurt Loki. He stuttered.

Loki fixates on Sylvie rather than his own freedom. This was the cue to Mobius to start interrogating.

Bruh, the feeling they were experiencing better be friendship.

This made me uncomfortable because I was so sure we weren’t gonna get a romantic subplot that I related the characters to my actual family relationships. Marvel. Why?

The music combined with Mobius’ subtle shift in demeanor from irritated to mockery was very unsettling to me. I never realised how good an actor Owen Wilson was.

“Our interests are aligned.” Once Mobius tells him the truth, Loki does the same. I really hope this is the extent of their relationship. Just let them recognise one another as equals. Please Marvel.

Mobius’ hands twitching, the slight swallow. Yeesh, he certainly doesn’t think Loki’s lying, but he’s not about to accept it.

Loki’s head shake is sad. He knows he can’t convince Mobius.

“That I can respect. I mean the lies you tell yourself.” This was the best writing imo. Loki doesn’t make any final attempts to connive his way out of the situation because telling the truth to someone he’d trusted had failed. He willingly walks into the Time Cell.

Time Theater 47

B-15 being unable to support herself, having to rely on the structures around her to stay upright. This woman deserves so much y’all.

WE NEED HER NAME MARVEL.

You better appreciate her beyond shipping her with Sylvie or istg.

The music is so mournful. It just emphasises how much everything changing is going to hurt not only the main characters. Lives change because of the TVA and the events of this episode, it’s not overlooked by the writing or music.

The poster and the 1984 parallels. Exquisite!

Sylvie not sitting straight made me snort.

Ravonna Renslayer’s office

More Theremin music! This time I’m pretty sure it’s Carnival of the Animals, XIII. Le Cygne (the Swan) : Le carnaval des animaux: No. 12, Le cygne (arr. For theremin and piano) by Clara Rockmore.

Fun fact! Clara Rockmore influenced theremin music and the instrument and was a virtuoso of the instrument. Give her a google, it’s worth it. Also look up Leon Theremin, he was (among other things) a Soviet spy. There’s a great Wiki spiral for anyone there.

Mobius was probably being lined up for a high position in the TVA. Damn.

TemPads are personal, or have different levels of clearance.

Mobius didn’t stop interrogating Ravonna throughout that scene. He knew that she wasn’t telling him the whole truth.

Sleight of hand wasn’t shown how Loki and Sylvie do it, they didn’t use misdirection.

Ravonna knows something is up with Mobius. Maybe he hasn’t been around for long if this is his ‘career case’.

The pacing becomes really fast like in the end of episode 2 as conflicts get resolved. Buckle up comrades.

2050 Roxxcart Disaster

I don’t have much to add, it’s a powerful scene.

They use close ups whenever a truth bombshell is dropped.

The music varies considerably between these scenes, each one has a different tone.

“We’re the same.” With what she knows of B-15, Sylvie knew not to be smug when delivering the news about B-15’s life.

B-15 crying in the rain hurts.

“I looked happy.”

TVA archives, Time Cell, Time Theater 25

The floor opposite Mobius is FE3, above it is 3FG.

Oh Mobius.

C-20 deserved better, I'd love to see her later in the series.

The music goes from mournful to harsh and we’re left in silence when it cuts to the Time Cell.

“You told me to shut up.” Loki can be salty sometimes.

“Do you really think you deserve to be alone?” Mobius is rattled, he wants to unsettle Loki.

The music starts to build somewhere between “...your connection... “ and Loki saying “‘WE?’”

The faint tinkling reminds me of the Avatar (blue people) score.

“How about the word of a friend?” This is Loki’s olive branch. When he admits Loki was right, their trust is tentatively reinstated.

The music is finally back to that chaotic theme we know. I think it’s the TVA’s theme.

“You can be whoever, whatever you wanna be, even someone good. I mean just in case anyone ever told you different.” Mobius corrects what he says in the first ep.

They are friends y’all I’m so sad.

Mobius can lie through his teeth like it’s nobody’s business.

Pruning hurts, Mobius’ face is in agony.

Loki’s tears. GIVE THEM ALL JETSKIS.

Ravonna takes a moment to compose herself.

Time Keepers (the final smackdown)

Why are the last 10 minutes always so insane?

Loki’s eyes only show hurt. I’ll leave.

Ravonna’s so sharp, she instantly catches Sylvie’s wet hair.

All of our expectations from the trailers always get yeeted out of a window because the scenes are never really what we think they are. I get that that should be expected but it’s refreshing that the writing is never what we think it is.

Did anyone else notice the egg timer/infinity sign murals on one of the hallways to the left of Sylvie?

Ravonna is so cold (and yet I’d simp for her).

The M.C. Escher staircases I see you set designers/CGI folks.

B-15 just gets knocked out. They better not kill her for no reason or I riot.

I’m pretty sure that Sylvie ripped off one of Ravonna’s TVA badges (or buttons) when she fought her.

Sylvie’s the better fighter, she’s had to use it more often though.

The elevator doors stay open.

It would be so funny if we get an elevator scene where Sylvie is just dragging Ravonna somewhere.

They really led us on with the Time Keepers, particularly the middle one. I was somewhat convinced there’d be something more to it. I’m interested to see where it goes.

Ep 4 review

I really don’t have much to add with these last two episodes. I’ve definitely come to appreciate that no matter whether you liked the writing of the show or not, it’s never what you expect. Is that a good thing? I guess that that remains to be seen. Nonetheless, I appreciate how much effort went into this series. It’s been a fun romp, I’ll be back with my reviews of the final episodes. I’ll also stop posting Loki content to my blog because the Gods know that my followers don’t read this lol.

I’m just going to survive until the season is over and then hopefully keep my sanity together until the next Marvel content or at least Dr. Strange.

Here's the link to my episode 3 review.

Thank you all for being here, you're wonderful my loves.

[aspiestvmusings]

ZEP ANALYSIS

POSSIBLE SPOILERS for “ZOEY’S EXTRAORDINARY PLAYLIST” (NBC) 

This is my take on the shows storylines (episode 1-8), spoilers (for rest of s1), comments from the creators and cast...

This was originally inspired by many online comments from TeamMax vs Team Simon. I just wanted to analyze the show based on that. 

My take on the storyline: “The Love Triangle”

Good news for one team, perhaps not so good for the other team. 

Based on everything we’ve seen on the show (the storytelling, the promotional materials, the spoilers)... everything points to Max/Zoey being the endgame. I’ve seen many fans (both those who support Team M & those who support Team S), say that they get the same message from the storytelling. It does seem to be the clear message from the show...no matter how they get there..or when...

The “proof”: 

First: The actor who portrayes Max is billed higher (probably mostly cause he’s done more well-known musical projects before than the other actor), and he’s featured in much more promotional materials (promo pics, posters, promo videos...) and in more central role, than the other actor. The promotion is vastly focused on M/Z. They use those characters & actors... a lot...for promotion. That suggests only one thing. 

Second: They told us the premise of Zoey’s future relationships in the Pilot already via this Max/Zoey conversation:

Zoey: I have a long history of --- what do you call my past relationships again? --

Max: -- “Unnecessarily complicated, exhausting for everybody, the opposite of good”?

Zoey: Yeah. Those things. Which is why this time I'm just gonna take things slow, and wait for the right “in”

And with Zoey/Simon thing has been just a repeat of her past experiences which she claims she doesn’t want to re-live again, and this show is all about her growth as a character/person, this cannot be the endgame. Even if they’d reveal that S/J have broken up... all that’s already happened has followed this exact description (see Max’s quote)

Third: While Zoey sang her heart song to Max and they had a moment for themselves (though..let’s be honest...they get interrupted so much that others in the office must’ve overheard a lot by now...), the heartsong to Simon seemed to be more like a setup for having Max see it. And while both songs are about her deepest, secret feelings/desires... and there’s truth in both, then the way the scenes were set up makes it seem like she sang to her best friend to make him aware of how she really feels (what he said in the previous ep: he needs to know/get a respose from her...and this gave him that). But the other song was meant to be overheard by her best friend...and that was the goal of the song/scene (not the song itself, but that he saw). Again pointing to the show going for Max as the endgame. 

Fourth: The triangle is as follows: Both Max & Simon like Zoey, but she only really likes one of them. Both men sang heart songs to her (Max = I think I love you, Sucker, If I can’t have you, 500 miles), and she sang to both...but different songs. Simon sang “If you say that you are mine, I'll be here 'til the end of time” in 1x05, so it’s coming from his side. Zoey in 1x08 sang "I'm Yours” to Max (that her heart is his), but she sang “I want you to want me” to Simon (not that she wants him, but she wants him to want her). As her best friend explained it - one is about love, the other physical attraction. But... if you listen to the lyrics more closely then based on them she’s singing about how she saw S. crying & all alone (1x01) and how that affected her, compared to singing to M. how she’s “caught feelings”. So she’s only actually interested in Max, as her feelings for Simon are not mutual (beyond the grief bond). One is one-sided and more “superficial”, the other is mutual and more “serious”. 

Fifth: While we’ve seen that Zoey thinks she’s caught feelings for Simon (what she told her mom at the engagement party), and she hasn’t really admitted this to anyone besides her mom, she seems to not see it as a good thing. She also claims to both Max & Simon that she doesn’t really have feelings for Simon/wasn’t aware of her feelings and/or that she’s basically over it... so kinda “little white lies”. She seems to think they have a sort of connection and/or she seems to find him attractive...despite realizing that it cannot happen because he’s engaged. (and before Simon went and took the wrong step, he said the right thing - they leaned too much on each other about their grief, and they should just go back to co-workers, and that’s all. Sadly...that was changed because of the “glitch” that mislead...people). But... we also saw that she is fighting against having feelings for the morally questionable engaged man, cause she probably realizes it’s a bad idea. 

Sixth: All this time, but especially in the last episode, the show has tried to show the two men in her life differently, and show the differences in their “relationships” with Zoey. It’s a very classic “fairytale story” that follows often-used “clichees”. They’ve shown how the two are different, and how the connection between both “ships” is different. And everything points to them starting to make the difference even more clear. By now they all are aware of each others feelings...to some point... and both men are aware that they’re both competing for her interest. 

And she’s aware that she is interested in both... but in different ways, and for different reasons. And again they used Max to vocalize the choice before her - will she choose physical attraction without deeper connection or love and deeper emotional connection...AKA “new attractive co-worker who went through what shes going through VS her best friend, who is always there for her...no matter what. The options were made clear, now it’s her decision. And it’ll depend a lot on how each man will act from now on...at the most difficult time in her life (she’s now really going to lose her dad). 

If Simon will try to make advances based on the heart song she sang, which gave outmixed signals AND at the same time Max will continue being a good friend (as we saw in 1x08...despite their dispute) then that’ll make Z/S grow furher apart and Z/M grow closer. And since it’s all become too complicated and messy for everyone... then it’s very possible all this will get to Jessica, and break those two apart. But... that’s IMO gonna be the opposite from making the path clear for S/Z. To have Simon as a character grow they need to have him deal with his grief, and all that. The Simon vs Max thing is a lot like Leif/Tobin thing... where the peer reviews made one become sketchy and start playing games, and the other start working on bettering themselves. I expect similar differences of paths taken for S & M. Especially because we’ve not only seen Tobin 2.0, but also Max 2.0 (and we’ll see more of that..in coming eps)

Seventh: We ve heard spoilers than in the S1 finale there will be a “heart song” for/from/with one of the two and Zoey. From how the scene is decribed it sound more like something fitting to Max (Max/Zoey). Which fits with how the season and story has been built so far. That seems to also confirm where they’re taking it. Cause...they’ve established that just like on most shows the main character HAS TO have a love interest, and so far they’ve only introduced two  options. 

Other reasons why Zoey will most likely choose “love” over “physical attraction”:

We saw Zoey’s reaction when she found out that S. had a SO/was engaged - she ran. And though she might find him attractive (physically)...as she found out via her heart song in 1x08, and she might feel a connection to him (because of the heart song she heard him sing in 1x01), she hasn’t shown interest in actually being with him... because she knows he’s taken. And also because she’s not really in the right place to start a relationship. She/They may not realize it, but they don’t have much more in common than grief - that’s the center of their bond (for now). Despite her interest/attraction to him & her thinking she “likes” him... 

This is also why it’s easier for her to admit she has/had feelings for Simon, but she’s having trouble admitting...to herself (and Mo) & to Max that she may have feelings for her best friend. There’s nothing to lose with the first, but a lot to lose with the second. She’s afraid (and she varbalized it at the end of 1x07) that something could not go well... etc

While Max was not at all ready to meet his dates (Autumn) parents, because it’s a huge step and he just wan’t ready for it, he has met his best friends parents, and is welcome at their home. And there’s no feelings of meeting the parents being such “next level step”. We saw this when he brough her dad pudding to eat & when he helped carry the bed downstairs. It was also mentioned that he’s been part of the extended family for a while - welcome to family events (Christmas, barbeques..). Zoey’s father - the most important person in her life until now - is definitely on the man’s side, who brings him pudding (cause he’s paid attention that he can only eat soft food) and visits him & helps out. And her dad’s opinion is very important to Zoey, so... 

She is completely at easy with Max seeing her with a facemask on, eating take-out, alone, at home, but she hides it (the true self) from Simon. She wears “a mask” with Simon, but doesn’t with Max. Same with how she didn’t tell Simon about her dad in 1x08 (brushing it off: hospital = lollipop), while telling Max that her dad had an apointment that morning. And though it did take her time to find the courage to tell him about it all in detail, she did..in the end. But from the start she shared the main info even if she didn’t tell what exactly happened and how she feels about it. She didn’t completely brush it off with him...even if the news made her unable to process and share it...right away.

We saw how she resisted her personal heart songs to Leif/Joan & to Simon, while being completely at ease with singing them to her best friend (Max) and her dad (Mitch). Cause if we leave out the big dance numbers (Crazy, Pressure), then she tried stopping herself  from singing the others...the personal songs... and/or apologized for what’s to come...with Simon, too. But with Max (and her dad) the song just came to her...without the need to apologize or resist it. And afterwards she just tried to claim it didn’t mean as much, because she’s just in denial (and not really ready to start a relationship...because right now she is going through stages of grief). There’s a huge difference in both the heart songs she sang & HOW she sang them.

And we’ve seen that she really appreciates him as a friend, and as she told him - she can’t lose him as a friend...she needs him in her life. She cares about his feelings. She is afraid she gave him the wrong impression, she runs after him to explain things to him, because she knows that he got hurt. She actually cares about him...and is feelings (as a friend). And they’ve not shown the same reaction with Simon. And though the friends to one-sided to more-than-friends trope is “an overused clichee”, it isn’t necessarily bad. It can work well. Examples: Mondler on Friends, Peraltiago on B99...

Max may have the advantage of having known her longer, and knowing her better (because they’ve been friends for 5 years), and hence she’s more comfortable around him. And...that’s the reason why she let him in on her superpower secret, and why she tells him about...things. But... that’s precisely why she should and will choose Max over Simon. (He’s been there for her...always...and he continues to be there for her...through this hard time in her life.)

We saw how even though he was upset with her (for keeping secrets from him, from setting him up with someone  else when she knew about his feelings for her...just because she didn’t dare to be honest with him & communicate...and hearing her sing to another person, too...) he was still there for her. A shoulder to lean on...literally and figuratively. He came to her rescue when she put her job at risk (singing Pressure), he gave her her mom’s message and supportive advice regarding her dad... And though there’s a hint of competitiveness that he seems to feel after the 1x07 elevator end scene (where we saw that both men seem to think they’ll be the end choice), and him wanting some kind of response from her, the 1x07 end scene and other moments have shown us that he’s willing to wait til she’s ready.

Especially...since in 1x07 he felt like it’s unfair that she can see into his heart and knows how he feels about her, he doesn’t. But in 1x08 he got to see into her heart (because even though she’d promised to always be honest with him from now on... she wasn’t fully... for a bit... and the “glitch” made her break her promise...til the evening), and it’s more “fair”. He now isn’t as in the dark, and less uncertain. I think the glitch was good for him, because he now knows how she really feels. All he wanted was an honest answer. And though it’s undertandable that he’s a bit hurt by what he’s heard & seen lately... but in the end it was beneficial. As Mo put it... he deserves an answer...no matter what it is...

I get the feeling that by now Zoey’s actually aware that she has feelings for her best friend. She might’ve not been aware of it all until he sang the first heart song to her, but after that we’ve clearly seen that she has either started to realize she actually has feelings for him or that she’s started to have feelings for him. She showed signs of jealousy when he was with Autumn (seeing them talking at the coffee shop, dancing at the club...). She couldn’t stop staring at him when she walked in during the Mo’ Makeover...indicating clearly that she finds him also physically attractive. Not to mention the emotional connection, and friendship. All the looks she gives him, her song & dance during “I’m Yours”... all for him... 

And she cares about his feelings & not hurting him (running after him when he sees her heart song to Simon...) The look she has, when he brings her dad pudding & when she sees him with her dad or when  she hears him sing “500 miles”, or the looks and giggles when she sings her heart song to him.... While she’s in no place in a relationship at this time, I think she’s realized that despite her grief and emotional state she’s developing feelings for her best friend. And that... just like what’s going on with her dad, seems to scare her. 

MY PERSONAL TAKE/THOUGHTS:

As human as her feelings for Simon are (you can’t control who you find attractive...), and as much as this can happen IRL then Zoey/Simon is a no-no... simply because of his relationship status. Cheating storylines are not cool. Hence I cannot stand behind that “ship” or the possibility of accepting them as a viable possibility. IF he didnt have a fiancee, he’d be a candidate, but that’s not the case...he has a SO. Hence Team Simon cannot even be an option. No matter how much they try to promote it all as a love triangle & no matter how much they make Simon make bad decisions and wrong moves (going to her place & talking to her about his feelings, kissing her) seem “nothing serious”.... it’s wrong. It’s just as her best friend decribed it in 1x08. If things were different, yeah, but we’re not talking hypotheticals. 

So IMO there’s one clearly wrong choice netween these two. I mean... I would not care if they would have her stay single, or develop new interest (Tobin)...as long as it’s not “morally questionable”. Z/S would be like Joan/Leif... sketchy, and wrong. And hopefully having seen those two helps Zoey understand that.... see the parallels (she has a hint that one is playing the other) 

As for “Max is being too pushy”... here’s how that goes: he’s been in love with his best friend...for some time...and not said a thing. She accidentally finds out after she gets her superpower. And all the while his feelings seem to grow deeper. And now that she’s aware of his feelings, it seems she’s become more aware of her own (similar) feelings and/or she’s developed them. And sure...after his peer reviews (that “he doesn’t show initiative”) & seeing that his best friend is interested in someone else...who would be just another “not good option” similar to her past bad relationship decisions, ...and after getting mixed signals from her, he made more direct steps. 

He sang her his heart songs, but he didnt push her (no, “Hand picked” is not like a date, just “are you free to go and eat”). She only felt pushed because she could “read his mind”. Also... he didn’t sing to her while being in a relationship with someone else...he kept his distance. And at the same time she seems to have become more and more aware about her feelings for him, and she was giving him “wrong signals”. His response - the flash mob was a response to that. And he was just upset that she ran...without any real response (not interested, can’t right now...cause I’m too occupied with  dad thing). All he wanted was some sort of respose, and he told her so. She avoided telling him how she really feels (as Mo put it... he’ll understand if you say you don’t know, but you owe your friend an answer)...delaying it...as long as she could.  

Also... any rational person would be confused about hearing that someone has superpowers. Again...she avoided giving him an explanation, instead telling him “fairytales of superpowers”. And in the end he was okay with her answer - that she can’t give him an answer at the moment. Even though he was upset, we saw he was still gonna be her friend (even if keeping some distrance, and not doing the movie nights), and that he was sure that one day she’ll be ready (the 1x07 elevator end scene, where both men think she’ll choose them...in the end..when she’s ready)

And in the latest episode we saw that no matter how hurt his feelings were, he did not stop being her friend. As he said “he’ll be there...always...and be the shoulder to lean on”. And you could tell that a huge weight was lifted off his shoulder when he knew her real feelings. When she did what she promised in last episode...be 100% honest with him. Sure... it only happened because of the glitch, when she sang him the heart song, but nonetheless it made things more equal. As he said - it’s unfair that she knows how he feels & can see into his heart but he cannot see into hers. The glitch changed that. Gave him the opportunity to get the answers she “owed him”

 So... it’s undertandable that he felt hurt and confused when he saw her sing a heart song to someone else... right after finally giving him some answers. But...during he same conversation he processed it all, and also explained it to her - one song about love, the other about attraction. And he didn’t say “choose me”, he just explained the meanings to her (cause it was obvious she didn’t understand it herself), and told what his choice would be, while saying that he knows she’ll make her decision on her own....cause that ’s what she’s like. 

As a friend he doesn’t want her to make the same mistakes she has in the past..hence him being “upset” with her. Cause to him it looks like she wasn’t completely honest (something she promised to be) with him - singing her heart feelings to him, and then to someone else. Claiming that she can’t lose him as a friend and that’s why she’s not ready to try being more than friends, when to an outsider it looks like the real reason is, as he put it - cause she’s confused about her feelings... for two people. All she’d have to tell him...from start... would just be honest and simply just say (more clearly) that she has to focus on her family & dad at this time, and ask for time. She kinda did at the end of 1x07, but because she’s not good with emotions and feelings...and she delayed her answer, she didn’t really let him in...and be the friend she needs at the time, it wasnt as clear as it could’ve been. 

So far all his “pushy” behaviour can be seen as being a good friend -  he’s trying to help her not start another overly complicated relationship...which she told him (in Pilot) is not what she wants anymore. He points out to her why Simon is not a good option - he’s taken. Yes, part of his “pushiness” seems to come from trying to be less what his peer reviews decribed him like & competitiveness (knowing Simon is kinda his competition). But from his POV... (before she told him about her superpowers& sang him her heart song)... she’d been shown more interest in him (checking him out, giving mixed signals) & at the same time he’s in a bit of hurry because if he doesn’t act soon she may make a move on the new guy/the new guy may make a move on her. So it makes sense that with all of that happening at the same time he seems...to some... to "push” her towards being more than friends... Cause unconciously he may realize that if he doesn’t make a move ...now... he may be too late. 

And though it all... he’s still there for her. He might be “mad at her... just a bit”, but he still goes to check on her, still gives her advice, and space... after he knows what’s really going on. (he “pushes” her to confont her feelings about her dad, and deal with it instead of running). He’s not looking for something in return. We saw that over and over in several episodes. He verbalized it in 1x06, and his face/look told it in the end of 1x07 elevator scene. 

Also... “Mr Nice Guy” is better than “Mr. Cheater”...any day... in my book. And it surprises me that there are those who think that “nice guy who goes after his best friend” is worse option & worse clichee than the “hot new guy, who is willing to cheat”. For me one is clearly wrong behaviour the other just depends on your preferences. 

To quote Mo : Max is funny, and funny always wins. Hence... being Team Max.

                  So... while up until things got overly complicated, both men could’ve been options, by now the show (writing etc) has made it pretty clear that they’re going for Z/M endgame. 

Though the showrunner/writers at times love to focus on the “love triangle” (I still don’t see it in the writing...I only hear it being described so by the showrunner etc), and how they want to continue with that...for a while... which makes it seem a bit like they’re seriously pro “cheating plots” and “human feelings are messy...hence we let the main character continue making bad choices” because “we love the love- triangle drama”, there’s still more evidence in them not really taking it further than the kiss. But yeah... at times the showrunners comments make it sound like he thinks more like the HIMYM creator did and less like Dawson’s Creek creator did. Too fixed in loving the “triangle drama” & not going for character growth... But... I truly hope that all that has just been misleading...and the storytelling is what tells us how it goes. 

They already let Simon make a bad move - the kiss. That should be the line over the line that they won’t cross again. He may continue pursuing her by singing songs to her, because he read her heartsong in the wrong way (because he doesn’t know why she did it, and what’s behind it), but if they follow the character growth path, and their current direction... they won’t let him/her go into the “cheating plot” territory again. 

    My “advice” to Zoey & Simon: 

IF I could talk to these fictional characters, then the advice I would have given them...weeks/months ago would have been: just talk to your family & friends...the important people in your life. That’s Jessica for Simon, and Max (Mo, her mom...) for Zoey. Luckily we finally saw Zoey do that in the latest episode. So far we haven’t seen her really share the specific details on her dads health & her feelings regarding it all, with him. She hasn’t really confonted her feelings about it...til now or really confided in anyone in her family...etc... until now/finally. But Simon doesn’t seem to be doing so (he kept it all inside for a long time...until he had a chance to talk to a stranger, Zoey), and even though he made a point to not talk to her about it all, there has been no indication that after the “smoked roses” incident he’s confided in the person he should, Jessica.

Because... it doesn’t take a shared experience to get the support you need. The other person doesn’t have to have lived through the same/doesn’t have to know what it feels like in person to be the right person to lean on. And that was beautifully showcased at the end of ep 1x08, when Max, after he had been told about her dad’s condition, and her feelings regarding it, was the emotional support she needed. It just takes one person - somone who knows you best/well... to help you nagivate your “grief”.

To elaborate: That moment, when she finally was completely honest with Max, and let him in on her dad’s situation, was very important. It was the step to right direction. It also showed Zoey & us that it doesnt take a person who has experienced the same to understand her, support her. It just takes one person, who knows you & is there for you no matter what. And we shan’t forget that since Max was also close with Mitch, he will be personally affected by her dad’s death. So a shared experience... shared grief. Max being “in” on the details means that they’ll lean on each other more on this (so less need fo Zoey to connect about grief with Simon...who doesn’t have a connection with her dad & who doesn’t really know her). It was a crucial moment: Zoey finally not running from it all & properly starting grieving (going through the stages). And she finally let someone really in (something Simon can’t/won’t do with his fiancee... both cause she doesn’t understand him & his not willing to let her in), so this will make their friendship stronger going forward. Meaning: she doesn’t need Simon fro grief bond - she can get that support from Max, too. 

And they really need to explore Simon’s character...and let him grow. Based on spoilers we know that were gonna get (finally) some more development and closer look into Max. But they need to look into S. (Is it just the grief? Is is something...more...)

wow ..this turned out way longer than I expected and planned. 

Also... no ship wars comments, please. Even though I stated why I prefer one of the options the show has introduced that does not mean this is an invite to start discussion which is better. This is not the purpose of this post. You’re allowed to have your preference. For me there simply is a (single) reason why I cannot support one, while am OK with the other. 

THE END 

[mamabearcatfanfics]

More Than Words - One

“Please, please, please, please, please Kagome!”

She looked up from her laptop to roll her eyes at the dark haired man leaning over her desk, his violet eyes beseeching, hands together as if in prayer.

“You would think by now Miroku, that you of all people would know that when a lady says no, she means no”, she said dryly, dropping her attention back to the computer screen in front of her. It was boring work, but if everything wasn’t just so, the tender documents could be rejected, and she really didn’t want to open that can of worms with her project manager.

“But Kagome”, he continued pleading. “She’s amazing, gorgeous, an angel!” His eyes misted over as he gazed off into the middle distance. “I think it’s her. I think I’ve finally found the love of my life.” Kagome snorted, and his eyes flicked back to hers. “You don’t believe me?” he said with a wounded expression.

“Miroku”, Kagome sighed, “you probably spoke to her for a maximum of what, two minutes, tops? And that was to order coffee. How is this girl any different from the temp secretary you took out on a date after the office Christmas party three weeks ago? Or that girl you abandoned me for last Friday night when we went out to karaoke? I’m not going to hound some poor woman minding her own business into giving you her number just because you have the unfortunate habit of falling for every pretty face you see!”

Miroku shook his head. “No, you don’t understand. This was different. When my fingers touched hers, it was, like, I don’t know, a spiritual connection.” He sighed, leaning against Kagome’s desk, his hand over his heart. “She owns me, body and soul.”

“Oh my god Miroku,” Kagome chortled, pushing his hip off her desk. “If you were any cheesier I’d need to run out and buy wine and crackers! You do realise that you sound like someone out of one of those trashy romance movies on daytime TV? Next you’ll be writing sonnets and saying you were struck by Cupid’s arrow.” She got up from her desk to move over to the filing cabinet, rifling through the files. “I still don’t see why I need to be involved anyway - just ask her for her number herself if you’re so desperate!”

Miroku sighed, hanging his head despondently. “I’ve been banned. By her guard dog.” Kagome looked at him questioningly. “The barista.”

“You got banned from a café by the barista? What on earth did you do!?” She held up her hands, the file in them covering her view of Miroku as he opened his mouth to explain. “No, don’t tell me, on second thoughts, I don’t want to know!”

“Kagome, I’m begging you! Just talk to her. If she doesn’t want to give her number to me, I’ll admit defeat. I just need to know! What if I did all your filing for the next week?”

Kagome shook her head. “No way! I’ve only just got all my files back in order from when you meddled with my stuff when I was on leave.”

“I’ll walk your dog.”

“I have a cat.”

“I’ll do your tax return for you.”

“I’d like to stay out of prison, thanks very much.”

“I’ll, I’ll… “ Miroku looked around the office, as if searching for inspiration, his eyes alighting on Kagome’s much loved pink coffee cup, sitting empty and forlorn on her desk. “I’ll buy you coffee for the next month!”

Kagome stared him. “You’re offering to buy me coffee for a whole month?” He nodded. “And this is whether she gives me her number or not?” Miroku nodded again. Kagome bumped the filing cabinet drawer shut with her hip, then placed the folders on her desk, turning back to him with a gleeful expression on her face.

Miroku’s face fell when he realised exactly how much that this might cost him in monetary terms. Kagome loved her coffee; she was rarely seen without her favourite coffee mug in her hand. And she did a lot of overtime, often working back late at the office, weekends too when a tender was due.

Kagome grinned even wider and slapped him on the shoulder. “Miroku, my lovestruck friend, you’ve got yourself a deal!”

 ☕💘☕

 Kagome walked towards the tiny hole in the wall coffee shop a few blocks away from the office. It was literally only a door and a window wide, the exterior painted in matte black, with a white awning shading the customers waiting outside in the hot Australian summer sun. The business name adorned the glass window, a simple red circle with black text in a strong block font - Black Dog Coffee.

There was a line of people heading out the door waiting patiently, some chatting quietly, but most looking down at their phones. As she got further forward in the line, she was amused to notice that everyone followed the same pattern – a step towards the woman taking orders, stating their name and order and paying, then two steps to the left while they waited for their coffee. The woman at the cash register didn’t take another order until the first one had been filled, yet no one complained. That was kind of odd, but the line was moving fairly swiftly, so she guessed it worked, even though it wasn’t how cafés usually took their coffee orders. It was hard to see what was going on from her position in the line, stuck behind a tall guy in a business suit. She decided to look up reviews for the coffee shop online while she was waiting.

‘This coffee is the absolute bomb, but don’t piss off the barista!’

‘Was recommended to me by a friend. Coffee is amazing.’

‘Kinda weird. They only sell coffee, roast their own beans I think. The barista is something else!’

‘Would wait in line all day for this coffee!!’

‘Worst experience ever. Got BANNED because I tried to order more than five things. And they have no food, just coffee. WTF! Pretty sure the barista was in the yakuza – that guy has tatts for days! 0/10 would recommend.’

‘Follow the ordering protocol and you’ll be sweet – best coffee in the downtown financial district.’

‘OMG – best coffee EVER! I’m now a daily customer.’

Hmmm. She tried to peer around the tall guy in front of her, but she couldn’t see anything; the afternoon sun was reflecting off the glass covered office building nearby, getting in her eyes and making her squint. She fanned her face with her hand. Man it was hot. You could fry an egg out here on the cement. She hoped the coffee was worth the freckles she was probably getting on her nose right now. The tall guy stepped forward to make his order, and she caught a glimpse of the woman behind the cash register.  

Long glossy brown hair with thick bangs, and a bright smile. Her brown eyes, highlighted by bright pink eyeshadow, sparkled with warmth; she was giving her total attention to the current person she was engaging with. She wasn’t much taller than Kagome herself and the tight black t-shirt she was wearing with the name Sango embroidered on the pocket accentuated her generous curves.

Kagome sighed. Miroku was nothing if not predictable – he loved curvy ladies. But how was she going to ask for this woman’s number without causing a disruption – everyone seemed to be on board with the ordering system, and if the coffee was as good as the reviews promised there was no way she was going to get herself banned from coming back.

She glanced down to the time on her phone, and then to the opening hours printed on the tiny shop window. It was almost closing time. Maybe if she hung back for a little while and caught the woman after they’d shut up shop? She groaned internally, trying not to think of the work still waiting for her on her desk. She should have held out for two months of coffee.

The tall man stepped to the side. Crap, she needed to order.

“Good afternoon ma’am. What would you like?” The woman’s smile was wide and welcoming.

“Uh, a large latte please, no sugar”, Kagome said, holding up her credit card ready to tap payment.

“Name please?”

“Kagome. That’s K – A…”

“That’s okay, I know how to spell it.” Kagome watched with interest as the woman wrote her name on the coffee lid in curving characters. Was that hirigana? She vaguely recognised it was her name being written from the two terms of Japanese she did in high school. A grunt came from her left, and she realised with a little start that she was meant to move to one side.

She stood in front of the gleaming commercial espresso machine, eyes closing as she savoured the rich coffee aroma. It smelt amazing, rich and full. Not burnt. It was a little hard to see the barista; her view was blocked by towers of takeaway coffee cups in various sizes. But those reviews that mentioned him had made her curious now. She stepped to the side a little more. Ah, there he was.

He was taller than her - she guessed she’d come up to just above his shoulder, but then she wasn’t exactly tall herself at 5’2”. He had long dark hair, looped back in a low ponytail, with a choppy fringe and slightly longer forelocks  on either side of his face, tanned skin that was complemented by the white collarless t-shirt he wore under a denim apron. His expression as he looked downward to make the coffee was stern, but she didn’t see what he had to be so grumpy about. Maybe he was just hot? Maybe he just took his job very seriously? He moved out from behind the coffee machine and her eyes widened at the sight of his forearms, revealed by the shirt sleeves pushed up to his elbows. They were covered in tattoos from the wrist; dark sleeves of swirling black water flowing up his arms, broken only by pink and red cherry blossoms, with a hint of green and yellow. Then he looked up.

His eyes. They were hazel, for want of a better description, but such a light hazel that they almost looked golden. With the late afternoon sun behind her, lighting his face, they almost sparkled like citrine quartz. He placed the lid on her coffee, then set it down in front of her.

“Kagome.”

He’d pronounced her name right. Ka-goh-meh. She was so used to the way most Australians butchered her Japanese name, a way for her parents to honour her Japanese grandfather, that she was immune to its mispronunciation, but he’d said it just right. Just. Right. His voice was deep and a little husky. He made that small grunting noise in the back of his throat again, his strong dark brows lowering a little, and she realised in embarrassment that she was staring at him.

“Uh, yes, I’m sorry, yeah that’s me! I’m Kagome.” Idiot. Of course he knew that, it’s not like there was anyone else standing right in front of him waiting! She reached out for her coffee where he’d placed it on the edge of the counter, and then backed away, pink cheeked, as another person stepped to the side to wait for their coffee.

She moved to stand in front of the shop next door, taking out her phone for something to do while she waited for closing time, slowly sipping her coffee, which was glorious by the way. But she couldn’t give herself over fully to her enjoyment of the taste, unable to control her wandering eyes.

‘Oh my god, he’s gorgeous! I’ve never seen anyone with eyes that colour before. And that’s so much ink on his arms - that must have hurt like a bitch! I never would have picked that a guy would get cherry blossom sleeves, but they don’t look girly on him at all - the exact opposite really. I wonder if they go all the way up his arms? God, now I’m imagining him with his shirt off - bad girl, Kagome! Maybe the cherry blossoms are a cultural thing? I think he’s Japanese, and I’m pretty sure that’s my name in hirigana on the coffee lid, but I don’t want to make an assumption just based on that and his looks. I wonder what he’s thinking about? He doesn’t look unhappy or angry exactly, just… determined? Maybe he just has resting bitch face.’ She snorted a little at that thought, then sighed. ‘His movements are so graceful and fluid, it’s like watching someone do tai chi or something. Oh, he has such nice hands - strong fingers. I could watch him make coffee aaaaall day.’

She gazed dreamily, sipping at her coffee slowly, the phone in her hand forgotten. Golden eyes suddenly met hers, one eyebrow raised in a puzzled expression. ‘Oh shit, he’s looking this way. He’s noticed that I’m looking at him. Abort! Abort! Oh fuck… This is all your fault Miroku!’

She turned tail and fled, almost running back to the office. The reviews had been right. The hot coffee was amazing, but the hot barista? Yeah, he was definitely something else. She knew she would be back first thing in the morning to get another coffee. And it wasn’t just because the coffee was amazing and that he was beautiful to look at. There was something about him. She wanted to get to know him better.

Miroku was waiting for her out the front of their office building. “So, did you get it?” he asked eagerly.

“What?”

“Did you get her number. Sango’s number?”

“Uh…” Shit. She’d been so flustered when he had suddenly looked up and met her gaze that she’d turned tail and fled without remembering why she was waiting there in the first place. Damn. Heat washed across her cheeks, and she flicked her gaze away from Miroku’s.

“Our calm and collected Kagome blushing? Oh, there must be a good story behind this – do tell!”

“No story. You’ve ordered coffee from there before – I didn’t want to do anything to upset the system and get banned like you did! There just wasn’t an opportunity today – I’ll try again tomorrow.”

Miroku poked her in the ribs. “But surely that wouldn’t make you blush Kags! C’mon, spill.”

“There’s nothing to tell!” she spluttered.

Suddenly Miroku burst out laughing. “Oh ho ho, I get it. You were so busy perving at the guard dog making the coffee that you forgot what you were there for.”

“Shut. Up.”

Miroku grinned at her. “Aw, little Kagome finally got a crush on someone. Were you struck by Cupid’s arrow?” he teased, throwing the phrase she’d used before back at her with a note of triumph in his voice. Kagome squirmed under his knowing gaze, and he chuckled. “Looks like Cupid’s been pretty busy with his arrows around that coffee shop, huh?”

Kagome made a growling noise in the back of her throat, then the corners of her lips curled up in a knowing smile. She blinked at him innocently, raising her takeaway cup.

“You may be right Miroku. You may be right. And I’m thinking the best way to get to know him will be to buy coffee. Lots of coffee. I hope you’re ready to pay up, buddy!” She sipped her coffee and patted him on his suddenly slumping shoulders as she walked past him into the foyer of the building and back to her desk full of filing, savouring every last drop.

  ☕💘☕

 Inuyasha pondered as he polished the already gleaming coffee maker. Sango had just left for the day, after balancing the till, and he was doing a final clean up, ensuring everything would be ready for 7am opening.

That girl. Kagome. She’d been staring at him. Usually that made him feel intensely uncomfortable. Growing up in an orphanage had internalised that being stared at was a bad thing, because pain caused by kids much larger and stronger than him usually followed close behind. That was until he’d been there so long that he was the large and strong one, handing out punches to anyone picking on the tiny ones. But he hadn’t got that uncomfortable feeling from her when she’d stared.

He knew he was considered attractive by some people. But her looking at him hadn’t given him that slimy creepy feeling that being ogled purely for looks gave him either. She had looked at him like he was a puzzle she wanted to work out.

He tried to picture her in his mind’s eye, but all he really remembered was dark shining hair like a corvid’s wing, and very blue eyes. She’d been small too, very petite. He rolled her name around in his head, as it tugged on a memory, and he suddenly thought of the rhyming game from his childhood about a bird caught in a cage. It was fitting – her mannerisms reminded him of a little bird - a wren, with bright inquisitive eyes. And when he’d looked up at her and caught her staring, she’d flapped her wings in fright and flown away. He chuckled. He hoped she wasn’t caught in a cage of some sort. No one deserved that.

He shut off the lights to the tiny shop, and walked into the studio behind it, flopping down on his bed with his laptop, ready to spend another evening struggling through his online English class. A little orange fluffball of a kitten jumped on to his lap, trying to sit on the keys, and he pushed it off.

“Shippou! Dame!”

The kitten settled down next to his thigh, snuggling against him and purring, and he turned his attention back to the screen. It was hard, learning a language this way, but he was determined. He had escaped his own cage, and he was never going back.

☕💘☕

PART TWO

[sanstropfremir]

I absolutely LOVED reading your kingdom review. You gave me such an insight in things I never even considered, especially since our rankings are so different from each other. The Boyz was my favorite, the narrative was about RTK. How they felt bad for having to compete against their friends but eventually the groups only lifted each other up and it helped TBZ grow into the group they are now through the hardships and mental dilemma, falling into the next challenge right after they reached the top. It should have been more obvious though, I agree, it wasn't really visible for anyone who didn't know. I was wondering how you felt about the dancing in general? my reason for not ranking BTOB high was lack of choreo (and Peniel's verse), same goes for SF9. Mostly because I don't feel the hype when watching, it doesn't keep my focus on the stage. As a baby-performer myself, my goal is to make the viewer curious about what's next. is that the wrong way to look at it? that's what I've always been told, building the tension up and down to create focus. would love to hear your feedback on that! thank you so much for sharing, we need more reviews of people who actually know what they're talking about.

i'm glad that you got some insight from it! like i answered in the previous ask im here to hopefully bring some more depth and understanding for people that care and are curious!

you unintentionally proved my point about tbz’s performance: that is way too complicated! even the most talented solo dancers i can think of would have trouble distilling that down to something readable in 100 seconds, much less a group of like, a dozen people! the introductory stages are meant to show us the character of the group and their abilities in the most concise way possible, it's not the stage to do deep philosophical and emotional introspection. for a full stage? absolutely, go hog wild! but for this stage it was too ambitious and ultimately was ineffective to anyone that isn't a fan of them specifically. 

by dancing in general do you mean like, every group? i put most of my opinions on the dancing where i had them in each of the individual rankings but honestly? unless there is something that really stands out positively or negatively, a lot of ‘average’ kpop dance looks the same to me. i know it’s not, obviously, and if pressed i probably could do a more serious breakdown, but dance is only one element of performance. it has equal weight with all the others in my mind, and therefore i notice when it is either 

very good

does something unique

very bad, or

interferes with another element

which is the same as how i evaluate every element, if that makes sense. 

hmmmm. i thought about this a lot in the shower and turns out i had more opinions that i expected so i'll put them under a cut.

firstly, i don't think lack of choreo should be penalized or considered an ‘incomplete’ performance. at the end of the day, these are bands, and a part of their brand/product they sell is the music. complex choreo does not need to be attached to that to make it a successful performance. also, btob did have choreo. any movement on stage is technically choreography. but this terminology can cause confusion so usually non-dance choreo is referred to as ‘blocking.’ but they also did include the song’s original point choreo at 1.41. the blocking in their performance was well thought out and suited the arrangement, by placing spatial emphasis on each part of the song that needed it. obviously it comes down to personal taste if the performance is ultimately ‘successful,’ because all art is subjective, but just because something isn't as visually complex as something else doesn’t mean it doesn't have the same level of thought. think of it like this: one is a super clean-lined post-post-modern grey/white living room, and the other is a kitsch goth basement. both share interior design principles and have obvious care put into the space, but they are vastly different styles that appeal to different tastes.

part of the job of production designer/AD is to decide what gets emphasis. a question you're always asking yourself is ‘is this important to the story that we’re trying to tell?’ and btob/their AD made a very smart choice with their introductory stage because it says a lot about them and their abilities in a short amount of time. that stage said ‘our foundation is strong, we have the training and experience and confidence to be up here and not rely on visual tricks.’ because they know they physically cannot do the things the 4th gen groups can; they're a decade older and they only have four members, it's just not feasible. something you learn with experience is the power that specific and pointed emphasis holds, which segues into my answer to your last question. i don't necessarily think that ‘building hype’ is the wrong way to perform something, but i do think it is a flawed way to approach creating a performance.

i think that ‘hype’ is flawed concept at its core, and one that focuses on the idea that there’s always being something more, something next, beyond the work itself. now there’s nothing wrong with playing with tension within the internal structure of a piece, that's exactly how constructing a narrative happens. however, the flaws come once we extrapolate beyond the boundaries of that individual work. the idea of ‘whats next’ implies that you have to constantly be promoting, have a sequel coming, building hype etc so people will keep engaged with your work. which is deeply capitalistic in nature and operates on the assumption that art exists purely as a product to be sold. and in order to keep selling you need to keep making a bigger and better and more spectacular product. and this is not the case at all. marketability is not the essence of art, it merely a factor of creating it under this insufferable system. kpop in particular suffers from this because the industry is specifically fabricated to produce capitol. we can have discussions all day about idols and their artistic integrity but at the end of that day, they are all cogs working with a system that was specifically made up by essentially one person to be culturally exported and to just print buckets of money. so in following that train of thought, there is a constant attitude of bigger and better because shock value (whether positive or negative) gets social media attention and therefore it sells. and it has become exponentially easier (and also seemingly required) to make things that are bigger and better than ever before. i remember being blown away by the projection floor at the sochi 2014 olympics because something of that scale and complexity would never have been possible without literally having the funding of the olympics. now that technology is easily accessible to anyone with an amazon account and the time to learn how isadora works. in comparison, it took 2400 YEARS for just the job of a ‘theatre designer’ to be even become a job at all.

because of kpop’s fan culture it is especially prone to ‘hype’ behaviour. in general with the accessibility of the internet and social media, everything has turned into a competition, and who can generate the most buzz ‘wins’. but ultimately that has taken away the general public’s ability to recognize that you can enjoy something quietly and you can enjoy something slowly. that the enjoyment of something doesn’t need to be all exclamation marks and keysmashes and trending hashtags on twitter. there is value in a work engaging in an emotion within you that is not just excitement. most of the artists and companies that i consume the work of i don’t do so because their work makes me excited, i do so because i liked the experience of engaging with that work. several years ago i saw the eternal tides by legend lin dance theatre, which you can watch a really short clip of here. that is not slow motion, that is actually how slow the dancers are moving. and 90% of the show is performed like that. and its two hours long. and it was one of the most incredible performances i've ever seen. if i ever get the chance I will go see another one of their shows again, not because i care about how they can top that experience i had, but because i know they can produce that experience, and that is enough to make me want to seek them out again. the speed of the internet has also loosened the general public’s understanding of just exactly how long creating a performance work can take. the lead dancer in the eternal tides was with the company for eight years before she and the piece were ready enough to be performed. large scale operas, musicals, and plays often have a year or more of pre-production before they even get to rehearsal. smaller theatre companies workshop new pieces for years at a time. performance is hard and it takes time. you can eliminate some of that with sheer amounts of money and people, which is what the kpop industry has done, but it speeds up the cycle of consumption to a degree that is not sustainable, especially for companies and creators who do not have that kind of access. performers and performance makers often don't put enough trust in their audiences. if they like what they see, they will come back. they dont need to be constantly bombarded with content at all times.

now that i’ve said a bit about why i think hype is a flawed concept, let's bring it back to kingdom. sf9 did something very interesting with their stage in that they actively chose to limit their dance time. and this plays very well off the performance film stage that taeyang did a couple of weeks ago. taeyang is talented and confident (for good reason), and his solo was incredible. but when it came to the intro stage, instead of trying to one-up the solo stage, the group instead said ‘well people are going to be looking at us because taeyang is insanely talented, so let's show them that we ALL have the confidence and the attitude to be up here.’ no need for flashy theatrics, they had the foresight to do something that would make them stand out from the rest of the groups. even if i was just casually watching the stages without doing any analysis on them (like i did for rtk), i would still be able to distinguish them because they had the stones to stand around for half their stage time. now i recognize them and would like to see what else they can do. same principle as what btob and also what ikon did. there is a fine line between anticipation and hype that gets equated in media consumption nowadays, but the two are not the same.

i think the tldr on this is that you dont need to ‘build hype’ or ‘go all out’ to make an interesting work. just focus on telling the narrative that you want to tell, and the people that recognize that will come. i could have a lot more things to say about peoples shrinking attention spans and the constant stream of information that we consume on a daily basis that devalues the labour done by artists in the eyes of the public and promotes hustle culture that is burning out and damaging creators at a rate that is both exponential and frightening, but that’s probably for another time, because this is SO LONG

[ggyppt]

In my 372nd review I take a look at The Falcon and the Winter Soldier 1x03 "Power Broker"

Spoilers Below

This episode finally feels like this show has settled into the grove of the larger narrative. Most of that has to do with the additions to the cast, most notably Baron Zemo (played by Daniel Brühl from the Alienist). Though, these additions also add a major level of frustration to the proceedings as well, which again, most of this centers around Zemo, they are still very welcome additions that ends up making the dynamics of the group finally feel complete. This, in turn, once again makes the previous episodes feel worse, and makes me actively not want to views those episode again cause they do feel left wanting knowing the places that the interactions go as the show goes forward. That in of itself is a major issue that this show keeps on doing, as rather than feeling like each episode is an improvement on the last, each episode has continually showed that those opening episodes were so much worse than I originally viewed them as, simply by being so much better at the functional aspects of being a show while barely being a better complete product than the previous episode.

Now, all that being said, we have to talk about Sharon Carter (played by Emily VanCamp from Revenge and The Resident) who comes back into the MCU with a splash. She is the star of this episode, between her absolutely amazing screen presence to the way she both feeds into and feeds off of the larger world of Mandripoor that she is existing in. With how naturally she fits into the seedy yet captivating realm of Mandripoor, the shifts that her character has taken offscreen feel natural. On the other hand, the fact that she feels natural in the world as a pre-established character ends up making Mandripoor feel like a grounded place that exists in this world, despite being a completely made up place. This balancing act hinges on the symbiotic relationship between Sharon and Mandripoor, and this show manages to pull it off. On top of that, Sharon is such a better presence in the fight scenes that we actually have the first truly engaging fight scene in the entirety of the series, though that falls away when it becomes a strict gunfight rather than letting Jess Durham’s (Emily VanCamp’s stunt double) skill in the close combat action.

Then we have Zemo, who ends up also working to seal up the hole that has been felt within the action scenes, and some of that credit must go to Daniel Brühl’s stunt actor Caine Sinclair. The character, portrayed by either Daniel or Caine, has such a strong physical presence in the scenes that your eyes are drawn to him even when he isn’t speaking. Then he starts talking and he becomes a fantastic counterpoint for our leads, and in the end, a much more interesting presence. That in of itself ends up exposing a foundational weakness in this show, where the actual characters we are supposed to be rooting for are far less interesting to engage with than the side characters that we know from previous experience that we are supposed to be rooting against. Now, while it is entirely possible for them to do a full face turn for Zemo, I find that highly unlikely, but once again, this is going to be an aspect of the show that will adjust as the full view of the series comes into focus.

Now, I’m going to take a second to explain terminology that I use. Face and Heel are two terms that I have stolen from wrestling, as I have found them to be more useful descriptors than hero and villain when it comes to talking out storytelling. This is because they end up having much simpler meanings that are also devoid of the moral factor that can sometimes make hero and villain bad descriptors. Face is just the person that you are supposed to root for, and the heel is the person you are supposed to be booing.

Thus, when we get into this situation where Karli (played by Erin Kellyman from Solo and Raised by Wolves) who is currently being depicted as a heel, and Zemo, a character who has traditionally been a heel, are both making great points that are important to be heard. In Karli’s case, speaking about how violence is the only way to get your point even heard a point that is a little too true to ignore in the current state of the public news cycle. In Zemo’s case, it’s his small speech on how we make people into icons and forget their faults, something that this society consistently does from the level of influencers all the way up to basically every president we’ve had for my entire lifetime. In turn, by putting the words through the mouths of the heels, they are vilifying them. That in turn, makes me opposed to the viewpoint of the show, in a sense, thus, untethering me from the reality that the show is trying to present. I cannot sink into and just enjoy this show because of the way they present these things, and to be uncritical of these things, alongside other things this show has done like their costuming (which I will not be letting go of) is to be complicit in a non-functional status quo that this show is advocating in favor of.

Now, that isn’t to say that this show isn’t also above villainizing its representation of global power, in the fact that is has continually showed US Agent to be actively at odds with the common people, with the opening scene actively throwing shade at the United States and their habit of playing global police. Instead, the show seeks to push the perspective that the right way is to leave the deciding of global right and wrong in the hands of these symbolic people, aka superheroes, a thing which Zemo has already been actively criticizing in a compelling fashion. This ends up leaving the show at odds with itself in ways that are down to perspective and performance more than anything else, which has caused major issues for this episode.

Then we have the ending, which is the closest to an actually effective cliffhanger that this show has gotten to. While it doesn’t quite have the feel of the actively game changing cliffhangers that WanderVision created, it is still something that leaves a hook behind that will create interesting drama heading into the next episode. The implications of which end up being a lot more, ‘how will they get out of this situation,’ and less the much more compelling, ‘what does this mean and how do we need to reevaluate what we already know’. This show really has been suffering from being the follow-up to WandaVision as it hasn’t lived up in any regard, but this is probably the regard that it has fallen the furthest behind on.

Overall, this is a major improvement in the actual functional aspects of the show, making it feel much more cohesively an actual TV show, rather than just a long movie. Though, this episode ends up creating those improvements at the detriment of it’s previous offerings rather than making this episode an obviously better complete product. Add this too some of the questionable presentation of political ideas that this show has put forward, which don’t work for me but that quality will vary person to person. This barely feels like an adequate episode of television, one with some of the worst foundations of a show that I have seen function as well as this one does, since the two lead characters are the worst part of the show at this point. 7/10

[calliecat93]

Well didn’t get this done before Chapter Five came out, but I’m still MUCH more caught up than I had been. Good thing they’re going on a six week break here soon since that’ll not only let me catch my barrings... but let my soul have a break, GOOD GOD THESE PAST TWO CHAPTERS HIT HARD!As far this specific chapter goes... boy I did not expect me to shock me as much as it did. So w\let’s not waste anymore time and jump right into it.

Overview

Robyn is recalling a story about Joanna in prison, but neither Jaques or Qrow are all that into. But she does manage to get Qrow to finally smile, as well as notice him still holding Clover’s badge. She apologizes for what happened, which lets Qrow vent about the entire fiasco and how for the first time in so long, it felt like he had made a connection without having to fear his Semblance ruining it. Robyn... actually understands, herself having been ostracized due to her lie detecting Semblance making people fear her revealing their secrets. Harriet and Marrow enter, throwing Watts ack into his cell. Harriet doesn’t believe Qrow declaring his innocence, even when Robyn offers to use her Semblance. Robyn also calls Harriet out on essentially blaming others and not caring about the truth since it’s easier for her to not accept her own blame. Before Harriet can act, Marrow stops her and the speedster storms off/

Back in the tundra, JYR are still giving chase to The Hound, Jaune even launching Ren at it. It doesn’t work and The Hound even calls for backup, summoning more Grimm. It leads to a giant chase sequence, including a new song that IDT has a title yet, but it is dark as Hell. The chase ends with two of the bikes being destroyed, Yang and Jaune almost falling over a cliff until Ren uses his grappling features to save them, and the three are forced to watch as The Hound escapes with Oscar in it’s clutches. Back up in Atlas, RWBNM have gone to, surprisingly, the Schnee Manor to lay low and tend to Nora. Whitley is less than pleased, especially with what Weiss did not even 24 hours ago in-show, but Weiss makes it clear that they’re not leaving and she sends him to his room. As Weiss and May tend to Nora, Blake sees Ruby worried about the others. She suggests that Ruby can still call Yang... but there’s one problem, Ruby already did.

JYR are out of signal range, forcing them to make their way back to Mantle on-foot. During the trek however, Ren’s closed up attitude is flaring up, which eventually causes Yang to get on his case. Ren i9s frustrated due to not just losing Oscar, but everything that has happened. Losing the Relics, Ironwood’s betrayal, the current Grimm attack with Salem just outside the doorstep. Even with yang pointing out their accomplishments and admitting that they have made mistakes but still pulled through, Ren’s anger flares as he points out that they are WAY in over their heads. Jaune tries to calm them both down, but Ren continues to point to how Ruby is leading them despite still being a kid, he himself is an orphan form the middle of nowhere, and the biggest shock is him getting after Jaune for forging his way into Beacon. This shocks everyone, even Ren himself, but Jaune simply says that he’s getting out of the cold and walks on. Yang asks if Ren just wats to push everyone away before following, leaving Ren shocked and upset.

Meanwhile... oh boy, this scene. Oscar wakes up and standing right across from him is Salem. She addresses Ozma and how long it’s been since she’s seen him and... yeah it’s pretty unsettling. Oscar tries to act like Oz, but Salem sees right through it and tries to get Oscar to give her answers. He genuinely doesn’t know where the Beacon Relic is, so Salem tries to get the password to the Lamp out. When he tries to use the ‘out of questions’ ploy... Salem uses her magic to... magically torture him... yeah it’s... rough. Oscar still doesn’t talk, so Salem brings out Hazel... you know, the guy who hayes Oz probably more than anyone and has sworn to kill him? Yeah...

Cinder meets with Salem, taken back by The Hound which Salem calls an experiment. Cinder again tries to convince her to let her go after Penny, but Salem again orders her to stay put. Cinder agrees... well, verbally anyways. But she knows that the heroes are likely going to still try and launch Amity, so sh decides to go for the Maiden Power anyways. Neo is less than thrilled with this plan, but Cinder has another person willing to help her: Emerald.

Back in the tundra, JYR have found shelter for the night and Jaune admits that Ren is correct about how he cheated his way into Beacon. But he’s since realized that he was above his mistake and tries to convince Ren to not push them out, knowing fully well how all that it does is hurt you more. If it did any good, Ren doesn’t show it as he goes to sit outside. Yang has found a part to fix the bike and also assures Jaune that she knows that he worked hard to get to where he is now. She starts working on the part before asking Jaune if ‘she’ thinks any less of her. Jaune, assuming that she means Ruby, assures her that they’re sisters and will be fine... but Yang was talking about a certain cat girl. Our episode ends here... but not before showing us the ice nearby beginning to crack... thanks a lot CRWBY!

Review

Like I said in the intro, I didn’t expect this chapter to shock me like it did. Did I expect intensity? Of course, especially after the last chapter? Did I expect what we got? Nope, but it was perfect!

Let’s talk about Ren first. Ever since last volume, it’s been clear that he’s been unraveling. He wasn’t engaging in Nora’s antics anymore, was more closed up than usual, seemed in agreement with Ironwood at one point, and of course his mini-breakdown in the finale Not even Nora and him kissing helped, heck considering what happened after it only seemed to make him worse. Even now he’s at serious odds with Nora for the first time since childhood, something that is clearly bothering him despite him keeping it to the chest. He’s trying to keep his focus on his duty, but with everything going more and more wrong, the facade is not only shattering, but the cracks are causing him to push those close to him away.

His argument with Yang was a tense moment. I like it though. Not only for more unique character dynamics, but out of every character Yang will lay it out as it is. If Ren’s going to have an attitude problem, then she will call it out and not give a damn about the reason why. Since Nora can’t get though to him, the harsher approach is kind of the only thing left. Ren’s breakdown was hard to watch... and he is right to an extent. They are in over their heads. Their decision, even if the right one morally, is creating more problems and endanger more lives. Ruby is still a kid and she’s placed far too much on herself. I think he is underestimating himself and the others about not being ready, but his concerns are completely understandable and he has some good, if harsh, points.

But then he brings up Jaune cheating his way into beacon. Yeah, been a while since that came up, huh? I actually gasped when that came up. While Ren clearly didn’t mean for that to come out, the fact that he did when pointing out that they’re way over their heads does display at least some doubts he has about his leader. JNR have grown close over the past few volumes, Ren and Nora essentially considering Jaune family by the time of Volume 6. So hearing this was hard, especially since all that Jaune was doing was trying to calm him and Yang down.

I do, however, like how Jaune reacted. Back in the early volumes, he likely would have taken it as a blow to his confidence and gotten huffy about it. Now? While the blow clearly stung, he keeps himself in check and keeps focus on finding shelter. Then once there, he outright admits that Ren’s right and tries to comfort him. He tries to advise him on opening up and how closing yourself off doesn’t help. Considering that he tried this both in V1 when we found out how he cheated and after Pyrrha died and only getting better when he allowed others to help, he absolutely knows how Ren feels. But the fat that he handled this so maturely and tried to help his friend instead of get angsty about it shows how much he’s grown. It’s really nice to see.

Now let’s talk about Weiss and Whitley. So this got some... mixed reception. Some were upset about Weiss pointing her weapon and Whitley and her general harsh behavior towards him this chapter. Now I do understand the first part since I was similarly annoyed at Yang for threatening Qrow in Volume Six when all that he was trying to do was be reasonable about the Lamp. It was likely too harsh, but in farness Weis sis not only trying to help save the kingdom, but one of her teammates is in critical condition and she has no time for Whitley to be angry at her. The Manor is the safest place at the moment, and she needs to get Nora care now. Not saying it’s a justification, but it isn’t her being mean for the sake of it either.

But even so... guys I’m sorry, but do you seriously expect Weiss to suddenly forgive and coddle Whitley this soon? After years of him belittling her and rubbing his success in her face while she was punished, not to mention seeming more concerned about the family reputation than the current conflict? I’m sorry , but it’s not that simple. Yes, Whitley is also a victim who was manipulated and groomed by his father and unlike Weiss, he was never able to get a proper support system or have any family to help like how Weiss had Winter. I do feel bad for him, and I do think that Weiss will take her mother’s words form the last volume and will help Whitley later in the volume. But they’ve both hurt each other. Whitley by treating Weiss badly, and Weiss not giving him support like she was given. They’re both victims AND hurt each other. Some try to paint it as one is problematic and the other is an innocent child, and that’s simply untrue. They’re only going to realize that if and when they talk out their problems with each other out, it’s just a matter of when it’ll be. It takes time to mend these kinds of things, sadly.

Next is the villains scene... ho boy. So I’m gonna wait on Cinder for the next chapter, but her ignoring Salem in favor of power isn’t a shock at all. No, let’s discuss Oscar. Just... this poor, poor kid. He’s trying to be brave, but seeing him get tortured and especially the screaming?! Aaron Dismuke, why do this to me you jerk?! I do admire him for trying it imitate Oz and keep his composure, but it was just so... brutal to watch. Salem doing it so calmly and being perfectly willing to wait for the answers since she can just make Oscar suffer is... well, evil. And don’t think I missed her with the shadow versions of her daughters. Some say that humanizes her, but since she remorsefully tortured a child and sicked an emotionally unstable brute to physically harm him without a care in the world... no. It didn’t excuse Ironwood, and it sure as Hell isn’t excusing Salem. Tis just makes her all the more terrifying.

Okay... last thing is that scene at the end. The Bumblebee implication scene. So... I won’t lie it did annoy me at first. Before anyone says anything, it was NOT because of hating the ship or anything stupid like that. I’m not a huge Bumblebee fan, but anyone who keeps saying there’s nothing there at this point is living in denial. It’s happening people and since at least Volume 6, I think they’ve been doing it pretty well. My issue is mainly just because... we’ve had plenty of Bumblebee content. Volume 7 had them together in pretty much every scene, and I just don’t like having a pair of characters limited like that. I had the same issue with Renora, especially in Volumes 1-3, and with shipping in general. The main reason though is that I want there to be some more focus on Ruby and Yang because I feel like it’s been a long time and that there is a genuine conflict between them that can bring some interesting things for both. I’m not saying they need to be at each other’s throats, but siblings DO argue and no, it doesn’t always get easily resolved and I am speaking form experience here. To be fair it could happen later and Ruby herself hasn’t been pondering on it that much either. Heck Blake seemed more concerned about it than either of them have. But I would like to see more than just the one pair that I’ve already seen focused on plenty of times because it’s limiting. That’s just a personal thing though and I’ve always enjoyed sibling stuff more than romance, so yeah just a me thing.

That being said, those saying that Yang doesn’t care about Ruby need to calm down. No, that is NO the case. Did we forget Yang trying to console a broke Ruby despite her own grief just last volume? Mere hours ago in-show at that? Despite what I said above and while she’s clearly concerned after Ruby’s recent choices, Yang still loves and ultimately trusts her sister. She never said that she didn’t think that Ruby would fail or was wasting her time, she just felt like Mantle needed them more and the consequences to trying were too much. Heck this is a spoiler, but considering her reaction in the next chapter, it only reinforces that belief. At least with Blake, this is the first time they’ve willingly split apart and Yang clearly still has some abandonment issues and concerns. Plus... yeah, it’s natural when you have feelings for someone to worry if they made a bad choice that may make them doubt them. Blake won’t, but it’s understandable. Heck, Blake was clearly concerned about Yang when trying to get Ruby to call. I think she was trying to comfort Ruby as well with the suggestion, but it was still pretty evident... also Ruby and Blake interaction, yay! Still yeah guys, let’s just... chill a little bit and see what more comes of anything.

Okay, got that out of my system, and I apologize if it came across wrong. Whatever annoyance I had I’m over anyways, especially after the recent chapter. Anyways, the chapter had so much good. Plus we not only had a badass chase sequence, but a new song! Again, IDK the title, but it was another banger for sure. The opening scene with row and Robyn bonding and Robyn calling out Harriet was great. Marrow’s subtle expressions showing how not okay he is, and I’m seriously hoping that he may be the one to free the others. It would be a really good move for his character in him deciding that being lawful doesn’t equal the right thing, and making it right especially considering his interaction with Robyn last volume. The animation was good with the backgrounds looking fantastic, the pacing has been on fire, and of course that ominous ending. God they’re trying to keep us on edge, and I love it!

Chapter Stats

Favorite Character: Lie Ren Favorite Scene: Ren losing it in the tundra Least Favorite Scene: Probably the wrong term, but seeing Oscar be tortured while well done was hard. Favorite Voice Actor: Neath Oum (Ren Favorite Animation: JYR chasing The Hound Rating: 9.9/10

Final Thoughts

This was fantastic, especially in the character department. I haven’t been this shocked in a good while. It hurt no doubt, but the writing and voice performances were so well done. Seriously, this is probably Neath’s best performance to date. Add in the great animation, the tone being on point, and the set-ups with the Schnee Manor and cracking ice and the fact that this is only Chapter Four is crazy. But it’s only going to get crazier people... oh so, so much crazier. Only one review to go until I’m back to being caught up... my poor heart XD

[killscreencinema]

Final Fantasy VII Remake (PS4)

We all have a precious work of art in our lives that made a profound impact on who we eventually grew up to be, whether it be an album, a painting, a movie, or especially nowadays, a video game.  Final Fantasy VII was that for me, and when it came out in 1997, it would go on to define my high school years.

Which would go a long way towards explaining why I never got laid during those said years.  Le sigh....

All kidding aside, I never got laid in high school mostly because I was a mess when it came to the social scene.  I had trouble connecting with others and taking what I perceived to be “big risks” like going to parties, joining after school clubs, or -GULP- asking out a girl I liked!  I was very withdrawn socially, but I did have friends, and one of them, whom I’d consider my best friend, managed to get his hands on the original Final Fantasy VII before I even owned a PlayStation (I had foolishly bought a Nintendo 64, believing the next Final Fantasy was going to be released on that). 

My friend and I were already very close, but we bonded even more as we experienced this new adventure together.  He had his own save file that he was pecking away at, but he created a new one for us both to play whenever I’d spend the night or vice versa.  The both of us were completely immersed in this world and these characters.  It was one of a few positive experiences I can remember from my high school years.

The reason for this preamble is to make you understand how much this game means to me on an emotional level.  So when the remake was announced years ago, I was extremely apprehensive.  First of all, Square Enix is a pale shadow of its former glory as Squaresoft.  Final Fantasy XIII was a goddamn mess and Final Fantasy XV was a step in the right direction, but hardly the stuff of legends like its PSone and SNES predecessors.  The Kingdom Hearts games... well, I’ll eventually talk about the rest of those in my blog.  Suffice it to say, I had completely lost faith in Square Enix as a company, whereas there was a day I’d play ANYTHING they released because I knew it would be quality.

So lets get to point - did they fuck up Final Fantasy VII Remake as well or is it an absolute masterpiece? 

Well... that’s kind of a hard question to answer right now as this is only “Part 1″ of what I assume will be a trilogy of releases that comprise the actual FULL game.  However, judging this game alone, I’m going to lean towards masterpiece... with huge “but”.  I’ll talk more about that below and warn of spoilers before I get to it.

Make no mistake about it, though, Final Fantasy VII Remake (part 1) is a goddamn masterpiece.  The care put into the game by the development team is evident from top-to-bottom, with even the most minute details from the original faithfully adapted.  However, this isn’t a strict beat-for-beat retread of FFVII, nor did I expect it to be.  While the game follows the basic story almost exactly, some tweaks have been made here or there to better pad out both the gameplay and the story as a whole.  I had no issue with any of these changes, until the final chapter revealed the implications of them, which I guess I’ll discuss next to get it off my chest...

SPOILERS

During the last chapter, your party is confronted by Sephiroth outside of Midgar, who then goads you into entering the “Singularity”, where you finally fight the ghostly “Whispers” who have been stalking you throughout the whole game.  These Whispers are a significant part of the new story “tweaks” that have been added, which I found annoying at first, but didn’t really mind so much as the story went on until now, because it is revealed that they are “arbiters of destiny”, whose jobs are to ensure fate plays out like its supposed to.  During your fight with them at the end of the game, after defeating each Whisper boss, the characters experience “flash forwards” to important story points in the future, such as Aerith’s death and the summoning of meteor, implying that they have more or less nullified these events now as a result of defeating “destiny”... I think.  Part of my problem with this portion of the game is Square Enix’s current “naval gazey, head-up-their-asses” story telling style is in full effect here, and I began to get Vietnam flashbacks to the completely incoherent plot of Final Fantasy XIII. 

Square Enix, it’s so simple - part of why Final Fantasy VII endures is because it’s a great story ALREADY.  By all means, give it a tweak here and there to give the characters more depth or make the story more dramatically impactful, but for the love of Jenova, please don’t tell me it’s going to turn into a philosophical shit show about the nature of destiny and fighting fate.  More importantly, Square Enix, please don’t tell me you are going to change CRITICAL plot points for shits n’ giggles or to “swerve” the audience.

For one, Aerith has to die. I love Aerith, especially his incarnation of Aerith in the Remake.  She’s so sweet and yet has a delightfully mischievous personality.  She’s absolutely perfect.  But the reason why her death still haunts fans of the game to this day is because THAT was the point in the story when shit got REAL.  The stakes were raised and Sephiroth cements himself as an evil son-of-a-bitch that must be stopped.  He doesn’t kill her just to be evil either - he kills her because she’s actively trying to foil his plans by using her white materia.  However, unbeknownst to Sephiroth, her death is what ultimately triggers the white materia to work when it needs to most.  It’s kind of like how Obi-Wan Kenobit warns Darth Vader “If you strike me down, I’ll become more powerful than you an imagine”, but in this instance it actually makes sense.

So that has to happen.  It can’t be Tifa, or Yuffie, or Cid, or Marlene, or some other swervy “gotcha” bullshit - it has to be Aerith. 

Secondly, Sephiroth must successfully summon the meteor - it’s in the fucking logo for crying out loud!  I can’t imagine what “imminent threat” for the whole world they could do instead.  Fat Chocobo gains a massive amount of weight and jumps on Midgar?  It’s baffling to imagine the developers would even *flirt* with the idea of changing these important story elements of the game, so hopefully we’ve all just hysterically misinterpreted the meaning of the last chapter.

Oh, one more thing - the final boss fight with Sephiroth was dumb too, if only because it cheapens the eventual actual final boss fight with him at the end of the game.  I liked how in the original he was basically a phantom that kept evading your party, leaving behind Jenova pieces for you to fight instead.  It’s like how in wrestling, a heel character talks tough, but then runs away when the “baby face” comes out to confront him.  Fighting Sephiroth now, not to mention beating him, kind of makes him look weak sauce.  Ohh legendary SOLDIER, my ass - I beat him at the beginning of the whole story.  To borrow from Star Wars again, it would be like Luke fighting Darth Vader in A New Hope and kicking his ass immediately.  Vader sure wouldn’t seem like much of a threat after that.

Anyway..

SPOILERS OVER

God, sorry, this review is out of control and much too long, but I have a lot to say!

Okay, so my worries above aside, the game itself is very well done.  The graphics are beautiful, despite the environment being a constant barrage of grey, industrial imagery (hey, that’s Midgar for ya).  They find ways to change things up visually, depending on what part of Midgar you’re in, such as Sector 5 having more greenery than usual (cause, you know, it’s Aerith’s home, so that makes sense!).  Wall Market, the “red light district” of Midgar, is a treat for the senses, especially at night, what with all the lights and the music playing everywhere.  It really feels like a lively, party town. 

One major change that had me, and probably a lot of FFVII purists, concerned is the combat system.  Gone is the turn based combat of old, replaced now with a more fast paced hack-n-slash style reminiscent of a From Software game than Final Fantasy (though not even as remotely as sophisticated).  However, I enjoyed the change, as this makes the battles much more engaging and fun, as opposed to the tedium that can come with turn-based combat, not to mention random encounters.  You can still use magic, items, and Limit Breaks like in the old days, so it still feels like the original, but with tweaks that make it better.

And you know, that pretty much sums up my super long review nicely - the game feels like the original but with tweaks that make it better.  Even the soundtrack is improved, which is a feat I didn’t think possible considering the original FFVII’s soundtrack is some of the best video game movie ever composed.  The Remake does a superb job of weaving in certain themes and remixing themes at appropriate points in the story.  “Aerith’s Theme” is more tear jerking than ever, while “One Chosen by the Planet” (otherwise known as Sephiroth’s theme) is even more chilling and fearsome than ever before. 

So overall, I fucking loved this game.  I rarely get emotional while playing video games, unless you consider cursing and screaming “emotional”, but damned if this one didn’t constantly give me warm and fuzzy feelings (especially whenever Tifa was onscreen - *growl*).  I’m eager to play the next part and explore more of this “new” world, despite my concern it might be “too new” in the worst ways.

[overthinkingkdrama]

Hi! So, I’ve just recently gotten into K-Dramas, and... I have a small issue, and that is though I LOVE them in the beginning, by the end they always disappoint me? Like, they start lighthearted and fun, and then by the end suddenly everyone’s in mortal peril, and I don’t care? Or they start all fantasy, and then it’s all about the romance in the end? So... Could you possibly recommend me ones that are good, or tone consistent, throughout? Please?

Hi! Thanks for dropping by for recs. These are some of my favorite asks. I just love going back through my watch list and finding dramas that fit a given criteria. It gets more fun the more dramas I've seen.

The thing about Kdramas that makes them a uniquely sticky beast is that many of them are live-shot week to week, at least for part of their run, and often the scripts are not fully written before filming begins. Popular Kdramas will also occasionally receive extensions which can cause further pacing and plot issues and (sometimes) cause a story to sputter out entirely. With the increasing prevalence of entirely preproduced dramas there's been an increase in overall drama quality and consistency in past years. That being said, Kdramas are still a decidedly mixed bag in terms of overall production quality. So it pays to either drop things with extreme prejudice if you stop enjoying them and watch widely, or to have a good drama filter friend (like me!) to give you vetted recs. As a genre a lot of the more "classic" feeling dramas have a tendency to start really light hearted and then swing super dramatic in the latter half. That's something I occasionally like, but lucky for you not all dramas are like that!

Your ask doesn't really tell me what genre of Kdrama most appeals to you, so I went through my list and tried to find you wide a variety of dramas that I think of as being well-paced and tonally consistent throughout. I've also tried to limit myself to dramas that I rated highly on MDL, although my primary criteria was "good and tonally consistent" so this list of dramas is kinda all over the map. But then, so are my tastes. Also, I kinda got the impression from your ask that you're not a fan of the uber-melodramatic side of kdramas and you want something a little more restrained and less soapy, so I tried to steer away from those more makjang dramas but did not entirely succeed, lol. I gave a couple sentences of description so you can more readily narrow down what you're interested in, and if you would like a more thorough review of the dramas some of these have full reviews on my blog which I went ahead linked where they exist.

Age of Youth: A well written slice-of-life ensemble drama about a group of 5 college age women who end up boarding together. There are a couple moments of high drama/trauma toward the end of the show that might be a turn off. But other than the finale the tone is consistent. 9/10 

Arang and the Magistrate: A dark fantasy fusion sageuk with a romance. I included this drama because it does a good job of developing the creepy worldbuilding and fantasy throughout. Though at points it can be a bit slow and the special effects are hella cheesy. 8/10

Argon: A tight, journalism driven suspense drama. Not always my genre but I found it very engaging, and at eight episodes it does not overstay its welcome. 8/10

Be Melodramatic: Another female-centric slice-of-life ensemble drama, though with an emphasis on fourth wall breaking comedy and clever dialogue. Very funny and heartfelt.  8.5/10

Cheese in the Trap: Maybe a controversial inclusion, but I very much enjoyed this drama. A slice-of-life college romance with psychological thriller elements. Some critics felt that the drama focused too heavily on the second male lead in the later half of the story, but YMMV. 8.5/10

Coffee Prince: Classic cross-dressing romance and still probably the best of its kind. A wonderfully nuanced and progressive handling of the subject matter, even after 13 years. Deals with serious subjects but doesn't go too melo with it. 8.5/10

Children of Nobody: My best of 2019, a dark psychological thriller about a child psychiatrist and a police detective who have to confront gray morality while attempting to track down a serial killer who only targets unrepentant child abusers. 9.5/10

Ex-Girlfriend Club: On the lighter side, a friends-to-lovers type romantic comedy about the writer of an autobiographical webtoon who has to figure out a way to get along with a group of his ex-girlfriends to make a movie based on his work. Only 12 episodes. 8.5/10

Go Back Couple: Also only 12 episodes (these shorter dramas tend to be better paced I find) a time-slip drama about a divorced couple who get the chance to relive their twenties and end up realizing they still have feelings for each other. This drama is both very funny and it had me bawling on multiple occasions. 9.5/10

Healer: A favorite of a lot of drama fans, this is an action-focused romance about an awkward soft boy with a secret identity as a highly skilled errand boy to criminals and an intrepid tabloid reporter who is his biggest fan. This drama is pretty tropey, but it's fun and the romance is great. 8.5/10

Hello Monster (aka I Remember You): A police procedural with a background love line about a criminal profiler looking for his lost brother and a detective looking for her father's murderer. One of my personal favorites. 10/10

Hit the Top (aka The Best Hit): A time-slip fish-out-of-water comedy about a 90s pop star who winds up in modern day Seoul and ends up befriending his biological son and meets old friends who his disappearance left in the lurch. 9/10

Incomplete Life (aka Misaeng): A realistic office drama that gave me real world work anxiety, focusing on a failed Go player who winds up an intern at a highly competitive shipping company and has to find a way to earn his keep even without the background and college education of his coworkers. Unbelievably well done ensemble drama. 9/10

Just Between Lovers: A romantic melodrama about two people whose lives were irrevocably changed by a tragic mall collapse that nearly killed them as children, meeting again as adults and finding comfort and healing in each other. A rough sit at times, but a wonderful love story with incredible acting. 9/10

Just Dance: High school, slice-of-life, drama about a dance club in a technical high school and a group of working class kids who reluctantly become involved in this club and befriend each other. Only 8 episodes (or 16 thirty minute episodes, depending on how you recon it.) 8.5/10

Life on Mars: Remake of the British show of the same name, this is a surreal time-slip police drama, about a forensics expert who gets shot in the head and wakes up in 1988. Or does he? He could also be dying on an operating table. It's hard to tell. Dark, suspenseful and trippy. 9/10

Matrimonial Chaos: An off-beat comedy about two dysfunctional couples who become inescapably mixed up in each others lives. One that's having a hard time getting divorced and another that's having a hard time getting married, and all the messy weird emotions that go along with that. This is another one of those, makes you laugh/makes you cry throughout dramas I have an affinity for. 9/10

Moment of Eighteen: A heartfelt high school drama about a straightforward but awkward loner who is forced to transfer to a new school, immediately earns the ire of a powerful student and experiences first love. Not my usual thing, but very well written with complex and likeable characters. 8/10

Mother: A cold and socially isolated woman becomes a temporary teacher and upon discovering one of her students is being severely abused and neglected, decides to pose as the child's mother and go on the run with her. Like Children of Nobody, this can be a bit of a rough watch because of the subject matter but it is very well done. 9.5/10

My Mister: A healing, human drama about a structural engineer in his 40s and a debt-ridden young woman in her 20s who end up crossing paths and saving each other from a miserable existence. My current all time favorite drama. Cannot say enough good things about it. Practically perfect in every way. 10/10

One Spring Night: A very restrained and naturalistic slow-burn romance about a woman who is about to get married and suddenly begins to question her relationship and a single father who had given up on love who find themselves irresistibly drawn to one another. 9/10

Prison Playbook: An ensemble slice-of-life drama centered on prisoners and correctional officers in their day to day lives. I find the actual het romances in this drama totally useless, but it's a large and talented cast playing a variety of lovable characters. 8/10

Psychopath Diary: Recent fave. A screwball black comedy about a mild mannered pushover who loses his memory and finds a diary that convinces him he's a psychopathic murderer, which gives him a huge boost of confidence from his new found identity, much to the chagrin of those around him and the actual owner of the diary himself. 8.5/10

Queen In Hyun's Man: A drama about a Joseon scholar who time travels to modern day Seoul and meets an actress who just landed a part playing the queen he served in the past. This one might be on the border line of too dramatic or tonally inconsistent, but it's got one of the most pitch perfect finales in Kdramas and the 45 min episodes keep it a snappy watch that doesn't drag or meander too much. 8/10

Reply 1988: A late 80s nostalgia drama about a group of families who all live off the same alley. Lovely family drama, comedy with a variety of romances. Long ass episodes especially later in the run, but I have rewatched the whole thing and I loved every minute of this show. 9.5/10

Save Me: A dark drama about a young woman who finds herself forced into a dangerous cult by her family, and is desperate to escape, and a group of 4 local young men who try to help her. One of the more unique and well done OCN thrillers. 9/10

School 2013: High school ensemble drama that launched a whole bunch of careers. In general I avoid school dramas (I know there have been three on this list so far, but those are like the only three, lol) but this show got me so invested in all these students and teachers. Also the two male leads are so shippable. 9.5/10

Secret Love Affair: A romantic melodrama about a piano prodigy from an underprivileged background who catches the eye of a married older woman and the two fall into a passionate affair. This drama involves cheating (obviously) but it's beautifully filmed and written and the music is to die for. 9.5/10

Signal: This is a supernatural crime thriller and a perennial favorite in the Kdrama community. An imbittered criminal profiler finds an antique police radio which allows him to speak with a police detective 15 years in the past, and uses this to crack cold cases and try to prevent brutal crimes from ever happening. 9/10

Six Flying Dragons: This one is a bit different from the others on the list, first of all because it's a more traditional historical drama, and secondly because it 50 episodes long. But it is so, so very good. And if you're looking for overall consistency in terms of storytelling and tone this drama has it in spades. 9/10

SKY Castle: A unique melodrama about a group of affluent competitive mothers who will go to any lengths to get they're children into the best medical schools, and a mysterious school coordinator with shady motives who gets brought in as a ringer to give them an edge. This show is kind of hard to sell but very entertaining and watchable. 7.5/10

Stranger (aka Secret Forest): The story of a stalwart prosecutor who, due to a childhood trauma is unable to feel the full spectrum of emotions, works with a bighearted police detective to root out corruption around a series of murders. This one’s rather cerebral and requires your full attention but the leads are amazing and there's a second season coming out this year I'm very much looking forward to! 9/10

The Nokdu Flower: Another sageuk drama about the latter years of the Joseon Dynasty surrounding three people who fall on different sides during the Donghak Peasant rebellion. Incredibly well written and involving historical drama. If you're not sure you're ready to commit to something like Six Flying Dragons, I think this would be another good entry point into the genre. The acting is amazing. 9/10

The Smile Has Left Your Eyes: A romantic melodrama and psychological thriller about a dangerous enigmatic young man on the cusp of becoming either a human being or a monster. He becomes involved in a fraught relationship with the sister of a police detective at the same time her protective older brother begins to focus on him as the prime suspect for a murder. High key moody and tragic if you're into that kind of thing (I am). 9/10

Touch Your Heart: On the complete other end of the drama spectrum, this show is pure unadulterated fluff, which managed to keep me giggling and swooning throughout the run, even though it's typically not my thing. An actress joins a law office as research for a role and falls for the ace attorney she's assisting. 8.5/10

WATCHER: Another OCN thriller about three different people with shady motivations who are connected to the same murder case and become involve in a corruption task force looking into dirty cops. One of those "trust nobody, everyone's a suspect" dramas with lovely complex characters and a fully engaging plot. 8.5/10

Sorry that got so out of hand! This is what happens when you don't give me a little more direction I guess. These are all dramas I quite enjoyed and I believe you will find something in there that will suit your fancy. This is a pretty accurate cross section of my tastes.

Happy watching!

Jona

[everydisneymovie]

Review #37: Old Yeller

Post #41

8/3/2020

Next up is 1957′s Old Yeller

Enjoyment : [6]

I was very torn on giving this movie any more than a 5. While this movie is engrossing, it is also very placid. It isn’t boring, but the exciting scenes are spaced out just enough that it threatened to get boring a few too many times for my comfort. Once it is all said and done though, this movie engages you enough to see it through to the end, and there is enough effort put into the acting and writing that it isn’t without value. I think it deserves most of the praise it has gotten over the years, it was certainly one of the best Disney movies I have seen in months.

Quality : [5]

There isn’t much to write home about in terms of the nitty gritty film making. Some shots are reused to save time and I assume, to keep the animals safe. The camera does a decent job showing the action when moments get tense, and the music accents important moments. There isn’t anything glaringly wrong with the craft behind this movie, and the way the story is structured is actually rather smooth once you look at the theming. However I just can’t find any exceptional and so it just sorta lingers comfortably in the ‘average’ category.

Hold up : [4]

There isn’t anything terribly offensive about this movie overall, which is a huge relief. There is a very tiny moment towards the end where the father gives the younger son an Indian feathered headdress and he runs around with a tomahawk making whopping noises, but it is like 2 seconds and right at the very end. There is a noticeable softness to this movie, and I think this is 100% due to the core cast being a mother and two very young sons. There are barely any men around to strut around and make toxic comments and it ends up making the movie a real refreshing experience when compared to some of the other machismo movies on this list. The violence towards animals is lighter this time around? There are several scene where Old Yeller is clearly actually fighting a bear, pig, bull and finally a wolf. They actually let the animals like, fight and smack each other around and it really felt uncomfortable. However from what I can find most of the animals were trained and there is at the very least some editing trickery to keep the animals safe for more risky shots. Still, you are on thin fucking ice Disney I have seen too many animals die in your movies to trust you anymore.

Risk : [6]

I think the reason Old Yeller stands the test of time, is that it has a clear thesis from the start that all other scenes exist to support. It is honestly a little jarring to see a Disney movie actually have a structure and a basic narrative, since 90% of the movies on this list just meander about aimlessly and then end. The entire movie centers around Travis being without his father for the first time in his life, the expectations to be the ‘man of the house’ and his fear of the larger world. It is a coming of age story, and his relationship with Old Yeller is a microcosm of his acceptance of adulthood. He is shown to be hostile to others mostly out of fear, and when he opens up, even a troublesome mutt like Old Yeller can be a friend and ally. Old Yeller having to be put down at the end is a big narrative risk, and it actually serves a purpose for Travis as a character. This movie had a tiny nugget of a risk and it really paid off, and it even got me to feel something for the briefest moment. 

Extra Credit : [3]

The movie is very charming in places, and the episodic nature of Travis and Yeller running around the farm solving and/or causing problems is rather fun. I liked that a lot of narrative questions are answered by the movie, and there is decent set up and pay off for certain element like the hydrophobia or the boar catching. I felt tension in some scenes and the movie ultimately works as a small little slice of growing up in the wild west and the everyday hardships of pioneers. 

Final thoughts:

Good on ya Disney, you made a decent film. I think this movie is one of the better live action movies I have seen on this list, I still like 20,000 leagues and Treasure Island due to their larger scale and more bombastic storytelling, but for a small intimate movie about a boy and his dog this is perfectly fine. I feel like all those crappy westerns I had to slog through were practice for this. A smaller cast and a smaller setting was just what they needed. Old Yeller dying is a sad scene to be sure, but it only works because of how much we get to know all the little nuances of this dog throughout the film and how much he matters to Travis’s character arc. Old Yeller is more lovable as a dog since he bites and barks and knocks stuff over and steals food. He isn’t trying to be adorable all the time, he is a dumb flawed animal and learning to love others in spite of, or because of their flaws is a lesson Travis needs to learn as he grows up. I feel like Old Yeller is a perfect movie to show to kids when you need an introduction to darker and more mature media. It is a fun movie about hijinx on a farm, but it doesn’t really sugar coat anything the way you’d expect from Disney and I think that is why so many people remember this movie and were so effect by the final few scenes. I don’t think this movie earns a *diamond in the rough* award but it is still worth watching if you haven’t seen it before. It is perfectly fine.

Total Score: 24/50

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[mbtiofwhys]

How Ni and Ne (don't) binge watch

Premise

MBTI is a serious topic for us mods and we always put our best effort writing articles for this blog. However, we also find entertaining to write in a more light way about how MBTI shows off in real life. This article is one of those: we won’t discuss deeply about theory, but we’ll rather talk about our experiences with binging works of various media, be them books, videogames or tv shows. We love typing fictional characters since we also love works of fiction. Listening to other high Ni and Ne users we found an interesting correlation between those two function and media consumption, especially regarding the topic of binging. So, this isn’t hard science, it's simply a light reflection that 200% comes from our experiences. That being said, we hope this article will be relatable and intriguing. 

Ni dom and binge

INFJ mod here. This may sound counterintuitive, but even if Ni is known to be a function about searching for deeper meanings, discarding options and focusing on the few remaining, I approach works of fictions with a “multitasking” method. What do I mean? Well, I’m not the kind of person who will just sit down and watch an entire season of a tv show, even if it’s the best I ever seen (there are few exception to this rule, works like Persona 5 Royal which I heavily binged. With no regrets). I simply prefer to watch a little amount of episodes, or read few chapters of a book, for example, and then stop, thus having time to reflect on what I saw or read. I just need time to process all of the data and feelings, otherwise I’ll just hit the wall of information overload.

Even if they’re just my attempt to find a correlation between high Ni and all those aspects, I’d like to talk about what the causes of this behaviours may be, with a MBTi perspective.

Binging may be hard for Ni users since they need time to analyze things, putting them in their abstract subjective system. This means, in other words, that the higher the level of complexity is, the longer will be the time needed to absorb it. For example, I can read mindlessly a novel for a mere entertaining value, but if I really like it I’ll just take my time to enjoy the journey, reflecting and talking about my feelings and first impressions to my friends (this is my auxiliary Fe showing, I know).

Ni operates by discarding elements, thus Ni users may reach a point where they simply prefer to stop. This process allows them to elaborate those information, be them characters, facts or emotions (based on personal preferences, for example feelers may tend toward the emotional aspect and T users toward puzzles, mysteries, logical consistency). As I stated above, if I absorb too much data and feelings I’ll just freeze, submerged by the information overload. With works of fiction, I have an underlying fear of missing important aspects of it and the more I read, watch or play, the more I’ll need time to stop and see how all the new things make sense, be them theories, feelings, or simply understanding what’s going on. Even while I’m actively reading/watching/playing I process all the informations as a way to put them into perspective, constantly elaborating them in the back of my mind.

Another personal consideration is: high Ni implies low Se. Low Se may find binging as a form of overstimulation. Moreover Se, in lower positions, requires little stimuli, allowing Ni users to organize the environment (rationally or emotionally through Te or Fe), since high Ni users are J and need a certain amount of control over the environment (Te or Fe) and their feelings or internal logic (Fi or Ti) .

Finally, I think there’s a tendency in high Ni user to consume multiple media, but in small amounts. This isn’t supported by hard evidences, it’s just a trend I noticed talking to friends about the subject. Ni users may prefer to approach different media rather than a single one, splitting their attention and energies through them. So, this is the opposite of binging. Personally, except for few works of fiction which I blindly burned with my passion, I usually switch from a medium to another, a sort of “media multitasking” as a way to “cool down” from one by simultaneously approach another one and still being engaged.

Ne dom and binge

ENFP mod here. I fear I’ll have to repeat the same premise as INFJ mod: This may sound counterintuitive, but even if Ne is known to be a function that works with multitasking and jumps from one topic to the other very quickly, I tend to approach works of fiction by shamelessly binging one and proceeding to be obsessed with it for months (or years.)

This happens especially for the works that end up being my favorites once I finish them - paired with the fact that I usually go through them again at least a second time after I’m finished. It almost feels like that if I’m not binging, I’m not interested/invested enough to care. I binge so much, in fact, that I’ve come to distinguish the ‘soft binge’ from the ‘hard binge’ - where ‘soft’ means a 12 episodes anime in 2-4 days and ‘hard’ means 145 hours of Persona 5 Royal in 3 weeks.

So, how might this work?

Firstly, Ne dom needs stimuli. Constantly. The more, the better. Because external stimuli means more prompts from something that isn’t one’s mind, which causes further reflection, connections and a ton of brainstorming. Ne can connect dots scaringly quickly, and even though proper reflection is appreciated to deepen the subject, connections are often made on the spot. I think it’s very difficult for me to reach a point of information overload - it usually happens with very complex topics and study subjects, for which I need to take a break and write things down into diagrams and lists in order to make proper sense of what I learned. But even in the case of works with heavy and intricate worldbuilding/plot (e.g. Stein’s;Gate, but I’m a sucker for time travel fiction so whichever is fine) I rarely stop watching if something doesn’t add up - I usually understand it later on, or wait for everything to end and search on the internet or talk about it with friends. My only time off is the one between OP/ED (which I NEVER skip and my friends hate me for that.) In that time, I disconnect my brain for 1 minute and 20-ish seconds to recharge.

Ne dom doesn’t have the patience to wait. If it wants answers, it wants them now. Binging is great because it offers both stimuli, questions and answers in a short amount of time. Also, (but maybe this is more of an F thing and for Ti aux might be different) I’m not one to make theories and speculations over fictional works - I might do that, but later, once I’m finished. While I’m enjoying a work, I’m usually so involved that all the theorising is limited to hunches and intuitions. Proper theorising needs time, needs one to stop and reflect on one’s knowledge in order to find hidden meanings and try to predict the outcome. I don’t have the patience to do that. I’m not interested in doing that - I want to know what’s going on, period. The few times I happened to reflect and speculate on a work of fiction were when I watched/read/played the thing simultaneously with some friends and talked to them about it constantly.

Which brings us to: discussing with people. Knowing a work means you’re able to discuss it with others, read reviews and watch video essays and analysis, of course Ne dom wants to devour it as quickly as possible. I literally watched the whole Evangelion (and I mean: the anime, EoE and the 3 rebuilds) in two weeks in order to finally enjoy those sweet, sweet video essays and parody and abridged YouTube wouldn’t stop to suggest me. This may sound silly, but searching discussion topics of the works I went through -even the ones I disliked- is very important to me, because listening to other people’s opinions and prompts is a way to further feed my Ne with different perspectives, viewpoints, things I might have missed while binging.

The problem: the quicker the binge, the more it’s difficult for me to remember details about plot, characters etc that, yet minor, can be important or interesting. Which is kind of the main struggle of having low Si: you know something, but you don’t remember everything you’d need precisely. You can’t pinpoint the scene where a thing happened, you feel you might have already seen a detail but you can’t recollect when and in what circumstances, and the list goes on. And this doesn’t stop once you’ve finished, obviously - it can only get worse. Typing the main Persona 5 cast was such a pain that, during my second playthrough of vanilla P5, I literally had to open a document and write down every single line or detail or plot point that could’ve helped me later. Otherwise, the situation would be: “damn, I know [character] said something alongside the line of [thing that could help me with typing] but I can’t remember what exactly! Let’s spend hours on YT watching walkthrough in order to find by chance the exact scene I’m thinking about.” This may also be why I periodically feel the need to go through my favourite works again: I may know them by heart, but there will always be things that I missed.