#op stay winning

[legitimateluffy]

I clowned myself

[soranatus]

OPLA Season 2 casting calls!

The link:

[lowqualityonepiece]

sniper king wouldn't have missed.

[greenerteacups]

oooh please someday tell us what you think of GOT

oh, no, it's my fatal weakness! it's [checks notes] literally just the bare modicum of temptation! okay you got me.

SO. in order to tell what's wrong with game of thrones you kind of have to have read the books, because the books are the reason the show goes off the rails. i actually blame the showrunners relatively little in proportion to GRRM for how bad the show was (which I'm not gonna rehash here because if you're interested in GOT in any capacity you've already seen that horse flogged to death). people debate when GOT "got bad" in terms of writing, but regardless of when you think it dropped off, everyone agrees the quality declined sharply in season 8, and to a certain extent, season 7. these are the seasons that are more or less entirely spun from whole cloth, because season 7 marks the beginning of what will, if we ever see it, be the Winds of Winter storyline. it's the first part that isn't based on a book by George R.R. Martin. it's said that he gave the showrunners plot outlines, but we don't know how detailed they were, or how much the writers diverged from the blueprint — and honestly, considering the cumulative changes made to the story by that point, some stark divergence would have been required. (there's a reason for this. i'll get there in a sec.)

so far, i'm not saying anything all that original. a lot of people recognized how bad the show got as soon as they ran out of Book to adapt. (I think it's kind of weird that they agreed to make a show about an unfinished series in the first place — did GRRM figure that this was his one shot at a really good HBO adaptation, and forego misgivings about his ability to write two full books in however many years it took to adapt? did he think they would wait for him? did he not care that the series would eventually spoil his magnum opus, which he's spent the last three decades of his life writing? perplexing.) but the more interesting question is why the show got bad once it ran out of Book, because in my mind, that's not a given. a lot of great shows depart from the books they were based on. fanfiction does exactly that, all the time! if you have good writers who understand the characters they're working with, departure means a different story, not a worse one. now, the natural reply would be to say that the writers of GOT just aren't good, or at least aren't good at the things that make for great television, and that's why they needed the books as a structure, but I don't think that's true or fair, either. books and television are very different things. the pacing of a book is totally different from the pacing of a television show, and even an episodic book like ASOIAF is going to need a lot of work before it's remotely watchable as a series. bad writers cannot make great series of television, regardless of how good their source material is. sure, they didn't invent the characters of tyrion lannister and daenerys targaryen, but they sure as hell understood story structure well enough to write a damn compelling season of TV about them!

so but then: what gives? i actually do think it's a problem with the books! the show starts out as very faithful to the early books (namely, A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings) to the point that most plotlines are copied beat-for-beat. the story is constructed a little differently, and it's definitely condensed, but the meat is still there. and not surprisingly, the early books in ASOIAF are very tightly written. for how long they are, you wouldn't expect it, but on every page of those books, the plot is racing. you can practically watch george trying to beat the fucking clock. and he does! useful context here is that he originally thought GOT was going to be a trilogy, and so the scope of most threads in the first book or two would have been much smaller. it also helps that the first three books are in some respects self-contained stories. the first book is a mystery, the second and third are espionage and war dramas — and they're kept tight in order to serve those respective plots.

the trouble begins with A Feast for Crows, and arguably A Storm of Swords, because GRRM starts multiplying plotlines and treating the series as a story, rather than each individual book. he also massively underestimated the number of pages it would take him to get through certain plot beats — an assumption whose foundation is unclear, because from a reader's standpoint, there is a fucke tonne of shit in Feast and Dance that's spurious. I'm not talking about Brienne's Riverlands storyline (which I adore thematically but speaking honestly should have been its own novella, not a part of Feast proper). I'm talking about whole chapters where Tyrion is sitting on his ass in the river, just talking to people. (will I eat crow about this if these pay off in hugely satisfying ways in Winds or Dream? oh, totally. my brothers, i will gorge myself on sweet sweet corvid. i will wear a dunce cap in the square, and gleefully, if these turn out to not have been wastes of time. the fact that i am writing this means i am willing to stake a non-negligible amount of pride on the prediction that that will not happen). I'm talking about scenes where the characters stare at each other and talk idly about things that have already happened while the author describes things we already have seen in excruciating detail. i'm talking about threads that, while forgivable in a different novel, are unforgivable in this one, because you are neglecting your main characters and their story. and don't tell me you think that a day-by-day account tyrion's river cruise is necessary to telling his story, because in the count of monte cristo, the main guy disappears for nine years and comes hurtling back into the story as a vengeful aristocrat! and while time jumps like that don't work for everything, they certainly do work if what you're talking about isn't a major story thread!

now put aside whether or not all these meandering, unconcluded threads are enjoyable to read (as, in fairness, they often are!). think about them as if you're a tv showrunner. these bad boys are your worst nightmare. because while you know the author put them in for a reason, you haven't read the conclusion to the arc, so you don't know what that reason is. and even if the author tells you in broad strokes how things are going to end for any particular character (and this is a big "if," because GRRM's whole style is that he lets plots "develop as he goes," so I'm not actually convinced that he does have endings written out for most major characters), that still doesn't help you get them from point A (meandering storyline) to point B (actual conclusion). oh, and by the way, you have under a year to write this full season of television, while GRRM has been thinking about how to end the books for at least 10. all of this means you have to basically call an audible on whether or not certain arcs are going to pay off, and, if they are, whether they make for good television, and hence are worth writing. and you have to do that for every. single. unfinished. story. in the books.

here's an example: in the books, Quentin Martell goes on a quest to marry Daenerys and gain a dragon. many chapters are spent detailing this quest. spoiler alert: he fails, and he gets charbroiled by dragons. GRRM includes this plot to set up the actions of House Martell in Winds, but the problem is that we don't know what House Martell does in Winds, because (see above) the book DNE. So, although we can reliably bet that the showrunners understand (1) Daenerys is coming to Westeros with her 3 fantasy nukes, and (2) at some point they're gonna have to deal with the invasion of frozombies from Canada, that DOESN'T mean they necessarily know exactly what's going to happen to Dorne, or House Martell. i mean, fuck! we don't even know if Martin knows what's going to happen to Dorne or House Martell, because he's said he's the kind of writer who doesn't set shit out beforehand! so for every "Cersei defaults on millions of dragons in loans from the notorious Bank of Nobody Fucks With Us, assumes this will have no repercussions for her reign or Westerosi politics in general" plotline — which might as well have a big glaring THIS WILL BE IMPORTANT stamp on top of the chapter heading — you have Arianne Martell trying to do a coup/parent trap switcheroo with Myrcella, or Euron the Goffick Antichrist, or Faegon Targaryen and JonCon preparing a Blackfyre restoration, or anything else that might pan out — but might not! And while that uncertainty about what's important to the "overall story" might be a realistic way of depicting human beings in a world ruled by chance and not Destiny, it makes for much better reading than viewing, because Game of Thrones as a fantasy television series was based on the first three books, which are much more traditional "there is a plot and main characters and you can generally tell who they are" kind of book. I see Feast and Dance as a kind of soft reboot for the series in this respect, because they recenter the story around a much larger cast and cast a much broader net in terms of which characters "deserve" narrative attention.

but if you're making a season of television, you can't do that, because you've already set up the basic premise and pacing of your story, and you can't suddenly pivot into a long-form tone poem about the horrors of war. so you have to cut something. but what are you gonna cut? bear in mind that you can't just Forget About Dorne, or the Iron Islands, or the Vale, or the North, or pretty much any region of the story, because it's all interconnected, but to fit in everything from the books would require pacing of the sort that no reasonable audience would ever tolerate. and bear in mind that the later books sprout a lot more of these baby-plots that could go somewhere, but also might end up being secondary or tertiary to the "main story," which, at the end of the day, is about dragons and ice zombies and the rot at the heart of the feudal power system glorified in classical fantasy. that's the story that you as the showrunner absolutely must give them an end to, and that's the story that should be your priority 1.

so you do a hack and slash job, and you mortar over whatever you cut out with storylines that you cook up yourself, but you can't go too far afield, because you still need all the characters more or less in place for the final showdown. so you pinch here and push credulity there, and you do your best to put the characters in more or less the same place they would have been if you kept the original, but on a shorter timeframe. and is it as good as the first seasons? of course not! because the material that you have is not suited to TV like the first seasons are. and not only that, but you are now working with source material that is actively fighting your attempt to constrain a linear and well-paced narrative on it. the text that you're working with changed structure when you weren't looking, and now you have to find some way to shanghai this new sprawling behemoth of a Thing into a television show. oh, and by the way, don't think that the (living) author of the source material will be any help with this, because even though he's got years of experience working in television writing, he doesn't actually know how all of these threads will tie together, which is possibly the reason that the next book has taken over 8 years (now 13 and counting) to write. oh and also, your showrunners are sick of this (in fairness, very difficult) job and they want to go write for star wars instead, so they've refused the extra time the studio offered them for pre-production and pushed through a bunch of first-draft scripts, creating a crunch culture of the type that spawns entirely avoidable mistakes, like, say, some poor set designer leaving a starbucks cup in frame.

anyway, that's what I think went wrong with game of thrones.

[kacievvbbbb]

I think it’s interesting characters like Big Mom and slightly even gear five luffy or even Homelander or just generally any superhero from the boys. Who are insanely powerful but find fights difficult or hard against weaker opponents because they lack battle I.q and are easily distractable.

Very might doesn’t always make right.

[pumpkinrootbeer]

no bc the lavabending nerf in the comic was CRAAZY like actually insane. In the series the lava disc was this like, clever way for Bolin to keep such a devastating power under control in a closed off environment.

In the comics it's all he uses?? EVEN WHEN HES BEING MIND CONTROLLED TO BE EVIL??? like.

why would that be all he goes for and not say.

This.

I hate it this is something I am always going to bitch about they're sooooo afraid of having to address the implications of what giving Bolin a power no one else possesses does. also ur telling me after being brainwashed to be EVIL and trying to KILL AND MURDER his friends he's going to hold back??? JAIL! JAIL FOR 1000 YEARS

[demonio-fleurs]

i wish i was able to enjoy robins new look for what it represents (her journey of healing from two decades of trauma and a call back to who she was a child before the buster call) instead of being tired of people acting as if she’s been “gone” just because they didn’t like her design (which was also part of her journey of healing her trauma) because it didn’t match what they thought she be

[flystep]

if sasja wins big brother: fallen hero i will let him be happy. if he loses ? at this point ? so close to the end and with as many PoV wins under his belt as hes earned ? i will never let him be happy ever again

[chromotps]

Emmyyy that winged Ace art😭 it made me think of an icarus/apollo au, cause there’s a reimagining of the myth with icarus and apollo as lovers and icarus built wings to reach apollo, and i’m just imagining a sorta tragic au where luffy becomes nika, losing his humanity and becoming the sun, and Ace builds wings to fly up to him😭 anyways, i upset myself and wanted to share haha

Merry.... how could you do this to me, personally,,,, (lmao)

whatever you do don't imagine luffy watching what's happening, knowing that there's no way he can help as he is now, anymore... he sees ace falling into the water, right in the middle of a reflection of the sun--and ace says "it's okay, luffy" because, at least like this, he can "touch" luffy one last time as he breaks the surface

gosh i'm having to restrain every instinct in my body to let the AU stay tragic... you have to understand i have Trained myself to make things fluffy. this is me working against years of stubborn fix-it headcanons and happy, everyone-lives AUs 😂 but I'll do it for the symbolism... the poetry...

[fooltofancy]

needed to change my sensor at work and my coworker was hanging around chatting for a pretty long time so i was like eh she can handle it

fortunately i kind of chickened out cause i was like what if it starts bleeding profusely like that one time it started bleeding profusely?

anyway guess what fuckin happened.

[princess-of-purple-prose]

[ID copied from alt:

Black and white drawing of a scene from chapter 494 of Omniscient reader's viewpoint. It depicts Secretive Plotter right after striking down Poseidon. The are standing in the dark water reaching up to Plotter's thighs. Plotter is wearing a black coat and a black veil full of stars, his face entirely hidden from the viewer due to the angle. He is looking longingly into the distance, where, behind a black castle, is an endless wall of text spreading out.

Black and white drawing of a scene from chapter 495 of Omniscient reader's viewpoint. It depicts Han Sooyoung, Kim Dokja and Yoo Joonghyuk, with their backs to the viewer, watching the Great Dokkaebis disappearing, sucked into a crack in the sky. From that crack a hand is descending, as if someone on the other side is reaching for something they dropped - something resembling a sketch with a star in the center, leaving a trail of pages behind it.

Black and white drawing of a scene from chapter 497 of Omniscient reader's viewpoint. It depicts Anna croft seeing through Kim Dokja and Han Sooyoung's pebble disguise. She is holding her hand up with two small stones floating above her palm. She looks serious, determined, her Great Demon's Eye floating where her left eye would be, hidden under hair with only scars peeking through. Behind her is a vast starless sky, all the stars laying on the ground, bleeding, pierced through by various weapons.

Black and white drawing of a scene from chapter 498 of Omniscient reader's viewpoint. It depicts Yoo Joonghyuk and Kim Dokja running across the rainbow bridge that is changed under the stage transformation in front of them, appearing as a generic, if half destroyed, earth road. Yoo Joonghyuk is running at full speed with an incredibly smug expression, one hand holding shocked and surprised Kim Dokja by the lapels of his coat: he is about to throw him like he did back in the beginning. Behind them a shining object - a spear - flying at them.

Black and white drawing of a scene from chapter 501 of Omniscient reader's viewpoint. It depicts Jung Heewon praying to Uriel to save Kim Dokja. Jung Heewon is at the lower part of the art, looking up, her hands folded in prayer. Above her, framing the whole art with her wings, is Uriel's white silhouette. Between them, pierced by Jung Heewon's halo, is Kim Dokja. He is standing atop of a destroyed stone throne overgrown with a tree curling behind him. Several fruits are growing on the tree, and around it destroyed shelves and discarded weapons and objects of previous scenarios are scattered. In front of all that there are many dead black stars laying. End ID]

[dragonsniffles]

Dragon Age: Veilguard is pleasantly whumpy right from the start (which is all I’ve played so far, lol)

Spoilers for the first hour or two under the cut

Whatever call you make, one of your allies gets hurt. And the injury isn’t just handwaved away in the next scene: you can check in on them, angst about having made the call that put them in danger, remind them to take it easy, etc.

[ganzfeldsyndrome]

thinking about how the character im so so attached to literally cannot win. he is too evil for him to win and not ruin the theme. he has to die forever or i rewrite the whole thing.

[throwaway-settings]

having a moment tonight about the cyclical nature of time and identity………

[stupidstupidratcreatures]

just found out about lost box

[cryptidunknown]

I GET TO DO A FINAL PROJECT FOR WORLD LITERATURE ON GREEK GODS

JUST WEEKS BEFORE THE PERCY JACKSON SERIES COMES OUT

HELL YEAHHH