#or maybe like yuugi still being the vessel

[tskumoyuuma]

no one - not even takahashi himself - can tell me mai n yuugi arent related somehow

[sage-nebula]

pick any or all? undertale, yugioh, mystic messenger and if you feel like It's Time.txt, voltron?

I’ll do all of them because I love you.

Let’s do it. (Under a cut, though, since it’s a lot.)

Undertale:

This is a minor thing, but I’d change the story so that it doesn’t take place over the course of one day. It just . . . doesn’t make very much sense to me that Frisk can traverse the entirety of the underground in one day, particularly on genocide runs where they’re taking the time to meticulously slaughter everyone in a given area before moving on. So I’d probably take out references to the fact that it takes place over the course of one day, simply because it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, even if you consider the idea that there are far fewer monsters than you’d expect.

I’d really, really like to know more about W.D. Gaster. It’s clear that Toby has a clear idea of who Gaster was, but there is not nearly enough in the game itself to tell us what that idea actually is. There’s enough to give us a taste, what with the Gaster followers, True Lab Entry #17, and the Mystery Man, but there’s not enough to actually put the pieces together. So I’d really like to know what was going on with Gaster. I’d like that to be accessible information even if it’s not directly relevant to the main plot.

On that note, I’d like to know more about the history of Sans and Papyrus. Where did they originally come from? What’s that strange machine in Sans’ lab? What are the blueprints for? And so on and so forth. There’s enough to get us interested, but not enough for us to figure it out, and I’m frustrated.

LET! US! SAVE! ASRIEL!!! It’s really frustrating, because one of the primary motivators for going after the True Pacifist ending is that, supposedly, the player is chasing the happiest ending, the best ending. This is a specific motivation as given to us by Flowey when he suggests, on certain Neutral runs, that the player can still get a better ending if they fulfill certain criteria. But the thing is, as happy as the True Pacifist ending is, it’s not the happiest ending since Asriel is still going to be damned to life as Flowey sometime after the game ends. And that’s so sad, it’s so unfair, because he was only ever turned into Flowey in the first place because Chara emotionally abused him to push him into the buttercup suicide plot, and then Alphys unwittingly carried out those experiments. It’s not right, man. I know he has been long dead, but it still kills me that there’s not a way to really save him. I want to save him. Let us save Asriel.

And I . . . actually can’t think of a final thing, haha, so I’ll leave Undertale there for now.

Yu-Gi-Oh!:

First of all, and before anything else, let’s just take out all the sexual harassment / assault “jokes” that are especially prevalent in the early manga. They’re not funny. They’re not even a little funny. They’re wholly unnecessary and gross, and while it’s not a bad thing for our heroes to have flaws, when those flaws are sexually harassing others, yeah, that’s not acceptable, it’s not good, and it has no business being there. So rip that out, please. Gut it altogether. Chuck that nonsense in the trash where it belongs. (This especially applies to Jouji, because he was the one bad part of Death-T. First of all, why can Jouji talk? Second, why is he such a gross little pervert? He’s LITERALLY A BABY, it’s so unnecessary and just . . . gross and nasty. Make him an ordinary baby, cut out the perversion, it’s not funny, thanks, Takahashi.)

My god the entire Kisara subplot was just atrocious. I’m sorry, but I find it really insulting that the woman who carries the spirit of the Blue-Eyes motherfuckin’ White Dragon was nothing more than just a timid, passive vessel waiting to be fridged so Priest Seto could lose his shit and Modern Seto could have an obsession. That’s ridiculous. It would be hard to fix this in a way that would be satisfactory given that Kisara was created just to be a plot device for Seto, but I think that a good start would be just giving her more agency, and more control over her own life. Instead of having her there to be rescued, experimented upon, obsessed over, have her actively be trying to cause insurrection. Hell, that’s exactly it: The Blue-Eyes White Dragon is known in the modern day as one of the most destructive of all Duel Monsters. It’s true that we already had Thief King Bakura (and Zorc) as antagonists / villains in the Ancient Egypt arc, but there’s no reason why Kisara couldn’t have been another antagonist. Instead of having people wanting to kill her because of her strange appearance, have them drawn to her instead. She’s alluring; she can get people to listen to her rather easily, and what she wants them to listen to is her calls for destruction against the elite (but also against any other who would seek to use them, such as the Thief King Zorc, and hell, maybe anyone else as well). She appears calm and beautiful on the surface, but that destructive dragon is still within her---that is her soul---and so she acts on it. Priest Seto’s storyline converges with hers both because he, like others, is drawn to her, but also because he’s specifically ordered to stop her from rousing up insurrection and wreaking havoc and destruction. Unfortunately, burst streams of destruction are her specialty, so . . .Basically, just let Kisara have agency and be something other than a fridged love interest. Of all the mistreated ladies in this series, Kisara is perhaps the most mistreated of them all.

Speaking of dragons, I would want Jounouchi’s connection to the Red-Eyes Black Dragon to actually have follow through. I’m not saying that he needs an Ancient Egypt equivalent, because I actually quite like that he doesn’t, but I am saying that it was made pretty clear that Red-Eyes was Jounouchi’s soul card just as much as Blue-Eyes was Seto’s and Dark Magician was Atem’s . . . and yet this is never followed up on, it’s never explained. Never mind that Red-Eyes was shown to obey Jounouchi’s command during the pier duel even though the duel was over and Red-Eyes was not his monster; never mind that it was Red-Eyes being summoned that was seemingly the final link to Jounouchi willing himself back to life after he literally died in the Battle City finals. These things seem to indicate that there is something more going with Jounouchi than meets the eye, particularly since he resists dark magic despite not having a Millennium Item of his own, and yet we’re never given any explanation for it. Explain, Takahashi, explain!!

This is really petty af, but I’m sorry, I hate that yo-yos were used in Hirutani’s last appearance. I mean, it’s funny . . . but Hirutani and his gang were set up as serious threats in their first appearance (200,000 volt stun guns used as instruments of torture and execution), and while the yo-yos were treated seriously, they . . . we all know that yo-yos can’t actually cause harm. I’m sure it was some form of executive meddling that forced Takahashi to censor his own story like that, but good lord, it . . . bums me out a lot that Hirutani’s last appearance has fucking yo-yos as the weapon of choice. (Also, just, in general, we’ve seen what I’ve done with Hirutani. I’d do more of that.)

And lastly . . . I’d bring the romance subplot to its logical conclusion. So much was already done to set up the fact that Anzu is in love with Atem, and that she’s not in love with Yuugi, even and especially at the end of the series, where it’s clear that Atem is the one she is rooting for, and the one that she wants to stick around during the Ceremonial Duel. (Not that Yuugi would go anywhere either way, but it’s clear that she’s choosing Atem. It was never even really a choice for her; he was always the one she wanted.) Moreover, it honestly seems as though Yuugi is moving on from his crush on her as the series progresses; he doesn’t feel any jealousy or any dilemma over sending Atem on a date with her, nor does he pursue her at any point throughout Battle City or even the small bit leading up to the Ceremonial Duel. We did get that little bit in Duelist Kingdom where he showed that he was hurt by the fact that she prefers Atem over him, as well as where he said that he wanted to get stronger so that he could help her as well, but Anzu’s assurance that he and Atem are the same to her---while it was intended to comfort him---might have been the little push he needed to realize that, yeah, this isn’t going anywhere, and wanting to help her the same way she helps him doesn’t have to be romantic. Thus, I’d want to make all of this very clear. The pieces are already there if you’re paying attention, but since it’s not explicit, it can still get lost in translation. (And I mean, as a side note, being more clear about the fact that Atem is starting to return her feelings by the end of the series---which he may or may not have been, but he does confide in her even before he confides in Yuugi, which is a really big deal imo---would be helpful as well.)Additionally, well . . . as I’ve talked about at length before, there is plenty of set-up for Yuugi to not only be moving on from Anzu, but to develop feelings for Jounouchi as well, and that “I love you” at the pier can easily be read as romantic (especially since he wanted that to be his last words, before he sacrificed himself to save Jounouchi’s life, ffs). In carrying the romance arc to its logical conclusion, having Yuugi and Jounouchi starting to realize their feelings for each other by the end fo the series (or at least Yuugi realizing and admitting his own at the pier, even if Jounouchi remains oblivious, god bless his fucking heart) would be something I would do as well. Again, the pieces are right there. It would take very, very little to connect them.

Mystic Messenger:

Get rid of the homophobia that some of the characters (namely Zen and Yoosung) spout at various times. It’s wholly unnecessary. We don’t need Zen grossed out at the mere suggestion that he or the others could be involved in a relationship with a man, especially since Saeyoung is canonically bisexual, which just makes the entire thing weird. It’s really unnecessary and has no reason to be there. (Additionally, there’s a part in Deep Story where you have to comment on a poster of Zen’s. Your choices are to either gush like an embarrassing nitwit (it’s like, “OMG OMG ZEN OMG!!1!11″), or to use the word “gay” as an insult when describing it. This happens twice, and those are your only options, and it’s really gross, uncomfortable, and unnecessary. So yeah, that would need a change, big time.)

Get rid of Another Story altogether. Seriously, just the whole thing. At first I was going to be like, “Get rid of the DID aspect of Saeran’s Another Story characterization,” but then I realized that his route would be a good thing to lose as well, and then I remembered all the awful things in V’s Route as well, and you know what? The whole thing is just trash. Get rid of it. Throw it in the dumpster where it belongs, and then set it on fire. Good riddance, Another Story. Goodbye and good riddance.

Have MC be a less clingy, needy, selfish bint during Saeyoung’s Route. Have her good answer choices be ones that respect his boundaries, but also want to offer him support. Instead of having her whine about him not spending time with her, have her instead asking him to please eat or get enough rest. Instead of having her go through his stuff, have her instead bringing him food so that she can encourage him to eat with even more vehemence. Have it be made clear that MC actually cares about Saeyoung rather than only caring about having a romance with Saeyoung. And more to the point, give her an active role in the Secret Endings. Have her floor it when she’s the driver and they need to escape. Let her worry about and take care of his injury. Let her fight Rika when the time comes. This isn’t asking for a lot, these shouldn’t be hard changes to make.

It’s ridiculous that it took all the way until Saeran’s Route in Another Story for the Choi twins’ father to be a prominent threat when that was set up in Saeyoung’s Route. Put the prime minister in Original Story---in the Secret Endings, even. Saeran being taken to the hospital for treatment could have been leaked despite Jumin’s best efforts. The prime minister comes to the hospital to try to retrieve his sons so he can kill them. That, more than Saeran being threatened with more permanent hospitalization, is what prompts Saeyoung to cut and run, kidnapping Saeran from the hospital to take him back to the bunker. Things spiral out from there. Again, it’s not hard, this could have easily been done, and the fact that it wasn’t is frustrating.

MAKE. THE TIMELINE. GODDAMN. COHERENT. It is ridiculous how awful Cheritz is at keeping a coherent timeline. Flashbacks vary wildly; you have ones that say they took place two years in the past, but then a flashback later on that takes place in the same season will say that it was eight years ago. Just ??? Cheritz should have drawn up a timeline from the get-go in order to avoid this mess, because honestly, it’s ridiculous. I would definitely fix this nonsense if given half the chance.

Voltron:

Oh boy . . . the biggest one of them all. For anyone who reads this: if discussion about how alteans are people who shouldn’t be deified beings who could never do wrong and never did do wrong, and if similar discussion about how galra are people who shouldn’t be treated as soulless monsters even though THE EMPIRE, as an institution, is evil, is something that makes you very, very angry, then you might not want to read what I have to say here. I talk a lot about how treating the alteans (as a race) as the Big Good and galra (as a race) as the Big Bad is an issue for a lot of reasons (e.g. declaring an entire race of people as all-this or all-that is never a good thing, it removes complexity from the war narrative, et cetera), and if you can’t handle that, if you can’t handle discussion of nuance between the alteans and the galra (as I know many in this fandom cannot), then you should turn back now, because fighting with me over it won’t help anyone at all.

All of that said, let’s see if I can stick to just five things. In no particular order besides the order which they come to me:

The pacing on this show is a huge issue. Sometimes it feels like the writers are honestly unable to tell what is or isn’t important / relevant to their story, or when they should introduce certain concepts, or how to handle certain concepts when they are introduced. A good example of this is the first two episodes of season two. Due to the events at the end of season one, Team Voltron was split up and thrown across the universe to different planets (or, in the case of Allura and Coran, trapped in a time stream). This resulted in several different little stories:- Keith rescuing Shiro and being accepted by the Black Lion for the first time;- Pidge making trash statues of her friends and befriending little aliens;- Allura and Coran being trapped in the time stream while Coran de-aged a bunch;- Lance and Hunk meeting and befriending mermaidsNow, even acknowledging my own personal bias for Keith, from an objective standpoint, the importance of each of these story segments to the overall narrative (and to the characters involved) is, in order from most important to least important:- Keith rescuing Shiro and being accepted by the Black Lion for the first time;- Allura and Coran being trapped in the time stream while Coran de-aged a bunch;- Pidge + trash / Lance and Hunk + mermaidsKeep in mind that while I listed Allura and Coran as being the second most important, they’re still quite a bit less important than the Keith and Shiro story segment in this particular instance, because the only real thing of value that we gained from that segment was Allura admitting that she sees Coran as a secondary father-figure. That’s it, and it’s something that we honestly could have pieced together ourselves given other interactions they’ve had / will have later on. Overall, the repeated trips back to Allura and Coran didn’t advance the narrative or their characters in a meaningful way. It didn’t tell us anything new. The same thing goes for Pidge, Lance, and Hunk.On the other hand, not only did we see the Black Lion accept Keith as a worthy Paladin / pilot, but we also got tendrils of backstory from Keith and Shiro. We learned that Shiro changed Keith’s life, and we also know that Shiro trusts Keith to pilot the Black Lion in his absence. But because that episode kept moving away from Shiro and Keith to instead focus on Pidge’s adventures in trash land and the same de-aging jokes with Coran and Allura time and again, we didn’t get any more than that. To make matters worse, Lance and Hunk’s mermaid adventures got an entire bloody episode to themselves, when neither of their characters gained anything meaningful from that experience (Hunk was brainwashed or whatever for most of it!), and the mermaids have had absolutely no relevance since then.So with all of that said, it would have made far more sense to have episode one to be split into the following three parts:- Allura and Coran- Pidge and the trash- Lance, Hunk, and the mermaidsEpisode two then could have been solely about Shiro and Keith, and since they would have had the entire episode to themselves, their backstory could have been given right then and there. We could have had actual flashbacks, rather than just hints, pokes, and prods. For those who don’t understand why Shiro believes in Keith, we could have seen how he mentored Keith at the Garrison, could have seen exactly what kind of background he’s coming from. Likewise, we could have seen exactly why Shiro is so important to Keith---we could have seen, rather than being told later, how Shiro was the only one who never gave up on him. Having that context given in 2x01 would have done a lot to shut down the people who cry favoritism, and it also, I feel, would have done a lot to eliminate the perpetual Discourse™ surrounding this subject, too.But no, instead the VLD showrunners felt it more appropriate to dedicate an entire episode to goddamn fucking mermaid adventures that have no relevance to literally anything. Again, I’m not saying the mermaid thing had to be cut altogether, but put it in the same episode with the other two silly subplots, rather than sacrificing something that would have given characters meaningful development, context, and helped further the narrative later on down the line. It should be a no-brainer for anyone who has even a shred of writing background, and yet . . .And this isn’t the only time that the VLD showrunners have done this. This is merely one example. Keith has been insinuated since 1x01 to have a quintessence sensitivity, yet literally nothing has been done with this, it hasn’t had any follow-through whatsoever. The Sincline ships and trans-reality comet were made to be a big deal in S3 and S4, yet they were dropped entirely in S5 for whatever godforsaken reason. The Blade of Marmora were introduced as allies who have been leading a resistance movement for thousands of years, and yet we still know hardly anything about them, despite the fact that Keith has been with them since season four. Subplots and instances of worldbuilding are introduced and then quickly dropped, and part of the reason seems to be that the writers don’t seem to have any grasp on what is or isn’t important for their audience to see or know. It’s extremely frustrating.So yes, I would definitely fix the pacing, which includes not having new elements, characters, or subplots introduced before dropping them entirely for whatever goddamn reason the writers have. That would be the first thing.(Oh, and it also includes not showing the Voltron transformation sequence so many goddamn times ffs. It’s stock footage! We know what it looks like! You’re wasting valuable screentime!! The only time we need to see it is in instances like the first two episodes where the team is struggling to form it for the first couple of times, and in 3x03 when Keith’s team forms it for the first time. That’s it. Otherwise? It’s not necessary, and it’s not cool. Knock that shit off istfg.)

The second thing would be actually allowing emotionally deep moments to happen, since the writers seem to be allergic to this. I talked about this in another recent post, but there are so many instances in which an audience would logically expect to see something play out, only for it to not be delivered at all. As a few examples:- Keith learns that he is part-galra, something he has been hardcore stressing about for several episodes. The rest of the team finds this out off-screen. We don’t see their immediate reactions, and in fact, we never get to see how Lance, Pidge, or Coran feel about it. - Related, but Keith spent two straight days having the living hell beat out of him, to the point where he nearly died. Yet after the Trials, we see him standing there, somehow perfectly fine. No healing pod for Keith? No panic from the rest of the team because Shiro brings him back half dead? No demands from them as to what the hell was going on that caused the Red Lion to freak out like that? Okay.- Shiro was missing and presumed dead for months. They find him (well, “him,” but since they think this is the real Shiro that’s the name I’ll use) nearly dead in space. We don’t actually get to see the team’s reactions to this, though, because apparently, despite caring about Shiro, their emotional reactions to discovering that he’s not dead and is instead alive isn’t important in the eyes of the VLD writers. (They also never express any conflict over who they should follow---over whether they should stick with Keith, who has been leading them just fine, or instead just listen to Shiro. They immediately take Shiro’s side instead, but that’s another issue.)- Lotor approaches the coalition seeking an alliance. He has been seen as an enemy prior to this point, yet he just saved all of their lives (and most immediately Keith’s life), and now he wants a truce, or at least a conversation. Do we get to see this conversation? Nope. Instead we jump straight to him being a prisoner of war in confinement. Lovely.- Likewise, Keith spent seasons three and four adamant about tracking down Lotor to see what he was planning. Yet despite this, the two aren’t allowed to exchange words even when they’re right next to each other. There was literally no emotional follow-through. (And this isn’t even getting into how Lotor was stated to have empathy and special interest in part-Galra like himself. We were made to expect that these two would have an important relationship and then we were denied.) And so on and so forth, it happens all the damn time. The Holts are yet another example: Sam Holt was a prisoner for at least over one year, if not two, and yet he showed hardly any emotions at all whatsoever once he was rescued. He embraced his children so calmly that it almost looked as though he was just getting home from a day of work. (And hell, he didn’t even look at Matt when he hugged him; it was like Matt was an afterthought.) This was supposed to be emotional, but it wasn’t, even if you separate it from all the nonsense with how badly Team Voltron treated Lotor in that episode. The VLD staff creates these scenarios in which you would expect some meaningful emotional follow-through, and then they completely fail to capitalize on it and . . . well, follow through. And it’s honestly detrimental to them, because it makes moments that should be emotional feel really ineffectual as a result. (The fact that they allow people to routinely spoil things doesn’t help, either. There was no reason for us to feel even a shred of sadness over Pidge at Matt’s grave because we all knew, thanks to that screencap of Shiro and Matt fighting side-by-side that was leaked, that Matt was alive.) So yeah, if I was in charge, I would change so much of this. Let the characters actually have these emotional moments. Let them have deep conversations. Let them have introspection. Because so far, that’s not a thing that really happens on this show, and it really lessens the impact of scenes to the point where you can tell that the writers want you to be sad, but you can’t really muster up the sadness because they haven’t given you enough reason to care.

There needs to be more depth and complexity given to this war as well. The fact that the galra are painted as the Big Bad while the alteans are painted as the Big Good is a huge issue, because both the galra and the alteans are races of people and, as such, neither should be vilified or deified. Before anyone gets it twisted, obviously the EMPIRE is evil and needs to be defeated, but there is a big difference between the Empire, as an institution, being evil and needing to be taken down, and an entire race of people being treated as evil, violent killing machines. We know that the galra aren’t evil as a race. The Blade of Marmora are good, and even setting aside active resistance like them, characters like Varkon are neutral parties just trying to live their lives. Vilifying an entire race of people and treating them as demons is wrong. It’s the exact sort of mentality that gives rise to fascist empires in the first place. When an entire race of people is dehumanized and branded as “the enemy,” it makes it easier for others to slaughter and kill them, because they don’t see it as murder, they don’t see it as something bad, they see it as something good and just. Yes, the Empire is evil. The Empire needs to be defeated. But galra, as a race, are not evil and do not need to be killed, and it’s important that that distinction be made.And you may argue, but they have made that distinction! The Blade of Marmora, Keith, and Varkon are that distinction! But the problem is that they haven’t made it clear enough, because the characters in the show still routinely say that the galra are their enemies. Allura, in season five, says that she doesn’t feel happy about a possible alliance with the galra, despite the fact that she has been working with the Blade of Marmora since season two. And we know, too, that she’s not just talking about the Empire here, because Lotor himself points it out by indicating that her problem stems from “preconceptions of [his] race,” and Lance and Pidge see absolutely nothing wrong with sending him off to be executed by Zarkon despite all of the help he’s given them. (And this is another issue in the “complexities of war” segment, but more on that in a second.) You could argue that Lance and Pidge had no qualms about doing this given that he was once their enemy, but given that they’re constantly labeling the galra as their enemy, how can we really say that his race doesn’t play a part in it? How can we say that when we know that Hunk, at the very least, does carry active prejudice against galra, as we saw in his treatment of Keith (which he never apologized for and was treated as a joke) in 2x09? (He complained about being sent on a solo mission with “the only galra team member,” and leveled racist microaggressions such as “what, do you all know each other or something?” for the duration of the episode. He also wanted to leave Acxa for dead purely because she is galra, which Keith had to remind him was not okay. So yeah, Hunk carries active prejudice against galra, despite standing up for Keith for all of one line in 2x11, so it’s safe to say that Lance and Pidge, his closest friends, probably do as well.)So no, the distinction is not being made clear enough. The protagonists of the show still very clearly view “the galra” as “the enemy” despite the fact that vilifying an entire race and civilization of people is problematic af, which means that this is the narrative that the show is pushing as well. In addition, as mentioned, the alteans are pretty much deified; the main perspective we get on the alteans comes from Allura and Coran, the former of whom conveniently has hazy memories of the war, and the latter of whom has shown prejudice toward other races before (e.g. calling human brains “primitive” in 1x01). Even if they aren’t intentionally painting the alteans as a race of perfect beings who can do no wrong, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t doing just that. History differs depending on who tells it, after all. Moreover, the only time alteans are painted in a light that is anything less than holy is in 3x04, and that’s in an alternate reality. While logic should follow that the lesson here is that empires are bad no matter who runs them, the fact remains that it can be dismissed with, “Oh, well, but those aren’t REAL alteans,” as Allura herself does once she learns of Hira’s true plans. Season five only made this worse; Lotor has taken to deifying the alteans in his mind as a way to cope with the trauma and abuse his father has put him through, Allura is only going to encourage this because she sees her people in a similarly idealized light, and Oriande was made up to be some kind of heavenly, mystical place, where only pure and worthy alteans can tread. Compare and contrast the location of the Kral Zera to Oriande, and you have one painted as clearly Dark and Evil while the other is Light and Good, and when you’re talking about races of people, this is really just . . . bad. (To say nothing of the fact that Lotor uses his idealizing of the alteans as a way to cope with the trauma the galra half of his heritage has inflicted on him, which is really going to fuck him up when he is finally forced to admit that, yes, Haggar is Honerva. It’d be nice for him to get a more nuanced picture of the alteans before it’s too late, but alas.)And setting aside all those bad stereotypes and how it hardly lets these two races of people be treated as races of people with respect in the narrative, it also really waters down and removes a lot of complexity from the history of the war---complexity that is right there, but once again, isn’t capitalized upon. Namely, while the Empire is clearly a terrifying force of evil that must be stopped now, the picture (heavily biased though it is) that we’re given of the past suggests (however briefly, and however tiny those suggestions are) this wasn’t always the case, that Alfor also made some really bad choices and did some shady things, and that the galra might have actually been at a disadvantage prior to the uprising which allowed them to rise into the formidable Empire we see today. Namely:- Lotor tells us that it was thanks to Honerva’s research that allowed galra civilization to prosper. He flat out tells us that the alteans were far more technologically advanced than the galra. This tells us that, had the galra and alteans gone to war before Honerva’s experiments on the rift, the galra would have probably gotten their asses kicked, because the alteans were not only also a race of warriors (Allura says that altean children passed the training simulations in 1x02, meaning that they trained their children to fight), but they woul dhave had more advanced weaponry and technology to work with. It was thanks to an altean that the galra reached a level where they could stand evenly. While it’s not spelled out, I feel that this is confirmation that the alteans were a more prosperous civilization than the galra were.- Honerva was experimenting on the rift because she wanted to learn more about harvesting and using quintessence. Alfor went to Oriande and gained the secrets of the White Lion. So then why, oh why did he not share this with his royal alchemist / the galra empress, hm? Particularly when he was oh so scared of further experiments on the rift? Alfor knew what Honerva was doing, and he knew why she was doing it. Had he shared what he learned at Oriande, perhaps she would have stopped. Hell, maybe she would have even been worthy enough to go there herself! But he kept this to himself because . . . because. Because he was selfish? Because maybe some part of him wanted Daibazaal to fall? I mean, that latter part seems inconsistent with his character, but remember that the only perspective on Alfor that we’ve been given comes from Allura and Coran, both of whom would be heavily biased in his favor, so who the fuck knows.- Alfor destroyed Daibazaal after Zarkon and Honerva died. Now, think about this. Imagine that you are a galra civilian. You’re living your life, having a nice time, when all of a sudden the news reaches you that your emperor and his wife (along with their unborn child, if the pregnancy had been announced) have died. Moreover, the altean king is telling you that you must evacuate, because Daibazaal is going to be destroyed because of the rift, something you might not even be that familiar with, given that you are a civilian. You don’t want to be blown up with your planet, so you take your family and you move off-planet. Your home, and your ancestors’ home, is then destroyed. You, and the rest of your people, are now refugees. You have no home, you have nowhere to go except for where the alteans tell you to go, and you have to take King Alfor’s word for it that this was for the best, that this needed to happen, because your leader is now dead, and so is his wife, and you might not even fully understand why. Keep in mind that this was also after tensions had begun to rise between the galra and alteans again; for all the galra know, considering the fact that Zarkon and Honerva’s deaths were announced after Voltron got together again, maybe Alfor planned this. Maybe this wasn’t an accidental death, maybe this was on purpose. You, as a galra civilian, have no reason to know otherwise except for Alfor’s word, and of course he’s not going to admit to doing anything nefarious. And then Zarkon comes back to life. It feels like a miracle, he literally rose from the dead. And he tells you, and the rest of the galran refugees, that he was murdered. And he tells you that Alfor was at fault. And he points out that Alfor destroyed your home, that Alfor left you as refugees with nothing, and that it is the right of all galra to get vengeance. And maybe you, as a civilian, don’t want to go off and fight, but there are plenty who do, because they have lost everything and their emperor, who miraculously came back from the dead (and who will also execute any who disagree with him) is saying to.Now, doesn’t that put the history from 10,000 years ago in a different light? And doesn’t that show the galra as being, you know . . . people rather than cold, soulless villains that are expendable and easy to kill? Keep in mind that I’m not saying that the alteans should be vilified, because that would also be bad. Like I said before, no race should ever be vilified OR deified. I’m saying that wars are complex. I’m saying that even when it’s clear that there is one side that is definitely wrong (the Empire, in this case), wars are not something that should be celebrated. There is no such thing as a good war, and while of course all of the innocent altean civilians who were swept up in this were victims, there were plenty of innocent galra victims as well. It’s pretty goddamn obvious that even today, in the modern era, galra aren’t sitting pretty. If they were, the Blade of Marmora would have no reason to exist. Part-galra, such as Lotor, Ezor, Acxa, Zethrid, Narti, and Keith, wouldn’t face the discrimination that they do. Showing that this war is an ugly, complex mess, and that things aren’t nearly as black-and-white or simple as they appeared at first, would do a lot to adding depth and complexity to this story, as well as showing the truth of war (that it is ugly and awful, always). It could be that deep, and yet it refuses.AND SPEAKING OF . . .

The protagonists are allowed to make morally grey (or even morally dark) choices with impunity. They’re never made to face consequences, nor are they made to even acknowledge that what they’re doing is wrong, which again, waters down the entire narrative and strips it of complexity, as well as prevents the characters from truly growing or being affected by this war in a way that soldiers fighting a war should grow and be affected.Take, for example, 5x02. In 5x02, Zarkon approaches Team Voltron with a deal: He will give them Sam Holt if they hand over Lotor so that Zarkon can kill him. They know, without a doubt, that Zarkon will execute Lotor. And we know that they know this, because:- In 4x03, they saw Lotor’s ships being attacked by Empire’s ships, and they overheard a broadcast given by Zarkon declaring Lotor as an enemy of the state who was to be killed on sight.- Lotor approached them at the end of 4x06, seeking both an alliance and asylum.- Pidge points out, before anyone else, that Lotor didn’t want to be handed over to Zarkon because he would be put to death. (“He’s just trying to save his own skin,” she says, as if that’s a bad, shameful thing?)- Lotor agrees with her that, yes, Zarkon will kill him.At this point, the issue at hand for Team Voltron is that they’re being asked to hand over a peacefully surrendered prisoner of war who has been actively providing them with assistance in the war effort. Lotor may have been their enemy at one time (but he never did lasting damage to them, even in situations where he could have, and stopped initiating interactions with them at all after 3x04), but he isn’t now. He poses literally no threat to them. Even if he wanted to hurt them, he has been stripped of his weapons and is in a confinement cell. He literally cannot harm them in any way, shape, or form, and is completely at their mercy. Moreover, again, he came to them seeking asylum, which they gave him (even if it’s the bare minimum). He came to them for aid, and when he wouldn’t be given that aid freely, surrendered himself as their prisoner. He’s done nothing to warrant being put to death; actually, he has done the opposite. So Team Voltron holds a man’s life in their hands. He is at their mercy. And do they discuss this? Do they discuss whether it would be acceptable, morally, for them to send him to his death---for them to play judge and jury to Zarkon’s executioner---in order to get what they want?No. They don’t.Pidge immediately calls for Lotor to be handed over, and uses every justification she can think of to argue her case. She argues that they have Voltron, so they can just beat down Zarkon if he’s lying (because that worked so well before). She argues that they have Voltron, so they don’t need an alliance with the Empire. She argues that Lotor is lying. She argues that Allura should think of Sam Holt’s life before she thinks of the lives of millions in the universe, and so on and so forth. But for all her tantrum throwing, Pidge is never once forced to acknowledge the fact that she is arguing in favor of someone at her mercy to be put to death for her own personal gain. No one points out that trading a man’s life for personal gain is something that an Empire soldier would do. Many in the fandom have pointed out that what Pidge was arguing for was dark, yes, but no one in the show itself pointed out to her that she was arguing for someone to die for her own benefit, or for the benefit of her father. That Pidge did this morally questionable (or morally wrong, depending on your view) thing has no bearing on her as a character, and does nothing for her growth, because she was never forced to confront it. (Nor was she forced to admit whether she was arguing for this because it was Lotor, or if she would have similarly been gung-ho about the trade had Zarkon demanded someone else, such as Kolivan, Rolo, or even Keith. We don’t know how far Pidge would have gone, because Pidge was never confronted with that.)Likewise, Lance, too, argues for Lotor���s death, and he does so out of jealousy. But does anyone call him on this? Does anyone point out to him that he is apparently okay with sending a man to his death because he sees said man as a romantic rival? No. Lance is not forced to confront this part of himself. He’s not forced to realize that he very suddenly wants a man to die, and wants to be the reason why that man is being sent to die, because of jealousy. Jealousy is a really ugly thing. It’s a flaw. And when it gets so bad that you’re willing to send someone to their death, that you’re willing to have their blood on your hands, that’s something you should have to confront and think about. That’s a part of yourself you need to examine. But Lance isn’t made to examine it, because none of the rest of the team confronts him over it. No one points out how fucked up it is that he’s willing to send Lotor to die over petty jealousy.And it’s not as if the rest of the team is much better. Again, no one questions whether they’ll be able to live with themselves knowing that they sent a man who was at their mercy off to die at the hands of his abusive, genocidal tyrant of a father for personal gain. Instead, what they actually discuss is:- Whether Zarkon is lying;- Whether Lotor will be more useful aliveIn that scene, they’re viewing Lotor as an object, pretty much. He’s either something they can trade to get what they want, or he’s something they can use later for their own benefit. Whether he, as a person, has a right to life (even if it’s life as a prisoner) never once crosses their minds. They’re fine with him dying. The only conflict they have is whether they’ll actually get what they want, or whether he’d be more useful to them alive. And that makes them look horrible, it makes them look like terrible people. It’d be one thing if they had this discussion and said, okay, we’re not really comfortable with this, we don’t like this, but we have no other choice, this is the best option available to us. They’re still doing something morally questionable / wrong then, but they’ve acknowledged it, they can learn and grow from it, they’re accepting that what they’re doing isn’t pretty, but it’s a reality of war. But to not discuss it at all means that they’re barely even considering Lotor as a person. His life doesn’t factor into it. All they’re concerned with is their own personal gain. They’re supposed to be the heroes, but a person’s life means nothing to them, apparently. That’s extremely messed up, and again, it strips complexity from the narrative and prevents the characters from growing and changing. They don’t have to deal with the fact that they did a really horrible thing because they never acknowledged that it was horrible to begin with. And we don’t know how far any of them, Pidge especially, would have gone, because they’re never asked.War does horrible things to people. As I said above, there’s no such thing as a good war. War is a horrible, terrible, awful thing, even when it’s necessary (and this war is a necessary one). But VLD is not acknowledging this by not letting its characters own up to when they do awful things. The fact that this is a kid’s show is no excuse. Animorphs was a kid’s book series, and yet it routinely made its characters have conversations about the moral dilemmas they found themselves in, and the moral sacrifices and morally dark choices they increasingly made as the series continued. If Animorphs showed its protagonists, who were thirteen when the series started, severely affected by war---and if it made them, when they were no older than sixteen when the series ended, acknowledge when they were doing things that were wrong (and acknowledge when they were toeing the line between being good and becoming their enemy)---then there is no reason why VLD can’t or shouldn’t do the same. Once again, it could be that deep. It just refuses. And the fact that it refuses is incredibly, unbelievably disappointing. Having your protagonists make morally grey decisions is all well and good, but it means nothing if they’re not forced to confront the fact that they have, learn, and grow from it. 

And lastly . . . goddamn, justice for Keith. Justice for Keith for being sidelined for the entirety of the first season, with various subplots he could have had (e.g. his quintessence sensitivity) being dropped altogether. Justice for Keith for no one, not even Shiro, doing anything to stand up for him when he was being mistreated by the rest of the team for being part-galra. Yes, Shiro hugged him, but Shiro didn’t speak a word when anyone (and particularly Allura) was treating him coldly because of his race. Justice for Keith for having a plot leading up to him becoming the Black Paladin, only to have that ripped away from him three episodes later. Justice for Keith for being treated as selfish when he leaves on approved missions for the Blade of Marmora that actively help the war effort, yet Pidge is allowed to go off to find her brother with no repercussions whatsoever. Justice for Keith for being out of focus while he’s with the Blade of Marmora---And actually, on that note, let’s start getting some justice for the Blade of Marmora, too. Justice for the Blade of Marmora for most of them being unable to ever show their faces, because the animators apparently can’t be fussed to come up with unique designs for them. Justice for the Blade of Marmora for being killed off at a rapid pace, because they’re viewed as expendable (probably because they’re galra) by the showrunners, and because Allura railed off against Kolivan and Antok and accused them of being the reason why Zarkon was still in power, because they were cautious with their agents’ lives. Justice for the Blade of Marmora for the fandom treating them as if they’re reckless automatons who don’t care about survival (Kolivan in particular being demonized and painted as heartless) when, again, it was Princess Allura of Altea who demanded that they proceed with compromised suicide missions because she’s impatient to deal blows against the Empire. Justice for the Blade of Marmora for being introduced in season two as important allies, yet still not having their history fleshed out, yet still not being given meaningful development as individuals or a team.Justice for Keith, and justice for the Blade. I definitely wish I could change that. And because I talked about important things all this time, one small, self-indulgent change I would make?

HAVE LOTOR JOIN THE BLADE OF MARMORA IN SEASON FIVE INSTEAD OF BEING A PRISONER OF WAR FOR TEAM VOLTRON WHEN ALL THEY WANTED TO DO WAS SEND HIM TO HIS DEATH ANYWAY, FFS, WE COULD HAVE HAD MEANINGFUL BONDING BETWEEN LOTOR AND KEITH, AS WELL AS LOTOR AND KOLIVAN, BUT NO, WE WERE DENIED THAT SO TEAM VOLTRON COULD BE AWFUL PEOPLE WITH IMPUNITY INSTEAD, GODDAMN IT.

Okay. Now I’m done.