#people really be taking every line of dialog literally

[tackykachowch]

If I see another "Silco didn't accept Powder" take I'm breaking tables I'm so serious right now

[aotopmha]

One thing that really hasn't changed about the Sonic fandom in the years I've been away from it is the very specific obsession with the most miniscule details.

It used to be the green eyes, now it's Amy being slightly less of a token obsessive love interest or there being a sniff of a continuity/references to previous games in the story.

(I mean, it also used to be voice acting and model wars, and those are actually still alive, so the more things change, the more things also stay the same.)

But that's literally all Amy was by Sonic 06, down to one of her abilities being able to turn invisible to stalk Sonic better and it's so crazy to me how people actually defend that as "having more personality" these days when all Frontiers and Generations did was tone it down just a little bit (which is actually in line with her arc in the original Sonic Adventure).

I think Heroes might've actually been the worst of it, but I think Amy definitely deserves to have more to her character than just her crush on Sonic.

The only bit of that criticism I think is understandable here is her "losing her spunky attitude", but I don't see it with the minor changes with her in Generations in particular. And Frontiers is kind of a more somber story to begin with.

These small changes are always framed as this egregious misstep when it's really something like the character having a mildly less extreme reaction or a reference to a different relevant element to what people want.

The Time Stones are pretty relevent to bring up in a game about time travel considering getting all of them was what lead to the bad/good future at the end of CD, for example.

And Sonic and Tails vaguely alluding instead of referencing locations really doesn't make a difference to me. This is just basic continuity stuff every story does to me.

I think a few ended up strange, like the silly implications of how dialog worked out in that scene with Sonic and Knuckles, but it's just strange instead of deeply offensive to me.

And the outrage I've seen about these details is just so funny to me.

Especially since Generations itself is a nostalgia game to begin with and is the time to make references.

(All of this said, apparently the jp version is pretty much the same outside of some of the added Modern Sonic dialog, so ultimately it's inconsequential as far as true substance goes?

Generations has a really simple story to begin with, so these don't do much to ruin anything, either.

I do understand the game preservation aspect of these changes, though. They definitely should've kept the old cutscenes as a toggle or option to still look at; remasters should include the game in its original form for the sake of preservation.)

As far as criticism of that aspect goes, to bring a different example, I think I really liked the cutscene with Sonic in the Shadow portion of Generations because it clearly was in good fun with the characters taking a jab at each other about those events that happened, in other words, true continuity.

A bunch of moments in Frontiers really felt like stilted "remember this" moments, rather than just a story with these characters and I think this is what some truly take issue with, rather than "the references" themselves.

People just want a fully new story with these characters.

I think this is also why Shadow's portion has a more positive response. It's just continuing his story.

And in my case, actually retroactively somehow making me care about his character after Sonic Adventure 2.

I think the main thing is that I just did not buy any of the turns his story took after Adventure 2.

The clone stuff in Heroes was alright enough, but not enough for me to think he was fine to be brought back.

And Shadow (05) was just a mess with a character conclusion I found zero satisfaction in because just "forgetting" everything you clearly cared for is just as bad as obsessing over it.

Looking into the Shadow The Hedgehog game just to refresh my memory has been a wild journey because while the forced, immature elements are mostly the localisation as I've always known, the story still is the same mess otherwise.

And Shadow Generations somehow, miraculously put all of that insanity together into a simple, but heartfelt package that somehow didn't end up too tryhard and made sense emotionally.

You have to work through trauma to truly move on from it. You can't just say you move on and have it be the end of it, just not how it works in my eyes, unless you want the characters to feel completely alien, which I think Shadow is intended to be the complete opposite of.

I think the fact that Maria remembered stuff from her time on Earth is an issue for some people (and an apparent inconsistency with the animation), but I think there are advantages to both: if she doesn't remember/know anything about Earth, it's a big additional tragedy added to her character of never being able to see a world she grew to love through all she learned about it.

If she does remember good times on Earth, it, in turn, makes more sense why she would love it so much and want everyone on it to be happy. If she has seen the beauty of it and wishes to go back and never can, it is a tragedy all the same.

In my eyes, neither of these really take away or add to her character nor Shadow's because their bond exists regardless of whether she knew what Earth was like for herself or not.

This game actually also made me care about Maria as a character, in fact, I'd posit she became a character because even Shadow's own game didn't really go into what her illness felt like or what her general life was like on the ARK or how she felt about everyone around her.

But to loop back to my point of people liking it, it's just really nice to have a complete, substantial story again.

I don't need it, and I especially like my Sonic stories more cheesy and silly, but if you're going to do a serious story, do it this way.

Be straight to the point and sincere and add some silly elements to not go too far in the indulgently tedious hyper-drama direction.

Revisiting this crazy and wierd, but fun series has been a lot more fun than I ever thought it would be, even if I think this fandom is one I'll probably mostly keep my distance from.

All bigger ones have their issues, but the bad parts of the Sonic fandom are just not anything I even want remotely anything to do with or tolerate.

I'll watch some more of those massive video essays, though.

[charliefqirie]

What made you so drawn to Ozzy

you know, i’ve also wondered that myself for a while, but i think i figured it out.

ozzy, at first, did not stand out to me when i first got into the game. ozzy was just, there. my favorite was ted when i started.

ozzy’s a side character that doesn’t have much going for him. literally his only purpose in the game is to be killed. he’s just there to die. and he does not show any likeable traits to the average player, he’s a whiny, annoying, self-centered brat who’s constantly complaining every time you speak to him. he even told madison to take a bath first thing after she escaped (which i really don’t believe makes him a jerk, i mean being covered in unidentifiable slime is kinda gross don’t u think) who would like a character like that? ozzy’s really the most forgettable character in the game. these are thoughts i’ve noticed people always have abt ozzy. i didn’t really share these sentiments and didn’t think of ozzy as annoying but i certainly wasn’t that interested in him before, he was just neutral to me.

buggs and cindy are less liked than the rest of the characters but they’re still more liked than ozzy because they are fun and hilarious characters, with interesting dynamics to explore. i feel like the SLIME GANG, the characters who have like 3 lines of dialog at most get more love than ozzy. gives people a lot of room to explore the potential of what their characters could be. and ozzy? ozzy’s just there.

but maybe, that’s the reason why i started to like him?

i’m not much for genuinely hating characters without reason, the very idea makes me sad and pitiful. i never hated ozzy, he’s just five, of course he’s going to act like that. but i wasn’t that drawn to him back then either. (i also dont like it when people hate on cindy to a concerning extent. like yeah she’s a little brat i can understand why people would dislike her, i don’t like it when that happens but i still understand why people would, but to the point of genuine burning hatred is when it’s concerning and disturbing. she’s still just five. ah, but that topic is for another day. i’ll continue abt ozzy.)

back then in the old fandom, i had a friend who loved loved ozzy a lot, ozzy was their favorite and they cherished him. they shared their thoughts on why they loved ozzy and the potential his character has. it was their love that made me start to appreciate ozzy a bit more. but ozzy was still not my favorite still. i appreciated him a bit more but he was still kind of put to the side with me.

then kg3 got announced.

with the new game coming out, i found myself returning back to my old roots, with new people to share the interest. i didn’t even realize there was still a fandom after all this time. a small one, sure, but it’s still just as lively. it was around this time when ozzy started to shine to me.

i looked back at previous memories, looked back at old kg convo’s with friends, and one person stood out to me. this person, very obviously, hated ozzy. it was upsetting to me to see, especially since i had a friend who loved ozzy. they cut ozzy out of his own canon friend group a lot, made jokes of “who cares abt ozzy” and made his character quite unlikeable in their au’s. made madison break up with ozzy even, and made ozzy into this pathetic mess of an unlikeable character. essentially made him even more unlikeable than canon. all of this, genuinely upsetted me. i hate seeing characters treated like this. maybe they had a valid reason for disliking ozzy, maybe ozzy reminded them of a toxic friend they used to know or smthn, but looking back at old convos and seeing all that ozzy hate really perturbed me. i couldn’t stand seeing characters treated like this. and it was all that hate that made me realized really just how underappreciated and exaggerated ozzy was in the fandom.

seriously, ozzy really wasn’t as bad people thought. and he’s NOTHING like tweek from south park?? he’s not spazzy and nervous at all? he’s really more angry and uptight! (AND BY THE WAY MADISON DID NOT ASK FOR A HUG AND I DONT KNOW WHERE PEOPLE CAME TO BELIEVE THAT SHE ASKED FOR ONE WHEN SHE DIIDDNNNNTTTTTTTTT ITS A COMMON MISCONCEPTION IN THE FANDOM AND IT MAKES ME ANGRYYYYY. LITERALLY LOOK UP A CREATURE FEATURE PLAYTHROUGH, SKIP TO THE END AND YOU CAN SEE SHE DID. NOT. ASK. FOR A HUG. Anyways,) and, he was even willing to make friends with kidd after an act of kindness (which, tragically, ended in ozzy’s demise.) he was just sad. he was just sad and miserable that his friends were gone suddenly, and he lashed out. but people focused on his tantrums, they didn’t focus on why. all they say was a whiny brat who constantly complained and it was all of that that made the fandom turn their backs on him. people didn’t even remember ozzy CANONICALLY HAS FRIENDS. HAS A GIRLFRIEND. madison and ron. barely did i ever see them all in one post. BARELY. i was an avid member of the fandom and saw lots of fanarts and i saw almost NOTHING of ozzy and his friends. ozzy was always by himself. madison and ron were always paired with alice. ozzy was literally REPLACED with alice to make the slime gang. ozzy’s friends were paired with alice instead. ozzy was fucking replaced and it made me genuinely upset to see. did no one fucking pay attention to that? did everyone really fucking forget when ozzy literally complained about missing his friends all the time? why was ozzy replaced?

it was all this mistreatment that made me pity ozzy. perhaps this was why i started liking him. perhaps it was out of pity and anger at how much his character was mistreated. and with all this pity, all this anger, it made me pay attention to him more, it made me see his potential as a character.

it opened my eyes.

i started to think abt him more, thought about his good sides and moments, thought abt how fun his character could be and the potential dynamics he could have. and with his little quirks and traits, i even started to headcanon reasons for it. why’s he so germaphobic? haha, perhaps it was dr danner’s fault and he traumatized him. why does he like destructotron so much? perhaps his friends introduced him to it, and now that toy is his favorite, as it is the only memory he has of them now. and, i think ozzy’s more kinder than people think, he opened up to kidd after a single gift, ozzy’s really just mad at the new kids that they took his beloved friends away, but with that single act of kindness made him realize, ah, maybe they aren’t so bad. really, he’s just lonely, you know? my pity for him opened my eyes to how much potential his character has, especially since he wasn’t as developed as the other characters, so i did it myself. i developed him myself, gave him lots of headcanons, as i am passionate about him and i believed in him, all this pity was the stepping stone in me starting to enjoy him a lot, lot more. he has a lot of potential and i want to use it. i believe he’s an underappreciated lovely, lonely child who’s angry at the world. and i like to believe he’s genuinely kinder than people think, and that he cares. (i believe he felt a heart dropping amount of guilt when he told madison to take a bath. how could he say that after seeing her again? his germaphobia is somethign he cannot control and he hates it, it inconveniences him and now it’s inconveniencing his loved ones and he hates it. i believe the next day, he gave madison (knowing that she already took a bath ofc) a hug and a gift because he truly missed her and felt guilty he couldn’t hug her before.) he loves and cares and he laughs and cries. he loves his friends and he loves his toy and he loves his games. and i cherish him, and i want to give him something to be happy about. i want to be part of the tiny tiny club that truly enjoys ozzy as a character because he deserves it. he deserves some people who genuinely like him in this cruel fandom who only saw him and ignored him because of his whiny tantrums.

I believe he’s a good character and I like him.

perhaps it is pathetic to be so passionate about a fictional character, but does it really matter? i am still passionate. i am passionate and it gives me a drive.

[lightandfellowship]

In honor of the finale anniversary coming up, I’m sending you a deep question:

What do you think is the main theme/message of Dark Road? Or, alternatively, what theme of the story resonates with you the most?

That's a good question. I can't say I'm the best at identifying this sort of thing, but I'll try.

I see two main themes. The first is what I believe to be the more overt "thesis statement" of the game, the one line of dialog that both references the title of the game (and a good title will usually try to convey a facet of the Main Theme of the work) and also is telegraphed as being really significant because it gets said directly before the title card.

"Your world can change in an instant. Sometimes all it takes is a single step." [fade to black] KINGDOM HEARTS —Dark Road—

I have a post sort of outlining the various ways this idea manifests in the game, but at its core I think it's just saying that your worldview can be drastically altered (for better or for worse) if you just take the initiative to seek answers. I think you see this theme reiterated by Heimdall and Baldr near the end of the game, too. Heimdall: "Your lives are not ours to judge, but yours to lead. Broaden your horizons and find your own answers." Baldr: "Seek answers...to the unjust ways of the world...to the darkness." Considering this is the Xehanort game, having the thesis statement revolve around self-determination, expanding your world, and the pursuit of knowledge makes sense.

As for the second main theme, probably something along the lines of: "light and darkness aren't so different but the continued belief that they are results in an endless cycle of unnecessary conflict and tragedy that could've easily been avoided if people were just more open-minded and tried to better understand each other." Like almost every awful event that happens in this game can be traced back to this flawed belief causing the characters to act in a certain way that seals their doom.

Eraqus is openly and unashamedly anti-darkness in front of Baldr which seems to make Baldr's anxiety about his sister abandoning him grow. Baldr being scared of what might happen to him if he's left alone with his darkness, along with feeling like Hoder's light is the only thing redeeming him, causes him to chase after her into Enchanted Dominion, subsequently getting her killed (in a situation that wouldn't even have existed had Hoder not made the rash decision to go after the dark being, Maleficent, all by herself). His utter dependence on her now-extinguished light makes Baldr's darkness spiral out of control and primes him to be manipulated by a dark being who's taking advantage of his vulnerable mental state to further its own goals. Oh, and Odin kept Baldr isolated in what appears to be solitary confinement for a week because of his darkness situation, which just made everything ten times worse. Baldr's grief and directionlessness makes him decide that the world is too rotten to exist anymore, which compels him to kill all of his friends in order to destroy that world and end it all. And things get so bad that a brother and sister who love each other feel like they have no choice but to kill each other because their differences are just too large and they're never going to understand. Literally all of this could have been avoided if Hoder wasn't tasked with being this "flawless and pure" beacon of light and Baldr wasn't made to think his darkness was Bad and Scary and Unacceptable.

Then there's the upperclassmen. Hoder, Heimdall, Helgi, and Sigrun dying to darkness is what convinces Vidar, Vala, and Vali that darkness is absolutely evil and needs to be destroyed forever via Kingdom Hearts (with the added benefit of Kingdom Hearts hopefully purging the darkness out of Baldr and sparing him). And they're so focused on their plan to summon Kingdom Hearts and destroy darkness that they don't even care that innocent people and entire worlds might get hurt in the process. Nor do they even care to ask Baldr if he wants his darkness to be purged (given what happened to Ven when Xehanort removed his darkness, it's not exactly the type of thing you should forcefully do to someone.) Which, it turns out, summoning Kingdom Hearts wouldn't have destroyed darkness anyway, at least according to Darkness Baldr, so it truly was a pointless endeavor that was only going to cause harm. Again, the upperclassmen might not have pursued such a misguided and extreme plan if they hadn't been convinced by their upbringing and circumstances that destroying all darkness was undeniably a Good Thing.

In actuality, this second main theme isn't just implicitly conveyed by the plot's events, it gets stated pretty directly by Heimdall, Helgi, and Sigrun during their conversation with Xehanort and Eraqus in the Underworld. They talk about how, after they ended up in the Final World without their bodies, they realized that the darkness and light in people's hearts might not be so different after all, and that everything is a matter of perspective and personal beliefs. Quite a change of heart coming from people who were raised to believe the exact opposite, especially Helgi who was the most vocal about not approving of darkness and who was willing to use brute force against those he disagreed with (you see the "seek answers and your worldview might get drastically altered" theme crop up again here.) It's hard not to believe them when they experienced something as spiritual and eye-opening as the afterlife, which gives credence to what they have to say about light and darkness, and emphasizes all the more that the narrative is using them to convey a Truth to the audience.

Anyway, it makes sense that these two concepts would be major themes of the game since there's some synergy between them. The answer to the question "how do you prevent the tragedies caused by the light vs. darkness stuff" is...knowledge. Expanding your world. Connecting with others. Being open-minded and compassionate. Taking the initiative to try new things. Being committed to seeking truth/letting your worldviews be challenged instead of stagnating in your biases. Characters like Eraqus embody the opposite of this and are examples of what not to do. Eraqus refuses to open his mind or budge from his beliefs. He takes almost no steps to change for the better (or rather, doesn't understand what the right steps are.) His world is small, and as a result he unknowingly causes harm to the people he cares about to a catastrophic degree, perpetuating the cycle.

Xehanort sort of has the opposite problem? He lets his experiences and the MoM's influence change his beliefs for the worst, losing a lot of the nuance and integrity he already had in his youth. Any pursuit of truth gets twisted and replaced with him selectively believing the things that support his condemnation of the world and prop up his status as the chosen one ("[People] believe what they want to believe.") He starts to see "change" as being the only way to save the universe, but specifically the sort of "change" that means destroying and recreating the universe entirely. He succeeded in broadening his horizons and explored the entire span of the world, yet deemed it rotten to its core, unfit to exist. The knowledge he gained became a reason to feel superior to everyone else, instead of a reason to feel kinship. His ability to empathize just became a way to manipulate others.

[ganondoodle]

fuck it, elden ring DLC rant (spoilers) (long post ... oh dear)

so, to start this- this is a very emotional reaction, so take everything with a ton of salT (i need to get this out of my system bc i need to go and do stuff today, i literally couldnt get much more than 3 hours of sleep bc my mind was racing) i only know two screenshots and what others have told me (thank you) so i might be missing more context and havent seen or read it myself

(more details and spoilers for the DLC below the read more thingy)

also, just to explain a bit, i dont usually get this upset about things i like, i like alot of things, but its RARE as fuck that i care, like actually care care about something, and that just kinda happens, i dont choose it or can decide to not care, i just do, and when something like this happens its like ... a sort of grief? i cant help but care about it but it messes with me emotionally, i have no control over it and cant change anything about it when it gets bad or done dirty, leavign me to just have to watch it be real even when i dont want to accept it-- i wouldnt say so much that i 'expect' somethign specific and cant handle when its not like that (common accusation about disliking totk)- and no i dont have somethign specific in mind, i just dont want it to be bad OR things that seem done and closed off suddendly out of nowhere be revealed to 'actually' have been like this, new stuff that either makes no sense or invalidates alot about what i valued about it, what i thought was the point

(i remember two .. my only two other intersts before- see what i mean RARE- that also went down simiarly like this; transformers (bay movies and mainly prime series, listen i didnt choose it either) with each movie it got more messy and stupid, primes second(?) season had an end i hated and the following movie was the final nail in the coffin- and one piece after that, which i slowly fell out of love with bc every chapter seemed to go more into a direction i didnt like, then the reveal that luffy is a god actually was my final ok i hate that moment)

i knew demise for a long time but wasnt obsessed about him at all, it took me learning about how hylia was depicted in a non canon (?) manga (which made me annoyed me bc i didnt like it and made a design for her to counter demises instead) and then reading his few lines of dialog about her again that it suddendly HIT me, like cupids arrow into my head-- i liked but wasnt that super interested into elden ring until radahn showed up, instantly his design made me go owo and then learning his (base game) lore it HIT me (i love sort of tragic side characters that might have been powerful or heroic at some point but now arent anymore- not saying he is that elden rings lore i messy and no ones good tm- and especially so if that character is widely hated for no good reason, dismissed or forgotten, has little lore etc)

i have things i like but dont care this much about, like okami or bloodborne, i like it alot, theres characters i really like (oki) but im not like, fixated on them?- and to have two at the same time, while not equally strong, i dont think i had before, and then have both be damaged or potentially lose it in a similar way within barely a year hurts so damn much--- anyway, getting into the actual rant now lol

so, to sum things up (that i know), in the elden ring DLC later on

miquella is actually a master manipulator and brainwasher (even to his sister???? which means alot of impactful things about his relationship to people is kinda invalidated or made meaningless, shitty)

he wanted to become a god by marrying radahn (his half? brother, same father) of all people that has never been mentioned before until now somehow?? ) you can argue it was hinted to but i find it completely out of left field

miquella sent malenia after radahn to kill him so he could be put into the realm of shadow so miquella could marry him (there were better candidates for that??)- its unclear (to me) if radahn ever actually accepted when sound of mind or even knew about it at all, but failed and he was isntead inflicted with rot to slowly waste away but not die (like he is in base game)

which also means that, what i found really impactful in base game, the festival of radahn, that i thought was a tragic sort of last wish/effort for of radahn to grant him an honorable death as a respected general after being made into mindless people eating zombie, organized by his soldiers/friends- might have been just yet another attempt to kill him and get him over there to miquella (and even if not, it still makes it way less impactful and now i feel like letting him continue to roam as a zombie is more of a favor than killing him bc hes just gonna a puppet again! which turns the whole tradgedy of the stuff in base game on its head imo)

you need to kill him to get into the DLC (and i was even sus of that but shrugged it off when i heard it ..) bc that way miquella could take whatever was left of his soul and stitch it into mohgs corpse?? (which is why hes so small in that DLC fight) bc his body was rotten by that point, which also allowed miquella to control radahn and make him agree, force him to do whatever miq wanted (which ALSO might mean mohg 'kidnapping' miquella wasnt that actually but mohg too was manipulated so oud kill him and make his remains usable)

radahn in DLC is a voiceless meat puppet essentially ... like a mindless rotting zombie eating friends and fow alike wasnt enough- also means that we never ACTUALLY GET OT KNOW RADAHN HIMSELF bc hes eithe a zombie or a literal puppet (if you are gonna do him dirty at least let us meet actual real him *cries*)

his fight is super hard apparently (though i have been hearing people complain about the entire DLC being too hard, while the -casual player- streamer i watched is beating main bosses so fast they dont even get to start their second phase) when his fight in base game, and him by extentsion, was also hated bc of that ALREADY, which means more people are gonna hate his guts (he doesnt deserve that!!) AND most people probably wont get or care that its not actually HIM him so its like a repeat boss that everyone hates

it feels weirldy forced in for it to be radahn (like miquella was already said to be one of the strongest gods out there .. why hed want radahn so badly when his goal seemed to be rather .. combat less?? if you get what i mean, and radahn also rejected him??? and the tarnished is right there too????) bc theres plenty others it would have worked with that are barely used- it feels like someone jsut wanting him to be tha main guy not matter what (when he worked so much better as a side character!!!!)

a tragic but well rounded off side character (imo) was made into the main guy this is all about actually tm (i generally dont like main guys and this jsut feels so .... it just hurts, it didnt feel foreshadowed at all, and its not even truly HIM that is reveal to be a creepy asshat but hes just manipulated and controlled with the whole time, be it by rot or miquella)

and for miquella its like, no theres no even mildly good people there, hes brainwashed and manipulated everyone actually tm, a giant plan all to force his half brother into marrying him by making him into a corpse puppet bc he rejected miquella- inlcuding potentially manipulating his own twin sister, which goes agaisnt what you learn of what hes done for her in the base game i think?? (not that much into that part but yeah ... it feels unfair to her too)

it also kinda just leaves other lore from the base game in the dust? like the whole haligtree plan, how miquella cared for the rejected (i guess he didnt then??? and it was just more manipulation tm??) that castle with the eclipse stuff

(is the gloom eyes queen, marika, and or st trina even .. important at all to any of this??)

ok from reading tweets from people talkign about it, miquella says radahn agreed apparently but whether thats true remains uncertain and given the circumstances i do not think radahn did- others said that it kinda sounds he agreed to something that he didnt think would involve him marrying miquella

everything feels like its in shambles for every fan of every involved chaarcter

yes i know you can argue that it was all planned from the start and meant to be a twist and everything and that people having a different idea of characters isnt the fault of the creators .... only to some degree bc why then build up make so much lore and story about stuff that turns out to be like saying 'actually it was all a lie' like its not valid to feel betrayed then, you can plan things out all you want but that doesnt mean it cant be bad oder underwhelming

(i wished to be able to meet or know more about radahn but like in a non rot way or like past flashback whatever kind of way and then not like this anyway, like i was interested into his relationship with jerren and just .. more about him i suppose the monkey paw has curled hasnt it -or however you say that-)

and there i was like two days ago going "omg radahn mention!!!" when that one .. feyja? NPC says she fought alongside him at some point ............................................................

leonard isnt there in the DLC to my knowledge, you know it cant be truly radahn if his horse isnt there (the sole reason he learned gravitiy magic for and it stayed with him even after the rot!!! i know people have started to hate it bc people love that but i love that, it made him so endearing to me, like a character i already found cool omg has a confirmed softer spot??? in MY fromsoftware title??)

sorry for the long post of rambling, i am a mess, barely slept 3 hours, yes i am weird to care, autisms or whatever .. i need to go somewhere in an hour and havent prepared as all bc i needed my thoughts out of my head- might have forgotten stuff, idk if i will add it later or just kinda .. stew in it for a while

(and yes a big point why i feel so strongly is both bc its just gonna make more people hate him even more AND feels so invalidating of alot of other stuff- pulls other characters down with it- the entire time i was watching the streams i and trailers i thought i was like, its onw thing, with miquellas littel adventure and more background info on marika mostly on its own from the base game BUT NO I GUESS)

(read all this in the sense of an utteraly disoriented confused and drunken seagull yelling around pls i am not in serious mental distress ..)

[leafiion]

+more playthrough thoughts. mostly tourmaline aka the bird chapter

first of all, for the people who want to know: you can actually cut off titania's walk-away when she says "you take west, ill see if i can get anywhere north" but she doesn't have collision so she just walks right through you into the next room.

anyway. taka's dialog here is always the best. ive said it already but it's really funny. titania: (ruminating paragraph) taka: ok. anyway titania tells taka what she wishes someone would tell her and we all run off into the sunset because every single one of us in this WTC is still doomed whether to die or otherwise. aughh i hate his little begging segment it makes me so sad. taka i love you really

big gap here to do all the quests and then quickly run through devon. i know a lot of people don't like devon bc it's kinda lame but from a narrative standpoint i think it's so fucking cool like just imagining it. it falls a little flat gameplay wise but the events are very memorable and extremely interesting to reimagine

tourmaline desert time HI TAKA. myguy.. help me not only does he hide behind/lean on that tree but he also walks super slowly over the sand dune. "i know i can't win, not against you... and not against them" every time i see those lines i die a little i think. something that hits me here is how much of a snap decision his "can i come with you?" is. and its very familiar. a la "i don't suppose i can just... tag along with you?" im a huge fan of taka in general... i have a hard time super analyzing him because i see him and i go yippee!!! i love his speech mannerisms we are literally friends.

no fucking way the forbidden lemonade stand AND it has a leafeon. fuck yes. He actually buys you a lemonadeeee cries... taka to me to lin communication taka to me to lin conversation. the narrative connections between taka and lin are insane actually but i wont get into that right now

+1 relationship points for calling him my boyfriend and he doesnt even want my ride chat

"the water isnt even drinkable.. i guess id try in a pinch" god please dont drink the corpse water taka. keeping this guy alive is so hard. for obvious reasons such as that one and other things he says and does. chiefly being him trying to kill me by being so cute. anyway now we have to go to the steel gym and put taka on the shelf :( killing myself is scheduled for right now.. his princess tower scene is sooo. can we get a little gayer justa little. asking for me. anyway fine go run off whatever..

[mineofilms]

voluptas indignationis

This all stems from a series of bulletins posted on the social media platform SpaceHey.com where I was attacked by multiple people; doxed and also they went after a family member. Not okay…

"Passive-Aggression: An infuriating behavior where people express hostility indirectly, leaving you puzzled and annoyed. They cloak their resentment in subtle sarcasm or backhanded compliments, making you question your sanity. It's a maddening dance of veiled hostility that drives you up the wall." -ChatGBT (Joe Rogan Persona master prompt).

"Believing Their Feelings Come Before Common Sense, Critical Thinking and Logic."

That one line is what I am being attacked for, as far as Snarky and Heath are concerned.

"Why Are Conservatives the Biggest Snowflakes of Them All?" Passive Aggressive title to a bulletin by Heath ‘the brief’ - [SpaceHey Conservatives Are Weird] - Blanket Statement, he means ALL and shows no actual examples or even explains himself in an articulate way...

He uses passive aggressive tendencies using words/phrases like “a 'certain someone,'" where "certain someone" is a link to my profile. Again more Passive Aggression. Heath ‘the brief’ says he is a chill dude, doesn't start trouble. Yet, talks about people in a condescending way, but really means me personally in the negative. Doesn't call me out by name, but then says ‘a certain someone’ with a link to me in it. Could be sarcasm, but to me this is a prime example of being a petty beta male practicing all they know in the form of passive-aggression and for a man to be "this much" on the passive-aggressive scale is just such a Pussy-FK'n-move. Like no testicular fortitude whatsoever...

Testicular Fortitude: A metaphorical term praising bravery and courage, traditionally associated with male resilience. It signifies inner strength and fearlessness in the face of challenges. It's not about physical attributes, but the boldness to persevere despite adversity.

Heath ‘the brief’ does not practice any of this from his ramblings about me. Even girls that like me never pay me this much goddamn attention, Jesus LOL…

I did try to have a civilized conversation about all this, which I could have handled better, but I was pissed all to hell. We did have some dialog, but Heath ‘the brief’ is an under handing little coward that talks to me from a position of "who, me, what did I do?" I have my opinions. I over explain these opinions to such a level of a degree that if someone wants to challenge me on them, one is gonna have to match the energies, intelligence, logic, time, patience and research I put into those efforts. Heath ‘the brief’ cannot do this, so he takes to the bulletins and starts all this madness that later becomes hostile when a misogynistic SpaceHey user named RILLO posted my home address on the platform, all while Heath shrugs his shoulders and is all coy about it.

He says I blocked him. I do not believe I did, as we are messaging, but I actually do not know if I did physically block him from before or not. I doubt it since he was able to comment on another thread where this all started. He did start this. He just cannot handle it and had to have a comment about it and now we are here. Again, he commented on my comment, then I told him off and he throws a fit on his bulletin about it. He literally states this: "He's exactly the kind of riff-faff that should have stayed on Facebook and left us alone." ~Heath ‘the brief’

HUH? He commented on my comment and then went and wrote a bulletin about it. Leave you alone? What? All he has to do is leave me alone and poof, done... Yet, he calls me all these things, but I am not leaving him alone? At what point is it NOT okay to defend myself, my character, my conceptual value here? Especially, when my reasoning for my words is embedded in nearly 8 years of writing, research and development of these blogs… At no time has anyone here on the SpaceHey every paraphrased my exact words and then come to me and tell me these things. It is always some half ass insult with no evidence, no breakdown, no nothing. Just a Twitter-like insult.

I was never blocked, I did remove him as a friend not long before this because of his radical concepts of equality and no explanation at all outside of: agree or be called a bigot, again with no explanation that defines his reasoning on the subject. Hence the name Heath ‘the brief,’ because he only talks in little tweets and cannot have big-boy conversations with some articulation behind it. He tells me to go back to Twitter. Yet, his whole persona is that of a ‘tweaker’ (Twitter addict). He will play the game like he can, but then say hateful shit to justify why he cannot. I wonder what he is trying to cover up by that lack of personal resolve?

That is how they operate, no debate, no dialog. I am too brash, I too toxic. I am too masculine. I get that. However, brash or not you cannot turn logic upside down and tell people up is now the new down and if you do not except that, we'll get you...

A Handful of Concepts That Were Shared in This Bashing of My Character: 

Snarky Brewster: Hates anti-pedos…

Snarky hates me for something so petty. I removed her and blocked her for not using a real pic of herself and basically being a Karen. Oh look at how she does her business and you tell me if this isn’t a Karen? She really took my rejection of her to heart to spy on me for over a year using an alternative profile or friends like Heath, RILLO and Tooterz.

I absolutely do not support adults that prey on children for sexual gratification whatsoever, is what pedophilia is. I also distrust and loathe the extreme opposite of that and chose a really bad word to describe what I meant, which I have explained a few times now, but will explain it again.

I am not perfect. I make mistakes all the time. Especially, in grammar and word choice…

I hate the anti-pedos on SpaceHey, specifically, the adults pretending to be kids, pretending to be an adult, reverting back to a kid to attempt to trap people into having sexually charged conversations with minors. Not Okay...

Especially when these adults are not targeting potential pedos but rather targeting people with conservative-leaning, opposing viewpoints. Again, NOT okay...

I do not have a problem with people gatekeeping to protect children as long as their goal, mission, core belief is to actually catch pedos on this platform. However, to target people who have a healthy sexual appetite, loves to talk to women, younger, but adult women should not be the target of these often radical thinking gatekeepers who say they are trying to protect the innocence of children on here but really just want me and people like me, gone. They want my voice gone. My Points-of-View gone. I do not hate liberals in general. However, those radical, WOKE liberals that live online in these INTERNET subcultures that do not actually believe in equality, but yet, preach a version of it that caters to radical thinking minorities, the weak minded, the attention whores of the social spaces we call equal, but really should be called “shut up and obey.” They will look for anything in my writing style that they find could be a loophole to get me into trouble with the Admins on here and in every instance they have been shutdown. Because for all their efforts all they have to stand on is made up stuff and opinion, which is NOT evidence of bigotry, racism or even me having inappropriate conversations with females on here.

SpaceHey should be now titled “Eggshells…”

SpaceHey caters to these weird INTERNET-subcultures. One cannot just be celibate without being a cel of some sort. One cannot be just Trans without parading around like an idiot and yelling it to the world. One cannot enjoy the nostalgia of SpaceHey without calling themselves ‘a scene kid.’ 40+ year old scene kids? Really??? ALL the trans/gay people I know do not do this. They actually do not do anything to show their pride. It is pride month and all and the dozen or so LGBTQ people I am close with, do not celebrate this. Their pride is their life. Their pride is being able to live in a free country where they can be this way. Real LGBTQ people are not glory hounds, desperately seeking attention for their efforts. Most of them just want to exist with their partner. Go do stuff within both their living community and their specialized community of people in LGBTQ. What I am saying is real LGBTQ people do not ALL except the LGBTQIAA+/- community as a community that is looking out for them.

If I were Gay or even Trans and I saw some straight people parading around, mocking our lives, pretending to be trans, yell, scream, cry, hold up traffic, clog our social medias, invade our safe spaces, take our sponsorships, pollute our American grown businesses and do it all on the LGBTQIAA+/-‘s behalf, I'd tell them ALL to go FK themselves and find their own group to belong to. Most people that are real LGBTQ like this do not feel the LGBTQ community actually cares about the community. Just like BLM doesn’t actually care about Black Lives Mattering at all, but all about money, money and distraction. It is a FK'n scam for bizarre INTERNET-subcultures to exist in the first place.

“People are addicts… The real problem with a lot of what's going on –on Twitter. There's a bunch of people that I follow on Twitter that don't have anything to do with me they're just negative people and I don't even follow them follow them. I bookmark their page and then I go visit them because they're so FK’n crazy and I see them 12, 13 hours-a-day tweeting. It's straight Madness and it's 100% an addiction and the amount of interactions that they have that are negative. The amount of expressions they have that are negative are overwhelming; that is an addiction. It's an outrage addiction they're addicted to recreational outrage and the response to their recreational outrage. It's constant and consistent it doesn't vary. They're not learning anything. They're not growing… They're not expanding the way they communicate with me, with people, and becoming better human beings and more –more-kind human beings…” Joe Rogan

That above Joe Rogan quote summarizes what is happening here to my account on SpaceHey to the letter. Heath/Snarky/Rillo are the literal translation of this:

• Defined as "Outrage Addicts" - They're addicted to recreational outrage and the response to their recreational outrage.

• People I have nothing to do with.

• People I do not follow or have blocked or have me blocked on here.

• I do not visit their page or care about what they have to say. Besides the doxing and going after family members.

• The amount of interactions that they have that are negative? Be interesting to know wouldn’t it…

• They are addicted to being angry with people with opposing viewpoints.

The key thing isn't the response from these people. They are free to do so and should be responsive. However, how do they respond most of the time? "Believing their feelings come before common sense, critical thinking and logic." That one line is what I am being attacked for, as far as Snarky and Heath are concerned.

Snarky also makes another comment to a mutual friend where she says I was never doxed and that it was never there. Rillo is also claiming the same thing. However, why am I looking at a screenshot with the [a href="link to my home addressDOTcom" target="_blank" – “meet his brother that lives in the same house” /a] tag. If you all know some HTML coding, you know what this rough texting code is. In the photo the direct link is not expressed, but it is in the meta tag. The text is slightly blue, meaning it is a LINK and I have that link handy and it goes directly to my home address. That is doxing. Posting the direct quotes here, along with links to their page is not. I have it, it is here. Snarky boldly and openly lied and not just that, she did it knowing she was lying about it and still tries to sound innocent. That is the sort of broadcel she is. Haha, Broad-cel.

Broadcel – A middle aged Karen that lived in the days when men called women broads.

‘She was a skanky broad.’

–example. Snarky “Karen” is an UNDERSTATEMENT…

Tooterz - is RILLO's mate and her mental health issues are a lot of the reasons RILLO/Tooterz/Snarky are so well hated on this platform and on discord and they actually are... Just their little cel club of people think they are neat and cool... I have been messaged by so many people over the last year talking about these 3 people, specifically…

Others That Jumped In to Have Their Ignorant Say:

Matt – “This guy blocked me months ago, he's a racist and a sexist. He's against anyone that questions what he likes, and he's against anyone who wants the world to change. He's happy with the state of America and thinks anyone that wants it to change is wrong.”

Andy Anarchy - Says I use words like “WOKE to hide my bigotry.” He also likes Volbeat.

Where exactly do I NOT properly define the concept and word WOKE in my blogs? How do I hide any concept in my writings? Find the phrases where I demonstrate I am a racist and a sexist and it isn’t a sarcastic joke... Find the phrases in my writings where I am against opposing viewpoints? Show me where I say I am happy with the state of America and think anyone that wants it to change is wrong? Find the exact wording. Oh, wait, you won't find it. I Wonder Why That Is???

BECAUSE IT DOESN'T FK'N EXIST...

“WOKE is both a Subculture and Internet Subculture that attempts to make minority issues displayed as majority issues and those issues be labeled as normal and/or everyday ‘FACTS…’” I love when these TROLLS make these claims, but cannot ever actually define where/when I stated these things... Amazing... Yes, FK, I love OLDER Volbeat before the radio got to them. Must be a crime... Head check, not…

My BLOG can be seen, free, on my website: mineofilms.me/blogs anyone can go there anytime and find my words with the full context laid out. Any of those people, at any time can go there and look for themselves and they will never find that stuff because it isn’t there…

Please report these 3 accounts for slander and doxing. Thank You for all that still support me and listen to reason…

RILLO - https://spacehey.com/darkstar_ Tooterz – https://spacehey.com/q2tr Snarky Brewster - https://spacehey.com/SnarkyBrewster

  voluptas indignationis (Latin for recreational outrage) by David-Angelo Mineo 6/10/2023 2,526 Words

[maxwellatoms]

I don’t know why more people aren’t watching this show, but it’s worth a peek.

This particular episode touches heavily on storyboards and animatics, and while these guys are all talking about feature films, just about everything they’re talking about applies to animation (half of any given superhero film is animation anyway).

Animatics are such an incredible tool that I’m shocked that they aren’t an industry requirement. We literally weren’t allowed to have animatics on Billy & Mandy due to “budgetary restraints”, and since I’d never utilized them before I didn’t realize what I was missing. Now, I basically board right into animatic. If I have a line of dialog for a character, I’ll just temp it in. That way I’m both writing and directing (essentially) at the same time. As I go, I know more-or-less how much time everything is taking, what’s working, and what drags. If I hit ten minutes and I’m still not into Act 3, I know I need to cut something to make room. I can make a version of my movie or show for (essentially) free and share it as a blueprint for others to follow or give feedback on. Why would you NOT do that?

There’s some good stuff in here too about the insane pacing of Television production, the amount of stuff you somehow have to hold in your brain when you’re dealing with all of these moving pieces, and the importance of having a plan for everything. As the director, you’re the only one who is really capable of keeping track of the project from the microscopic to macroscopic scale. Everything from overall tone to the tweak you want to make to line 236 is your responsibility.

I’m not a huge fan of Snyder’s body of work, but Zack Snyder films are Zack Snyder films. His stamp is all over them. The Russos come from a much more Disnified, collaborative background. And lest that sound too noble, the collaboration is all directed toward making a product engineered to be enjoyable. In a very real way, it’s The Auteur vs. The Machine. Listening to this episode, you can tell that no one ever say Zack Snyder down in a room with a bunch of lawyers and research executives to talk about whether or not he was accidentally delivering fascist messages or how many girls aged 8-12 were into Steppenwolf. Whereas that would be Day One at Disney, and every day after would involve some other checks-and-balances meeting, a number of high-level sign-offs, and the upkeep of an intricate company-wide roadmap.

Snyder and the Russos both found themselves making superhero movies for two very different companies in two different very ways. The ways those movies were produced are as much a result of the studio culture as it is the personalities and desires of the directors. As much as Jellystone has reminded me how much I love deep collaboration, methods of production are often not my choice. Depending on the studio, I’ve occasionally felt either overwhelmed by too much “support” or left alone in the woods to die. Neither situation is exactly ideal, but both present their own unique challenges and opportunities. The Machine is efficient, gets things done, and will protect you -- as long as you’re in its good graces. The Auteur is laid bare -- flaws and obsessions on display for anyone to see. Neither Snyder or the Russos go too deep into the studio culture at either studio (oh to be a fly on the wall when the pizza is gone), but is one really superior to the other? Learning to work within the confines of a studio’s culture is a whole different layer on the onion, and I wish they talked about it here.

It’s cool to see that from the simplest cartoon short to the summer blockbuster, the struggles in the entertainment industry are all the same. The pay’s way better on the blockbuster side, though. In case you’re trying to choose.

[onyxbird]

These are my thoughts about fan content clarifying what fandom values about a work that I mentioned in a response to @trivalentlinks.

The optimistic side of this post is that I think there is value in fan content forming a record for whoever chooses to look (even if that's only other fans), in the form of thousands of fanfics and fanart and fanposts, that these are the things fandom got out of a source work that made them love it. These are the versions of the characters that fans loved (or hated), whether or not that's quite what the writers/actors/etc. intended. These are the story beats that resonated so well that fans delve into them over and over and over, and these are the ones that flopped and get "fixed" again and again.

However a lot of the stuff below the cut is more pessimism and frustration about the crudeness of the "dialog," such as it is, between fandom and creators, using Leverage/Leverage Redemption as an example. I have no real answers, here.

Mostly, the thing is gets me is that 1) I know viewer numbers and ratings are what drive decision-making in TV/movie production and 2) on the viewer's end, the choice to watch or not watch a show/movie/whatever is such an incredibly crude, binary signal about something that so much factors into.

So taking Leverage as the example, since that's what touched this discussion off, imagine if Leverage Redemption just tanks next season. Lots of people who tuned in when season 1 launched stop watching. The obvious question that a lot of people are going to be asking is why. When Leverage originally aired, it was clearly popular enough to get 5 seasons and to eventually spawn a sequel series, and enough people started watching Redemption to get a second season greenlit, so the question would be what changed?

If you're looking solely at the show end to try to diagnose viewership/ratings trends, there are quite a few changes that could factor into reception, both obvious and subtle, and very limited "signal" from just numeric viewing/ratings data. Some of those changes are (all stuff I recall seeing discussed in fanposts in one form or another, BTW):

They became an Amazon production. They killed off Nate. They added Harry. They added Breanna. They made Sophie the Mastermind. They moved the setting to New Orleans. Hardison was away for most of the season. They gave Eliot a multi-episode love interest for the first time. They shifted the focus more towards the way the powerful can twist the system to their own ends to legally screw people over (linked to Harry's incorporation in the team). They had a more diverse pool of clients for the crew. They went little further over the realism line into the fantastical (e.g., literally talking guards to sleep). They seemed to explicitly refute the OT3 dynamic ("robot bodies" scene). They made a number of smaller, possibly unintended characterization changes to established characters (e.g., various stuff with Parker's portrayal). And, separate from Leverage Redemption itself, a local Portland news outlet put out an article (which doesn't appear to have been picked up by any wider news outlets) about alleged sexual harassment/assault on Electric Entertainment productions, including Leverage.

Lots of changes, both large and small. Some changes I think were excellent. Some were not. Some were non-ideal for the show, but obviously limited by circumstance (e.g., working around Aldis Hodge's availability). With (I hope) the exception of the abuse allegations, I suspect every change on my list has some fans who like it, some who hate it, and some who don't really care.

So… how would you figure out what accounted for a hypothetical drop in ratings/viewers?

In the absence of any direct feedback about what the fans are saying (or expressing through other fandom participation), there would be a lot of guesswork. The show is very centered around the crew, so I would guess the impact of cast changes would be a major objective change to look at. The original crew was well-liked in OG Leverage, so they'd probably assume no problems with returning cast. (Fans perceived some changes to how the OG crew were portrayed, but those are relatively subtle/subjective and likely not deliberate on the show's part.) Harry is a newcomer, but Noah Wyle was a core character in The Librarians, which also got 4 seasons, so I doubt him turning off fans would be the first guess. That leaves removing Tim Hutton (well-established actor, central to previous well-received series, resulted in major restructuring of crew once removed) and adding Aleyse Shannon (who seems to have fairly few previous roles) as major cast changes. (If the "Silence on the Set" article had gotten more press and really blown up, then that might make the list of possible reasons for turning people off, but I have only seen that discussed on Tumblr so far, and it appears to be only the one local article in a location they don't seem to be filming in anymore.)

Now, from what I've seen in the Tumblr fandom (both on my dash and in the main leverage tag), my impression is that people here largely think removing Nate was the right choice (either because of the allegations against Hutton or because Nate's arc had ended or both) and adore Breanna and her casting. But to know that, you have to look at what fans are saying and/or how they're engaging with the fandom rather than just looking at the fact that the new line-up isn't holding viewership. Otherwise, you might conclude, e.g., that getting rid of the (older, white, male) Mastermind and bringing in a young, queer, woman-of-color geek were a mistake for the show's popularity.

In terms of fanfic (the topic of the other post), I've seen people remark before about how little "fix-it fic" there is for Leverage. In terms of the changes in Leverage Redemption, I certainly haven't seen much, if any, fic that brings Nate back. I've seen plenty of fic that's enthusiastic about both Breanna and Harry. I have seen fic "fixing" the OT3 or having Parker do more masterminding or keeping Hardison in closer contact, suggesting that those are things that people genuinely did think were problems with the new setup.

Another obvious takeaway from the Leverage fanfic/fan content in general is that the Leverage fandom loves Eliot, but from the fic and posts I've read, my impression is that the Eliot the fandom loves is one who would never do the kind of shit Christian Kane is accused of. E.g., the fan content often delves more deeply into Eliot's bloody, ex-hitman past than the show ever has, while at the same time "Parker and/or Hardison have to practically sit Eliot down for a Powerpoint presentation to convince him they are romantically/sexually interested in him, too, because otherwise he will never make a move to avoid crossing their boundaries" is practically its own Leverage fic genre.

Now, are the creators/producers/etc. going to come to Tumblr and AO3 to figure out why their show is or is not doing well? Likely not, especially not AO3. (In this specific case, perhaps more likely than for other shows, since I think at least one of the creators has explicitly mentioned writing fanfic themselves.) But I do think there is value in the fandom talking about what they do like, what was done well, in addition to the things that make them walk away from watching further, even if the only people listening are other fans.

Leverage/Leverage Redemption isn't the only place where I have this frustration, BTW. I had a lot of fun with the MCU, before Infinity War/Endgame killed a lot of my enjoyment. And then, of course, they start rolling out a lot stuff following more diverse heroes, etc., whether that's highlighting already-established side characters (Sam Wilson, Black Widow), stuff that I'd never heard of before (e.g., Moon Knight; Shang Chi), and stuff that I had heard of and wanted to do well (e.g., Ms. Marvel, one of my cousin's favorite comics). And I just want to shake the people in charge and say "Why didn't you feature these characters before you soured me on the franchise as a whole? I didn't stop wanting to watch because you shifted away from white male superheroes. Now, if ratings go down, you're probably going to say people just don't want to watch [POC/Muslim/mentally ill/etc.] main characters, and that's not it at all."

I'm not really arguing that the fandom version of the show is actually going to get back to the creators/people deciding show funding/etc. and influence their decision-making or have a tangible impact on the way mainstream media operates, outside of (perhaps) explicit reviews of the work. I'm not arguing that people should continue to make fanworks for this reason, or should continue supporting shows just to avoid creators drawing the wrong conclusions. I'm just saying I find it comforting that there is a record out there, in all the fan content, of what it was about these works that spoke to people. And of what, in the show universe, put them off enough to warrant discussion or fix-its. I just think it matters.

[annakie]

Mass Effect Trailer Thoughts

*EDIT* -- there are now TWO UPDATES to this post with additional screenshots, thoughts and theories, please check that one out! :) 

I wrote an unhinged disorganized post before... now I’ll attempt breaking things down in a much more logical way. :D

1) It’s basically confirmed that this is both the Milky Way and Andromeda in the same shot.

2) The audio is some actual and I think some fictional mix of communications -- 

“We know now that in the early years of the 20th century, this world was being watched” is from War of the Worlds

“Eagle Houston, you are go for landing, over” is from the moon landing.

“Arcturus Station, uknown vessel approaching, we need first contact protocols” would probably be new dialog from the First Contact War.

“Humanity now stands as partners in the galaxy” is likely new dialog from after the end of the FC war when humanity was accepted as a Citadel species.

“Ark Six is away, godspeed” is new dialog, likely a reference to the Andromeda Initiative.  There were six arks in the initiative.

3) This system isn’t in any of the first three games as far as I can tell -- and I logged into ME3 with the EGM mod wherein literally every system in all three games is used as extra content and looked at them all.  Anyone recognize it?

4) This is anyone’s guess but... possibly... what’s through the Omega relay?  the rings seem... very densely packed.

5)Two moons and a gas giant looking planet.  I don’t even want to hazard a guess.  The planet itself could look like Jupiter, but Jupiter has a lot more moons.

6) Then of course, we have the destroyed mass relay.

This comes with the dialog about taking down a dreadnaught, and (sensors?) are going crazy, and abandoning the ship, and then the REAPER SOUND.

Then “Is anyone receiving this?  We’ve lost contact.”

So all of this felt like traveling through time, and here we finish Mass Effect 3.

7) Then comes this image... which again, does not really look like any system recognizable in any of the games.

An indistinguishable female voice says something about Humanity (something like “Humanity is all the problems its faced”?  Maybe?) and a male voice... which sounds a little like Clancy Brown (Alec Ryder) to me, but... maybe I need to play through the Andromeda prologue again. 

The slight break in the action there may be accounting for the 600 years passing before Andromeda.

The break in the action could also mean it’s something in the future of what we’ve seen, something new.

8) Now, we come to this planet.

There are THREE MOONS...  and Alchera has three moons.  Maybe this is a coincidence.  Or maybe this is Alchera.  It seems oddly specific for them to show the three moons in sequence if there wasn’t a reason for it.

9) It’s confirmed that Liara is walking up a reaper here.  There ALSO appears to be a SECOND reaper in the background (look just above the sun, you can see reaper-like wires and follow that outline to see the other reaper’s legs.)

10) There appears to be more stuff, maybe N7 striped stuff, than just the fragment Liara picks up buried in the snow here.

11) This may be a part of an N7 helmet, but it can’t be Shepard’s N7 helmet.

You get the helmet as a reward for finishing the Alchera DLC in ME2 (so basically, Shepard brings it along after planting the monument), and although the part is similar on the side here, it’s definitely not the same.  This is Shepard’s helmet on the SR-2 in ME2, loaded it up and took the pics with flycam just to confirm.

14) That’s definitely a Salarian on the left and probably a Krogan on the right. Guesses for the center person... Human?  Turian?  Angaran? (Comedy answer: Javik?  Though we don’t know how long Protheans lifespans are so... hey!  Anything’s possible!)

13) Liara has crow’s feet and laugh lines -- she’s most likely much older in this trailer than we saw her last in ME3.  Perhaps... 600 - 700 years older?  Grunt would likely be the only other ME/2/3 companion still alive. (Wrex was alive to fight in the end of the Krogan Rebellion in 700 CE, if this is post-Andromeda that would place him at over 2000 years old, I don’t think Krogan lifespans are that long.  Drack is considered an old man at 1400.  But it could be possible.)

So my best theory right now aligns with what I’ve seen other people guess -- this game will take place sometime after Andromeda and serve to bridge the two galaxies, but how that happens and why Liara is retrieving a piece of broken N7 armor is anyone’s guess.  I have a few wildly unhinged theories myself. :D

[rootfish13]

A couple weeks ago I was bored and saw Thor Love & Thunder at the theatre because I was morbidly curious and I haven't watched a MCU movie in a long time. I didn't have high hopes for it but the trailers made it look fun. Boy was I wrong. It was SO BAD. Astronomically so. I'm halfway convinced Taika was sabotaging his own movie, like this was the superhero equivalent of What We Do in the Shadows but less funny and clever. I haven't been this pissed off at Taika Waititi since Jojo Rabbit, his twee take on nazi Germany movie.

All of his and the MCU's bad habits were dialed up to 11. The worst thing to me was how much contempt the movie had for it's audience. Characters literally talked out loud about other character's motivations & character arcs in that obnoxious MCU snarky way. Korg tells Valkyrie literally something like this: "Oh you don't want get close to anyone again ever since Hella killed all the Valkyries and your girlfriend so you just sit alone wallowing in your own sadness while getting drunk."

Multiple characters have similar 4th wall breaking dialog multiple times in the movie. I felt like I was watching an episode of Rick & Morty. No one talks like this in real life unless they are a huge asshole. God that is so irritating when characters sarcastically talk about their own tropes meanwhile saying an info dump to the audience because they are too stupid to pick that up through the character's actions. It's lazy dialog and it comes off as the writers being so smug and pleased with themselves thinking they are clever and too cool for school to write a serious scene.

Modern media is so littered with this bullshit they can't have characters have authentic feelings or interests anymore, everything has to be buried in 5 layers of sarcastic irony. It's like the characters are winking straight at the audience saying: "Wow isn't this so dumb and funny and ridiculous?!" It's like I was written by an insufferable 13 year old showing everyone how he's too cool to enjoy anything because everything is stupid.

Every scene is robbed of any kind of seriousness because it's always undercut with a lame joke. Why should I take this seriously when the movie doesn't? There is no stakes, suspension of disbelief, meaningful character arcs, sense of drama or even any sense that anything in the movie even matters. There are two character death fakeouts. Thor's friend Sif is dying in his arms and he treats it like a joke. A major character dies sacrificing herself for Thor but he doesn't seem to be too broken up about it other than spouting off some cheesy dialogue. Doesn't even shed a single tear.

This whole movie should really be called Thor: Mid Life Crisis as he mopes around the whole movie like a divorced dad. The acting is horrendous except for Christian Bale as Gorr the God Butcher as he acts circles around the main cast. Everything else screams first takes no direction given by the director as people robotically utter their lines without ant kind of conviction. I know this is a superhero movie and I wasn't expecting the Godfather but jesus this is Shumacher Batman & Robin level of cheese.

I've written way too many words than this movie deserved but this movie, Taika Waititi, Disney and The MCU royally pissed me off by wasting my time and money.

[ganondoodle]

why does it seem so impossible for theory people .. or any people really to even consider that rauru isnt the firstest of the first kings of hyrule, its been remade so many times already and the 'forgotten era of myth' might as well have included hyrule being forgotten; instead its always messing with the old titles and timeline and im so TIRED

is it rly some sort of complex to HAVE to connect the new stuff to the old titles somehow?? again i get that theorizing and all that can mean anythign but i havent seen anyone even bring up the fact that maybe, this is just a new hyrule and rauru was just the first guy on this one to call himself king, maybe the name hyrule survived but it didnt connect back to a kingdom so hey jsut thought thats a neat old name lets call it that, hell, maybe it was a surname of sonia even so he literally just called the kingdom after her not knowing its been called that since the beginning of time, wouldnt that be a cool coinsidence!! and also rly sweet of him!! like him being called rauru!! like a guy loooong long before him that no one knows of bc its been so long its long been forgotten he ever existed! isnt that cool and somber connection!

id also love if someone could just kinda ... consider botw/totk(uhg) as their own thing, like, i love the old titles, but i also love them as being done, their era has ended, this is a new era, what if we could just ... view this new era as their own thing without having to chain every little bit of dialog to the old titles

i really wish rauru/sonia never said they just founded hyrule, and zelda(i think) never called him the 'first' king bc apparently some people are unable to think oh this is a new hyrule and he was the first king of this one like i did but instead go into a rampage trying to make everyone believe totks past is somehow canonically right after fucking SKYWARD SWORD; like ... some people take every line of dialog like wayyy to literally, rauru probably THOUGHT he was the one who founded this kingdom bc he literally couldnt know any better with everything of the old stuff being so loong forgotten already, hes just some dude and not literal god who knows it all, characters can be wrong even when they believe they are right!!

(yes i am annoying about this bc i hate this on a personal level)

like .. i cant be the only one who thinks botw to be of a new era so long after all the old titles its basically a new world entirely, with no direct links to anything in the past, with references and callbacks from all old legends, but still a new world, without chains to the old, reoccuring names and happenings haunting it just the same as it did all the ones before them yet not being aware this has been happening over and over .... .. and, after it was said that oh rauru was the name of the 'first' king of hyrule, immediately thought oh shit he founded this new hyrule coolio (lets ignore how much i grew to dislike totk in general, i was hopeful still at that point) (lets also ignore how many problems totk alone has with its own damn lore for this ok, its its own mess that dragged botw into its mess but that doesnt mean it ALSO has to drag literally every single other game into its mess too)

[molinaskies]

Ok there's a lot of caps in here and it's kinda long but I nEED to tell youuu😭😭😭

Oh my GOD O HOY MYBGOSI MYGOSHGDHOVMG

I LOVE YOU COME WITH ME KILLED ME 1000 TIMES OVER I LOVED IT SO DAMN MUCH THE WAY YOU HANDLED THE VHARACTERS WAS CHEF KISS AND THE WAY THE STORY FLOWED FRLT SO NATURAL IM NOT OKAYYYY

I love that you gave Amy so much awesome spotlight because she's!!! A really!! Cool!!! Character!! And it was so cool seeing how you put in different ways of how she can stand out AS a character it was SO

YES

SO MUCH YES AMY IS A DIMENSIONAL CHARACTER AND U 100% MADE ME LIKE HER CHARACTER POTENTIAL SO MUCH MORE ALREADY OMG

And I looooove how you explored BOTH of their nuances!!! It felt so easy to actually see and EVERY interaction felt so REAL AND LOVELY AND HEARTWRENCHING NHBUHSBBUBHSOBBING

I don't read fanfiction like ever And! And I BINGED this entire thing!!!! LITERALLY From when I found it to the very last chapter!

I love when people look at sonic and see all the in-character folds that are there that nobody pays attention to!! Like how he's a really sweet guy but doesn't show it much and how with all the complexity of Amy's character it just comes out so EASILY and how they just FIT SO WELLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

LITERALLY E V E R Y TIME SOMETHING WAS A SWEET LINE OR A LITTLE HINT CALLBACK TO A PREVIOUS THING I LIKE DANCED AROUND LIKE ACTUALLY IT MADE ME SO GIDDY

I mashed that kudos button like crazy LEMME GIVE MORE THAN ONE AO333333

I almost never react to media I take in and this!!!!! Destroyed meeeeeeeeEEEEEEEE LITERALLY EVERY EMOTION TO FEEL WAS THEREEE

ANYWAY, I ADORE this fanfic analysis of the characters EVERY SINGLE WORD CHOICE AND DIALOG LINE AND PARAGRAPH SPACING AND ENVIRONMENT DESCRIPTION WAS SO PERFECT I LOVED IT LOVED IT LOVED IT SO MUCHHH

I'm like ACTUALLY gonna reread this at some point I loved it sm I could gush about every individual chapter bc I read them so hard WORD FOR WORD THERES SO MUCH PACKED IN THEREEE

There's probably like a zillion typos in there but I stayed up reading this so my brain is hardly anything but in a dream state already LMAO

MILLION GOLD STARS MILLLLLIIIOONNN GOLD STARSSSSS💫💫💫💫💫⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐🌟⭐🌟⭐🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Thank you, Anon! You’re so lovely and so sweet 🥺 this made my day to read!! Thank you for reaching out :)

I Love You - Come With Me has my heart and soul inside it, so I’m absolutely touched to hear how much you enjoyed the journey! I’m glad you caught all my little hints and things :))

Thank you again for your kindness ♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️

[miserablesme]

The Les Miserables Changelog Part 1: Barbican Previews

Hello everyone! I'm starting out a blog which will look at my favorite musical, Les Miserables, and will discuss the various changes it has gone through over time (musically and lyrically). As it turns out, a LOT of edits have been made over the years so this will doubtless be a series with several parts.

This first part may well be the most difficult and will almost certainly be the most incomplete, as previews can be a time of extensive editing and experimentation. At least for the first few weeks or so, it's perfectly possible any one day of previews will be slightly different than any other day. However, I only have access to two audios from the Barbican Theatre previews of Les Miserables, meaning it's likely that lyrical variants exist which I have no way of hearing.

I am aware of the existence of a third audio which is fairly early in the run of previews, as the tape's master has told me that Gavroche's death scene is in its original form (I'll clarify that later). However, that tape has never been traded, and has sadly only been listened to by its master. I am also aware of a video proshot of the Barbican era that exists in the Royal Shakespeare Company library, but currently have no access to it. I plan to inquire about whether I can look at it sometime (though I'm not sure a blog like this is "official" enough to warrant it for research purposes). As such, this comparison only entails the two widely circulated audios from the Barbican run.

Now that we've gotten that cleared up, let's get started!

First, let's look at the opening "Work Song". In the earlier recording I have (let's call it R1), the beginning music (the same tune used, for instance, at the opening of "At the End of the Day" and "One Day More" and for Marius and Cosette's meeting in "The Robbery") stops. Then, a few moments later, the more familiar opening that leads directly into the prologue begins. By the time of the later recording I have (let's call it R2), the scores have been combined so that the first tune directly transitions into the second one.

Meanwhile, in R1 there is a sequence of lines that goes as follows:

I've done no wrong

Sweet Jesus, hear my prayer

Look down, look down

Sweet Jesus doesn't care

I killed a man

He tried to steal my wife

Look down, look down

She wasn't worth your life

I know she'll wait

I know that she'll be true

Look down, look down

She's long forgotten you

Most fans of the musical recognize the middle sequence of lines ("I killed a man" through "She wasn't worth your life") as no longer being lines in the show (for good reason, as we'll get into in a later edition of this blog). However, R2 keeps the lines. Instead, it deletes the third sequence ("I know she'll wait" through "She's long forgotten you"). I have no idea if this lasted only a few performances or made it all the way to the end of the Barbican run, or somewhere in between.

During "On Parole", specifically after Valjean is underpaid for his labor and sings about his frustration, R1 uses a variation of the "Work Song" theme which, to my recollection, is heard nowhere else in the musical. It can be heard here. By R2, it was switched to an in-tune version of the number with a unique opening. The musical retains that version to this day, but in case you can't recall it you can hear it here.

Minus an unintentional line flub in "At the End of the Day" in R2, the two Barbican recordings seem to use the same libretto and score from this point until "The Runaway Cart". At this point, R1 has a rather extensive scene leading up to Valjean saving Fauchelevent, which goes approximately as follows (the dialog is difficult to make out):

(VALJEAN)

Is there anyone here who will rescue the man?

Who will help me to shoulder the weight of the cart?

I will pay any man thirty louis d’or more

I will do it myself if there’s no one who will

We can’t let him die like that down in the street

Can you all watch him die and do nothing at all?

(FAUCHELEVENT)

Don’t approach me, Monsieur Mayor

The cart’s not gonna be holding

Not my poor mother would care if I should die

(TOWNSPEOPLE)

Don't go near him, Monsieur Mayor

There's nothing at all you can do

The old man's a goner for sure

Leave him alone

Most of that dialog is deleted in R2, so that it goes directly from "Who will help me to shoulder the weight of the cart" to "Don't go near him, Monsieur Mayor". I really like the idea of the original version; it seems reasonable that Valjean, having become a more trusted man, would expect the townspeople to help him. It's more meaningful that Valjean is good enough to do what's right when there's more time to establish that no one else is. Having said that, the original version did take quite a while and didn't really contain any relevant information that wasn't in the final version. I think the cut version as heard in R2 is a good compromise and retains the general mood and pacing to make Valjean's ultimate action satisfying (something that can't be said of later cuts, as will be discussed in a future edition of this blog).

Additionally, at the end of the number Javert refers to "the mark upon his skin" in R1 and "the brand upon his skin in R2 (as well as literally every subsequent performance since then to my knowledge). I have no idea if the "mark" line was a minor flub or was actually the original lyric.

"Who Am I?" is an interesting one. The musical content is identical in R1 and R2, but in R1 after his high note, Valjean shouts "You know where to find me!" with emotion so dramatic it sits right on the border between awesome and campy. By contrast, Valjean is totally silent after his high note in R2. Neither version would see its final day just yet, although the latter certainly has become more traditional over time. More on that in future editions.

From this point until "Master of the House" everything is the same between the two recordings. Roger Allam even comes in slightly late in both "Confrontation" scenes (making his line "-jean, at last...")! However, in the opening to "Master of the House" the following lines occur in R1:

(THENARDIER)

My band of soaks, my den of dissolutes

My dirty jokes, my always pissed as newts

My sons of whores

Spend their lives in my inn

Homing pigeons flying in

They fly through my doors

And their money's good as yours

(CUSTOMERS)

Ain't got a clue what he put into his stew

Must've scraped it off the street

Hell, what a wine

Châteauneuf de Turpentine

Must've pressed it with his feet

Landlord over here

Where's the bloody man

One more for the road

One more slug of gin

Just one more or my old man is gonna do me in

All of those lines would be scrapped in R2. Personally I prefer this shortened variant than the one that would occur much later. Sure, some fun moments get lost, but nothing that actually adds any substance or characterization to the musical (unlike the later cut, which I'll discuss in a later edition of this blog). Some have speculated that this is simply lost dialog due to a tape flip of degrading, given that future performances would retain those lines. However, there is firsthand confirmation that the cuts were in fact part of the performance. To quote Trevor Nunn on page 87 of 1990's The Complete Book of Les Miserables (a page which elaborates that "the cost of overtime incurred after three hours could be crippling at a time when Les Miserables was still trying to find an audience"):

"Cameron wanted major cuts, which would have reduced its length to two and a half hours. I resisted, refusing to discuss things on those terms... Some of the other proposed cuts - like the removal of the "Master of the House" scene-setting preamble - were tried out in previews and then restored as the scenes would not work without them."

From a historical perspective that quote is invaluable. As will be brought up in a later blog post (notice a pattern today?) the musical would in fact be cut much later to avoid overtime charges. When people like myself have expressed the opinion that these cuts come at the expense of artistic integrity, I've seen others defend them by claiming that the overtime costs never were relevant to Cameron and the gang until Broadway sales began to go down, and that if they were taken into account the musical may well be in its shortened form from the beginning. However, this quote proves that argument to be false. Right from day one, the crew was aware that retaining a >3 hour runtime would come with severe financial costs, but this was deemed a worthy sacrifice in order to tell the story they wanted told. Indeed, it sounds like Cameron Mackintosh was waiting quite some time to enact his infamous cuts! (Cameron Mackintosh valuing profit above art?! Crazy, right??)

But I digress. Going back to the musical, the "Waltz of Treachery" number is mostly the same. However, after Valjean's "It won't take you too long to forget" line, R1 has over a minute of wordless vamping which leads right into the rather awkwardly-placed "Stars" song. By contrast, in R2 this vamping (which is still a minute long, mind you) leads into a humming duet between Little Cosette and Valjean, similar to the duet right before the number. A nice little bookend that makes the scene feel all the more resolved. (Much later this duet reprise would ironically be scrapped again, though!) The remaining segment of R1's vamping now plays after this sequence in R2.

Minus some unintentional missed lines at the beginning of "Stars" in R1, the recordings seem to follow the same libretto right up until "One Day More". Here, R1 uses the following lines:

(EPONINE)

One more day with him not caring

(MARIUS and COSETTE)

Was there ever love so true?

(EPONINE)

What a life I might have known

(MARIUS and COSETTE)

I was born to be with you

However, by R2 this scene is in its current form:

(EPONINE)

One more day with him not caring

(MARIUS and COSETTE)

I was born to be with you

(EPONINE)

What a life I might have known

(MARIUS and COSETTE)

And I swear I will be true

And that closes act one! Going on to the second act, the opening barricade scene has a few changes. First off, following the opening notes, R1 features a rather odd tune bearing resemblance to "Do You Hear the People Sing" (which can be heard here) before transitioning to a more true-to-form instrumental reprise of "Do You Hear the People Sing?" By contrast, R2 goes straight from the opening notes to the true-to-form reprise.

Next, Enjolras proclaims "Have faith in yourself and do not be afraid" in R1, while in R2 he instead states "Every man to his duty and don't be afraid". It's unknown if this was an intentional libretto change or if it simply reflects a flub during R1. A later sequence uses the "Have faith in yourself" line, meaning he may have just sung the wrong line for that particular scene.

Finally, R1 includes the following sequence (at least I think this is how it goes, since the lyrics are a little hard to hear):

(PROUVAIRE)

And the people will fight

(GRANTAIRE)

And join with you

Who gives a speech in the square

Fortunately, R2 uses a much less clunky (though still somewhat so) sequence:

(PROUVAIRE)

And the people will fight

(GRANTAIRE)

And so they might

Some will bark, some will bite

This isn't quite its current form ("dogs" and "fleas" will soon respectively replace the two usages of "some"), but it's pretty darn close.

I've heard that the very first Barbican preview(s?) didn't have a finalized opening to "On My Own". Sadly there is no known audio record of this, so I cannot comment on what exactly it began as. As such, the next major change takes place during Gavroche's death scene. This honestly is probably the biggest of all the changes between the two recordings. R1 uses the following death scene (in the tune of "Look Down" right up until the "So never kick a dog" verse, which is in the tune of "Little People"):

How do you do, my name’s Gavroche

These are my people, here’s my patch

Not much to look at, nothing posh

Nothing that you’d call up to scratch

Some fool, I bet, whose brains are made of fat

Picks up a gun and shoots me down

Nobody told him who he’s shooting at

He doesn’t know who runs this town

Life’s like that

There’s some folk

Missed the joke

That’s three, that’s three

That one has done for me

Too fast, too fast

They’ve got Gavroche at last

So never kick a dog

Because he’s just a pup

You better run for cover when the pup grows...

By contrast, R2 uses a much shorter variant which is set entirely to the tune of "Little People":

And little people know

When little people fight

We may look easy picking but we've got some bite

So never kick a dog

Because he's just a pup

You'd better run for cover when the pup grows up

And we'll fight like twenty armies and we won't give...

This is much closer to its current form, although the last two lines are inverted (we'll get to that in a later edition).

We now fast-forward to "Dog Eats Dog", which while recognizable is very different from the number we know today. The chorus of R1 claims that "It's a dirty great sewer that's crawling with rats", which R2 changes it to "stinking great sewer" instead. I'd definitely say the revised lyric better captures Thenardier's and the sewer's grossness.

Additionally, regarding Marius' ring, Thenardier originally exclaims that he "didn't mean to waste it, that would really be a crime". By R2, the line changes to "wouldn't want to waste it", which I'd say makes a lot more sense.

"Javert's Suicide" has changed a lot. R1 features the following remarks following "Vengeance was his and he gave me back my life":

Damned if I live in this caper of grace

Damned if I live in the debt of Valjean

I'll spit his pity right back in his face

Is this the law or has sanity gone?

(I'm a little unsure as to how accurate the final line is.)

By R2, the lines have been replaced with the current ones:

Damned if I live in the debt of a thief

Damned if I yield at the end of the chase

I am the law and the law is not mocked

I'll spit his pity right back in his face

In R1, the "Where's the new world, now the fighting's done" line is absent, and there is nothing but instrumentals in the segment where it is usually sung. By contrast, it is sung as usual in R2. My guess is that an actress simply forgot her line in R1 and it was always supposed to be there, though I can't say for sure.

The final change occurs at the wedding scene. The singing which opens the number is repeated in R1. By contrast, R2 has it sung once and then done with, as it currently is (and as it should be in my opinion, since the music isn't particularly pretty and contributes nothing to the plot).

Later in the same scene, R1 includes approximately this exchange (again, it's quite hard to make out the exact lyrics):

(THENARDIER)

I was there

Never fear

Even got me this fine souvenir

He was there

Her old dad

*indecipherable* and fleecing this lad

Robbed the dead

That's his way

(MME. THENARDIER)

That's worth five hundred any old day

(MARIUS)

I know this...

By R2, everything between "He was there" and "Any old day" were removed, which makes sense given that they essentially just rehash what was already said.

Finally, there's a subtle difference in the epilogue, specifically during the "Do You Hear the People Sing?" reprise. In R1, the ensemble sings "They will live again in glory in the garden of the Lord". R2 replaces the word "glory" with "freedom", and that word remains the one used to this day. I suppose "freedom" is more appropriate for the context of peace and prosperity. To many, I'd guess that "glory" conjures imagery of knights, battles, and the like; just the kind of violence that the characters wish to move away from! I have no idea if this was why the writers changed the lyric, but it's my hypothesis.

Towards the end of the show, the chorus in R1 sings "Even the darkest moon will end and the sun will rise". By R2, this is changed to "the darkest night". Makes more sense to me, since moons aren't known for being particularly dark!

And that just about sums this part up! If I missed anything feel free to let me know, as my goal is to create a changelog as thorough and complete as possible. I plan on making more parts in the near future covering all the changes that have been made in the show up until this day (discounting concerts). Any feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated.

As a side note, both for this project and my own enjoyment, I want as complete a collection of Les Miserables audios as possible. I already have most of what's commonly circulated, but if you have any audios or videos you know are rare, I'd love it if you DMed me!

Until the turntable puts me at the forefront again, good-bye...

[zkfanworkweek]

ZFAW Fan Content Creator Interviews: HayleyNFoster

Hey everyone! We hope you’re all excited for ZFAW, and to honor (ha!) ZFAW’s commitment to supporting and celebrating fan content creators in the Zutara fandom, we’re going to be rolling out a series of interviews with well-known and widely-beloved content creators over the next few weeks. We’ve got artists and fanfiction authors, some names you recognize as well as a few phenomenal up-and-coming talents, and we can’t wait for you to meet them all!

For the second interview in this cycle, we have our best propaganda creator and this fandom’s hottest new artist/undisputed queen of the animatic, @hayleynfoster!

1. Tell us about how you came to ship Zutara. What does this ship mean to you?

When I was around 14 or 15 and caught Avatar: The Last Airbender on television, I was drawn in by the art style, the humor, and the wonderful characters. I caught the episodes out of order, and the first one I saw and wasn’t prepared to be sucked in by was The Waterbending Scroll. It intrigued me at that age, and the line “I’ll save you from the pirates” combined with the tension between Katara and Zuko in that whole scene was electrifying. I remember my teenage self thinking these two have so much chemistry! And when I saw a commercial on Nickelodeon that featured fanart submitted by fellow Avatar fans, I realized that I could do that to! So I set about making Zutara fanart for myself. I stumbled onto Youtube, practically in its infancy, and discovered that people set clips of Zuko and Katara set to music (And this was still in season 1 days… so people who made these amvs were the real mvps because they were able to make compelling narratives in their amvs with like practically nothing to work with!). The AMVs really spurred my interest in this couple, I remember distinctly one Zutara AMV using the Dido song White Flag utterly capturing my imagination. I found fandom shortly after, getting into deviantart and forums. But the ship really began to mean something to me when, as I was working on my drawings in the computer lab at school, a buoyant presence hovered over my shoulder noticing my Zutara art on the computer screen. The girl was someone I had never really talked to and had only seen from afar but she immediately started excitedly saying she shipped Zuko and Katara too! In this simple shared obsession, I made one of the best friends I’ve ever had and we’re still friends to this day. We would theorize and fangirl over Avatar like it was nobody’s business; we poured over bootleg San Diego Comic Con footage that showed spoilers for season 2 before it aired; we lost our freaking minds when we finally saw The Crossroads of Destiny. We had watch parties every week as Season 3 of A:TLA aired, and comforted each other when the show ended as it did (much ranting was shared). Those are some of my happiest memories from high school… all because this one pairing from this wonderful show. Even though Zutara didn’t happen, we still chat every now and then about it. Zutara will probably be a lifelong obsession, always bubbling under the surface. And without it, I would have never realized that animation was a viable career path. It really did inspire everything including the work I’m doing to this day in the animation industry. I owe a lot to this ship and to Avatar: the Last Airbender.

2. What inspires you to create zutara fanworks?

The resurgence of Avatar: The Last Airbender this year really helped sort of spark that dormant love I had for Zutara. The show’s ending still disappointed me on the rewatch, but Zuko and Katara’s relationship arc was as captivating as ever, so I turned to some fanfiction and looking at people’s pretty Zutara art and AMVs to just revel in fanon instead of getting to hung up on the actual ending of the show. But then I realized, with quarantine and my work load being pretty light, I had time to actually make all new Zutara art for myself, art I was never fully capable of making as a kid, but now could do with my 7 years of industry experience and just… life experience. And I was inspired to do some corrective animatics to satisfy my own desire for a different ending. I just really like exploring these two characters, doing different and interesting things with them, and frankly I’m inspired to make cute, fluffy, romantic art simply by virtue of living in a really sad and depressing world. Things are so crazy right now, creating art about two characters I love being in love, is comforting. And it helps to have inspiring music and amazing Zutara amvs to just sort of stir up my emotions and imagery in my head to make into animatics and art.

3. Be selfish - if you could request one fanwork based on your own art/fanfic, what would it be? What would you absolutely love to see someone create?

Ohhhh… Well, It’s always nice to have people write fanfiction that puts words to my animatics. I am not that great at coming up with dialog myself, so I’ve just chosen to indulge in visuals and emotions for my boards. But when I read things like RideBoldlyRide’s take on my Reunion Animatic, it makes me pretty giddy. (They finally have voices!) :) And this is the MOST selfish thing I could request, but I’m not shy about saying how much I love well done amvs, so I will literally kill for someone to make Zutara AMVs to songs I like… Like, most of AURORA’s songs but especially Exist for Love, Sunseeker by The Naked and Famous, Promises or Take Me by Aly & AJ, Adore You by Harry Styles, Human Enough by ONR, Never Let Me Go by Florence + The Machine, and/or Almost (Sweet Music) by Hozier just… I can see the AMVs so clearly to any of these songs in my head, but I don’t have the tools or skill set at my disposal to make a compelling fan video. When I was in high school, I originally thought I wanted to go into video editing simply because I loved making very crappy AMVs (they were so bad you guys), but I figured out being a storyboard artist was more in my wheelhouse. haha

4. Any words for people who are new to the fandom and/or nervous about sharing their work for the first time?

If you’re new to the Zutara fandom, just have a good time! Don’t waste too much time arguing with people over your shipping preferences. I wasted so much of my teen years having pointless shipping wars with people on DeviantArt, and I’m just so much happier nowadays because I’m just making Zutara art in my little corner of the internet, and honestly, in the politest of ways, I don’t give a shit if people don’t like my art or Zutara. haha I think that’s sort of a key thing for people thinking of posting creative works here in the fandom, just make art for yourself, satisfy your own desires for the pairing, get your creative sparks flying, and create just for the joy of creating. It’s always nice to get comments and such, but simply making the art should be what spurs you on, not the external validation. And have a good time, don’t worry too much - I say as someone who worries about EVERYTHING. But honestly, making art for A:TLA is some of the most relaxed I’ve been because I make it just for me. I’m lucky others seem to like it too!

5. What’s an idea for a fanwork that you have but haven't gotten around to making?

I have an idea for a second generation storyline with my Zutara kids that involves Kya (the eldest firebending daughter) falling in love with an airbender boy (tentatively named Gora in my headcanon who’s a bit of a rabble rouser and one of Aang’s kids he had with a Kyoshi Warrior), and then they start a socialist revolution in the Fire Nation in order to dismantle all of the hierarchical societies across the Avatar world… Together Kya and Gora Fan the Flames of revolution… ehhhhh... Get it?? Oh! Oh, and then Katara, who had put in legit liberal reforms in her time as Fire Lady listens to her daughter after resisting in the first part of the story, but then realizes she can actually play a part in the dissolution of the royalty and is also active in the revolution realizing that moderate liberal reforms are no substitute for a society free of serving royalty (which she had always been uncomfortable with but had rationalized with herself that she was doing good in her capacity as Fire Lady.) I just feel like there’s a lot of cool potential for discussing these ideas and also having some aspirational change in the Avatar world. lol For aesthetics and just happy fluffy times, I can indulge in Fire Lady and Fire Lord Zuko stuff, but really at the end of the day, I take issue with the structures in a society that have to exist for monarchies to exist. Soooo, I kind of want to do my own corrective story for that… if I ever have the time or guts. On a less ambitious note, I would love to do a Zutara sparring animatic to practice doing action, but I need a good story; I am not good at doing fights just for fighting’s sake. Those are just some things I have rattling around in my head.  

6. Are you participating in ZFAW? If so want to give us a hint as to your plans?

Yes! The most I can say is I have one animatic almost finished and one that’s still being thumbnailed. The rest are probably going to be comics or emotive single pieces based on the fanfics I really like right now. :)

[gongziyus]

more self indulgent thoughts, mmmm....another thing i love about run on is that it *tells* the story both visually and via dialog. like just looking at the images and how they are put together you get the story, and then just listening to what the characters say to each other you get the story, and then together you get the story. i mean it’s pretty straightforward and “yeah that’s what tv is,” but watch like.....a daily or a weekender and you’ll see immediate differences. i’m not going to articulate this well because i don’t know the technical terms, but i’ll try bulleting:

1. visually

i. first is the “show not tell” part lots of people have pointed out. for example, the way we saw seongyeom was nervous while confessing because of how he fidgeted with his hands and let out a held breath. another example is when we’re shown the process of his thinking about getting a hotel room for mijoo and her colleagues, as opposed to say thinking it out loud

ii. second is like the repetition of images and how that creates meaning, both literal meaning and meaning that’s more about like vibes---the focus on their hands, the shots of mijoo’s shoes, how danah keeps touching/holding people by their chins, people appearing before each other; and these images go beyond the usual kdrama symbolism (though there is that, too, and deliciously so, like when seongyeom didn’t run and he was the lone runner at the starting line)

iii. third is stuff that’s like the building blocks of film making --- the transitions, like when it went from mijoo walking away from his dad giving her money into seongyeom sitting alone in the dark in his hotel room as it rained. that example shows how mijoo and seongyeom both felt, idk, lost? unsettled? at the same moment even though they were in separate places dealing with different things. another example is the cut from mijoo translating carol to danah walking into the coffee shop. that adds to the conversation the show is approaching re: queerness and specifically about danah being a lesbian. it’s something it “said” without using dialog.

iv. all the film and tv references --- casablanca, jerry maguire, e.t., winnie the pooh

2. via dialog

i. i mean, obviously. dialog is the basic building block of a drama. dramas are really just people meeting up and talking. but the dialog here first of all has a characteristic (i think for u.s. americans it’d be analogous to like gilmore girls? or sorkin, like may referenced.) in its delivery---that it’s sharp, quick-witted, and delivered at a fast pace. i also feel like there’s also less ‘talking out loud to yourself’ than you usually see in most dramas. 

ii. the drama does this thing where, just like images are recurring, words, phrases, and even conversations are recurring --- “mistake,” “do what you want,” how mijoo first mentions jerry maguire in ep 5 and then seongyeom is only able to comment on the film and respond to her about it in ep10, how they discuss having a home in ep3 and then mijoo invites seongyeom into her home in ep7, how they remember exact phrases from their past conversations (mijoo remembering seongyeom saying running is mostly just being breathless), yeognhwa saying he’s a character from an anime only to have mijoo later reference that same anime to him. and tomorrow we’re getting mijoo again asking seongyeom not to leave her. and each time we return to a word, phrase, or conversation, the context changes, the meaning changes, and those changes push or pull the characters together or apart and reveals something about them.

iii. every character has distinct speech patterns/tendencies. the way danah takes an insult and spins it into something positive; the way seongyeom will just not respond if he finds you boring or rude; how forthcoming mijoo is (she loves explaining things! esp when they matter to her); how ironic may is; how every conversation yeonghwa has is always on the verge of devolving into an argument.

iv. how the dialog comments on the theme/premise of the show. the translated dialog mijoo heard that made her become a translator is “why do we fall? so we can learn how to pick ourselves back up.” and that exactly what both seongyeom and woosik are doing.

and then all these things working in tandem, building on each other, to explore central themes, and, very simply, make the show fun to watch. like, it’s just a really thick show.