#re: specifics: to start with. bait does not generally SURVIVE the experience.

[dandelion-wings]

This post I reblogged earlier tagged for the knight trio is actually one @theabysscomeshome sent me a while ago for them (which is to say the connection is not originally mine), and in subsequent conversation I mentioned that it made me want to think of things Diluc and Kaeya could do on the way to rescuing Jean that, despite her willingness to look the other way explicitly for Diluc and implicitly for Kaeya, she couldn't make herself look away from this time. Seeing that post again on my dash resurfaced it for me and got that spinning in my head again; this warm-up bit is fairly vague on specifics, it's just the exchange that jumped into my head, but I assure you that they are, in the long run, Unpleasant.

---

"She isn't going to forgive you for this," Eroch says, looking up with difficulty. "I don't know anything, and she'll know it. I've done my penance. I'm an upstanding private citizen!"

Kaeya has him in a picture-perfect containment hold: flat on his stomach on the floor, arms twisted behind his back with his wrists together, knees bent, ankles crossed, Kaeya pressing them down against his thighs with his knee and most of his body weight. The rest is keeping his wrists pinned to the small of his back. It's severe, but still a far kinder hold than Diluc would have put him in.

Jean would be proud. There's an irony to that, because Eroch is right about the rest.

"Even if that's true," Diluc says, stepping out of the shadows, "I don't care."

"The funny thing is," Kaeya adds, "is that she would forgive us if we were doing this for anyone else. But for her, what we plan to do with a private citizen will be going too far."

"Unfortunately for you, we'd rather have her alive and unwilling to forgive us than too dead to care." Diluc raises his hand and lets flames dance above his cupped palm. He enjoys the way Eroch's eyes go wide, the embers of an old anger rousing to join the fear that's been hissing under his skin since Kaeya knocked on his door. "Given what you did, she might let me get away with what I'm about to do, if not the rest."

"Diluc. Haven't you learned yet that torture doesn't work?" Kaeya tsks at him.

Irritation prickles alongside the fear and anger, and Diluc glares back, though he clenches his fist to douse the flame. "It's worked for me more than once. Unless you're forgetting some details of the Stormterror incident."

"Hahaha, well, that was on Abyss Mages. We're built a little differently from regular human opportunists like him. Besides, he's telling the truth. He doesn't know anything. That's not why we've picked him up."

"Then why?" Diluc demands through clenched teeth. He hates being led along like this, getting the details of Kaeya's plan in drips and drabs. He wishes Kaeya would just tell him what he knows.

Kaeya's hand tightens on Eroch's wrists until the man squirms, and he pats him on the shoulder like he might a fractious horse. "He's bait for the real fish. I don't suppose you have any rope?"

[breakingbadfics]

Thought Experiment. Part 1.

or “How would I have done it” 

So The Sith Resurgence is a petty bashfic driven purely by a desire to spit in the face of canon, but specifically ReyLo Shippers, specifically the Kylo Ren/Ben Solo lovers of the ship. The plot is hollow, the only characters given any consideration of depth are the romantic leads making the supporting characters even more bereft of substance. and in trying to fix certain things with in the canon it somehow has even less than canon

What does a good version of this look like? 

“Course Correction”

So lets start with an easy version of this question. The story is sitting at 35 chapters as of my writing this section of the essay. 

Lets say Hypothetically Lily Orchard reached out to me to outline the final arc for the story. How would I do that? 

So as of the end of chapter 35 these things happen 

Kylo Ren is intending to fake the return of Emperor Palpatine. 

Aliana and Rey have just gotten married

Rey’s growth in power has been climbing and causing concern among her friends for her safety. 

The First Order know the location of the Resistance’s new base after they survived the events of episode 8

There is still some sort of conflict between Aliana, Rey, and Leia.

Kylo Ren is Angling towards setting up the fall of the republic. 

Rey and Aliana are sent to Nathema  reinforce the extraction of child recruits from The First Order. 

I’m missing something I’m sure, but we’re moving forward from these points. 

Chapter 36 begins with Aliana and Rey arriving on Nathema, They do the fighting, clear out the base, begin the evacuations and save a bunch of children. During this The Message is sent out to all First Order bases. The Emperor has returned from the dead. 

On Nathema The Message arriving causes a shift in the morale of the fighting and while Rey and Aliana make it out in time along with any resistance back up they had, but everyone is ratttled. 

in spite of that Aliana is basically no-selling the threat of The Emperor’s return. and while Rey is also nervous about it Aliana assuages those fears by explaining that, that wasn’t Palpatine at all. Because there was no shock in the force. If Darth Sidious had cheated death, it would have been something everyone force sensitive could have felt, and would have been felt long before the emperor even composed the message. 

And so Chapter 36 ends

Chapter 37 

With the force bond having been unblocked Kylo Ren was able to detect Rey had left the Resistance base. And in an impulse chose to personally lead an attack on the base. During this he made sure to have The Message from The Emperor sent out 

During the attack a lot of casualties occur, but The Core Cast srvives but the big casualty is that Kylo Ren slashed a path through and took out his mother. 

the rest of the story is trying to recuperate and then convey that Palpatine’s message was fabricated as propaganda. 

during all this it’s decided amongst the remaining resistance that when they make the retaliatory strike it has to be the final blow that sets off the collapse of the first order. 

Chapter 38

Aliana and Rey train more, Rey start learning various Sith Techniques. 

Captain Phasma leading the last remnants of The Knights of Ren reveal themselves to have been waiting in hiding, they’re further accompanied by a collection of bounty hunters aiming to overwhelm the jedi and the sith through sheer numbers and power. 

It is not an easy fight but Phasma’s attack force is defeated and the captain is forced to retreat as one of the sole survivors of this attack. The victory is owed in both to Rey and Aliana’s capabilities as a unit as well as Finn and the remaining Resistance assisting where it counts. 

--

Kylo Ren is continuing his own private solo training and has found a collection of sith holocrons in Snokes original private quarters that have aided in honing his skills.. 

The First Order itself has made an order for all forces across the galaxy to return to the original coordinates of Star Killer Base.

once the full force of The First Order arrives in one place the plan is revealed that they intend to pull a full final assault on The Republic, intent to basically glass the surface of Corruscant. 

Chapter 39

The First Order again. 

They are preparted to set out only to find themselves faced with The Resistance and The Sith Fleet having arrived to make their own final attack. 

The fight begins

During all this Rey, Aliana, and friends infiltrate the lead ship with intent to find and eliminate the leaders of the first order. 

The eventual final confrontation between Kylo Ren, Aliana, and Rey happens. 

And Then everythings for a moment as hundred of thousands of Imperial Star Destroyers warp in from nowhere. And start attacking both sides. 

A mesage relayed across all channels. 

Emperor Palpatine is actually somehow alive, and has arrived to reclaim control of his fleet. 

Chapter 40 

Emperor Palpatine’s message is simple; he’s returned to take his throne as ruler of the galaxy. To the Resistance he demands surrender so that their deaths may be quick and merciful. To The First Order a message to stand down, declare fealty to him or die. 

The entirety of the battle as far as the fleets go dissolves into chaos and immediately Rose and Holdo declare a fall back and as many people in the resistance get out, leaving the first order and imperial forces to engage in a massive civil war. 

While this is happening Aliana and Rey are trying to gauge what to do while also fighting Kylo Ren, only for Kylo Ren to get shot in the back of the head by General Hux, who retreats to take his side with the empire. 

Aliana and Rey spend the rest of the chapter escaping and being very very angry they were denied the catharsis of killing Kylo Ren 

Chapter 41 

everyone is panicking. 

The resistance is down to their last legs and the entire galaxy is with little hope 

meanwhile Hux and Phasma are called forth to see The Emperor personally. where it is explained that even in spite of the unifying desire to re-establish the empire the first order was not the entirety of the remaining imperial forced and some chose to quietly seek out planets known to be inhabited by the dark side of the force. during this a ritual was carried out to allow a suitable individual to become the vessel for the emperor. The Emperor is basically wearing full fitting body armor at all times. but basically he’s inhabiting the body of a Galen Marek clone. 

Oh also Hux is executed, because the emperor saw what he did to Kylo Ren who was the acting supreme leader of the First Order, and so determined Hux to be not trustworthy. 

The resistance are still having doubts to their abilities now that they’re low on forces. further faith in Aliana is wavering due to the whole “I’d know if the emperor was back” blowing up in her face. 

However because Palpatines Message was delivered across the galaxy, and on all channels they get a message from The Senate that basically declares that they’re going all in on the resistance and fully endorsing them. planets from across all systems as well as former rebel alliance members are en route to bolster their forces. it is now a full scale war to snuff out The Imperial Remnant. 

Chapter 42.  

Aliana and Rey are declared high generals with only Holdo and Rose Tico holding equal authority to them 

The Resistance manage to find the current whereabouts of the emperor. 

They set out to finally put an end to his reign of terror once and for all. 

Chapter 43 

Rey, Aliana, and crew launch a strike on Emperor Palpatines personal cruiser. 

It’s revealed that Palpatine has “resurrected” Kylo Ren. though no more than a puppet to act as an extention of Palpatines will. 

The final fight for the fate of the galaxy and the right to be The one true sith lord begins. 

Chapter 44 

The fight happens.

 Rey fights the husk of Kylo Ren, The final step in Rey Beniko’s empowerment, destroying and ending the life of her abuser, lamenting only in that the soul of kylo ren never occupied the husk so she couldn’t revel in the end of his pathetic existance. 

Aliana and Palpatine fight, The right to call themselves the True and Rightful Sith Lord. Palpatine almost wins, even with the act of the fight becoming a one on two drag out brawl between the two lovers and the emperor.

However Galen Marek proper, and Finn arrive, and proceed to even the odds in a 4 on 1 fight.

As one last attempt at a moral blow is Palpatine reveals that somewhere along in the past he set up an arranged marriage with the Beniko line of sith lords something that had been set up several hundred of years back somewhere between lana and aliana’s grandmother. The suitor was a member of his bloodline which he says to be rey. And that in falling for one another they’ve played into his plans to the letter 

Aliana, does not care. Murders palpatine, and as to whether or not he was telling the truth. No one cares about that either. taking it as an attempt to fuck with the both of them 

Chapter 45

The story ends with the usual “where are they now” 

Finn and Poe get married, Rey and Aliana adopt. under the leadership of Holdo and Rose The Resistance slides back into being the officially backed “Rebel Alliance” hunting down the last remnants of the first order and the empire with the full scope of the republic military 

The future for Force users is made a little more weird because the sith and the jedi are effectively the same thing trying with what ever opposes them being recognized as extremists of both sides

Somewhere the sole remnants of the first order and empire gather quietly to lick their wounds, lead by “Supreme Leaderl Phasma”  as a potential sequel bait

The story ends with Rey and Aliana drinking wine. and a toast to the future. 

[pass-the-bechdel]

Marvel Cinematic Universe: Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?

Yes, once.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Seven (30.43% of cast).

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Sixteen.

Positive Content Rating:

Three.

General Film Quality:

Significantly flawed, and well-known in fandom for it. Unpopular opinion? I still think it’s better than the first Avengers film.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) UNDER THE CUT:

Passing the Bechdel:

Natasha and Laura pass in a single-line trade. It’s sooo close to not counting.

Female characters:

Natasha Romanoff.

Wanda Maximoff.

Maria Hill.

Helen Cho.

Peggy Carter.

Laura Barton.

FRIDAY.

Male characters:

Tony Stark.

Steve Rogers.

JARVIS.

Thor.

Clint Barton.

Strucker.

Pietro Maximoff.

Bruce Banner.

Ultron.

Sam Wilson.

James Rhodes.

Ulysses Klaue.

Heimdall.

Nick Fury.

Erik Selvig.

Vision.

OTHER NOTES:

Everyone talking about Strucker like we already know who he is...

The “Shit!”/”Language!” gag was funnier before they hung a lantern on it. Not least because it takes almost a full minute before Tony harks back to it (fifty seconds, actually. I checked). If you’re gonna make a Thing out of it, you gotta follow up immediately, not after fifty seconds of cutting around to different character intros and action shots and a whole lot of other dialogue. 

Urrgghh, ok, I’m going to break my standing rule about not discussing source material, because we gotta acknowledge the colossal wrongness of re-writing the Maximoff twins - canonically Jewish Romani - as willing volunteers in a Nazi science experiment. It gets worse the more you think about it. There are a few things about this movie which generated significant negative outcry, and this incredibly offensive decision is one of them.

Tony and Thor fighting over who has a better girlfriend does have a certain charm to it. If you’re gonna have a testosterone-off, it might as well be about how great your partner is.

I got a zero out of ten on this out-of-nowhere forced romance crap with Natasha and Bruce. We’ll come back to this later.

“I will be reinstituting Prima Nocta,” Tony declares, as he prepares to lift Thor’s hammer and thereby theoretically take charge of the Nine Realms. Primae noctis (believed to in fact be a myth) refers to a supposed Dark-Ages law that granted lords the ‘right’ to take the virginity of any newlywed peasant woman who lived on their land. So, this is a wonderful little rape joke from Tony (or, y’know, not so little, since primae noctis in reality would make Tony a serial rapist). Ha ha ha ha. Hilarious. Good one.

I’m really mad about the parts here that are total garbage, because mostly, the revels sequence has a nice low-key quality to it, good solid team dynamics. 

I can’t fucking believe that they played the ‘and then Bruce falls with his face in Natasha’s cleavage!’ gag. I cannot believe it. Is this a disgusting frat-boy comedy from the nineties?

Honestly, Tony, just shut up and admit that you KNEW from the get-go that it was wrong to try and make Ultron happen (that is why you kept it secret from everyone else to begin with); don’t try to defend the decision now that you’ve got a ‘murderbot’ on your hands. Take responsibility for a bad choice instead of talking shit about how you had to and everyone else is just too short-sighted, damn it! 

Andy Serkis is delightful.

The Iron Man/Hulk fight absolutely KILLS the momentum of this film. It goes for way the fuck too long (eight minutes) and has no narrative significance at all. Pro tip for action scenes: they should always be driving the story somewhere. You can pull off eighty minutes of action so long as your plot is advancing alongside/within it.

Also, Iron Man causes a huge amount of additional damage during this fight, in the service of the aforementioned pointless action. His efforts to minimise Hulk’s effects are extremely poor, and calling in his relief organisation to clean up after the fact does not negate that. 

Gotta love that throwing a wife and kids at Hawkeye at the same time as we suddenly start pushing this Natasha/Bruce thing. That’s not transparent at all. I also understand this to be a major deviation from Clint’s identity in the comics, and very unpopular with fans for that reason, but regardless; reinventing him as a family man to reset the romantic blather after baiting fans with the possibility of Clint/Natasha in the first Avengers movie is such a shitty move. I was not invested in the ship myself and would have loved to have them reinforce the just-friends relationship between Hawkeye and Black Widow, because there are not enough platonic friendships between compatible men and women in fiction, but 'they’re not interested in each other because they’re busy with someone else!’ is a weak reinforcement indeed. Less forced romances, and definitely less token wifey who exists for no other Goddamn reason at all. This comes out of nowhere, and not in a clever-surprise kind of way.

“You still think you’re the only monster on the team?” Natasha says, after telling Bruce about her sterilisation. This earned a HUGE backlash, and for good reason - despite all arguments about how what Natasha meant was that her being raised to be an assassin makes her a monster, the direct implication of her words as they are phrased and as the discussion is structured is that her inability to have children makes her monstrous, and that’s deeply offensive. It’s also completely in keeping with a narrative which is often played out against women, in which their value as people is attributed directly to their ability to produce offspring, so it’s not even like this outrageous implication of monstrosity - the corruption of what it means to be female! - is that unusual. It’s awful, but not unusual. Add on the fact that 1) Natasha’s nightmare-flashes specifically foregrounded her sterilisation over all other details of her training, supporting the idea that she believes that it’s what makes her irredeemable (instead of, y’know, all the murdering and stuff), and 2) this is Joss Whedon’s work and he is OBSESSED with highlighting the womanhood of his female characters and treating it like their defining trait while also variously punishing them for it, and you’ve got every reason to interpret this terrible fucking line as exactly the heinous thing it (presumably, unwittingly) seems to be. 

Steve ripping a log in half with his bare hands is the funniest thing in this whole movie.

Thor’s brief side-adventure with Erik Selvig is pretty out-of-place. He just...goes for a swim in a convenient magic pond that Selvig chances to know about. Seems normal.

Ultron is full of such boring, empty rhetoric. Reminds me of Loki in The Avengers, with all that sound-and-fury. 

I love Paul Bettany.

Man, they sure do find Natasha instantly. It’s almost like making a damsel-in-distress of her who needs to be rescued by the team was completely meaningless...

Breaking my no-BTS rule (since I already have done for this movie at this point) because it’s well-known how Joss Whedon ordered Elizabeth Olsen not to show exertion or ‘ugly emotion’ on her face in this film, because God forbid she compromise her attractiveness by being human. Joss Whedon is not human; he’s fucking trash. 

The final fight sure does just, y’know, get to a point where it ends. They really did not ratchet up the tension over the course of the Sokovia conflict, it just goes along until it stops (also, they say Sokovia is a country, but then they never call the city anything else, it’s just Sokovia. Is the city conveniently named after the country (very confusing), or is it a city-country, like The Vatican? I kinda assume it’s option three, which is that no one bothered to care because it’s just some fake European placeholder anyway and we’re not supposed to notice such a dumb oversight).

“I was born yesterday.” This is the best quip in this whole thinks-it-is-way-wittier-than-it-is movie.

Helen Cho deserved better than to be a prop rapidly dismissed and then just trotted past at the end for an ‘oh, she survived, btw’. 

Back when I reviewed the first Avengers movie, I said that I considered that film to be heavily overrated, so maybe it’s not such a surprise that I actually like this one better. The two primary problems I had with that first film were the overly simplistic plot, and the fact that most of the characters were OOC compared to previous films, and this movie does do better on both scores, so I feel more engaged by it, and less annoyed. That said...this movie has still got a lot of problems, and those include iffy characterisation and a plot with various holes, nonsensical complications, and conveniently ignored or smoothed-down dynamics. When I say I like this movie better than the first one, I mean just that: I like this better. That does not mean I am here to sing its praises. 

The tacked-on romance is part of the problem - for Clint as well as Natasha (but especially for Natasha). After Hawkeye was so heavily under-used in the first film (and his slightly-ambiguous relationship with Black Widow was the only human element that made him a character instead of a prop), Age of Ultron attempts to compensate by giving Clint a personal life, in the form of a magically-appearing heavily-pregnant wife and a pair of nameless children. The function of this family appears to be 1) to give Clint a reason to not be interested in Natasha, and 2) to ‘humanise’ him by giving him something to fight for and get home to, because we all know nothing legitimises a character quite like some otherwise-irrelevant dependents. Want a man to seem lovable and important? Give him a pregnant wife. That’s what women are for, anyway, right? To enhance a man’s story? In this case, to provide a man whose purpose in the story has been contested with insta-personality, because ‘he’s secretly a family man, ooh, twist!’ is way better than having to spend time on giving him something to do in the plot that is actually meaningful in some way. Great logic. Makes Hawkeye super dynamic, right? 

Natasha, unsurprisingly, is hit much, much harder. As the only female avenger and one of only two prominent female characters in a cast which has seven-to-nine male characters of equal or greater importance/screen time (YMMV on whether or not you think Fury and Vision count for that list), the pressure is already on for Natasha to be served up a quality narrative, because if she doesn’t get one, well...she doesn’t have six-to-eight alternative characters to pull the weight for her gender. The best solve for this problem would be to avoid the ‘Token Woman’ cliche in the first place, but since we missed that boat...not having the personal story of your only primary female character revolve completely around her womanhood and her catering to heteronormative expectations of a love interest would have been a good choice. This weird, forced, chemistry-free thing with Bruce Banner? Was the worst thing they could have used to define Natasha’s presence in the film. It sticks out like a sore thumb every time they have an awkward interaction, and it leads in to that atrocious ‘monstrous infertility’ element (though that particular egregious mistake could have been included with or without a romantic blunder, it...probably wouldn’t be, and we’d all be the better off). Even the Hulk-whisperer part of the relationship - while not awful on its own with all the unnecessary romance and Unresolved Sexual Not-Tension removed - serves to highlight Natasha’s female-ness by making her the soft maternal figure for the team, because God forbid one of the other male members of the team be asked to ASMR-speak to the Hulk while delicately caressing his hand. If Natasha’s presence in the first Avengers film leaned too heavily on her gender identity as a defining trait (and it did), this movie doesn’t fix that problem at all: it doubles down on it. 

The good news for most of the excess of male characters is, they by-and-large don’t feel as OOC as they did in the first film. The boorish romantic entanglement aside, Bruce Banner is still a naturalistic character highlight (all credit to Mark Ruffalo, who probably doesn’t know how to turn in a bad performance in the first place), and Thor’s dialogue is way less ridiculous this time ‘round, so he lands a lot closer to his personality from previous films simply by virtue of sounding like the same guy (unfortunately, the plot does not have the faintest idea what it wants to do with him as a character). Steve Rogers is still being written as if being Captain America is his character, which is a fundamental misunderstanding of his identity, albeit one which conveniently allows him to behave in a stereotypical self-righteously bland manner, thus avoiding the need for any nuance in his perspective or actions. This borderline fanfic-flamer ‘Captain America is my least favourite character so I’m going to write him as a boring stick-in-the-mud and then hopefully no one else will like him either!’ approach doesn’t grate quite as badly as it did in the first Avengers, and it can’t cancel out the innate level-headed charm of Chris Evans, so as disappointing as the bias is, it’s still a better balance here than it was last time. The one character who is not so flatteringly handled, however? Also happens to be the one who was arguably handled best last time, and unfortunately, he’s the one who is essentially treated as the ‘lead’. 

The big problem for Tony Stark is that this movie is not interested in digging in to the pathos of any character, it’s all-flash-no-substance on that front, and Tony really, really needed a less heavy-handed slathering of ‘afraid of what might come (feat. messiah complex)’ to motivate his actions and reactions in this film, because without any exploration he’s basically just a billionaire kid playing with matches. If this were an Iron Man film (either the first or third one, anyway), we’d get into some tasty deconstruction of Tony’s mental state and confront his hubris, etc, and - crucially, most crucial of all, it’s a mainstay of all his past stories in the MCU - Tony would own up to his mistakes, listen to the advice of those around him, and take contrite steps toward fixing the problem not just in the direct sense of ‘beating the bad guy’, but also in the personal and emotional sense of working on his own flaws and making amends with the people he hurt along the way. This movie offers none of that. To begin with, Tony’s ‘I know best and I will not be taking any questions’ approach to creating Ultron feels like a significant step backwards in his character development so far (Iron Man 3 was specifically about addressing his PTSD and associated tumultuous emotions surrounding the fear of imminent alien invasion, so his reactionary and secretive behaviour in this film feels particularly out-of-touch with a mental reality Tony has been explicitly working on for the past couple of years); Tony is actively aware that it’s a bad call and thus hides it from the other Avengers until it’s too late, and then he’s bizarrely unrepentant about his mistake. Worst of all, he actually attempts to repeat that mistake, only worse, late in the film (the fact that his idiotic ‘mad scientist’ pep talk actually convinces Bruce to help him again is the weakest character moment for Bruce outside of the aforementioned romance crap). The plot rewards Tony’s second, far worse mistake, in the creation of Vision, who turns out to be ‘worthy of wielding Thor’s Hammer’ and whatnot and conveniently provides every necessary skill to defeat Ultron in a deus ex machina so overt you could use it as a textbook example, so even though Tony had absolutely no way of knowing that he’d get a good result this time and almost every reason to believe he’d just compound the existing problem, his reckless disregard for the literal safety of the planet is treated like a good thing because it happens to work out this time, and they just kinda sweep under the rug the fact that Tony is playing God (and being uncharacteristically stupid and selfish about it - in other films, Tony is normally only reckless with his own safety, and it’s when his actions spill out into unintended consequences for others that he realises the error of his ways and cues up a positive learning curve; it’s what makes him palatable). At the end of the film, once Ultron is gone and Tony has thrown some dispassionate wads of cash into ‘relief efforts’, he strolls and quips and eventually drives off into the sunset in his expensive car, with nary a mention of, I dunno, maybe a little guilty conscience? Maybe a hint of having learned a valuable lesson? The closest he gets is just suggesting that it might be time he retires from Avenging, but neither he nor anyone else lets on that there’s a need for serious self-reflection. The Tony Stark in this movie is the nightmarish male-fantasy version of the character, the playboy with the cool tech and no limits who does whatever he wants and then...literally rides off into the sunset in the end, no muss, no fuss. He’s kinda like a complete reversion to his original self, pre-Iron Man, frittering money around and designing weapons of mass destruction while convincing himself he’s bringing peace to the world one explosion at a time, but that Tony has no business here, seven years of character development down the track.

While we’re talking iffy characterisation, we should also segue into plot, and that’s something we can do easily enough by looking at our villain, Ultron. Calling Ultron an actual character feels...ambitious. He’s a CGI robot full of empty rhetoric and, you guessed it, more of those quips that this movie has in place of any meaningful dialogue. I’d call him self-fellating, but he ain’t got nothing to fellate, so instead he just blathers a lot in a manner that sounds vaguely poetically intelligent but is, upon a moment’s consideration, just vapid nonsense (much like Loki in the first Avengers, as noted above, but at least Loki had the benefit of a flesh-and-blood actor delivering his lines with conviction; James Spader does solid work as the voice of Ultron, but trying to make a CGI robot who spouts a school-kid’s attempt at edgy philosophy sound like a genuine menace is an uphill battle). Speaking of genuine menace, I assume the reason the film is called Age of Ultron is because A Couple of Days of Ultron Causing Disturbances in a Handful of Specific Locations was too much. For all the big talk (and there is..so much), Ultron doesn’t get up to all that much trouble, most notably in the sense that he apparently has his code all over the internet and yet he doesn’t bother stirring up a single ounce of chaos with that ungodly power. Why bother including this as an element of the character if it achieves zero story? Is it purely to make Ultron seem ~unstoppable~ because he keeps downloading into new robots? Because it didn’t really land, y’all. They try to play it like a big victory for the good guys when Vision burns Ultron out of the ‘net, but in context it’s meaningless because he didn’t do anything while he was there. Pretty much everything about Ultron was all talk, little to no action - even a whole bunch of the trouble he did cause happened off-screen, with Maria Hill just popping in to let us know that ‘there are reports of metal men stealing shit’. Cheers, cool. And you know, Ultron makes a song and dance about how he’s going to save the world by ‘ending the Avengers’, but then he...does not pursue that at all. He tries to make himself a pretty body, the Avengers thwart him, and then he enacts a doomsday machine to destroy all life on Earth. Like every other aspect of the character, the whole ‘end the Avengers’ schtick is just white noise, there’s no meaning in it. Ultron is just a same-old-same ‘What if Artificial Intelligence wants to WIPE US OUT?!’ cliche, and maybe that’s what he was in the comics too, I don’t know, but it’s the job of the film to tell that story in a dynamic way, and they had two and a half hours to do it. And yet.

There should be more to this than a nondescript placeholder villain concept and a series of action set pieces that just kinda happen until they stop. At least the first Avengers had some variety in each of its action sequences, using the location and the different skills and weapons of its antagonists, whereas this one is just ‘there are robots and the good guys punched and shot them until they were all broken, the end’. Even making the city fly in the end doesn’t actually make it interesting, not least because the characters spend most of their time running around the (weirdly, perfectly stable) streets not having to deal with any consequences of being up in the air anyway, and the doomsday device is too nebulous to ratchet up any real tension about figuring out how to deal with it. The conflicts with the Maximoff twins have at least some spark of life in them, but the characters themselves are treated to an over-simplified and very contrived narrative arc that uses what they do and what they know more as plot devices than as details of actual people’s lives, leading to a cheap death for Pietro so that Wanda will be distracted enough to abandon the big ol’ doomsday button, and it’s just all so convenient. There’s no heart in any of it, and it makes the moments that try to have heart all the more embarrassing and out-of-place (don’t even get me started on what a prescribed attempt at tugging the heart-strings it is to have Hawkeye name his magnificently well-timed newborn after Pietro, because DAMN). When I said I liked this movie better than the first Avengers, I meant just that: I like this better. That’s not to suggest that it is significantly better in any sense, because it isn’t, and I can’t even argue that this one has a better story, because honestly, it doesn’t. The first film made more sense, it was just less interesting to watch, and the things about it that were contrived were contrived in different ways. The first film was weaker and more irritating on character, and character is always the most important part of a story for me, so as annoyed as I am by the major character blunders in Age of Ultron, I’m still not as annoyed as I was after The Avengers. That is damning with the faintest of praise; this is just not a particularly good movie, it makes a poor use of its cast at the best of times, delivers a sub-par action extravaganza, and the script is not half as witty as it gleefully convinces itself that it is. It comes as no surprise, I’m sure, that I am very glad a certain writer/director departed the franchise after disappointing everyone with this outing. I say I like this better than the first Avengers, but gee, it’s a close call.

[radiantxhero-moved-blog]

keep this ask for last and answer all the ones you didn't get

[Boy, this is long...]

Supportive – Who did you S-rank and why? 

In Awakening, I S-ranked Tharja. Not cause she appealed to me as a character or as a “sexy waifu”, but because she shored up my unit’s only stat deficiency of mag/res.

As far as Fates, my Birthright file S-ranked Kaden, and my Revelation S-ranked Reina due to a miscalculation on army-wide supports -- though she surprised me as a marriage a option, even if she can be a little unnerving at times. 

The marriage aspect is overall sort of eh to me, so I rarely have a reason outside of “how is this beneficial to me” or “whups I made a mistake & you need to marry so and so instead lol sorry bruh”

Misfortunate – Unluckiest moment in game? 

Don’t even speak to me of Birthright. I still haven’t finished the damn game because I got so fucking frustrated with it. The entire playthrough was a big “fuck you”. 

Otherwise, probably the time I played through Radiant Dawn and got to the level where you fight Oliver again. Ike & Soren got completely separated from the bulk of the group, and were surrounded by Halberdiers and Snipers. Ike got hit by well over 10 Sniper crits until Soren ran out of staves.

Aching Blood – Did you name/forge any weapons? If so, what was your favorite name that you gave to a weapon? 

Ever since PoR! Back when you could name and change the color of the weapons (not relevant, really, but you could have freaking neon weapons, come on).

I can’t really recall specific names, there’ve been a lot. My most sentimental was probably a golden sword from PoR I dubbed “Golden Claw -- not the most creative sounding, but it stems from a fantasy world I made up when me, my bro & a friend of ours used to play with toy swords in our backyard. It was the first step into writing and world building I ever had, so it’s meaningful to me.

As for sheer punny names, though, I forged Jakob a dagger dubbed “Get Served”.

Triple Threat – Swords, lances, or axes? 

Generally axes, I just love to bash/crush things in games. But, irl, I have more...experience??? (not really, but what else am I to call it?) with waving fake swords around and handling real blades. I have a few in my closet, I really should post some pics of them.

In Extremis – Clutch moment for you in game? 

I’m sure there must have been some -- especially in RD -- but I’m blanking. The only thing I can think of atm is Zihark standing alone in the river, completely surrounded/barraged by Laguz, and Astra/critting for most of the chapter. Barely surviving for most of the time, and quickly running out of healing items and eventually weapons.

Wary Fighter – Are you reckless or careful in your strategies? 

I vacillate. I’m not that great of a strategist. With newer levels/games, I’m more careful -- I fight defensively more often than not, and try to bait enemies; which didn’t work very well in Fates, and it annoyed me. 

With games/levels I know like the back of my hand, I run around like a nutter because I know I can. 

Swap – Did you ever sacrifice a unit in order to save another? 

All the damn time. If you play without perma death, you’ll likely come across a situation where you just...have to. Meat shield was a favored term for me and my bro when we were younger, going through Blazing Sword-Radiant Dawn. Some characters were literally there to soak up hits, block paths, and draw attention in dire need.

Aptitude – Was FE easy for you when you started or was it difficult? 

I started when Blazing Sword came out to the US, so way back in 2003, when I was only eight years old. Some things were difficult on account of obvious lack of thought as a child, but I learned fast what to do and what not to do. I would say it was easy to get into, though there sure were rough patches.

Rally Spectrum – What is your most favorite/preferred stat? 

Defense, followed up closely by Attack. I like my tanks, what can I say? 

Galeforce – What was your most broken unit? 

Not counting my level who knows what MU in Awakening, the most broken unit I’ve ever used was Ephraim. Without using any stat increasing items, at the end of it, he had maxed every stat aside from res (which he was one or two off from max) through just level up. He’s ridiculously unbalanced. PoR Ike is also crazy unbalanced, and it’s not hard to max him in crucial stats without even trying -- plus, he uses Aether like a nut in PoR.

Rightful God – Favorite boss in the series? 

This is really, really, really hard?? I love Nergal and his backstory -- not mention his kickass theme, and flashy magic -- I love Lloyd, because you really just don’t want to fight him plot-wise, and he’s a challenging boss to boot.

As much as I just don’t like Orson, he’s a great boss on account of why he turns sides. It’s fucking heartbreaking, and left a very solid impression on me as a child. It’s really, really sad for those of you who haven’t played Sacred Stones, and I recommend looking into it if only for just that scene in the game. I felt absolutely awful after clearing that chapter. I vaguely remembering setting the game down for a bit, because wow that just happened.

I love the Black Knight, I love Ashnard (the crazy fuck). I love/hate fighting Shiharam; it’s an underrated, but very emotional level in my opinion. Especially if you recruited Jill. It’s sad, but it’s realistic and I love them for not glossing over the real facts of fighting against your own countrymen and family, no matter that you feel you’re doing the right thing by opposing them. Probably loads more of PoR bosses. BERTRAM WAS ALSO A FAV NEARLY FORGOT HIM!

I love so many RD bosses, too. Jarod was a great boss, in my opinion -- I just loved his character a lot. Every single boss in the Tower of Guidance is incredible, and it’s constant “fuckfuckfuck” and angst the whole way. You will never forget going up against Ashera. Never.

That one dude in Awakening after Emmeryn dies, can’t recall his name, but I felt terrible doing that level.

Fates??? Leo was fun to beat up and I liked his cutscene, I guess? I don’t really recall many bosses that I cared about. Does Silas count?

Veteran – Which FE games have you played and what was your favorite? 

Blazing Sword, Sacred Stones, Path of Radiance, Shadow Dragon, Radiant Dawn, Awakening, Fates. Path of Radiance, Radiant Dawn and Blazing Sword will always be my tops in this franchise.

Paragon – Was there a unit that you put extra effort into/ favored over others? 

Harken and Lowen. Gerik. Ike, Boyd, Gatrie, Ranulf, Mist, Rhys, Rolf, Leanne, Rafiel, Oscar, Nolan, Volke, Geoffrey, Mordecai, lots more probably -- ones I did regret putting time into: PoR Sothe, and Kyza in Radiant Dawn. Lon’qu, Stahl, Lissa, Miriel, others I’m forgetting whups?? Silas and Kaden.

Quick Burn – Do you try to get through the game quickly or do you take your time? 

Take my time, especially now. It’s amazing how much dialogue/plot I missed as a kid by punching the A button or skipping scenes entirely. Or stuff I simply didn’t understand as a kid, too.

Vow of Friendship – Do you reset if you lose units in battle? 

Depends on A) the unit, B) how the unit was killed, C) how long I’ve been playing whatever level it is. 

If they’re a favorite unit, yeah, I’ll reset. If the unit (regardless of favoritism) died because of something ridiculous, I’ll reset out of frustration or annoyance at something that was most likely circumstantial, but usually only the once. If I almost clear a level and a unit dies -- especially one I care for -- you bet your butt I’m shutting the game off and swearing up a storm before leaving it to sit for a few hours because I’m pissed at whatever mistake/bullshit I made/happened.

But, on the whole, if someone dies, they die. It doesn’t bother me overly much, and I know that I can just use that character on another playthrough.

[katrinratto]

Post-Millennial Marketing: How to Market Effectively To Generation Z

Millennials have starred in marketing headlines for the past several years.

But, did you know that Generation Z will make up about 20% of the workforce and 40% of consumers by 2020?

While few agree on exactly where the cut-off between Millennials and Generation Z is, (is it 1995? 97? 98?) everyone can agree that a new generational cohort has arrived on the scene.

Why should you care and how does Generation Z impact your business?

You need to have marketing strategies in place for millennials and their generational successors. Heike Young, Salesforce’s Industry Strategy & Insights Manager, explains:

They may all look young. But Millennials and members of the subsequent Generation Z are markedly different in how they shop, interact with brands, and view money.

If you’re a marketer, you’ll need to tailor your messages to reach a new audience.

If you’re a business owner or manager, you’ll need to figure out what these new employees will be looking for and how to get the most out of your working relationship with them.

Here are 5 key differences between Generation Z and Millennials, and our perspective on how these differences will impact your business.

Generation Z is more entrepreneurial.

Generation Z is more realistic.

Generation Z has a shorter attention span.

Generation Z  grew up with personal brands.

Generation Z has higher expectations.

Let’s examine each of these differences in detail.

1. Generation Z is More Entrepreneurial

While entrepreneurship – a staple element of the American Dream – has ironically been in decline in the US for several decades, Generation Z may be on the verge of turning that trend around.

According to serial entrepreneur and best-selling author Deep Patel:

Generation Z is 55% more likely to want to start a business than millennials. In fact, a full 72% of Gen Z high school students say that they want to start a business.

If Gen Z follows through on these aspirations, they very well may reinvigorate the American entrepreneurial landscape for years to come.

But, what is motivating this trend?

Altitude’s Jeremy Finch writes for FastCompany:

Recent reports have labeled Gen Z the “entrepreneurial generation” and highlighted their desire to forsake the corporate grind for their own startups. We found that while Gen Z like the idea of working for themselves, the majority are risk-averse, practical, and pragmatic. Their supposed entrepreneurialism is actually more of a survival mechanism than an idealist reach for status or riches.

Each generation is shaped by the events that occurred as they grew and evolved.

Generation Z is coming of age, having witnessed the struggles of the 2008 economic crisis. They saw the resulting changes in their world – even if they didn’t understand them at the time.

These events inevitably left their mark and likely explain Gen Z’s desire to control their own economic future.

But, whatever the reason, Generation Z is poised to take their financial future in hand.

And, they’ll probably re-shape the American economy as they do.

Your Take-Away

Gen Z is equally as likely to become your competition as they are to become your employee. Be prepared to offer autonomy, flexibility, and fair financial compensation as part of your terms of employment if you want to have any hope of enticing these workers to your business.

  2. Generation Z is More Realistic

Millennials, fairly or not, are forever branded as the entitled generation of the participation trophy.

But, Millennials didn’t choose this path for themselves. It was a by-product of their upbringing. Millennials grew up in a time of financial prosperity. As did their parents – the Baby Boomers.

The Boomers were the product of the golden age of American capitalism. In such a positive economy, it was much easier for Baby Boomers to achieve financial security.

Millennials dutifully absorbed the lessons of their parents – and naturally expected that when they followed the same prescribed steps, it would lead to the results they were promised.

Is that entitlement? Or merely a nasty bait and switch?

Whatever the case, as a result, Millennials appear to be more optimistic than Generation Z.

Generation Z is coming to the workforce with a completely different perspective than their predecessors. Altitude’s research reveals that:

On a professional level, Gen Z are hyperaware of the negative stereotypes that have plagued millennials. As a result, they want to be known for their ability to work hard and persevere offline.

Ryan Jenkins, an expert on the differences between Millennials and Generation Z, reveals:

Seventy-seven percent of Generation Z expect to work harder than previous generations.

Millennials became optimistic thanks to their encouraging Baby Boomer parents and growing up in a time of prosperity and opportunity. Generation Z will be realistic thanks to their skeptical and straight-shooting Generation X parents and growing up in a recession. According to Pew Charitable Trusts, during the Great Recession, the median net worth of Generation Z’s parents fell by nearly 45 percent.

Generation Z is walking in with their eyes wide open.

This is not the golden age of capitalism. And they know it.

A booming economy isn’t waiting to support them with open arms and easy paydays.

And they’re ready to work.

Your Take-Away

Give these young employees space and autonomy to shine. They are driven to work hard, so let them do that in their most productive way.

Marketers, Gen Z is pragmatic and careful with their money. Make the value you offer very clear if you expect to make a sale.

  3. Generation Z Has a Shorter Attention Span

While Millennials grew up as modern technology took hold, Generation Z has been saturated in it from day one. Deep Patel explains:

Millennials are hard to keep engaged, but Gen Z’s attention is even more split. On average, millennials use three screens (and bounce between them intermittently). Gen Zers use five: smartphone, TV, laptop, desktop and tablet.

It’s true that Generation Z tends to bounce from device to device, screen to screen, but it may be too reductive to call them attention-deficient.

With endless options for entertainment, information, and communication, Gen Z has no tolerance for wasted time. Do they have a short attention span? Or a fast filter?

Jeremy Finch opts for the latter:

Gen Z have a carefully tuned radar for being sold to and a limited amount of time and energy to spend assessing whether something’s worth their time. Getting past these filters, and winning Gen Z’s attention, will mean providing them with engaging and immediately beneficial experiences. One-way messaging alone will likely get drowned out in the noise.

Knowing this, it will be essential to capture attention quickly and to be present on multiple platforms to ensure that you make it through these filters. Patel lays it out:

If you want them to click on your blog post, watch your video or like your Instagram photo, you need to help them understand what the content is about, why they should care and how it will help or entertain them.

And you need to do it in eight seconds or less. This is an art, and it’s not easy. It’s why today’s best content creators are in such demand.

Generation Z’s discerning eye is waiting to see what you have to offer.

Your Take-Away

To help pierce the noise, targeted messaging will become that much more important as Generation Z begins to influence the market. Getting the right message on the right platform at the right time will be key.

And keeping those messages consistent will also be important. Consistency starts with strong branding, including the company name and logo design, and continues with delivering on your brand’s promises.

Employers will need to present interesting challenges as well as opportunities to learn and evolve in their roles to keep Gen Z engaged in the workplace.

  4. Generation Z Grew Up With Personal Brands

Millennials remember Myspace. But, social media has been a part of Generation Z’s lives for as long as they can remember.

As a result, Gen Z approach social media differently.

Millennials tend to splash every detail of their lives on their social media accounts.  However, Generation Z takes more care in curating the content they share and the image they present on social media.

Millennials and Generation Z expert, Jeff Fromm describes this phenomenon:

Through social media, they meticulously curate their personal brand to reflect how they want to be perceived. Unlike the millennial generation, Pivotals [Generation Z] only share specific stories, to specific people, on specific channels.

Generation Z understands the importance of “code-switching” (adapting to the language of the cultural context in which they find themselves).

Their personal brands are reserved for recreational social media platforms. And their professional persona will be managed separately.

This privacy is very important for Gen Z. Ryan Jenkins shares that:

Seventy percent of Generation Z would rather share personal information with their pet than with their boss.

Your Take-Away

Understanding and respecting this desire for privacy will be important when it comes to connecting with and managing Gen Z.

And, if marketers hope to reach this audience, they need to be just as savvy in curating targeted appropriate content for specific channels.

  5. Generation Z has Higher Expectations

You should know by now that Millennials value authenticity in the brands with which they do business.

This is true for Generation Z as well.

But, Gen Z take it one step further. Like their older cohort, Gen Z is vigilant against ads and being “sold.” But, they also expect to be a part of something bigger. Deep Patel points out:

According to a recent report, 60% of Gen Zers want their jobs to impact the world, and 76% are concerned about humanity’s impact on the planet.

This means that if you’re a big brand with a social responsibility element, it’s really about walking the walk. Whether you’re selling to or hiring Gen Zers, you should realize they are going to know very quickly whether they’re part of something special or are caught in another big-talk campaign.

This new generation is bringing high expectations and a sense of social responsibility with them. And, is it any wonder?

Generation Z  was watching and listening as the 2016 election divided our country as never before.

Serious questions about the direction for our country were raised. Will we be inclusive or divisive? Will we take care of our own through social support and healthcare? Will we take steps to protect the planet on which we all live?

Generation Z has opinions and they want to make an impact. Patel explains:

Gen Z is open minded, and believe there’s plenty of room for everyone to thrive together.

This is important for big brands to note. Now more than ever, consumers are eagerly looking to the big brands and companies of the world to facilitate these major changes…

Your messaging needs to be intelligent, thoughtful and inclusive. It’s not about proving that you’re right and someone else is wrong. It’s about including everyone together.

Gen Z is already tired of the status quo. They want their role to make a difference for the better. And they’re not waiting – they already have a strong influence on purchases:

Your Take-Away

If you’re looking to snag these young visionaries as employees, be prepared to show them how your business is making the world a better, more inclusive place.

And, if you want to sell to them, be ready to create an authentic brand with values they can get behind. For example, if you sell physical products, consider sustainable strategies when creating products and packaging design for those products.

  The Future is Here

Millennials have already conquered the workforce. And, shortly, Generation Z is poised to make an equally significant impact.

Your business needs to adapt. Or it will become obsolete.

Gen Z is a driven, pragmatic and ambitious crowd.

You can create a welcoming environment for them, or become their competition.

They’re impatient with the choices that have been made for them; and, ready to start shaping the world in their own image.

Gen Zers are your next employees, co-workers, and consumers. If you get to know them for who they really are and what they really want, your business will thrive with them.

If you’re ready to create a more authentic brand, now’s your time to act. Crowdspring’s community of over 210,000 graphic, web, and product designers can help you create a Millennial and Generation Z-friendly brand – without breaking the bank. You can get started on a project here, or request a free design consultation with one of our design experts here.

  from http://bit.ly/2N6Q3ym