#scenes that wouldn't get shown but set up the characters perfectly

[kirric-the-fan]

More oc stuff, different precure team:

Precure Royale:

These girls have a lost kingdom a la sailor moon vibe going on, but with slightly less save the universe need, and even less wanting a kingdom. And one pushy prince.

Anyway, almost all of them have past precure lives and forms. Back in the Heart Kingdom, the four girls and the princess they were protecting were revered as immaculate soldiers (cures) and icons, but in reality they were just as messy as anyone.

Which brings me to Hita (Atsuko), the fairy cure of the team (Cure Sunfire/Sunrise)

Hita is a Firebird, with gold and deep purple plumage. She looks elegant, suave, and noble. Beautiful. Like a colour tweaked peacock.

And every morning she stands outside the princesses bedroom window, takes a deep breath,

And yells "MORNING MOTHERFUCKERS!"

Before blowing a big ball of fire into the air.

Appearances can be decieving. Very decieving.

[the-trash-site]

My favourite type of fanfiction at the moment has been 'y/n is reincarnated into fandom to save the characters from canon!'. (currently mainly reading for JJK and MHA as that's what I'm obsessed with.) There's something so pure about the plot and how the author has fun with it. With scenes where yn is lowkey simping or the actual character of the fandom being dorky.

I think the appeal (besides the amazing writing and passion given into each chapter of these fanfic, rec list below) of this is how straightforward it can be. You already know the characters, you know the canon. All you learn when first reading is what ability you get and how you fit within the world. Which is usually attending the school or growing up with the character.

But mostly, what I love is seeing the butterfly effect and the new dynamics it can create. But lately, I can't help but wonder about a fanfic that has the vibe of 'careful what you wish for'. And seeing what ripples that could make. (I write mostly of JKK and MHA but these ideas could be apply to AOT or Demon Slayer or any other fandom.)

I find it hilarious if instead, the y/n is older than the main group. Imagine being the milf/dilf of MHA. Being the same age as All Might or old enough to adopt characters like Shigaraki.

Or being the in-between age of Deku and the teachers. Where your options are; hanging out with the League of Villains, working hard asf to be a top hero to be around Hawks/the plot. Or becoming a teacher/assistant to watch over class 1A to change canon. I mean, what else are you meant to do in your early twenties? You literally have to force yourself into the plot lol

Oh, you have a favourite character, like Nanami, Gojo or Choso you want to meet? Here you go, a new life as their child! (probably be a sibling for Choso lol) Oh you met you wanted to rizz them up and treat them right? Nope, sorry, you're forced to tag along and face any challenges that would come as being a child to a; Jujutsu sorcerer/ the strongest/ a half-curse spirit.

Oh, this time you specified the thought of being dating/married to Aizawa/Geto/Toji as you died? Kinda weird but here you go! Your new life as their spouse! But only, you don't gain memories from this new life, as you only remember about the canon. Don't mind the grief and odd looks the character is giving you, their amnesia darling. It's not like you can't remember the wedding you two shared. (for maximum angst, they have the kids and you're just clueless about being a parent and saving the canon. yikes)

Okay, but what if you get super lucky? You get to be with the main character and do real help! Everything is fine in JJK but Sukuna is dead set on killing you. Every chance he gets, he uses until he kills you. But it's only after he brought you back that you learn it's because he actually loves you. After all, you're the reincarnated of his reincarnated dead wife. (not confusion at all, lol) He was just pissed that you dead centuries ago and couldn't have the life you two planned. It was his way of getting even. Definitely not annoying when trying to save characters.

Okay, for real now. Everything is perfectly fine...But what's this? Yuji and Izuku are actually yandere for you? Oh, that wouldn't change canon that much, right?

Anyway, here are my favourites fanfics;

Otherworldy attraction by Kilkyo851 JJK | on AOE | multiple pairings

When I catch you Gege by Quinnyundertow JJK | on AOE | multiple pairings

Daybreak by sexy-captain-rexy (smolkatsudon) Star wars | poly Obi-Wan, Anakin Skywalker and reader pairing| on AOE

Promise: Thorin x Fíli x reader Hobbit | love angle with true pairing haven't been shown | on AOE (this one is interesting as reader has more visions than knowledge from media.)

Changing History [MHA! Various F!Reader] by summerblack | MHA | on Qoutev

The Future's Keeper [MHA!Various x F!Reader] by summerblack | MHA | on Quotev

[zombielovesbrainz]

RAMBLING

first on my list is ben, he's been my favorite ever since i started watching the show

ive recently been rewatching jwcc and came across the monorail scene and i was thinking of how could those possibly be able to handle a human?? i looked at the wiki and they only seem to be 55 pounds and ben is at LEAST double their weight (im just guessing by his official height 5'4 and his thin body at the time) and even then if they were that strong wouldn't they rip through his clothes and scratch him up? he was holding onto darius for quite a bit so with darius and the pterandon pulling he must of gotten some sort of injury since the pterandon is portrayed to have a lot more strength than it actually does. i believe he should have some sort of scarring around his waist/stomach with the amount of force the pterandon had on him.

the monorail event definitely scarred his brain though/j, he ended up lost and away from everyone for about a month, so obviously he had to change to survive on his own. with his ranting on the monorail before getting attacked, he mentions that he's "sick of being scared all the time", "holding everyone back", saying he "can't do this." he has to change so much in order to survive even though the constant change in the season (escaping dinosaurs just to bump into others later, not having proper order, just all the chaos) must've taken a big toll on him. while in season 2, he kind of has a set schedule for every day? it's usually just wake up, eat, drink, sleep, repeat, but each time he seemingly loses more and more of his sanity with bumpy not letting him properly rest. after that whole fight with bumpy he is on his own, this I guess attracts the compys that try to attack him. but now that he is on his own he has to fight his own battles, he finally faces the compys and scares them away, he celebrates, becomes jungle ben, faces off toro. that kind of stuff, i don't really like how it happened that fast, obviously winning his own battle must've felt great, but how could his mindset change so easily? but the new confidence in himself was such a great start to the new ben that he becomes later.

i believe he may have some type of neurological disorder other than the anxiety that was shown specifically in season 4, along with yaz's PSTD. at first when they got on the island, it's like a lot of them clicked with each other, all except for ben, this makes me believe that he may just do things on a different frequency than others (totally not projecting) i believe he may be on the spectrum, with all the phobias, general anxiety even at the beginning of the show, his timidness and reluctance to involve himself with the others, difficulty adjusting to the environment of camp cretaceous. it feels all too real to me tbh, and even though he has a hard time with all of this, the show still did amazing with self discovery, growth, and learning. all without having to completely change a character. but i do think jungle ben isn't just an outfit or mindset, i think this is how he responds to the horrible amount of distress and anxiety of being alone and needing to survive, he's never HAD to do it on his own, so im thinking this is his way to cope with it. ik this isn't enough to say he's autistic, im just referencing instances in the show that led me to that belief.

an extra thing with no proof is that i hc ben to be hard of hearing for the sole fact that i am hard of hearing and there aren't any characters out there that i enjoy and are hard of hearing 😔

i love bens journey with discovering himself and how he can change while still being comfortable in the show, it was shown almost perfectly (only saying almost because i didn't think that the pacing was all that great sometimes) and i love this show with all of my heart, ive watched all 5 seasons maybe 6-7 times by now, been around since it first came out and ive loved it since 😁

i do not know if i said anything that may be taken in another way, it is almost midnight and i just wanted to ramble about a few episodes and how i see ben 😔 (definitely will be writing more tomorrow)

[skania]

I watched the Slam Dunk movie for the second time today and though the Shohoku/Sannoh match doesn't quite reach the greatness of the manga, I think I'd still have rated it 10/10 if it weren't for the very lousy timing of the flashbacks during the last 10 min of the game.

(Mild spoilers for the movie below the cut)

My issue is more than anything with that last flashback focused on Ryota's mom.

It isn't the only moment where the movie stops the match so we can revisit Ryota's past, but at least most of those flashbacks serve to build up Shohoku. We're shown more of Mitsui, more of Akagi and Kogure, and we even get a small scene with Ayako and a tiny one with Rukawa. It's easy to see how they add depth to the match we're watching. I was so happy to see more of Akagi's and Kogure's pasts!

The flashback focused on Ryota's mom doesn't serve that purpose, though. I'd argue it actually hurts the flow of the match. We're all hyped, holding our breath—and then the momentum is completely ruined by this long, dramatic flashback that should've been placed elsewhere. It doesn't help that I feel like it was inserted there, at that particular moment, simply so Sakuragi's plight wouldn't outshine Ryota's.

I imagine that's the same reason why Sakuragi's "I love [basketball] very much!" was cut, too. I can see two other reasons for that a) they may have thought that it wouldn't be as impactful in the manga b) it's also supposed to serve as an (accidental) confession to Haruko. But the thing is, it could've still worked despite that. The Sakuragi montage we got was enough to get the message across and have that moment land. A simple shot of Haruko superposed with Sakuragi's words could've let movie-onlies know there's more than meets the eye, specially because the flashback does open with Haruko asking him if he loves basketball. So I fear that what it comes down to is that Sakuragi isn't supposed to be the main character of the movie, so they couldn't let him have the emotional climax.

To a lesser extent, the same goes for the iconic Sakuragi and Rukawa high-five. It's fantastic but it's less impactful than in the manga, because in the manga it's just about them. The world ceases to exist in those few seconds where they look at each other and then high-five. In here, the scene cuts away just to show Ryota watching them. Even though it contributes absolutely nothing lol The worst part is that Ryota is already very present during that match in the manga! He is amazing during it and has some very memorable moments in the manga that perfectly set up the fact that he is Captain material. But instead of being satisfied with those, the movie goes out of its way to insert Ryota in pretty much every single moment he can possibly be inserted in, and it feels like a bit too much near the end.

In that regard, I felt like Rukawa kind of got the short end of the stick. This match is filled with amazing moments and insight into the kind of player he is, how far he will come and into his dynamic with Sakuragi. His rivalry with Sawakita is also fantastic. But in the movie he's kind of just there until it's time for him to kick ass, which I found a bit disappointing. They could've at least included a flashback to his 1 on 1 against Sendoh or against Sakuragi, since everyone else had the right to some flashbacks. I imagine that the logic was that just like Sakuragi, Rukawa already received enough focus in the manga, but... I still want to see more of him?

While I'm at it, I have to say that another thing that I couldn't help but ??? at was the after-credits scene. Instead of showing the Shohoku team picture, or at least including it, we wait... and for what? To see a table full of pictures of Ryota's brother? And don't get me wrong, I loved Ryota's backstory. But it feels a little of out-of-touch that the movies does spend a lot of time on the Shohoku-Sannoh match, getting us invested in the team, and then they're just never shown nor mentioned again after they win the match. I think that even if this were my first interaction with anything Slam Dunk, I'd have felt just as underwhelmed by the lack of Shohoku in the three closing scenes.

The funniest thing is that despite all this, it's still impossible to outshine Sakuragi (and Rukawa, for that matter). Sakuragi's main character energy is just too strong. I came out of the theater itching to read the manga again because I want more Sakuragi. So if that was Inoue's objective, I have to say he achieved it with flying colors. I haven't read the SD manga in years, and I've already gone through it twice in the last week!

He truly is the Tensai 😭

[fantastic-nonsense]

also before anyone gets the wrong idea about my Jason response, I wasn't trying to say that Jason doesn't care about women and kids or that a well-characterized Jason wouldn't respect women. The point I was trying to make is that while Canon!Jason is perfectly happy to shoot rapists or abusers or drug dealers dealing to kids because he thinks they're scum, he's not shown as someone who like...specifically sets out to protect the unprotected or thinks it's his actual mission to do so.

Post-Crisis!Jason had exactly two life goals as Red Hood: make Batman's life a living hell by creating chaos and prove he's "better" at crimefighting than Bruce. Even taking over Gotham's gang scene was largely a means to an end for him. He kills all those guys because he genuinely thinks the world is better off without them, but his primary goal is not actually to clean up Gotham for the sake of cleaning it up or to protect other people from suffering his own fate; it's to fuck with and piss off Bruce by showing him that his way (killing people and becoming a crime lord) is a "more effective" way of solving crime. And in doing so, he often fucked over or blatantly used people he would have previously died to protect when he was Robin.

And whether or not you agree with that characterization, Judd Winick has been very open in interviews about how Jason's hypocrisy is something he genuinely enjoyed writing, so it was clearly a deliberate choice on his part to portray Jason that way even disregarding the various awful OOC characterizations of Jason we had to deal with in other post-Crisis stories:

As we saw in the original run, he’s also comfortable controlling crime and even becoming a part of it. He can’t kill everyone, nor does he want to. So, along with handing out his own brand of justice, he does believe that crime can be controlled. Batman had said it makes you a crime lord. Jason doesn’t think it makes him a crime lord at all. He thinks it makes him a much more effective Batman. Yes, Jason sees what he’s doing as making himself into a better Batman, the Batman that the world actually needs today. But some of that is just Jason fooling himself. The truth is, all of it is based in the fact that Jason is just damaged and tortured and angry with Bruce. And this is a constant revenge upon him..... ......I also like the fact that Jason’s actions aren’t black and white. Sometimes he functions in that gray area, and it gives you the license to be somewhat hypocritical, because he is. I used to do that with Oliver Queen in Green Arrow, and people would go crazy, because I thought it was interesting to explore that sometimes he’s a bit of a hypocrite. I find that likable about the character. And in Jason’s case, he professes that he’s trying to be a better Batman and he’s trying to rid the world of evil, but then he’s also just trying to stick it to Batman. It’s very much a man-child thing going on. [x]

Warning for victim-blaming Jason for his own death in this one:

Jason can do a certain level of good in one arc and a horrible in the next, and none of that would be out of character. He’s very unpredictable. Maybe that’s what makes him kind of interesting. He’s someone who is tortured, he’s someone who is damaged, he is someone who has been through a lot and is still just trying to find his way. You could say he’s a good man who does very, very bad things, and it’s not always the case that he’s doing bad things for the greater good, sometimes it’s doing bad things just for the bad. Killing villains in his opinion isn’t a bad thing. There is somewhat a message and methodology to what he’s doing, but at the same time he lets his emotions get the better of him. It’s what got him killed. It’s the sort of thing that Jason, in a way, wouldn’t surprise me if he is viewed as somewhat heroic for a fashion, but then falls back on bad behavior, which could happen from year to year, you don’t know. From anti-hero to villain to back again, I don’t know. [x]

So that's the opinion of the man who brought Jason back to life, wrote his debut arc as Red Hood, and also wrote the one other post-Crisis story Jason fans universally like (Lost Days).

Meanwhile post-Flashpoint!Jason is generally too busy dealing with his own trauma and his teammates' issues to actually dedicate any significant, consistent effort to protecting and saving vulnerable populations like sex workers, abused women, and orphaned children. Wanting to save them is usually his response when he stumbles upon something happening, but reboot!Jason generally does not consider it a core moral mission to seek out opportunities to protect or save these groups. Writers other than Scott Lobdell occasionally gave him stories featuring him doing so, but they were incredibly few and far between since Lobdell was Jason's primary writer for nearly a decade. Not to mention Lobdell's blatant misogyny led to a Jason that repeatedly objectified women and engaged in casual sexism on a depressingly regular basis...which despite being theoretically antithetical to Jason's childhood and Robin-era characterization is a characterization he maintained throughout the majority of his post-reboot appearances. So like...that's also a thing to consider.

DC finally seems to be moving a little more in the direction of matching Jason's motivations with his pre-death characterization (where he DID consistently showcase a genuine respect for women and desire to protect vulnerable children), but until that becomes a more consistent aspect of his character now I can't in good conscience pretend like fanon's interpretation of Red Hood!Jason as this incredibly pro-woman guy who has a core character trait of respecting and protecting women and wanting to keep children out of the crossfire actually exists in canon. That's the point I was trying to make in my original post about Jason and Helena. Nothing more, nothing less.

[hychlorions]

Ik your biggest pet peeve is people getting the bracelet wrong, but what is a Popular Apollo and or Klavier HC that you look at and just think 'no. Wrong.' (alternatively just.. bad takes on the characters, any of the AA cast really)

actually yeah let's get into this before i overthink it. this got really long so i'll put it under a read more

personally i get that it's funny that pre-relationship apollo would turn klavier away and be annoyed of his. klavierness. and it makes SENSE because like. it's how we see them act in the games. i especially love their banter when they're in a relationship, even if this "ew klavier" facade is put on from time to time as a clear joke between them. sometimes, though, the way people portray how apollo reacts to and treats klavier in the context of a developing/established romantic relationship reminds me of a certain ship from another fandom i will rather not mention… particularly the fact that a lot of the comments made towards the content for it was like "you do know people in relationships are supposed to LIKE each other… right?" so yeah. you don't HAVE to portray apollo as 100% lovey dovey and mushy brained (though it's funny and kind of sweet. my guilty pleasure 🥴) but at a certain point, him being constantly annoyed makes me feel like. why is he even dating klavier yk?

as for klavier… we all love a man that dresses provocatively. but ig sometimes it goes too far, to the point where it's kind of ridiculous? i understand he's a rockstar AND a prosecutor, but i feel like he does in fact keep those two professions separate. we all agree he looks good in fishnets and platform stilettos and whatever, but for crime scenes and at the office, i feel like he'd stick to clothes that are more fit for court (albeit with the cleavage still lol). aside from professional settings even, i just think he KNOWS how to dress for the situation! no one in their right mind would wear heels to the gym or when they go hiking. you can look slutty AND be comfortable at the same time! anyone who knows how to dress up knows how to show skin (or not 🥴 black turtlenecks anyone?) in other ways. same as how no one would wear their court suit to headline a concert (ik we can attribute it to sprite limit but it's ok capcom. i know you just don't like klavier)

then there's trucy my love who is always the wingwoman. don't get me wrong i like the idea. but sometimes the content of her acting as a wingman makes her kind of disrespectful of apollo's boundaries. i mean she tends to push him outside of his comfort zone in the games, some of the things i've seen her do in fan content is just. holy fuck! you would never do that to a friend! let alone a sibling! though at this point that's just one of those fandom tropes already—going behind someone's back, setting them up to get into situations they've already stated they don't wanna be in, because it's definitely perfectly fine if it's all for love 🙄 you can argue she does the same when she makes them assistants for her magic show, but at least apollo somewhat knew what kind of stuff he's getting into beforehand. whatever wingman thing trucy does is always just thrown at him with no warning at all. but again, this is also just a trope common in a lot of fandoms when it comes to women who are in any sort of close proximity to mlm ships. i just wanna see more of apollo and trucy's relationship as siblings/friends beyond the context of her helping him get together with klavier, too! she's got a life outside of being a support character! it wouldn't hurt to have a conversation or two that isn't about the love interest or a murder, you know

this got long i'm sorry i just have so many Feelings and i've gone through so many fics and comics and ourgh. i’m a natural hater. speedrun of some other things:

narumitsu (whether one or both of them) having bitter feelings toward klavier post-7yg when other kids' parents manipulating said kid in ways that hurt either of nrmt have been shown in aa and they're on very much good terms with those kids too.

apollo personally being the head of rebuilding the justice system in khura'in. he'd help nahyuta yes, he stayed to be a defense attorney there bc there were no defense attorneys and it helps to have at least one, but being in charge of the entire thing? no. just no. soj itself has too many colonialist themes already

follow up to that last one: klavier moving to khura'in to help apollo??? and be his co-counsel? sorry but there are many lines from him that established he loves being a prosecutor too much to give that up just for a man

apollo or athena calling phoenix dad (in a canon setting). no. just no. esp if he adopts them???? gorl i love found family too but damn this is a workplace, not an orphanage...

to end with something silly: anyone being an aquarius/scorpio (sorry lmao this one is definitely personal. other people will hate these signs for general reasons but mine can very much be narrowed down to four people. i'm a special little boy)

[lilithrebellion]

Ok because we have been blessed with Krul awesomeness today, I would like to take the opportunity to elaborate on the relationship between her and Amaya.

I chose Krul as Amaya's sire because, well she is the highest ranking female vampire in ons (and the only one we know of...), so she was pretty much the only logical choice. But besides that, she is incredibly nuanced as a character who is a woman in power.

I wrote Amaya's back story as her being a daimyo's daughter, and one who was set to inherit that position. There's actually quite a lot of baggage that comes with that. Being a female heir to a traditionally male position (and a lesbian, so it is not going to be a situation where a man marries into the family for the title), it's fair to say that Amaya faced much higher scrutiny as opposed to if she had been born male. She consistently had to prove that she was suitable for the position.

Part of this I think, is that Amaya was consciously and consistently making an effort to suppress her "commit violence in retaliation against people who harass you" impulses. Because she knows that will only give her opponents more reasons to criticize her. It's the whole "you need to act better than this because you're female" thing, where women are unfairly held to a higher standard than men. And it's definitely something I kept in mind when writing the Ashina conflict and Amaya's motivations when she was human.

Then she becomes a vampire under Krul. It's not like Krul isn't criticised by the other nobles. We see in Seraph ch 22 where Lest Karr is all "if being Queen of Japan is too difficult for you, I am perfectly capable of stepping in". But Krul just doesn't back down. She's not afraid to stand up for herself and put him in his place. This scene is specifically what inspired me to put Karlheinz as a political opponent to Krul. Because it's pretty clearly implied by his language that Lest thinks himself more capable than Krul even though he is younger, simply because he is male. And we know for sure Karl wouldn't accept a woman having more power than him.

This scene shows that despite Krul being one of the oldest vampires, and I think the oldest active Progenitor on the council behind Urd, that she still has to fight for respect because she is female. (A further example being how Ky was... weirdly flirting with her a couple times?? While Krul was just completely fed up.)

It's even more evident in how Ferid consistently tries to undermine and belittle her. But, instead of "acting better than that" Krul literally beats the shit out of him whenever he is out of line. And this is presented positively! Every time Ferid provokes her and gets his ass handed to him, it is shown as completely deserved and works to show Krul as powerful and someone not to be messed with.

Nobody is calling her "emotional" or "hysterical" for rightfully kicking a creep down a notch, or responding with aggression when antagonized.

And I think Amaya really needed to see that. Krul is why she has zero qualms retaliating physically against the Sakamakis now and calling them out on thier bs. She taught her that it was completely justified to react with petty violence and scathing retorts when subjected to sexist crap. That all the anger Amaya had towards the injustices she faced in the past is something she absolutely was allowed to act on. And that acting on it like she'd always wanted to WAS an effective method for demanding respect.

Amaya greatly admires Krul as an example of a woman in power. She's the kind of ruler Amaya aspired to be if she could have been daimyo. And that's why Krul was the perfect choice for her as a mentor figure.

[lezziemanville]

"Yeah but it kinda is my problem," Melissa says, turning her body to face Barbara. "After my husband cheated on me I hated the other woman. Couldn't understand how someone could be like that. Could break up a marriage like that..."

Barbara listens, watching the lines drawn across Melissa’s forehead.

"...and for the last two years, I've begun to understand it." Melissa's eyes find hers and set there. "Because if you'd ever shown any interest in me, I wouldn't have thought twice about your husband."

This scene from say anything but don’t say goodbye literally haunts me, I think about it everyday, how did you even come up with that???!? You set it up so perfectly, it’s so vivid and the dialogue 😩 please never stop writing for work wives

Awwww! I don’t know that anyones ever posted anything I’ve written to me like this and it’s incredible! I’m so glad that it meant something to you!

I don’t profess to be any whiz at writing other people’s characters but whenever I write for a pairing I have to be able to see it as though I’m watching it on the show. This just felt like something that could happen between them!

I promise the last chapter is coming soon! As are some of the 20+ prompts I’ve received… I’ve just not had a chance to settle in and get in the headspace.

Thank you again. What a joy it was to receive this!

[muffinwalloper]

Let's talk about the villain's wardrobe - Cruella De Vil (Part III)

As I've pointed out in Part I, Cruella's character is shown immensely through her wardrobe. She wears gloves with nails on them, loves furs and animalprints in general and everything about her is meant to make everyone's eyes follow her.

Now, this is the first outfit she wears in the movie. While the costume is strictly business with a high collar, there are a few details that make it stand out. For one, the stripes are made out of glitter which is not only an eyecatcher but also adds a glamour to the outfit whenever Cruella moves in it. The details such as the mix of black and white fit her hair perfectly and the sharp looking shoulder pats make her appear broader than she actually is (she's rather short and thin) which means, her outfit helps her to take up more space than she physically can. Paired with her beloved heels and gloves it radiates professionalism. Of course, she wouldn't forget the fur, which she carries as a coat with a long trail which makes her appear like a royal (remember the family crest). Also, there's a frowst which she carries for stylish reasons, also in black and white. Her hat, along with the net surrounding it was a perfect choice for her introduction because it hides half of her face and again, adds something royal and ladylike to her appearance. Everything about that outfit screams highclass. Signature makeup: the blood red lipstick and her black eyeliner. Her hair is positively wild but when she's in her office and has set down her hat, she checks it in a mirror and makes sure it stays that wild. I think it might be another way for Cruella to take up as much space as she can.

Not sure if it's a dress or a dressing gown, though I think it might be a gown because she only wears it in her private home. Again, the black and white combination is outstanding. Her hair looks a little tamer than before which is probably due to the fact that this is supposed to be Cruella's 'lazy outfit'. The arms and the collar are littered with feathers and again, there is a long trail at the back, also made of feathers. She's wearing gloves again, though this time of a thinner material but still with nails on them. It also has a deep cleavage which is also one of Cruella's outfit signatures: sexually revealing. In contrast to Anita who never wears anything with a cleavage and mostly pullovers in grey or beige colours, Cruella's clothes are always flashy and I wouldn't be surprised if they were uniques that she has designed herself. In combination with furs and her striking makeup she uses her sexuality in an almost grotesque way. But all of that is her intention because no matter where and with whom Cruella is she needs to be the centre of attention at all times!

cleavage - check!

animal print - check!

gloves - check!

Notice how on the outside of the coat the print is tiger and inside the coat it's leopard. Underneath Cruella wears a combo of a tiger corset and a long black leather skirt. This time, she's wearing boots but still with heels. To make it a Cruella outfit you can't leave out the fur. Here, it looks like another frowst but this one's smaller than the black and white one. Also, her hair in this shot is tamer than it was in the scene where she wore this outfit:

Another outstanding feature is the high collar and the shoulder patches once more. Like in her first outfit, it makes her look broader than she is. Also, notice how she manages to get Anita and Roger to stand with their backs against the doorframe (in their home!) by simply pushing past them. Cruella's aware of the fact that she isn't the tallest person, so she accents other parts of her body to intimidate people. I mean, just look at this cleavage!! As for jewelry; I'm not sure what her bracelet is made of but as the rest of her attire, it looks agressive.

Now, for another outfit of Cruella which was cleverly used at the beginning of the movie to show the depths of her character:

At the very beginning of the film, it's established twice that the white tiger went missing from London zoo. Anita watches a report on TV on it while Roger reads about it in the morning paper. Only after Cruella's been introduced to the plot, the film shows a scene where Horrace and Jasper enter Cruella's private home to bring her the fur of said missing tiger. As the news already suspected that it might have to do with fur dealing, nobody would suspect a single fur obsessed woman behind it. This scene is important to show the audience how far Cruella is not only prepared but used to go to get what she wants. Perhaps she tried to buy the tiger first (as she did with the puppies) but was declined by the zoo. So, her reaction was to steal this endangered animal, let Skinner make a fur coat out of it and have it brought to her by her minions Horrace and Jasper. The puppies are not the first animals she's stolen and it's likely that she would do so with any animal as long as she loves their fur. Also, rewatch the scene when she takes the tiger fur to the mirror and basically starts flirting with it: it's downright creepy how obsessed she is!

Finally, her last outfit which she wears as she hunts down the puppies herself. As it's the film's climax where the tension is at its highest, so is Cruella's mania and it's reflected in her outfit. She wears a blood red and black attire with leather pants and boots and the thickest fur coat of the entire film. At times, she has trouble to move in it and it actively slows her down and puts her at a disadvantage on her hunt for the puppies. However, she doesn't even think of taking it off. It's like the fur has become a part of her that drags her down to her inevitable ruin. The aggressive colour also shows that her mind is completely off the rails now and that she's out of control. Also, as her name is devil, the colours fit those of a demonic being and she finally looks no longer like a lady but like the monster she is inside. Again, the bracelet and the earrings this time look aggressive but even more so because they remind you of teeth and/or a razer. The claw gloves are of course firmly in place again.

To sum up: Cruella's outfits all follow the theme of animal and/or monster. She wears the fur of endangered species, has literal claws on her hands and her blood red lipstick accentuates her pearly white teeth which she loves to flash at anyone. On top of that, the sexually revealing aspects of her outfits come across as agressive and excessive, serving the purpose of making anyone look at her but feeling uncomfortable at the same time. As the saying goes: clothes make the woman, for Cruella this one's 100 percent true!

[unpopularopinionbydemand]

Cherry Blossoms After Winter series review ✐∗  ˖࣪ ༻

Same review on MDL!

Rating 𓄷 8 - Wish I would've watched while it was airing. Some minor issues, but overall, it was a lovely watch.

Spotlight Aspect of CBAW 𓄷 Set & Scenery (superb)

Recommend ? Definitely recommend this K-BL. It's super cute, and if the story doesn't do it for you, the height difference will.

Review:

CBAW is an unexpectedly decent K-BL, and it could even be labeled better than that. I've noticed with K-BLs to keep my expectations below surface level so by doing so, I won't lose any hope I had. Even with CBAW, I read the manga (my first one ever) and I still watched the live adaptation and thought it was on point from its book form (kinda). CBAW took me only a day to watch, it piqued my interest, and kept hold of it throughout the episodes.

Let's Dive In.

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Cherry Blossoms After Winter is a live adaptation of the manga following the same name. The basic synopsis is that Haebom lost his parents, so his mom's best friend takes him in as her own where he would live with Taesung, his best friend who indicates that he doesn't want Haebom to be his brother. Years passed and they're now seniors in high school navigating their strange feelings for one another. It's obviously a lot easier to tell a story full of detail in a book than it is in a dama, but in my honest opinion, I believe they did an impressive job at following along with the manga, even having the same lines said from the book. Add that on top of perfectly casted actors and you've got yourself an A+ K-BL.

What needed some work: I'm the type of person who usually doesn't read original work before watching the live adaptation, however, I wanted to give it a go here, and now I've unlocked a new hobby (great, something else to take up the time I don't have). But for the people watching without having read the manga, there are a few things that would seem very off and weren't given enough time for a thorough explanation. Like why Haebom just lets these bullies abuse him (and why they just vanish all of a sudden), or why Taesung is so standoffish and the reason Haebom thought he hated him. There are some other smaller implications, but those were the larger ones that needed more of a story behind them. If I wouldn't have read the manga, I would be partially confused throughout the series. Just a few fixer-uppers would've done the job.

I had to get used to the cinematography of this series that I've never (at least can't remember) seen in any other K-BL, let alone any BL. For a while, it looked like I was watching a vlog on Youtube and it kept throwing me off my wagon. Some of the scenes shot are a little shaky, I'm sure that's how they wanted to interpret the moment being shown, but if it's not fluent throughout the series, then those small moments when they do happen, it's a huge eye-catcher, and a bit of a bothersome. While the sets and the scenery were absolutely breathtaking, the color-grading and editing could use a lot of work. There were so many scenes that just got cut off in the midst, and it happens quite often, causing a stir of annoyance. There were a few very subtle ad placements that I appreciated for their subtleness, but by now, I can tell an ad from an actual motivated action.

Onto what I loved: The casting for CBAW was probably as accurate as I could imagine. Jinuk did an incredible job as Haebom, playing almost perfectly into his shyness, bubbliness, and everything in-between. I just wanted to pack him in my pocket and protect him for the rest of his life. Hui did an excellent job as well playing into Taesung's character. I'm also glad they decided to not make his character as stoic as the one in the manga, and this Taesung actually has some personality. Yonghee is hands down the best-casted character, and Gun did a fantastic job. Everyone else was really good too, even down to the guest roles.

The plot is handled very well and follows the exact same story. Obviously, some things are different (like Haebom working in a flower shop, or the friends all going on a camping trip) but their implications helped to move the plot along, and they were good anyways. Again, the story is about as accurate as they could've gotten it to the book, and it was fun catching all these different moments that I remembered from my read. The time jumps can be easily missed for someone not truthfully watching, but I think even those were done pretty well. The writers do a superb job at connecting the feelings and emotions of the characters in the story, which boosted its ability to give me the feels for everyone involved.

The chemistry wasn't as strong as it could've been between the main leads, but they still were able to give us a real relationship that wasn't full of forced touching and kissing. From the cuddles scenes all the way up to their more intimate scenes, both actors did a great job at making it look natural. I felt more of a connection closer to the end, but in the midst, it felt a bit lacking.

Not very important, but the height difference gets to me. Taesung was a whole ass head taller than Haebom. When he bent down to hug or even when Taebom reached up to hug, it was a-fucking-dorable. God, I can't explain to you how much height differences mean to me.

Ratings:

Story: 8 - Loved the story, also loved how accurate it was to the book. All the characters were genuine, everything flowed nicely, and I wasn't dissatisfied with any of it. I'll take off one star for some of the jumpy cuts and another for some of the weaker storylines.

Acting - 9.5 - Superb acting. everyone did an excellent job, but Jinuk was the best. Gun also put on a very strong performance that outshined the others.

Music - 5 - didn't pay much attention to it, meaning it wasn't distracting. Good.

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[h50europe]

Why the ending of the series finale felt off for many of us (and what PL could have had really in mind) - Aphorisms

As you can easily see from the photos, season 11 was a safe bet, as was a new team member, McCole. What could have been, it says, written by Justin, the wife of Alex stunt/stand-in double. I'm going to play the advocatus diaboli.

In the penultimate episode of H50, Lenkov created a new character. He was sort of based on Steve, but also not. As it turned out in the last episode, Cole and Steve also had a mutual friend: Catherine. Why does that not really surprise us? The rumor mill was really churning, and it was a given that PL was definitely going to bring her on board. So, without further ado, he made her a key person. She was the one who cracked the ominous code that Doris had left for her son. Question, couldn't Jerry have done that just as well?

Anyway, PL set up Cole and Steve. But the chemistry - for us - wasn't really there. They could have just as easily put anyone next to Steve. PL built on the military past of the two (what else) and finally the common denominator: Catherine. Oh, how original. NOT. If you look at this constellation, you can already guess where this was going. But there remained this one obstacle: Danny.

Well, no problem, Lenkov thought and had him kidnapped without further ado. All planned because of all the great McDanno moments we got to see in season 10. So appropriately for lulling, even if these moments did not have nearly as much heart as in previous seasons, but hey, the fans would swallow and relish it, PL thought.

Then came the obligatory threatening call from Daiyu Mei (note the clever pun ala Yoda: die you may...), and the drama unfolded. The whole thing was further clarified by the words of Wo Fat's ex: "I have the person you care about most in the world." Bummer, as she is not talking about Catherine but Danny. Queerbaiting at its worst. Then comes the usual. And during the escape attempt, Danny, who is already half-dead, gets shot. So far, so good, or not.

Danny's injuries could have easily been fatal. So now I'm going off the premise and just claiming that this was PL's original plan. Why? PL did mention at one point that he could imagine H50 without Steve or Danny, but he certainly wasn't stupid enough to believe that. It was nothing more than a smoke grenade. But what PL had wanted for a long time was the end of McDanno. He preferred another ship. But while McDanno sailed blithely across the seven seas, PL's fav ship never left the harbor. But now, he had the ultimate opportunity with a new, equal partner at Steve's side (Book'em Cole), who also pulled Catherine out of a hat.

PL's heart did somersaults. What a great plan that was. Alex didn't say anything about really wanting to quit, even after the series ended. While he had been open about his departure after season 7, there was no need to hide this fact now in season 10. And as you can easily see, all signs were pointing toward season 11. What PL didn't count on was the massive resistance from CBS.

In contrast to PL, they had no problems with Scott/Danny or McDanno. They knew that this was the heart and soul of the show. And PL's protector Moonves was no longer available because he had been kicked out of the network. So PL's back was against the wall. And nothing and nobody could change that. Too bad, because actually, PL had everything perfectly planned.

Danny would either die on the way to the hospital or later in the hospital. This would lead Steve to a massive revenge attack, which should have ended in a brilliant showdown (brilliant for PL, not necessarily for the fans), but Daiyu Mei escapes eventually. Then, Steve would have been driving around aimlessly. We were possibly shown some flashbacks, only to end up at Casa McGarrett, where Catherine would have already been waiting for him. Nice reversal of the goodbye scene from season 6.

The conversation between Steve and her would have been similar to Danny's, except that it wouldn't have been about his parents, but about Danny and that he just can't take it in Hawaii any longer. Too much reminds him of his dead friend. Steve also wanted to pay his final respect and bring him back home to Jersey. Of course, Catherine suggests joining him. What else? Now that one ship sunk, PL could easily replace it with HIS fav ship. And because Cole has done so well, Steve also entrusts him with the task force's leadership. Before Steve leaves to accompany Danny on his last journey, he hands Cole his credentials.

Steve and Cath stand next to each other at the airport and watch as Danny's coffin is loaded onto the plane. Then they board the plane together, ending with them holding hands as we know it. Fade out, season 10 ends.

How would it have continued in season 10? Danny's funeral would have happened off-screen, like so many other pivotal scenes. Steve would have maybe spent an episode or two mulling it over and then returned to Hawaii to hunt down Daiyu Mei with Cole and the team, which now included Catherine.

So much for Lenkov's wet dream, um, plan. However, because CBS knew that McDanno was the heart and soul of the series, they found this idea more than lousy and turned PL down. We could imagine that Alex also threw in that he would certainly not continue without Scott. There was a short back and forth, and it was decided to cancel the show. So we've come full circle to the sloppy, heartless execution of the last episode and the absolutely meaningless words PL put in Steve's mouth as a result. Due to lack of creativity and apparent lack of time, the deadline seemed to be predetermined, considering how quickly the soundstages at Diamond Studios were obliterated.

The crew was equally surprised when PL succinctly informed them that there would be no season 11. See the post from an angry crew member on IG.

Can we prove any of this? Nope, but it's the only reasonable explanation for why the show ended the way it did. Namely, completely illogical, with a Steve who was more than just off the rails. At the very beginning of the series, Steve gives completely different reasons for staying. If you do a rewatch, you'll see.

Everybody knows that you don't solve problems by running away. You don't get rid of the weight that you carry around with you. Steve may be a stubborn mule, but one thing he has never been: self-centered. And if Danny was really the most important thing in the world to him, as Mei said, then he wouldn't have dumped him in the end. Because that's what you do when you really love someone, you stay and fight against all odds. Especially when someone is in a bad place, like Danny, who has just jumped from the brink of death.

You don't suddenly go on a self-realization trip and kick the person who's already lying on the ground. But that's exactly what Steve did. At least the way PL wrote the part. The man must have really lost it when he wrote those lines. I'm sure he was enjoying pure schadenfreude.

And if you take a close look at the two protagonists, you can clearly see the reluctance with which they shared it all with the audience. There was no more room for any affectionate ad-lib actions that we knew from before. They could only stubbornly reel off what was in the script. PL would have done well to sit down with Scott and Alex and find a common solution instead of imposing his version on them and the audience. That's what people with integrity do, but the man never any.

In our opinion, the show's ending ranks among the dumbest and most unimaginative of all time. Rarely a person manages to drive a show against the wall in such a way and at the same time assassinated the main characters. PL shouldn't be proud of it. He should rather stand in a corner and be ashamed of himself.

And now you can go ahead and bash us, or just ignore the whole thing and keep on scrolling. Thank you for your time and for letting us share our thoughts with you.

[lorelexi]

Hey so it's my 17th birthday today and I was wondering if you could maybe write some general relationship hcs for kenma or dabi? You don't have to I saw in your rules that you're not really familiar with side characters, you could even ignore this and I wouldn't mind lol :)

A/N: 17 :0 have fun hehehe. This is a bit late but I hope you enjoy nonetheless!! I'm just writing for the students of bnha rn but Kenma was good to go so here you are, love!💖

---

•let's start with love languages shall we

• i think kenma’s preferred love language to show is gift giving!!

•sometimes words get a little stuck when he tries to say them so he likes to give you gifts that can convey his thoughts

•it can be anything!

•between your favorite snacks, to chapstick he heard you saying you needed, to some expensive he may have seen you eyeing!!

•your heart melts everytime and he just waves his hand dismissively bc if he dwells on it too long he’ll get embarrassed hehe

•on the other hand, his preferred love language that he likes to be shown is acts of service!

• he can get really wrapped up in different things so he really appreciate you when you do anything to ease his stress for him

•got carried away with work or video games? Don’t fret kenma! Your lovely s/o has dinner ready for you!

•exhausted from a long day of practice? You help him out by getting his spare practice clothes and his water bottle/towel ready for the next day of practice!

•cries a little internally whenever you ask “Is there anything I can do for you today, love?”

•play games with him do it 😼

• if you’re not a gamer or just a casual fan-like me-he’ll choose a light fun game you two can play together

•if you’re more of a serious gamer you bet he’s gonna recruit you to play games with his discord server LOL

•he’ll roast the hell out of any slimy gamer dude who picks on you or says anything creepy

•might send them a virus if they are particularly annoying idk idk

•i feel like movie nights would be so much fun omg 

• it kind of works out since he’s anxious and big crowds or open spaces might give him some sensory overload, movie nights are a great choice for date nights

• it’ll be a whole event! It doesn’t have to be boring

• some take out and snacks and a makeshift form sets the scene perfectly!

•kenma might be convinced to drag out the mattress to the living room if he’s feeling extra

• you guys cuddle up with your movie and a slice of apple pie after dinner and it’s so cute plssss😖💖

•touching a bit back on the anxiety thing I think you two have probably had a convo about what he needs from you if he ever needs you to ground him

•it might be a struggle for a bit since anxiety is not and easy burden to bear for either party but with some patience you both get into a good swing of things

•oh god I just thought about a 3rd wheeling KUROO AHAHAHA

•he shows up on what started out as dates and you and kenma act like hes not there😭✋

• he starts talking and yall are like “hey ken did you hear something?”  “hmm no...must be the wind”

•pls yall are so perfect for eachother

•hehe kenken🥰

[derl30]

ALTERED STATES REVIEW TIME!

OK, this tumblr is, today, a vehicle for me to review ALTERED STATES. And you (the one person who stumbled on this review two-hundred years from n- oh who am I kidding, when the aliens from A.I. who show up to thaw out Haley Joel Osment and the teddy bear who was the real hero of that movie find this) should be very excited about this. Because this movie is insane. And highly entertaining.

Yes, the movie poster looks like ass. If I told you this was a movie where William Hurt (not the William Hurt from that awful 90's Lost in Space remake, or the one who slept through an entire performance as Duke Leto in the Syfy miniseries of Dune. This is before the body snatchers got him) took ayahuasca and got in a isolation tank and it blew his mind so hard he started devolving into a neanderthal and creating dimensional portals and he couldn't stop because he was addicted to finding the truth of existence... Well you wouldn't get that from this poster, would you? So let's move on. Shall we?

The film opens in 1967 with William Hurt's character, psychopathologist Edward Jessup, already immersed in a sensory deprivation tank, whilst his colleague and “buddy” Bob Balaban (he's just Bob Balaban in everything I'm not giving you his character's name look it up yourself if it's bugging you so much) oversees.

Now, you may notice I put buddy in quotes. The reason for that is that Jessup is a self-obsessed ass who seemingly has no reason to be around other people unless he can expound to them one of his various monologues. Bob Balaban barely gets a word in edgewise throughout the entire film. Bob Balaban.

See, Jessup loves the sensory deprivation tank experience. Unsurprisingly, as it allows him to be completely alone with himself for hours.

Later, at perhaps the lamest party ever, a bunch of faculty are chilling out and listening to the Doors. Everyone we see is talking about Jessup. Why? Well, much as Jessup is obsessed with himself, everyone else seems to follow suit by being obsessed with him. One young woman, Emily, (Blair Brown) is introduced to him in this very shot below as he arrives at the party:

Notice how is framed in holy light? There is a closeup after, of him framed in blinding glowing light followed up with a zoom in on Emily's face, enraptured with this incredible dynamic man. So much so that the moment he tries to make a goddamn sandwich she starts grabbing his celery (get your mind out of the gutter) and flirting with him. Which for these two that means talking science, immediately. Talking more at each other than with each other. This is often the way with Paddy Chayefsky's scripts.

PAUSE

Paddy Chayefsky is doubtless one of the great American writers for the screen. He wrote Marty, The Hospital and Network (which is a fucking incredible piece of work). He got an Oscar for all three. He also wrote this movie (Altered States, remember? Good lord) and disowned it completely three weeks in to production. His scripts tend to have very intelligent, driven characters at the center, who monologue extensively at each other. These scripts are not attempting to sound naturalistic.

Ken Russell, however, directed the film. He, like Chayefsky, is top notch at what he does (Direct. I said he directed the film like a second ago, come on keep up). His films, like Women in Love, The Devils, (which was banned in several major countries upon release and has never been shown publicly in its full, uncut form (by the way it's a masterpiece)) the Who's Tommy, Gothic, and Lair of the White Worm are all fucking gonzo nuts. I mean like, when you gave this guy the reins, you were going to Overthetopsville and there will be no stops on this trip. And god bless! I love directors who GO for it!

You're getting the chance to make a movie. Stop hemming and hawing and hit me over the head with what you want to say! Film is a visual medium, USE IT!

I feel I might have made my feelings clear here. So, moving on...

Ken Russell and Paddy Chayefsky immediately started butting heads, right from the start. Chayefsky was a BIG deal, and he wanted control over the picture in a BIG way. Ken would listen to his suggestions on everything to lighting and set dressing, and politely tell him, “No.”, and continue being the director of the film. Chayefsky hated him pretty quickly.

He had much more control over films like The Hospital. Which, if you watch The Hospital, well, it shows. You've got great actors (George C. Scott, Dame Diana Rigg (Dame may be the greatest official title of all time)) saying great dialogue. But its just two very witty bitter people sort of expounding on topics and speaking at each other and suddenly admitting they are in love and discussing what drapes they will have to buy for their new home. It's utterly preposterous, and it doesn't work in the way Sidney Lumet got it to work in Network, by literally making one of the lead characters realize his life is turning into a ludicrous soap opera.

So of course Ken tried to humanize, naturalize, the dialogue sequences. And it works! The film feels more human than the Hospital or Network. Despite the fact that Jessup is literally becoming more and more inhuman throughout the film. One of the ways he does this is by having the character's eat, drink, and work on other things during the dialogue sequences. This is perfectly normal in film, it's called giving the actor “business” to do, during the scene. Chayefsky HATED this. “They are mumbling my precious dialogue! Chewing through it! Sucking it through a straw!” Sorry, Chayefsky buddy. It works for the picture. Chayefsky also felt the actors were too emotional with his dialogue. Right. See, they call that acting.

UNPAUSE

Which brings us back to the first meeting of Emily and Jessup at the party. They are eating during this important scene! I can just picture Chayefsky seeing this, and running to the studio brass to tattle and get Ken Russell fired (as he got Arthur Penn of Bonnie and Clyde fame fired before Ken Russell came on board).

Emily and Jessup are, true to Chayefsky form, extremely intelligent, driven people and hearing them discuss topics such as anthropology and schizophrenia is quite interesting. It's just that what is to come, film being a visual medium, will eclipse just about any dialogue, no matter how good, from our mind thingys.

The two give up on the science talk and go straight to banging on her couch. After, she asks what he was thinking about. His answer is priceless. “God. Jesus. Crucifixions.”

She smiles.

Bwahahaha! Oh Paddy Chayefsky, you sure know women.

He admits he used to have religious visions. She listens to him from the sweaty couch whilst he sits naked on the floor, and starts going on about his father's horrible death of cancer and his loss of faith. And he admits to her that he's a nut. Her response is to call him a fascinating bastard. I think Lucas may have taken notes for Padme and Anakin.

So naturally, they get married immediately.

But none of that matters because Jessup gets back in the sensory deprivation tank and has his first vision. A nightmare of his dying father and lost faith in christianity. It's pretty great, filled with foreboding hospital rooms, his father's face being covered in a burning Shroud of Turin, everything covered by horrible blood red clouds and then THIS FUCKING THING SHOWS UP AND ITS ALIVE AND WRIGGLING

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

excuse me...

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

The many-eyed goat is slaughtered over a gold bible and suddenly Jessups screwing Emily again and we enter a blood vessel looking thing and the vision ends and he never mentions this again. Oh. Okay,

Emily continues on about what a nut Jessup is as they make marriage plans. Her monologue:

“You're an unmitigated madman. You don't have to tell me how weird you are. I know how weird you are. I'm the girl in your bed the past two months. Even sex is a mystical experience for you. You carry on like a flagellant... Which can be very nice, but I sometimes wonder if it's me that's being made love to. I feel like I'm being harpooned by some raging monk in the act of receiving God. (Emphasis mine)

"And you are a Faust-freak Eddie! You'd sell your soul to find the great truth. Well, human life doesn't have great truths. We're born in doubt. We spend our lives persuading ourselves we're alive. And one way we do that is we love each other, like I love you. I can't imagine living without you. So let's get married, and if it turns out to be a disaster, it'll be a disaster.”

It's a disaster.

As in, by the next scene. It starts off happy enough looking, they have kids and people are smiling. And hey, wow it's seven years later! But, well, see, whoops, they are getting a divorce. Well, not they. See, he is divorcing her because he considers the seven years with her a complete waste.

She still loves him, desperately. He doesn't give a shit about her or the kids. He tells Bob Balaban this, straight up. And then starts bugging him about deprivation tanks and Hinchi Indians in South America who have sacred mushrooms that can really fuck you up.

It's at this point you would like for Jessup to be hit by a Mack truck. But the movie continues on. By the way, this is one of the kids he doesn't give a crap about:

That's right. Drew Barrymore's first role is a kid that William Hurt doesn't give a shit about. Something that William Hurt would make a career out of with narcoleptic performances in Lost in Space and Syfy's Dune. So, Emily takes the kids to Africa for her anthropology work while Jessup goes to South America to go deeper into his own creepy mind.

The Hinchi Indians agree to allow him to participate in the drug ritual. They enter their holy cave.

This shot is beautiful. At this point the film becomes increasingly gorgeous. Ken Russell has started to go into overdrive, ladies and gentlemen. Buckle. Your. Seatbelts.

The Indians grab Jessup's hand and cut him, freaking him out. They pour his blood into the drug mixture. They begin to drink. Then he takes a sip. The intensity of the film here has quadrupled. The vision begins, fireworks going off all around him. He sees cave paintings of humans and komodo dragons and this:

The proper life he left behind with Emily. He's convulsing, sweating. The Indians are all around, masked. Snakes. He's laughing in pain. Energy spills from the void. A snake under the parasol strikes and begins to strangle him. He and Emily march toward a nuclear explosion as energy pours from the cut on his hand, becoming a lizard. From within a sandstorm, Emily watches him, naked. Jessup looks at her, entranced, as the soothing sands cover them both, slowly.

It's a beautiful sequence. A perfect film sequence. I can't overstate how strong the vision sequences are from this point forward. Great visual effects work and the madman mind of Ken Russell create something unforgettable, with it's own pace, independent from the rest of the film.

Jessup awakens with a komodo dragon laying before him, ripped to pieces. The Indians and the others all claim he killed it in rage. Jessup remembers nothing, takes samples of the drug to reproduce it, and goes back home.

Back home, Jessup keeps doing as much of the drug as he can and having Bob Balaban record results. They can't up the dosage any more so Jessup hops back in to the self deprivation tank to create a more extreme experience.

In his next session, Jessup states he is having a vision of early man, hunting a deer and killing it. Suddenly he states he is one of them, killing the deer. He begins to grunt like an animal. The two pull him out. He's incredibly pale, blood seeping out of his mouth. He can't speak, and has difficulty breathing. He insists they do an X-ray. It shows that there is a vocalizing lump in the front part of his throat. Jessup claims that his body had begun to revert to a simian state. The medical doctor agrees, stating the throat X-rays looks like that of a gorilla.

Luckily his throat returns to normal. So Jessup finishes up his day by having over a student of his and sleeping with her.

Our hero, people!

At this point we hardly feel sorry for him as his body suddenly begins to twist and bulge in the middle of the night, shifting in and out of neanderthal shapes. It's a horrific sequence, disturbing as hell. You certainly didn't expect the film to shift into body horror.

Jessup feels normal after a while. but sees visions of lava explosions, the birthing of the Earth all around him. Not a good sign.

He goes to pick up Emily from the airport the next day. She asks how he is doing.

“Oh, fine.”

Yeah right.

Emily has been told what Jessup has been doing and is worried, which of course pisses off Jessup even more. The guy is obviously obsessed with reaching the truth and root of existence, much as Emily surmised earlier, and we see he has no fear of even losing his own soul, again true to her word. The only thing that allows us to give a shit about him at this point is that Emily cares for him and she's decent people, okay?

So back Jessup goes into the tank with his ayahuasca or whatever it is. Alone. The tank door opens from the inside.

The hand that pushes it open is covered in thick hair. He's devolved.

Ape-Jessup escapes the tank room and chases a janitor around the building. Again, this scene is fucking freaky as hell. We can't get a good look at this screaming animal that was Jessup.

The janitor gets a guard to help and chases after him into the boiler room, where we finally get a good look at him when he assaults the security guard and escapes.

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

Ape-Jessup runs through the city at night, making his way to the zoo where he kills a antelope and eats it. The Ape-Jessup sequence goes on way too long, but is nonetheless unforgettable. The makeup is much more convincing than the above picture suggests, and whoever performed Ape-Jessup did an admirable job.

The cops find an unconscious Jessup in the zoo and bring him in. Emily picks him up and questions him. Jessup admits everything that he can remember. He also admits that he probably killed that security guard. And once again doesn't seem to give a shit. Prick. He calls it the most supremely satisfying time of his life.

Even Emily seems disgusted with him. But, she's also fascinated with what he's accomplished. As an anthropologist, his transformation fascinates her. And so, she agrees to help oversee his next session. Big mistake.

Before the big session Emily and Jessup romantically reconnect, and then into the climactic session we go!

Get your popcorn ready!

After a few hours in to the session, the video monitor shows Jessup begin to literally melt apart like goo, reverting to primordial ooze, the very beginning of existence. An attempt to open the isolation tank doors blasts everyone unconscious, as light and energy pour forth. Emily is the only one left. She sees Jessup's life energy pulse from within the tank.

Rain pours down around them. The pipes on the walls twist and turn like jelly. The ground is covered with a pool of swirling fog and energy. Emily advances toward the vortex of the tank.

In the emptiness of the beginning of everything, Emily seizes the energy before her and reconstitutes Jessup.

They take him home. While he sleeps, Emily rages over the fact that she loves such a insane bastard, and can't get over him. And, then, after Bob Balaban leaves, leaving Emily alone, Jessup wakes up.

He sweetly admits that the truth he learned was that there was no learnable truth, just unknowable horror, and all that's real is human experience. And he'll be a good boy from now on. Well too bad!

Because that horrible truth isn't done with him, and it's back to goo-Jessup! Emily tries to help him, grabbing him, but this in turn effects her, turning her into a shimmering lava form of herself. Both of them begin to self-destruct as Jessup, enraged, watching her in pain, struggles to retake his humanity, slamming himself into the wall, reforming himself through sheer will and physicality. He grabs her and brings her back, mirroring what she did for him during the final session. They embrace naked in the hallway. He finally admits, “I love you, Emily.”

Fade to credits.

Awww true love!

What can I say to sum up? Awesome 80's practical effects. Genius wacko go-for-it Ken Russell directing. Out of this world vision sequences. A awake and actually remarkable performance from William Hurt. An occasionally turgid but often fascinating script by the ever ornery Paddy Chayefsky. Whats not to like?

Well, the ending is a little rushed. The ape sequence goes on for a little too long and takes up perhaps too much of the films overall running time. The central love story is, well... a little hard to swallow, but hey, I guess there really is somebody out there for everyone. Even self-absorbed, deadbeat, cheating, sensory deprivation loving, ayahuasca dropping, Harvard teachers with a messiah complex!

And on that note, aliens from A.I. Artifical Intelligence, have a good day, and don't leave poor Teddy alone with no one to keep him company!

Sayonara!

[night-unfurls-its-splendour]

I'm watching the entire series of Game of Thrones for the first time. I've made my way to season 3, making sure to watch as many commentaries as I can. Last night I listened  to the Set Design / Costume Design commentary for S3 Ep 4: "And Now His Watch is Ended".

I know most historical costume Enthusiasts / Critics either don't touch, or make exceptions for Fantasy productions and on the whole I agree with that. But something about the Game of Thrones costumes (and how the show's popularity has impacted costume design on productions actually set in the medieval / Renaissance time period) has just really been bothering me.

(Perhaps you see what I mean here with Contessina De Bardi in Medici: Master's of Florence and her sneaky mini structured neckline)

It may be a couple of things, but lots of the ... insights from Michele Clapton shed some light on this for me. I have a few questions.

First: North of the Wall, we spend some time in this episode with The Night's Watch at Craster's Keep. Of Craster's wives, Clapton said [Disclaimer this is not an *exact* quote because I couldn't find a transcript anywhere and my sister sent back the Netflix DVD and I do not have an idetic memory - but the important parts of the comment are, in my own estimation, accurate] : "With Craster's wives I got this idea of them just having bits of rabbit, whatever they can get, woven with grass..." this raises in my mind, SO many questions.

Firstly - we ARE north of the Wall, yes? Where,  as we have seen, the ground is just about ALWAYS covered in snow, or 90% mud. So where is the grass coming from? And also what they are wearing is so clearly not grass?

This also provides a segue into my second question.

Do sheep exist in Westeros?

Why is it that this show has such an aversion to wool? Every man wearing protective clothing is wearing Leather (or rather I should perhaps say "vegan leather"). Every Hearty Weave (TM) appears to be an attempt at Linen; and every Fine Lady is wearing Silk satin, or if you're Olenna, silk brocade (in obviously hot weather, because naturally elderly ladies benefit from heat stroke).

I've not seen one woollen cloak. Not. One wool... anything really. I ask myself "Why?"

100% natural wool is wondeful. It's naturally flame retardant; it keeps you warm; it breathes well; it's soft in a light weave; it's strong in a heavy one; its water repellent. So what is with this endemic erasure of wool? Even productions like 2018's Mary Queen of Scots have had costume designers like Alexandra Byrne who, when searching for a durable fabric for cold and rainy Scotland, came out with a wardrobe comprised entirely of DENIM. Which,  as we all know is the WARMEST AND MOST COMFORTABLE of fabrics when damp. Now we all know Byrne's real reason for using denim is because it's cheap. The problem is Byrne tried to justify it by saying all of that guff about wanting a fabric that wears well in rain (Which,  I cannot stress this enough- denim does not) and, of course because denim would be "ReLaTaBLe". But I digress.

All that aside, perhaps the things that bother me most are components and composition. Which is where we get into the wooly (heh) area of me being a person with interest in HISTORICAL costume, critiquing a FANTASY series.

So let's just get this out of the way: I'm not saying that anything that the costume Department did with this series was "Wrong" [with one exception, but we'll get to that when we get to it]. I'm just going to say that I don't like the way it was approached, and my reasons on WHY. 

I think I have a modicum of justification for my opinions here because, fantasy is fantasy, yes but the concepts of "Fantasy" and "Medieval" have become so strongly connected that the line between them has become so blurred in the modern mind as to be almost non-existent anymore. We're in a strange cycle here. "Fantasy" was directly inspired by Medieval and over the years took more and more creative wiggle room because, the great thing about fantasy is, you can make it whatever you want it to be aesthetically. But as Fantasy and Medieval have become so intertwined, more and more creative license has been taken with the latter, so that the original inspiration has become beholden to imitate the art it inspired.

But I'll save my pontification on the modern eye and Medieval fashion for another post, and try to keep on track only as far as this affects my feelings on Game of Thrones.

My justification is that GoT is not just inspired by Medieval England/Europe in the broad sense that most Fantasy of the Sword and Sorcery variety is; it was SPECIFICALLY inspired by ONE ERA of English History, The Wars of the Roses [15th century] (with character inspiration from other eras, as recent as the 16th century).

The thing about being interested in Historical Fashion is, once you know it, you can't UN-KNOW it. For example, my understanding of the medieval approach to clothing composition is "Cut as little as you need to because sewing is tedious". You don't want to have to sew more than you have to because what's the point of that? Practically no clothing in the medieval period was tailored because why bother doing that when you can just sinch it with a belt, or lace it up the sides? Is any of that applied here? Nah. Because when we look at Sansa's dresses, look at those obviously machine stitched, perfectly pristine seams. ~whistles~.

I'll never throw shade at a costume department for using sewing machines, but I will shade them for not bothering at all to make clothing for a universe that has no sewing machines look like it was made in a universe that has no sewing machines.

  I can agree with not holding Fantasy series to historical standards - to a point. To wit: as long as it's believable IN-UNIVERSE.

AS FAR AS WE KNOW, the GoT universe doesn't yet have Mechanized looms. Now I know that they make some pretty unreal lace in Myr, but I just can't think of any in-universe justification for the texture of Danny's blue number in season 3.

Another thing that bothers me is the proliferation of corsets and how those corsets are approached.

Here are some historical corset facts.

• the term 'corset' wasn't widely used to refer to structured undergarments outside of France until the late 18th century (1700's). Before tart they were called "stays" (16th-17th century) or "a pair of bodies" (15th-16th century)

• structured undergarments first appeared in the 15th century, as the bodice of under-dresses(kirtles) were lined with reed or Buckram to provide back and breast support and provide a smooth surface for the gown worn over it. It also provided a foundation for multiple layers of petticoats, so the waistbands wouldn't dig into your sides.

• Structured undergarments that existed independent of a kirtle or petticoat aren't in evidence until the 16th century (Elizabethan/Renaissance) and aren't widely used by all classes until the late 17th century.

• Most 16th-17th century boned foundation garments had straps, since they didn't reach down much farther than the natural waist,  unless they were designed with a high back.

• Corsets, stays and other structured undergarments were never worn without a shift/chemise/slip underneath because...

• Corsets chafe.

• Corsets are difficult to clean, but shifts are easy to launder. Shifts protect your skin from chafing and protect your very expensive corset from the oils produced by your skin

(Reproduction example of 15th century style kirtle, from Prior Attire. Source video here)

(Sansa's... corset here has this bizarre low back and 18th century style tabs on the bottom? It also seems to lace only down to her navel. Not quite sure what's going on here, it really doesn't seem to be supporting her at all.)

The reason I hate, hate, hate the way Sansa is costumed under her...  very suit-like gowns is  because she never ever is shown (so far) wearing anything under her corset; her gowns are all long-lined, flowing and loose fitting; and show only wears (usually) one petticoat under them. So in short, I dislike that Sansa wears a corset because Sansa has NO REASON to be wearing one.

◇◇◇◇Another Thing◇◇◇◇

I want to spotlight on a little thing from the commentary that really hits on one of my larger problems with the aesthetic interpretation of this show in general.

During one of the scenes with Stannis and Melisandre, Clapton mentions that they made Melisandre's hair a darker shade of red in season 3 than it was previously. She says the phrase "sort of makes her more earthy".

Yes. Let's make the FIRE priestess more EARTHY. LET'S JUST DO THAT. AS OF THIS SHOW ISN'T "EARTHY" enough.

There's this fantastic quote I read somewhere by GRRM about how he loves fantasy because it's colorful, where real life is gray and brown and olive and dull. Melisandre is arguably the most colourful character in the show/series. In the books, EVERYTHING about her is Red. And not just red. She's scarlet and crimson. When she's introduced there's this fantastic description of her wearing flowing robes of scarlet silk with slashes in it revealing a darker, blood red fabric underneath.

That was passed up for a monotone, very simply cut red gown and I can't stop asking myself why a designer would scrap something like that without even trying to pay homage to it.

This show just sort of takes everything colourful in Martin's world and MAKES it gray and dark for the sake of Gritty Realism (TM). I suppose that's part of trying to appeal to a wider audience, but I just find it increadibly visually uninteresting.

◇◇◇◇ONE MORE LITTLE THING◇◇◇◇

Is this the sofa from the Study in Clue?

???

[nadziejastar]

If BbS V2 really was what you theorized they might have been better off planning it as a series of shorts. A game about filling in the gaps of other games was probably a very hard sell for executives, regardless of how much the overall saga would benefit from it. With shorts it would be perfectly normal to jump around, there wouldn't have to be a flimsy excuse to shoehorn in Disney worlds if they weren't necessary for the story, and it might even be cheaper if 2D animation was acceptable.

— So what will it be?

I can’t say that quite yet, but it will be more “official” than a side story. I actually told the producer this recently, and he said “…what?” It’s the mystery KH. (laugh) Of course, I am also thinking about KH3.

— In an interview in the KH Days Ultimania, you said ‘I’m thinking of a mystery KH that made the producer go “what??”‘. Was that KH3D?

No, it wasn’t. I originally planned to make that after KHBBS, but we ended up making KH3D and the project was stopped. It’s a shame, but we won’t be starting that project again.

I think you are correct. The premise of the game seemed very weird and that’s probably a big reason why it got cancelled. But the story still really needed all the loose ends tied up in some way. FFXV got a short animated series called Brotherhood. I totally think KH3 could have benefited from something like that to fill in all the blanks. And fans would love seeing a 2D animated version of KH. I know I would.

The biggest issue the series had was that it was spread out across so many different handhelds. But the HD collections solved that problem. If the shorts were included in the HD collection, or made freely available, it could have worked really well. It’s no worse than making so much of KH3′s plot tie into Union X, which is less accessible than Brotherhood, for example.

A game about “blank points” was probably just too weird from a gameplay perspective, which I understand. I also agree about the Disney worlds. That also seemed like it might have been an issue. KH games suffer when the Disney worlds aren’t incorporated well. This isn’t an issue in games that feature new worlds like KH1, KH2, KHBBS, or KH3D. Even Days was mostly fine IMO. The worst offenders were CoM and Re:Coded which felt like the Disney worlds were just obligations and their plots were tired rehashes. KHUX Disney worlds were also very strange, too. Even 3D was weird since it used sleeping worlds. Stuff like that is why the series gets lambasted as being too confusing/convoluted.

— What about the missing 0.3?

We thought to tell the story of 0.5 with all three characters, but instead we decided on 0.2 with a focus on Aqua.

Honestly, I can’t even think of how Disney worlds would be incorporated into a lot of the “blank points” story. Nomura said KH0.5 was supposed to feature all of the wayfinder trio. Does that mean they would be playable? I dunno. Aqua was in the Dark Realm. That was a very unconventional world. It had Disney-themed locations, but it’s still not technically a Disney world. Story-wise, it was also unconventional, since she just spent all that time talking to herself until she briefly teamed up with Mickey.

I have no idea what Nomura planned to do with Ventus. Dream world? Or flashbacks to how he met Xehanort? Or he just wasn’t gonna be playable? Then there’s Terra, who was living as apprentice Xehanort and possessed. I don’t see how that functions gameplay-wise, unless it was something weird like you playing as the Lingering Will or something. There was the whole subplot of Namine communicating to the Lingering Will, which was poorly handled.

— Which worlds did Pluto travel when he had that letter?

I can say that he appeared in worlds that do not appear in the game [KH1]…. well, other than the current worlds, there are other worlds that the Heartless erased. The End of the World did not exist at first and is a world that is made up of erased worlds put together. Also, there is that place the door to Kingdom Hearts appears. At first that was another world, so that means that Sora and the others are now residing in that world which returned to what it once was.

— After debugging Traverse Town, the King says to Sora, “That day, your travels began here. Also on that day, I was here too.” Does that mean that the King was in the same place at the same time as Sora adventured into Traverse Town in Kingdom Hearts I?Seems so. What he was actually doing becomes the previously mentioned “blank time period”, but in this title, it’s implying that the two crossed paths in the same place.

Mickey probably would have been playable. In Blank Points, we saw him in the Dark Realm, and his blank period in Traverse Town was something Nomura specifically said he wanted to show. I guess he might have visited Disney worlds with Pluto and we could have played in those? I don’t know if that world that was shown in the end of KH1, the grassy place with the crossroads, was supposed to be important. It sounded like Nomura wanted to explain why Pluto was there with Mickey’s letter, though.

— About the World of Darkness and such, you haven’t gone into detail. Could you possibly talk about some of these things? Does the beach at the beginning and end of KH II have some connection to the World of Darkness?

Presently there are 4 main untold stories to consider: “the period of the King’s absence”, “the period of Riku’s absence”, “Roxas’s time in Organization XIII” and “Xehanort’s past”. In this case, the story of “the period of the King’s absence” is set in the realm of darkness. I am examining a way to tell these 4 stories so I might be able to find a way to tell them soon.

Young Xehanort’s past was another blank period. Him visiting Disney worlds is…possible, I guess. The best candidate for visiting Disney worlds is Riku, though. Nomura said he wanted to cover Riku’s period of absence, which probably includes KH1-2. In KH1, he was a bad guy and in Blank Points, he was shown in Neverland. Monstro is another possibility and that might have been intended to connect to the Monstro subplot in KH3D with Dark Riku. We also saw Riku in Twilight Town watching Roxas and Xion, so his Days period is open. Then there’s his period of absence in KH2, which opens up those worlds. In the novels, we know Riku spent most of his time in KH2 with Namine and Axel, and he also kept an eye on Sora, like during The Land of Dragons and the Beast’s Castle.

I didn’t notify you but you might’ve already heard from Yen Sid-sama. I’ve come to train to become a Keyblade wielder. Until now, I’ve only been waiting for you guys to come back from your journey. Maybe with this I can at least help out a little.

The magician Merlin-sama can use magic that surpasses time. Here, we can forget about the flow of time. Isn’t it great? Lea’s training with me. He apologized to me over and over again. It’s alright, I’d say, but he’d keep on apologizing…

At first I was a bit scared but as we trained together we started talking to each other. I found out Lea also has a best friend he wants to save. I felt like, he’s not a person that I can bring myself to hate…

Sometimes….. He’d stare at my face, so I’d ask him, what’s wrong? “I don’t know, but I feel like it’s something I must recall”, he’d say…

Your journey is a journey that will help many people and the people you’ll meet from now on. I have a feeling these people you meet will also need your help. The journey might be hard but please stay as the cheerful and bright Sora I know. Because your smile, will save many hearts…..

Then there’s Lea and Kairi. I guess we could have played through their training and the world could be based on The Sword in the Stone? I figured that was what the forest area in KH3 was supposed to be, but I dunno. Then they could have flashbacks during their training. I think we were definitely supposed to get more scenes of Lea and Kairi talking to each other, where she learns that he has a best friend he wants to save. It was obviously referring to Isa. KH3D was all about Lea looking for him, and he summoned his Keyblade immediately after learning that Isa was a vessel.

It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to see where that subplot was going. Lea was training to rescue Isa. Roxas being Axel’s “best friend” in KH2 was supposed to be a red herring—a pretty well-written one at that. People just didn’t pick up on it due to Roxas’s popularity bias. I doubt Lea would have told Kairi all the details of him and Isa being human test subjects. Like, she still didn’t understand why he didn’t wanna take off his black coat in KH3. But he’d tell her enough to know that he has a best friend who is a vessel and we’d learn what happened. It would have made their closeness in KH3 a lot more understandable if Kairi knew about his past. In his heart, he could tell that Kairi was Xion, too. And that’s how I’m gonna do it in my fanfic. :)

After KHBBSV2 was cancelled, Lea had no backstory anymore, so I guess we were just supposed to conclude that Lea was referring to Roxas in Kairi’s letter when he said he wanted to save his best friend. Which is just…dumb and insulting to the audience’s intelligence. Lea knew even in 358/2 Days that Roxas looked like Ventus. He said he kept it a secret from Roxas, so he obviously knew for a long time. It sounded like he realized it as soon as he met him, which is why he got so nostalgic for his childhood right after meeting Roxas.

Before he started his training with Kairi, he also knew that Ventus was one of the lost Keyblade wielders they were all looking for. Up until Yen Sid’s tower, Lea thought that Ventus was going to remember him as Axel. That’s how he was going to reunite with “Roxas”. He had no reason to think he needed to rescue “Roxas”, since that was Sora’s job and he was handling that. Of course he was referring to Isa in that letter.

Eh, I dunno. It’s possible we’d get to play as young Lea during his flashbacks in Radiant Garden. During the experiments, maybe he was tasked with Heartless clean-up duty inside the castle. He doesn’t have a Keyblade, though. Just his frisbees. It’d be unusual to have him be playable, but not impossible. If so, that opens up the castle, like the Hollow Bastion areas from KH1. All in all, the gameplay part of BBSV2 seemed pretty strange and the Disney worlds didn’t seem completely necessary, either. I think a series of animated shorts could have worked phenomenally well.

[bluephoenixdruidicprincess]

Shadowhunters 3x11, Lost Souls -- Review

It's that time of the year again where I put myself through the torture of enduring this show. Watching this show is like going on an endurance run. You drag your feet when you first start, when you get acclimated to the level of exercise, you think "hey, this isn't too bad" and then by the end, it's just pain...but also a sense of pride that you made it through. That's been my experience with the show, anyway. And it's basically how I felt about Shadowhunters 3x11, Lost Souls.

I would like to preface this review with saying that I am NOT a huge supporter of this show. I do enjoy certain elements of it but I'm not what would be classified as a devoted fan. For me, Shadowhunters is not a good show and I do get very critical of the show in my reviews. Honestly, for me, I watch the show because 1) I'm too curious not to and 2) I find that this show can be so bad its funny and that's how I reap enjoyment out of it. I am not at all invested in this show or its characters anymore. I'm just watching to see what happens. If you're a die hard fan and you lash out at everyone who has a different opinion than you, you might want to skip these...I'm just saying. My reviews may not be for you. If you do decide to be a total troll, well then pay attention to the below disclaimer.

This is going to be an honest review of my thoughts and feelings regarding this episode. If you're the kind of Shadowhunters fan where you only want to hear positive things about the show, this is not the place for you. If you decide to stick around and get offended by what is said, then that's on you. I warned you. Just know that if you send me any rude comments or messages, I will 100% ignore you. I find that's the best way to deal with bullies. I work 14 hour days. Do you really think I want to waste my incredibly valuable free time dealing with derogatory comments? Hell no. This review will consist of my honest opinions. Opinions are never right or wrong. I'm not telling YOU how to think and feel. I'm telling you what I, quirky and socially awkward me, think and feel. So please, lets discuss with dignity and respect. If I'm critical about this show, it's only because I want it to get better. There is, in fact, a difference between hating a show and being critical of it. I do not hate Shadowhunters, I am being critical and analyzing the flaws as I would with any other show. There are positives but there are also negatives. It's great if you want to promote positivity with this show (and I encourage you to do so) but that doesn't mean I'm not going to point out the things that are legitimately wrong with it. Also, keep in mind that despite the fact that I do like the books, me being critical of this show has nothing to do with my fondness for the books. I don't really care if the show deviates from the source material as long as the changes are good, it makes sense, and it doesn't create plot holes within the confines of the world the show has created. My problems with this show are problems I would have with any show or book for that matter. I think it's perfectly reasonable to take issue with a show that has plot holes, shoddy world building, and inconsistent characters. There will be spoilers for the books and movie.

We are at last embarking upon the final episodes of this show and if this episode is what's going to set the tone for the remaining episodes, then I'm glad it's the final episodes because...well, this episode wasn't great and is a perfect example of what I won't miss about Shadowhunters. Bland and cringey dialogue, more characters than it knows what to do with, and too much jumping across plot points. There are individual moments in the episode I enjoyed but overall, this isn't an episode I loved.

The Loss of the Mary Sue

I'm not entirely certain of the timeline in this episode. The episode never specifies on exactly how many days have passed since the 3A finale but I'm going to estimate about a week or so. Everyone believes Clary died in the explosion caused by Lillith attacking Simon.

The episode opens with Jace, Izzy, and Alec chasing after a downworlder and Jace makes some very shoddy decisions in this fight that lets you see just how reckless he's become in the wake of Clary's "death". We then get a montage of everyone missing Clary and the more significant one is Jace, that's the one they spent the most amount of time on. He's basically walking through Clary's room remembering all the times he spent with Clary...so basically three memories. Another classic example of what I've always been talking about when it comes to the adaptation changes. Clary and Jace have barely spent any amount of time together, even less actually dating and I'm supposed to believe that they're each other's one true love...not going to happen because the show didn't develop it at all. There's a moment in the montage where Jace starts looking at Clary's drawings and getting really emotional about it and I felt nothing because Jace has never been shown to take any sort of interest in Clary's artwork before. In fact, if it weren't for that one scene in 3A, I wouldn't even have known that Clary was still drawing. By the show deviating from the books in the way they did, Clace had less development but yet the show still wants to continue the aspect of Clace being hopelessly in love from the books. You can't make a significant change from the source material and then pages down the line expect to pick up exactly where you left off. By making the change, you changed the entire context of the relationship so now the entire story has to change in order to fit that new narrative. Sadly, the Shadowhunters writers have not figured that out yet and continue to make that same mistake...or they're lazy, it could be that, too. Jace eventually gets so depressed that it's implied that he's contemplating suicide but Izzy is able to talk to him and get him to think. And then she just leaves him after making him promise he won’t go through with it. If anyone's wondering, if you catch someone who you believe may be contemplating suicide, do not UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, LEAVE THEM ALONE!!! Particularly in a dark room. Being in a dark enclosed space is not the kind of place that typically sends out positive energy. But I suppose I can cut Izzy a little bit of a break. It's entirely possible the Shadowhunter world doesn't really understand how to help someone who's experiencing suicidal thoughts. They certainly didn’t help out Jace’s mother. Alec also confronts Jace about this in probably the only believable scene in this entire episode. Seriously, I've never been a Jalec shipper but I totally understand why people ship them. Matt and Dom are probably the only actors who actually have any chemistry with each other. But Alec tells Jace he's doing the memory of Clary a disservice and that if Jace were to die, it would destroy him as well. In other words, Jace isn't the only one who's going to be affected by this decision. Jace eventually is called by Luke who for some reason appears to be living in a motel room. I don't know why but whatever. Luke doesn't believe Clary is actually dead and he tries to convince Jace through some really weird conspiracy theory that probably even flat-earthers would find difficult to believe. But hey, if it leads to them finding Clary, I'll go with it. And I understand why Luke is unable to accept even the possibility that Clary might be gone for good. He can't think that about someone who he basically views as his daughter and the last connection he has to Jocelyn. Luke gives the evidence to Jace and tells Jace to at least check it out.

Simon, understandably, is also having a difficult time with all this. And Maia returns to give him emotional support despite leaving for a very particular and totally understandable reason but Simon needs her so of course she comes back for him. It's not like Maia exists for anything else but for Simon's character arc. Both Simon and Izzy kind of passive-aggressively shame Maia about leaving. And I'm particualrly disappointed in Izzy telling Maia about what happened to Simon's family as that's a very deeply personal issue and Simon should've been the one to tell her. It wasn't Izzy's secret to tell. I get that they were trying to use that scene to exposit information to the audience but there were better ways of doing that. Hell, it could've just been Izzy making an off-handed comment about Simon. Maia could've been talking to Izzy about how badly Simon is doing with the Clary situation and Izzy could've been all, "especially with what happened with his family" and Maia could've been shocked and Izzy could've been flabbergasted because she didn't know Maia didn't know. That would've been a much better way for the situation to be handled. But I'm not too pleased with Izzy saying in response to Maia not knowing, "well how could you? you weren't around." Just the insinuation that Maia should stay around and support her man and not go off and get in the right head space to properly heal herself after dealing with the re-emergence of her abuser. But I suppose I shouldn’t expect any different from Izzy seeing as she, herself, also only exists to give support the other characters. I think these passive aggressive intonations of shaming Maia are really horrible and shame on the writer. Maia, Izzy, and Simon decide to work together to find a way to get rid of the Mark of Cain from Simon's forehead. They talk to Raphael who now works at a soup kitchen in Detroit and Raphael tells them the tale of some dude chilling in the sewers of NYC who could possibly be the oldest vampire alive and may have answers to the removal of the Mark of Cain. Maia decides not to help Simon on this as its a bad idea for a werewolf and a vampire to meet and I almost forgot that was a thing, the show so rarely does anything with the vampire vs werewolf dynamic. But of course Maia has to back off to give room for Sizzy. I’m really not a big fan of Sizzy being explored here as everything that made Sizzy fun and interesting in the books has been completely stripped from the show. I’d much prefer Saia on the show. But really, I just want Maia and Izzy to have their own character arc, though that doesn’t revolve around shipping. 

The Malec B-Plot

We have a Malec B-plot that I found just completely unnecessary wherein Iris returns and kidnaps Magnus because she wants to get Madzie back. She falls for the most obvious trap in the world and hopefully we never see Iris again. What it does for Magnus's story works I guess but I just found it to be a really obtrusive subplot that didn’t fit at all with the episode. I'm not sure if it's just the fact that I've been away from the show for a year so I can see the the show a little more clearly now but the Malec chemistry is no longer working for me. Maybe it's just that I've always paid more attention to how alarmingly unequal their relationship is but I'm looking at the body language they're giving off and its not the kind of body language you would expect from lovers. They're so stiff around each other and not relaxed at all.

In fact, there's a line in this episode where Malec has just put Madzie to bed as they're baby-sitting her and Alec kisses Magnus and Magnus tells him to stop because they have a child in the apartment currently. Alec kind of scoffs because it's just a kiss and Magnus is all, "You know how we get." And I'm like, "Do we really, though?" There's plenty of scenes of them talking and I can buy them as friends with that but lovers? I’m having a difficult time actually buying that now. Like I said before, the Jalec scene was way more believable than any Malec scene in this episode.

But Magnus decides he doesn't want to feel helpess ever again so he decides he needs to learn how to fight. Honestly, I was surprised to learn that this is implying he doesn't even seem to really have any basic self-defense capabilities. The way he was swinging the sword earlier in this episode lead to me to believe otherwise. Plus, Harry Shum Jr is a pretty buff dude but I guess maybe Magnus lifts weights and that’s it. Alec decides to help him out on this venture, though.

Siblings Reunited

We find out that Clary is indeed not dead and that Jonathon's back. I'll be real, here. It's kind of hard to feel sad for Jace or Simon or Luke or anyone really regarding the "death" of Clary, considering this entire episode is interspliced with moments of Clary being very much alive. Honestly, I think this episode would've functioned better if it was just about showing everyone going through all the different stages of grief regarding Clary and at the end of the episode when they've hit the acceptance stage, that's when we see Clary wake up in the apartment with Jonathon. But whatever. The show decided not to go that route so we have to make do with what we got. Clary wakes up and looking pretty damn fantastic for someone who's been asleep for days. Not a strand of hair out of place, make-up is flawless, and not a wrinkle to be found on her clothing. In fact, I think they're in even better condition than they were when Clary initially had to put them on. Clary also isn't even the slightest bit groggy, she knows exactly where she's at and everything. Clary does comas well. Jonathon tells Clary that it is indeed him, her big brother and that before Lillith was sent to hell she sent them away to Siberia, apparently. Clary plays nice for a little bit with Jonathon but decides to chance out in the cold of Siberia. It's nice to see that in her state of unconsciousness her muscles didn't atrophy from lack of movement or deteriorate from lack of food. But Clary fails in her escape, Jonathon finds her and brings her back. Clary tries to stab him with a knife but they both find out that what happens to one person will also happen to the other. So yeah, we're full in City of Lost Souls plot here which is ironically the title of this episode. Shadowhunters has never been all that subtle. This new actor for Jonathon is going to take some getting used to. Will Tudor did a phenomenal job with him so its difficult to see this new guy as Jonathon. But it also is difficult to take Clary's anger and hatred of Jonathon seriously when you think about all that Jonathon's really done on the show is kill a shadowhunter Clary had never met before and then injured Max and Max swiftly recovered. Clary is all about painting him as the worst possible being and indeed, in the books, he is but here, while he may be a bad guy who's done really bad things, I don't know if its deserving of that level of hatred. We haven't exactly seen a lot of his horrifying dastardly deeds. Another example of making a change and then thinking you can still keep the same storyline at a later point in the story. I'm certainly not saying I wanted Max to die but story-telling wise, it would make the emotions Clary's feeling here a little more believable. But I'm actually really interested to see where this whole Jonathon and Clary plot goes. In the books, it's Jace that's put in this situation so it'll be interestig to see how the show tackles Clary being in this situation. I'm also wondering, because they seem to be trying to stay away from the incest vibes here, is Jonathon going to gain an unhealthy obsession with Jace instead of Clary? In the books, Clary was who Jonathon was creepily obsessed with. He was equating possession with love and viewed that Clary belonged to him in every way imaginable. So since the roles of Clary and Jace have been reversed here, will Jonathon's obsession now change from Clary to Jace? Probably not but it would've been interesting to see for sure. I mean, if you're going to do a role reversal, you might as well go all the way, right?

The Clave Acting Shady AF

The Clave is being super shady right now. They appear to be doing experiments on the incarcerated downworlders and all I can say is, "do we really need this?" And also, "Why is it being implied that Jia knows about this and is okay with this?" The interesting thing about Jia in the books was the fact that she was the first step in the leadership to help get rid of the more corrupt aspects of the Clave and instigating change. But I suppose it's per the norm for the show to make everyone but the main group a bad guy instead of morally grey. As I've said before, this show has no concept of subtlety. I can only imagine that this is leading into the part in City of Glass the show hasn't done yet wherein the alliance rune is going to be introduced but instead of using it to fight Valentine, they're going to use it to fight Jonathon. That's what these downworlder experiments seem to be leading into as it reminds me a lot of Valentine experimenting in the books. I'm sure there was 0 social commentary intended when writing this into the show, though...but I think its safe to say it's totally social commentary. The show isn't very subtle, once again.

But good news is it looks like Ollie is gone for good so yay! I am side-eying the show, though about that. What was the point of introducing her if you weren't going to do anything with her? I'd say they probably wasted about half of 3A with Ollie unnecessarily. But maybe if this show hadn't been cancelled, Ollie would've played a more significant role? Well anyway, at least some of the fat has been trimmed.

My biggest issue, as always, is the dialogue. The dialogue felt extremely one-note. It was almost like the writer made a flow chart of what they wanted to happen in this episode and was like, "crap! I guess my characters do need to speak, here's some lines to explain what's going on." The dialogue basically existed solely for the purpose of giving exposition but the real kicker is that it was really unnecessary. I could've had this episode on silent (and that might've even have made it an improvement) and I would've understood what was happening perfectly. The dialogue really didn't add anything to the experience, it just made the episode feel more awkward than it already was. And then there continues the trend of Shadowhunters treating their awesome plans as if they’re the most clever plans in the world when in actuality, the plan is beyond obvious and it was super cringey and awkward seeing Izzy being treated as this amazing strategist for making the obvious move. And the episode was already plenty awkward with the constant cutting. It's really difficult to enjoy any particular subplot going on in this show when we only spend maybe 30 seconds to a minute on any particular moment. I kind of wish this show structured their episodes more around themes as opposed to plot. Plot is temporary, plot is always changing but exploring themes through plot gives you more of an appreciation not only for the characters but the story, itself. While I didn't mind sequences in this episode, at the end of the day, it just kind of left me feeling empty. I also think the acting felt a little stilted as well. I wasn't a big fan of any of the performances given in this episode and whereas I've never thought anyone on this show was oscar-worthy for their performances in the past on this show, their performances have always been maybe a C+ to a B. But in this episode, it just didn't feel like any of the actors' hearts were in it. Now granted, that could be a side effect of the script because, as I've mentioned before, the script wasn't great. Or it could've been the directing. There's a lot of reasons for why acting can feel stilted and it very rarely has to do with the actor or actress being bad at acting.

I've made notes about how the dialogue and acting was stilted but those weren't the only things that were. The fight choreography and the blocking felt a little off as well. For starters, the fight choreography did not feel organic. It was strangely reminiscent of season 1 fight choreography. The constant jump cuts so you don't see too much of what's actually happening and just feeling like fight scenes move very slowly. Like the reaction times between sword swing to parry were very slow and it kept on taking me out of the moment. Then you also had moments where Alec and Izzy catch up with Jace in the sewer and everyone's staring at the seelie they're trying to capture for a good 5 seconds before the actual fight continues. And then there's just strange blocking choices where a character walks to a point in the room and then delivers their line but the walk to the new mark wasn’t organic and actually made the line feel more awkward.

I'd probably give this episode a C+. It was passable, with enjoyable moments but ultimately not something I have any desire to return to. There were cute moments (primarily Jalec and Madzie), but overall as an episode, not something to be too terribly impressed with. And yes, there were moments I did like. It’s not my fault the show just had more bad parts I felt compelled to talk about.