#so as our main characters + creation/destruction parallels it's fitting for them | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

nesta-stan · 4 years ago

Text

Theory on Nesta’s power:

I am going to be honest, my theory is the same as what a lot of others have already come up with. Nesta has the power over both life and death; Nesta is both a healer and a destroyer; and Nesta is full of compassion and animosity.

But I got this idea from my mythology class I am taking this semester. We got to the chapter about the great goddess archetype and all I could think of was Nesta. Here is an excerpt from the textbook about the great goddess.

So here is a paraphrased list of what we know so far:

Nesta got the power from the cauldron, the thing that created the world

the cauldron was said to be used by the mother;

there is a dark mother

Whatever Nesta took zapped at the cauldrons ability to reform beings

Nesta has used the cauldron’s power to commit an act of mass destruction

Feyre thinks Nesta has death powers

Feyre also considered if Nesta could be a healer.

It’s already cannon that Nesta can use her powers for destruction. A lot of people have already referenced the scene with Cassian but what we don’t think about a lot is how Nesta botched the youngest queens transformation. Nesta did not botch the cauldrons ability to destroy, which we see is still very strong when Hybern uses it in the war yet the same cannot be said of it’s ability to create. Leaving me to believe Nesta might have more powers in reformation of life than in destruction of it.

Another thing I think is that if Nesta does have both life and death power it would be a perfect representation of how both her character flaws and advantages are equally displayed and parallel each other.

Nesta is loyal but stubborn

Nesta is outspoken but blunt

Nesta is honest but abrasive

Nesta is intelligent but shrewd

Nesta is a critical thinker but cynical

The great goddess is supposed to be ambivalent and I think Nesta really fits that characteristic.

There was also a discussion post I had to do about the great goddesses where our instructor asked us

"Because of those contrasting characteristics, there are often ambivalent feelings about the Goddess. She becomes the wicked witch, the demoness, the Lilith figure that corrupts humans.

Why do you think that it is so much easier for people in many cultures around the world to accept a Supreme Being, a masculine figure that takes life and offers punishment, but find it much harder to accept the Great Goddess as not only the birth giver but also the death dealer? Why is it harder to accept the death dealing aspect of the Great Goddess? Why is the Great Goddess figure vilified while the Supreme Being figure is idolized for similar qualities?"

Obvious answer was the patriarchy.

In alot of the myths we also see the great goddess get attacked by a new God. For tiamat it was her grandson marduk, Gaia raged a war on zues, Nut was permeantly seperated from her husband ( for them he was the earth God and she the sky God). Izanami was rejected by her husband after he saw how her face rotted away. Isis was betrayed and beheaded by her own son. Inanna's sister killed her after she tried to visit her in the underworld and then her husband refuse to mourn her.

The great goddess often has to face many betrayals. And she doesn't always end up on top. Which I think can be said of Nesta's relationship with the inner circle. And it can also explain Rhys' disdain. He See's himself as leader of a Pantheon and if the Nesta is the great goddess that makes her a wild card not fully subordinate to him.

Another theory could be all three Archeron sisters are in a way great goddesses. They all envelope the three main types: life, death, and regeneration. Here is someone from the crash course video on great goddesses.

Goddesses of life are maternal, often associated with the life-giving Earth...Sometimes these life-giving goddesses are associated with primeval creation...Life-giving goddesses are occasionally seen as protectors as well as nurturers...

Goddesses of death are often seen as queens of the underworld... In these roles great goddesses control the cycles of growth,decay and rebirth: occasion, goddesses associated with death are portrayed as witches or seers...Death goddesses are also often associated with fate, apportioning a person's life, ordaining health, disease, prosperity and suffering.

And finally, goddesses of regeneration often relate to sexuality in myths, appearing as virgins or nymphs. Sometimes they're also responsible for creativity: according to Leonard and McClure, their pulsing Sexual energies impel mortal creation to renew itself, and thus their influence redeems individual mortality through beauty, passion, and offspring." Pulsing sexual energy? Oof, is it getting hot in here or is it just these mother goddesses? One other interesting thing about goddesses of regeneration: they seem to have a tendency to bestow their favors on mortal men and that just does not seem to work out.

The great goddess is also seen as the mother, the crone, and the maiden. Which I think three Archeron sisters fit into. Feyre would be the mother, Nesta the crone, and Elain the maiden.

What do you think? Does Nesta fit the archtype of the great goddess?

220 notes · View notes

kingofthewilderwest · 6 years ago

Note

it kinda bugs me how they cant make httyd3 longer just so they can emphasize the story in a deeper meaning, like your post abt it being disproportionate. httyd3 had a LOT more plot than httyd2 and we can already see how it has to cramp so much and why that makes D2's pace felt pretty fast. the structure of the story is actually well planned.. perfect, to be exact! but the execution like putting pauses, necessary humor, longer dialogue, is whats needed to make it um, understandable? im not sure..

this isnt meant to judge the movie as bad though! but its a question ive been asking why they cant do it longer, for that sake. is it the budget? was Dean really certain the script is okay? or is it meant to be like this so people can interpret the movie their way? (oof that one is confusing).. i dont know, i want to ask about your thoughts on that ><

From this.

It’s an interesting conversation for sure! I believe that THW doesn’t have to be longer to be extremely successful in the ideas it needs to convey! The core ideas being:

Toothless cannot be a wild dragon and strong alpha leader with humans. Other dragons probably deserve the respect of needing wild dragon needs, too.

Humans like Grimmel are extremely dangerous to dragons and will continue to arise, so dragons need to go to an area separate from humans to live in optimal peace.

Hiccup and Toothless’ powerful friendship will separate (insofar as physical location) due to the first two points

I know you’re not the only person I’ve talked to who wanted a longer time because you feel like certain elements were cramped, needed more breathing room, or that dangerous plot points didn’t get enough sense of weight. More time would presumably give that flow and sense of scale and danger. Now, it’s true that more time would give us more content to develop these things. That said, I believe solutions aren’t always “add more.” Creating good art isn’t about adding new things; it’s about knowing when to take away or alter, and how to make every second of your creation count optimally.

I remember when I was doing my music composition degree, my instructors hammered into me what would make a good final piece: the editing process of deleting measures - even measures that were really good! - because they didn’t fit what the final product needed. It’s painful to delete, but ultimately, it’s freeing; instead of making a music piece more cluttered to put all possible good ideas in, I can make it less cluttered, more manageable, more beautiful, more meaningful, and more effective to audiences. A better overall piece isn’t putting in every good idea I have; it’s leaving the piece with the beautiful ideas it needs.

I suggest The Hidden World doesn’t need added materials so much as it needs refining what’s already there.

Budget, production green lighting, and carefulness to the script all seem to have been done. HTTYD 3 was given a longer production time than originally planned. They pushed back the date exactly so they could make their best product. Interviews with people like DeBlois and Spielberg (who read several definitions of the script) talk about how much the script was transformed and bettered through its drafts. They did enough tweaking and care to rework the script. As for budget, the movie was 129 million USD, which sure was the cheapest of the HTTYD trilogy to create, but it’s about on par with what DreamWorks has spent on other movies like Home and Trolls - it’s not like there was skimping - and it’s all about making your money count, which I think this glorious, top notch animation quality film effectively did. So from what I’ve heard, I think production ran fine and we can’t question THW there.

I think most of THW’s problems can be solved simply by tweaking how scenes go down, taking a few small elements out, and adding a few small elements in. It doesn’t need time changes; it needs internal modifications to what’s already there. What I propose wouldn’t change much of the movie’s length - though maybe I we could add 5-8 minutes for things like a longer climax.

1. To Feel Less “Cluttered” or “Rushed”

The movie didn’t feel rushed to me or too cluttered, but it’s cluttered. You’re right. In addition to creating less clutter, my suggested tweaks will clear up time THW can spend elsewhere, streamline THW into fewer palatable essential ideas, and give a slight tone makeover that will add more sense of danger and conflict that THW needs.

Fewer humor side gags with minor characters (and less time spent on them). The gang’s antics are fun additions, yes, but that doesn’t mean they’re central to what the plot needs. Spending too much time with them adds clutter and takes away from plot-central, tone-central material. There’s a huge gaggle of gags in THW, more than any movie needs in a less-than-two-hour-long run time. Do we need all these to give THW its comic relief? Don’t get me wrong - I loved the humor - but time needs to be prioritized, and the movie will be improved once “less is more.”

Less time with Tuffnut’s pep talks. This goes with my first point. This comedic gag was lengthy in particular. It’s in part because it connects to the idea of Hiccstrid marrying, which THW does make more central in its themes. However, I also propose:

Spend less time (or delete) the will-they won’t-they marry Hiccstrid plot. THW intends to parallel Hiccup and Toothless maturing into adulthood, including their romantic connections. However, a will-they won’t-they marry subplot in Hiccstrid isn’t needed to create that parallel. Not to mention: it can be uncomfortable to have this undertone of romance as “required” adulthood maturation, and the fact that Hiccstrid are so close and intimate makes it feel “off” that they’re so uncomfortable talking about marriage. Spend less time here, simply make fans aware they’re going to marry in the future but not today, and return to the main relationships THW needs to pay attention to: that of Hicctooth and Nightlight.

2. To Make Grimmel a Greater Sense of Threat

One of the central points is that Grimmel is extremely dangerous and represents one of many humans that’ll continue to be a threat to dragons. While Grimmel can be overcome, Hiccup will need to interact with Grimmel in such a way he can understand that dragons and humans cannot coexist in today’s civilization without continuing to risk danger, and that it’s best for everyone to live happily in two separate civilizations. It’s not being defeated by the enemy’s oppression, but taking a brilliant countermeasure to give humans and dragons both a better existence.

Making Grimmel feel like a greater sense of threat, and helping audience members understand what Grimmel represents overarchingly of humanity’s current antagonistic state, will help us and Hiccup process why a separation is best. This can be done by:

Show Grimmel’s impact on human society. All we’d have to do is change what his base looks like: it could be located in an area taken over from another human civilization, showing his army’s power and place in this world over humans.

Greater weight placed on Berk’s exodus. The Hooligans lost their home, but it’s played too lightly. It’s not written optimally as an emotionally impacting or destabilizing moment, which decreases the sense of threat Grimmel has. Instead of having the Hooligans excited to find New Berk, show them grieving. They can butt against Hiccup’s ideas of finding the Hidden World, but instead in a way where they’re frustrated at his naive solution and hurt at what they left behind. This isn’t adding time to THW; this is tweaking phraseology and presenting an event differently.

Change how Berk is abandoned. To make the attack feel more dire, threatening, either: 1. Have the Hooligans more reluctant and grumpy to leave in the town meeting, and not play the leaving scene so lightly, or 2. Have Grimmel chase them out of Berk so they have to flee then and there. This might even reduce time!

Show Grimmel’s power over dragons. We could have a few-second-long flashback of him standing over a field of dead Night Fury bodies, or have his place cloaked in dragon skins or skulls.

Show Grimmel’s power as a warlord. Grimmel acts in almost a solo fashion, despite cooperating with warlords and having an army. It doesn’t give us a good sense of scale. Show his interactions better with the whole of his forces to make him feel more dangerous, and for humanity as a whole to feel more like a threat against dragons. For example, in the scenes where he’s trying to trap the dragon riders, show him commanding more people.

Show Grimmel’s impact on the dragon (and/or human worlds) through landscape. What if, as the Hairy Hooligans try to find a new place to stay, they fly over several islands that have been destroyed by Grimmel’s forces? Either human civilizations, or homes once havens to dragons, with characters making comment they “hope” people got away. And what if, when Grimmel takes their dragons near the end of THW, it’s again through more violence and a raid and fire and destruction?

Conversations more clearly talk about Grimmel’s dangers over dragons and humans, and how he’s one of many people that’ll arise. This idea is embedded in THW dialogue, but not clearly enough to fully grasp its weight, especially not in the sense we see characters grasp this. Have Hiccup and Astrid and Valka or something talk about how widely destructive Grimmel is, how even once he’s gone another man like him will take his place, and that while they may continue to fight and win for human and dragonkind, it’s ultimately not the right move to make for everyone to live safest and alive. A conversation laying this out makes a world of difference in our understanding of what dangers are going down and why we need to come to the solution THW concludes with. Again, this isn’t adding time; it’s changing phraseology.

Add a few minutes to the climax. Make the final fight with Grimmel obviously the final fight, the threat bigger, the action more intense.

Perhaps show that Berk’s done good work changing the world by their choices. Even though Berk ultimately decides to let the dragons go, they are meant to be the voice of peace that changes their world. The good guys can’t resign to letting themselves live under the thumb of bad guys’ choices. Show that they’ve made a difference - Grimmel and his armies are gone and the world is regrowing (no more torched landscape, if we add that element in) - but that it’s still going to help their world by letting dragons go, too… for this generation, at least.

3. To Make Hiccup and Toothless’ Parting Jive Better

Hiccup and Toothless separate out of need - they can’t live in the same place for the better of both their kinds. However, since the movie spends so much time on Toothless chasing after the Light Fury, we don’t get that full sense of need. I propose:

Open THW with a clear Hicctooth sappy bonding moment. We need things like “Forbidden Friendship” and “Where No One Goes” to feel the power of Hicctooth’s love. Give us that starting sense in THW of how close they are before adding in the complications. It can even be done by tweaking how the opening fight scene goes down.

Show dragons profiting by living with humans, but it also being Complicated with their wild side. We need to acknowledge that the relationship between humans and dragons has done the dragons good, too! Otherwise it might feel incongruous with the rest of the franchise.

Show dragons being unfit in the urban area through their own restlessness. The movie tries to show this with Moosie Boi being too big for Berk, and Berk being so crowded with dragons Gobber finds the soup unsanitary. But if we see Stormfly restless and want to leave for the Hidden World, too, wouldn’t this say something more about where dragons are pulled to and belong?

Less time spent on Toothless investigating the Night Fury. You can’t cut this down too much or we’ll feel like rushing, but since THW focuses so much on just Toothless and the Light Fury’s connection rather than an overarching problem for dragons, it’s hard to feel the full-scale issues of the problem. Making it just him and her feels more like a hook up love story than “dragons and humans are incompatible for their needs.”

Change Toothless’ body language. Show more emotional division in Toothless about his conflicting options. Show him hesitant to leave Hiccup and the two interact over that. Show him lonely away from his kind when with Hooligans. Show him feeling that loneliness met - that deep emotional need of being with his own species - when he’d thought was lost to him (rather than focusing on it being a romantic hookup interest). This doesn’t take more time; it tweaks what was already given on screen.

Change Toothless’ emotions with the Light Fury to feel more like loneliness being met than horny boi practicing kissing with a rock. This does a better job of showing that Toothless has a deep need that needs to be met as a wild animal and as a social draconic species.

Change conversations Hiccup has with humans about Toothless’ struggle. Maybe have Hiccup processing less with people and more by himself or with Toothless. Don’t write the conversations with people be about “Toothless has a girlfriend” and “of course he left.” Discuss instead how Night Furies are social creatures and Toothless hasn’t been with his kind in six years - that’s a huge hole in his heart being filled. Validate the deep connection Hiccup and Toothless have, while simultaneously acknowledging the struggle of this moment now. The movie shows that the Light Fury can never be domesticated, so I think that’s fine, but maybe one line from Astrid saying, “I don’t think she’ll come to live with us,” would be enough to help other audience members pick that up too.

More time spent on all dragons being in danger, and Toothless as an alpha unable to protect them with Hairy Hooligans. The story doesn’t show Toothless being much of an alpha - intentional - until he reaches the Hidden World and it clicks. But I suggest it’d be more effective to pull this out more than having an issue with Moose Boi taking up too much space in Berk, and Berk being so crowded Gobber has a dragon in his soup.

Put more of a deal on Toothless being an alpha. You can say that Toothless didn’t understand or use his role as alpha when with humans, but I think showing more sense of conflict, and of an alpha needing to be wild to protect his own, would be useful. Make this an issue for all dragons. The alpha status being used as a blackmail device against Toothless to keep the Light Fury alive could be replaced with us seeing the full species of dragonkind being unable to be protected by an alpha apart from his own people. More needs to be done than dragons bowing to him in one scene to understand what the alpha does for his society.

Show Toothless with more Light Furies. The Light Fury being his singular focus is great. But what about, in the Hidden World, Hiccup and Astrid watch Toothless interacting with a whole group of Night Furies, and he’s clearly in a situation that was Made For Him?

THW already has great content in there - Toothless and the Light Fury interacting, Hiccup crying when he realizes Toothless is fit in the Hidden World, Hiccup freaking out and Astrid comforting him when he feels a low, and Hiccup and Toothless parting ways touchingly at the end.

With these proposed tweaks, we get Toothless and Hiccup’s relationship being addressed deeply from the angle of both friends. We understand what both Toothless and Hiccup emotionally feel, and palatably sense how both love the other. We get a sense that Toothless is attracted to the Light Fury and might want to mate, but that she’s also calling him into a wild life and reminding him that he’s been alone, separated from his kind. We get a sense that it’s not just Toothless, but all dragons who might be called back to the Hidden World. We get a sense that it’s not just Toothless, but his whole role as alpha affecting the entirety of dragonkind.

And once we add in a greater sense of Grimmel being dangerous, and that more humans like him will continue to rise up, we can understand why Berk would release all their dragons. It’s not that dragons hate living with humans - THW can make that clear - and it’s not that dragons haven’t been profited by living with humans. But in the current call, the current situation, it’s best to go to the Hidden World.

I’m mostly tweaking how scenes go down, changing lines and reactions rather than adding material. Feel free to propose a longer movie! For me, THW already has enough space to share its message. Maybe it needed to be a few minutes longer, but I suppose my own sense is that they had enough time to budget in this material, make a smooth-flowing movie with all the material they needed to present, and come away with an astounding storyline.

Like you, this isn’t meant to judge the movie as bad! It isn’t bad! It’s downright wonderful in many aspects. I’m so happy I’ve seen it and can scream over it! Simply, if I were in charge of tweaking the script, these are the first alterations I’d make, and I think it would make THW even better.

#long post #httyd 3 spoilers #httyd 3 criticism #httyd3 #httyd 3 #How to Train Your Dragon 3 #THW #The Hidden World #analysis #my analysis #Hiccup #Toothless #Hiccup and Toothless #Light Fury #Grimmel #ask #ask me #awesome anonymous friend #faq

185 notes · View notes

weaselandfriends · 6 years ago

Text

Hymnstoke XV

GC: TH3Y 4LL THOUGHT 1 W4S CR4ZY GC: BUT H4H4H4 1T TURN3D OUT W3 4LL W3R3 1N OUR OWN W4YS GC: TH4T H3LP3D US R34LIZ3 TH3 P4RTICUL4R D3ST1N13S THE G4M3 PUT TOG3TH3R FOR US GC: 1N TH3 VOC4BUL4RY OF L1K3 GC: TH3 HYP3R FL3XIBL3 MYTHOLOGY 1T T41LORS TO 34CH PL4Y3R GROUP

Bildungsroman.

I think the term "bildungsroman" (or its less-pedantic equivalent "coming of age story") is over-employed in contemporary critical analysis. It's a lot like the term "deconstruction," which can be draped atop a wide variety of stories to ostensibly make a critical statement without saying anything.

Hussie himself, in one of his old Formspring posts, described Homestuck as a "coming of age story." But who exactly is the one coming of age? Obvious answer is John. The story opens with him on the cusp of adolescence (thirteenth birthday) and ends, at least in one Epilogue, with him reconciling with his estranged wife and child. Obviously some coming-of-age has occurred, even if only literally. But in what way has John developed as a person? Is that development stymied by the existence of a parallel Epilogue in which he unceremoniously dies, or does even that branch of John's existence feed into who John becomes as a person?

I've only read the Epilogues once, so my thoughts on that part of the story probably won't be fully realized until I reread them at the end of this blog. Rooting myself purely in the current moment of Act 4, however, I can still discuss certain aspects of John as a character. I mentioned in previous Hymnstokes his beginning as a naïve, blank slate reader-surrogate who blindly fumbles his way through uncertain situations. His trajectory has been away from this initial naivete toward cynicism—or "irony" if you will—a more cautious, guarded approach to his understanding of the world around him. The main moment of development so far has been his foray into his Dad's room, which revealed to him that his Dad "isn't all that into clowns you guess." But I don't think it's until John's interactions with Vriska in Act 5 Act 2 that he's going to reach the done-with-this-shit, rolling-my-eyes attitude he possesses throughout Act 6. (And it's funny, because even when he takes on that attitude, he still serves as reader surrogate—as if the reader, too, sees what was once novel and wonderful as obnoxious and stupid—but that's for a discussion of Act 6 as a whole.) So that's John's coming-of-age "arc."

Which feeds into a larger discussion about duality, because as I mentioned previously Dave is moving in the opposite trajectory, away from irony and toward sincerity. Rose is moving away from scientific analysis and toward occult spiritualism, while Jade—well, Jade never really gets a "character arc" because she's more of a plot device than a real character. But Jade, functionally, begins as a spiritual prognosticator whose seemingly supernatural facets all eventually become explained by rudimentary technical features of the SBURB game.

The reason why I think describing Homestuck as a "coming of age story" is reductive is because while these young characters do develop (or at least change), these developments crisscross one another, lead to innumerable dead ends, and fail to satisfy the characters themselves. I would argue that almost all of the characters are more insecure, or even more immature, at the end of Homestuck than at its beginning. The thirteen-year-old versions of these characters speak with the vocabulary and understanding of a reasonably well-read 30-something dude, employing witty barbs and clever sentence constructions left and right as they empirically sort out the unfamiliar game world of SBURB to satisfactory results. They have "problems" with their parental figures, they don't "understand" themselves, but they are competent people capable of progressing despite immense challenges hurled their direction. The major failures of the B1 SBURB session are caused by the meddling of the trolls, not imperfections in John, Dave, Rose, or Jade. In fact, the kids' concerted, Herculean efforts to create a clockwork Cascade of perfectly-placed mechanisms are what salvage an otherwise hopeless situation.

Yet in B2 it all goes to shit, and John and pals wind up being totally useless despite having far more advantages than they did in the B1 session: three years to prepare, foreknowledge of the game's mechanics and even the specific situation of the B2 SBURB they are entering, being literal gods, retcon powers, et cetera. It's almost as if, rather than "coming of age" and "developing into adults," the kids undevelop, unmature, regress, fall apart, decay...

Kind of like entropy.

So if the characters themselves are progressing in these crisscrossing dualisms, irony versus sincerity, science versus faith, then the development of the characters as a whole is crisscrossing the development of the plot: Degeneration versus regeneration, destruction versus creation. In a way, these characters are relics of the world they left behind: that saturated, useless Earth. They are products of its cultural detritus, and while their aim is to create a world from its fragments, they themselves are among those fragments. In the Epilogues, their intrusion into the world they created hurls that world into chaos, and the Meat epilogue ends with them extracting themselves from a place in which they do not belong.

GC: 4CT1ONS TH4T COMPL3T3 LOOPS 1N TH3 T1M3L1NE GC: COGS 1N P4R4DOX SP4C3 TT: Paradox space? GC: OH H3LL GC: L1ST3N TH3 UN1V3RS3 W1LL 34T P4R4DOX3S FOR BR34KF4ST GC: 4ND SO W1LL TH1S G4M3 GC: G3T US3D TO 1T GC: BY NOW YOU SHOULD R34L1Z3 TH1S WHOL3 M3SS W4S 4 B1G S3LF FULLF1LL1NG CLUST3RFUCK GC: A HUG3 ORG14ST1C MOB1US DOUBL3 R34CH4ROUND

Or are the linear tracks of character development I described actually part of Homestuck's favorite structure, the mobius loop? Is the duality between irony and sincerity, science and magic not actually a duality, but two sides of the same one-sided shape?

Because the path of Homestuck might also be read not as a linear rise and fall, but a series of loops. John and pals degenerate in early Act 6, only to renew again after GAME OVER when Vriska sorts everything out and they have a huge pow-wow before the final fight. Yet they degenerate again in Epilogues, falling apart at times even more pathetically than they did on the three-year plane ride to the B2 session, only to finally reach a semblance of resolution at the end of either one Epilogue or the other. But even the ends of those Epilogues suggest a lack of finality, a way for the story to continue, more development upward or downward to be had.

A series of Ascents and Descents. It fits the naming structure employed for many key moments in Homestuck. But what does it mean? Why does it matter that Homestuck is structured this way?

Thomas Pynchon, that nefarious postmodernist, was a writer overtly concerned with entropy, given his background in science and engineering. He once wrote a short story about another one of his favorite interests: parties, bro. In this story, a group of young people are partying in a house. Having fun, drinking, all that young kid stuff. But as the night draws to an end, the energy disperses, everyone becomes tired and lazes about. The closed system of the party has succumbed to entropy. At the end of the story, someone opens a window and a breath of fresh air revives everyone so that the party can continue.

On a universal level, entropy is irrevocable. Eventually, millions or billions of years in the future, heat will disperse throughout the universe; no more stars, no more solar systems, only a cold expanse of space. But in a closed system, entropy can be easily overcome by opening the system and letting in energy from outside, the way it worked in Pynchon's party story.

In an earlier Hymnstoke, I exuberantly declared that Homestuck overcomes entropy. My argument was that, by making meaning out of meaningless cultural detritus, Homestuck resolves the problem of societal decay famously put forward by T.S. Eliot in the poem The Waste Land. That conclusion may have been overeager, especially in light of how Homestuck ends both in Act 7 and the Epilogues. But I think viewing Homestuck through this post- or post-postmodern lens of entropic decay sheds some insight on what exactly those tricky Epilogues mean.

Paradox Space appears to be a closed system that overcomes entropy. It can go both up and down despite being closed. It continually chews up and recycles its own parts to continue its progression, similar to how Hussie brings back seemingly irrelevant details to create meaning later. As characters state innumerably throughout the story, everything in Paradox Space is a "S3LF FULLF1LL1NG CLUST3RFUCK," designed with the sole intention of continuing the existence of Paradox Space.

But Paradox Space cares nothing for the existence of its constituent parts beyond what they can do to further itself. And because of this, the characters, while trapped within Paradox Space, cannot truly progress. They go up every time they go down, down every time they go up. Every state of maturity breaks apart into a state of immaturity, every revelation or self-understanding is later reframed as a shortsighted false epiphany. Eventually, like John at the end of the Meat epilogue, they are unceremoniously mulched so that Paradox Space can continue.

Where's the escape? In a world where the worth of an individual is only how much use can be drained out of them until they break, how does the individual "come of age"?

I think, moving forward, I'll keep a closer eye on how each character interacts with Paradox Space, that unseen clockwork machinist putting all its cute pieces together for the sake of continuing itself. If Homestuck is a "coming of age story," I do not believe it has an altogether positive view on the ability of children to mature and develop. Hussie may have intended it to at an earlier stage of Homestuck's creation, but that was PAH, Past Andrew Hussie. It has been, what, seven or eight years since that Formspring post?

TT: I'm starting to see that. TT: So the exiles are on Earth? Does that mean our goal is to get back there too? To resurrect it somehow? GC: NO NO NO GC: S33 1RON1C4LLY TH3Y G3T TO DO TH4T GC: 4FT3R TH3YR3 DON3 H3LP1NG YOU TH4T 1S GC: YOUR JOB 1S OF GR34T3R CONS3QU3NC3 TO S4Y TH3 L34ST GC: BUT P4RT OF TH31R JOB 1S TO R3BU1LD L1F3 4ND C1V1L1Z4T1ON TH3R3 GC: 4ND 1F TH3YR3 SUCC3SSFUL 1N THOUS4NDS OR M1LL1ONS OF Y34RS TH3 T3CHNOLOGY 1S UN34RTH3D 4ND TH3 PL4N3T 1S R1P3 FOR S33D1NG 4LL OV3R 4G41N

Oh hey, rebuilding and reseeding. Even the dead planet gets recycled so that another session of SBURB can begin.

(End of Meat epilogue, 2010 colorized.)

GC: 1M MOT1V4T3D BY S3LF 1NT3R3ST GC: TO H3LP YOU 4DV4NC3 MOR3 QU1CKLY GC: B3C4US3 1V3 GOT YOUR WHOL3 ADV3NTUR3 R1GHT H3R3 1N FRONT OF M3 EB: do you have a braille screen or something? GC: SHHHHHHHH! GC: 4NYW4Y TH3 PO1NT 1S GC: 1TS LONG AND BOR1NG GC: 4ND YOU COULD ST4ND TO SK1P SOM3 ST3PS

Vriska will eventually take on the role Terezi is performing here, but this exchange hearkens back to what I was talking about in the previous Hymnstoke about "skipping to the end." Doing it here gets John killed, because of course this skip is meant to "FUCK UP TH3 T1M3L1N3." At other times, screwing with the timeline is exactly what the timeline requires, so it is allowed in that instance (and it's even allowed in this instance because the doomed timeline created here allows the main timeline to progress in a necessary way). The concept of temporal causality, introduced in the Intermission, becomes more explicit in this episode with Terezi and John and the jetpack. Where Spades Slick and the Felt played by temporal rules, John will not, and the consequences for those actions will be revealed, as well as the harsh truth: the individuals within the system have no choice; the system commands their actions.

GA: I Just Would Like To Gather GA: Some Means Of Gauging Her Sincerity TG: ok well its easy TG: for everything she says take her to mean just the opposite TG: see not everybody always means literally what they say the way john and jade always do GA: Maddening GA: How Do Humans Forge Meaningful Relationships Using Such Communication Patterns GA: Perhaps It Is The Human Riddle That Is Truly The Ultimate Riddle

While this quote touches on the irony versus sincerity angle as it pertains to the kids, the reason I bring this passage up is: What the hell was the Ultimate Riddle? I completely forget if it was ever meaningful whatsoever. Did it get answered? Does it even show up after Act 5? Act 5 (and Act 4, its prelude) is so divorced from everything that comes before and especially after it. Act 6 gleefully forgets anything that happened in Act 5, and the Ultimate Riddle is only one of its many casualties.

I guess if you slap something into a story called "the Ultimate Riddle" you're going to provoke people to try and answer it, even if the riddle lacks any substance whatsoever.

GC: TH3 HO4RD CONT41NS SO MUCH MOR3 GR1ST TH4N YOU COULD 3V3R US3 1N 4N 4LCH3M1T3R GC: 1 M34N YOU COULD 1 GU3SS GC: BUT TH4TS NOT TH3 PO1NT GC: 1TS FOR TH3 ULT1M4T3 4LCH3MY EB: what's the ultimate alchemy? GC: 1TS NOTH1NG FOR YOU TO WORRY 4BOUT NOW

I think the Ultimate Alchemy also doesn't matter? I don't remember it, at least, although maybe it had more of an answer than the Ultimate Riddle. I think SBURB as a game doesn't matter all that much, that a lot of it is, eventually, skipped Vriska-style. (Maybe the Ultimate Alchemy created Caledfwlch? I seriously forget.)

JASPERSPRITE: Rose im just a cat and i dont know much but i know that youre important and also you are what some people around here call the Seer of Light. JASPERSPRITE: And you dont know what that means but you will see its all tied together! JASPERSPRITE: All the life in the ocean and all the shiny rain and the songs in your head and the letters they make. JASPERSPRITE: A beam of light i think is like a drop of rain or a long piece of yarn that dances around when you play with it and make it look enticing! JASPERSPRITE: And the way that it shakes is the same as what makes notes in a song! JASPERSPRITE: And a song i think can be written down as letters. JASPERSPRITE: So if you play the right song and it makes all the right letters then those letters could be all the letters that make life possible. JASPERSPRITE: So all you have to do is wake up and learn to play the rain!

God damn, we are just going on a tear of "shit that is introduced like it's important but turns out to be not important at all." I recall in particular several people were annoyed that Rose never "played the rain," that it was a point foreshadowed but never acted upon. But rereading this story from the viewpoint of knowing what is and isn't resolved, I think it's no accident that all these game concepts (Ultimate Riddle, Ultimate Alchemy, play the rain) are introduced in such rapid succession and all wind up not being that relevant. The quantity of these esoteric terms undermines their ostensible quality; when faced with Ultimate This, Ultimate That, the reader fails to affix narrative importance to all of it. And because all these things do, in fact, wind up being barely relevant (if relevant at all), this stylistic presentation turns out to be entirely appropriate. Of course, these pointless Ultimate Whatevers are framed against the backdrop of John "skipping to end," so the concept that certain things might not be important should already be implanted in the reader's mind.

Does that make Paradox Space not as efficient as it seems to be? That's one interpretation, but here's another, based on a point I made previously: What is important for Paradox Space is not important for the characters. Paradox Space can put forth an Ultimate Riddle, and to Paradox Space that riddle may, in fact, be important. But it's only more jumbled detritus to the protagonists, a collection of obscure terms that are ultimately less important on their personal paths than, say, Con Air. And this fact might suggest that creating your own path ("skipping to the end") might be more important than following the preset path laid out for you, the path created by the system (society, biology, your parents, the government, whatever you consider the "system" to be). John's jetpack excursion fails. But it wasn't his idea to skip ahead anyway, it was Terezi's. He wasn't following his own path. Hence, his failure.

However, in this Jaspersprite instance, "irrelevant" is not a completely fair assessment. A song that can be written down as letters? The letters can make life possible? Jaspersprite also says this:

ROSE: Jaspers, the message you gave me years ago before you disappeared... ROSE: What did you mean? JASPERSPRITE: Meow. ROSE: Sigh... JASPERSPRITE: :3 ROSE: I don't understand.

M, E, O, and W are the four letters that represent GCAT and become essential later in Act 5 for creating Becquerel (if I'm remembering correctly). I think it's those letters that Jaspersprite refers to when he tells Rose to "learn to play the rain," meaning this mystery, at least, is not only relevant but was resolved long before things in Homestuck stopped being resolved.

#homestuck #hymnstoke

14 notes · View notes

radiantmists · 7 years ago

Text

ok so obviously comparing todoroki to zuko is like... obvious. but personally, whenever i see this moment:

i always think of pride from fmab

(source)

and i’m probably just thinking too hard but there are actually a bunch of weird parallels, despite the fact that unlike todoroki, pride is like... actually evil, so more under the cut i guess cause this got p long

-also pretty superficially, they’re both introduced later on in the story as completely outclassing our main characters, to the point where they seem pretty much unstoppable

-they’re both the youngest(-looking) but favorite child of an evil father who ‘created’ them and treats them like a tool (even if pride is absurdly loyal to father despite this)

and then there are these moments with the facial scars!!!

THE SCAR’S NOT ON THE WRONG SIDE!!

(sorry couldn’t help myself)

obviously there are some visual differences here (the side the scars on, the zoom into pride’s eye and out from shouto’s) but the point is, they’re both, in this moment, declaring that they will defeat the main character in order to prove something about how they deal with being their father’s creation, which for both of them the facial disfigurement kinda embodies

-in both cases, the main character does something absurdly self-destructive to try to defeat them, proving his conviction to win the ‘right’ way

-at the end of ed’s fight with pride, he chooses not to kill pride but instead to return him to his poor mother; at the same time, midoriya’s influence directly leads to todoroki reconnecting with his own

-depending on whether dabi is actually touya (shouto’s older brother), they may both have siblings who turned their back on their father and everything he stands for (greed in fma)

-this is more of a stretch (what am i saying this entire post is a stretch XD), but i feel like there’s an interesting connection between todoroki’s resolution not to use his fire and the way that makes him a hypocrite in his desire to become a hero, and the way that, as kimblee points out, pride’s willingness to jump ship and possess ed when his body starts falling apart is directly contradictory to his pride in being a homunculus

there’s no real point to this (except that it’s an interesting start of an fma x bnha crossover idea which i am now thinking about a lot) and obviously it doesn’t work all that well since again pride is evil and todoroki’s just hurt and misguided, but i just thought it was interesting

also while getting the gifs for this, i realized just how much pride talks about honor so there’s that connection to zuko again haha (though ACTUALLY, pride is basically azula, seriously more than half the points of similarity above apply to her, better than to shouto, in addition to that they have the same sort of feel and arc as characters, down to the mental break at the end when they realize their father doesn’t care about them leading to their undoing; the only thing that doesn’t fit her is the eye thing which is not as huge for pride as this post likes to think, SO) and that’s really interesting but not on topic so i’ll stop

anyway thanks for reading my weird rambling!!!

#fullmetal alchemist brotherhood #fma #bnha #todoroki shouto #pride fma #selim bradley #rant #idek guys #fma x bnha crossover thing

25 notes · View notes

supacutiepie · 6 years ago

Text

New RWBY Theories and Old Hidden Plotlines

So far, with the new lore and old lore- this is what the general world of remnant looks like in terms of symbols and the maidens and relics and plot.

Right off the bat, I don’t think that Ozma and Salem’s children are the maidens. Simple because they don’t actually match up to the maidens once laid out in these ^^^ terms.

Color wise, they don’t match, age wise, they don’t. Clearly, the oldest daughter is Blue- to the maidens it is Fall (orange). So I think the maidens are in fact the Wizard’s way of grieving and moving on from his daughters loss, and his way of getting back on track with the god of lights task.

With these four women, he can bring the world closer to it’s judgement and hopefully passing it with connected seasons and powers to help bring people together.

I believe, that the girls weren’t just killed in the fight between Os and Salem. I think that there was a lot of rampant magic being thrown about by two careless parents- and that the girls were changed because of the battle. They had magic too, perhaps it was the only way to save themselves or one of the girls tried to protect her sisters (Blue most likely) and therefore, the girls became powerful but uncontrollable beings. Jinn is a VERY powerful being, but she is ultimate trapped due to her form and such.

Which, therefore- the girls became one with the relics.

(for the sake of ease, I’m giving them nicknames based on possible story connections of elements of the relics)

Blue became Jinn, who was combined with the Lamp of Knowledge Relic. And then, to protect her, was safely stowed away in the vault of Haven. But clearly, the reincarnations traveled a lot, and the younger Ozpin must have located the relic, but we can assume that each 100 years the current reincarnation would seek out the lamp. It’s just coincidence it ended up in Haven at the end of the line? Hardly.

I think Ozpin is and has always been a bit sad, and keeps asking the same questions expecting new answers. It’s likely, that he finally had to stop- and then trusted the lamp to lionheart’s academy to be its guard (without outright telling lionheart surely, but this was also something had to learn which I’ll explain in more detail soon)

Gold became Caliburn, a spirit combined with the Sword of Destruction Relic, which we believe is the weapon that the Vacuo King used in the last great war to cut down the thousands of soldiers etc. She was then, put away or is somewhere in the Shade academy. Possibly being used? Or, more likely for story effects, placed in stone like some kind of Caliburn. This could make for a fun narrative of one of our girls (RWBY) trying to pull the sword from the stone (LOOK ITS RWBY YOU KNOW THEY WOULD MAKE ANOTHER MYTHICAL STORY REFERENCE)

Third daughter is Pink, which ironically DOES fit with Atlas’ relic symbol. The Paintbrush or possibly a staff or stave. Look at her, she looks like Rapunzel, who is semi-famous for painting. There are so many instances in which Rapunzel is associated with painting I.E. Creation. She became the relic of creation, and is somewhere in “Atlas”.

Theory 1--- I bet that she is actually with Weiss’ grandfather, who has been hinted at being the main engineer of Atlas’ military concepts and of Atlas as a whole as the genuine patriarch of the Schnee family name.

((Rapunzel, the girl trapped in her tower by not her mother, but someone who stole from her mother. (It does fit rather well).))

But let us not forget, the biggest clue that Atlas is of creation...

Theory 2 -- Or, that once upon a time, Atlas wasn’t even existing. It was in fact, a barren wasteland And not until Alsius flourished did it exist. When Mantle lost the capitol status, and when Atlas became Atlas as a whole, the relic could have very well been left behind in the old kingdom of mantle, or moved through the war. We won’t know until we get there of course.

Which leaves Laurel.

The last daughter, the relic of vale. A Crown of Choice.

This one is basically confirmed location wise simply because of what we’ve seen so far. RWBY is a team of self made choices, Pyrrha as the fall maiden to-be MADE HER CHOICE to face off against Cinder. Vale is the home of Ozpin who is now synonymous with “make a choice, make a choice, MAKE A CHOICE” (between the gods, the witch, and everything from rwby s1-3 this is a solid theory)

Laurel was the youngest, most likely the least bit skilled in magic. (This is paired with the Fall Maiden being the oldest). It’s most likely that when she was turned into a being, she was the least put together. Possibly the most fragile, and most necessary to baby over. Oz took personal watch over her relic.

But, there is a chance, that while Oz knows he is connected to the relics, he doesn’t recognize them if they are his lost daughters. Clearly, with each reincarnation, things got fuzzier and more cloudy about past and reality. His body hosts didn’t even recognize themselves in the first few reincarnations.

Who’s to say it even is Ozpin in RWBY V4-6. What if he only thought he was? Clearly, with the newest reincarnations some of the lines have blurred. What if Ozma has been the one in control from the beginning and even Ozpin didn’t know anymore..

Regardless, The relic in beacon is either the most powerful or least controllable, highly volatile perhaps.

Where these relics are is clear, the academies.

But, the hints of these objects locations is the most interesting bit.

We we’re told of Jinn before she even arrived, through the Haven statue.

So the question becomes (and what we should be on the look out for) what are the other clues??

I think, we have one.

Ozpin said that the Beacon Relic was, “A challenge to find”. And what’s more hard to find than whats in plain sight?

I do want you to take note that Blake is narratively connected with THIS statue. Like how Yang is connected with the Haven statue (chasing her mother etc)

But she isn’t the only one.

Both of these characters are inherently, DEEPLY, connected with the idea of Choice. Not just choice, but Vale’s symbol is that of choice between the fist and the open hand of leadership and such. It would make A LOT of sense for either Blake or Jaune to deal with this artifact. But, I think it’s Blake, and you’ll see why...

The statue itself is in the court yard, its the place that Raven choices to speak with Yang in. Which we STILL don’t know what happened in the rest of that dream btw.

Atlas, might be right in our faces. Or, we already know part of the story.

As we can sorta tell, RWBY as a whole will play their parts toward finding and reclaiming the relics. Yang found the Lamp, Blake will find the Crown. Which leaves Weiss and Ruby.

We know the next relic is the paintbrush, and that its in Atlas. As previously stated, I think that maybe old man Schnee will know where it is, or know of it. And that Ironwood will be necessary to accessing it. In regards to the show, and to Weiss- this would pull together some very nice loose ends and create some good character development.

Weiss will not only get to know her grandfather, she will learn her true powers. like how Yang learned her mother was the spring maiden and finally let some of her grief go. I think, that in parallel, Weiss will reclaim the Staff/Paintbrush as well as deal with her family as a whole.

It’s really important though, to know that Atlas was once Mantle. And therefor, we are missing key parts of its founding. The relic may not even be in Atlas, and since our heroes are currently a little lost in the land that was once Mantle, they may just happen to stumble upon its true location.

Or, Maria will be helpful in this case. I think we’ll be finding out soon.

Vacuo is the Sword, and as I stated before, the sword could become a very Caliburn situation simply because its not in use. We know its not because Vacuo isn’t currently waging war with the literal sword of Damocles in the story right now. Which means most likely, it is either safely hidden or the current leaders of Vacuo have it carefully guarded. We won’t know until the show finally takes us to Vacuo. But I believe this won’t come for a while.

The sword is meant to be the most dangerous weapon. But, it’s also a symbol. Of the king, the knight, of war. And when connected with the Summer Maiden, of Change. Deep and intrinsic change.

When the Summer Maiden came to the Wizard, she changed him. she set him on the path. When the king took up the sword, he changed the face of the great war. It changed things.

Which is why Ruby will claim the sword.

Think of it, Ruby is the main force of change in this show. the Chosen one, our Arthur. It makes total sense that even though the others find the relics, SHE is the one who will use them. She’s the silver eyed warrior, our plot pusher. And the one Ozpin already saw something in.

She is the one the god of light set in motion.

When Ozma was given his task, it was said he wouldn’t have to do it alone.

I believe, that Silver Eyed Warriors are VERY specific to their Oz’s. The two children for the reincarnation before Ozpin were important to that Oz because they taught him something, family and what to fight for. And other before them had their own uses and values.

I think, that Summer Rose was Ozpin’s silver eyed warrior, and that the story of what happened to her will ultimately make a lot of sense in how the current story has developed. Whatever happened to her, whatever sort of mission Oz had for her, it set in motion major events which have led us here...

Like inspiring her daughter to become a huntress, or giving reason for her children to be who they are today. But ultimately, I think that the truth will be far sadder. And that when it comes out, Qrow will be the one to deal with the major fallout. We’ve had many hints and teases that Summer Rose meant a great deal to Qrow, and we know now the Ozpin didn’t tell Qrow the major things, the real truths.

If Summer died at the fault of Ozpin, the blame and regret will have a devastating effect on Qrow.

But Ruby? Ruby isn’t Ozpin’s Silver Eyed Girl.

She’s Oscars.

There is no inherent say to who becomes the next Warrior/Wizard. Simply that, with each reincarnation something must be learned.

Ozma, he learned of the fate of the world. He accepted to task. The first reincarnation learned the hard way that Salem must be defeated. From there, each reincarnation has learned something else that will ultimately come together in time.

The Wizard learned that he could not just sit by and let the world turn. That he had to move forward. He was so OLD. He held onto the reincarnation for centuries. Refusing to die, to put the power out into a new mind. He learned how to change. The maidens taught him that, and when he gave them the powers, it made a new possibility show up- a way to defeat Salem.

Ozpin couldn’t defeat her, because that was not his task.

He was meant to bring the world together. And he was meant to find the forces that CAN defeat his witch.

Which is exactly what Ozpin did.

It’s clear that the final moments of the world are coming. That RWBY began at the end of the world. With all the songs and stories and the show explaining how a peaceful world suddenly became a war zone.

The time for the judgement is coming, Salem knows and is finally acting. And somewhere, deep in the immortal part of Oz that is still Ozma, that is the man brought back by the God of Light, he knew it was coming too.

So now, Oscar is here. the youngest reincarnation, the youngest because this battle may take a while. And, something new to learn.

I’m sure he isn’t the first, clearly not- but Oscar defied Ozma. He not only stopped Ozpin, but outright acted out. He learned how to fight as himself and not as the reincarnation.

And we know that, ultimately, that the Ozma in the reincarnations takes control. Each reincarnation so far has not only taken over the life of a stranger, but changed it. Like possession, and Oz played the roles of his bodies but he was still the one in control.

Even with the man and his family, Oz was the one in control. He just simply playing the part of the father and crafter and huntsman, but still listening to the man who’s family he know protected.

It’s important that this family gets some story. Because they became this Oz’s responsibility. His plans and his greater purpose had to be put the this side in order to do the right thing. (thats what he learned in this form)

But Oscar? Oscar is not only pushing back against the reincarnation possession, but WINNING.

“and it was in that moment, that the wizard knew what should be done”

Oscar is the exact opposite of the Wizard. He is young, he is fighting back, and he is taking control. But, at the same time- he still has help.

From his four maidens, from his silver eyed warrior.

I think, that the show is about to REALLY REALLY REALLY kick off. and not a damn one of us are ready.

Now, I wanna talk about the Faunus.

The god brothers ARE faunus. I don’t see anyone else freaking out about this. A stag and a ram faunus. The God of Light is playing right into old school witch stories about the Horned One and the Old God. While the God of Darkness plays into the more modern idea of the “devil” with the ramhorns. Both were once the same thing, but time and people have made them unique concepts.

Either Salem told every new human about the gods appearance, and also told them about the old history of the world and such- or some people survived who knew what the gods were like.

This is an odd plot point. It gets confusing.

If the god of darkness really did destroy all humans, and the moon- then how do people know anything about the gods at all. Surely, the world would have decayed in the time it took for Humans to grow back out of evolution. And that alone is a weird narrative plot because it implies that Humans just, sprang back up... and ignores that they needed to grow.

So I think, that in fact, we should operate on the idea that Salem DID teach people about the world before. At least she did before she became corrupted..

The World of Remnant.

Before Salem was revealed, the world of remnants were her stories.

Of course, since parts of the show are new concepts- its hard to count each and every one of world or remnants and other such stories as part of the whole story..but I find that the VERY first story is VERY telling.

In the VERY FIRST episode of RWBY, Salem is introducing the story. It’s very important to realize that what she says, with the new information explains SO MUCH. But, its interesting to note that for the majority of it she sounds calm and gentle, kind and sad even. and then angry, and righteous and cynical. As though she goes from someone kind, to someone spiteful. (A young maiden in a tower to a blood thirsty angry and deeply sad immortal)

But then Ozpin speaks. And what he says is kinder and hopefully and while not reprimanding..it does try to smooth over what Salem says.

Its as though, they were telling a story together.And she fell back into a twisted sense of reality..and Ozma corrected her..as though they were telling a bed time story and he was keeping that viciousness in her at bay. (they’re albeit short time together in the first reincarnations life)

The world of remnants are their daughters bedtime stories. And when they were gone, and when all Salem had left was the newborn humans, she kept telling stories.

Taking the WOR into account therefore --

The Moon shattering wasn’t just a coincidence.

In the first story, Salem explains that man is born of Dust. In the telling of WOR Vol 2.- Salem explains that animals are also made of dust.

The God of Darkness intentionally destroyed the moon, used the fragments to rebirth humans, and what was left became our dust shards.

A fascinating fact.

But, in the new world, Faunus existed for the first time.

I think, that with the moon shards (what else do I call them lol??) some of the shards took on the appearance of the gods. As thought the god of darkness had purposefully used his own image to rebirth the humans.

“ According to Qrow Branwen, the Grimm were created by the god of darkness in order to destroy his older brother's creations of life. Eventually, the brothers ended their feud and both created Humanity, however, despite the younger god's involvement in creating Humanity, the Grimm were still left to roam Remnant and prey on them. “ -RWBY Wikia

I think, that as a little minor haha take that, when the god of darkness killed the humans and brought them back, he made them look like himself to spite his brother who had previously created the animals (hence why they look like the animals themselves)

It’s interesting to note that the God of Darkness was kinder to the humans than his brother. Where as the God of Light put priority over their children, the God of Darkness was empathetic, and when he wiped the planet he did so quick and painlessly. Whereas his brother continued to cause pain to Salem, and even went back on what he said to make his own ends meet.

Both are not very good beings. And lack the basic understanding of Love. A common theme in RWBY. Love and Compassion are what create purity and strength. And the brothers of grimm were VERY quick to not only turn on each other but also quick to destroy their “experiment” of a world. To the Gods, the world of RWBY is but a play thing and like a weird ant farm.

But back to it- The humans are both of the gods creations, but the faunus are specifically the god of darkness’ kiddos.

Which somehow...translated over to modern times.

I’m curious to know where along the line this happened. But I think that either Salem’s story about the gods created a distaste for the god of darkness, and therefor his children, Or Salem herself had a hand in it. I think it’d be the former, since she seems to still be considerate of people’s plights and doesn’t outright like suffering. I don’t think she would have started the whole, “Lets destroy the faunus”

Salem is not Cruel. She is corrupted and quick tempered, and yes she is careless in her rage, but she is not a cruel thing. She is even capable of being gentle and kind to a degree, when it suites her but still.

She might have seen Cinder as something like a daughter, something that the dormant mother in herself would connect with. Which may be interesting seeing as once again, due to her actions her child is dead.

Some of this may be off, I’m brushing up on all the world of remnants and back stories. But for the most part, the world of remnants have their own places in the narrative. And if you think it might be a symbol, chances are, IT IS.

Like the fact that Mistral looks like the dragon brothers side by side, or that the lands above vacuo are SUSPICIOUSLY dragon shaped.

Or that the color combos are insanely matchy matchy.

Or that every song ever has been foreshadowing and RIDDLED with spoilers and back story.

Go back and listen to to Salem’s songs, and now you’ll see them in a new light, Like Divide which was then Salem to Ozpin, but now is Salem to Ozma AND the Gods. Infact, a small portion of Divide can be heard when Salem and Ozma reveal themselves to the humans.

Sacrifice, “falls from grace are never elegant, stars will fall and drop out the sky”

“show them gods and deities, blindly keep the people on their knees”

I once thought that Sacrifice was a story between Salem and Ruby, but now its SO MUCH MORE.

The song isn’t about ruby at all, its from Salem TO the GODS.

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby s6 #rwby v6 #salem #ozpin #rwby oscar #ruby rose #yang xiao long #weiss schnee #Blake belladonna #the songs are all so new now #im gonna go back and listen to it all looking for the connections lol

4 notes · View notes

thomasroach · 6 years ago

Text

Everything we Know about Elden Ring: Release Date, Action RPG, Souls-like, Open World

The post Everything we Know about Elden Ring: Release Date, Action RPG, Souls-like, Open World appeared first on Fextralife.

The next FromSoftware title has been revealed as Elden Ring, and fans of the Souls series have many unanswered questions about the title. In This Elden Ring: Everything We Know article, we summarize all the bits and pieces scattered through the wind, and give you some insight into possible release dates and features.

Everything we Know about Elden Ring: Release Date, Action RPG, Souls-like, Open World

Elden Ring has been in production since the end of the Dark Souls III DLC. This is in contrast to Sekiro, that begun production in 2015 after Bloodborne.

Elden Ring will release on PC, Xbox One and Playstation 4

Bandai Namco is publishing and has registered the Elden Ring IP

Elden Ring Release Date – From our observations The release window for this game is unlikely to match FromSoftware’s traditional March-April, and is more likely to fall into Dark Souls’ September-October release.

“Elden Ring is a third-person action RPG with a fantasy setting… gameplay is not so far from Dark Souls… Elden Ring belongs to the same genre.”

Plethora of weapons, magic and builds, and a focus on RPG elements. FromSoftware expects equipment variety to be larger than Souls in this regard.

No main fixed protagonist, players create the characteristics and personality of their character. This leads us to believe Character Creation is a given.

The World of Elden Ring is vast and interconnected. No longer a continuity of “levels”, players see vast landscapes in between the “dungeon-esque” areas.

The larger world scale allows for freedom, promotes exploration, and introduces new and exciting mechanics, such as Horse Riding and Mounted Combat.

Elden Ring is a “natural evolution of Dark Souls.” New mechanics needed by this larger world. Expect FromSoftware’s trademark challenging boss battles.

Towns won’t be full of villagers, merchants and the like. They will be ruins, dungeons and exploration hubs. As Souls there is no vast population of NPCs.

The NPCs the player finds are expected to be the most compelling yet in the studio’s work, thanks to Martin’s involvement in the Mythos.

George R. R. Martin has written the world’s mythos and Hidetaka Miyazaki has written the game story.

Story will be revealed through “fragments of environmental storytelling” as in previous Souls games.

Mythos and the present moment of the player are connected and exploration will lead players to understand why things are as they are.

There is no information at time of writing about multiplayer/online/invasions.

Mythos Vs Story

Without doubt the most unexpectedly welcome development we know is that the game is being produced in collaboration with George R. R. Martin. This has prompted a lot of interest outside of Souls fans, not least as the Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls game worlds had dark “Western” fantasy settings, and Martin is of course best known for the Song of Fire and Ice/Game of Thrones series. While we’re very curious to see what this collaboration will look like, we already know we shouldn’t be expecting a Martin-penned story. In an interview with Bandai Namco, game director Hidetaka Miyazaki explained the collaborative process involved Martin discussing Miyazaki’s ideas, and then writing the world’s backstory after that. Confirming this in discussion with IGN, Miyazaki explained that he felt the process of videogame design would be too constricting for the author. So while Martin has provided the “mythos,” the game story is all Miyazaki.

Not something we expected to happen, but a welcome development!

Elden Ring Trailer Analysis

Considering the E3 2019 debut trailer, this isn’t too surprising. While characteristically vague in typical FROM style, we can perceive some very Miyazaki-like themes. We learn from the voice over that the Elden Ring, “that which commanded the stars, giving life its fullest brilliance” has been destroyed, and also that the sky is burning. This of course brings parallels to the collapsing sun of the Souls universe, and how such sun would be commanding the stars, and giving life brilliance.

The tone is furthered by visuals of destruction and decay, including a severed arm, a woman slotting a prosthetic arm using her other decaying hand, and the blacksmith figure who appears desiccated, cracking and collapsing at the end of the trailer. This is classic FROM, with fin de siècle themes of a dead or dying world, of darkness overcoming the light. And let’s not forget Dark Souls was originally going to be titled Dark Ring, until someone smartened up that it might mean something unpleasant in some slang.

This might be an allusion to an actual real world mythos

The one-armed warrior might be inspired by Nuada Airgetlám (Nuada Silver Hand/Arm), an Irish mythos based around a deposed king that takes the throne back after ten years of rival oppression. This is significant in setting the possible inspirations for the game, which are said to be Gaelic, Celtic and Nordic.

We see in the trailer part of a golden curve apparently in splinters. We know from the IGN interview that the ring is not a LOTR style device, an actual wearable magical ring, but is more thematic, a force that “forms the rules and rhythm of this world. This also discounts possible connections to Fromsoftware’s Eternal Ring game – as in that game the Rings were indeed physical objects.

The shattered Elden Ring?

The Elden Ring of the trailer has, in spite of not being a physical accessory, been shattered. Of course the apparent blacksmith figure in the footage is deliberately provocative: is he the destroyer, or is he trying to fix something? We’re probably wrong either way! But what is interesting is that figure, and others, in apparent states of dissolution and yet still live, and of course there is that severed arm which is still twitching. Is the ring the cycle of rebirth? Or has its destruction prevented people and creatures from passing normally in some other way?

Characters look as mysterious as always

What we found interesting on that piece of speculation is Miyazaki’s revelation of exactly which of Martin’s books it is that he recommended to his team: not GoT, but Fevre Dream¸ Martin’s tale of immortal vampires seeking to remedy the curse of their existence. We’ve seen Miyazaki put death and undeath central to the Dark Souls world; could this be another area of inspiration and collaboration, in addition to the dark Western fantasy world we’ve just been introduced to?

The Elden Ring might well be a concept like the “Dark Sign” of the Souls series. The “linking of the fire” might carry over in a similar manner as the concept of Fire, Ash, Darkness and Rebirth is re-framed as a Ring and possibly a collection of ethereal, dimensional or, should the “Sun” theory hold true, cosmic rings.

Lastly on game theme, Miyazaki commented in the Xbox Wire interview that there was a theme of will, or ambition of mankind. Certainly the “Gaia damaged by human action” trope is extensive in JRPG world stories (including famously Final Fantasy VII) and this would fit Miyazaki’s style of dying world storytelling. However, he also said that was one theme, and a theme represented by one of the presented character artworks. There may be more, and you might want to explore the screenshot gallery here.

This artwork has more hints of the setting. And that really sort of looks like a bonfire coil poker.

Elden Ring Gameplay Concepts

Open World & Mounted Combat

So far, so mysterious. Let’s move on to things we actually do know. First up, this is going to be Souls-like, FROM-like, Miyazaki-like Action RPG, as spelled out clearly in Twitter, YouTube, and all the interviews Miyazaki has granted. In terms of game world, it seems the intention is to build on the Souls experience but in a far broader world. The phrase “open world” has got people excited, but Miyazaki has qualified this, stating “there are many definitions to the term ‘open world,’ and I might not be phrasing it correctly, but we have simply tried our own approach to a game with a large, open field to play in.” So anyone expecting a Daggerfall-size Great Britain full of Souls enemies is likely to be disappointed. However, it does seem the intent is to do more than simply do away with loading screens between areas. The player will be able to ride a horse between locations, and indeed be able to do battle from horseback, which indicates an increase in scope.

World Composition

While this sounds more Skyrim-esque, there are key differences that once again point back to the Souls experience. For example, villages will not be NPC hubs for quest objective accumulation and trade: “Villages will be the dark dungeon-like ruins that you have come to expect from us,” according to Miyazaki. So it sounds like rather than have narrow, constricting battle areas linked by loading screens or long elevator rides, there will be those traditional “dungeons,” but they will be linked by an open world which will have its own battle character, as well as opportunities for further exploration and discovery of the world’s story. We’re looking forward to seeing how much variety these very different environments will present for combat, and to the contrast between the vast landscapes and the “detailed and intricately designed castles” we have been promised.

Character Creation, Equipment, Stats

And finally, on that note: character creation. Miyazaki stated in the Bandai Namco interview that “this title will include a wide variety of weapons, magic, and ways to engage enemies, that make it possible to provide users with a style of gameplay and strategy that suits them”. It was further emphasized that this was the largest project in terms of scale and that they expect the variety of equipment and combat approaches to surpass Souls titles. This is further reinforced by a call-out to “fun, action, melee combat” and “unique and horrifying” bosses.

Miyazaki also stated that “there is no fixed main character in Elden Ring. We mostly leave it up to the player to decide the characteristics and personality of the character they create.” That does sound like modern RPGs where there is a central role in the game but it is up to the player to design the look, making the central character a player avatar. Does that mean Elder Scrolls style levels of control from fatness to cheekbones? This is yet unconfirmed, with Miyazaki commenting the game contains “character customisation elements.” Not explicitly a “Character Creation” confirmation, but given that the game is said to evolve Souls, we see no reason why this would be scaled back, particularly if battle approach versatility is to be expanded.

Expect larger than life bosses and intense combat mechanics

Elden Ring Release Date and News

Many were left wanting with the cinematic teaser and the limited availability of interviews and replies. From here on out, fans are likely to hear about the game at four crucial junctions this year:

Playstation Tokyo Event on July 15th.

Gamescom 2019 in August.

Tokyo Game Show in September .

The Game Awards in December.

That said, Bandai Namco has a tendency to make their own announcements at times of convenience, such as the announcement of Dark Souls Remastered being unveiled in January at a Nintendo event. What is clear from the timeline, however, is that it is unlikely that the title will be released in March or April 2019. Were the game ready prepared for such, E3 would have shown gameplay instead of just a teaser, so we are about 6 months behind a typical release window. This would then push it back to the September-October window, so gameplay may only be forthcoming by TGS 2019.

If you don’t want to miss anything about Elden Ring, bookmark our Elden Ring News Feed, or the Elden Ring Wiki Homepage, where we will be sharing the latest information, news, gameplay and details on Elden Ring as soon as they are live. If you want to check out similar games, we suggest having a peak at Project Awakening!

The post Everything we Know about Elden Ring: Release Date, Action RPG, Souls-like, Open World appeared first on Fextralife.

Everything we Know about Elden Ring: Release Date, Action RPG, Souls-like, Open World published first on https://juanaframi.tumblr.com/

0 notes