#so like. yes the latter joke is funny because of the backstory

[jelreth]

[mtkay13]

I accidentally sent a keysmash! I'm really sorry but I hope it can bring at least a laugh to you. I opened your askbox to make a consideration about TYK: I'm not sure if anyone has already talked about this, but I think Faraway Wanderers is a romcom with a wuxia subplot and not vice versa. I don't know how to articulate this more but I really feel like all the gruesome details make the romance humourous in a way (WWX and ZZS flirting often happens during very violent fights and the consequence is that you can't take neither the violence nor the romance very seriously) but also give depth to it thematically (the need of finding peace in one's own life as opposed to a lifetime of struggle and cruelty). It's like the wuxia setting is functional to the love story.

Helloooo!! Haha yeah the keysmash was very interesting hahaha, thank you for that <3 .

And thank you for bringing this up!! I have given it a bit of thought today, and I feel ready to respond now, haha.

First of all, it was great food for thought, and I personally think it's a great way to look at TYK.

There is definitely a play on genres within TYK, and I think that the wuxia-ness of the story is absolutely taking a backseat for the human relationships and dynamics to happen at the foreground. If anything, it initially does feel like an accessory or an artificial setting to put the characters in and let them do their thing while nearly ignoring most of the background plot during the story.

I also fully agree that there is a surprising lightness and a lot of humor in the way the story is presented; not only are WKX and ZZS quite funny, but the whole cast is often made fun of, turned into a joke--the LLJ (glazed armor) itself is a rather ridiculous McGuffin, and on top of that Priest really likes to tank her climaxes and emotional beats with either jokes or sudden events that both give whiplash and considerably defuse the tension (or outright turn the whole scene into a joke, LOL).

I think the twist I find in that is: WenZhou mostly deal with everything that happen in their lives with lightness because… it's what they are used to, it's maybe not that big of a deal, and it's also a way to not make it so serious when it threatens to be overwhelming. The extreme violence is normalcy, and it's that "casualness" that can suddenly make it jarring once recontextualized. The same way the wuxia genre is subverted in TYK (in the way the story doesn't follow the typical wuxia storyline, in the way some themes are turned on their heads), I'd argue that the romantic comedy genre is also subverted, and at times borders on…. tragedy, to be honest?

I feel like the latter part of the books, although some scenes like WKX's aborted confession (when he tells ZZS he'd like to spend the rest of his life with him, but then laughs it off like it was a joke, for the tone of the scene to then flip and be about the loss of WKX's parents); the scene where ZZS sings Li Sao, and many more later, and of course not to mention the entire last ark and extra 4---all of those passages send the message that actually, most of this was serious. In a way, those scenes, and the latter part, reframe the narrative to make that lightness serious, and as it turns out, the romance, the violence, all of that was serious and meant to be taken seriously.

The humor was there to cover for sorrow, frustration, disillusion, investment, and all of those more serious, deeper feelings. The ridiculous wuxia plot was no joke and was the core of WKX's entire life story. ZZS has a very serious backstory when it comes to attachement, to love, to commitment, and is going through a lot regarding his own ambitions, goals, and what living means to him, etc. On top of that, the wuxia story responds to Qi Ye's themes and storyline as well. So---the wuxia "subplot" is irrelevant until it becomes sadly relevant.

So to summarize… I almost want to say that it's a tragic love story set in a dramatic wuxia setting disguised as a romcom set in a setting of wuxia subversion, hahaha. Like you put it very well, actually; the way both genre are articulated around each other, and the way the romance and relationship between WenZhou take precedency over the wuxia narrative allows for it to be explored with depth.

I feel like the gradual deepening of seriousness is also to signify that, when people start mattering, when the characters care for each other, the events of the story start mattering in ways that they can't just be light and comical. The way the romantic comedy topes and the mockery of some wuxia archetypes only serve to amplify that and make it even stronger, more apparent, in contrast.

Anyway!!! Hahah thank you for raising those considerations and discussion points! I actually really wanted to engage properly and think about it thoroughly to the point I asked some people around to see what they thought and what they had to say as well. I really enjoyed it and I thought it was a great angle to go about the story. If you have anything you want to bounce off from this or feel like responding, I'd also be very, very pleased.

Many, many thanks for reaching out!!!!!!

[ms-cartoon]

New HB Episode! (Jesus...)

Alright... So I seen the new episode - can't say this show gradually gets any better. I can fairly say there was only one decent thing about this episode, and that was the backstory with Moxxie and why he has daddy issues. Seriously though, why does almost EVERYBODY in this goddamn show have daddy issues??? And why are all these dads a**holes?? And yes, I'm going to include Millie's father. Of course, he's no abusive dad, but he (nor his wife) wasn't kind to Moxxie at all, and all because he was considered a weakling who uses guns as a choice for weapons. Which sounds like a pretty stupid reason. There are people who are scared to even pick up a gun, let alone pull a trigger.

I couldn't tell if I was skimming through this episode, or if the episode was just skimming itself and I just couldn't keep up. I think it's mostly the latter, cuz MY GOD, this was so rushed! I had to watch this twice to process whatever was going on. Everything just feels so crammed into this episode There's also Moxxie's ex-boyfriend, but I'll get to that in a minute.

⦁ So the first start of the episode, we start with Moxxie and Loona in the room. I just love how Loona is just there, lol!! She's just sitting at the table on her phone and has no speaking lines whatsoever. She might as well have not even appeared in this episode, for real. What's bad about this is that she was only there for another "Moxxie is fat!" joke. I really don't get what's so funny about this gag. Why is it even a gag? Moxxie is not fat! He don't even look it. I highly doubt he's even heavy. Loona and Blitzo are just being d*cks to him. It doesn't even help that he mentions he lost a few pounds just so they stop making fun of him. Now it's just sad!!! They body-shamed Moxxie so much, he felt he had to lose a few pounds so they would leave him alone about it. They did not make this funny, they just made it worse. PLZ STOP with the unfunny fat jokes!!

⦁ This seems to be the most try-hard horniest episode compared to the ones that have Stolas in it. Seriously, what in the gracious hell is with these dildos popping up from chairs and walls!!!??? 

Then there's Blitzo who has photos of porn in the drawers in his office (why would he even put those where people can open it up and take stuff out anyway??)!!! And then you got this perverted fish (who's the most annoying out of everybody in this episode) tryna bang everybody in IMP! He's literally just another Stolas, Blitzo, and Angel Dust character put in one: an LGBT horny mess who just wants to get his mack on anyone around him or just certain people, sexually harassing them in the process. Plus, anything that comes out of his mouth is a literal sex joke and it's just uncomforting.

⦁ So Moxxie's family is in the mafia and they're rich...... But why??? I thought Imps were of lower class and practically poor compared to the other species of demons.

  ⦁ You mean to tell me Millie and Moxxie dated the same guy at one point in their lifetime before getting together? Okay, but it seems to be too much of a coincidence. Idk, it just comes off as odd.

⦁ So Moxxie and Chaz had a thing going on before he met up with Millie. But when they were together, their relationship seemed to be more centered around lust than there was genuine love. Obviously considering when Chaz was quick to take the money and abandoned Moxxie when he needed help during the heist. Now this, amongst other parts of this series, just keeps up the stereotypical nonsense that all gay dudes are horny for each other and want nothing but to get it on. I don't understand what Moxxie even sees in his perverted a**. What makes no sense about this is that Moxxie isn't the type of guy that just get's horny like that. He's not perverted and doesn't get turned on over the slightest of things, yet he's shown stroking a gun while cleaning it while at the same time feeling pleasure. Chaz is more vulgar than Blitzo, and Moxxie barely tolerates him! So, wtf??

⦁ So in hell, you can pretty much get away with anything illegal with no consequences. Whether it'd be robbing a bank, murdering someone, sexual harassment, etc. So why in THE HELL is there a prison???!!

⦁ Blitzo and Moxxie's meeting makes no sense to me. So #1, I was under the assumption Moxxie met Blitzo after he met and married Millie, but now they're telling us they met in jail right after Chaz abandoned Moxxie. #2, Why is Blitzo quick to let Moxxie join IMP after only saying a few words to him? He didn't even ask him for his name or let him speak or anything - he was just like, "Hey let's bust outta here and you can join my company!" #3 Why is Moxxie even smiling? What has Blitzo said to make him feel better so quickly after basically being dumped?? Does he feel like he's being accepted or something? Like bro, you just met this dude and you didn't even say a word to him.

⦁ Millie's more pissed at Chaz for abandoning Moxxie at one point. Why is Millie getting so angry and quick to kill Chaz over something that happened she wasn't even present for!? She never even met Moxxie around that time. Plus, it's not like that situation is bothering Moxxie now. There was no need for her to get so triggered here. Not saying she's not right to get upset about it, but the sudden rage was a little extra.

  ⦁ If Blitzo and Moxxie were considered friends when they met, then why is Blitzo such an ass to him all the time?? Are we supposed to give Blitzo props for acknowledging or being nice to Moxxie?

⦁ Crimson seems to make a better villain than any other antagonist introduced in this series. Mainly because he has motivation. From what I can gather from this, from Crim's perspective, Moxxie was turning soft because of his wife. It seems that he was extremely pissed off that the mother disagreed with how he raised Moxxie, going as far as to kill her. Granted it was too far and for a petty reason, but it's better than just doing things and having no motivation for them, unlike Stella.

⦁ A priest.... in hell...?

⦁ They only have Moxxie stand up for himself ONCE in this episode, and it's not even enough. His whole life from when he was a kid, he was pushed around by his father and put up with his abuse. The second he meets him after a long time, he's still afraid of him. The only time he puts his foot down is when he says he's not gonna go along with whatever his father plans for him and refuses his commands.... and that was it. It seemed like he was threatening his dad initially, saying how good he was at his job, and not even a second later he gets tased and knocked out, becoming a damsel in distress. That was the most brave we get out of him. If anything, his freakin WIFE was doing the most out of him once more, becoming the man of the relationship as always!! Wouldn't it have been better if Moxxie tried to get out of the knot and fought his dad or Chaz? Maybe he could have helped out Millie and they could make it to where Millie was having difficulties fighting all those gang members.

⦁ Speaking of that; Millie is only useful in battle only when the plot deems it necessary. It kinda seems like she's falling in and out of being a talented fighter. She gets taken down at one point and then the next she'll beat everybody's ass with no sweat! Sure - defeat an entire mob whether it be a mafia or a bunch of agents and take down a whole damn sea monster, but get knocked out by a freakin glass bottle and your leg ruptured by a bear trap...Yeah, I can totally buy that. I feel like they were being a little extra with Millie taking down all those gang members anyway. As I said, she could've had some difficulty fighting all those dudes and Moxxie could've helped her.

⦁ I swear- the women in this show get no respect not just in the show itself, but from the writers. Millie is once again only existing to be just a woman who's married to Moxxie and only gets angry and violent just for Moxxie. There's at least one episode that should've been about her, but it was mostly about her husband and she was just there as his moral support. Literally, the only thing we get outta her in this episode is her extremely hot temper, and all because of Chaz, who she dated at one point. Why is she so upset with Chaz? Why did she hate him so much before she knew about his relationship with Moxxie? What did he do to make her dump him? Or did he dump her? How did she even end up with a guy like him?? We don't know!! We only get to know about Moxxie's past relationship with him and how it faltered, and that is such a letdown! This could've been our chance to explore Millie as a character, even if it's a little flashback of her love life.

  ⦁ I'm not gonna disclude Moxxie's mother in this. Honestly, I don't think it was necessary for her to get killed off just so we could feel more sympathy for Moxxie. We can already see how his father treats him. Can't forget Loona or Blitzo. Not even Millie's parents liked him.

⦁ I'm I the only one who feels like Millie and Moxxie as a couple is boring? Yeah they love each other and would probably die for each other and that's nice n all, but wouldn't it be interesting to have Millie and Moxxie have a slight argument at least once? We all know these two love each other to death. They're sweeter and more loving towards each other than anybody else around them, and that's why it would be interesting to see a quarrel. Sometimes, you can't be a married couple without having an argument or two at one point. Millie clearly felt upset that she was kept in the dark about Moxxie's family. She kept on questioning Moxxie; "Why haven't I met dad before? Are you okay? You know you can tell me anything, right?" And Moxxie would just continuously dodge the questions and not tell her anything. This actually could've been another opportunity for Millie's character. Not that she has to lash out at him, but maybe she could've told him how she felt about him not saying anything about Crimson, his ex, his mother, or how he feeling in general while also having an upset attitude y'know. Maybe Moxxie could've argued back and said he just didn't wanna worry her or something.

  ⦁ I don't think Moxxie and Chaz necessarily have to marry just so Chaz could be a part of the family. If this is just about financial issues then why can't Crim and Chaz come to an agreement or something? How did Crim not know that Chaz was actually not rich?

⦁ I just know people are triggered over the fact that Blitzo slept Chaz and are like "BLITZO NO!! YOU BELONG TO STOLAS!!" or some whiny sh*t like that, even though Stolas and Blitzo aren't even an official couple. When did Blitzo suddenly become an imp version of Stolas? Why was he so quick to get horny and sleep with Chaz and he JUST MET HIM! This might as well be the same situation he had with Stolas, except he's Stolas and Chaz is Blitzo. Not to mention Blitzo ended up sneaking around and snooping through his stuff.

⦁ Why is Blitzo the one to get suspicious of Chaz anyway? He is mostly just there for comic relief and mostly seems more goofy and lovable compared to his behavior in the latest episode. It's kinda a good thing I guess, but I'm not gonna hope for the better of him. I wouldn't say he changed completely since there was a moment he lashed out at Moxxie for a split second. I don't even think he has any motive for trying to get him caught in a lie cuz he doesn't even know him, other than the fact that he wants to be the only one who ruptures Moxxie and Millie's relationship (I'm sorry... are we supposed to be rooting for him still?) If anything, I think it makes more sense if Millie was the one to figure out was Chaz was up to considering her history with him (if there was any. We don't know.... it was never shown!)

⦁ I can't believe Crimson easily let Millie walk away with Moxxie scott free without putting up a fight! Bro killed dozens of people!! He wasn't even afraid to kill his own wife. He even threatened to harm Moxxie and Millie! Why is he backing down so easily!?

Uh, yeah... this certainly wasn't the greatest episode. I think the only thing good about it was Moxxie's childhood. That was certainly interesting (and dark). Apart from that, I was expecting something outta nothing. We could've seen some potential from Millie, but we didn't. This show just can't exist without sex jokes. It's alright if they wanna be funny like that, but at this point, it's just uncomforting. Wondering how they're gonna screw up the next episode.

[oddlittlestories]

Alright so a combination of some of y’all’s posts and a chat with a colleague at a conference

I have finally watched my first Dimension 20 episode. And I LOVE it

I actively listen to / have completed somewhere around 30 audio dramas. NONE of those are actual play.

Which, when you consider that I’m technically a trained tt rpg designer, and have been roleplaying for over 15 years, is kind of baffling, right? It’s not like I haven’t tried them out. But historically, I either have no idea what’s going on, or it doesn’t somehow feel like a tt rpg to me.

Some of that’s probably play style. Brennan Lee Mulligan starts out with an opening episode that is SO like my style as a GM in your DND/Pathfinder system. With color, with backstory delving. And then proceeds to DM a game session that until the last like ten minutes has almost no “real” combat. It’s all about social stuff, puzzles. And these characters! They’re so well developed but they also feel like the kinds of characters I love to have at my table. Like the moments when they have poor judgment because it’s in character and also at the same time the player feels like it’s really funny & pulls them further into the game world. The way they have these personality archetypes — like Gorgug still trying to give Fabian the flower. Or Riz handing out his business cards. I died.

Idk. There was obviously backstory and archetype work that went on for possibly quite some time before the first session which is always how I run my games! And it’s not clear whether detention was always the goal, or if Brennan just decided that after the first two got detention. It almost feels like the latter. Which is SO good DMing in my book. Right? You have this group of characters, you have a clear opportunity to connect them later in the day, two of them go in a different direction and you go that’s even better actually! Let’s do that!

Actually the overall yes and style of the group leading to greater player agency and a more robust world…

Look. I’m sure actual plays are hard to develop and write. And I also have my own preferences in DND (combat-light games, heavy on backstory and character exploration, with limited DM fiat over the characters and somewhat over the world).

Also the way Brennan describes the various characters and situations. It just makes me feel like I’m DMing, it really does. The jokes, the vividness. The ridiculous details that are nonetheless so evocative. (Also his voice acting, all their voice acting really, is off the CHARTS.)

Anyways I’m having a blast and I’m so glad I finally found an actual play I vibe with bc I have really wanted to for a long time

[spidermanifested]

today i went to go see transformers one, And. i feel somewhat bad about this because every single one of my transformers friends seemed to love it. however i was not super impressed

which, if you liked it im glad you had fun & feel free to chalk some of my gripes up to me being pretentious about movies. but if you want to know my thoughts in more detail im putting them under a cut because a) spoilers and b) lot of words

so number one, the main thing, is that while it didnt follow the formula Exactly (orion was the one gunning to rebel from the get-go while megatron was initially really wary about stepping out of line) its still one of those "villain revolts against a corrupt system but goes TOO FAR" stories. which, yes thats what megatrons backstory usually is. yes i expected this going in

But did they have to code him as black via voice actor and pit him against a saintly nonviolent counterpart voiced by fucking chris hemsworth .

like this is the third time in the past couple years ive watched a new thing and everyones gushing over it and im like oh cool and i watch it, and the villain is a black coded (nonhuman!!) guy whos Too Mad about systemic injustice and has to be stopped by the noble liberal pacifists. it happened in live action one piece it happened in the tmnt movie and it has happened once again in transformers one!!! and EVERY single time i look through the tags to see if anyones talking about it and guess what. They are not

i cannot take even remotely seriously the in universe pearl clutching about megatron killing one (1) super evil guy. in general, sure, but mainly after watching bumblebee literally cut people into little pieces with knives on screen??????!!¿like im sorry but you cant act like megatron would be doing some horrible bad irredeemable thing by assassinating a corrupt head of state and then say okay 🤗 heres my new bffsie the knife murderer. Be real with me right now

aside from this i simply found the script to be extremely repetitive simplistic and marvelbrained. too much cheap shoehorned 2013-youtube-parody-grade humor. to which you the reader might turn to me and say manfred, you sound like a snob and the movie is for kids! the dialogue has to be simple or kids wont know whats going on. And to which i say first of all, it is my god given right to be a snob, and second of all this movie has swears in it such as hell and damn and badass, the latter of which is repeated upwards of thrice in a joke that gets less and less funny every time, and i think that MAYBE any child who is old enough to hear curse words, is old enough to understand SUBTEXT

at least it looked nice, animation was good, set design was crazy good. the little cyber deers with the light up antlers were genius, whoever came up with those was bringing their whole pussy to work. still dont like that they gave the robots human lips. optimus prime i am not going to kiss you put tjose things away

[mevekagvain]

Chapter 472 - So is there a reason why Raizel's brother says his whole name? I know that the lord and noblesse have that 'the entire thing is our first and last name' thing going on but even mvp lord just calls his daughter Raskreia. Is the brother just being an annoying older brother and using his whole name in a scolding way? Or is it just because he's being murdered?

- Wow the werewolves with their tiny population just had it halved after all the culling already occurring over 820 years from experimentation. How many people are left now? 100? 200?

- W-why is Kentas going upwards? Is there a sky city I'm unaware of? Are there actually winged werewolves that I should know about? Surely Kentas could leap in like, the direction he's heading for without going upwards that much.

Chapter 473 - Suddenly I'm illiterate. Why could Raskreia be blushing? No clue. Love Kei knowing jackshit though.

Chapter 474 - I like how neither Frankenstein nor Gechutel approve of the idea of Raizel and Raskreia being together.

Chapter 475 - Also Seira immediately jumping in to make fun of Regis sjjsjsis. "Regis has always been single. May the lord strike me down if I lie." And Regis not even registering it as a joke because Seira is likely saying it seriously.

- Obviously Rael is gonna kill either the lord or noblesse with Kartas to prevent Gechutel's fears. Why are you so dumb Karias 🙃

Chapter 476 - The way Shinwoo studies Raizel after Raskreia says he loves the time he spends with the kids... totally different meaning when you hc he's a noble <3

- So Karias is the only one in the household with love experience 🤣 Everyone else either doesn't get it or is a weirdo like Frankenstein. Also he tells Rael to stay away from Seira :)

- Grandpa is so fucking embarrassing.

Chapter 478 - Raizel using Muzaka as his gofer... Lmao.

Chapter 479 - Contradictory flashback time! Why is there a peaceful moment where Ashleen and Muzaka visit the Noblesse manor where the latter reveals that the former is his daughter? I'll just have to take it as Raizel fantasising about an alternate life where this happened instead of her death.

- Why does Garda get a default suit outfit btw? I actually think she looks good in it but you'd think she'd be given more casual clothes. Or maybe she chose this over whatever skimpy female clothes Crombel has...

Chapter 481 - Yeaaaah still hc that Muzaka transferring his power did nothing to help. Power /= Lifespan for anyone outside the noblesse after all. Ashoka doing it with Ragnarok is different since he just straight up gave Raizel his soul how romantic.

- Anyway I get why he did it this way but isn't making Raizel fight then transferring power kinda dumb? What if all your power is only equivalent to all the lifespan he used up in this fight?

- Muzaka's a very good actor btw. Better than Maduke imo. Like everyone knows the latter is an evil asshole. There are 0 people who are not wary of him unless brainwashed.

Chapter 482 - Garda's love (not romantic) and admiration for Muzaka is so deep and it makes me sad.

- Anyway did I rip my tragic hc backstory for Raizel's brother partly from this? Yes. But not exactly obviously. The nuances and circumstances are different. The aftermath on Raizel's psyche is the exact same though :)

Chapter 483 - Okay I know he wasn't the one who killed Gradeus but it is funny seeing every traitor except him.

Chapter 484 - 'that not even his species is known for' huh? Are you not a werewolf too mr. scientist on werewolf island? I guess not since Kentas says he'll give the guy the support of all his species.

- Oh. No in person meetings for 50 years?? So no recent Union pool parties either? At least, not between the Elders? That's so sad :( But actually... nah the Elders probably did come to any relevant Union parties or upper echelon human parties when they felt like it. Parties aren't the same as meetings after all. Or at least Lunark, Urokai, and Zarga showed up to Third Elder's pool parties. Four ppl party. They're friends <3

- And First Elder is here. Meh.

Chapter 485 - I feel like some of the other Elders did probably know about First Elder coughUrokaiwithhischokeholdonUnionfinancescough but they didn't care. Also all this does mean he's only been in the position for 50 years max or that Haydn has always been covering for him since he became First Elder, even in person, if more than 50 years.

- Amusingly enough, the room bg designs have gotten better now that it doesn't particularly matter to have them with the constant fighting. I do appreciate it though. Better than whatever tf Yuna's home was and the one (1) room in the noblesse manor. Like Raizel pls put more furniture in there.

Chapter 486 - The manhwa throneroom with the elevated throne area (stairs, platform, pillars, floaty blue diamonds) and straight red carpet, the anime throneroom with the fancier carpet and throne combined with the manhwa throne (so gold with red plush but dragon armrests. though only actually for ashoka and raskreia since I like to think that lords have personalised thrones for their reigns), the anime lord's sanctuary with its chessboard style floor and mosaics, and my own design where the entire walls and ceiling are just mosaics aside from one layer of glazed windows, thus bathing the throneroom in multicolour light in the day, is how I imagine it. It does ofc mean that the throneroom is on the topmost floor.

Chapter 487 - Not everyone with red eyes is a noble :/ Some are just emo.

Chapter 488 - Geo!! Considering her clothes/accessories compared to her skin colour I'll always hc that she's from a minority group in China.

Chapter 490 - King of the humans... so fucking lame.

- I can't be bothered by righteous anger when it comes from some rich white prick like First Elder. Because it's people like him who worked with the werewolves and traitor nobles to hurt other humans in the first place.

Chapter 491 - I do want to point out that the other Elders were also all :/ at Maduke destroying random human areas. Canonically they probably didn't care about the people and just that it was Maduke who did it but. Yeah. Seriously though, Maduke is so bad at politics. No wonder the only times he got what he wanted is when others wanted something from him too like with the Muzaka Raizel fight or with humans wanting werewolf sponsorship.

Sidenotes - The last episode of the anime was utter shit but the anime did give me one of my fav noblesse bgs. It's just such a nice room.

- Just like how I imagine lords have personalised thrones, I also imagine that there is a room in the castle with special multimedia mosaic paintings for each lord representing them/their rule. The frame is created based on their likes (Kalidasa's is a strange black and white amalgation, Chinasa has a simple wooden frame he made himself, Mai has a really pretty and fancy jewelled one comissioned by Chinasa using jewels he found himself, Al-Kahina's is carved detailed wood made by Hesediel, Gentilus has a detailed Agvain metalwork frame, Ashoka's is a strange one that glows white always so you can't tell what the material it is or how it actually looks, Raskreia has an ornate gold one made/commissioned by her family, Helia and Lan Yue's is ofc shared and is ornate wood and metal with silver gold veins) while the mosaic/painting itself is enchanted so it comes into being over the course of the lord's reign. Each piece has the lord, their version of Ragnarok and symbolic representations of important things in their rule or personality.

- First and Third Elder's relationship will forever make me uncomfortable because of how it reminds me of master/slave, caste, racial, etc dynamics. Easiest way to solve this would be if Raizel had been dark skinned lol.

[that-shamrock-vibe]

Movie Review: Cinderella (Spoilers)

Disclaimer: I am posting this review the day after the movie airs on Amazon Prime, so if you haven't yet seen it don't read on until you do.

General Reaction:

It is slightly weird to think of another movie studio taking on one of the classic fairy-tales that isn't Disney, because, as I am sure is the case for a large portion of the mainstream audience, Disney have almost claimed fairytale adaptations as their own.

However, as identified, Cinderella, is a fairy tale and one created long before Disney came about. As such, other studios are allowed to put across their own interpretation of these classic stories that we have seen a lot of times adapted at this point.

That being said, we have seen many different adaptations of Cinderella at this point from the classis Disney Animation version and it's live-action counterpart, to modern-day reworkings like A Cinderella Story of the mid-noughties starring Hilary Duff.

It's quite an easy story to tell and adapt to a variety of different settings, and what this 2021 retelling does with the story blends the old-fashioned with the modern. Does that mean it is set apart from the others? Well in my opinion yes and no.

While this is a Sony movie, it plays a lot like a Disney Channel Original Movie. From the comedy to the settings to the costuming and the music, it plays like the best of those types of movies. I'm talking the High School Musical franchise and the Descendants franchise. It is by no means bad or corny, but it isn't even on the level of the 2016 live-action Cinderella.

While that version was pretty much a straightforward live-action version of the original animated version, the style of the movie outweighed the substance.

Here however, there is a great blend of both style and substance. The story takes the classic elements of the original Cinderella fairy tale but tries to inject a modern and feministic twist that the recent live-action Beauty and the Beast tried to do.

In terms of whether this version of Cinderella stands out in the crowd of Cinderella movies, I would say it does. Not only is the titular character race-bent and the setting she is in seemingly plays into that, but the reworking of the Fairy Godmother as the Fab G as well as giving the Stepmother a more humanised backstory allows for a more compelling take on a classic.

Cast:

Because this is just the one all-in review I'm not going to do an in-depth character analysis and instead group the characters as who were my favourites, who did a passable job, who was bad and who were for some reason just there.

Favourites:

I have a top 3/4 favourite characters in this movie. Idina Menzel's Stepmother Vivian, Billy Porter's Fab G, Minnie Driver's Queen Beatrice and additionally Beverly Knight's Queen Tatiana.

Idina Menzel was always going to be fantastic in this movie, but to see her portray what is traditionally the villain character in the movie as a sympathetic character as part of the movie's feminist agenda was an interesting twist. No cat for a start, I don't know if Lucifer was a part of the original fairy tale but of course in the Disney adaptations Lady Tremaine is always accompanied by her faithful feline, but also the fact that her backstory parallels Ella's current story and the fact Vivian was so willing to have Ella reject her passion to do what is expected of her just as was forced on her was actually great motivation.

In truth I have only ever seen Billy Porter in one other thing aside from this movie and that was American Horror Story: Apocalypse. I have never seen Pose though I have heard good things, but from what I understand, Billy Porter only really has one speed. However, as the character's name states, that speed is fabulous. I loved Fab G in this movie, the fairy godmother is usually one of my favourite characters in the movie and every interpretation I have seen has brought something different and memorable. If this version of Cinderella is remembered for anything it will be for this very modernised take on the Fairy Godmother, not only gender-bending and race-bending a traditionally white female character, but with Porter choosing to make the character non-binary and that outfit speaks for itself, Fab G was simply a fabulous character.

In both Disney adaptations, I have never heard mention or reference to Prince Charming having a living mother...or a dead one for that matter. So to not only have the Queen being in a chunk of this movie, but also having her own story branch tying into the feminist agenda running through the movie and being portrayed by Minnie Driver, I was in love with this character.

Pretty much similar to the Fab G, if you've seen Beverly Knight's one second in the trailers you've pretty much seen her in the movie. She contributes to Ella's story in the movie and only appears in the latter half of the movie in 2 maybe 3 scenes but she makes an impact because she's Beverly Knight. My only gripe with her is she does not sing in the movie, you have Beverly Knight with not even a solo in a group number?

Passable:

Unfortunately the star of the movie Camilla Cabello is just passable in this movie as Cinderella. She does have some humour about her and her singing is great despite maybe being autotuned because I know how she can sing, but she doesn't feel like Cinderella to me, it actually feels more like a version of what Emma Watson was doing with Belle in the live-action Beauty and the Beast rather than Cinderella but at least she tried.

As for Nicholas Galitzine, he's definitely more engaging as a modern-day Prince Charming, Robert is definitely more engaging a character than Ella unfortunately, which to be fair is still good as the 2015 Cinderella is the only other adaptation to really make the Prince interesting, but I can't quite put my finger on exactly which movie it is but there is another movie I have seen where the Prince Regent doesn't want to be king but the Princess does and has to fight for her right to be it...that's pretty much this story for them.

Also Pierce Brosnan as the King, despite jokingly singing towards the end, did a great job at being the archetype of old-fashioned values with his on-screen wife Minnie Driver's queen pushing him into a modern-day thinking.

Bad:

As for who's bad, I have to say it pains but the British comic relief characters really let the side down in this movie.

In the three mice defence, Romesh Ranganathan and James Acaster are somewhat funny but unnecessary. James Corden however is abismal in this movie. I get he produces it, but particularly after Cats I do not understand 1) Why he'd want to portray another CG animal or 2) Ever think that one shot of him changing back from human to mouse with his head on a mouse body was funny...it was terrifying.

Also this movie is supposedly a family-audience movie...so why include a crass joke of Corden's character talking about peeing out of his front tail?

Additionally to the three mice, Rob Beckett has a surprising role in this movie as a potential suitor for Vivian's daughters, but he simply portrays such a creepy, cringe-worthy character it's almost uncomfortable to watch.

New Additions:

So as well as the two queens and the British comic relief there is also the addition of Princess Gwen to the movie who is the sister of the Prince and the one who wants to be ruler. It's kind of the same story as Jasmine's in the live-action Aladdin as wanting to be Sultan but being a woman isn't taken seriously, however here it is treated more comedically as every time there is a serious moment with the King trying to force Robert to grow up and be King, she always tries to interject with "Would this be a bad time to tell you about an actual real reason why I would be a good ruler" and they make sense but she's always dismissed until the very end.

Then there's a town crier, who is also inserted as a musical number while he's reading his proclamations but as a rap. Honestly I don't know Doc Brown as an artist but I did happen to enjoy what he contributed.

Music:

Which brings us on nicely to the music of the movie as this is a musical and I usually break down the songs. Again this time I will be doing groupings of best to worse.

Honestly my favourite number is probably "Shining Star" mostly performed by Billy Porter with verses by Camilla Cabello and, unfortunately, James Corden.

I also enjoyed the two original songs of the movie, "Million to One" which is Cabello's "I Want" song of the movie and used a lot through the movie, and then also "Dream Girl" which is Idina's main other song but also sung by basically the women of the movie, it's Idina Menzel if you don't give her an original song it's an insult.

Idina's other song is a cover of "Material Girl" and honestly it is a lot of fun, Nicholas Galitzine's rendition of "Somebody to Love" was also fun and surprising as I did not think this guy could sing that well.

The group numbers were fun and well choreographed but they are also somewhat forgettable. The song at the ball of "Whatta Man/Seven Nation Army" was probably the most memorable but still just mediocre.

Recommendation:

So with all that said, would I recommend watching Sony's Cinderella? Honestly I would say it is worth at least one viewing, and I do recommend watching all the way through just to get the full experience. I do think it will do better as a streaming movie than it would have done as a theatrical release, but I cannot pinpoint a market for this movie.

I don't think this will go down as one of the great adaptations, but there are moments and aspects of the movie that sets it apart from the crowd.

Overall I rate this movie a 7/10, it's not as fantastic as I feel the trailers were making it out to be, but having seen the movie twice there are definitely elements of the movie I looked forward to watching the second time around.

So that's my review of Sony's Cinderella, what did you guys think? Post your comments and check out more Movie Reviews as well as other posts.

[myinnerscarlett]

Just call me Madam, Maestro, Majesty, Master, Mistress...or Mensa member

Do any of these conjure up a particularly positive connotation?  Not in the latter case (at least among some who have tested into the group just to infiltrate our camps). Yes, I’m referring to a certain comedienne (no, not “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”) who reported it was a bastion of right-wing politics. “Camps” not just Steiner summer camp in the Catskills. So much for the “alt right” am I right? Mrs. Maisel did that bit, too. The Nichols and May reference. I only steal from the best. Back to politics... Especially in our current climate, when we would find it difficult to travel to Tuscany even if we could find a house for rent, well that’s what he said. That is, looking back fondly on that episode of Seinfeld, the guy who insisted because he conducted on-the-side gigs his friends must refer to him as “The Maestro” is of particular poignance. Master is, of course, taboo, and reminiscent of our history of slavery. Madam has mistress written all over it. A madam runs a brothel. Majesty is right out of the question in a democracy. Characters worthy of a play, most of them unworthy of honorable mention, I’d say...save for alliteration’s sake “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.” And that's the point, princess. Even “Mr.” and “Mrs.” or “Ms.” is considered an “honorific.” But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, missy. The world is full of examples like “The Maestro” nothing more or less than a light-hearted and humorous attack on the use of “honorifics” that sprinkle the writer’s pad. Dr. Seuss is an example of one who has neither a PhD nor an MD. In honor of this season of The Grinch, let’s remember a talented man, who gave himself a pseudonym. Or, as The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel puts it a “nom de plume.” A stage/pen name. Jackie says it sounds like a sex toy. I won’t elaborate. Jokes are almost always better than taking yourself too seriously.  A fault I find with all who insist on using an honorific. Just like the Maestro. Earned or given, the quality of the degree matters. As does the dissertation. The word honorific does not apply only to an honorary, but usually to a two letter abbreviation that seems to invite way too much controversy. The best among the academics and the medical field alike are not wrapped up in themselves. Public servants, remember, not slaves, as no one should be on either side of the desk - and I should know having frequently worked both sides of that desk simultaneously. It’s up to you what you call someone, not that individual. Or else, this is not a free country. No one can dictate the words that come from you. You are the boss. If students refuse to refer to professors that way, which is their right, so can customers of health care, sometimes known as mere patients. I know it seems like an either or proposition and I think there are many people who agree, but it seems the majority want to defend the honorific not of Mr. or Mrs. X at The Gaslight but that good ole doc. They defend it like it’s their reputation or their own skin. Or even their religion. In this way, I might be more like tRump than I care to admit. Is it a zero sum game if you want it so much it seems like a win for you to be called Madam X. If I don’t follow suit, do you lose and I win! I’ve voted once and I’ll vote again. It’s the run-off. I live in Georgia. Sorry if the Scarlett reference is under attack. It still fits especially where I landed. It’s tongue-in-cheek, a pseudonym I gave myself years ago, myinnerscarlett, knowing all too well I have no mean bone in my body and could never imagine beating a horse, as she is shown to do in the film, now a film rightfully explained in context of the time frame. The actors in the film defended their various roles, regardless. In retrospect, I hope we don’t lose every shred of our sense of humor in our pursuit for the betterment of society. On this point, however, I am taking no one’s side. No one hears me pronounce the honorific because it doesn’t mean a thing, save perhaps pretense. The letters belong behind the name. That goes for everybody. Period. It’s a habit worth breaking. What’s amazing is the backlash on this topic in times of so much real turbulence. Is this just another distraction? Scary thought. Even scarier than Halloween. And, as for true honorary degrees, just think of how many of those are revoked after the honoree falls from grace. Master aside, Mister, the old use of mistress, which Mrs. or Miss or Ms. is meant to abbreviate, as in lady or mistress of the house, is old-fashioned; and, as with slavery, there’s always a backstory. Now we can add to the list John’s Hopkins, which officially acknowledged a long held belief or mistake made in reference to its founder not having held slaves. Or is that too white-washed a term; owned is more to the point. The backstory is told, as the statues are removed. Ours is a haunting history and I’m not just talking Halloween. Sadly, all of these characters could be made into costumes. Some have been worn, unfortunately, in blackface. Thanksgiving is not much better in terms of the hidden backstory of abuse and even slavery of indigenous peoples. We prefer pretty pictures or cute, funny stories. They make us happy. We could all use a good laugh, but not at others’ expense. We don’t like stories of human or of animal abuse. We want heroes/heroines and we foster that sort of worship. We ignore the crux of the matter when (as one member of Mensa put in a recent letter to the editor about Aristotle) there’s a greater lesson to be learned. In reference as to whether or not nonhuman animals had rights, the gist was that politics was the highest form of ethics, and if ethics were the basis of animal rights, the world would be a better place. It’s more than academic. So, after the backlash, Edison fans focused on the Topsy scandal and diminished his role in the cruel electrocution of the former circus elephant; however, it’s also been reported that he performed the same cruelty on stray dogs and cats as well as cattle and horses. If he or his company affiliates filmed any act, I’d say complicit is as complicit does and this is just a matter of mincing words. He used to describe the gory details of electrocution, or so I’ve read, in its defense. Again, I get those were other times but there’s nothing pretty about it. It happened. Even if it was deemed less cruel than other forms of “execution” and even if it was practiced on humans at the time, have we learned nothing? Topsy, the elephant, was innocent. The cruelty on the part of a drunken handler (much like a slave owner) caused behavioral concerns that justified in the twisted minds of the circus owners and their cronies using her one last time. It was a cruel demonstration. Edison is also purported to have cheated his most famous assistant, Nikola Tesla. Geeks and nerds love this guy. I say that in jest. Hopefully, Mensans still have a sense of humor. It’s a sliding scale, right? If Edison was alive today, what would he say? Well, apart from the usual rhetoric, how’s this for an anecdote. True or not, believe it or not, he had a reputation of being a slob. That’s slob, not snob, as he wore his shoes two sizes too big in order to slip into them more easily. No bending over to tie shoe laces. Sounds like he should have invented the slip-on loafer. Self-promotion we know exists among showmen or editors and reviewers alike from within the least admired or lesser known organizations to most highly publicized and political platforms - sometimes to the point of being unethical. What else can you expect from a self-educated guy. As some have also pointed out, Mensa (overall) has a certain sartorial reputation. Subtlety, not discretion, is the better part of valor. Mincing words doesn’t make it right.

The narcissists are running our country now. You need to understand what this means. Read and share this book today! 

[poetictrekkie]

TNG Crew Highschool!AU

Anonymous said: Hey! I was wondering for the 500 followers list prompt, you could do Headcannons for a TNG high school au? I was thinking of it as if they were students. Thanks so much if you decide do this!

Jean-Luc Picard

He’s one of those rare types who defies stereotype. 

No one can place him in any particular group, no set table in the cafeteria.

Of course, he prefers to spend lunch in the library. For some reason, the librarian never reprimands him if he eats there.

He’s fairly popular, and certainly no outcast. Whenever he enters a room, he exudes this undeniably authoritative aura.

Always taking the lead in group projects. Always.

Enjoys athletics, especially long-distance running. He’s trained for marathons in the past, and participates in cross-country events.

Subtly nerdy. He raises his hand all the time in English class.

Whenever students are assigned memorization work of a poem or a monologue, they can’t wait to hear Jean-Luc recite it.

His recitation of Hamlet’s To Be or Not to Be soliloquy went down in the history of the school as receiving a standing ovation and actual tears streaming down the teacher’s face.

He’s been the lead in the school play since his sophomore year. He was the first sophomore to get the lead.

Very private, especially in regards to his personal life. No one ever knows what’s going on in his head – or who he’s dating.

Will Riker

That guy. Every coming-of-age movie has one of them.

The more than slightly annoying, jock, “cool” guy that everyone wants to be around.

Secretly not a complete dunce. If he put in some effort, he could be doing great things.

Comes from money. The Rikers have been pumping money into the school for generations. Probably the only way that Will hasn’t gotten expelled.

There are probably several plaques in the school with ‘Donated by the Riker Family’ on them.

Has his own car the moment he turns sixteen, making him even more of an object of envy for the next few months.

Like his infamous escapades, his string of girlfriends is legendary. There’s a new girl on Will Riker’s arm every month.

But lately, since he started dating Deanna Troi, he’s toned down his reckless behaviour.

He’s also begun to realize that underneath his act, there’s a surprising amount of vulnerability that he’s refused to acknowledge.

Data Soong

Very likely the smartest person in the school.

He can memorize dates for history and formulas for math without a single error.

He is the captain of the school robotics team, and they’ve had a winning streak in the district and state tournaments since he joined.

He is also responsible for the construction of “Broomby,” a highly modified Roomba that can go 20 km/hr and is very good at wreaking absolute havoc when a distraction is necessary.

He is also on the autism spectrum (he has Asperger’s), and he finds it difficult to interact with people and feels uncomfortable in social situations.

This sometimes makes him a target for bullying, but Data has learned to ignore the people who tease him.

Even the teachers sometimes grow annoyed when Data tries to answer every question in class.

His adoptive father, Dr. Noonien Soong, is very protective of his son. But although he often wants to intercede on his behalf when he hears about the bullying, Data always stops him.

He hasn’t told him, but Data just wants to make his father proud, and prove that he can stand up for himself.

Geordi LaForge

The kind of person everyone wants to be friends with.

Rarely has a bad word to say about anyone. Very kind, funny, and helpful.

Geordi excels in the classes which require some hands-on work.

A star in woodshop. He has a knack for carving.

But he’s also very good at automotive work and technology-related tasks.

Always helps people with their homework. Might not know the answer every time, but he’ll sit and work it through.

He’s working at all the open houses for the school, talking to prospective students and touring them around the facilities.

When Data comes to the school, they immediately become fast friends.

Geordi understands how difficult it is to be different from other people. He’s visually impaired, but he doesn’t let that stop him from doing the things he loves.

The two of them spend late nights working on robotics projects, and Data even designed a pair of visual aids for his friend.

They didn’t work as well as the ones he already had, but Geordi kept them anyways.

He’s absolutely hopeless when he works up the courage to ask his crush out.

Hopeless.

But Data doesn’t really get that sort of thing either, so it all works out.

Beverly Crusher (Howard)

The model student and president of the Student Council.

Like Will, she also comes from a family of significant repute, but she doesn’t try to use her status for bonus points.

For her entire first year of high school, she denied any relation to the Howard family, just to prove she could make it on merit alone.

Everyone knows that Beverly is definitely going to get into a very good medical program in an Ivy League university.

She has top marks in Biology and Chemistry in her grade (Data is a year younger than her), and is an Honours student.

Beverly is friendly and effusive, but still introverted. She prefers to stick to her small group of friends.

She also has very high standards about the people she dates. Not many people can say they’ve gone out with Beverly Howard.

That’s why everyone was so shocked when she started dating Jack Crusher. A nice guy by all means, but no one particularly remarkable.

The two of them loved each other with a passion that could have went far beyond “high school sweethearts.”

But just before graduation, “could have” became all it ever could have been.

He was in the car.

Distracted. Listening to music. Talking.

Not seeing the truck that ran that red light.

Then Beverly didn’t know who to think to blame, not even Jean-Luc. Who was in the car too. Who survived.

Deanna Troi

The most popular girl in the school.

On first appearances, she comes off sometimes as a bit of an airhead.

Some people say she’s concerned more with her clothes than school itself.

But they couldn’t be more wrong.

Deanna is constantly motivated, trying hard in all her courses.

She knows she’s no Beverly Crusher, and certainly not Data, but she’s determined to succeed.

She’s an empath in every sense. She’s a great conversationalist, and has high emotional intelligence.

Whoever talks to Deanna always feels better and happier by the end of the conversation.

She gets top marks in the psychology class, and she’s considering becoming a psychiatrist or a counsellor.

She likes to make people feel good, and talk them through their problems.

Some people honestly prefer talk to Deanna than the actual school counsellor.

When Will Riker asks her out, she almost says no. In fact, she only says yes on the condition that she won’t become one of his cast-offs.

And surprisingly enough, Will Riker stays true to his word.

Because to him, Deanna is worth all the things in the world.

Worf

The slightly frightening exchange student.

He came from Belarus with his adoptive brother, Nikolai.

Compared to his rather rebellious and genial sibling, Worf is very stoic and prefers to keep to himself.

Some people joke that the brothers might as well have come from different planets.

Not many people have seen past his stony exterior. There are a few exceptions, though.

Deanna Troi, who he dated briefly in his junior year. But it ended up not working out, and they parted as good friends.

Jean-Luc Picard, who he respects as an intelligent person and capable leader. 

He is brilliant at sports, if rather aggressive.

He’s the captain of the school wrestling team, probably one of the best they’d had.

The bulk of sports-related injuries at the school had some relation to were caused by Worf.

He spends quite a bit of time in the gym, where he discovered he had an aptitude for basketball.

Tasha Yar introduced the game to him, and she remains his usual partner for shooting hoops.

He always stands up for the underdog, because he knows what it’s like to be one.

So, if he sees any of the younger kids being bullied, there’ll be hell to pay.

Tasha Yar

Ever since her first day of freshman year, Tasha Yar had acquired a sort of rebel mystique.

In the first lesson, she corrected the History teacher on a particular fact about the Cold War.

Not very politely, mind you.

By the end of the first month of school, she had been sent to the principal’s office twice.

Tasha’s very much a lone wolf. Wasn’t there to make friends, no matter how many people thought her defiance was “cool.”

“Tragic backstory unlocked at level 4.” No one’s got there. 

Protest is her art form.

She’s consistently skipped Fridays to strike for climate change.

She came early to school (for once) in order to put up signs protesting the heartbeat laws in Alabama and Georgia.

Tasha is a killer debater, and Debate is the only club she participates in.

If you try and argue anything with her, you’ve just dug your own grave.

Loves heavy metal, but also classical music. She doesn’t talk about the latter one as much, though.

When she’s not protesting the dress code, her favourite t-shirt reads: “Dismantling the patriarchy, brick by brick.”

And no one dares make fun of her, because they know they’ll pay for it one day.

[victoriousfrankenstein]

Experiment 1: “Descend in pain, demon!” -- I, FRANKENSTEIN (2014)

You’re probably wondering why I’m kicking off this series with this shlock. Well, I’ll just tell you--it’s free with Hulu and I’m not trying to break the bank here. (Spoilers ahead, not that you care lol)

I, Frankenstein stars blandly chiseled Aaron Eckhart as Frankenstein’s monster, here conveniently named Adam, with assists from Bill Nighy, Miranda Otto, Yvonne Strahovski, and Jai Courtney. The backstory goes like this: in 1795, Victor Frankenstein brought his monster into the world (in an undisclosed place), immediately rejected him (for an undisclosed reason), and tried to kill him (by tossing him off an undisclosed bridge). The monster survived this attempted drowning and came back to kill Dr. F’s wife, then led him up north through the unforgiving arctic, where the good doctor eventually succumbed to the cold. This information is communicated to us visually and via voice over, in case we couldn’t figure it out for ourselves.

The movie truly begins with the Creature burying Frankenstein next to his wife (“It was more than he deserved,” spits a bitter Aaron Eckhart). As he does this, he is attacked by demons and immediately kills one of them. This awakens some nearby gargoyles who fly from their perches on a castle to merc the rest and save the unconscious Creature. They remark that they’ve never seen a human kill a demon before and conclude that “it” must be special; as they loot what they believe is a corpse, they find a pretty sweet journal belonging to one Victor M. Frankenstein and gasp because the rumors are true!!! Then the Creature begins to move!!!!!

The gargoyles take him back to their queen (Otto), who demands to know why the demons wanted him. She explains that the Gargoyle Order has been at war with demons since the fall of Satan, and that they were commanded into being by St. Michael himself. She also gives the Creature a name--Adam--and requests that he stay with them for protection...but he leaves and forges his own way for 200 years, before finally returning to hunt down the demons who want him for some reason.

So it’s now Modern Times, but I couldn’t tell you where this movie is actually set for the life of me. The gargoyles live in some monstrous European cathedral and all the actors are affecting that bland movie British accent, but there are few indications of what the actual, specific setting is. Unless, of course, the cathedral is real, and I just don’t know my landmarks. Sorry.

Anyway, now scientists are hard at work trying to figure out the secret to reanimating dead corpses. Dr. Terra Wade (Strahovksi), working under Bill Nighy (who unsurprisingly turns out to be Prince Naberius, leader of the demon horde), zaps a rat back to life. She weirdly measures the electricity in Joules and not volts; I am not a scientist, but this sounds wrong to me.

She tells Bill Nighy that they aren’t yet ready to reanimate a human corpse yet, and he fires back that hasn’t she heard of Victor Frankenstein? She proclaims that Frankenstein is a myth, made up to “scare children.” For me, this opens up a can of worms I’m not sure the writers thought of when they put this in the script. Just...who is Frankenstein in this universe? Does the Mary Shelley novel exist? Does it exist, but as real documentation and not a work of fiction? Is he more of a legend? She wonders why Frankenstein didn’t share his discovery with the world if the story is true, but he explains that himself in the actual novel, which leads me to believe it was never written in-universe. But then seriously, where did the myth come from?! Terra speaks as if the Brothers Grimm invented the story and it’s very odd.

She does admit, however, that if Frankenstein did reanimate a corpse, it would be helpful to study the creation. So Bill Nighy assembles his troops.

Demons attack the cathedral, where Adam is being kept by the gargoyles. The CG is absolute ass. This movie has big 2004 energy for a lot of reasons, and this is one of them. The only thing I appreciate about the fight scenes is that there isn’t an excess of shaky cam, so it’s easy to see what’s happening; unfortunately, what’s happening isn’t usually very interesting. The fight choreography is stale and repetitive. The music is incredibly generic.

However, this scene particularly has holy waterboarding, so that’s pretty good.

It also has the best worst line in the entire film!

The demons capture the Gargoyle Queen, who is then traded back for Frankenstein’s journal. Now the bad guys have the ability to reanimate dead humans, something a man in the 1790’s figured out and they could not.

Meanwhile, Adam breaks into the lab and finds a room of stashed corpses, which the demons are presumably storing to raise an army of the undead. He jumps through a window into the lab to get the journal back. Everyone knows immediately who he is because Victor Frankenstein was really good at drawing.

Unfortunately, security shows up with Bill Nighy, who chews the scenery as much as he can. He calls Adam “Frankenstein,” as “we are all the sons of our fathers.” Adam cannot accept this. He breaks out of a separate window and lands on a train, where he begins to read his life story, then doubles back to meet up with Terra and tell her all about the gargoyle/demon battle. And that she’s working for a demon prince.

Demons attack them. One of them monologues about how they will summon their brethren to possess the corpses. What does this have to do with Adam? He doesn’t have a soul...and demons can only possess bodies without soul!

 Adam is injured. Terra learns that he’s hot. Sexy Wound Dressing commences.

This is probably the most annoying part of this film to me. Adam and everyone waxes poetic about how he was rejected by his creator and humanity, and I have to wonder why. He looks and acts like a dude. A ripped dude, yes, but a dude. He apparently learned how to speak in a single winter, so it’s not like he was ever really a wild animal? His scarring isn’t even raised! He could hide his blemishes with foundation if he really wanted to, yet several people in this movie call him “it” before even learning what exactly he is. It’s about as unnatural as Ben Shapiro purposefully misgendering trans people.

Anyway, Terra tells Adam she’ll make him a companion since Frankenstein didn’t because he was a bad dad. This is a one-off line that amounts to nothing.

At this point there is a third of the movie left, but you can guess exactly how it unfolds from here. It’s hardly worth recounting in detail. Basically everyone is after the journal, but Adam destroys it before anyone can get it. That doesn’t matter. Terra is forced to reanimate the corpse of her murdered colleague without it, which sets into motion the reanimation of the thousands of corpses Bill Nighy has had on ice for….centuries, presumably?

Demons ascend to Earth to prepare to take over their new corporeal forms. Luckily, Adam is here to take them and the gargoyles, who have betrayed him, down.

I didn’t mention the gargoyle betrayal before because it lasts four seconds and amounts to nothing. They’re all fighting demons now. Bill Nighy reveals his true form!

A demon tries to possess Adam, but it doesn’t take. Our king says “my body, my choice!” He has a soul! Yasssss!

The whole laboratory sinks into Hell and the gargoyles save Adam and Terra. The movie ends with Adam vowing to protect humanity. And because I know you’re wondering, yes, the last line is this:

We do not ask for the lives we are given. But each of us has the right to defend that life. I have fought to protect mine. And when the forces of darkness return, you shall know that I am out there, fighting to defend yours. I, descender of the demon horde. I, my father’s son. I, Frankenstein.

Jesus Christ.

So, is this movie worth watching?

That is a resounding no. There are some movies that are a fun kind of bad, and others that are just boring. I, Frankenstein is the latter. Even watching it with a friend wasn’t that fun. The film has about four different colors, and the acting is even less varied. It’s the same performance all around--gravelly, serious, dull, with nary a joke to be found. Only Bill Nighy makes an attempt to do something, but even he doesn’t ascend above the generic Evil Rich Guy mold.

It’s funny because as I watched this, I thought it seemed like an Underworld ripoff. According to IMDb, the franchises were originally envisioned to exist in the same universe, but I, Frankenstein did so poorly that the idea was scrapped.

Is it any wonder? The performances are empty, and so is the world itself. A few extras in the first scenes gawk at Adam’s scarring, but none show up at all in the climax. “This city” is referenced throughout, but can it really be called a city when there is no life to be found? When it isn’t even named?!

Please stay away from this film. Its scarring runs deeper than Adam’s, and it doesn’t even have abs.

[airlock]

airlock grades the Punchable archetype

so far, a majority of the Fire Emblem villains I’ve covered in this series are the sort who are meant to be liked, forgiven, sympathized with... these here are not those ones. these are the ones whose singular purpose in the narrative is to piss you the hell off. so, which of them played that role to excellence?

(do note: under cut are spoilers for… everything, and also a significant amount of me criticizing or blamming characters that you might- okay, yeah, no, you probably don’t like anybody on this list, but you may still strongly disagree with my opinions of them. you’ve been warned! ha, no way these fools would set about reading the whole post now... what!? impossible!)

a foreword

so, to be very specific, I’m not rating every flatly irritating miniboss here; the definitive aspect here is that the character has to be a recurring one, whose extended screentime never quite ends up giving them a chance to be something other than vile. but more important than the hair-splitting here is giving some consideration to how exactly I’ll be doing the rating; after all, I’m not supposed to like any of these people, but there’s still better and worse ways to be despicable as a character.

I’m running pretty much on two central critteria: is this character entertaining, and is that character satisfying to take down. it’s more important to hit one than to hit both; a character who hits neither is significantly more likely to be a pure waste of bile, however.

without further ado, let’s start gritting those teeth!

fuck this guy

(9/10)

directly enabling the single most badass scene in all of Book II obviously lands you on the upper echelons of this here character type. but that’s just the effect; we should peer into the cause of what makes him work so well!

of the critteria I mentioned, Lang goes for the latter: he’s not only quite satisfying to defeat, it’s also great anytime someone finally talks back to him and puts him in his place. that’s because he’s not the sort of character for whom this sort of thing is a given. a lot of the ones we’ll see ahead of him are incompetent toadies on top of being amoral, but not this guy; he knows exactly what he’s doing, relying on the backing of the most powerful nation in the continent to plunder, raze, and oppress to his heart’s content. the business of doing something about this dipshit gets severely delayed by the dire consequences of crossing him -- until Marth finally decides that enough is enough.

and THEN Jagen tells him to meet him 9 PM at the Grustian denny’s parking lot for an old man brawl-

fuck this chin

(3/10)

I struggle to understand ol’ Kaga’s obssession with jealousy as a villainous character motivation, I really do. it’s one entirely realistic thing to envy someone for having riches, fame, status, influence, the attention of one’s crush, or other such things that are more or less objective and palpable. it’s also entirely a thing to have an inferiority complex and fear or spite people one perceives as being more talented, better looking, stronger, smarter than oneself. but the way these characters are written tends to come across like they’re furious because they’re underwritten gonk and not everyone else is.

... which hey, would be a pretty upsetting thing if it happened to a real person, but I don’t think meta-commentary is the point here, is it? I sincerely hope it isn’t...

fuck this lady

(7/10)

the second leg of Genealogy of the Holy War finds you facing the same sorts of enemies most of the time: half of them are Satanists, and the other half are unfortunate innocents trapped in the crossfire of courtly intrigue. it’s exactly because of this that the arc desperately needs a villain like Hilda.

Hilda is just someone who doesn’t particularly mind if the most effective path up the social ladder involves destroying her relatives, daughter included, or capturing children and forcing them into murder tournaments. how is the imperial machinery of tragedy and death supposed to run without someone like her cranking a couple of the levers? er, I mean, you don’t really crank levers unless you’re doing something weird, but... okay, moving on

amidst all of the battles you might struggle to feel were worth fighting, Hilda here serves as a reminder, as a face of every reason why the Empire is the enemy and must be defeated.

and yes, making Tinny kill her rocks

fuck this guy IN AMERICA

(2.5/10)

not too long ago I would have dropped him a straight zero, but I’ve recently been reading through the Project Exile text dumps for a new Thracia 776 fanslation and what can I say, they put good work into making him tick properly and I essentially have no choice but to keep that sort of thing in consideration when making the ratings, being that all of the other villains are also characters I only have indirect contact with through a translation that may have improved or worsened things.

but the good work is no miracle -- although given much-needed entertainment value, this guy is still who he is: practically a standard-fare asshole miniboss who ends up getting three whole chapters to chirp into. and to make matters worse, you only actually get the payoff to him in one of two possible routes!

I am strong, I am clever, I am handsome, and most importantly, fuck me

(4/10)

I can’t possibly deny that his antics are some of the most hilarious on this list; the ridiculous speeches, the facial expressions from the manga, the fact that he gets demoted on screen... and I mean, they got Kaiji Tang to put voice to his high drama on Heroes, on top of it all!

alas, it just really spoils the fun to a significant extent that his very introduction in Binding Blade sees him macking on a captive prepubescent girl. however entertaining it may be that she snatches his wig on that occasion anyway.

fuck this morph

(5/10)

yeah, some people wish. notably including Brendan Reed-

the thing with Sonia is that she’s a little less believable than most folks in this archetype -- specifically because she’s not, like, working within the structures of power that would let her get away with being as much of a dip as she wants to; she’s earned her influential position by seducing the boss, which is hard to buy when, however attractive she may be, she never has a single positive interaction with anyone and nobody trusts her (barring Ursula on both counts, but she’s not the one who needs to be brought on board anyway). I realize what a phenomenon it is to think with one’s dick, but come on; surely, you don’t let your new friend with benefits tell you how to do your job just because she’s that good in bed or something.

that said, although her overall spot on the plot feels weakly implemented, she still makes for a tremendous bulwark to overcome specifically within Nino’s subplot. what a powerful confrontation against a lifelong abuser she provides in the end!

do not fuck this guy what is wrong with you

(3/10)

Valter is just uncomfortable as a character, which is limbo as far as emotion-inducing goes; it’s not particularly entertaining, and nor is it artfully terrifying in the way that Orson is. furthermore, I normally praise Sacred Stones’s antagonists for averting the way of behaving like a plot device, but this guy is the exception; he seems to primarily show up to cause trouble because trouble needs to be caused.

I feel like he’d have made for a far stronger character concept if his backstory had been handled differently, being more specific in what part of his mind broke when he held the cursed lance, instead of just being “now he does bad things and talks like he’s vaguely horny throughout”.

at least he’s quite a bit entertaining in Heroes where he gets voiced lines and no particular characters or plots to interact with -- but if that’s what it takes to make the character shine, it doesn’t really say good things about him.

fuck beauty

(5.5/10)

so, the truth come out: does this guy is deserve becoming the absolute teacher’s pet he’s been since Radiant Dawn? my verdict on the matter is: not really.

I mean, Path of Radiance actually writes him into a solid niche; for all the big words he emits about being a patron of beauty, he’s ultimately just the same kind of petty, ostentatious garbage that poisons the governance of Begnion, and finally taking him down for good and all makes for an excellent dive after all the work it takes to set the light of justice on him -- not just in Day Breaks (oh gooooooooddd) but over the course of the several chapters it takes.

it’s all downhill from there, though. his appareance in Radiant Dawn is not only unecessary, but also a deviation from the established writing to focus on pallid, ineffective jokes, like someone invented Heroes writing before the thing itself happened. he fights on your side because now he genuinely cares about beauty and art to the point he’ll fight a goddess over it? yeah, that’s not who he was.

and seriously, one strongly gets the impression that, in that appearance onwards, the punchline is just supposed to be that he’s fat, bald, wordy, and has a shitty mustache -- which, besides being blatant fatphobia, is seriously stale; “it’s funny because he’s ugly” is, like, at least two random minibosses per game, usually more.

fuck the senate

(2/10)

although he jabs a lot of the buttons that should make for an entertaining and stalwart hate sink, it ends up not really working.

his narcisism lacks the performatic grandeur of the likes of Narcian; it lands as pastiche at best, and common annoying smugness at worst. and although he’s powerful and influential enough to cause a bunch of problems, he’s introduced at a weird time that fails to make his specfic capabilties relevant to opposing the protagonists, and he ends up not doing a lot more than severely inconveniencing Zelgius (who is on his team) a couple times.

at least, the battle dialogue against him in Part 4 still provides some of the most fierce drags in Radiant Dawn

fuck the valm arc

(0/10)

seriously, fuck it

but ahem, onto the guy in question: he’s an annoying waste of writing space that doesn’t seem to be intended for any reason other than making the rest of Team Bad Guy look good, plain and simple.

you might be thinking, airlock, this is the third Awakening villain you blammed in four posts, are you just biased? the answer is: yes, but even if I were being perfectly fair, let’s be real, antagonists are just not one of that game’s strengths, overall. that just happens sometimes; I can really say the same thing of like Thracia 776, y’know?

fuck playing f- yeah, okay, that’s just low-hanging fruit

(??/10)

honestly, from this distance, none of Fates’s fixed antagonists bar Anankos really give me the impression of not just being despicable pastiche, but I’m guessing he’s supposed to be the one who actually intended to take it as a niche?

so, I’m just going to assume you hated this, but how was it? are you glad it’s over, or do you regret having read it at all? we’re probably not going to be spared from one of these characters on Three Houses, but specifically how much would you like to hate the one that comes along? to be honest, your thoughts aren’t remotely as good as mine, so I wouldn’t bother replying or reblogging to share them, worm. what? you’ll do it anyway!? how dare you! do you know what I’m capable of!?

[roxannarambles]

Roxy Rambles About Mystic Messenger (& mostly 707)

So, last year, I saw one of my online friends posting screenshots on their twitter. It looked like some kind of chatroom, but their tweets referred to it as a game, so I got confused and asked them about it. They explained it was actually a phone game-- specifically, a story-focused dating game aimed at a primarily female audience, also known as an otome. 

(click below for full post. Caution: contains major spoilers for Mystic Messenger, as well as opinions. oh gosh. opinions oh no.)

Amused, I downloaded the game just to satiate my curiosity. And what I found was pleasantly more engaging and well-done then I had expected. While I wouldn’t call the writing of Mystic Messenger to be consistently fantastic-- there are ups and downs-- there are definitely plenty of spots that are downright poignant.

There’s a cast of characters to choose from, of course, as these games go, and you can choose to date them one at a time to play out all the endings of the game. First I dated this young college boy who was addicted to gaming, and who had never dated before and was still struggling to adjust to living alone now and being a new adult. His gaming addiction sprung from his depression and general sense of aimlessness at what he wanted to do in life. Honestly, there was a lot to relate to with the character, and I feel like the storyline was, for the most part, thoughtful and maturely handled. 

Next I dated the female character, and much of her storyline and character development was very engaging and even poignant as well. She worked as an assistant for a major company and was deeply overworked and unhappy in her job but felt kind of trapped in it and lacked confidance to break away. You become her friend and confidant and cheer her on and encourage her and she eventually gains the self-knowledge and courage she needs to find her own path in life. Again, so much to relate to and so many great messages there. I genuinely enjoyed it.

There’s certainly some aspects of this game that were not written quite so well; sometimes the drama really went over the top. This is especially the case with Zen’s route where his abusive family was hypercontrolling over his life because he was . . . too beautiful? I found it rather silly. There’s a LOT of abusive family/tragic backstories that went a little over the top in these stories, but I suppose the soap operatic mellodrama is supposed to be part of the appeal.

Despite those weaknesses in the writing, it does not disguise the strengths, and when they shined through, they really shined through; with dialogue that usually felt very natural and on-the-mark and some really great moments.

And then . . . there was 707.

This is the character I ended up liking too much. You can’t even date him until you earn enough of the in-game special currency to unlock his route (or spend real money). He was swathed largely in mystery as a hacker who kept his privacy and a lot of secrets. His presence in the chats mainly consisted of adding a hyper, cheerful, goofy presence, joking about, being good-natured, launching the occasional prank campaign (which at first I perceived as needlessly cruel, but as time went on the tone in which it was intended was further revealed; the same could be said about Jahee saying very nosy and cruel things at times about Yoosung, etc.) and babbling about his passions (which largely consisted of cars, cats, and Dr. Pepper).

And yes, I ended up liking him the best. One of the best things about the game was the phone calls you received from the characters. They were generously long, well-written and well voice-acted. You actually get to know the cast of characters very well that way. When I initially hated Zen because of his narcissism, he called me during other routes and I learned a lot about him that way and found out he was actually a good guy (they just perhaps oversold the narcissism to a ridculous degree at times). Same for Seven—you knew so precious little of him, but his phone calls on other routes revealed just a tad more, giving you a flavor for his presence that transcended the relative lack of information. He especially became involved during the latter part of the story routes, when the action and danger elements of the plot kicked in and he was tasked with trying to keep you safe.

Ahhhh, I don’t know. I’m trying to recall the moment I decided he was the best one, but I can’t. I do remember the way he signed off his phone calls was always charming as heck. At some point I decided I would date the nerd as the last one, because that is how I wished to finish it, as he was my favorite.

I wasn’t entirely stupid, and I caught the hints in the game at a very angsty and dramatic backstory for him. So I knew it wouldn’t be all fun and happytimes, but he was still the best one to me anyway. And it was fun to spend time speculating on his mysteries while dating the others.

Over my winter break I got the Christmas DLC to noodle around with before continuing with the main story, since it ‘twas the season. They let you date anyone in that short little sidestory. I had not selected anyone in particular when I started but it rapidly became obvious there was no way I was going to do anyone but him, as I was too impatient. After that, well, during the main story I was SUPPOSED to do Jumin’s route first. That had been my intent. And I started out that way! But I quickly abandoned it.

Seven, like the others, has things that are easy to relate to. In his case, I found his energy, playfulness and optimism even in the face of darkness to be highly relatable. He was actually very depressed and had seriously negative self-perceptions and had a very painful past. But he was both positive and negative at once. And I know that experience. To be both optimistic and deeply pessimistic; to be both cheerful and playful yet also in so much pain. To like yourself but also to hate yourself quite strongly. It does not make much sense, but you can be both at once, and it has been my case for many years. The playfulness and antics helped Seven to stay bouyed above the ocean of pain, to survive, and I feel at times like that is what keeps me afloat too. We differ in that I tend to gaze directly into the dark pit of my despair far more often than he did, while he tended to do everything he could to pretend it did not exist; yet still, there’s much to relate to and understand.

And there’s much to admire. Because while part of it may be escapism from pain and failing to cope with your sense of sorrow or emptiness, a sheer coping mechanism that is not truly coping, it’s also . . . admirable. Because part of it is truly, genuinely who you are: a happy, optimisitc person, who manages to hold on to some of that spark and cheer and refuses to let it be consumed by the black. You still cling to joy. You don’t forget how to have fun. You are . . . incomplete, but at least you are still fighting, still searching. To keep that spark alive? That is so brave.

And I love him for that, and for his weirdness. He loves the funny and the weird and the wonderful, and he’s imaginiative. Perhaps fantasy and imagination is part of what lets us feed our spark in dark, cold times. He’s creative and incredibly intelligent and talented. He has hobbies and passions (cool ones!). He is kind and generous and giving to others, always there to help them out. There is so much depth and complexity, not just a surface-level cheap phone game drama. And the voice acting, especially, imparts so much sincerity and life.

Plus, he made me a robotic puppy as a gift. If that’s not the coolest, most sweetest, fantastic way to express your love, I don’t know what is.

I had to go through QUITE the dramatic, angst-packed storyline on his route, because the writers of this game tend to go overboard on that, and I never do well with heavy angst. While I did not enjoy the angst, and it was honestly rather difficult and painful to get through, I was willing to stick it out because of how excellent a character Seven is.

I’m not about to claim Mysme is a perfect game. There are some elements I find downright problematic. When I went back later and played Jumin’s route, for example, I found it pretty disturbing; his “good” ending seems to teach the impressionable young people playing this game that it’s okay if a man locks you up in his apartment and refuses to let you leave-- as long as you’re patient and understanding, he’ll eventually change and become a better person. (Guys? This is not OK.) There’s some crap I could get into when discussing Rika as well, but I think you get the idea that the story isn’t always perfect. 

That said, I don’t expect anything to be perfect, and there are a ton of positives to be found in this otome as well. Overall, I really enjoyed the game. I haven’t played any other otomes, but I suspect this one is a cut above the rest. 

In the end, I guess the moral of my story is . . . try out something new. You never know when something really silly ends up being a lot better then expected.

[nerdsideofthemedia]

Should the term “Mary Sue” be retired?

The original. 

I didn’t have any intention of posting my non-RWBY, non-MHA blog posts here, but here’s this one seems to be becoming important with the rise of the claims that Arya Stark is a Mary Sue. So here it goes:

In my walks through Dan Olson’s twitter, I came across this:

Which got me thinking: is the term “Mary Sue” completely pointless?

Before I wonder about this question, let’s take a quick journey through time. In the 70s, Paula Smith noticed a character pattern among the Star Trek fanfic and created a parody to point this out, “A Trekkies’s Tale”, whose protagonist was called Mary Sue. During the following years, the “Mary Sue” wasn’t necessarily considered as something bad, instead it was considered as a phase every writer will go through as it was intimately associated with self-inserts and was only applied to fan-fictions1;2.

In recent years, the term has left the fanfic and began being applied to original fiction too, losing its meaning along the way and gaining a pretty negative connotation. In fact, nowadays, “Mary Sue” is such an extremely subjective term that even TV Tropes admits:

“TV Tropes doesn’t get to set what the term means, the best we can do is capture the way it is used.” 1

Hell, I’ve even come across with this subjectivity, as once I called Orihime from Bleach a Mary Sue, on youtube, and one person defended my use of it by explaining she was liked by everyone, which wasn’t the reason I considered a Mary Sue to begin with and consider that justification to be pretty dumb.

Why is being liked by everyone not a good parameter?

Have you ever read/watched a shonen? Most of the good guys are on good terms. Even when there is some animosity between a main character and another one, it’s usually because of the other, like Vegeta from Dragon Ball Z, who dislikes Goku because he’s better than him, not because of anything egregious the latter did. In “My Hero Academia”, Bakugo hated Midoriya mostly because of pride and arrogance (they are now on good terms).  Yes, the Avengers may have not loved each other from the get-go, but, by the end of the film, they were ready to live happily ever after. And when the sequels even stop (they never will), they will end up being on good terms.

Another definition of what is a “Mary Sue” is it’s a character that is overpowered/great set of skills + tragic backstory, (sometimes even without the latter). So let’s take a look at:

Superman: an alien whose planet was destroyed, adopted by 2 humans, and has a set of skills that would make Goku turn… Well, he would probably just find it cool, but Vegeta’s head would explode for sure as he threw a temper tantrum. His powers include flying, super speed and strength (to the point of almost completely invulnerability), X-ray and heat vision.

Bruce Wayne: a poor (not literally) orphan who was raised by his butler and whose riches go beyond Taylor Swift’s wildest dreams, let alone poor (far more literal) little us. Thanks to it, he has access to technology that has little to no limitations, yet his money never ends.

Goku: an alien whose planet was destroyed, adopted by an old man who was killed by him in giant monkey-form. Not only he can fly, he is particularly powerful even for his people even though he’s a low-level specimen according to the planet’s hierarchic structure.

Ichigo: a guy who turns out to be part-Hollow, part-Shinigami, part-Vizard, part-who-the-hell-even-cares-anymore, even though some of them are pretty rare.

Harry Potter: an orphan raised by his aunt and her family, who all treat him badly, finds out he’s a wizard and finds out his parents have left him a mountain of gold (literally). Everyone either admires him or feels jealous as he is famous for “defeating” a particularly powerful wizard as a baby, without any damages besides a scar. He’s also part of a prophecy.

What about those self-inserts?

I guess we could still use the term as just a self-insert, but considering that most of the time we don’t know the writers, then we can only know their self-insertion if they tell us.

It also doesn’t justify its negative connotation. Writers are people, I presume, which means they have flaws. So why is a character based on oneself bad? Provided the writers are realistic and self-aware, those should be some of the most realistic characters. Now, I know there’s a trap in here, which is the tendency of favoring ourselves and make us just a bit (or a lot) more special than we actually are, but 1) this doesn’t necessarily happen to every self-insert; 2) that can happen whenever writers begin to favor a character for whatever reason, even if it wasn’t a self-insert, leading it to become more and more special or less flawed.

They’re the personification of perfection.

OK, except perfection seems to be kind of subjective, since what I like isn’t the same as everyone else’s. I mean I may like active characters and some may like passive characters. You may think perfection is pizza without pineapple, while I say “you are objectively wrong”.

Jokes asides, being different human beings, usually we end up writing “perfect” characters with our definition of it, which may not correspond to someone else’s.

For example, Bella Swan is called “Mary Sue” a lot for being perfect, but she’s deeply flawed. She’s co-dependent and suicidal. Edward Cullen is the one “Gary Stu” that actually stuck, yet he’s manipulative and a stalker. Yet, there is truth to the claim they are perfect, not to me, but to Stephanie Meyers as they are both idealizations to her, regardless of our opinions of them.

I suppose a character can be drop dead gorgeous, have all sorts of skills and being loved by everyone, but, eventually, he/she will make something that many will consider to be wrong. If that doesn’t happen, then there’s probability not a good conflict, which reveals that, maybe, the problem is in the story itself, not necessarily in the character.

Speaking of subjectivity in flaws and virtues…

“So why did you used to call Orihime a Mary Sue?”

Well, because I thought her flaws were inconsequential with Bleach begging me to sympathize with her for awful reasons and smart characters being really stupid, meaning causing unnecessary plot-hole or plot-contrivance for her. The few most glaring examples I recall (and I’ve read/watched Bleach at least half a century ago, so it’s possible there are a few lapses in my memory) being:

Her almost kissing Ichigo while he was unconscious. That scene is framed as if I am supposed to sympathize with her, instead of what it actually is: creepy as hell and also falls under almost sexual assault in many countries.

Her having an obsession for Ichigo to the point of only thanking him for coming for her in her mind, even though Rukia, Chad, Uryu and Renji were also there to save her. This again is framed as I’m supposed to empathize with her, instead of thinking she’s being narrow-minded and has an unhealthy obsession with Ichigo.

About others acting stupid: Uryu takes her to where Ichigo and Ulquiorra are fighting even though where they were before, Ichigo was losing cause he was holding back to avoid hurting her. Yes, the other place was bigger, but their powers were huge and Uryu taking Orihime should have been a stupid idea (and he’s supposed to be smart).

Not to mention, of course, she resurrects Ichigo by crying and yelling his name which was also major bullshit.

And yes, it’s time to talk about the gender-thing and to admit to my own prejudices despite being a woman, because Orihime isn’t the only character I know who has her flaws not being acknowledged or being perceived as good. Many male characters have all of those yet, I still don’t call them “Gary Stu” or any other male equivalent.

Sun Wukong from RWBY has pretty much all the same problems as Orihime: he stalks Blake for months yet faces no actual consequences. And his actions were framed in the show as “needed”, even though they weren’t since the entire Menagerie arc could be written without him with only minor changes. Creepy actions being framed as right and sympathetic – check.

He also abandons his team several times, which, again, was inconsequential (even if he confesses to being an awful leader in V6) and no way in hell a combat school would interrupt classes for an entire year. He’s completely oblivious of the Faunus struggle, though he’s a Faunus and goes to school in one of the most racist territories. And Blake goes from super paranoid to so relaxed she doesn’t even believe him when he says he saw a WF member wearing a mask for no apparent reason. If I had to guess it’s because if she kept being super paranoid, it would stand to reason she would be the one noticing Ilia spying all by herself, rendering him almost useless and without interrupting her talk to Ghira, which would have made Sun completely pointless. At some point, Orihime became all about Ichigo, Sun was always all about Blake (until V6).

Like I said, I have criticized Sun for being badly written, unnecessary and the contrivances his presence demanded, but I have never ever called a “Gary Stu”. Looking back, I think it’s a combination of a few reason:

I know “Mary Sue” is a term too subjective to be used without an explanation afterwards;

We just don’t tend to hold the same standards for male characters;

Even when we use them for male characters, it almost never sticks.

And I know I’m not the only one doing this.

Once, I came across an article that accused several characters of being a “Mary Sue”, including Orihime, but because she’s too perfect (are you sure about that?) and Sailor Moon, yet claimed Goku wasn’t one.  It’s particularly funny, because Sailor Moon is written to be more flawed than Goku (even if I much higher tolerance for Dragon Ball and DBZ to Sailor Moon).

Goku is an absent father and husband, yet his family never really holds that against him. His wife may complain about it a few times during the anime, but there’s no real strife between them and Gohan never holds it against him either. He gives Cell a senzu bean so that he and Gohan can have a fair fight, even though the entire world is at stake. It still is mostly inconsequential, until Gohan’s arrogance gets in the way.

Meanwhile, Sailor Moon is stupid, coward and petty many times, and it’s clear the writers knew it because they acknowledge those flaws within the show. She is mocked because of them, and her lack of resilience even leads to the death of one of the Sailors in a season finale, if I remember correctly (admittedly, I watched it 5 centuries ago, so I might be wrong). Yes, I know they come back from the death.

This is not an argument that Goku should be called a “Mary Sue/Gary Stu”, rather that the term is heavily gendered. It’s much more applied to female characters and even when used for a male one, it almost never sticks. Even in the example I gave, Edward Cullen, which was successfully labeled as “Gary Stu”, still feels like it was gendered-motivated. Not because of his own, obviously, but for the target audience’s: the majority girls and women. So there we notice another double-standard: the sex of the target audience also affects the claims to “Sueness”.

Ultimately, I have to agree with Dan, with the term “Mary Sue” being too subjective to actually have any validity and is deeply rooted in sexism. Explaining why a character doesn’t work for us  and why we think they’re badly written is far more productive. Let’s keep in mind, we aren’t supposed to like every character writers make, even the ones who are meant to be likable and relatable.

Note: Yes, I watched Overly Sarcastic Productions’ video on the subject. While I like Red’s take, I’d say almost no character in original fiction fits the mold. That in itself wouldn’t be the problem, but the fact that it will remain extremely subjective, I still find the term to be counter-productive, heavily gendered and it needs to die.

1 – https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MarySue

2 – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue

[toasttz]

From the Tabletop #2

So, back in the world of tabletop gaming, I figured I'd share a highlight reel of the most-recent campaign in our Exalted 3e game. This party actually started off on a pretty strong footing before it all came undone by... I mean, just take a wild guess which half of the party turned this game into a slog. First, introductions, of course. First off, Taiga's player created Valentinian, a knight archetype. His whole thing was that every time he reincarnated, then Exalted, his previous memories overwrote those of whatever body he ended up in. This is how a grizzled war veteran of eons past ended up as a teenaged girl who, according to the party, had a phat butt. Valentinian was trying to reunite with his six besties, the Oath Warriors. More on them later. Zen's player created Volkenstein, a wrestler who... was, frankly, quite terrible at working the crowd. His player kept insisting he was a face and kept trying to equate it to the WWE, whereupon we had to keep reminding him that this is, in fact, the Bronze Age. So he ended up inebriated (the entire party had alcoholism as a flaw) and half-aware most of the campaign. The GM finally tired of his storyless-ness and began creating rivals and mentors for him, all of whom had reason to take the piss. The thing that irks me is that Volkenstein totally, totally could've worked too, but he always acted so half-hearted about everything. Most disappointing of our team was Maxwell, who was the successor to Targon. He was built to be a well-read scholar and, at first anyway, was played that way. Unfortunately, his heavy over-reliance on his Lunar Mate, Selene (yes, seriously), an owl lunar (yes, seriously) for just about everything up to and including his limit trigger (more on this in a moment), and we realized that the character who should've been the player was an NPC and the one who should've been an NPC was foisted into our circle. Maxwell briefly claimed to be a student under Valentinian, but the latter more humored the former than mentored, on account Maxwell was a surrender-monkey with no backstory or motivations. You might notice a recurring theme with these players. We sure did. Lastly was my new character, Scarlet. I started with the concept of "pirate" and rolled with it, so she and Valentinian shared some aspects of character, both being melee/parry characters with some charms in athletics and the sort. Scarlet, however, was a socialite with a specialty in seduction (of course) and I fluffed her out as being built like Bayonetta. Eventually, the GM and another player compared her to Fate: Grand Order's Francis Drake, and that kind of stuck too. Funny enough, despite this leaning, I rarely actually got to employ those charms (the figurative and literal) as the GM immediately shot down any attempt of my doing so, so she became more of a face/thief sort who went heavy into larceny and sail charm trees. Her whole gimmick was she was chasing after the lost, legendary treasure of my previous character, which quickly became known as the One Piece. Because, of course. Scarlet and Valentinian were largely the driving forces of the story until the very end. Speaking of, Scarlet and Valentinian (affectionately nicknamed "Valley" by the flirtatious Scarlet) met before the game began - on account good character building should include some intra-party relationships - and their mutual goals were already understood between the two, with the added caveat that Scarlet wanted to boink Valley, and Valley was having precisely zero of that. Maxwell joined us after the GM and Valentinian dragged his motivation out of him. That went nowhere, much as Maxwell himself. I... actually don't remember why or how Volkenstein joined us. Scarlet was too busy breaking and entering into a rich sailor's house to steal a safe she believed contained Master of the Eternal Golden Paradise's journal. I got away with it but required some assistance from the others to open it, as it released a spirit who tried to act as a form of intrusion detection, but we deftly dealt with that. Before we knew it we were off, as Scarlet moonlit as a merchant to move safely port to port. This created a small number of issues, not the least of which was Scarlet was not actually guild certified... As I mentioned, Scarlet was actually social built, and this game maintained all the accumulated exp from the past two campaigns mentioned last time. So when the GM told me to roll for Scarlet's seductive dance-advertisement when we rolled into a new port, I did well. Really well. Freakishly well. So well it caused a riot in the port for some orange marmalade. And a Dragonblood official threatening to arrest me for trading without a guild license. After flashing some skin, he agreed to "renegotiate" with us in an hour's time. The team briefly convened and, rather than just going for the most immediately-obvious option, I decided to be far dumber about it: we'll ASSASSINATE THE DRAGONBLOOD! This went poorly, short version, and the DB got away as we pulled out of port. For the remainder of the campaign, Scarlet repeatedly lamented how "I should've just fucked the Dragonblood." So, with some new products in tow, we headed towards the island of Dhaam-bel (I think that's how it's spelled), an island that values strength and swolness. There, we learned about the land war in Vietnam, as it later came to be known, as Valley's companion Khai Jhonn assisted in leading the efforts for the rebels and various mercenary groups against the Grand Duke of the entrenched government. Khai Jhonn was one of the most widely-loved NPCs of the campaign, due to his incredibly deadpan nature and his tendency to troll the circle. Somehow, we got caught up in this in a stretch of the game that went on entirely longer than it should have - and resulted in the absolute destruction of no less than three major cities. One among which, we didn't even mean to destroy. Scarlet, at this point, grew bored and ransacked one town on the coast, before fucking off to do her own thing because she owned the ship, God-damn it, and she could. She went out to Flotsam, selling Dhaam-bel-ian goods for more protein-packed foodstuffs which she then returned to sell at a grossly inflated price. This plan... did not pan out. While away, Maxwell of all people somehow became King and instituted full-on socialism. Cue Angry Scarlet Noises. The price of her cargo flatlined in the short time she was away. However, due to a player absence one session, Valentinian took over, put sensible economic reform into place, and set Scarlet up with an official letter of mark. We then had a crazy naval battle, including the summoning of the Lord of Whales, burned down another town, and had the final battle where we helped Khai Jhonn push into the north. At this point, Khai Jhonn was just flying around atop an electric cloud dragon thing that Maxwell gave him... which Khai Jhonn never returned, surprising no one. Around this point, we agreed we had been here far too long, and decided to move on elsewhere. Khai Jhonn couldn't come with us, but this may be because the GM probably wanted to give Maxwell reprieve from the endless ribbing. Then we entered the Wyld. TL;DR, it turns out Maxwell had a cult. If you're noticing a trend in "characters who should not have cults, having cults" congrats, you understand why cults are now banned from our circle. Ever since, our GM has put a moratorium on the cult merit, much to our immense relief. Short version, we fucked around in the Wyld for a bit, the storyteller started this "Manchurian Candidate" gambit, implying Maxwell's cult had been dead for a long time and had been replaced by fairies (and continued acting more and more bizarre as time went on). Maxwell insisted, no, this was totally on the level, which Scarlet and Valentinian became increasingly frustrated with and, ultimately, resulted in a dead old man and the two sword-wielders storming back to the cult town and slaughter them all. Long story short: we killed most of them. The remainder surrendered. Skipping ahead a small bit, around this point, Maxwell actually hit limit. Problem is, no one actually knew his limit trigger. In fact, I never saw his character sheet and I don't think anyone else did either. But his limit trigger was people insulting his wife's honor (Selene, for those following along). Scarlet, repeatedly and teasingly, joked that she and Selene enjoyed some lesbian escapades, which actually set off his limit break. And, in a bit of meta-knowledged induced schadenfreude, resulted in Scarlet decapitating Maxwell with a hearty "Ahoy, fuccboi!" Around this time, Valentinian's player and our GM traded places for the next few sessions, so I'll call the story here for now. Join us next time for the Legend of Gwyn, Volkenstein develops an aversion to radishes, Maxwell gets replaced by Stockholm Dinosaur Maiden, and Scarlet continues her pursuit of the One Piece. D&D stories coming soon.

[devintrinidad]

10 GIFs of Anime that You Love, Then Tag 10 People

Just got tagged by @chemicalflashes.

Durarara

One of the first few anime I watched. I adored how the intricate stories were intertwined with others; how a bystander in one scene could be a hero or a villain in another. A choice that one makes can easily have devestaring consequences. And of course, the mastermind himself: Orihara Izaya.

Death Note

Oldie, yes. Overrated, probably. Completely worth watching and still able to discuss a decade after completion? Along with a few movies, musical adaptations, and a live action remake? Oh, yes!

Favorite characters are Near and Misa. The former for his cool nature that resembles L’s, but ultimately serves as a better allegory for Justice because he doesn’t find Kira for fun. No, he captures and probably would have him imprisoned for life because it’s his duty as L’s successor. He’s also heavily under-appreciated by the fandom. The latter for her adaptability and unpredictability in situations. Did you guys watch the Yorsuba arc? The girl was calculating how cute she was going to be. Plus, she’s not mentally well (her parents were murdered in front of her), but she still managed to handle herself SO WELL during her time as a prisoner under L’s inhuman methods to seek out the Second Kira. Again, she’s under-appreciated.

Death Parade

Brilliant idea. Has a possible tie in to Death Note. The opening was laughably so misleading!

There are some flaws, like plot holes and unfinished storylines, but it held up pretty well. We learned about the characters through how they interact with one another—especially when put under pressure. The Arbiters are amazing in that they can’t question the system, and yet, in the end, Decim tries to understand and formulate how Chiyuki is going to be finally put to rest.

If nothing else, just watch for the skating scene and the opening sequence.

Cells at Work (Hataraku Saibou)

How could I not add this show??? I’m not that great science, but I have been intimately acquainted with how the body works (I’m frankly disappointed no one has called 1146 a granulocyte yet and we haven’t seen any neurons in the manga 😞). Also...3803 is basically me: I’m terrible at directions, I’m continuously learning new things because I moved away, and the way she met 1146...is kind of how I met my best friend, hehehe.

That said, I’m really in love with this anime/manga fandom and hope to continue writing for it. (Insert self promotion: please read my fanfics on my main platform which is ffnet!)

Another reason why I love CAW...

The neutrophil squad.

...and wbc x rbc...and by that, I mean any or all of those wbc squad can get paired with 3803. Because I have a soft spot for reverse harems. *cough Ouran High School Host Club*

Hetalia: Axis Powers

This show made me love geography and my country so much. It’s funny, it’s hilarious, and it’s so heartwarming how the fandom likes to make all sorts of fanmade stuff to expand on what Hima-papa gives us. (YES, IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 2018, I SHALL REFER TO HIMARYU-SENSEI AS HIMA-PAPA. FIGHT ME.)

Is Hetalia dead? I don’t know, but the fandom and one particular FanFiction by @cultureandseptember really helped me out a few years back.

Bungou Stray Dogs

I love literature, good looking animation, and smarmy little know-it-alls who like to play the fool. Hehehe, I’m planning on reading No Longer Human when I get the time. Does that mean Osamu Dazai is my favorite character? Well...

Can you blame me if I said yes? He’s so charming and enigmatic that you can’t help but love him. However, I think I really love him because I struggle with dark thoughts and suicidal ideation from time to time. I haven’t actively sought it out quite like he has in the past, but well... hehehe! I can also relate because he’s kind of like an outsider in the Agency due to his past—he’s different because he can’t actively cancel out your abilities, which always makes him a threat.

Anywhoozles, I’m still waiting to see the movie...Le sigh.

K Project

This. This is not the best anime out there. Seriously.

The animation gets wonky here and there, they do the women in here a huge disservice, and they put too much emphasis on how great Mikoto Suoh. Like, he’s great and all, but the dude has no effect on the story except for the last season.

With that said, I think the main selling point here isn’t the anime, but the side materials like the manga/novels. You get to appreciate the backstories of so many of the characters and you get to feel for them because some of them have suffered so much! (Read: Fushimi Saruhiko).

I think you can get the same amount of enjoyment if you stick to the novels/manga.

Favorite characters: Scepter 4 Alphabet Squad. They are the best boys. Also, Lieutenant Awashima Seri. And Fushimi Saruhiko. You know what? Just put down Blue Clan here. They’re all nerds and they enjoy it.

Also: Domyoiji Andy reminds me of U-4989 from CAW. So...

Violet Evergarden

Remember how I said that I liked literature? This entire anime is about the power of not only the written word, but of also the act of writing, sending, and receiving those words. The anime may be episodic in nature, but you can really connect with the character through her terrible backstory and really feel for her when she realizes that she needs to face her past. PTSD is real and I think the anime really handled the post war aspect of this torn down world really well.

I’m also a sucker for typewriters, steam punk, and characters that don’t really know how to function in society (but learn over the course of the story).

Watch this if you want feels...and get ready for episode ten.

Samurai Champloo

This takes place in feudal era Japan.

But there’s rapping.

And breakdancing.

And guys spraying paint everywhere.

Also, there’s a sunflower samurai we gotta look for???

Hahahah, while episodic in nature, this was a joy to watch. You never get to know the characters really well and when we reach our mission’s end, it seems to fall short, but it’s not about that. The journey is what makes this anime worth it simply because the characters interactions are rife with hilarity and all three mains balance each other out. There’s a fanfic out there that describes them in detail, but in a succinct manner that had me melting. (https://m.fanfiction.net/s/2351750/1/The-Order-of-Things) check it out when you have the time.

Anyway, for those of you who have watched it, I sincerely hope that they meet again in the future.

(But, let’s be real. They probably didn’t).

Tokyo Mew Mew

Guys.

This isn’t a joke.

I have a soft spot for this anime because this was my first ever anime I watched where I realized that this was anime. This was like my gateway anime. Not Sailor Moon. Not Naruto.

This.

Looking back on this, it wasn’t the best—it’s your typical monster of the week deal with some environmental activism involved but for what it’s worth...it’s good??? Like, even the 4Kids dub (DONT CRUCIFY ME) even added some songs that were really great??? Bree Sharp’s Don’t Wake Me Up was my jam??? It fit better than the original Japanese counterpart???

TMM also introduced me to shipping, FanFiction, and amvs. That’s right, without this little gem, I would be writing/writing/thinking about FanFiction. I probably wouldn’t have been an anime watcher without this magical girl anime from the early 2000s.

So, yeah. This anime will always have a place in my heart because without it, I probably wouldn’t have become the person I am today. Thank you, Tokyo Mew Mew.

(This was also the birth of my first OTP before I knew what OTPs were: Kisshu/Ichigo...although nowadays, people are calling them Quiche/Strawberry? Hehehe, there’s so many things wrong here, I only like interactions, not the implications. That’s why I’m completely okay with Aoyama/Ichigo being endgame—and they’re actually really cute in the sequel manga???)

Honorable mentions (because I only thought of these now after I wrote analyses and gifs):

Five Centimeters Per Second

Ouran High School Host Club

Kimi no Nawa

Wolf Children

Psycho Pass

Trigun

(There’s like a dozen more, but nah. I’m good).

Aaaaaaaaaand that’s a wrap!!!

I’m tagging everyone who reads this! MWUAJAHAHAH!

I’m kidding; I don’t have that many friends here (if any) who are into anime so, umm...try it!

Thanks to @chemicalflashes for this amazing opportunity to find out why I love anime so much!

[lia-nikiforov]

Winter 2018 Anime Final Review

Why yes, pretty much all the Spring premieres are done (don’t even remind me haha I’m so far behind) and this is horribly late, I had a busy couple of weeks ;---; and am still struggling to catch up, but here’s my final rundown of this long slow winter! Worst to best, as always.

Dropped

Basilisk Ouka Ninpou Chou: Although I’d said I’d keep watching for the Nobunaga twist, given the onslaught of new stuff for Spring, it’s unsustainable to keep watching something so mediocre I don’t even find anything to say about it. Also Nobunaga hasn’t been mentioned in three episodes.

DUMPSTER FIRE

Darling in the Franxx: So we’re halfway through the show and still feels nothing of importance has happened, except we learned “lesbians are not viable, what a relief” and also KOKORO REALLY WANTS TO MAKE BABIES. The whole Kokoro business is very unsavory because on the one hand the writing is a dick to Walking Fat Joke Futoshi, but on the other hand Futoshi is an entitled Nice Guy who acts like Kokoro has some obligation to return his feelings, so basically everyone sucks lmao. Btw, does anyone know what happened with episode 13? I went to watch it but what I got instead was a Deadman Wonderland episode, complete with the story of Palurdo meeting Lab Experiment-turned-Beast Waifu as children and making a promise that would subsequently be forgotten until they meet again in their teenage years. Jesus, does Womenz are Beastz: The Anime have a single original idea?

How am I supposed to measure my own disinterest and contempt

This basically means I didn’t care for these shows. I don’t hate them but I was aggressively unengaged in them and I can’t really rank them from worst to best because that would imply me having any measurable emotional reaction to them

Violet Evergarden: I don’t think I have much to add about this one that I haven’t said before. Tryhard Sad Anime Girl stories rehashing old clichés with little novelty to them,  with a bonus of a super poorly explained and thought out child super soldier tragic backstory that still has me ?????? The final episode has the addendum of trying to redeem That One Asshole in a “he treats her bad because he’s sad about his brother dying sob sob sob he’s totally not a jerk” and i was very annoyed by that.

Koi wa Ameagari no You ni: It’s complicated to talk about this show. I really liked the first episode, hated the 4-6, then was mostly bored by the rest of it. The whole romance angle was completely dropped in the latter half, but I’m not even sure if that’s a good thing given how tastelessly it was being handled in some moments, or a bad one given how bland everything else was. It felt like Akira’s crush on Kondo turned out to be insignificant in the grand scheme of things. It also felt like Akira was profoundly underdeveloped, and it bothered me because Kondo was developed properly. His character felt more fully realized than hers. Like idk, I just cared so little for the last few episodes and it didn’t feel like Akira’s emotional progression was very connected with the first half of the show. 

Fate/Extra Last Encore: I don’t even have a screenshot. Apparently the reason the show started so late into the season is that it took a long time to produce, and apparently there are two more episodes that will be released at some point in July. But really, what matters is that I have no idea of what this show was trying to accomplish. The characters were a bunch of pieces of cardboard spouting pseudo nihilistic philosophical nonsense and I don’t even know how to describe the plot. It was generic in its Boss of the Week approach but the execution was often very flat. Definitely none of the fun from Apocrypha’s cool characters was to be had in this iteration of the franchise.

Too much iyashikei

This season we had too much iyashikei and I’m burned out. Here are the ones I didn’t hate but also wasn’t super in love with.

Miira no Kaikata: I think this show would’ve worked better as 3-minute vignettes. 20 minutes of it was a bit too much and I struggled to pay attention. I also felt the dragon and MukuMuku had very tangential roles. I don’t have a whole lot to say. It’s cute, if cute is your jam this show is for you. Connie is best smol monster.

Hakumei to Mikochi: Another cute show that gains extra points for its somewhat unique setting, beautiful color palette and picture book aesthetic and because the two main girls are great characters. I particularly liked the first and last episodes. It’s a relaxing, fun little show

Sanrio Danshi: The harbinger of feminism made into a toy commercial, while not quite iyashikei, is still a slice of life that just occassionally indulged in too much melodrama. It was nonetheless a fun little thing that managed to turn cynical consumerism into a positive message for boys: it’s okay to like non-traditionally-masculine things. One of the details I liked most was that none of the boys had to give up on their previous groups of friends even after “coming out”, Kouta’s friends and Shuu’s team were supportive of them and even participated in their dumbass musical play. Some may even read this show as a not-so-subtle allegory on homosexuality and while I don’t think this was Sanrio’s intent (their intent is to broaden their market, plain and simple) the fact that it works so well with that reading is honestly great. I had very minimal expectations for this show and I’m happy it turned out better than those.

Classicaloid 2: Classicaloid isn’t quite iyashikei either but it fits in the “didn’t love it, didn’t hate it” category. I’m a huge fan of season one, but unfortunately a big part of S2 failed to capture the magic. I think most of it was restored in the second cour, specially with brilliant episodes such as the one where Dovo-chan becomes a super-realistic painting of himself, and the last three episodes really captured what made Classicaloid great. I’ve really come to love this cast, so I wouldn’t complain if we got more seasons (please do Vivaldi!!!)

Shonen is a Good Genre, Actually

Shonen as a genre/demographic is much reviled for its repetitive clichés and childish stories, but I think we live at a time in which we can have well-executed shonen anime that, although falling for the same old clichés, have enough heart and sincerity that makes them enjoyable. This part also isn’t necessarily ranked, since my favorite one will change depending on which day you ask me

Nanatsu no Taizai: Imashime no Fukkatsu: As I have mentioned before, this second season seems to be the polar opposite of the first one’s rapid pace. It’s been a while since I read the manga, but I feel like it took a lot less to get to the mid-season cutoff point there than this anime would lead you to believe, especially the training part felt excruciatingly long. NanaTai has other various flaws including its 1000% not funny harrassment jokes and the dumb introduction of quantified “power levels” (why Suzuki), but characters like Diane, King and Ban give the show a unique flavor. And I’m not even gonna pretend to be unbiased, I just love everything involving Ban, even the weird and questionable choice of bringing Elaine back. I’m excited that we’re finally approaching Escanor’s arrival.

Yowapeda Glory Road: I also forgot to grab a screenshot lmao. Yowapeda is a very particular beast, and with its episode count already in the hundreds, it’s not something I’d reccommend unless you’re super into dragged out ridiculous sports anime. This second season of Onoda’s second year has not been without its flaws either, starting with the, imho absurd persistence in making Sohoku look like underdogs even though they’re reigning champions. It’s made a lot of the first two days of the Interhigh feel a lot grimmer than this cheerful show ought to. Kaburagi is still an insufferable character, and the fact that he drags the team down doesn’t help him either, and I just wish the writers would let Best Boy Teshima win anything. I hope the second day ends on a lighter note, because the gloom and doom is making this a less enjoyable watch than it should be

Mahoutsukai no Yome: I feel a little better about this one knowing the final was anime-original, but at the same time I’m beyond livid with how it was wrapped up. I loved the second half of the series because of how well-written and emotional Chise’s growth was, and everything up to her embracing of Cartaphilus’s curse was a beautiful display of her strength and will to live. What I’m not here for is that asspull wedding whatever that makes no sense in the context of the previous events, especially because after the fact, Elias’s attempt to kill Stella is swept under the rug. This could’ve been my favorite show of the season without that bullshit ending and while I don’t regret watching it, it leaves me with a sad feeling of what could have been

Best of the season

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens: It had a slow start, but with its endearing cast and well-developed character relationships, HTR won me over, especially the last quarter. The animation was veeery barebones, but Lin and Bamba’s charisma and their organically developed relationship carried the show to be one of the most enjoyable of the season. I also really appreciate the fact that the series includes a gay couple with an adopted daughter and that Lin’s crossdressing is never used as a joke or treated as a character flaw or a “phase”. I love stories about found families and I’d love to see more of this gang fighting crime and doing shady business in their city of assassins.

Garo: Vanishing Line: This iteration of Garo had a somewhat slow start, but boy did it pick up steam in the second half. The action was great -the final fight against King had some incredible stylistic choices, the characters’ journeys felt complete and very human and the story was interesting and different enough from other Garo to not feel repetitive, yet with enough Garoisms that made it feel connected to everything else. Like I said, I love stories about found families, so the way Sophie found a home with Gina, Luke and Sword by the end was very touching. Watching Sophie’s journey has been a treat, and I’m immensely happy that this wasn’t a Guren no Tsuki disaster, but was more in line with the excellence of Honoo no Kokuin.

Gakuen Babysitters: This was the huge surprise of the season for me, I almost expected it to be pretty dull. Instead it turned out to be super cute and extremely heartwarming. It had a couple of duds here and there, mostly the not-actually-a-pedophile joke character and the early love triangle skits, but the former disappeared and the latter was vastly improved in the second half of the show. I wish Ryuichi’s grief had been dealt with a bit more, but I think what they did show was very well executed and empathetic. And the portrayal of the kids felt very realistic, including both children’s most adorable and most obnoxious behaviors. KIRIN IS BEST GIRL

Card Captor Sakura Clear Card arc: I have expressed some complaints and dissatisfactions with this sequel all through the season. Mostly in regards to the new cards and how the old ones seem to have been forgotten (also the lazy designs of the new cards). In spite of that, Sakura hasn’t lost any of its heart in these 20 years, the characters are still the kids we grew up with. It is an overwhelmingly cheerful and positive show, from Sakura and Syaoran’s shyly developing relationship, to the hopefulness of Sakura’s magic and just the simple day to day life of Sakura and her friends. In spite of all its flaws, Sakura is still my favorite show of the season and I’m happy we get to spend one more season with these characters. Just please give me more Yue??? 

Ooooof, finally I’m done with this! PLEASE LET’S NOT TALK ABOUT THE 20+ SHOWS I’M SAMPLING FOR SPRING AHAHAHAHA. There’s too much anime. Anime must be stopped, immediately. Don’t hesitate to send me your thoughts about the winter season, even if it seems I’m losing my mind a little Dx TOO MUCH ANIME