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#somehow the same weird art style doesnt look as scary on her?? she just looks like the world's sweetest grandma
tumblunni · 5 years
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Ehh i think i finally summed up why all of this steven universe diamonds stuff has been so underwhelming.
YES you can redeem a villain
but you have to
actually
TRY
Yes you can write a story about the world’s most fuckin horrible person being really actually sad at heart
Yes you can write a story about an abusive parent actually being able to change
Yes you can write a story about some wild genocidal alien civilization of asshole space rocks actually only doing it because something something societal pressure DESPITE BEING THE ONES IN CHARGE WHO SET THE DAMN RULES I GUESS
But fucking hell its not gonna be EASY and you shouldn’t treat it that way.
All of this shit was SO fucking quick?? And everything else WASNT!
You spent SO long hyping up these guys you spent SO long convincing us that they WERE evil and that they had entirey different motives for what they were doing and EVEN WITHIN THIS FUCKING EPISODE you spent more time showing us White Diamond being absolutely ridiculously existentially horrifyingly awful and refusing every offer everyone gave her to help and refusing every chance and fucking fucking goddamn violating people’s entire minds and just.. fuck.
After all that you cant just fuckin have steven walk up to blue and yellow and say “hey everything you did was bad” and them go “GEE WE NEVER KNEW!” for some reason this time they’re convinced in a single sentence despite it being the same sentence steven said before in every damn episode and pink said to them years before and every person they abused and enslaved and mutilated and KILLED said while they were DYING
And you can’t fucking have white diamond never redeem herself and never change and never admit she’s wrong and steven SOLVE IT WITH FUCKING FIGHTING WHILE SAYING HE DOESNT WANT TO, WHILE THE ENTIRE SHOW TRIES TO CLAIM THE REASON THEY ARE DOING IT THIS WAY IS BECAUSE OF PACIFISM
because seriously he?? just defeated her?? and this made her?? change???
redeeming a villain shouldn’t be easy. redeeming a villain has to have the villain TRY. white diamond has done nothing to prove she really has a heart, prove that she really did all this for sympathetic reasons, prove that she’s able to change, AND ESPECIALLY NOTHING TO MAKE IT UP TO ANY OF THE PEOPLE SHE’S HURT
she just got defeated and basically admitted she’s wrong cos she has no other choice. and i guess her blushing because steven issued a SICK BURN to her is meant to be enough proof that her entire motivation so far has been because of self confidence issues forcing her to put up a false front aka her entire personality we saw so far. If you wanna tell me she’s entirely different to what we saw so far then please could you please give it more screentime than twelve goddamn seconds.
This is like how yellow and blue just suddenly were accepted as part of the family and steven agreed to go with them to homeworld literally just because they realized he “is really pink diamond”. Like they never fucking repented or actually learned to empathise with humans or ever explained why they dont empathise with humans no nope the only answer we got is that they were sad about their sister/daughter/friend dying even though they were already doing all the same evil stuff before that and its what caused her to leave in the first place. no we’re gonna just completely trust them instantly and not even continue making an effort to convince them? we’re gonna trust them so much we’re gonna trust that white diamond will also change just cos we beat her up? COS SERIOUSLY STEVEN FUCKIN DEFEATED BLUE AND YELLOW IN A FIGHT AND THATS THE END OF THEIR ARC, HOW IS THIS PROVING THE POWER OF PACIFISM!! beating everyone up and then saying the same singular sentence again and somehow now it works!! or saying “my mum was pink diamond” and it doesnt convince them but hey if we say it again with magical proof its true then i guess it works now. wow that sure does argue the power of words i guess
everything EVERYTHING they did was just a fuckin misunderstanding cos they dont UNDERSTAND they were doing bad and thus they dont have to face any form of consequences beyond being mildly embarassed i suppose.
if you wanna make that the ending then you need to work to disprove all the hours you spent implying that.. yknow.. they were doing things because they were evil
and even if theyre sympathetic they still did evil things and they still need to work to prove that theyve changed
and ESPECIALLY if you’re making a show very heavy on subjects like LGBT discrimination it shouldnt be FUCKIN WOW UNEXPECTED that the audience would see this plot as a metaphor for stuff like homophobia and abusive parents and.. yknow.. societal oppression in a law system that forces you to live in the closet in constant fear of being discovered and killed. and all the other apparantly accidental undertones of racism and extermination of indigenous people in stolen land which YOU REALLY SHOULD HAVE EXPECTED PEOPLE TO SEE WHEN THE PLOT IS LITERALLY EXTERMINATING PEOPLE TO STEAL THEIR LAND
all of that means you need to do MORE work to prove that that isnt actually what the plot is supposed to be, and more work to redeem villains who are very heavily goddamn triggering to a large part of the vunerable audience YOU SPECIFICALLY MARKETED YOURSELF TOWARDS
this was just so fucking overwhelming and somehow rushed despite being an hour long episode, and i hate it because the show spent so much effort on so much other stuff yet decided to half ass it at the really important part that NEEDED to have thought and time put into it if it was gonna nail the landing
especially after ALL THAT FUCKIN TIME AND EFFORT INTO THINGS THAT ONLY AMPED UP THE VILLAINY AND TENSION OF THESE GUYS AND MADE IT SO MUCH WORSE
like fucking hell how can you be so tone deaf??? this has been in the planning for so damn long and theyve been working on it forever and THIS is what they chose to rush over? this is the priorities they thought were important? even just within this episode if youre struggling to fit it all in then like seriously cut out some of the stuff like the montage of unseen fusion forms that did basiclaly nothing but a few jokes, and the equally as rushed bad lars and sadie romance resolution. Which is another thing that needed a lot of work to fix when the introduction we got to these two was a really unhealthy relationship and a dude who refuses to change despite being given twelve chances but suddenly changes COMPLETELY on the thirteenth one and i guess cos he died that proves he’s all good now. Except he acts all weird and creepy in the very next episode and endangers his new friends by acting all possessive over sadie again and getting angry that she has other friends????
i hate it because ive had to deal with the fandom telling all the people who were rightfully uncomfortable with how these subjects were handled that oh we’re just overreacting and oh wait and see cos they totally have a big plan for the ending or something that’ll make it all make sense. And comparing people being triggered by child abuse and racism to “huhu those dumb su criticals who hate the art style” or whatever...
god, man, its just a deflection of what the issue really is
“oh youre saying NO VILLAINS can EVER be redeemed and NOBODY can EVER talk about dark stuff in shows without being SECRETLY BAD AND SUPPORTING IT IN REAL LIFE?”
no im not saying that im just saying the subjects are fucking depressing to people who’ve suffered from the real life stuff and the villain redemption should be GOOD and should THINK ABOUT THOSE PEOPLE IN THE AUDIENCE if it wants to make up for it
like fucking hell look at how much zuko from avatar went through before his redemption. look at how long he struggled with his morality and how long it took him to realise he was wrong. look at how much detail they showed us on all the people who negatively influenced him into making the bad choices he did. look at how much he went through to make up for what he did and apologise to everyone he hurt. look at how everyone he hurt didnt believe him at first and it took a while for everything to work out. look at how sometimes he messed up and took steps backward before getting to where he needed to be. and look at how he actually changed as a person and continued learning and growing and trying to be a good person even far into the future after the story ended.
hell, fuckin look at PERIDOT! peridot had a full goddamn zuko arc! peridot had more screentime than all of the diamonds combined, and it was way better utilized! she had a full process from being introduced as a scary villain BECAUSE OF MISUNDERSTANDING WHO SHE REALLY WAS, then being revealed as having a fully rounded personality, flaws and redeemable traits while still being a villain. and moments of her proving that she did indeed only become a villain because she didnt understand what she was doing was wrong, and a personality that matched with that reveal rather than having NO INDICATION she was like that until it suddenly happened only after she was defeated. and her redemption came slowly through friendship with steven and it had moments of the other characters not instantly trusting her and also of her making mistakes and struggling with believing steven’s philosophy when it went against everything she knew about life. and speaking of which it was established that she had a very different life which had negative influences pushing these ideas upon her, and tough stuff that made her scared and pressured. Not just being in a high position of ruling over a planet in the lap of luxury and ONLY AFTER BEING DEFEATED do we learn that they feel pressured by the societal expectation to be perfect and they actually would have agreed all along with dismantling the system but they were just too afraid to be honest. Or whatever the fuck that rushed ending was trying to go for! And man even after peridot joins the team she’s NOT redeemed yet, she’s initially only halfway doubting herself and only teaming up with steven because they’re both afraid of the cluster. And she messes up and says horrible shit to her new friends and feels the consequences of her actions and chooses to change. And her ultimate choice to switch sides is REALLY hard, she gets so close to going back to the diamonds and its a great personal sacrifice on her part when she chooses to give it all up and make an enemy of the person she was so scared of!
and GAHHH that good redemption is one in a million episodes that really set up the diamonds Being Bad and should have been a goddamn tally in the “effort required in the fuckin ending” chart!
could we not have even just had one ten minute episode of blue and yellow going around earth and experiencing human life and realizing there’s things worth protecting? or a few damn scenes foreshadowing white being actually insecure and lying to protect herself, rather than GENUINELY ABUSIVE BECAUSE SHE’S BAD?
and seriously even if you hurt people because you hate yourself YOU STILL HURT THEM
a sympathetic backstory should be a reason why they COULD be redeemed, not proof that they already are redeemed just because the backstory was stated in words and nothing else has fuckin changed.
imagine if zuko just lost one fight to aang and said “yes but my dad abused me” and aang was like “oh no now lets team up with zuko to beat up his dad” and none of the bad things zuko did were ever mentioned again and also he keeps his season 1 personality throughout the entire series
imagine if peridot fuckin.. just changed sides cos she’s funny and we like her. people wantedher to change sides as soon as she acted funny and likeable but they still made the effort to actually prove she had changed! the diamonds didnt act remotely harmless or remotely good until they just suddenly are in the very last episode.
hoo
fucking
ray
also why are we constantly just ignoring all these dark things about homeworld? like the episode with holly blue agate and the famethyst slave caste and all the creepy ways the entire place operated. i totally thought thatd.. yknow.. EVER BE REFERENCED AGAIN?? its never even mentioned that anyone even WANTS to go back and save them?? and the human zoo were outright stated to be like.. unsaveable. “oh theyve never known real human life and theyre happy in their slavery so itd be cruel to take them away from it” One off episode, forgotten about. And the creepy as fuck scenes of gems being BUILT INTO THE WALLS AND DOORS AS SECURITY SYSTEMS and the confirmation that more lapis situations are constantly going on yet somehow that singing hairbrush person doesnt get all the sympathy that she did. And steven going daww at the pebbles instead of being horrified that theyre born to work as servants and forced to live in the walls because the noblewomen dont want to look at them? and he asks them to make him a new outfit?? and theres no plot anything involving them except them puttering around in the background outfitting?? like was none of this meant to be seen as PROOF THAT THE DIAMONDS WERE EVIL and PEOPLE WHO NEEDED TO BE SAVED????
goddddd
please say they were rushed or something please say this is all the faultof being given less time than they expected please say there were other plans for other episodes we didnt see that would have given at least slightly more substance to any of this
also why wasnt this even advertised as the last episode if its the last fuckin episode
hhhh well at least obsidian was a great character design and so were the other fusions and new outfits even if they only appeared for twelve seconds. and white’s whole scary evil mind invasion stuff was really good even if it actually hurt the episode by being good, kinda
man im not even mad or anything i just feel mehh and bored and like im actually glad its over. i never wanted to feel that way about a show that used to be so good. i kinda wish the earliest episodes werent so good if the answers to all those well set up mysteries were gonna have so much less effort than the setup itself
...man i should make a whole post about all the mistaken ways i THOUGHT the show was gonna go that actually would have been way more interesting than the real answer.
i’m just super glad that my last theory was wrong cos wow that would have been the only thing worse than this ending! when white pearl first appeared before we’d actually seen white diamond, and it had all this thing that white diamond hadnt been seen in ages.. well i was worried it was setting up some sort of reverse twist where actually white pearl is bodysnatching white diamond instead of vice versa. So the whole evil empire would actually be run by a member of the slave class that its oppressing, and the diamonds/representative of the upper class would actually be poor victims all along. dear god i am so glad i got that wrong! tho im weirded out by how evil white/pink pearl looked in that first hint that she was originally pink pearl??
anyway basicallly im just so fuckin tired
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tumblunni · 7 years
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Oh mannnn Rune Factory why are you so good at making friendships feel so genuine with fictional characters Like, it legit is good therapy when you’re lonely! It just leaves you with this contented feeling. And they somehow managed to achieve it through doing like basically nothing?? Its so good because they leave the options open for you to form your own fanficcy thoughts! There is SO MUCH of that! The characters’s AI wandering around the town doing random stuff and occasionally bumping into each other and having a short emoticon conversation like in the sims. That’s just so weirdly theraputic to watch, its like watching an aquarium?? And so many fanfic ideas when the ‘conversation’ is something interesting with an interesting combination of characters. What would happen if Porcoline flirted with Leon! What exactly was forte doing carrying that melon? SO MANY IDEAS!! And then like... i DO wish that you could do more stuff with the characters when you’re paired up, but its still really cute and friendshippy to just be paired up while doing everything, even the characters never aknowledge it or join in. You can imagine what would happen if they did, cos they have such well-developed personalities! It feels like having a fun afternoon with two of your friends doing [insert thing here], and then when you pair up with just one character you kinda somehow feel its a bit more intimate and wanna impress them?? like, I know now that characters dont gain any friendship points for fighting together even though fighting together is the one thing they actually can do together. But I still just HAVE to go find my two faves and fight together with them! Every time! Whether its a plot event or exploring together or collecting items together! porcoline, help me go pick mushrooms, u is the chef~! It would be so cool if they got given passive skills that had bonuses to certain things and levelled up as their friendship increases!! Like Porcoline actually does increase the probability of food items dropping from monsters. And just AAAAAA why do I have to go grab a character and pair up before I do work, even when I know the game doesnt aknowledge anything thats happening with gameplay. You give me the opportunity to put anyone in my party when their schedule is free, and even if there is ABSOLUTELY NO BOON TO THIS CTION I still wanna sit outside arthur’s office like a lovesick puppy waiting to give him his morning packed lunch and then take him with me to till the farm and craft eyeglasses. And I wanna take Dylas to go fishing!! I was so lucky once that I arrived at the beach when his Daily Randomized Action actually was fishing, and I could pretend we were fishing together with friendship~! He doesnt fish too when he’s in your party when you fish :P And then the only actual interaction that they do have is sometimes giving you gifts when you talk to them, same as when you talk to them when theyre sitting as static npcs in their house. But AGAIN it just makes me fanfic and roleplay that me and this character are having a fun day doing [action] and then what silly antics would occur if they gave me [randomized present] at this moment! And sometimes the choice of dialogue and present clashes hilariously, and sometimes it works so well to make it extra heartwarming! like Porcoline gave me a present on HIS OWN BIRTHDAY! i came along and gave him is present and he gave me one back, its like NOOOOO U R TOO NICE THAT IS NOT HOW IT WORKS!! And i know it was just randomized chance but it was so in-character that it made me smile! Also I know that any extra presents you give them after the first present don’t make any difference to your friendship points, but I felt so bad that I didn’t have anything Doug likes for his birthday so I gave him like five neutral gifts. And AGAIN the game doesnt actually aknowledge when you give someone a weapon you’ve fully built up to level 10 but I always feel so happy doing that with my main weapon when i gain a new one, i have to give it to someone else who could use it. Porco had my super strong gale edge that I won from the first harvest competition and used for half the game, and its so neat that they actually do use the weapon you give them! WE STRONGE DUAL BLADE BUDDIES BEING STRONGE! (tho then I managed to craft the leek blades that are super good for porco so now he’s got those) And BTW its so funny cute that Porcoline has a self-healing ‘spell’ that’s literally just him eating a sandwich mid-battle. As far as I know he’s the only npc who can mimic the player’s item-using animation, nobody has an actual inventory when theyre travelling with you. Oh and Clorica can do the same but different! She can mimic the player’s sleeping action and fall asleep on the ground to recover her HP. I love in-character npc-only variants of skills, thats such a cute idea! Tho I kinda wish I could hack them onto my character to replace the default Cure, lol! Oh and AAAAA I like.. skipped the entirety of Fall?? I hit 8 hearts with Arthur at the beginning and didn’t realise that the game glitches out and won’t let you confess if the character is part of a Town Event. Arthur had one dialogue line in Forte’s quest to ride an elephant, so he didnt show up when he asked to meet me and I thought I’d been stood up but then he acted like I’D stood him up?? And he was stuck in a dialogue loop of ‘I have something to tell you now- I CANT TALK RIGHT NOW’ and then when the town event ws over he was mad at me and wouldnt accept a second confession until he hit 9 hearts. So I literally did nothing every day for a month but hang with arthur and hug him and give him gifts, blazing through to 9 hearts at ridiculous stubborn speed! i felt so bad that all the other characters are sad you havent talked to them in 15 days :P But I was happy that I finally got a second chance to confess PRECISELY on the 1st of Winter, and we had heartwarming cuddles in the freshly fallen snow. And then i was too tired from staying up all night romancing a fictional taxkeeper so I saved the game and passed out. OH, but not until after I added Arthur to my party and just skipped around the snowy town with him for ten minutes! I gave him an umbrella and pretended the two characters were having a romantic walk underneath it. I AM SO ON THE SHIPPING TRAIN, MY GUYS! I cant believe I came here for the two monster boys and got attatched to mr normal nerdman prince before I even had a chance to see either of their events :P I wanted to maybe try seeing all the relationship events with all the batchelors but I just felt so guilty like I was cheating on arthur, cos he was the one I picked first... Man, i shoulda saved picking a boyfriend til the endgame and then made three savefiles to see them all :P BUT I AM STILL HAPPY WITH ARTHUR!!! soft man, walking hug nerd in a snuggie my character’s dream boy When a game can provoke such attatchment to the love interests in a completely asexual player then u kno u done rite NOBODY IS SEXY BUT EVERYBODY IS SOMEONE I WANNA SEE SMILING Let me resolve your plotline arthur I want you to have a happy marriage You can hug all my pet monsters and i’ll make you turnip stew every morning and AAAAAA I love learning what everyone loves, i love that arthur is one of the ones with many different fave presents. He likes turnips and new spectacles and cute fluffy things! And Dylas likes fish and carrots and milk he has THREE FAVOURITE FOODS, what a cutie!! And Dolce likes tea and sweets and hot chocolate aka THE PERFECT FUSION OF BOTH. And also she’s started liking medicine and doctor-related gifts after being adopted by the cute doctor couple, its so sweet she’s aspiring to be like them!! And porcoline eats literally all my cooking crafting successes and I wouldnt have it any other way!! and AAAA you can give people HATS and they WEAR YOUR HATS so you can see arthur actually change glasses when you give him new ones and porco wears ribbons on his hat that already exists and these two have been my party for LIKE FOREVER and I love them and i totally headcanon arthur seeing porcoline like a dad since they started working together! He has sad dialogues about how he had a bad relationship with the king and how he was raised entirely by servants, so porcoline reminds him of that. And cute stories like how when he was working late at night he walked outside his door and there was a mysterious homecooked meal out of nowhere. yeah porcoline TOTALLY made a midnight snack and just forgot not to eat it, suuuuure! porco is always trying to trick him into taking care of himself, its so damn sweet!! And you get similar dialogues from everyone else working at the restaurant and just GAHHH forever headcanoning arthur and dylas as Official Adopted Members Of The De Saint-Coquille Noble Bloodline. I wish they had more interactions together tho, even if they arent like brothers its odd that two people working together each day dont talk much about each other. BUT SERIOUSLY porco is like.. he adopted a friggin horse monster and THE PRINCE OF THE COUNTRY. Sorry king u messed up dadding, he is mine now. Also: the wild wilderness of a monster temple is no place for a young boy. U come gain some employment as a well-paid waiter and also my son! I ain’t care that you’re slightly a unicorn! THEYRE ALL JUST SUCH NICE PEOPLE AAA I wanna be like ‘plz let me marry your son’ to porcoline, i wanna join the fam as a daughter in law. I’m not REMOTELY interested in being the princess, I just wanna be a new member of the restaurant peoples!! Aaaaa I cant stop rambling about how much i love this game and these characters!! And I;ve only even really started befriending this small chunk of the characters, who knows if I’ll get even more rambley about the others!!!! I just love love love that you can put them in your party at any time and drag them along to do everything and PRETEND WE ARE HAVING FAMILY BONDING ACTIVITIES BECAUSE I ADORE YOU ALL
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