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miraculouscontent · 6 years ago

Note

Have you written anything about what specifically you dislike about Gigantitan? I tried searching for it on my own, but Tumblr Is Not A Functioning Website

I haven’t talked about it much at the time of posting, so don’t worry, you didn’t miss anything.

“Gigantitan” is my least favorite episode of Miraculous from a strict watchability standpoint, being the only episode that I wanted to quit watching outright (and would’ve had I not been watching with someone else). There are episodes that have worse writing from a plot/character view, but “Gigantitan” is the only episode that I firmly believe has no value whatsoever.

[Lolliplot]

I have no problem with filler in concept. Filler can actually be very important to a show’s runtime, letting shows rake in some more views for the more high-budget episodes by filling in story gaps with fun little snippets about nothing.

But this episode isn’t fun. It’s just nothing.

Let’s start with what this episode actually offers for future plot points. Firstly, it confirms JARM (Juleka, Alix, Rose, and Mylene) being already aware of the fact that Marinette has a crush on Adrien.

We didn’t need to know this. Everyone could’ve guessed that anyone in the class already knew. If I’d skipped this episode completely and seen “Frozer”, I wouldn’t have batted an eye at JARM already knowing and making suggestions about what Marinette should do about Adrien.

The other thing this episode does is show that an akuma can switch targets, which happens later in “Zombizou” anyway. Not only that, but I don’t know how genuine this moment even is, because it’s just a “comedic” ploy to get a reaction out of Hawk Moth. I can see the result in two ways: either this is relevant because this is going to happen later (actually making this episode pointless because it’s going to happen in a later episode) or this was a one-off and no one will ever know if it was a legitimate thing or a comedic detail.

It just leaves me confused.

Point being, I don’t want to hear brags from the writing staff about how this season has “no filler” because it’s a cheap way to generate hype when all they really did was sprinkle in crumbs of establishing plot into this particular episode. If one were to ask the question, “Why couldn’t it be established that they know about Marinette’s crush in a different episode?”, the only answer would’ve been, “Because this episode would’ve been filler otherwise.”

It’s lazy. Simple as that.

[Don’t Cry Me a River]

I don’t talk about myself often on my blog, but I’ll have to say a little bit to get my point across. See, some things I’ve never mentioned about myself before are that my ears are pretty sensitive, my eyes don’t like saturated colors, and I’m easily disgusted (not amused) by gross-out humor.

Already, my next problem with this episode is obvious.

I don’t like babies. I hate them, in fact. Don’t like looking at them, don’t like holding them, and every scream feels like sharp nails being jammed into my brain. They’re gross and loud and I have no maternal instincts whatsoever.

As a baby, August has no personality. He has no traits and his shtick is “he’s a baby.” That’s literally it. He cries, he screams, he’s easily distracted, and he’s completely unintelligent.

An akumatized person isn’t even supposed to be the same exact thing as the person they akumatize, but that’s exactly what Gigantitan is; August, but with powers.

And those colors blind me. The neon pink and green are hideous. One might say that it’s the idea because Hawk Moth akumatized a baby (and those akumatized might get to pick their looks), but that doesn’t change the facts that they didn’t have to akumatize a baby and that the design is still terrible to look at even if there’s a reason for it.

And the model is disgusting. I outright gagged at the scene with Adrien’s bodyguard and the saliva and just–EUGH, EW, GROSS!!

Once the timestamp hits the point where August turns into Gigantitan, it’s nothing by baby humor for eight straight minutes.

And Hawk Moth can’t just, y'know, release the akuma, because that would end the episode.

Hawk Moth’s even been shown to be able to torment his victims to some degree to get them to do what he wants but oh no we can’t have that because it’s a baby.

Personally, I would’ve drop kicked this obnoxious little menace into the Seine like a sack of rotten potatoes.

[Character Dos and Don'ts Except It’s Actually Just Don'ts]

No one has their head on straight in this episode. No one is safe from the “Gigantitan” go-with-what-the-script-says flu.

Alya setting up this huge elaborate plan instead of focusing on Marinette’s actual problems concerning Adrien.

Rose not understanding the flower naming theme despite being rarely shown as incompetent, which is also something no one does anything about because everyone’s so hooked on using codenames.

Adrien’s bodyguard calming down out of nowhere right when the akuma shows up.

Hawk Moth not just releasing the akuma and accepting that this was a bad idea.

Adrien brushing off all of Marinette’s stuttering despite this being a thing he should be concerned about by now and instead just being like “OKAY BYE YOU SEEM STABLE TODAY”

It’s all just set up so the episode goes exactly how the show wants it to and it drives me nuts.

Alya can’t be smart and realize that codenames aren’t a good idea (given Rose’s confusion) or the plan couldn’t mess up in “hilarious” ways.

Hawk Moth can’t do anything intelligent or the episode will just fall apart.

Even just the little things, like the fact that Alix brushes off Marinette’s fear that the boys know about her crush as “nah of course not because they’re boys.” That annoys me because I don’t like the suggestion that the boys are oblivious about love just because they’re boys. This escalates further in “Glaciator” with Ivan and I’m constantly frustrated about it because there’s already a logical, actually sensible reason for JARM to know and none of the boys to: them being closer friends with Marinette and thus seeing more of her than the boys do. I don’t mind specific characters gender-stereotyping, but not when it’s the show itself doing it and imprinting that on the characters themselves to make it true.

On another note, Adrien’s bodyguard is also extra infuriating because he has to get over his rage immediately or he’d be akumatized instead of the baby, which would’ve been actually fun. I’ve said it before, but one of the worst sins an episode can commit is presenting a more fun and/or interesting idea than what they actually go with.

Heck. Adrien’s bodyguard in general is pretty inconsistent. He gets upset about everything going wrong for him, then calms down almost instantly. You’d think the latter is because he sees Adrien, but when Marinette’s talking to him, Adrien’s bodyguard starts honking rudely at them instead of letting Adrien finish a freaking conversation. This is why I hate this guy so much; he’s so inconsistent and constantly swaps between caring about Adrien’s desires and just being irritating.

And, oh boy, that ending scene. I already complained about it in “Treatment of Marinette (Season 2)”, but it drives me up a wall.

Marinette stuttering was not her fault. It was the writing’s. It’s so blatantly obvious, especially on Marinette’s second attempt where she rejects riding home with Adrien.

Yet, the episode still has her friends get annoyed with her. There just comes a point where things stop being Marinette’s fault and start being the writers tripping her up and tugging at her pigtails because “No, bad Marinette, you’re not allowed to make progress even if it’s completely in character for you at this point.”

Marinette goes through this whole plan (and I frankly don’t care if the intention was to get Adrien’s bodyguard in trouble because screw him, honestly), even stopping at one point and almost ruining everything because she wanted to help a baby, and for what?

Nothing. Marinette embarrassed herself in front of her friends, embarrassed herself in front of Adrien, and she gets teased.

I don’t have to wonder why Marinette is constantly fumbling and afraid of screwing up, because her friends and others are always teasing her for being clumsy/stuttering/etc. Alya teases her at the end and Marinette looks so embarrassed at what she’d said, but then the end card just pops up as if we’re supposed to forget about Marinette’s issues and anxiety. They go completely unaddressed and this episode is the worst example I can think of when imagining episodes that try to brush off Marinette’s problems as “you just gotta get it right this time.”

And of course, Alix makes a comment about how Marinette knowing Adrien’s schedule is “creepy.” Like, ‘k, cool, so if she does believe that, what is she gonna do about it? Confront her? Just accept it because she’s her friend and saying anything would’ve forced this episode to not happen?

The is one of the few times Marinette’s schedule (that she has only ever used for purposes of confessing/taking a confession back/tracking down Adrien for crucial reasons) has been brought up, but the show doesn’t want to dwell on it. The show doesn’t seem to want anyone its audience to think about, but it still wants to crack jokes at Marinette’s expense.

And instead of addressing Marinette’s core issues, all five of her friends just waffle around them. If this was actually fun, I probably wouldn’t mind, but with this being the unpleasant experience that it is, I feel like the glaring flaws are constantly being shoved in my face.

[Predictakillity]

This is probably the fourth-ish time I’ve said this in my blog’s lifespan, but one way to send my interest into a downward spiral is when I can predict an episode. There are exceptions, like when I see a scene or hear a particular line and go “Yes! This is probably leading up to [x]”, but most of the time, it’s negative.

And, from start to finish, I could predict this episode. After every scene that happened, I could predict what was going to happen next.

The second I saw this elaborate plan, I knew it wasn’t going to work. Even more insulting was when they threw the fantasy sequence in, because that made it even more obvious. After all, why would they show us what’s going to happen later in the episode instead of building suspense and then having us see the happy moment when it’s actually real?

Not only that, but the fantasy sequence is doubly terrible because it was some top-tier Adrienette and it’s fake. It just brings down the next Adrienette scene that follows it in whatever future episode because now they have to beat “having ice cream together” or it becomes underwhelming.

And that’s exactly what it did, because “Glaciator” was the next episode with Adrienette in it and it had the gall to set up the exact same premise without even letting them have ice cream together. It tore me up too because I knew that’s what they’d do; I knew they weren’t going to show the audience what they wanted to see because the fantasy sequence in “Gigantitan” already showed it. I wanted to be wrong and I wasn’t.

Back to “Gigantitan” itself, most of the jokes and dialog are so drawn out that it felt impossible to not know where things were going to go. They hold on jokes for way too long and everything is so in your face that things become obvious.

The second Rose started messing up the codenames, I knew she was going to be a weak link in the plan.

The moment Juleka got stuck, I knew most of them were going to have to swap jobs and be stuck doing something they weren’t good at.

The instant August appeared on screen (with spoken dialog from the mom, no less), I immediately pointed and said, “That’s who’s getting akumatized.” No amount of Adrien’s bodyguard getting annoyed fooled me because I knew it would be a red herring.

At the very first mention of August wanting a lollipop, I knew that it was going to be important to take him down when he was akumatized.

When the akuma went into August’s bracelet, I knew Hawk Moth would just run with it and wouldn’t give it up.

Even with the lucky charm, which is typically one of my favorite moments in episodes because Ladybug always gets stuck with the most random stuff, I knew what it was for before Ladybug’s Lucky Vision even went off.

And at the final moments of the episode, where Marinette wanted to just get straight to the point, I knew; I knew she wasn’t going to be able to do it. I knew this episode wasn’t going to let her have her moment. I knew her friends would get irritated with her. I knew the writing would just brush it off.

When Marinette’s friends kept asking, “Is she going to do it?”, I was pleading for them to just be quiet because it made the outcome so obvious. Everything’s obvious. When I realized that August was the next akuma victim, I knew that this episode would be nothing but baby humor and gross-out.

I hated that I knew. I didn’t want to know. With every passing minute, I kept begging–hoping–that the episode would throw me some sort of twist.

One wrench in the predictability. One instance where something wasn’t what I expected. One nanosecond where all the characters just looked at each other and went, “Hey, maybe everything that’s going on right now is actually really contrived?”

I got nothing. Once the episode was over, I got into a three hour conversation on why it was the worst thing I’d seen out of Miraculous from an enjoyability standpoint.

And every time Gigantitan shows up as an akuma again, I feel all that annoyance come right back. A full 26 episodes haven’t even passed yet since his episode and Gigantitan has shown up three times.

I hate this episode so much. I hate it because it’s a combination of nearly everything I could hate in an episode.

Character destruction.

Gross-out.

Babies.

Obviousness.

Predictability.

And worst of all, the promise–the set-up–of progress that the protagonist deserves but doesn’t get in the end despite all the garbage they’ve been through and WILL go through.

I think back to this episode and I just find myself unbelievably frustrated. In a way, I feel like I should be glad about how pointless it is. After all, its pointlessness means that I have no reason to ever go back to it.

But also, it didn’t need to exist, and those 22 minutes could’ve been spent doing literally anything else that this season desperately needed.

Instead, it’s 22 minutes of nothing.

#((Rare occasion where I'm actually heated and not just stating facts.))#category: salt #((Super Salt.))#((Mega Salt.))#((Ultra Salt.))#episode: Gigantitan #other: ask and answer #category: long post #word count: over 2000

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ariadnelives · 5 years ago

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Chapter 18 -- The Heist

[Missed earlier chapters? Go catch up here! Otherwise, welcome back! Oh, and make sure to join our discord server! Chapter can also be found @ ao3”]

Sometimes, when a person makes a declarative statement, they are only referring to one specific, usually fleeting instance. For example, if someone said “it’s cold in Lohnausfall,” what they may actually mean is “it’s cold in Lohnausfall today.” This statement would remain true even if it was warm there the next day. They could also mean “it’s cold in Lohnausfall in winter,” which would also remain true even if it is incredibly hot in Lohnausfall in the summer.

However, they could also be referring to the general, often much more permanent, state of things. In that case, when they say “It’s cold in Lohnausfall,” what they mean is that it is just generally a cold place, and that whenever you visit Lohnausfall, it would make sense to bring a coat.

In some cases, both senses of the word apply. For example, if someone said “it’s cold in Lohnausfall,” what they could mean is “I know it’s always cold in Lohnausfall, but wow, it’s especially cold today.”

A more relevant example would be the statement “Nicks Rizzo was bored,” which is, unlike “it’s cold in Lohnausfall,” was true both in general, and specifically at this moment.

Nicks Rizzo was bored. She rarely managed to find a moment when she was not bored, but right now, she was especially bored. The night was dark and dull and absolutely nothing was happening in the casino that you wouldn’t expect to happen at a casino.

Most movies about Cosa Nostra crime families made the life seem glamorous and filled with mystique. In reality, it was incredibly dull and almost bureaucratic. Her father, Harry “Big Top” Rizzo, spent most of his time running numbers, loaning money to desperate people so he could charge insane levels of interest, and having his goons launder his ill-gotten money through their family’s casino. It was, of course, fairly easy to launder money through a casino, since it’s one of the few forms of business where money is exchanged for neither goods nor services. In fact, most of the time, it is simply surrendered to the business in exchange for nothing at all.

Since anyone could enter with thousands of dollars of ill-gotten cash and leave with nothing, while Big Top Rizzo could report those thousands as legitimately earned casino profits, pretty much all of his illegally-obtained money was handed down to subordinates who were instructed to lose it all gambling in his casino. The family business wasn’t doing so well lately, but a recent acquisition might turn that around.

The most exciting part of the life, in Nicks’ eyes, were when a minor turf conflict escalated into a shootout. That seemed rarer and rarer lately, however, and after the fifteenth time you’ve seen six guys shooting at each other from behind washing machines in a dirty laundromat until the cops show up and they have to flee out the back, it loses some of its charm.

This was how she’d fallen in with a community of confidence tricksters, since that allowed for a little more creativity than organized crime, but even that had grown a little stale.

At this very moment, she was sitting on a gaudy red velvet couch in her father’s office, whose already low comfort level was made much worse by the baggy plastic slip-cover (placed there to avoid the same dust-covering that coated her father’s trusty but long-unused pulse handgun on the shelf behind her), watching the security hologram of the casino floor that flickered about two inches above the surface of an antique mahogany coffee table. She was, as she often did in this situation, praying to god that a rival gang would burst through the doors and try to start something.

Today, for the first time, she would not be disappointed.

On the corner of the hologram, she saw a young woman about her age jump up onto a blackjack table and brandish a fully automatic pulse rifle in the air. A thrill surged through Nicks. The unmistakable flicker of repeated muzzle flashes appeared from the gun’s tip, blowing holes in their very expensive ceiling. The hologram didn’t provide audio of the casino floor, but she imagined the young woman was shouting something to the effect of “EVERYBODY GET ON THE GROUND,” since the next thing that happened was that all of the casino patrons dropped to the floor and covered their heads. A few of the casino employees reached for concealed firearms, but the woman on the table quickly revealed some kind of switch in her hand and opened her jacket to reveal rows of explosives strapped to her body. She began speaking again, likely something in the vein of “ANYBODY MOVES AND I BLOW THIS PLACE SKY HIGH,” since even the armed employees stopped reaching for their guns and slowly kneeled down on the floor.

Several more young women filed in. All of their faces were covered by strategically wrapped scarves, and they were all strapped to the nines with automatic weapons. One of them used their free hand to pull an aerosol can out of her pocket, and seemed to aim it directly at Nicks.

Nicks smiled. These girls are clever, she thought. A moment later, everything viewed from that angle seemed obscured by a dark fog. The girl had sprayed over one of the composite cameras that formed the hologram. Nicks changed her angle so she could keep viewing the action, but it didn’t matter. Within a few minutes, all of the cameras had been painted over and the hologram on the table looked like nothing but a dark cloud.

She had to be a part of this action. She regretfully looked back at the safe behind her father’s empty desk. She knew she’d be in a world of trouble if she left the safe alone and something happened to its contents, but, she doubted anyone would be able to detect it. There was one safe hidden behind the portrait of her grandfather, which contained a few wads of petty cash and a handful of jewelry so that potential thieves would think they’d gotten away with something, but the real valuables were kept in a concealed secondary safe behind the vault’s false back.

She briefly considered staying there, but, thought better of it. Without her father’s handprint, retinal scan, and fifteen separate passcodes, it would take the system’s greatest hacker to break in, and from the look of these girls, they weren’t looking to commit cyber-crimes.

On her way out the door, she retrieved her father’s dusty Chekhov M2460 off the shelf, and quickly thought to grab something to conceal her own face.

This should do nicely, she thought, grabbing a metallic-looking cowl from one of the drawers on her father’s desk. She remembered he’d worn this to a recent masquerade thrown by a colleague who’d referred to him as a “snake” behind his back. Big Top thought it would be funny to show up to the party wearing a snake mask, and he’d paid handsomely to have a realistic-looking mask custom-made.

In the drawer, she also noticed a small device that she thought could come in handy, and hastily jammed it in her pocket.

She tucked the pistol into her waistband and left her father’s office, flagging down the two nearby enforcers to follow her. They quickly barrelled down the steps, but quietly slipped in one of the less conspicuous entrances to the casino floor, concealing themselves behind a row of large slot machines.

“We don’t need anybody to get hurt,” the main girl shouted, “My associates will be coming to each of you with a large sack. Consider them fare collectors. You are buying safe passage to the exit of this casino. The cost of admission is all the cash, credit cards, jewelry, and electronics you have on your person. Fail to provide this, and you will not be granted admission into the rest of your long, happy lives, and that’s not what anyone wants, is it?”

As if on cue, a woman who had been playing poker before the bandits arrived began to cry, and tried to make a break for the door.

The girl standing on the table did not hesitate to put three shots in her back. The woman fell to the floor and lay there, motionless. Her assailant announced, “Are we clear?”

The girls started to bring their bags to the casino patrons.

“It’s okay,” Nicks heard one of them say in a voice that was much softer than she expected, “you look scared so I’m not going to make you give us anything. Just pretend to put something in the bag and I’ll let you go safe, okay?”

This struck Nicks as strange. Why would a group of armed bandits be swayed by their victims seeming scared? Wasn’t the whole point of armed robbery to intimidate people into giving up their money?

Nicks looked at one of the other girls. She watched as a crying man in the suit reached into his pocket, brought an empty hand to the mouth of the sack, and open his hand.

It suddenly clicked with Nicks. “They’re just trying to cause a scene,” she hissed at the guards, “it’s a diversion, get back to the office now.”

They rushed back up to the office, but they were too late. The portrait of her grandfather was on the floor. The decoy safe was blown open and its contents left untouched. The false back was set aside with a note on it reading “Child’s play.” The duffel bag full of priceless religious artifacts was gone.

Thankfully, Nicks had thought to put a tracker in the bag. They wouldn’t get far. She turned on the tracking beacon and rushed back downstairs. The bandits were gone, as was the supposedly dead woman they’d shot.

She rushed out the front door, following the homing signal as fast as possible. The guards attempted to follow her, but she dismissed them by saying “Haven’t you two have disappointed me enough for one day? Send the rest of the guards after me in fifteen, you two take the night off. Without pay.”

This hurt their feelings, since it was her who’d left the office unattended and ordered the people in charge of stopping intruders to abandon their posts, but as so many people do in the workplace, they swallowed their objection since their continued employment meant more to them than their dignity.

Nicks knew the streets of Lohnausfall better than anyone, she’d been sneaking out from the watchful eyes of a crime boss for years and she knew all the shortcuts. Based on the movement of the homing signal, it looked like they were heading to Belafonte Park, but they were not taking the most direct route. Four narrow alleys and two jumped fences later, Nicks arrived in Belafonte Park just in time to see about a dozen young women she didn’t recognize, and one young man she did, running up to an idling shuttle with a duffel bag that belonged to her.

“Stop right there,” she shouted. She stepped out into plain view, holding her pistol in one hand and the small device in the other. She quickly hit the switch on the device and the bandits all felt a small electric charge run through their body. Nicks heard the engine of the shuttle suddenly go quiet. “Your weapons and explosives are useless. Right now, my pistol is the only one within 30 meters that is able to fire and it’s going to stay that way for the next 20 minutes.”

“Who the hell are you?” Said one of them, a Chinese girl with a pompadour standing unmasked with blood on her shirt. Nicks recognized her as the woman who’d been shot on the casino floor. She wondered how long she had to play the table to realistically seem like a casino patron before she could be “shot” to make the robbery seem real.

The girl next to her, who was still wearing her bandana, asked “Why are you wearing a corny halloween mask?”

“I could ask you the same question,” Nicks replied.

The man she recognized, Prescott, responded, ignoring her. “This is Nicks Rizzo. Remember what I told you about her?”

“Yes,” replied a short black girl wearing strange goggles, who Nicks had never seen before, “I tried that, but we’ve established that my pistol isn’t working.”

“Prescott,” Nicks smirked, “Thought you’d have been killed when you got caught punking out on the church heist.”

“Not for lack of trying,” said the tallest bandit, also still masked, but clearly identifiable as the woman who’d been standing on the table issuing commands.

“You have something that belongs to me,” Nicks said, and gestured at the duffel bag in his hand.

“I stole it, it belongs to me,” Prescott snapped, “you just betrayed me and left me to die.”

“Let’s not get caught up into what belongs to who here,” said the girl in the goggles, “it’s not like any of us acquired this bag legally.”

“We were supposed to use this to start our new life together,” Prescott said, sounding pretty genuinely hurt, “did you ever care about that?”

“Ugh,” Nicks replied, “a new life doing what, exactly? Running low-level cons on dumb wagoners? Scamming some bumblefuck cult out of their goodies?”

“With this kind of money, we could’ve gotten out of the criminal life,” Prescott sounded close to tears, “finally settled down somewhere, you know? We finally could’ve lived on easy street for the rest of our lives.”

“What fun would that be?” Nicks chuckled, and summarily unloaded two rounds into Prescott’s chest.

Out of force of habit, the bandits all raised their guns, despite the fact that they were still completely useless. Had they brought any sort of bladed weapons, there would be one lodged in Nicks’ neck before Prescott hit the ground, but as knives are better for covert operations and this was supposed to draw as much attention as possible, no one had thought to bring any.

“Don’t think I don’t know about your little trick, either,” Nicks said, gesturing her gun at the girl in the bloodied shirt. “I watched her take a fatal dose of plasma and here she is walking around, so I’m betting in a few seconds, our friend Mr. Cain will be in fighting shape again. That is, unless I do this…”

She aimed at Prescott’s corpse and fired off one more shot, this one landing directly between his eyes.

“Now,” Nicks began, “I’m going to take my duffel bag and then I’m going to go home and take a warm bath. I’m going to let you walk away from here unharmed, and I’m not going to call the authorities.”

“Sorry, I just…” the bandit from the table began, “You have us at your mercy and you’re just going to let us go? I mean, I’m not complaining—”

“Oh yes,” Nicks said, walking up to the tall girl from the table and the short girl in the goggles, laying one hand affectionately on the tall girl’s face, “you girls are just too. Much. Fun.”

“And what if we don’t let you leave,” asked the girl in the bloody shirt, “I mean, you can’t shoot all of us, we could easily overpower you.”

As though by magic, at this exact moment, the fifteen minutes Nicks had requested was up, and several dozen mob goons sprung out, all brandishing high-powered plasma hand cannons.

“Oh, I forgot to mention, these guys were 50 meters away when I disabled the weapons, so be aware: their weapons work too! Now, give me what’s mine.” Nicks gestured for the duffel bag and the bandit with the goggles handed it over. “Boys, grab this degenerate’s body and throw it in the incinerator. Last thing we need is a buncha pigs trying to jam us up on another murder. Alla prossima, belle ragazze,” she called back, “arrivederci!”

The crew piled into the shuttle. As soon as Fastwing could get the motor running, they found their way off-world and navigated back to their station.

Tripwire was there to greet them. “So, the mission went well?”

“We didn’t get the cargo, Prescott died, and that pampered little princess has his decryption key and she’s going to incinerate it,” Sasha replied dejectedly.

“Only one of those things is true,” Tripwire said, and smirked at Ariadne. “You sure are quick on your feet, cap!”

Sweettalk looked confused. “What is she talking about?”

“I knew he couldn’t be trusted. When we got into the office,” Ariadne explained, “Prescott thought I was too preoccupied with the safe to notice him dislocate his wrist to get free of the Jumper, attach it to this, and stash it in a potted plant.”

Ariadne held out a small, visibly broken, electronic device.

“It’s a bomb,” Ariadne said. “Its detonator is configured to respond to the energy of a teleportation field. Proprietary hardware of the Rizzo crime family, to keep people from attempting to teleport valuable property out of the casino. He was planning to run off with the bag and leave us with a useless, burnt-up decryption key. So, while his back was turned, I grabbed the decryption key out of the Jumper and slipped the Jumper in the bag.”

“So,” Pilar practically beamed at Ariadne’s deviousness, “you’ve had the key this whole time?”

“Not only that,” Tripwire said, “but with their safe in our cargo hold, I’m betting the Rizzo crime family won’t be dealing in religious artifacts anytime soon.”

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high-functioning-fangirl473 · 7 years ago

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Codot!Verse Fanfic

Author’s Note: Hey guys! Oracle here and I have officially become trash for @waiting4codot ! To the point where I have decided to write a frickin fanfic about his universe. This is about my friends @bugboy54 and @adriallejordynn and I getting stuck in the Codot!verse during Lockup’s Lockdown. Also this was started just before “Taking Office” was posted. I will be slow in updates so I apologize ahead of time!

Well! Onto the story!

The day seemed normal, at first. Go to class, watch Supernatural, Glee Club, then have a jam session with Braden and Adrienne. Just go about the motions of the day. Maybe binge Codot with them. He’s been on hiatus for a few months, and the three of us, specifically Braden and I, could barely stand it. We met in Glee Club at college, but we really bonded over our mutual love of musicals and superheros. I made the best and worst mistake of my life introducing Codot to them. We all loved Batman and Codot’s universe absolutely blew us away. His writing was fantastic, his interpretation of the characters was so unique, and good Lord his voice did not help my somewhat unhealthy obsession with Riddler.

Lockup’s Lockdown was his latest story arc, and we were all so close to losing everyone. Just a mere 27 votes away from everyone either being killed or almost being killed. We voted on the winning and losing side any number of times, but the fact was we almost lost Ed and Jonathan. Braden and I already had a plan to drive to Canada and torture him until he changes it all back, jokingly of course. Honestly, if he did shut down the blogs, I don’t think I would be angry forever. I would still listen to his stuff, but I would be sad that there would be no more blog updates.

So there we were, having a jam session as usual, when all of a sudden all three of our phones went off. We all glanced at our phones then looked at each other. Codot updated, which was strange considering he didn’t say that he was going to update for at least a few months. I put my phone in the middle and got ready to play it when Adrienne spoke, “Isn’t just a little bit strange that he would update just a month and half after he finished Lockup’s Lockdown?”

“I mean, yeah, but maybe he decided to give us a sneak peak to what’s coming up,” Braden replied. He did have a point. Codot did sometimes show us previews of what’s coming up, though sometimes we didn’t know it. Exhibit A: Covering “Toxic Love” as Music Meister to show how he would sound when singing. I spoke up, “Well, are we gonna listen to it or what? I need to know what happened to Ed after he talked to Jervis.”

“I want to know where Jonathan went, I mean he’s vulnerable now and Scarecrow is not gonna be put down that easily,” Braden remarked and Adrienne nodded in agreement. I picked up my phone and pressed play before putting it back down and waiting for it to load. The countdown clock stated that it was only a little under a minute, so we assumed it was probably just a few lines of upcoming dialogue. But instead we heard something else entirely, it didn’t even sound like Codot or Dee.

“Teleport thee now, now is the time for thee,” the voice spoke and we looked at each other confused. That didn’t sound right at all, but the voice continued, “Teleport thee now, so mote it be.”

I was just about to pick up the phone when it started to glow much brighter than it usually did. Adrienne looked at me, “Kara, did you turn your brightness up?”

“No, but I think Tumblr may have glitched. That’s not Codot,” I went to grab the phone but Braden’s hand grabbed my wrist and pointed out that the clock on the recording was still ticking down, “Guys, it's still playing.”

“Wicked ways beneath thine skin, let all who listen now join in,” the recording finished before it cut out abruptly. The glow on my phone became brighter until we could barely see the room anymore. I screamed, “What’s happening?!”

“I don’t know,” Adrienne shouted back. The three of us covered our eyes and I started to feel a sort of pull towards the phone. I was slowly losing my footing and was getting pulled towards the phone fast. I looked at my friends and the same thing was happening to them. What’s happening?! The last thing I saw was a bright white light around me.

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I woke up on a cold floor. My eyes slowly opened and all I saw was a tiled floor. I started to push myself up and groaned slowly. It felt like my ribs took at least a few punches. I managed to sit myself up when I noticed my hands. They had gloves on them, specifically purple, fingerless gloves. Even more specifically, from my Riddler cosplay that I made and wore for Halloween and Comic Con. I looked down at my chest and sure enough, my question mark clad jacket, purple tie, and white blouse, were on my body. What happened?! I was not wearing this earlier. My legs had my green pants and my feet were covered by my black combat boots. I quickly looked to the side and saw my friends slowly getting up as well. They were dressed strangely too. What the hell happened and where are we?

My eyesight was quickly clearing and I looked over at Braden, who whispered, “What the hell?”

He was wearing what looked to be a brown suit that was roughed up around the edges. A white blouse was under it. His glasses were still intact, thankfully, but in his hands was a burlap sack. I called out, “Braden?”

He looked over at me and I saw a scar going from above his eyebrow down his cheek. My jaw dropped, “Braden, your face…”

“What? What’s wrong? What happened,” He stood up suddenly then looked down at a puddle on the ground. He saw his reflection and gasped in shock, “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t like it,” I said back and Adrienne started getting up. She was wearing a black and red jacket with matching pants and a white spotted skirt over it. We walked over to her helping her up, “You okay.”

“A little bruised, but otherwise fine. What about you guys? And what are we wearing,” she exclaimed. We both told her that we were fine, but on the outfits part, we weren’t so sure. I started looking around the room and spotted something on the far wall. I walked over to it and I could hear my friends following me closely. I read it out loud, “Arkham Asylum? What the hell is going-”

I was cut off by the intercom going off. A low, distinctly southern accent came out, “Good evening, Arkham Asylum.”

We immediately got close to each other and went against the wall. Adrienne looked down at me, “Is that-”

“Quiet,” Braden and I told her when we looked up and around for the source of the speaker. I pointed to the small speaker on the ceiling in the corner of the room. The person spoke again, “Scarecrow welcomes you, one and all, to a night you will never forget.”

My eyes widened once I realized what this was. I immediately grabbed both Braden and Adrienne’s hands as my fear became apparent. I knew exactly where we were and what was going on. The three of us were silent as the voice spoke for the last time, “Now, if you’re listening, Lyle Bolton… and I know you are. How ‘bout we play a game? Hide and Seek. First one found meets a most… frightening end. As for the rest of you - you best stay out of the way. Scarecrow never forgets a face.”

The intercom turned off and I let out a sigh of relief, almost collapsing to my knees. But, thankfully my friends kept me standing, knowing my anxiety was acting up and very present, “I know, exactly what is going on.”

They looked at me expectantly and I slowly let go of their hands just as an alarm started to go off, “We are in the Codot!Verse, during Lockup’s Lockdown.”

Their eyes widened once they realized that who they recognized over the PA system was in fact Scarecrow’s exact lines that Codot wrote. We were locked inside Arkham Asylum and Scarecrow was on the loose. It certainly did not help that for some odd reason we were dressed as our favorite characters. Adrienne shook her head in disbelief, her black dreads going slightly in her face, “That’s not possible, we can’t be. We must be dreaming, we have to be. Right?”

Braden looked around with just shock on his face, “Kara’s right. There is literally no other explanation for this.”

He went to say something when we heard distant footsteps. I decided to take charge since I knew this place better than my friends as I had been following Codot longer than they have. I turned to them, “Look, we have no idea why we are here, but we have to hide before someone finds us. It could be Bolton or worse, Scarecrow. Our sentiment for the characters is not going to save us if Crane does find us.”

The footsteps were steadily growing louder, so I decided we had to think fast. I went in front and they stood behind me following quickly. We went in the opposite direction of the footsteps hopefully not making too much noise. I peeked around a corner and pulled back quickly seeing a bunch of guards lying dead on the floor, “I think I’m gonna be sick.”

My friends looked around me and gasped upon seeing the bodies pulling back behind me. We didn’t know what to do and the footsteps were getting louder. I spotted an open door and pointed to it indicating for them to follow me. They nodded in response and I started running towards the door and opened it for them to go in first. Braden went in first and Adrienne followed closely behind. I took a look through the hallway making sure no one saw us before going into the room. It looked to be an office that was abandoned in the chaos of Scarecrow’s takeover.

Adrienne looked like she was going to panic, “Okay, we are stuck in Arkham Asylum and Scarecrow is on the loose. The other Rogues might kill us, not to mention we are dressed as Harley, Riddler, and Scarecrow! We are going to die! I have just decided this! Yep! We are gonna die!”

“Adrienne! We are not gonna die! We just have to hide here long enough for the lockdown to stop and to stay out of the Rogues way,” I snapped at her already stressed about the whole situation. Braden spoke up, being quiet about everything so far, “How are we going to get home?”

Adrienne and I looked down, sadly and I replied quietly, “I don’t know, but we have to stay here and hide. It’s the only way we might be able to stay alive.”

They nodded at me when all of a sudden we heard something like muffled voices. I put my finger to my lips and slowly walked over to the desk pulling open one of the drawers. A walkie talkie was inside the desk and a voice was coming from it. It must have been left behind by one of the guards. I picked it up and brought it out so they could see it. We heard a low British accent speak through the speaker in the small machine, “Harley’s plan sounds the more feasible. Do what you can for Joker.”

My eyes widened as I realized what having this thing meant. There was only one channel on the machine and maybe it meant we could find help. I looked up at my friends, “Should I do it? Should I talk?”

Braden looked at the device then back at me, “It could be the only way we get help. We can’t trust them. They are villains, after all.”

I nodded and looked at Adrienne for approval and she nodded but still looked a little unsure. My fingers shook as I held the walkie talkie and pressed my finger to the button that allowed me to speak. A small noise was heard and I took a deep breathe and spoke shakily, “Hello? Is someone there?”

#batman #codotverse #waiting4codot #fanfic #edward nygma #Jonathan Crane #riddler #scarecrow

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recentnews18-blog · 6 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://shovelnews.com/slater-case-proves-nrl-justice-is-indeed-blind-and-just-plain-stupid/

Slater case proves NRL justice is indeed blind – and just plain stupid

Handshake deal

The ESPN Sports Business reporter Darren Rovell put out an interesting tweet this week noting that Thursday was the 20th anniversary of the day that the St Louis Cardinals baseball slugger Mark McGwire – powered by steroids as it later turned out – broke the single season home-run record by belting his 70th.

The ball bounced out of one fan’s hands, bounced out of another’s and was finally caught by a 17-year old fan, Phil Ozersky, who at the time was earning chump change stacking shelves.

The Cardinals asked him for the ball and offered in return a signed bat, ball and jersey. But Ozersky wanted one more thing. Yup, he told the Cardinals he wanted to meet McGwire, shake his hand.

McGwire was too much of a big shot, busy hitting more big shots over fences, and said no. So three months later, Ozersky sold the ball for $US3.05 million, bought a house for his handicapped father, gave six-figure sums to charity, married his high-school sweetheart and went on to live happily ever after – while still driving now the car he had back then.

Ain’t sport grand?

Teaming up

Now you can call me an old “romantic” if you like, but I don’t care. See, by definition, every day that passes, big-time sports gets more “modern”, which usually means more technical, more driven by statistics, and more littered with incomprehensible jargon like “corrugated iron” and “marmalade jam”.

It means that, when you come across stories of big-time teams prospering because of embracing the old-time values, it is heart-warming. A prime case in point is the Tampa Bay Buccaneers NFL side, who’ve come from nowhere to open their account this season by beating two of the top-ranked teams in the league, including last year’s Superbowl winners, the Philadelphia Eagles.

United: Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston looks for a receiver.

Photo: AP

Part of it is credited to coach Dirk Koetter doing something different in the off-season.

As reported in The New York Times: “He broke his team into groups of eight, mixing coaches with players, and had the groups hold meetings during which people took turns talking about their backgrounds or upbringing. The goal was team unity.”

Yes, I know. Players actually getting to know each other, and care about each other, beyond football!

“You play with guys but you don’t know personal details of their lives,” tight end Cameron Brate said. “It was really eye-opening. A football team is built on communication and trust and truly being able to understand where someone is coming from and being able to open up to them. It created new pathways of communication and enhanced our trust in each other.”

Everything is so old it’s new again. Next thing you know, you’ll get players truly caring about the jerseys they play for, and speaking about the clubs they’ve played for, for over a decade, in the first person, not the third person, as in: “They’ve been a great club, and really good to me.”

Just Google it

As I have said many times before, if they were holding a group 1 horse race – whatever that is – around my house, I would pull the curtains shut and call the police. I just don’t care. Still, occasionally stories arise from the racing world that pique the interest, and a case in point comes from reader Paul Foster this week. He advises that all owners of new racehorses get to name their steed, often by seeking inspiration from their parents’ names.

“So this fella has a horse by Benfica out of Loose ‘n’ Lovely. He called it Andiamo Fica, which is Italian for Let’s Go C—.”

For this effort, he��s just been disqualified from owning horses for 18 months.

My thoughts . . .

1. It’s great to get one over the authorities.

2. Don’t Racing NSW have Google?

Knock it off

TFF had a rant mid-week on the ludicrousness of SCG Trust Chair Tony Shepherd following Alan Jones’ lead by asserting that if the Sydney Football Stadium is knocked down, we risk a Hillsborough disaster – where 96 lives were lost – in Sydney.

My central point was this: “If you do insist that the SFS actually risks being a Hillsborough, how on earth did you or the government let last Saturday night’s final go ahead? You dinkum thought there was a risk of 100 people dying, and somehow – ignoring your duty of care, to preserve the safety of spectators – the match was allowed to proceed?”

Precisely what happened that terrible day at Hillsborough thirty years ago remains a deeply sensitive topic but, as several readers pointed out, it’s a whole lot more complex than just assigning blame to the design of the stadium itself. Just two weeks ago, the man who was in control of police operations that day, former South Yorkshire Police chief superintendent David Duckenfield pleaded not guilty to manslaughter by gross negligence. The date for his trial is set for January. We will let their legal system get on with it.

What They Said

Mick Malthouse at a Ballarat sports lunch on Thursday, on women’s football: “I don’t like it . . . I don’t say you shouldn’t play it, I say I don’t like it . . . I don’t like the women’s game the way it is. I would rather see them with a smaller ball, I would rather see it without any tackling, I would rather see it without any heavy bumping.”

AFLW player Moana Hope on Malthouse’s comments: “He said that AFL was a man’s game and not a woman’s game and he’s said that on stage in front of 50 kids who had just played a boys and girls game of football. I left after that. I was so disgusted and drove back to Melbourne. He can have an opinion but then there’s just degrading and disrespectful comments. We’re in 2018, not in 1942 . . . I will never be in the same room as him again.”

Drought over: Tiger Woods celebrates with caddie Joe LaCava after the Tour Championship golf tournament and the FedEx Cup final at Eastlake Golf Club in Atlanta, Georgia.

Photo: EPA

Tiger Woods on his 80th tour win: “I was having a hard time not crying on the last hole. I just can’t believe I pulled this off. It hasn’t been so easy the last couple of years. It’s hard to believe I was able to do it again . . . [lightly sobs]”

Cooper Cronk on whether he’ll be 100% for this weekend’s grand final: “Obviously there’s a point where you can’t get things right in a certain amount of time . . . at some stage God or science will say no, but until then I’ll do everything I possibly can.”

Shane Watson on the support for Steve Smith: “To be able to see so many people come along to a grade game is incredible. We see the crowds that come along to a Sheffield Shield game or a JLT Cup as well, it’s nothing compared to this. It’s very impressive.”

New Zealand great Brendon McCullum tweets his view that David Warner celebrated a grade century a bit too much: “Geez Davey! This celebration is the equivalent of Sir Ed Hillary giving it large climbing his front steps, post Everest! Hahaha.”

Over the top: Dave Warner was in a particularly devastating mood against St George during his knock of 155 not out.

Photo: AAP

Richmond young gun Jack Higgins on winning goal of the year: “Firstly, my heart is at about a thousand minutes per second, so if I screw it up, don’t hate on me.”

Wallaby Ned Hanigan with a fine mixed metaphor: “We can’t be sitting there kicking stones and letting it just get worse, we’ve got to grab it by the balls and try and turn it around.”

Melbourne Storm’s Will Chambers knows how the media rolls: “It’s pretty easy to be a keyboard warrior, people don’t really say stuff to your face. It’s easy to print it in a newspaper, but they won’t come and say it to you. But everyone wants a story, it’s pretty funny don’t you think? I’m from a small town in the Northern Territory. You don’t get much media up there, it’s pretty cruisy, it’s not the Sydney press.”

Michael Cheika aware of how quickly things can change: “They wanted to cut Nathan Buckley’s head off last year didn’t they, and he’s in a grand final this week. That’s the way it goes.”

Richmond coach Damien Hardwick after their elimination: “It was an un-Richmond-like performance.”

Jose Mourinho can’t explain why Manchester United players can’t fire up: “I can’t explain the difference of attitude because I never had a difference of attitude. For me it is difficult to explain that.”

Team of the Week

Magpies/Eagles, Roosters/Storm. Play in this weekend’s grand finals.

Tiger Woods. After his extraordinary finish to the season – including his first victory in five years – his world ranking has soared to 13, a nice improvement from where he finished in 2017, at 1193.

Central Coast Heart. This regional elite team just won the Netball NSW Premier League grand final last night, a big achievement for the only non-metropolitan team in the Premier League competition.

Tom Mitchell. As TFF predicted, winner of the 2018 Brownlow medal.

Nathan Buckley. One of the most storied figures in Australian sport is about to add the one thing his glittering career has lacked – a premiership. After his Collingwood side finished 13th last year, they are today in the grand final against the Eagles.

Eddie McGuire. There is a very good reason they don’t call him “Eddie the Eagle”. The Collingwood president is a Magpie to the marrow of his bones, and his decision not to sack Buckley last year now looks a like a master-stroke.

Mozzie Legends. Beat the young pups of the Weigall Wanderers in the Cook and Philip Park indoor soccer grand final. The significance is that the Mozzies have played in every single season held since this ex-Olympic venue was handed over to the public in 2001 – meaning that the team, who now has an average age of 45, have compensated their loss of speed with an injection of guile and determination.

Peter FitzSimons is a Herald journalist, columnist and author, based in Sydney. He is also a former Wallabies player.