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starryalpacasstuff · 9 months ago

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Indian BL? FROM 2017????

There's an Indian BL from 2017 that I just watched. And I have incoherent thoughts

Before I continue, massive thanks to my bestie @anixknowsnothin for telling me about this show and proofreading the post for me. You don't even watch bl so I have no idea how you found this, but I'm incredibly grateful nonetheless

Here's the link to where I watched the show from, there's a glitch in the first episode subs where the subs seem to be from another show entirely, but it's only for the first ep and about 50% of the dialogue is in English anyways, so it shouldn't be hard to follow.(My ask box is also always open if there's a specific dialogue/scene in Hindi that you want the translation of)

Edit: The link seems to be region locked, so to watch it you can use a vpn and set your region to India, otherwise the episodes are available on youtube, albeit without subs

Note:- this post is going to have a few mild spoilers throughout, but I'll flag major spoilers in red

It's no secret that India is fairly behind when it comes to queer love shows if we compare it to other Asian countries. While it has a handful of great queer shows and movies, it's still quite a small quantity. Additionally, before this, I'd never watched an Indian show that felt like I was watching a bl (if you have recs, please send them my way!!). I'm not going to get into the technicalities of what feels like a bl and doesn't, because honestly, I'm not completely sure myself. For now, I'm just going based off of vibes and feelings, and this show felt like a bl through and through.

Titled 'Romil and Jugal' after its main characters, the story is a modern, desi, bl remake of the classic story...

Romeo and Juliet

Well, Bad Buddy was the first Thai bl I ever watched, so Romil and Jugal being the first Indian BL I watched just feels right, no?

I didn't actually know that the story was based off of Romeo and Juliet till the second episode, because I didn't bother looking for a synopsis, and jumped right in. However, it's links to Romeo and Juliet quickly became apparent, around the same time I started to see similarities between this show and Bad Buddy. I also did not know that this show came out in 2017 before I googled it, having already watched the entire thing, which was a pretty huge shock, because this BL is progressive by 2024 India standards.

Alright, enough of my rambling. Here's a synopsis of the show in case you haven't heard of it. (I couldn't find an official one, so I did my best to write a spoiler free synopsis)

Ramya happens to start talking to a slightly older woman at an airport, who believes that there is no romance in the younger generation. To prove her wrong, Ramya decides to tell the older woman her brother's love story. The story from the past is shown to us as Ramya narrates it to the woman in the present. Jugal is a closeted 19-year-old who lives with his parents. One day, a family moves into the house next door, and Jugal immediately falls for the son, Romil. The two of them attend the same college, and eventually become friends. The two of them eventually get together, but have to face the challenges of a homophobic society and having parents that hate each other.

I was a little skeptical of the show going in, but the show surpassed all of my expectations in the best way possible. It's no masterpiece, and it has its flaws, but it was far better than what I expected. It had both comical elements and darker themes, and it did not shy away from exploring the darker themes at all. Oh, and it has a few musical numbers. What did you expect? This is India after all.

The show is 10 episodes long, with 20 minutes per episode, and so it does unfortunately fall into some of the pitfalls that shorter shows tend to fall into, namely underdeveloped relationships and rushed endings. I did end up feeling a little bit like it didn't make sense for the pair to sacrifice and suffer as much as they did because they hadn't known each other for very long, and I felt like they should have been given more time to fall in love with each other. But it also could be argued that the show stays true to the play, and Romil and Jugal are dumb teenagers who make mistakes and stick with each other through them. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it.

One thing that I loved the show for was that it showed us that the relationship is not all sunshine and rainbows. They argue, they break up, they get back together, and they do argue even after that. But every time, they eventually work through the issue and reconcile. The show even depicts Romil dealing with internalized homophobia and struggling to reconcile with the fact that he will never be who his family wants him to be. Although I do wish they'd have had more time to explore this, I'd say it was decently depicted and handled. The show really delves into how children are forced to uphold their family's wishes and are constantly put under pressure to make them proud. Although it clearly affects both of them, it's more obvious with Romil, who is expected by his family to date and marry the daughter of his father's boss, whom they think he is dating. There's a metaphor along this theme too, where Romil pretends to like the mango shake that his mom has been making for him since he was a kid, even though he hates it, and when he tries to tell her, he has to act like it was a joke to spare her feelings. The show also goes into the communal mindset of basing your actions off "what will people think?", and you can see how a lot of the characters' actions throughout the show are haunted by this question. Some of Romil and Jugal's earlier disagreements are due to this very mindset.

The show also very candidly depicts the extreme homophobia of society in India. Romil and Jugal had to constantly hide who they were, always having to keep up a mask and I felt that reach somewhere deep inside me. When the pair come out, the show really shows how ugly homophobia can be in India. Their parents immediately disown them. They're mocked in college and wrongfully suspended for a fight that was provoked by other students. Very, very few people stand with them, and the pair very quickly realize that now that they are out, they simply cannot live in the city anymore. So with the help of Jugal's best friend and her mother, they flee to Mumbai, where they get jobs and live as paying guests with a friend of the aforementioned mother. But, even in Mumbai, the masks stay up. They have to act like cousins, for fear of being persecuted. The series depicted the worst-case scenario that so many of us live in fear of, so watching it was something of a cathartic experience for me.

Another thing that the show did quite well is showing how different people and their mindsets can be. Jugal's best friend, Ahalya, and her mom are very supportive, and they help the pair out quite a bit. Ahalya's mother provided a safe house for the pair and helped them find a fresh start. Meanwhile, Romil and Jugal's parents are incredibly homophobic. There was a scene that really stuck with me, (mild spoiler ahead, skip to the last sentence of the paragraph) where Ahalya's mother came across Jugal's mother, who prided herself on being educated and well-read, searching up how to cure homosexuality. Ahalya's mother then tells her off for calling herself educated yet believing that homosexuality is an illness. It is so important to me that the show depicted both the violent homophobia that permeates Indian society and the surprising, warm acceptance that one can find.

One final thing that I loved about this show so, so much is just how authentically Indian it feels. Asian cultures share a lot in common, but they also have their differences, so seeing a show where I can imagine encountering the characters in real life is really amazing. Rather than something big, it was little things sprinkled throughout the story that warmed my heart. The story felt like something I could hear the local aunties gossiping about. The way it depicts queerness in India hits incredibly close to home.

One thing I've learned watching Asian bls is that the ending of a show can make it or break it, but with this one, I'm stuck. The best way I can describe the ending is absolutely insane and incredibly Bollywood.

I believe this show was supposed to get a second season because the last two minutes of the show leave us with a massive cliffhanger. Now, it's been 7 years, so a second season is unlikely, so I'm simply pretending that the last two minutes of the show never happened. But the ending has so much more to it than just this (Major spoilers for the ending up ahead. I mean it when I say major, this is like going into Bad Buddy knowing that they're going to trick their parents in the end).

About halfway through the show, I remembered what play it was based upon and realized that there was a very real possibility that Romil and Jugal would die. The first half of the last episode leads up to this, telling us that they died when reconciling after an argument in the middle of the road when they were hit by a truck. We get a super emotional scene (yes, I cried) where the two families somewhat reconcile in their grief as they go to the police station to identify the bodies. Except... they're not dead, which is revealed when Romil's father hugs Romil's (not) dead body. They reveal that they planned this to show their family that they still loved their sons. I did say it was like PatPran tricking their parents in the end, didn't I? So the families reunite, Romil and Jugal get jobs in New Zealand and get married, and return to India for a wedding celebration (yes, I cried. again). The ending does feel slightly rushed, but if I'm being honest, it wasn't as terrible as it could have been. Believing that your child is dead for a bit is a somewhat justifiable reason for a sudden change of heart. There's a part where Romil and Jugal tell their parents that if they choose acceptance, they can reconcile, but if they choose to remain prejudiced, Romil and Jugal can simply get back on the stretchers, because they'll be as good as dead to their families anyways and it is *chef's kiss*.

All in all, the show was surprisingly heartfelt and poignant. It had me laughing, kicking my feet and even crying. There's a lot more about this show that I could talk about, but I'm going to stop here for now, and I'll try to write more on it later. This show really does deserve more recognition than it has, and I'm almost mad at myself for not knowing about it before. Am I being really biased when talking about this show? Absolutely. But I do think that this show is a worthwhile watch, and I'd really like to see what other people on here think of the show, especially because I'm aware that I am biased towards this show.

I'm tagging a few people who I know might be interested/have some thoughts about the show because this is a show that I really want to hear other people's opinions on and have conversations about, so I hope you guys don't mind!

@waitmyturtles @lurkingshan @bengiyo @neuroticbookworm

#good lord this post is almost 2k words #i think this is the longest post i have ever written #and there's more thoughts rattling around in my brain about this show #did i convince you to watch the show?#please say yes #i need people to talk to about this show #bl recs #indian bl #indian bl recs #romil and jugal #romil & jugal #bad buddy #i mean it's related #how does everything i write about somehow find it's way to that goddam show #but seriously romil and jugal was surprisingly very good #i did not expect it at all #but i have never been so glad to be proven wrong #queer indian media

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sunshine-and-christmas-caryls · 3 months ago

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My thoughts on The Umbrella Academy’s season 4 Love Triangle. Spoilers below!

Please Note:

This is ridiculously long and consists of my thoughts and interpretations of the characters and their motivations/ feelings based on what we got to see from the show. They aren’t necessarily right or wrong for the characters- they are literally just my interpretations and likes and dislikes with how they handled the love triangle in this season of the Umbrella Academy.

I do not want to get in debates or arguments about the merits of either couple, if the storyline should have been included in the first place, of what is in or out of character, or about who is endgame, or anything else. If you agree with my opinions cool; if you disagree with them cool; if you want to share those thoughts or have a conversation about it, also cool.

But please skip this post if you’re just looking for a fight. This was more for me to organize my thoughts on them, and share for others who found Five and Lila as a couple unexpectedly (for me at least) engaging.

Other Things to Note that I don’t really get into in the main body of this:

-I think there are a hell of a lot of plot holes and inconsistencies, and some poor dialogue scripting in season 4. Some of which really, really bother me. But I think the storylines and plots had potential as concepts and could have been done so much better had there been more money & care to make more episodes. (Some of the concepts would probably have needed much more time than a full season to really be done well though...)

Overall, I didn’t hate season 4 so much as I was kind of underwhelmed and a little disappointed by it. [But if we’re being honest, while I like TUA overall, I do think each season was at least a little bit worse as a whole than the previous one anyway, despite there being good and/or great parts to every season too…]

-I did feel like most of the characters were a little off compared to how they acted in previous seasons. However I don’t know if that had more to do with:

a) lazy and/ or rushed writing, or

b) the plot/ time skip

I am one of those who thinks Five actually is a little calmer in nature, but a lot more manic the more stressful and pressing the situation gets. However he doesn’t have a lot of the same smugness and sarcasm that I was expecting either. Diego doesn’t have the same kind of determined motivation he shows in previous seasons, and Lila is a little less chaotic even if there are still a few hints at it.

Now part of that, I think, is due to the 6 years time difference and the characters growth that we missed during that. Especially considering their new circumstances: Diego and Lila being parents and Five, for the first time since he first time traveled to the future, was not in the middle of (nor actively trying to stop) an apocalypse. Plus ALL the characters had adjustments to make in being without their powers.

Part of it, I’m assuming, is also because of the shortened episode count leading to a poorer script overall. And I’m hoping that had we got a full season we would have been able to see a little more of their previous characterization come through too.

-My opinion about Five’s sexuality since that seems to be a topic of conversation for some who felt he was OOC in that regards:

To be honest I don’t really have a clear idea of it, other than he is absolutely not aromantic, in my opinion. I can respect your opinion if you do/did and were disappointed, but he thought up a wife for himself when he was alone- not friends or a substitute of his family. To me that just means he’s a big romantic at heart.

Whether he’s asexual, Demi-sexual, bi/pan or straight otherwise, I honestly have no clue. I think I gravitate towards him needing an emotional connection for him to have a fulfilling relationship in the show. But I think I saw somewhere that he got around a lot in the comics, and I could see that too if that’s the unspoken assumption they were using.

Side note on Dolores: I thought 5’s romance with her was a great addition to 5’s personal story and as a way to show the basic human nature of needing others, but I’m also kind of glad that she didn’t actually become real, because at the end of the day, she was a delusion of his, and I don’t really want to see that story. (Just my opinion; no harm meant to others who would have liked that plot.)

-Sometime around the middle of season 3, I actually remember thinking that if Aiden/ 5 had been older or Ritu/ Lila younger, I would have shipped the shit out of the characters because of their symmetry and contrasts. However, I also immediately dismissed the thought because the physical age gap IS a little weird for me. I didn’t read their scenes as necessarily romantic or sexual, so much so as they could have been if they were of the same age (at least for me).

In universe, I took it as the characters being kind of fascinated by each other, both getting enjoyment out of goading and poking at one another, but there wasn’t really genuine interest in pursuing each other either. (In hindsight of season 4, though I suppose it was really laying the groundwork for what would eventually turn romantic.)

I thought the writers were going to make Five and Lila the “platonic besties who, to a stranger, looked like they were a couple but really weren’t” and Diego and Lila were going to be the “contentious and passionate couple who argued as much as they loved”.

After season 4 though, I adjusted my thinking, and that’s kind of the basis around my opinions in the main body below.

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By the end of season 3, I thought Diego and Lila might have been the best relationship that was still on going. Despite that, I couldn’t bring myself to ship it either. They were never True Love/ OTP material for my tastes, because while they certainly had passion, they lacked the kind of emotional connection that would draw me in. (Don’t ask me what that is specifically because most of the time I have no idea what makes me ship one couple over another…) So, even though I think it had the most development, I also was just not attached to them as a couple.

And maybe my apathy towards them as a couple is making me biased, but Diego and Lila being unhappy with each other and their domestic life made sense to me. It was surprising, because I thought they were going to make them a “happy violent” couple, (or at least something more along the lines of what the rest of the fandom had expected) but not truly shocking either.

Diego and Lila had only known each other for about four months by the time season 3 ended. And again their actual romantic scenes mostly take place during the few days we see on screen in season 2. It might not have been as quick as a “love at first sight” arc, but it was definitely a whirlwind romance.

Also, Lila grew up under the Handler and was primed from the start to be her weapon. So, I think Lila being around Diego for months (I’m working with the assumption that she was in the institute nearly as long, if not longer than Diego) would naturally lead to her becoming infatuated with him.

After all, Diego is a handsome, good, & maybe a little bit goofy man who cares about people and justice, and loves his family; and they had a lot of passion/ sexual connotations to their scenes. I feel like he was everything she thought she ever wanted.

And it was much the same for Diego. She was the wild, manic pixie girl of his dreams whose personal brand of crazy drove him mad as well. He’s got childhood trauma, too, which he relates to with her, and I think in the beginning he kind of viewed her as both damsel in distress and partner in crime, which would appeal to his need to be a hero and his desire to not be alone.

(I’ve always thought of Diego as the most insecure of the siblings, and his need to be THE hero- not just any hero but the main star of the show kind of hero- was the way he hid from his inner insecurities and desire to fit in and be noticed.)

Season 2 was essentially Diego and Lila falling for each other despite being on opposing sides; and it’s clear that both had strong feelings for each other. Season 3 picks up immediately after and is also only a few days long. The main plot point for Diego and Lila’s relationship in this season, was essentially them deciding to give their relationship a go and establishing them as soon to be parents.

Season 3 also continues some precedents that were set in season 2, and continue in season 4. (Lila lying, Diego not noticing or misunderstanding a part of her character, Five and Lila having a side adventure/ arc on their own, and Diego noticing Lila was around Five.)

Now there are obviously more details and nuances to both seasons- showing Diego and Lila both feeling like they can open up to each other a bit more than they felt they could with others, showing their desire for a family, and to be better than their parents, establishing the fear of failure in that regards (at least for Lila) etc.

And while It might not have been my ship, I don’t want to diminish their bond either. Diego and Lila obviously had a connection and cared a great deal about each other, and were probably happy and in love for a while too. But none of that changes that fact that Diego and Lila had a whirlwind romance built amidst lies and high stakes, end-of-the-world stress, on top of an unplanned pregnancy, all within only knowing each other for 4 months at most.

And in light of that, it’s not actually surprising that when the dust settled and things were calmer, the cracks in their foundation were visible. I think they were both swept up in their connection to each other and their dreams of having a family and life better than what they had, that they never saw that maybe they weren’t quite right for each other, maybe they each needed something a little different than what the other could offer.

It’s clear in the first episode that they are not in the best of places as individuals nor as a couple. Diego hates his job and is constantly complaining about his life. He’s a bit suspicious of Lila and her whereabouts but also seems to miss, or at least underestimate, how hard things are on Lila.

Lila is visibly and verbally struggling with her role as a mother, as being too tied to that identity, and is sneaking out of the house to do undercover work and lying about it to her husband. She’s constantly badgered with Diego complaining, but also kind of fails to acknowledge that his motivation for doing a job he hates is to provide for their family.

Neither of them are truly happy with the way their lives turned out. And I think a large part of that was because they tried to change themselves to fit the mold of what they thought they should be in their dreams of a family, rather than finding a balance of being themselves with and as a family.

But there’s a disconnect between them as a couple too. From their scenes in episode 1-4, I got the impression that Diego, while clueless to Lila’s unhappiness/ struggles, nonetheless still had feelings for her because he was still trying to show off to her (the chef had the wrong technique, throwing the axes blind, holding her whilst convincing her to go on the road trip, etc.).

I got the impression that for Lila it was the opposite. She still loved him as a person and a father to her children, but she couldn’t bring herself to feel the same way she did in the previous seasons either. Every overture he made, even if it wasn’t exactly the most romantic, she met with annoyance or disdain. And while she might have laughed at him previously, she also defended him too. This season she was the one poking at him the most without defending him really at all.

Had she never got lost on that subway with Five, maybe they would have been able to work it out and it really was just a slump for them, one of the lower points in the ups and downs that every couple experiences. But (in my opinion at least) her annoyance in Diego’s attempts at reaching out and the fact that after six years she still felt the need to lie to him rather than talk about her unhappiness were more a sign that the romantic love was gone for Lila. That after the initial whirlwind romance and honeymoon period, she wasn’t quite in love with him anymore; at least, not in the “you’re my forever person” kind of way.

But I think she’s stubborn, and she so wanted a family with him, that it kept her from saying anything about what she was going through for so long. And I think Diego was totally oblivious to this in the face of his own struggles with domesticity, but I also think that maybe he was a little less in love than he thought too?

I’m of mixed opinions on this, but it felt a little weird to me that he was more upset- at least in the moment- that she went undercover than that she had potentially cheated. It could just be that in the moment he was so upset to be left out of the action that he wasn’t really thinking about how much bigger of an issue it would be had she cheated. (Or maybe cheating just isn’t as big a deal to him as it would be to me? Like I said I don’t have a good read on this…)

But I could also see it as potentially showing him having settled into his choice in loving her forever rather than truly feeling- without falter- like she was his forever person. Either way he definitely still has feelings for her, and that’s what made me so much more sad for Diego.

Especially because, in the end, it was his brother that it happened with. I feel like her choosing to save Five at the Mexican Consulate in season 2 instead of him has always sat in the back of his mind, and that’s why he’s always noticed when they are together. Of course he went through the realization that she had first used him to get close to/ watch Five, but when she came back to bring him into the Commission he knew she had genuine feelings for him too, and I don’t really think he questioned it much after that.

But it’s something that I think stayed with him, lurking in his subconscious. Knowing that when he was on a metaphorical ledge and first reached out to her for help, she chose Five instead. And that’s why he always noticed when Lila and Five were together.

Also, I think the first two greenhouse scenes spoke volumes about both (though indirectly for Diego & Lila’s) relationships. It was mentioned at least twice in season 3 that Lila’s worried about not being cut out for a maternal, domestic role, and her struggles in the beginning of season 4 probably felt like confirmation of that to her. But then we see in episode 5 that she can be happy in a softer domestic role, when she’s with the right person.

I’m 100% aware that it’s different for Lila and Diego with the kids and real world things like mortgage, school, taxes, etc. than it is for Five and Lila who only had each other & whose sole focus is on surviving and getting back to their home. I understand the nuances make a HUGE difference. But at the end of the day, for Lila they are two sucky -albeit very different kinds of sucky- situations with two different men. And she’s happier making do with one than the other.

Which brings me to the Five/ Lila portion of things. I was VERY caught off guard by the fact that the writers/ producers actually went there. As in all the way up to episode 5, I thought the writers were just making hints of Lila/ Five as a red herring, or to highlight Diego’s insecurities. But then I saw the intro to episode 5, and thought oh, they were actually building them up as a potential couple. And the greenhouse scenes sealed it for me- whatever they might say, the writers really went there and let Five and Lila fall in love.

It was both a slightly uncomfortable and a very pleasant surprise. I’m not a big fan of big age gaps, they tend to leave me feeling a little icky, but there have been several ships of mine that it happens with because I feel like it makes sense with their characters and how deep or strong their emotional connection and history is. I don’t really enjoy that aspect, but I won’t deny that there are some stories that I just accept it & move on (notably book canon Braime for me).

Five and Lila is worse simply because Five is in the body of a 13 year old in the first three seasons, and that’s just a firm no all around for me. But his mind was that of a 58 year old and just because he’s had a weird thing happen to him, doesn’t mean that he suddenly can’t think or feel like any other adult does (I’m honestly kind of thankful they did at least wait, because it would have felt wrong to me when he was physically 13, despite knowing he was much older mentally).

It also helps that that kind of mentally older, physically younger character at some point take on “vampire rules” for me (as in the contrast between mental and physical age of some vampire/ immortal/ supernatural character and their human love interest is so absurd and abstract that it somehow cancels out for me).

And by the time there’s any kind of romantically intimate scenes between the two, Five is 25/26. And even though it’s heavily implied they slept together, all that’s actually shown are a couple of fairly tame kisses.

Furthermore, they’re both mentally adults, and had it ever reset to a timeline without any time travel involved, Lila and Five would probably be the same age (all the super power kids were born on the same day after all). So it’s really not that big of an issue when they actually do get together.

The other aspect that makes me a little uncomfortable about Five and Lila is of course, Diego and Lila’s relationship. I already mentioned that it wasn’t necessarily something I personally shipped, but it was the relationship I think the audience members were most familiar with, and them having a family and still technically being together, made it a little sad to see Five and Lila happy with each other.

I would have personally preferred the writers completely dissolve the Diego/ Lila relationship before actually having Five/ Lila get together, because I’m not a huge fan of cheating storylines, especially when there’s kids involved.

I also feel like they could have hit most of the same emotional beats even if they had let Diego and Lila divorce first? Like it still would have been an emotionally charged reveal scene at the house if Diego had something along the lines of “that was my wife, we only divorced a week ago” or “you’re my brother and she was my wife, what the hell!?”. But I actually think the writers were trying to leave the “end game” couple up to interpretation, which felt too much like a cop out to me.

I think most audience members just needed more screen time of all three & that would have helped quell some of the hate Five & Lila get. We needed more time to see how Diego and Lila’s romance fizzled and died out, and more time to feel the weight of the 6.5 years on the subway building to Five and Lila’s romance.

I think it would have been better received if they had a fourth, fifth, and side season, or made this fourth season extra long (like 12-16 episodes) with a split release (first in August, and the latter half of the episodes during Christmas time) with a mini or side season (or even a movie) of just Five and Lila’s subway adventures. Kind of like how they did a Queen Charlotte story between seasons of Bridgerton.

There would always be some who refused to like it because of the age gap, or because they just prefer Diego/Lila or Five & Lila as purely platonic; but I think more time would have helped shorten the list of haters at least a little (and given the writers an opportunity to work the kinks out of more of the storylines in general).

Like I said earlier I’m not a big fan of the cheating aspect of their relationship, but I also don’t entirely think it’s fair the way so many people seem to view it as Five “letting Lila betray his brother with him” or “Five not caring about his brother is so OOC. He’d never betray Diego just to fuck”.. Because from what I watched, that’s not what happened at all??

Putting aside the “letting her cheat” (because they’re all grown ass adults and no one is responsible for someone else’s actions) I don’t get how people don’t see the love that grew between Five and Lila. Lila might be saying verbally that it was “only survival” and that “it’s over”, but her actions, expressions, and tones all scream love and care and affection.

I think Lila was a little confused when she gets back, but it’s also very obvious that she loves Five in the same way it was obvious in season 2 that Lila was downplaying her interest and affection/ love for Diego when she said “nah” to killing him like the Handler suggested.

And it’s the same for Five. If it had only been a physical or lonely thing, I don’t really think it would have happened. It’s because it was Lila, who is so similar and so opposite him in equal measure that he fell in love with her. And it’s because he loves her that he would want to pursue a full relationship with her. The fact that they’re human and gave into their feelings rather than uphold moral standards wasn’t that crazy of an idea, especially given the somewhat murky circumstances. It was never about purposefully hurting Diego or not caring about him.

Them getting together was two damaged people put in extraordinary circumstances with only each other to rely on for years, without any knowledge of how long they would be alone, surviving through hardships and growing in love. Or at least, that’s how I interpreted their relationship from what we got to see.

None of that felt out of character for either of them to me. Everything through the first two greenhouse scenes (minus a few dialogue/ scripting issues) felt pretty in character to me, all things considered. What did feel wrong and out of character for me was Five hiding the journal for months and him saying he wants to kill Diego and physically fighting him, while the rest of their family fought the Bennifer Blob monster.

I get wanting to show Five struggling with the decision to prioritize the world because for the first time he’s actually experienced love and happiness with a real person; plus they already started him on the do “not save the world” mindset last season. But they could have executed that in a much better way than having him find and hide a cypher book that would take them back home.

[Hell, even within the scene, he could have found it sometime that same morning or within the past couple of days and it would change literally nothing about their argument except the length of time he’s had the journal- because his actions are literally never addressed!]

But while it could just be an expansion of him not wanting to lose the happiness he found, and faltering in his steadfast determinedness to do right by the world and be with his family, it still feels off to his character for me. (Obviously the writers disagree with my interpretation of his character though.)

For me, even though he would grapple with the decision, Five would, in the end at least, still have chosen to go back to save his family & the world because that is so central to him as character. What I think they should have done was have him find it right after or before her gifting him the instant coffee. Have him open the conversation that he found it and Lila being so excited that she initially missed his internal conflict.

It could pan to her realizing what it means to go back, and them having a short talk about it. Lila could say they have to go back because of her kids, they have to go back to save their family. And Five could say he knows but he was happy there with her, and a part of him didn’t want to leave. She could have said she was happy too, but flinched when he went to hold her hand and that could have prompted the start of the argument.

The argument itself could still keep to the core of what it was in the show with only a few dialogue changes, and it would hit all the same emotional tones of the scene but without feeling like Five’s core motivations as a character were totally flipped on its head. Again, that’s just my opinion on it.

I do feel like Five being jealous and lashing out at Diego a bit during the Christmas reveal was in line with how Five might react in that situation. After all, he gets more sarcastic, testy, and even manic with the more stress he’s under. The bracelet line from Diego should have been reworded though. I’m not sure if it was lazy writing, or if they were rushed and/or overlooking things because of the episode cut, but that felt off.

They could have just as easily had him say, “you hate bracelets now” or “you never wear bracelets anymore” before mentioning the traded Valentine’s bracelet, and it still would have shown the disconnect between Diego and Lila in their relationship. A blanket “you hate bracelets” after we had- for two seasons- seen her wear the one he made that she nabbed in season 2 just felt like poor script writing.

And I would be 100% down for the first initial shoves of their fight had that been as far as it went before Five or Diego said they bigger things to worry about and the other passive-aggressively agreed.

Or better yet, if their confrontation happened after the family escaped to Luthor’s, so that the writers could still have Five run off to the subway without having him & Diego, in a sense and literally by Five, abandoning their family & acting stupid in the midst of battle. Because that felt weird and out of character for both of them to me.

I also very much needed a scene where Five apologizes to Diego at least that he hurt him (but not necessarily for loving Lila) and Diego not necessarily forgiving Five, but at least acknowledging him before they died. Because letting things be so unresolved between them and then erasing them from existence was cruel.

All that being said, I very much loved Five and Lila’s relationship with each other. Their dynamic outside of the actual storyline is the perfect mix of enemies to lovers and two broken souls finding solace in each other. And while I do wish they had changed or tweaked a few things, their story was still rather tragically beautiful.

I also firmly believe that had they all survived, Five & Lila probably would have been end game. I think the set up for them was too deep (even if a little too rushed with the episode limit/ being the final season) for Lila to truly be able to go back to Diego. If pushed too much too soon, I think she’d probably try for the sake of the kids. But the unhappiness with each other/ their life together even before the subway time-skip, coupled with the distrust and hurt that comes when a partner cheats, isn’t something I really think Diego and Lila are strong enough as a couple to overcome. And that could have led to even more bitterness and resentment before they finally called it quits.

However, if given enough time, I think Lila would have pulled back from both of them for a bit to figure out what she wanted and focus on her kids, herself, and any ongoing apocalypse situation if there were still one. I think she would have come to the realization that she loves Diego and would always care for him, but that she was no longer in love with him. That when she pictures the rest of her life, it’s Five she wants beside her.

Maybe she procrastinates a bit on talking about it, because she hates the situation and doesn’t want to hurt either one of them, but eventually they’d sort themselves out. But I also think she and Five would have to have a long conversation about taking her choices from her, especially if it involves her kids, because hiding the book was a fairly big betrayal and not something I think she could totally ignore, like they did in the show. (I personally hated that it was even a part of the story to begin with, but Five hiding the journal really needed to be addressed. I hope it would have been if the had more time.)

& If this was along the lines of what they were going to do with the plot if they were to get another season or two, I hope the writers would have used this to let Diego spiral a bit, before confronting his underlying insecurities and moving past it all. Hopefully with a new love interest at some point that is as perfect as can be for him, because I don’t like him sad and he deserves love and a happily ever after too.

On a side note, one thing that I thought was cute & slightly amusing out of context, but firmly believe should have been left on the cutting room floor was the entirety of the van/ “You’re family needs you; I need you” scene. And I know they kept it in to push the uncertainty of the Five/ Lila and Diego/ Lila relationships, but this was too obviously a plot device for the love triangle that just wasn’t believable for me narratively speaking.

Because with Allison’s new powers, Klaus’ ability to raise ghosts that were corporeal, & Diego’s telekinesis with redirecting multiple bullets, what do you mean there were too many enemies for them to handle? And how am I supposed to believe that in the past seven years, Five, who was canonically shot at and chased, never took the time to practice and remaster his blinking abilities?

Especially since they established in episode 4, and earlier in episode 6 when he and Lila returned to the house, that he could apparently- and accurately- time travel over large stretches of time without any issues/ struggles. Not to mention that mere minutes later inside the department store, he’s able blink to the second floor without any problem?

Whatever issues or enjoyment I had with the way they had Five and Lila and Diego’s story unfold, most of it just came down to personal preference, tweaking the script, and needing more episodes. But this scene in particular just felt silly and pointless to me. They could have had Lila say “I need you” in a show of concern, or physically reaching out to Five instead of Diego; only to say the “it’s over” line a few scenes later and it still would have pushed the “who does she choose” narrative. But the fact that the love triangle never gets truly resolved either, makes all of it fall flat, in my opinion. (I thought on first watch that the “it’s over” line was just about the fight and misunderstood by Five, but it could have been about their relationship too. And now we’ll probably never know for sure because they didn’t resolve anything in any of their relationships to each other 😢)

All that being said though, this is a slightly whacky show about very messed up people, who do very messy things all the time- I shouldn’t be surprised they went for the messiest option for how to handle this love triangle…

#fivela #five x lila #tua spoilers #TUA season 4 spoilers #my thoughts on the TUA season 4 love triangle #reminder- these are just my thoughts and opinions on what happened

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siblingshuffle · 6 months ago

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Sibling Shuffle: The Darkman Problem

FINALLY FINISHED. WHOOOOOOO!

I’m a bit iffy about some of the dialogue (idk of its awkward or not) but I finished this late at night and don’t want to change it right now

A bit of context: the question this minicomic is based on is right here. For those who don’t know, back in January I posted to my main blog a question I had about Megaman 5: Did Dr. Light know that the Protoman who kidnapped him in the intro was not the actual Protoman?

While it’s hard to say for sure for the original universe (though if you have an opinion / evidence suggesting either way please share in the original post), there is a VERY clear answer for this universe…

…And that answer is yes, yes he did.

No one who actually interacted with Rock before thought Darkman was him lol

Darkman was trying to go for a "without direction / family / a home, turned to crime" kind of thing. And that’s like. Contrary to his function.

Random civilians? Yeah, most of them could believe it. The Robot Master attacks and fact he once worked for Wily weren’t really helping. His family? Absolutely not! Everyone who knows Rock knows he’s a sweet kid who wouldn’t intentionally hurt anyone unless there was no other way.

(Idk if it’s clear but that’s basically what Dr. Light is saying: “your disguise is so bad, you didn’t even grab me or gesture with the correct hand. I doubt literally anyone this was supposed to fool actually fell for it.”)

————

Rock is left-handed! They made him a leftie in the games for readability, I believe - it would look weird if he fired from his right hand; he’d have to turn his body to face away from the audience. I try to keep it so he gestures with the left hand more than his right, but I’m not the best at The Focus Thing™�� and I may have drawn him gesturing with his right accidentally a few times.

To distinguish between Rock and Darkman, I desaturated Darkman’s colors a bit!

I didn’t feel like doing much for backgrounds. The one in this comic is a slightly-edited screenshot from a scene in the game taking place at the very end.

"It was at this moment that Darkman IV knew: he ****ed up"

—————

Next Up: Cave In

As always, please ask any questions you have!

#sibling shuffle au #mega man au #mega man classic #megaman #rock light #dr. light #my art #lore #Minicomic #whooo! it’s done!#This one is both taken seriously and not lol #The next one will be a lot more serious.#:D #Also I like to imagine Darkman calling Wily after this like “I CANNOT WORK UNDER THESE CONDITIONS!”#like a stereotypical actor character

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avaantares · 3 months ago

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Guardian Bonus Bingo: Answer

Okay, I'm going to have to cheat a little on this. I do have an absolutely IDEAL scene for the @guardianbingo "Answer" fill, one that contains the exchange

"Does that answer your question, [name redacted]?"

"If I say no, will you repeat the answer?"

...but I realized I can't post it as a fill because it's the penultimate scene in the (very long) story I'm (hopefully) about to start posting, and as such it would be a spoiler. And since there are a few dozen chapters ahead of it -- most of which I still need to finish editing, and definitely won't have ready before the end of the amnesty period -- I can't just post the rest of the story early to fill the prompt. >.<

So since that can't go live just yet, and I doubt that two lines of dialogue out of context constitutes a bingo fill, I'm going to tackle a question that probably has no definitive answer (see what I did there?). It's one that has mystified me every time I've rewatched this series, and which (conveniently) I was prompted to ask again while pulling gifs from episode 3 for my last bingo fill. The question is:

"Why Do We Even HAVE That Library?"

(If you read that in Izma's voice, you get it.)

The SID has a library. We see it several times throughout the series. But we aren't sure why it has a library, because Zhu Hong straight up states that it's not functional:

...And looking at the books, it's clear that the SID library really is the collection of all time. What's the theme? By what criteria are books selected for inclusion? How are the books catalogued? Why are half of them upside-down on the shelves? Why are there a dozen duplicate copies of several titles? WHO KNOWS?

(Well, probably Sang Zan, eventually. But he's not here yet.)

To probe this mystery, I decided to zoom in and see what I could make of the books. And lo and behold, some of the books have legible titles!

Bottom shelf, left to right:

BLOOD RITE Dominique (not sure if that's an author or a subtitle)

CLASSICAL NOVEL (very original title, that)

Arletta (the Comic Sans nightmare that appears all over the place in various cover colors)

(indecipherable; I think it's both in Chinese and upside-down on the shelf, but it's out of focus)

the statue of liberty (style preserved)

LUXURY HOTELS

Read It Yourself With (last word cut off)

CENTURY

BLOODY HARVEST: The Killing of Falun Gong for Their Organs (I am actually surprised by this one; I had assumed this book was banned by the CCP, but there are multiple copies here)

CENTURY (upside-down this time!)

THE CATCHER IN THE (presumably RYE)

Next shelf:

The People's Lawyer

Unicist Organizational Cybernetics

JUSTICE OF THE PEACE (volume numbers obscured by Zhu Hong's hand; it's the book she's taking down)

Something with an approximation of the American flag and a bunch of languages on the spine

untitled

BLOOD RITE Dominique (same book as lower shelf)

OUYE Sofa + Furniture (this one's repeated all over the shelves, along with CENTURY and Arletta)

Basics of Modern Economic Management (translated title)

Corporate Finance (translated title)

the 10Ks of Personal Branding

GLOWIENKA

GLOWIENKA (but upside-down)

In addition to many duplicates of these books on other shelves, other titles visible on the wide angle pans include:

Anne of Green Gables (good to know this classic also exists on Haixing)

The American Journal of Medicine (we already suspected America existed on Haixing, given the flag stool in ZYL's apartment)

Imperial Crown

Charles Darwin: The Descent of Man (parallel evolution on Haixing? *rimshot*)

The Hotel Book

None of these titles seem particularly relevant to the SID's function -- except, perhaps, for the Justice of the Peace regulations, which Zhu Hong was actually looking for -- which makes me think there must either be a secret code of some kind, or the SID once raided an IKEA OUYE and took all their prop display books into evidence, and then someone at the SID later saw all the books and assumed it was a reference library.

A lot of the titles in this scene aren't really clear, but when I have time to pull up later episodes that have scenes dealing with the library specifically (Zhao Xinci visiting, et al.), it might be fun to grab some frames, enhance with the magic of Photoshop, and put them on my 4K display to see if I can find other interesting titles.

Also, I don't have time to go looking just now, but I'd bet the books in the library are duplicates of the ones in Shen Wei's apartment, which I seem to remember being pretty random. They recycled so much of the set dressing, I can't imagine there would be more than one collection of weird shelf-fill.

Zhao Yunlan's tastes, on the other hand, are a bit narrower. The most prominently-displayed book in his apartment is just titled Furniture.

#guardian #zhen hun #Guardian Bonus Bingo #The SID library

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oyeicher · 2 years ago

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Decided to turn my late-night ramblings on Starstruck into an actual post for the three people who might be interested in a little bit more of Yoojae's characterization in the source material. Yoojae reacted poorly to Hanjoon's confession, to say the least, but the novel gives much more insight into why Yoojae reacted the way that he did.

Now the show didn't really explain how Yoojae found out where Hanjoon lived, but in the novel, Yoojae goes to see Hanjoon at his old home the day before the college entrance exam to give him something, only to be told by the landlord that Hanjoon and his mom moved out ages ago. The next day, after the college entrance exam, Yoojae goes to see the owner of the boxing club, who has been feeding Hanjoon meals because he doesn't have enough money for his meals. It is the boxing club owner who fills Yoojae in about Hanjoon's current predicament.

After Yoojae says, "Don't try to preserve your dignity in front of me," to Hanjoon, he also says the following:

Throughout high school, I often went to school hungry, so you invited me to your home to eat. This happened countless times. Why did you do so? Wasn't it because we're friends? So why can't I do the same for you? Why is it that I am allowed to rely on you, but you can't rely on me? If things are difficult, just say so. What's so difficult about that?

Both of them grew up in poverty in the same neighborhood so neither are strangers to not having enough money to buy food. However, while Yoojae's family has made a small fortune and moved into an apartment in a fancier neighborhood, Hanjoon and his mom have been kicked out of their home. Nevertheless, having been through similar situations himself, Yoojae is painfully aware of what it's like to be so poor as to go without meals, as well as not wanting to be seen as a charity case and pitied by others. Thus, after Yoojae's family escapes poverty, Yoojae treats Hanjoon the same as he always has, save for small things like occasionally buying a few snacks and offering to pay for Hanjoon at the comic cafe. Yoojae did not want to tell Hanjoon about his family's newfound wealth on account of Hanjoon's family's finances. Especially after witnessing his parents show off to everyone, Yoojae had no desire at all to show off or even tell others about his family's wealth. As for Hanjoon, he did not want to be a downer about his own situation in the face of Yoojae's "good fortune."

Both of them do what they think is in the other's best interests, but they still struggle to understand where the other is coming from. Moreover, a lot of Yoojae's thoughts and experiences on love and relationships seem to reflect what he has witnessed from his parents, who constantly fight and blame one another. At times, they also force him to take sides. Therefore, it's no wonder that he has such a warped view of love and relationship. And this isn't even taking into account the internalized homophobia that others have mentioned as well.

Hanjoon loves Yoojae so much, and has loved him for so long, that he takes the opportunity to express his love to Yoojae through an expensive heart-shaped box of chocolates, under the pretense of wishing Yoojae good luck on the college entrance exam. We see how happy Hanjoon is to buy the box of chocolates and give them to Yoojae, and then how crushed he is when Yoojae throws it on the floor. But all Yoojae sees is that Hanjoon spent money he doesn't have on the fancy chocolates.

Yoojae reacted poorly, there's no question about that. However, I do think that the rest of the dialogue, which was cut from the show episode 4, gives more insight into what was going on in Yoojae’s mind at the time. [edit: portions of this dialogue were in episode 5]

Are you threatening me?

Are you saying that if I don’t go out with you, I won’t be able to see you ever again? How could you say something like that to me?

You must have known that there was no way that I would ever agree to something as ridiculous as that. So why did you say it to me? Are you really going to never see me again? Are you really going to give me up just for that sort of reason?

Contact me once you’ve sorted out your feelings.

My interpretation is that Yoojae viewed Hanjoon's confession as emotional blackmail of some kind, which coupled with his own confusion regarding his feelings toward Hanjoon, led him to react even more strongly. All this is to say that yes, Yoojae was behaving like an immature teenager, but his life experiences shaped him to be that imperfect person, and he wasn't simply being a jerk just for the hell of it.

That's all I have to say about Starstruck for now and if you're still reading this, thank you for reading my word vomit💕

#starstruck #star struck #스타스트럭 #korean bl #this is my very first analysis-type post on this site and it shows #i'm not able to provide deep and meaningful analysis into shows #like many of the wonderful people on this site #but i hope this post helped shed some light on Yoojae's character and thought process #for those who may be curious about what happens in the novel #and i translated the excerpts from the novel myself #so they might be kinda wonky

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batrogers · 10 months ago

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Twilight Princess: the Resistance

In the game Twilight Princess, there is a group that meets in Telma’s bar, one that clearly knows each other very well and has for a long time. The bar they meet in has a connection to the castle, the group has clear and obvious disdain for the Hylian soldiers, and most notably of all, is willing and able to break into castle grounds with fairly elaborate weapons in order to aid Link in the end-game.

This is standard video game fare, but I want to go into a few other details about the storytelling that have always leaned me towards the group having a much more active past in which the resistance they had to the Twilight threat is a footnote on a much greater accomplishment: that of regicide.

[Note: I am discounting all comics canon in this analysis, as I do not have easy access to it, nor familiarity. This is based off in-game dialogue and visuals only, with some reference to Ocarina of Time.]

Also this is stupidly long and I'm about to post something even longer, so I guess uh, get yourself a drink. (1400 words)

The first necessary detail for that is this: Princess Zelda is the only member of her family we ever see. When Zant invades the throne room, Zelda is standing at the thrones alone, surrounded by guards, dressed in her formal regalia and wielding a sword. Nobody ever speaks of her parents, or questions her right to speak for the people of Hyrule. By every signal present, she is sole ruler and has been for long enough nobody questions it.

She is also very young: this isn’t usual either unless there has been recent, violent conflict or plague, and there’s no real evidence of there being a large war with an outside party or expensive civil unrest. Therefore, if something did kill her parents, it was likely targeted against them alone, or she had extraordinarily bad luck.

The second massive detail is the behaviour of the Resistance group in general. Notably, most group members are much older than Link or Zelda. Rusl has young kids, but he looks much older – more like 40-50 than 20-30. Telma and Auru are in that age range too. While Shad looks young, he talks old, so he could simply be a well-preserved 40 rather than merely a scholarly 20. Ashei definitely appears to be closer to Link’s age, but she speaks openly of her father as though he was involved before her, so perhaps she is here in his stead.

Notably, while there has clearly been time passing while the Twilight overlay the population and people were capable of moving around and doing things, there’s no real sense of it being a long time. Queen Rutela sent her son away, and he became suddenly and violently ill but none of the Zora are worried in a way that implies an absence of more than a few days. Impaz was secluded in the town but not long enough she reacted afraid for her life from lack of food or water. Others, again, are worried for lost family but not convinced of their deaths – a sentiment that, especially about children, would escalate quite quickly even in pre-modern times.

If that’s the case, how long has the Resistance had to set things in motion? If it was a new thing, in the face of the Twilight, the people involved would not be reacting so smoothly. But if it’s simply reconnecting with old allies, then that re-connection would be rapid. Rusl left Ordon village to look for the children: he appears to have gone straight to the Resistance rather than deviate from his path to follow likely leads. Why would he prioritize that? Only if he knew that was his best chance to chase multiple leads at once.

Only if he knew and expected them to be there, reachable quickly from Telma’s bar.

The Resistance does appear to have extremely rapid communication, especially for this time period. The group is already not only reintegrated but aware of current events and actively investigating them per expertise. They act as though they’ve never actually disbanded, in fact. Telma instantly tries to recruit Link upon his arrival, almost as if she was expecting him...

Almost as if Rusl might’ve told her to expect the boy’s arrival in Castletown in the recent future, possibly before this all began...? He was planning to send Link to the Castle in his stead after all.

I have another post about taxation that will likely be posted after this, but its stated that Rusl “made” the sword that’s going to be presented to the Royal Family from Ordon, the Village. This is not what a village would normally send in taxes, but it might be something they might send specially if the castle wants an extra gesture of good will from the village, possibly from a specific villager.

Possibly from someone they suspected was involved in recent activity they wanted to keep an eye on. A man who can make swords and armour (he’s the only one with a solid, defensive helmet we see, after all) is quite valuable in arming a small group of vigilantes, after all.

There is mention of “prolonged wars” that destroyed the guardians of the royal family to which Impaz belonged. That does not sound like a history of a royal family that has historically been kind or well-liked. We never get any specific sense of what caused these conflicts, but some things can just become entrenched power struggles over time. The Resistance are all incredibly disparaging towards the guards, who are useless within the city but around the castle are quite persistent and very solid. (Especially if you include that they are even proof against speedrun strats...)

In addition, Zelda’s royal garb skews incredibly militant. She is obviously trained in sword-fighting, or she’d have never grabbed a weapon when the throne room was invaded; the walls may be open but that offers as much opportunity for her to flee as it does defence, especially at the height at which this room is placed in the castle. While we do see two large cannons in use, and one hand-held cannon among the resistance after the fact, she is still so very high that’s not a real threat.

(Would this absolutely require magic to make the castle stable? Yes. Is that plausible in this context? Also yes.)

Lorewise, the previous game (Ocarina of Time) also has intense implications of prolonged conflicts: a civil war ten years before the story begins, evidence of torture by the Sheikah at the King's command, another war that ended in Ganondorf’s imprisonment by sages. Sages, who were clearly deeply distressed by everything going on, which implies the war had gone horribly for Hyrule and they were acting out of desperation. The Ocarina of Time script is an isolated language that never repeats which has its own implications of invasion and attempts to wipe out the history before it... (Changing a script on people has the “benefit” of forcibly making the literate population suddenly illiterate towards documentation you don’t want them to have access to, after all.)

If the people had become used to distrusting their rulers, and their rulers became used to suppressing dissent with violence, the cycle can continue for quite some time with periods of ebb and flow. And if the people have become used to the idea that you have to simply kill the King before things will change... Well, you’d have reason to keep a very close eye on them in the future, now wouldn’t you? You'd have reason to keep a group prepared to address matters quickly and finally when required.

In brief, there are a great many things that push me towards reading the Resistance as something that formed not in response to Zant, but in response to the government under which they lived.

Twilight Princess is a very settled era in the Zelda timeline. There are wide fields that clearly see a great deal of travel, elaborate and well-maintained bridges, multiple small villages in close proximity to each other that have walls but not elaborately defended ones. This world is not currently in serious distress. The Twilight War appears to be the worst thing to happen to the villages in some time.

It is not, however, particularly disruptive to the city. The people there are defensive, and strange, and alive in wonderful and interesting ways. We have a cursed rich man, a questionably ethical preacher, guards of both the poorly behaved and well-behaved variety, in which the well-behaved are strongly concentrated on the castle... As if the royal family expects to need strictly monitored guards at the castle.

As if there was perhaps something recent that caused it.

As if this isn't the first time the Resistance has broken into castle grounds in the recent past.

Perhaps Rusl had reasons to want someone who wasn’t him to present the sword to the young Queen, after all.

#Twilight Princess #story analysis #this is so stupidly long #LOZ: TP #Zelda lore #I'm sure this is somewhere else too but #I haven't found it #so have my take #Game analysis #Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess #Twilight

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jacky-rubou · 6 months ago

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Twenty Questions for Fic Writers

thank you @septic-dr-schneep for the tag!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

44 public works, 48 if you count anonymous

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

486,495

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Gravity Falls, which is the only one I really write for. Any other fandoms I have are either from previous fandoms or crossovers with Gravity Falls lmao

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. A Hug For Those Who Need It with 205 kudos (first fic to hit 200, woot woot) 2. The Trouble With Sweaters with 190 kudos 3. Sometimes All It Takes Is A Sleepover with 132 kudos 4. He Signs I Love You with 125 kudos 5. In The Dark with 112 kudos

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I always try to at least give them a single sentence of gratitude, if not an author's cut of why I did what they liked. Sometimes just a heart if their comment doesn't have much to respond to. or a winky face if I'm being coy lol. I just like to let my readers know that I appreciate the comments and that they're not commenting into a void lol.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

that is so hard because almost all my fics are angsty in some way haha. but i guess there are some with bittersweet endings that aren't as crushing as others, so I'll go with Sacrifices Must Be Made (major gore warning), The Things You Can't Live Without, The Twist of the Knife That is Fate, and Lost in Loving Memory (suicide and self harm warning) all with major character death.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

define 'Happiest'. i got some hopeful endings after soul crushing angst like Not So Different (And We're Dying For It) (suicide attempt warning) and Barely Living (And All It Takes Are Some Pills but idk.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

occasionally. mostly just peeps upset at pacing or my weird choices. i haven't gotten a lot. if i do, i delete it right away usually.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

haha no. (no shame on anyone who does but... that's not my style)

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I've written a fair bunch. I think the wildest one was a Courage The Cowardly Dog and Undertale fic I abandoned on ffnet.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

no idea if I have and hopefully i haven't. anyone who notices someone stealing a fic of mine please let me know.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

if i have, they haven't asked or told me about it.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

nope and the idea terrifies me. though if helping with ideas counts, i have had someone help me with one of my fics in a more 'major' way but i don't want to talk about them further for personal reasons.

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

right now, i like fiddauthor.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

there's a wip i made a few months ago inspired by a small angsty comic about ford's ptsd being triggered by water guns and almost shooting his family with a real gun i saw but i lost interest pretty quick when i didn't know where the hell to go with it.

16. What are your writing strengths?

emotions. i have made many a reader cry and i love that about my writing. and I think I have a good grasp on world-building.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

probably my bias towards specific characters blinding me to implications. specifically Ford.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I think it's fine. I don't do it because I fear writing something wrong. Also I don't really write with characters that would know other languages (except for Stan I guess but I don't get very much opportunity to add it where it makes sense haha)

19. First fandom you wrote for?

regrettably, the transphobic wizard franchise mixed with Sonic the Hedgehog for some godforsaken reason. never posted it anywhere though, thank god. just something i handwrote as a kid. for first ones I've actually posted, see the courage the cowardly dog and undertale fic on ffnet i mentioned earlier.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

ARRRGGGGHHHH SO HARD TO CHOOOSE!!!

A few I love from myself are my suicide!ford duology (soon to be trilogy, shhhh), my paralysis!ford trilogy, my blind!ford duology, and Dead On Arrival

anyway, tagging @ferretwhomst and @thereareeyesinsidethetrees

#tag game #fanfics #gravity falls #ford pines #stan pines #ao3 #suicide #self harm #gore #warning for some of the fics

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flowervolcano · 2 months ago

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Oh man… I just read Deadpool (2024) #6 and I GOT MUCH TO SAY. But I’m gonna keep this Taskpool centric, I might do an overall review on the full series later but there’s a few talking points specifically about Taskpool I’ve gotta say before I forget ‘em.

spoilers beyond the cut so DO NOT READ IF YA DON’T WANNA GET SPOILED!!!

At least I hope this works. It’s been a while since I’ve done this, I don’t usually even do review type thingys but I’m really hyped ^^

Let’s begin….

Really loved the way Tasky looked here. But also find this pretty funny considering back in Despicable Deadpool he threw a guy/his wheelchair at Taskmaster.

Interestingly enough, Wade called him Taskmaster more times in this comic than the previous ones. But he’s on business mode rn so he’s definitely keeping it professional!

Because not too much later he then calls him Task-Daddy— WHY DID HE DO THAT???? Tasky, you aren’t getting out of this anymore, I’m sorry… I had to full stop and process this. We kept making jokes… we did it for months now and Wade finally said what we all been saying 😭💀

This just interested me a lot. Both of them are talking about new territory, but it’s not the same kind. I think it’s really important for Tasky because he’s never actually been a father-like figure to anyone (not even his own daughter…) but maybe I was reading too much into this—

I know this is very much in character for Tony to wanna brand more since he’s broke, likes good business, etc, but I can’t help but feel like this equals him being a dad to Ellie, why? he’s never had to brand anybody before, but he obviously saw promise in her and even if Wade may have thrusted this mentorship onto them both, he didn’t HAVE to do it like this, that he is explaining the reasoning just felt like an excuse/deflection, it was like he WANTED to have a piece of himself in her outfit but he’s just gotta act cool about it.

I won’t lie when I say this “No Killing Rule” has piqued my interest the most, because to me, rules are made to be broken. And I am intrigued to see where this leads in the future and what will unfold. It is sort of a big deal for Wade to put onto Taskmaster, and I can think about how he may react if Ellie crosses that line— I mean it is his responsibility… I’m wondering if I’m thinking too much on this!

At first I just wanted to add this in and say isn’t he just gorgeous here? But then I realized the dialogue is something to poke at. He’s somewhat pulling her leg here, but I also think it could be interpreted in a few different ways; he’s never gonna admit that he’s protective of her, but he is. It’s not just hit reputation that he’s concerned about okay?

I also think it may be how he’s worked with Wade for a very long time, but with her, it’s a whole new world. It could go a lot of ways, but I’d like to think there’s a part of Taskmaster that is going to miss working alongside Wade and he doesn’t wanna confess. But being around Ellie is just gonna be a reminder.

Being around Ellie might remind him of his own daughter that he knows nothing about. And maybe he feels regretful about this. Idk maybe he doesn’t even remember her at all… depends on the writer.

—————

Loving the dynamic he’s got with her so far. They’re goofy and silly and I love to see him being the funny guy in the situation while Ellie is more serious. Nice change from Wade & Tasky. Really appreciate Ellie is her own person and not just a Deadpool 2.0, I think Tony likes that about her too.

Finally. Love seeing these two interact. A lot. This is something I will REALLY miss now that… well you know… now that stuff happened…. And at this very moment NEITHER TASKY OR ELLIE KNOW THAT WADE IS DEAD OH I AM SICK!!! (Also why did Wade look extra cute here… there was zero reason for it. Thank you Artist!!!)

Uh yeah and these were my little thoughts and such. I might of jumped over things and I’ve never really done posts like these. But this issue really itched my brain and so I wanted to discuss stuff a little haha. Hope y’all enjoy and ofc enjoyed the new issue!!!

#deadpool spoilers #deadpool 2024 spoilers #deadpool issue 6 spoilers #taskmaster #deadpool #deadpool 2024 #taskpool #spoilers #marvel #marvel comics #can confirm that taskmaster now really is the dad that stepped up RIP wade I love you

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rupeenotruby · 2 months ago

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Of Courses I Have Horses -Reflection

Ok this is mostly for me but if you have any feedback for the comic I'll leave my anons on for a few days and you can pop it over there!

Anyways proceed with caution, this'll probably be long. Also I'm probably going to be pretty critical of myself here but please don't worry or feel the need to defend me from myself. I actually love critique and if I really do hate what I've made I won't even be able to look at it.

Stats:

Expected Time: Three Weeks (Don't clown on me I have ambitions)

Actual Time Spent: Ten Weeks

Expected Length: 9 Parts (73 Panels)

Actual Length: 9 Parts (72 Panels + one big panel) and one bonus drawing.

Pros/the good:

FINISHED IT!!!!! :D I did it. I did it. I'm the best you know how it is!!! I've always been scared of bigger projects like these because of how intimidating they can get but I did it! I got to the end! And about 83.56% of the panels had an environmental background (not all unique but hey whaddyagonnado).

People liked it!! (unless everybody is lying to me *-* jk jk too many people for that to be true). Sure you shouldn't measure your success on other's opinions but it is nice to know that I'm not alone in my enjoyment of my work.

Updated it pretty regularly! Good to know if I ever want to make a real webtoon.

Horses Researched ✅ I probably have some blind spots having not actually interacted with horses all that much but eh. It is fanfic in the end.

Cons/the bad:

I don't like posting while writing/drawing. Too much pressure even if the pressure was kinda good to motivate me and it was technically imagined anyways.

Colors are ugly. I'm not sure why I chose that color of sky but hmmm.

Backgrounds are present but uninspired and bland. The colors contribute to this but also the fact that I didn't draw the backgrounds before I drew the people most of the time. I also was just referencing images from botw (if you couldn't guess) and this lead them to be flat and like they were not existing where the characters were existing sometimes.

Too wordy in some places. Despite the fact that I chose to do four panel chunks to practice brevity I ended up being too verbose in some situations. One of these was Legend's episode. I felt like people wouldn't get the joke so I over explained it in the dialogue but even then I still don't think people got it got it. This is usually fine but when you over correct and still end up failing it is bad because you end up failing both ends (so to speak). Also the words were not always that good or polished.

Characters were off model frequently. The horses were the worst part as their head shapes would change frequently. This is most likely a result of my lack of experience drawing horses (why I decided to go with a series where I would have to draw a bunch of horses no one will know).

Characters were also ooc (probably) Wild was a little too happy/silly, Four was a little too irrational, Legend was mean mean instead of more accidently mean, and I think the others were fine. They just didn't really get to showcase their personalities all that much.

Lessons for next time:

MAKE A REF SHEET!!! I had to go back and forth between old pages to get the colors and it was such a hassle. Made me not want to color which is bad because I already don't like coloring all that much.

Crank up the threshold on the bucket tool when coloring. Leads to more being colored in and less white bits to fill in later

Write it all out before!! Especially if short like this. Makes it easier.

Put the words before sketching dummy!!! Saves many headaches.

Speaking of which, maybe set the background to be grey so you get less headaches (maybe, unconfirmed if this was the cause of headaches).

Draw (sketch) the background before drawing the characters.

Add clouds to the sky.

Do wrist exercises! Real ones!

Conclusion:

Good experience all around. Many things learned about myself and my creative process. Still not a horse girl but maybe one day.

Anyways this is probably the last you will see of "Of Courses I Have Horses." On to bigger and brighter things!

#of courses i have horses #personal

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otakween · 4 months ago

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Digimon World 4 - Final Thoughts

Whelp, that was...something. This game is objectively bad, but I still had a good, brain rotting time. It falls into the "game to zone out on the couch to" category. The lack of much story, characters or dialogue means I got in some quality podcast/music time as well. It's pretty similar to Digimon World 2 in its crappiness, but I found DW4's gameplay more satisfying. I think DW2 has the more appealing art style though, so they even out to the same rank basically. Full thoughts below!

Notes:

So this is loosely based on the Digimon X-Evolution CG film I posted about before. I was disappointed to see that the opening credits are just a hodge podge of scenes from said movie. That's pretty boring and lazy if you ask me. I picked Dorumon to control in honor of the film's protag (and since it would be a more novel experience).

I found any weapon aside from the guns to be a colossal pain to use, so I just used guns and guns alone for the entire game lol. At least I was able to get tech points quickly that way!

This game has the most unbalanced difficulty levels ever. It's either stupid hard or stupid easy. Luckily, the stupid easy moments are far more frequent. Every time I fought a boss I braced myself only to just button mash my way to the end in like a few minutes. Most of them were jokes. On the other end of the spectrum, the beginning of the game was weirdly hard because I would get mobbed by enemies and massacred in like two seconds (this is when I realized I should be using the guns lol). It's hard to have much strategy because most battle moves you can do (spin attack, charged attack, block) suck control-wise. My strat for most of the game was either the ole "shoot and run" or just to get up on a high ground where I was invincible. The latter move kinda felt broken and was part of what made the game stupid easy.

Thank God I emulated this game. Although it's mostly easy, there are definitely moments where it's easy to die. Some dungeons will lock you into the tightest corners and then just spawn like a jillion enemies out of nowhere (the Otamamon and Infermon were the WORST). Some of the harder bosses had some pretty cheap moves too. Save states were the VIP, as usual.

The plot of the game is really basic and the writing is just as wonky as DW2. Basically all you need to know is that there's a virus that's bad and you need to get rid of it. It doesn't get any deeper than that and there are no twists or turns. Ophanimon, Seraphimon, and Leomon are the only characters with significant dialogue (none of the bosses talk) and they really don't have anything interesting to say (I did like Ophanimon and Seraphimon's models tho)

The dungeons were definitely better than DW2 in terms of visuals/layout, but the enemies felt super repetitive. You get maybe 3 types of enemies per dungeon and then you just fight those same 3 again and again and again.

The dungeons are unreasonably long slogs with no way to save in the middle of them. I had save states so I was okay, but sometimes a dungeon would take me over two hours?? Like wtf. I know kids have a lot of free time but some of them aren't even allowed to game for 2 hours straight!

Of course, I played this single player. I actually think it'd be really fun as a multiplayer game? Like, that's probably what it was actually built for. There are actually some moments where you can't go to certain parts of dungeons without a buddy :'(

The bosses were mostly big bads from the series/movies which was fun. Made it awkward when I defeated them so easily though lol

All of the walkthroughs for this game suck lol. The one I used for the majority of the game the guy literally kept writing "I don't remember what happens in this dungeon. Just go through it." LOL thanks for nothing, bud. He said "I don't remember" sooo many times it was comical.

I poked around on the internet looking for info for this game and it seems the general consensus in the fandom is that it's pretty abysmal. Still, there are people like me that got enjoyment out of it regardless.

The little noises Dorumon made when attacked were very cute

I never bothered with digivolution. You don't get digivolution until late in the game and if you digivolve it reverts you to levl 1. Nuts to that!

I also didn't bother with any side quests because they sounded extremely not worth it (some of them don't even have a reward?)

I was pretty under-leveled at the end of the game (barely scraping level 30) but I felt like I had infinite healing basically because I had so much MP. That's another aspect of the game that felt broken.

The ending of this game was SO anti-climactic. I defeated the boss, returned to the hub world expecting a cutscene, and then it went straight to credits. No dialogue, no thank you, nothing. I had to go around and talk to people to get some thank yous but they didn't sound that appreciative really lol. Where are my flowers!? 😭 This took me over a month of tedium!

One part of the game that I did find pretty hard was the Storm Train where you have to get to the end of a train track while hitting the right levers while simultaneously fighting of a ton of enemies. If I had to do that without save states, I probably would have given up lol

I never really regret beating a video game, even if it kinda sucked. It's especially nice to check off another game in a series (even though the World series isn't really connected). I give Digimon World 4 a 5 out of 10.

#digimon world 4 #digimon #video games

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watcher-comic · 1 year ago

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okay hi

did i promise to make an art... lore dump post literally last month? yes. did i not do it for nearly a month? also yes. and im Very Sorry.

anyway! onto the ranting

So starting off with the obvious, Nanehi's color scheme is based off of the Shawnee tribe's flag!

Obviously more desaturated, but the blue sweater and two yellow stars were meant to show that he's native.

Alright, going in page order I'm just gonna throw around some easter eggs or fun facts or commentary...whatever....

Because this is the only good image I can find of it, Nane wears his parents' wedding bands on a necklace. Because his parents are divorced </3

On page 2, Nane has a poster up on his wall which is my current sketchbook cover in my art class. I believe it's somewhere on my art blog

Nane has a ziptie on his backpack! It doesn't mean anything.

Page 6: The white text that says "what?" is actually a reference to the first debut of Nane - an askblog!

(technically his first word was "huh" but i changed it to what for plot's sake)

Continuing with the black spaces on page 6, the panicked eye doesn't really mean anything. However, the twisted light switch was supposed to represent the noose that shows up at the end of the comic.

For page 7, there's obviously the audience design to talk about, but the things I actually wanna focus on are:

The doodle on the top left, which is Nanehi saying that he thinks he has tinnitus [which he then goes on to immediately deny in the next page]

And the doodle on the bottom right. His fursona is a bunny and if I could, I would've tried to fit more bunny imagery into the comic. But alas :pensive:

Page 13: All the different colored text were the responses I got from a select few people. I showed them the previous panels of the page and asked them what they wanted [there is one distinct person I didn't ask but I will get to them later].

I also want you to keep the... 3rd shade of green in mind [the "i want to see where this goes"]

For this panel on page 15, I wanted it to be known that Nanehi isn't a real person, and they know it. Everyone else's face is squared, even the simply doodled character in the background and the barely visible person in the foreground. Everyone except Nane.

Page 16: Man that's just mold on his shower curtain.

Page 17: There's actually a lot I want to talk about with page 17. Firstly, the design of The Audience. It changed, clearly. Before it was that weird circle thing, but now it's more humanoid - to the point of having hair similar to Nanehi's. The reason being, it's not entirely The Audience anymore. It's The Creator too. Nanehi was based off my fear of being watched and constantly having an audience. The little amount of comfort that the figure gives was... sorta supposed to be an apology to the character- as cheesy as that sounds.

(Also the fact that their text originally said "didn't they already answer that" but was crossed out to say 'we'. The Creator disguising themself as The Audience. And truly, what is to separate them?)

Another thing I want to point out is the dark grey panel. It's the same shade of grey I used for the askblog, and he's smiling in that panel, because during the askblog he was much happier around the audience- or the concept of them, rather.

And then of course, the dark blue text that reads "I know how this ends." That actually wasn't a response I took from someone, but rather a piece of... I guess dialogue, that I felt like someone would say. That specific someone being my friend Classi, who was the only person besides me that knew how Watcher ended. Purely because she had a very similar character and we thought that they'd be buddies.

On page 18, we have 3 entire panels in a different style. That being the style of the askblog.

(some examples)(the last image is where the avatar came from, haha)

On page 19 we have this panel, which you can probably assume what it is. It, I suppose, could both be seen as Nane standing, back to the audience, or as Nane hanging without the noose. You choose.

And of course, the last page. For some reason this fucks me up. Because this is The Creator talking to Nanehi. The Creator knows that Nane has no say in how their story ends, but they're given the illusion of control, because that's all they've been looking for. They wanted control over something, so the only way to prove such control was to show The Audience that they could end the story whenever they wanted. He doesn't know that he was talking to The Creator, he just assumed it was still The Audience. He doesn't know that he didn't really have a say.

This was what he wanted. That's how he's ending the story

#watcher comic #directors commentary #uhhhhh #yeah i think thats everything?#idk i'll probably add more later

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raylangivins · 1 year ago

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twenty questions for fic writers

thank you @acorrespondence for tagging me in this! i love shiteing on about writing :)

How many works do you have on ao3?

33, which shocks me because for some reason in my head the number's permanently at, like, 8.

What's your total ao3 word count?

195,093

What fandoms do you write for?

I mean currently it's beatles rpf 🌝. But also Check Please (specifically jackparse, I have absolutely no interest in anything else), Wolf 359, The Social Network, Community (although none of these are an ao3 due to I wrote them when I was 15), and some random one hit wonders.

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

live through this, and you won't look back - Jack/Kent, Check Please

if being afraid is a crime, we hang side by side - Kepler/Jacobi, Wolf 359

baby, it's all relative - John/Paul, Beatles

Time May Change Me - Mark/Eduardo, The Social Network

Five Men Roy Ruined For Jen - Jen/Roy, The IT Crowd

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes, always, unless I forget!! I don't know why I wouldn't like, if people are reading I am genuinely excited and grateful for that. Why wouldn't I tell them? (I'm very bad at thinking of things to say which aren't just "I'm glad you enjoyed it", but I try).

What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I think lately you've been feeling so good i forget my future (in which jack and kent go to prom) is pretty grim not even because the ending itself is the worst but also it foreshadows so much worse to come. Most of my jackparse fic is them as teenagers because I love that "the worst is yet to come" doom that constantly hangs over them in those years. Also one and one and one is three (in which john/paul/yoko have an emotionally fraught threesome). I hurt my own feelings writing that one lol.

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Not one of the recent ones, I can tell you that! Although it depends if you mean fluffy or happy by my own metric because EYE think the best happy endings are the ones you have to work through some angst to get. So if you're looking for fluffy, probably Five Men Roy Ruined for Jen; if you're looking for a journey that ends in happiness, then I'd say wouldn't it be? nice makes me feel euphoric at the end.

Do you get hate on fics?

I've gotten a couple bitchy comments but generally no.

Do you write smut?

Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I've only written one and it's where Jean-Ralphio from Parks and Rec becomes the Eleventh Doctor's companion in Doctor Who. It's cute, I still like it.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

God, I hope not. Although, I did have someone once finish a fic I abandoned on ff.net without really asking me first, which I thought was both flattering and hilarious of them. So true, babe. Write the finished fic you wish to see in the world!

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I think someone translated one of my old Gossip Girl fics on ff.net, also. I can't remember what language it was though.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No, but I'm not opposed to it.

What's your all-time favorite ship?

All my fave ships are pretty much variations on the same dynamic with a few exceptions. It's comical how consistant I am about this without even trying.

What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

Tbh I never truly rule anything out. There's a post-canon Justified fic that has lived in my head for years, that I mostly haven't written because it's a lot of work, and I don't really care about sharing it that much it's mostly just for me. There's a Dawson's Creek Pacey genderswap fic I dream of writing, but likely will never bother. There's a beatles fic where Paul can talk to instruments that I actually wrote 20k for but it's so dogshit I can't bear to try to fix it so it's going to just sit on my computer forever probably.

What are your writing strengths?

I hate this question, I'm so bad at identifying these things. Vibes? I think I'm good at dialogue but that's mostly because that's what I start with, so it's like the bones of most of my fics. I've been told I'm good at like being thoughtful to all the different characters in fic even if it's not about them or their POV, which is always a nice thing to hear.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Physical descriptions probably. I don't care about them very much and therefore I don't put as much effort into them as I probably should. Also, I write chronologically so most of my endings are slightly lazier than the rest of the fic.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I don't know. I've never tried it. As a bilingual person, seeing people who are not bilingual completely miss the nuances of that is actually really irritating. Especially as someone who speaks Portuguese but grew up in an English speaking country, reading TSN fic was so specifically annoying. And don't even get me started on the concept of "untranslateable" words and "saudade".

It can be done well, but often isn't. Also, if you give me a bunch of text in a language I don't know, my brain is just gonna skip over it, so it's often redundant when it's more than, like, a sentence.

First fandom you wrote for?

First fic I published was for Gossip Girl, but when I was like 11 I wrote what was essentially a Life With Derek canon-divergence fic in a copybook that I showed to a teacher in my school.

Favorite fic you've written?

All of them. But some that have not yet been mentioned on this post:

kissing just for practice - Jack/Kent (idk, I set out to do something specific with this fic and I really felt I did)

i want every other freckle - si-5 ot3 kind of (this fic means so much to me)

tomorrow i'll miss you - mclennon before sunset au (before sunset is one of my favourite movies and i worked really hard on this one)

i thought i knew one, what did i know? - paul's girlfriend catches john and paul together (this one makes me crazy and i'm the one who wrote it lol)

tagging: @softbrah @jeanharlowseyebrows @scurator @wurmzirkus @coyotesuspect @midchelle

#tagged tag

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spacevixenmusic · 1 year ago

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Unfairly Maligned Games, Vol. 1

Games I loved that got low scores, review bombed, or have some other weird negative stigma attached to them that I think is unfairly earned.

NOTE: I don't believe in giving games a number score or a letter grade. Maybe I'm just bad at criticism or very easy to please, whatever.

Battleborn [2016]

One of my personal favorite games of all time, Battleborn was advertised as a hero-based PVP shooter with MOBA mechanics that unfortunately came out right alongside one of the biggest games of the PVP shooter genre ever released (Overwatch). Thanks to this poor timing, Battleborn - along with several other similar but different games - was doomed to failure, choked to death by Blizzard's infinite marketing resources and predatory Free Play Weekends that just mysteriously happened to occur on the same weekends as its "competitors" major updates, DLC releases, promo events, etc. Battleborn is no longer available to play ANYWHERE as of January 2021; so few people played it after it was review bombed as "the game your mom bought you when you asked for Ovewatch for xmas" (yes Blizz fans used that fucking Simpsons meme TO DEATH, it's their one joke they have about Battleborn) that the game's servers had to be shuttered so the money could be funneled into Gearbox's much bigger cash cow release at the time, Borderlands 3.

Sour grapes aside, Battleborn was in many ways the game that many people actually wish Overwatch was now. In addition to the PVP game, Battleborn had a co-op campaign mode - complete with a story, cutscenes, and unique character dialogue depending on who you brought to each mission - which could be played for character XP (ability tree unlocks), random gear loot (for use in either campaign mode or PVP), and character cosmetics. The 30 playable characters were wildly varied in terms of design and gameplay, and yes I have to point it out every time, Battleborn had both "cute tiny animal in a mech suit" and playable black women BEFORE Overwatch did. The game also featured a very impressive and highly slept-on visual aesthetic that felt like every Saturday Morning Cartoon I ever grew up with from the 80s/90s, featuring a wild blend of 3D and 2D animation that all the other hero PVP games WISH they could have matched.

And damn, dude. If you like Lore in your video games, there was a TON of material written for this one. And I'm not just talking about supplemental media like a comic or a wiki or an interview about cut content or whatever. I mean there was a metric FUCK TON of additional world-building material right there in the game. Each character came with a set of challenges you could complete which would give you the usual XP and money, but also unlocked a fun little tidbit of Lore about the universe. These came in the form of short stories, recorded conversations, email logs, forum posts, shipping manifests, and even fully voiced segments explaining details about each character, who they were, why they were fighting this war, and some fun little ways of explaining how their weapons or abilities worked. For example, Reyna holds her laser pistol on its side, gangster-style, because she wanted to use a very specific gun model, had its internal parts stripped out so she could use an ammo clip of a much stronger caliber than that model was supposed to be capable of, but in order for the chamber to reload correctly, the gun had to sit a bit cockeyed. And that fun little nugget is just sitting there, right in the game, for you to discover! It's fucking cool as hell!

Now I know you're itching to make a joke about there only being like 15 people who even played the game. Yes, I've seen the Active Player Steam charts meme. It's true, Battleborn had a very small, but also very dedicated, community. Despite that, there were so few people playing that we all ended up making friends with each other pretty quickly. It was one of the friendliest PVP communities I'd ever been a part of. We knew there weren't many people online, so we created an environment that felt comfortable for players new and veteran alike. Many of us are still friends today, outside of the game. Because there were so few people online, we also got to play regularly with Gearbox devs and game writers, and even one of the voice actors responsible for at least three of the game's characters (plus a few NPCs!). We organized and hosted our own events, got official backing from the devs for Double XP weekends, held art jams and hashtag celebrations. Hell, I even used my love of this game to jumpstart my serious foray into music by making an entire album of songs for its characters (complete with a bunch of commissioned fan art from the community)!

(art by Leaddybum)

So yeah. Rest in peace, Battleborn. You were ahead of your time and the hate and harassment you got from The Gamers was completely undeserved. I will always keep hope alive that you'll come back to us some day. Maybe as a sequel, maybe in a new format. There was so much more left to explore in that universe.

May our battle never end.

#unfairly maligned games #battleborn #ask me about this game motherfucker #TALK TO ME ABOUT THIS GAME #I dare you to come at me cause I will preach my love of this game forever and a day #also it's 2023 and OVERWATCH STILL SUCKS SHIT #FUCK YOU BLIZZARD

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speedofsoundsketches · 2 years ago

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I like you’re shadow and jolt comic giving me insperstion to create my own comic with my oc and shadow tbh I pictured my oc and shadow doing the same as shadow and jolt which is giving me courage to do my own comic with them fancomic obviously but do you have any tips on how development of a comic would work how long did it take for you to plan the comic

I've been working on this comic for about five years this coming November. From the start of developing the story to when the first comics were posted, it was about a three or four month long period of early development.

To be honest, I'm never NOT developing the comic. Each update is sort of treated as a self-contained session and while I have a plan of how everything connects, you don't really know how it'll actually work out until you're making the pages themselves and piecing the puzzle pieces together to make it all coherent. If you go to my Patreon, you'll see all the raw, first drafts of my comics and how much they changed in the final pages.

The following are my personal tips but I highly recommend also reading this post by the creator of Lackadaisy on the same subject. I followed her example for my work a lot and thankfully she's open about her secrets. :)

Tip #1: Know what your End Goal is for your comic

A lot of eager hopefuls start with a strong passion for their stories and it seems clear in your head how it will pan out. Over time, your interest starts to dwindle, passion is replaced with procrastination, writer's block occurs and you wonder why this thing you loved so much has become a total chore.

This is often due to not knowing the overall POINT to making your comic at all. What's the theme? The message? What do you and your audience GET out of it?

Shadow and Jolt has a clear progression and ending in mind that all relates to the Themes and Messages I want to impart to my readers. Try dissecting your favorite Sonic stories (or any story in general) and analyze why you like them and what made them impactful to you. Determine their themes and messages then observe how each part of the story, character arcs and such were written to serve them. What were the creators trying to tell you or make you experience?

That's the difference between a story with intention versus one that's confused or directionless. Because even during writer's block, if you know what message you're trying to tell, it gives you a lighthouse to paddle towards and keep you from getting lost in the ocean of vague notions.

Tip #2: Script It Out!

Before I ever drew a single comic for Shadow and Jolt, the first thing I did to help me develop a more solid plan was to write scripts. Some were fully realized with dialogue and action sequences. Others were outlines to help me see the full picture from beginning to end.

I've written over 30 different scripts. Many are just a few pages each but some are about 50+ pages.

And guess what? Every single one of them STINK.

These are not my best work because they don't need to be. They're meant for playing around with character dialogues, motivations, relationships and manner of speech. If a script resonates with me enough, I'll try doing a draft of it in comic form to see how it feels on paper and continue tweaking things from there. It was such a horribly cliche story at first but it's ok because to determine what's wrong, I need to see it actually in front of me and not as some ethereal mess of images in my mind.

Tip #3: Gather, Research and Conceptualize

I cannot stress enough how much doing this has helped with this project.

References I used included the games I liked the most, their production history, interviews with Sonic Team, compiled images/inspirations I found around the internet, etc. I used all this material to strengthen the ideas I had so I could start drawing concepts.

Characters, vehicles, environments.... everything and anything gets concepts. Lots of sketches, sometimes with color. I've possibly gone through almost 10+ sketchbooks for just Shadow and Jolt alone. There were a lot of things that needed testing and fleshing out, especially because it's such a big project. (and I'm just one little ol' me ;-;)

From the beginning, the plan was that Shadow and Jolt would be based on the games so my research was spent digging into the entire timeline and reminding myself of what the games are about and how to capture their essence as close as I can. I'm not sure what setting you plan to base this story on but you'll have a different set of research to do if you plan to include things from something else like Archie, Boom or whatever.

Tip #4: BEWARE SCOPE CREEP

In game development, teams start by deciding on the full scope of the project and settle on what's going to be in the game. The team makes projections on how long it'll take to complete it, set deadlines and then move to act on it.

A few weeks into production, maybe you decide to add a new animated action for the main character. Maybe then you add in a new weapon that will require another full move set to program and animate. Maybe you want to add a new character that you came up with during lunch. Maybe you have a whole extra side quest that adds a whole new plot point that adds even MORE characters who all have unique functions and animations you'll have to make-

See how quickly that can happen? That's scope creep. You start adding way more than was initially planned, thus it ends up extending the time it takes to actually finish the project.

Obviously, it's less dire than a product meant for sale but the lessons are the same. With any changes you make, be mindful of how that's going to effect you getting the story done and if it even really adds anything to your End Goal.

Remember, you only have so much energy in a given day to dedicate to your comic. Manage it wisely!

Tip #5: Live life!

This is a bit of an odd one maybe but for me at least, it's super valuable.

I've mentioned in previous posts how real world experiences helped inspire my comic. Part of what makes Sonic's world feel so lived in is the dedication the team put into making each level feel that way! Sonic Unleashed is maybe the best example of this point. I feel that Sonic was made by people who not only wanted to make a fun game series but who use it to celebrate the actual act of adventure. Living life, seeing new sights, meeting new people, eating unique cuisine, you catch my drift!

Some of my best ideas came from having a lived experience. You won't be able to write authentic stories staying in a bubble of your own making. Outside of my fancomic, I like going on long walks, exploring places or simply hanging out with my friends. So my final suggestion for you is to live a full life and be inspired by it! Nothing beats reality anyway. :)

#art help #Shadow and Jolt #fancomic #comic #Sonic #thoughts #asks #ramble #webcomics #advice

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