#the animation medium is just really fucking good at getting me emotional

[animebw]

Short Reflection: Oshi no Ko Season 2

In case you're new around these parts, let me just pull a Kendrick Lamar and say that I'm Oshi no Ko's biggest hater. I staked my claim on this show being crap twenty minutes into the first episode and I've stuck by that assertion ever since. It's a shallow, insincere, cynical piece of crap masquerading as a Serious Examination of the entertainment industry, claiming to portray the true nature of working in this business while being just as plastic and pandering as the very attitudes it pretends to critique. No matter how many self-important speeches it puts into its characters' mouths, it can't hide the fact that at heart, it's a juvenile power fantasy about an self-insert edgelord who boringly broods and cringes his way through a half-baked murder mystery while amassing a harem of teenage girls, sister included. As I said in my season 1 review, if lies are the highest form of love, then Oshi no Ko must be the greatest lover of all.

So imagine how infuriating it was when I put on season 2 and realized it was actually really good.

Listen, I didn't want to believe it. How was this show getting me so invested? How was this show making me pump my fist and cheer with triumph? But the facts are the facts: for the first time this season, I saw Oshi no Ko rise to become the best possible version of itself. After all the garbage it put me through, I suddenly found myself watching a show that was propulsive, beautiful, earnest, and filled with genuine insight into what drives people to throw their lives into art against all better judgement. This is the kind of show Oshi no Ko was always promising to be but never lived up to before. This was a show at least a little worthy of the tsunami of hype it crested into the anime world on.

Unfortunately, it was also proof that this show is never going to be truly great.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves. The first two thirds or so of season 2 are taken up by the Lala Lai arc, in which Aqua, Kana, Akane, and a smattering of new and old faces get together to put on a 2.5D stage play adaptation of a long-running shonen action manga. On concept alone, that's a pretty novel direction to take things; we don't really have 2.5D plays in the West, so seeing all the technical stagecraft necessary to translate manga into a theatrical performance was fascinating. Ditto the insight into the complicated process of adaptation, how communication can break down between parties and the conflict between keeping a work's original soul and adjusting to fit the demands of the new medium. I've long been an advocate of adaptations making big changes when it makes the work better, and watching those conflicts and conversations play out made me much more appreciative of how difficult that process can be. For the first time, it felt like all the industry info-dumping was actually enriching my understanding of how this business works, and how it informed the characters' place within it.

Speaking of those characters, what makes the Lala Lai arc really shine is in broadening the spotlight. This is no longer the Aqua and Ruby show; this is a full-on ensemble piece, where pretty much every member of the production has a moment to shine. It bobs and weaves between countless little stories playing out both during the rehearsal process and during the first performance of the play itself, flashing back and forth as it digs into the heart of each individual passion that drives these actors to shine so brightly. And watching those passions collide and cascade makes that performance absolutely riveting. Seriously, I can't count the number of times I just about leaped out of my seat and yelled "Fuck yes!" at someone reaching their full potential on stage and seizing the spotlight in a brilliant display of emotion (and animation; the swooping camera and surreal colorscapes that take over this part of the show are the best Oshi no Ko has ever looked). Natural genius, amateur, it doesn't matter; on the stage of Tokyo Blade, everyone is a star.

And no one's served better by this kaleidoscopic focus than Kana and Akane, who are probably the true protagonists of this arc. I'm still annoyed at how dumb and retconny Akane's backstory has been treated- I swear, season 1 gave us three different conflicting backstories for her- but her rivalry with Kana over the years is the best stuff in all of Oshi no Ko. They've admired each other from afar for so long, but resent each other for their incompatible acting styles. They're determined to outshine each other but never believe they can measure up. They can't stand each other, but they're entwined by fate so deeply they know they'll never be truly alive without each other. That push and pull of wanting to live up to someone while wanting to surpass them, hating and loving them at the same time, is the singularity that makes this entire arc resonate. It's gripping and heartbreaking and beautiful, and if Aka Akasaka has any self-respect, he'll end the manga with the two of them collectively realizing Aqua isn't worth their time and marrying each other instead.

But of course, that's not gonna happen. Because Aqua is the one albatross Oshi no Ko will never be able to untangle from around its neck.

And this is why for as excellent as the Lala Lai arc is, it can't save Oshi no No. It's why nothing can save Oshi no Ko. On a fundamental level, it will never be able to shake the fact that it's saddled itself with one of the worst protagonists in all of modern anime. Or at least, one of the worst not to come out of your average seasonal isekai slop, but I don't watch enough of those to know how hellishly low the bar truly is, and I intend to keep it that way, thank you very much.

The point is, Aqua sucks. He's always sucked, he always will suck, and his mere presence in this story makes even its best ideas turn sour and ugly by the end. Even if you took out the fact he's technically a grown man involved in romantic subplots with three underage girls, he's the worst kind of edgy self-insert Light Yagami wannabe, and he forces the whole story to bend around him and suck his dick at the expense of what it's supposedly trying to say. Gut-wrenching portrayal of online hate mobs driving a young talent to suicide? Nope, it's all so he can save the day and add Akane to his harem with no further repercussions. Showing the difficulties of new idol groups struggling for attention in the modern age? Nope, just another chance for him to show off at Kana's concert and save her emotional state for her. Hell, even Kana and Akane's rivalry is tainted by the knowledge that they're ultimately fighting over this reincarnated pedophile's dick as much as for each other's respect. No matter what ideas this show tries to explore or how earnestly it tries to grapple with the realities of the entertainment industry, it always ends up coming back to "Yeah, but isn't Aqua such an edgy chad badass saving the day and getting all the bitches? Damn, what a cool brooding dude!"

In other words, the real reason the Lala Lai arc works as well as it does isn't the focus on the stagecraft process, or the expanded cast, or Kana and Akane. It's because turning into an ensemble piece means Aqua gets at little screen time as humanly possible, so he's mostly not around to fuck everyone's great moments up for a change. And even then, every time he does show up in that arc feels like all the air being let out of a balloon. And he's probably at his best during the play! At least dealing with the lasting trauma of Ai's death gives him some actual internal conflict to play with! But even that's not enough to keep the protagonist of this fucking show from feeling like a sickening, blemish on his own supposed series. And once that arc's over and the focus returns to Aqua and Ruby in the season's final third? Hooooooo boy does it immediately go to shit again. All the masturbatory chauvinism I ripped into season 1 for is back like it never left, no lessons learned from how much better Lala Lai was charting an entirely different path. Hell, it's arguably even worse, because it ends up reminding us that Ruby's just as irredeemably broken a character as Aqua at this point. I know, the teenage girl trying to marry her adult doctor who is secretly her reincarnated brother also makes this show worse? I'm shocked, I say! Shocked!

Speaking of, can we acknowledge at this point that the whole reincarnation aspect of Oshi no Ko just should not have existed? There's nothing in this story that couldn't work just as well if Aqua was just a normal edgy teen who watched his mom die as a kid and developed PTSD/a desire for vengeance from that. It's only just become even somewhat plot relevant, it's barely present in any character interactions or relationships (even between Aqua and Ruby, they almost never talk about it!), none of its themes have any reliance on their past lives to get the point across... Really, its only contribution is making every potential romantic subplot with Aqua a five-alarm emergency siren while the show limply tries to pretend he totally counts as a normal teenage boy for dating purposes, honest! It's a ten ton weight dragging the entire story down for no goddamn reason and you'd barely have to edit the earliest chapters at all to get rid of it entirely. That wouldn't fix all its problems, but it would at least make it salvageable. Which currently, despite how shockingly good this season started, it is not.

So where do we go from here? Who fucking knows. I'd like to think Oshi no Ko could somehow learn from its successes with Lala Lai and continue shooting for greater heights, but everything I've heard from my friends who've read the manga suggests that was the high point and it's all downhill from here. All I know is that for better or worse, I'm on this train to the end. If only to continue rubbing in everyone's faces that I was right from the start about what a turd this would turn out to be. But I'll save that gloating for when it's truly deserved, and god knows, it will be deserved later on based on some of the spoilers I've picked up. For now, though, I'll have to settle with giving Oshi no Ko's season season a score of:

6/10

Sayonara for now. Let's see what the future brings.

[r0s3s26]

hello! i would like to request a MHA matchup if possible<3

name: anne

pronouns: she/her

romantic or platonic matchup: romantic!

gender preference: none, i don't mind:>

ideal first date: going for a walk and grabbing some fast food, hopefully stopping by a bookshop or a cute cafe

personality: i'm an introvert and i like my alone time a lot, my social battery dies very quickly. i can be a bit shy at first, but only at first, i usually get comfortable very easily. i joke around a lot and have a pretty dark sense of humor. i'm quite sarcastic. i'm honest and outspoken, i usually first act and think later. i get attached easily. i overthink a lot. i get emotional very quickly, it's easy to make me angry but also easy to make me cry. i always plan things in advance. i'm stressed 24/7. always worried about future and pretty insecure

likes: animals (i have two cats and a dog), books, food that's especially sweet, the color blue, cartoons, plushies, sleeping

dislikes: parties, crowded places, loud noises, snakes, darkness, people who are unnecessarily mean, heights

perfect partner: someone who is fun to be around, would respect my boundaries, someone who wouldn't mind staying in instead of going out, someone protective who would make me feel special ✨

hobbies: listening to music, writing, reading books/mangas, learning languages

appearance: green eyes, medium length brown hair which i dye a lot, round face, 6 ear piercings, arm tattoo, tall (175 cm or so)

hopefully this is okay, sorry if it's too long or wrong:( take your time and have a nice day/night!! :3

@isadollie Your Match is…Shota Aizawa

<3 This grumpy man

<3 If you guys were to be in a relationship it would mainly be you trying to get Aizawa to get out more into the sun (like please touch grass)

<3 BUT he also loves staying in, ordering take out, and cuddling up on the couch while watching a movie

<3 He works with 1-A so he has an godly amount of patience for anything, and if your his partner it has absolutely doubled

<3 He thinks your tattoo and piercings make you look badass, but he would never say that outloud

<3 And also because he is the teacher of 1-A he already is protective of everyone, so you would never have to fear of being in danger, cause he fixed the problem before you even got there

<3 If you ever made a semi dark joke to him he would look at you like this

(he looks so fine in this picture oh my lord😍😍)

<3 Yall have so many cats

<3 Eri probably really likes you, and likes having a maternal figure in her house (dadzawa needed help BAD)

<3 On a more angsty note…

<3 He is very good at telling when something isn’t right with you

<3 Very observant

<3 Like if your having a bad day and everything is just bottling up inside of you and you lash out, he would let you, and then once you have calmed down he would just pull you into a hug, kiss the top of your head and say “i'm right here, you can let it out”

<3 BAWLING

<3 Ok back to happy

<3 So basically I feel like Aizawa is funny as fuck but like secretly, only you and Hazashi know that he is super funny.

<3 Date idea: Playing soft lofi or jazz while reading together in his arms

<3 EEEKKKKKKK

<3 Just so much domestic fluff

<3 Last thing is because you both have longish hair, you absolutely do matching hairstyles, like that half up half down

<3 Ok now to drabble

You sit there with one of your many cats on the couch, your scrolling through movies to watch with as you wait for your boyfriend to get back from patrol. On the coffee table you have taken out from his favorite restaurant, it's basically a buffet at this point knowing the pro hero will be hungry. There is a knock at the door alerting you that Aizawa is back, you softly place “mittens the cat” on the couch, not to disturb his slumber. You walk to the entrance and see your boyfriend taking his shoes and pro hero gear off, “Hi Shota” you say while softly walking up to him and wrapping your arms around his front “Hi honey” he says back. For a moment you just stare at each other softly until he leans in kissing you as softly as his gaze, you kiss back slowly wrapping your arms around his neck, raking your fingers through his hair and scratching his scalp. You tug him closer by the back of his head to kiss him deeper, showing how much you have missed his body slotted next to yours. Aizawa pulls away and pecks your nose, “I missed you too anne”.

(Authors note: I'm sorry I lowkey got carried away at the end, but I hope you like it)

[ac-liveblogs]

I really don't enjoy Penacony, but I think its structure is kind of shooting it in the foot too.

HYV is having a lot of fun with perspective changes, but I don't think it works very well in a story that wants you to get invested in 'everyone playing their own angle'. Rather than playing as a Trailblazer that's investigating these characters and getting to know them/develop a rapport with them as a player, the game will POV switch to the characters just outright explaining, or partially explaining, their goals to you or to each other.

I couldn't get invested in the Trailblazer's relationship with Aventurine despite 2.1's patch finale really wanting you to think they're cool, and absolutely no effort was made to build up Aventurine and Acheron's final conflict. You suspect Aventurine as a suspect for murder/a liar, he says he's not, and before you can investigate that you switch POV to Aventurine and learn exactly what he's up to because he walks you through it step by step. What did the Trailblazer do last patch? Talk to Gallagher? Why were they not bonding with Aventurine so that his death really hits hard?

Acheron is accused of murder, and before you get to investigate that yourself and try to figure out her motives we get a POV switch to Sam and Acheron promising they're not the murderers we're looking for, and also context for why Acheron Did The Murder she did do (but it was okay, the guy was cool with it).

Switching back to Sunday and Gallagher and having them just... rendezvous with the crew (via Firefly) instead of having us investigate Gallagher ourselves is also really boring.

I wouldn't accept this in a book or an anime, but I definitely don't accept it in an interactive medium.

It's especially disappointing when Penacony provides you so many options to investigate these characters that are usually unavailable to detectives - you can enter people's dreamscapes and muddle with their emotions, but that's never a factor. Why is a ghost Aventurine telling present!Aventurine (and therefore the player) about Aventurine's inferiority complex and how terrified he is? Couldn't I figure that out by trying to use my Emotion Dial thing to trigger an emotional response in him to get information and see first-hand how good his poker face really is?

It's not helped by HSR using expository dialogue as a crutch for the fact that they don't want to build too many maps, make cutscenes that are too fancy or put in fights they don't have to. It just turns the whole 'mystery' into an explain-a-thon with very little gameplay that actually ties into the mystery we're 'solving'. (we're about to get another one with gallagher and sunday. the 4th since this patch started and it's been like 20 minutes.)

Why did Acheron have to exposit about 'the dark side of Penacony' instead of us visiting it and seeing the differences first hand? Bc this map had to be saved for its own patch? Why did we not get to see the effects of what Sunday tried to do to Aventurine til this patch? Bc they thought expository dialogue would spook me?

Maybe if HSR didn't blatantly theme this around famous crime fiction novels and movies it wouldn't annoy me so much, but when 'solving the mystery' involves almost no actual investigation and the answers are just 'POV switch to the appropriate NPC and they'll explain it".... they've got some fucking nerve, right?

Anyway, I would've had Robin and the Trailblazer team up from the start of Penacony instead of Firefly (for their respective investigations), and had her die in front of them. Aventurine, Acheron and Sam are all present as witnesses so you investigate them for more information using various gameplay modes.

Then the player can see Sparkle-as-Robin and give a shit about that mystery either as a ??? what happened and/or !!! outrage, our friend, and we might give a shit about the fact we think Robin actually died.

also, did we seriously wait 12 weeks to learn the memory meme is a taxi? last patch was such filler bs. did aventurine actually accidentally kill himself.

[siriuslysatorusimping]

HAVE U READ THE NEW JJK LEAKS

"(ง'̀-'́)ง

MY SWEET FIGHTING ANON, HOW ARE YOU??

I’ve seen a few lil snippets but I’d stopped really keeping up with the leaks. I will say I LOVE that some of you immediately messaged me upon seeing the leaks 🥹😂 it made my morning to see messages in my inbox 💕 (this is my not subtle nudge to everyone that I love hearing from you guys, even if it’s just life updates or random shit. Pls, I get lonely 🥺)

Side note for the other sweet anon who messaged, I can’t answer that ask rn bc of obvious reasons, but I SEE YOU AND THINK OF THIS AS MY RESPONSE TO YOU AS WELL!!! IT MADE ME SO HAPPY INSIDE THAT YOU CALLED ME 'LOVE,' BTW. MY HEART DID A LIL JUMPY. 🥹💕

As for the leaks?

Me @ everyone losing their shit:

Spoilers for JJK 260 and a huge fucking Kiko rant below the cut.

I’ll believe it when it’s really confirmed. From what I saw, it was the last panel and there’s speculation on whether it’s really him or if Sukuna is seeing shit as he dies or any of the crazy possibilities.

That being said, if Gojo really is back, WELCOME BACK, YOU WONDERFUL, TRAUMATIZED BLUE-EYED BEAN OF A MAN. WE MISSED YOU SO MUCH.

And now my rant begins…

I’m on the fence. In all honesty, I think I’d finally accepted his death tbh. Because I remembered something that’s actually really interesting: some of the very best stories have stakes. They have death because it’s unfortunately a part of life. Gojo isn’t the MC of JJK, even though he’s an incredible character and I adore him and I still hate how he went out.

But while I still hate how that played out, I was actually thinking recently about how much credit we really don’t give Akutami. Writing is hard. World-building is hard. And he’s created a universe that’s truly incredible. The countless number of cursed techniques he’s written into the story, the number of characters he’s given depth possible without even meaning to? Genuinely incredible. He’s done something amazing. I had a ‘come to Jesus’ moment of realization that he’s actually an incredible story-teller. The story he’s built in his mind is amazing and I’m so glad he’s decided to share it with us. We’ve questioned him because we didn’t have all the pieces he has, but he’s said time and time again that he has things planned and he’s had things planned since the beginning. The medium he’s using to tell the story necessitates it being a bit choppy because he can’t explain every little thing every single time. There will be holes and gaps and things he reveals over time for the sake of the story he’s planned, and I know I forgot that fact when I was angry and grieving. (I’ve also been just losing my shit lately at how stupid some people are saying Akutami hates anime fans just because he killed Choso off. The number of comments I’ve seen about ‘hot characters aren’t allowed to die’ is just… these characters are more than eye candy. They have a purpose and emotional value in the story, specifically Choso as a big brother figure for Yuuji.) okay, fun lil side rant over lol

I think we forget that this is a shonen manga. Shonen are notorious for killing characters. I think of Hunter x Hunter, which Akutami has said is a big inspiration for him, the Chimera Ant Arc seemingly killed over half the cast. I’ve also seen a lot of anger at Akutami for him saying that he doesn’t care how many characters die as long as it’s a good story, and I think people missed the point because they were angry their favorite character died. But the thing is, he has a point. If the character deaths push the story forward, then it works. Yuuji has clearly had a power up that wouldn’t have happened if Gojo hadn’t died. On top of that, we criticized the month-long time skip, but these big reveals couldn’t have happened without it. So while it felt jarring, and it still doesn’t sit quite right with me, I understand why Akutami’s logic now. Again, I think of Hunter x Hunter’s chimera arc and how Gon had to watch Kite die and then fight his puppet corpse. Talk about traumatizing a fucking twelve year old. And adding to that, Akutami has literally said that this is meant for adults. He’s writing with an adult, predominantly male, audience in mind because that’s been the primary demographic for shonen for decades. So no, he isn’t writing with the female audience, or the young female audience, in mind because that’s not the genre he’s targeting. It just so happens that there’s been a huge surge in American teenagers obsessively consuming Asian media in the past few years and now it’s wildly popular among that demographic.

Basically what I’m saying is that gen z has developed the female counterpart for the fedora-wearing weirdos with waifu pillows in the obsession with hot guys in manga/anime. The difference is that they’re raging about a story following its chosen genre. But this is me generalizing things a lot and it obviously doesn’t apply to the majority of fans. I’m pretty sure a large part of our lil corner here is on the older end of gen z or younger millennial, but I could be wrong. Actually, I’d love to know what that split is 🤔 maybe I’ll do a poll.

ANYWAY, SORRY FOR THE RANT. IT WAS ME WORD-VOMITING TO START THE DAY. I HOPE YOU HAVE A LOVELY DAY OR AFTERNOON OR NIGHT!

[neeko-system]

SIGNALIS SPOILERS AND WHATNOT~~

finished my second playthrough of signalis, was going for the artifact ending. then loaded my save and got the memory ending. such a good game aaaa

the memory ending made me cry, it was really heartwrenching when ariane said sorry i dont remember, i just crumpled. watching elster be so exhausted was a lot.

not really sure if i understand the artifact ending. i feel like either its really vague (on top of all the other vagueness) or if im missing something. it kind of feels like a burial of arianes memory? like elster dies and we see ariane thikning about her and elster dancing in the wrecked ship? i’m not sure. maybe someone could give me their interpretation of it?

i also found out that theres a difficulty setting and really wished i had set it to survival before my second playthrough. woulda been nice!!! I do have one more ending so i might play the game again but might also just watch it on youtube and play the game again some other time(gotta let it ruminate so i can go back in with different eyes), I wanna get all the achievements anyways.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

all in all i fucking love this game a lot. very rarely do i replay a game so soon after playing it for the first time. its really tragic i’ll never get to experience this game for the first time again, but, so it goes. its such a beautiful game i will be thinking about it for a longgggggggggggg time. ive been wanting to talk about it so badly for so long but none of my friends have played it yet kyaaa!!! >_<

its crazy to me that the game exists the way it does. the style, the mechanics, the story, the music, everything about it oozes so much passion and care and thought. very few games have made me want to stare at every part of it to figure out how they made it look the way it did (THE GAME IS SO STYLISTICALLY RICH LIKE HOIW DID THEY DO ALL THAT) and the game mechanics are so nice to my brain, everything is so tactile and clicky and inventory management and ammo management and horror stratgey and the flesh and rust and death and love and lesbians and robots and anime!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

amazing game thank you rose engine, i hope they make more stuff because i really want to see it

edit:(thinking about the first time i played compared to the second. i was considerably less scared since i had a clue of waht was going on but the fear that i felt playing the first time was special to me. i really like games with stories about ‘time loops’ because the replay-ability is baked in in a cool way. especially with how the game throws information at you, viewing things again having experienced perspective shifts from information is really cool. seeing scenes again re-contextualized makes my brain go ^-^(hots quest ding sound) but going in completely blind and being afraid of everything (i especially remember being scared of the dream beach, i had literally no clue what to expect and it was nice) it all had a different flavor than the second time which is cool because i feel like i experience that kind of emotion change *with* elster. (girlie needs a FUCKING cuddle nap)

the way the game balances reality and the surreal i think is super neat. i love surrealist dream stuff a lot and i think that a video game is a super good medium for that kind of experiential stuff that really inspires me to wanna make video games. especially because then theres also this super nerdy sci fi stuff going on about robots and space regimes and magical tech(my favorite) and planetary systems and military systems and all that good shit. i similarly wanna get nerdy about stuff like military logistics while also telling a story about gay robots and girls that keep missing each other just barely in the space time continuum. i love that the game tells you a lot but also is vague and also says fuck you (affectionate) stop looking for answers and just feel it. it explains just the right amount to not feel esoteric while keeping enough vague to leave a lot up to interpretation/figure it out by playing it again/thinking about it. it plays with themes and reality and reoccuring symbolism and all that good shit that makes stories addicting to think about.) ((also one of the endings requiring beating the game once among other things that keep between playthroughs, yummyyy. games that know they are games/stories/worlds that are aware of themselves., thats good shit right there))

[courtofmatchups]

Hey could I get a match up for Obey me or Twisted Wonderland?

Pronouns: He/Him

Sexuality: On the ace spectrum but I know for certain I like dudes.

Appearance: I wear thin glasses with the lens showing out more than the frame, and any frame there is, is a black on the top. I am chubby, which only shows more often than not in my face, with having a real chubby face. I have blue eyes, with dark short hair, swooped to the side. I am short, around 5’3”.

I often have that real nerdy look that I lean into. Mainly on the front I am one. Either dressing in graphic t-shirts of my favorite shows and movies, or straight up overdressed for occasions. A nice white button up, a nice pair of pants, with a sweat vest.

Personality: Generally speaking I have social anxiety. So it’s really hard for me to open up to someone face to face. I usually talk as a way to make the thoughts of anxiety go away, but when I am truly comfortable, it comes through actions. I love spoiling my friends with gifts, I love being there for people and listening to what they have to say, it’s my comfort to know that someone cares. Though as for myself, I struggle to give myself the benefit of the doubt.

I always try to go farther than I actually need to, when I do go far I struggle to give myself real credit. Especially for the things and accomplishments I have done. I always believe I am lazy when I am just exhausted. I always enjoy making fun of my friends and them with me.

Likes/Hobbies: Okay, where do I start. I really enjoy spicy food, I’ll often take on larger doses of spicy food because it usually tastes better. I enjoy indie music, though a lot of people find it weird. I enjoy RPGs generally speaking, as for the specifics, I absolutely would kill for a good game of any table top rpg (exg. D&D, Pathfinder, etc). I also always enjoy traditional rpg games like Hylics. Outside of gaming, I enjoy writing a lot to the point that in previous relationships I have written poems of the people I cared about. I also enjoy reading and watching movies, though for most of the time I restrict it to the horror genre, that doesn’t mean I don’t like other stories in these mediums. I also like to doodle and watch anime.

Dislikes: Guh, fucking hate people with no emotional intelligence, like whatsoever. It has to be one of the quickest ways to get right under my skin. I also have a short temper with people that assume major things about me due to my disabilities. And oversexualization or infantilization of me.

What I look for in a partner: Reliability. End of sentence. More accurately, I want a partner who is willing to respect my boundaries and hang out with me. I want a partner that I can rant my problems at and they are more than willing to open up about their issues.

Hopefully this isn’t too hard

It seems to me, you've captured the heart of...

Idia Shroud!

I read that you were more on the introverted side, and when I read about your interests, I KNEW he was the one. Idia, like you, is someone who struggles with face-to-face interactions and would deeply appreciate a partner who understands the challenges of social anxiety. He’d be able to relate to your nerdy interests, from video games to tabletop RPGs, and the two of you could bond over your shared hobbies in a low-pressure environment.

Given that he's a little bit anxious, you might need to make the first move, and seeing that you and he are basically on the same wavelength, that won't be too hard for you. There is also a chance that he might make the first move at Ortho's insistence.

Either way, the relationship between you is a dream come true for him. I hope you can understand rap lyrics (the really fast songs in particular) because the speed at which he yaps about his interests is reminiscent of that. Can you really blame him though? His love language is infodumping about his favourite things. Of course, he'd love to hear you ramble about your interests as well, especially if it's something he's not dipped his toes into, since he can learn more about that, and by extension you.

Idia is a lot more emotionally intelligent than he lets on. He chewed out Rollo pretty hard in the Glorious Masquerade event. He experienced something similar himself, and his speech did help Rollo see a different path (Saying all this with as little spoilers as possible just in case). That said, you don't need to worry about a lack of emotional intelligence.

With Idia, you’d find a partner who is just as introspective and understanding as you, allowing you both to share your love for games, quiet moments, and nerdy pursuits without pressure.

[bmpmp3]

i shouldnt really be giving any hot takes on character design as someone who, despite having mild success in the adoptable scene in highschool, absolutely does NOT still got it when it comes to character designing (nowadays im just trying to do my best orz) but i do think one of the most important things with character design is that they serve the medium theyre in well.

like, a super exaggerated shape style triangle man with tiny legs a la mr incredible works great for an action cartoon movie but i dont know how good that style would work in a visual novel where you tend to only see the top half of the body. you wont be able to appreciate the tiny legs 😔

and as much as i goof on the visually cluttered anime boys in otome games and their odd fashion choices (kent from amnesia. at least 21 belts. 11 on one arm alone) i genuinely think they work for what they need to do, like all those fucking sashes and scarves and cords and capes and swishy things on the ikemen sengoku guys, painful to draw for me who wants to draw a goofy comic of them but WONDERFUL for an unanimated visual novel sprite, flowing clothes and hair adds a lot of movement to static images that you'll be staring at for 20-50 hours.

but of course on the visual novel/japanese adv game end of things u also have stuff like phoenix wright and the absolutely beautiful hotel dusk that tend to have blockier silhouettes than the fluttery flowing cloth and hair of like, a character in a bishoujo game from Key or something, but their sprites are animated which benefits from the blockier and (usually) less cluttered designs.

and theres still lots of exaggeration to be had to get very varied character designs, like the jake hunter games have a very grounded semi-realistic style but everyones posture and body types and expressions are pretty distinct, just the distinction is focused on the upper half of the body rather than the whole body like you would focus on with a comedy slapstick cartoon or like a comedy newspaper comic strip. okay its becoming increasingly obvious through what im talking about that i grew up in north america in the 00s-10s using deviantart where if ur cartoons didnt look like disney or pixar or like i dont know johnny test ur designs were considered not good enough so im still in that world. im still in that world. i hope the world is more open now

and something like the hotel dusk designs also would work well for drama or thriller comics - like i was also thinking about big sparkling shoujo manga designs and like. in a comic if ur like a garfield slapstick comedy u wanna look like a garfield, but if ur constantly doing closeups with serious emotion like a romantic drama shoujo manga, having big glittering expressive eyes and emphasizing the upper half of the character is pretty effective for the combination of medium and genre. i also think naoki urasawa's character designs would look so so good in a hotel dusk style game, that guy makes like the perfect thriller design, varied and diverse in shapes but so effective for a serious toned horror mystery thriller thing will lots of closeups of characters faces. i guess because i love serious and dramatic stories about people talking a whole lot i do gravitate towards this style of character design, where the emphasis is on the silhouette from the waist up LOL but it really goes to show that some character designs that may not fit the late 2000s comedy animation shape-based design philosophy have their own places where they thrive <- obvious thing everyone knows except for me who was on deviantart too much when i was 12

i think what im trying to say is i think big boobied super busy anime girl vtuber designs are fine, good even. i like em, i think they do the job and a lot of work goes into them. u only have a headshot/bust (heh) shown on screen 99% of the time u might as well make it with a bunch of particle effects and cool hairclips and lace and weird moving head wings or some shit. slap some sparkles on that thang

[tacetnix]

[GetToKnowMe(me)]::Start()

Tagger: @hexenjagd // Oh you~ Name: TK! Pronouns: He/They Most Active Muses? -- Mary, both here and in FFXIV -- "URIEL", an OC that I can best describe as 'What if John Carpenter's The Thing was a psychic emotional vampire and was trying to figure out human coexistence on a whim. -- Tsengel Malaguld, my FFXIV main who is a big loving himbo as a facade for a calculating lizardman terminator.

RP PET PEEVES: Oh you aren't ready for this list. Where to begin?

God-Modding is the old adage. When someone can't let anyone give them consequences for their actions. Whether it's saying heinous stuff, assaulting other RPers and then refusing to acknowledge attempts to settle the score, etc. etc. People who refuse to take what they dish out. Most recently this was someone who "avoided all the guards trying to tie her down because she assaulted a man in public because she's really flexible". If it comes down to two people not knowing how to solve a scuffle, please roll. That's wat luck and the dice are for.

People who refuse to engage in what's going on group-wise and then complain that there's nothing to do. This is very particularly targeted to some people outside of the RPC here but I wanted to throttle you. 'I'm not engaged in [Group Activity]', well I apologize but 20 other people were. You are not giving me critique or constructive criticism by saying 'I'm bored.'

Oh, my god, people who just enter a chat to say 'I'm bored.' as though they're expecting people to spoon-feed them with interaction.

Loops back to the god-modding point but "I'm too powerful for you, so I'm gonna no-sell anything you do to express the difference in our power levels." like, dude, get hit, at least give the person you're fighting the pleasure of seeing their blow push you in the dirt a bit. Have a reaction rather than "haha no *punches back with anime*". >// Multiversal RP is fun until the Anime character wants to fight.

"I am strictly into [x] so if you're anything other than something I wanna fuck then I'm going to be extremely hostile to you and casually and vocally espouse how much everything other than [x] is awful and will cite it often as a reason why I refuse to engage in any RP in this public area.' >// Unfortunately, this has happened multiple times, much to the detriment of peoples' safety and comfort in public spaces I've been in. Moderators have refused to step in, and the behavior has been allowed. ://///

"My Character is Vocally Racist." You suck. You chose to pretend like that's a character trait. You're choosing to make every minority who's experienced that shit IRL to see it again in the middle of their feel-good hobby. 'It's realistic' and you're the one choosing to bring that realism into a space for people to enjoy. Costs you zero cents not to make your characters straight up bigots.

That's all I got for now, but I could keep going, I'm sure. Sorry to just splurge all over main; I've had some baaaaad RP drama go down in the last few months in other mediums/RPCs.

LEVEL OF RP EXPERIENCE: Hah. Haha. Been RPing for 16 years about now. Started back in SPORE while coming up with little stories for my creations, and RPing out diplomatic relations with other people, to going to the JoeyRay's Bar forums for StarCraft 2 where I actually picked up proper narrative RP. Then I went to DeviantArt, RP'd in the chatrooms and learned sauciness (way too young, but oh well), and then was brought over to Tumblr by my ex who showed me @axemurderercreighton back in the day. And I've stuck here, through UNDERTALE, through Skype, through Discord, through playing FFXIV. Always back to here as a casual place to RP.

FLUFF, ANGST, OR SMUT? Angst is the most reliable, but I know I write good smut and it lets me play out fantasies. Fluff is fun, but in moderation. Too much of it and you grow stagnant. Angst brings with it conflict, and conflict drives stories onwards. Smut is the victory lap, and if that also helps serve conflict, then fuck yeah, two-for-one!

PLOTS OR MEMES? Give me a skeleton of a plot an we'll fill in everything in between. I prefer spontaneity to a firm constellation of everything that will happen for years down the line. Improv is the spice of life. Memes facilitate the funniest stuff that's happened in RP, but you wouldn't get there without plotting and having relationships with others. So... cop-out answer, but both.

LONG OR SHORT REPLIES? I err on the long side. But at the barest minimum... - Respond to what your partner has given you to work with (usually matches their length pretty well). - Offer insight into my characrer's thoughts or feelings or give them a general action to help immerse in the setting/scene. - Give my partners something to reply/respond to.

However long that all takes is how long my replies will tend to be.

TIME TO WRITE? Whenever I can. When I'm at work I'll steal Discord replies, when I'm waiting for bad lights I'll type and respond. When I'm in the bathroom -- you get the idea. Discord is my preferred method because I can respond without having to have icons or formatting or what have you. It's easier to just throw random ideas like darts on a board, and I get more clear notifications when someone's responded to me.

ARE YOU LIKE YOUR MUSE? For better or for worse, I put a lot of my anxious thoughts and my paranoia into Mary. I put a lot of how she overthinks based on my own ideations, and in a way... all of that is merged with a lot of how my wife acts. Almost any time I write Mary and you feel the love that I put into her actions, it's because I'm basing that on things I've seen and experienced intimately. She always had this role in my mind of 'cold woman who is accidentally adorable' but -- it took seeing someone who I found absolutely adorable to find the life-inspiration and information to properly convey that and bring it to life in a way that was natural and earnest.

.........God that was so much I'm so sorry for splurging. Tagging: @yellowfingcr @urbanumviolentium @bidotheuncanny @theblackwarden @tinyredrose (to surprise some of you whenever you get back, ehehe)

Thanks again to Cat for @ing me. It's been fun!

[mistydeyes]

Hello! I don't know whether matchups are open and if not you can delete this request. But...

Can you please give me a MW2 matchup? 🙂

Pronouns: she/her

Sexuality: straight

MBTI: ENTJ-A

Zodiac Sign: Cancer

Appearance: 5'7', Slim thick, dark brown eyes (looks black tbh), Curly black medium length hair, fair skinned, wears glasses (cuz I can't see shit without them)

About Me: I'm Indian and I come from a conservative family, and so my upbringing was a bit weird and made me into a weird mess. I would consider myself an introvert. But definitely not someone who sits in a corner of a room and stares. I do enjoy having conversations with people, but my social battery is low and so I get tired pretty quickly. But if I'm speaking to someone who I am really interested in, like my longtime best friend, I would talk for HOURS!!!. When it comes to friendships, I'm a very selective person. I'm not someone who gets close with people as it's very hard for me to open up, as I'm quite reserved. I also don't get along with a lot of people so 🤷🏻. Also, people have pointed out that I look unapproachable and Intimidating as I have a resting bitch face. I maybe having the best time of my life but my face does not show it, at all 💀. Or sometimes, I get really stoic and people can't tell whether I'm sad, happy, or angry lol.

I'm a level headed person, but sometimes people get on my nerves and I'm the type to bottle all of those emotions. Then when a minor inconvenience happens, BOOM! I will literally turn into a demon and my whole day just got ruined.

I'm someone who really cares about my loved ones. I will protect them from anything and I will help them out in any way I can. I'm a good listener and love to empathise with people who are hurt or would let people rant so they can feel better. I'm the therapist and the mom friend of my friends group so.... Yeah, I care about the ones I love wayyy too much. My love language is acts of service, words of affirmation and gift giving. Also, as much as I love giving love and care to others, I hate receiving it as I have mentioned before, have a hard time opening up. It takes a lot of trust and a lot of time for me to do so. So basically I give therapy to others meanwhile my mental health is blown to shit.

When it comes to work, I'm very organised and hard working. I don't like procrastination as it drives me nuts (Even though I still do it sometimes, idk why). I'm logical, focused and very passionate on the things I love. My favourite subjects are Math and Physics as I do fairly well in them. I'm not the best but I work hard and it pays off. That's why I'm opting for Aerospace Engineering in college. I take my work very seriously and definately not the type to fuck around.

Outdoors, I come off very cold and serious, but indoors I am very goofy, silly, pretty stubborn and bossy (sometimes stupid). I love doing small pranks and doing weird things that crosses my mind. I'm very loud and laugh at the stupidest things that I see or hear. Also love to play around with my pet cats. I'm a huge geek/nerd and love to talk about my hyper-fixations. Also, I'm a huge animal person and I love to feed strays and sometimes, I take them home with me. 😄

I'm very loyal but I can cut ties with people who have done me wrong. 100% has no problem in confronting people. I also suffer from ADHD, PTSD and mild depression. I also have stims where I bite the inside of my cheek or fidget my fingers or shake my legs.

Likes/Interests/hobbies: video games, reading books, writing, drawing, cooking, baking, watching murder documentaries, taking care of animals, horror, sci fi and action movies, tea, spicy food, rain, gardening, math, science, literature, history, travelling, listening to music.

My type in a partner:

Should be very passionate

Hard working, wise, mature and adventurous

Someone whom I can banter with and make me feel secure

Can be extroverted, introverted or ambiverted.

Can be on the playful side.

Alejandro Vargas (a/n @queenof-spades WE LOVE WOMEN IN STEM!! also girl I relate so hard to the conservative parents who push you to be the best :') good luck with all your studies!)

How you met: A trip to an aerospace engineering company was not on Alejandro's bucket list for the year. Especially after the last contracted company they dealt with (he's still getting his base in order after the fiasco of Graves and the Shadows). However, another joint mission with the 141 required a preview of some new satellites and other multimillion dollar technologies. After going through rigorous amounts of security, him and Rudy finally met up with the 141. "Nice to see you again, hermanos," he said as he shook hands with his British counterparts. They were making small conversation when you walked in. Your shoes echoed in the facility and a long lab coat hung around your shoulders. "Gentleman, welcome to Boeing. I'm the lead scientist here and you can follow me on a tour of the facilities," you said confidently and quickly turned to lead them through the expansive company. As you introduced them to the team of engineers and showed them the technologies of your newest satellites, they stood in awe. "This satellite is equipped with the best monitoring technologies and can withstand the temperatures of exiting and entering the atmosphere," you described as you jokingly pounded on the hard metal shell of the satellite. "She does not fuck around," you heard Alejandro whisper and the group laughed in response. "That's right Colonel Vargas, there's a reason I'm working here at Boeing and worked my ass off for a doctorate," you smirked at him. As you continued on, the blush was evident on his face as he felt like he was struck by cupid's arrow.

A peek into your relationship: It was no denying your relationship with Alejandro was difficult. Between his position as Colonel and yours as the head scientist at Boeing, you both wracked up thousands of miles on business flights. However you made it work and were now comfortably settled in a comfortable south western mansion that offered you excellent wifi for meetings. You signed off from a consulting meeting with a new company that wanted to contract your planes and sighed as you shut your laptop. The last few days you were on edge and your husband took notice as you declined his offer for wine and gently pushed your food around. "Mi corazon, what's going on?" he asked as he got up from the table and kissed your head gently. "Just work things," you sighed as you melted into his touch. "You love work through, there's something else going on," he said and carried you to the couch, "you even turned down a glass of our favorite wine." As he studied your face intently, you asked him a surprising question. "Ale, do you love me?" you asked. It took him 0.2 seconds to respond. "Are you joking? Of course I love you, you are my moon and stars. You are like if the heavens sent me a goddess to walk on earth. You are Persephone, Aphrodite, and Athena all rolled into one," he exclaimed as he peppered you with kisses. You smiled slightly and nervously held his hands. "I, um didn't know how to say this but I'm pregnant," you said quickly and looked at his face for any sign of anger or disappointment. You had kept this from him so long as you didn't want it to affect his opinion on your work and traveling so often. You weren't about to be confined to a house wife position after all this time. Instead of a negative reaction, he scooped you up in his arms and spun you around. He held you stomach as he kissed it gently and whispered, "my own child, you're going to have the best parents." As he pulled you in a tight hug and kissed you softly, he was already designing plans for their nursery and how to encompass everything you both loved into it. (Just know that this child will be absolutely spoiled by you too, especially if Ale became a girl dad HAHA)

[vt-scribbles]

Y'know I know ask games are for people to, y'know, send in asks. But I don't see people often just. Fill it all out themselves. Fuck it I'll help out the shy people.

SO ASK GAME BELOW 'READMORE' LET'S GO

1. Art programs you have but don't use: MS Paint, Blender, I used to have WAY more like this one painting [like actual paint] program.

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even): Left is easiest, Right is in the middle, and forward is the hardest of those three for me.

3. What ideas come from when you were little: I was fascinated by G/T from like. 3 years old. I blame Super Mario Land 2 LMAO

4. Fav character/subject that's a bitch to draw: Handheld, perspective, monsters/creatures, and massive scale

5. Estimate of how much of your art you post online vs. the art you keep for yourself: Uhhh probably about 50/50? A lot of things I draw are spoilers, shitposts, and other study art I don't bother sharing.

6. Anything that might inspire you subconsciously (i.e. this horse wasn't supposed to look like the Last Unicorn but I see it): Not that I can think of? My art doesn't get analyzed super often. I think people think I study anime more than I do.

7. A medium of art you don't work in but appreciate: Charcoal, watercolors, sculpture, oil pastels, acrylic, copic markers

8. What's an old project idea that you've lost interest in: Originally I was going to make an AMV with my two characters, Nonny and Felicia, to the song 'shut up and dance with me'. These two aren't active OCs anymore, and the project was WAY too ambitious for my skill level 9 years ago lmao.

9. What are your file name conventions: 1: Name of song I listened to on loop while drawing. 2: An inside joke. 3: Literal rep of what's on the canvas like 'Hema doodles Aug 2023'.

10. Favorite piece of clothing to draw: Body suits, capes, scarves

11. Do you listen to anything while drawing? If so, what: TONS. My fave lyrical music, videogame soundtracks, sometimes just ambiance if I'm overwhelmed. Usually tho it's the same song on loop till I get the inspired piece out of my system.

12. Easiest part of body to draw: Eyes!

13. A creator who you admire but whose work isn't your thing: A lot of NSFW artists who I won't list here LMAO. I don't go to that school, but their art skills are top-notch.

14. Any favorite motifs: Mirrors, doppelgangers, leaving 1 eye absent for emotional effect, feathers/wings, falling, sinking into water, eyes, dark palettes with bright accents/light sources, glowing eyes, flowing hair, size difference/scale, fucked up version of self vs real version

15. *Where* do you draw (don't drop your ip address this just means do you doodle at a park or smth): Starbucks, home, parks if I'm feelin spicy, anywhere I take my tablet for the day.

16. Something you are good at but don't really have fun doing: A lot of my niche/kink stuff tends to get pretty dredge-y for me. I may be good at it, but it's not where my passion lies. That's in animation, fantasy, dramatic stuff, storytelling, etc.

17. Do you eat/drink when drawing? if so, what: Water or Snapple for the drink, milk if it's bedtime so I can settle down, and then usually the snacks are just whatever my lunch is for the day since we don't have a table.

18. An estimate of how much art supplies you've broken: Not many! Less than $100 I'd say. I'm very careful with my supplies, and I don't believe I've ever broken a tablet. The worst I've done was I busted 1 or 2 cheap tablet pens with stupidity.

19. Favorite inanimate objects to draw (food, nature, etc.): Definitely nature. Tree trunks and swirls therein, flowers, grass.

20. Something everyone else finds hard to draw but you enjoy: Humans! Not that it's an 'everyone' thing, I just run in some furry circles where human artists are a rarity. Eyes, too. Some people find expressions rly hard.

21. Art styles nothing like your own but you like anyways: Uhhh man damn, I don't follow a lot of art styles that aren't something I took inspo from? But I guess Wolf Walkers is my biggest one.

22. What physical exercises do you do before drawing, if any: Sooometimes I stretch, but I don't do it nearly often enough.

23. Do you use different layer modes: Yep! My most common ones are Multiply, Glow Dodge, Add, Add Glow, Overlay, Pin Light, and Color.

24. Do your references include stock images: Absolutely! Reference is important.

25. Something your art has been compared to that you were NOT inspired by: Not much! Most of my inspirations are pretty clear-cut and strong. Avatar, SU, Disney, Dreamworks, FMA, some Warner Brothers' movies, etc.

26. What's a piece that got a wildly different interpretation from what you intended: God, so, the G/T gif of mine that makes the rounds a lot? The one where VT finds someone small and it's their POV and he helps them and puts them in his shirt pocket??? Most people were completely normal about that post. But then there's one chuckle-head who was calling it pocket-vore, and I wanted to scream. I even chastised them like 'hey uh, no. That's not what this is.' and they argued back with 'well it's up to the eye of the beholder more than your opinion.' and I was like 'UH NO. I MADE THIS. MY OPINION IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOUR WEIRD ONE???' I've also RAAARELY had people call my characters underaged when they're all well over 21, so those are always gross/wild LMAO.

27. Do you warm up before getting to the good stuff? If so, what is it you draw to warm up with: Sometimes! I usually do an anatomy study, brush stroke warm-ups, or just doodle something personal first.

28. Any art events you have participated in the past (like zines): I think Multi Animator Projects [MAPS] would count here! I was part of Starclan's Chosen, Change Your Mind [Brambleclaw], Levitating, Family of Me [fallenleaves], Goosebumps Warriors MAP, Pay No Mind MEP, LA Devotee [never finished], White Rabbit, and Fear Garden! Among others :>

29. Media you love, but doesn't inspire you artistically: Not much! Pretty much everything I love inspires me artistically. I guess some anime styles?

30. What piece of yours do you think is underrated: Pretty much any of my animations. But I only feel that way cuz they take THE MOST dedication and work time. Also kiiiinda my writing? But a lot of people have trouble getting people to respond to literature, so.

[animebw]

So the live action One Piece is really, really good.

I know, far from the first person to say it. But it really must be stressed how absolutely bonkers it is that One Piece, of all anime properties, is what breaks the live-action adaptation curse in the West. So many attempts at adapting far more live-action friendly stories like Death Note and Cowboy Bebop ended up complete disasters, and yet it's perhaps the most unabashedly cartoonish anime franchise, the one defined by how it takes advantage of drawing and animation to portray people, places and things that would be completely unfeasable in the real world, that shows how to translate this medium to live action without losing what makes it special in the first place. It's not a perfect adaptation, but it pretty much nails everything it needs to, capturing the heart of this story in all its most important moments and making smart changes that serve its new form as a binge-worthy Netflix drop. So let's talk about the things I liked, the few areas I think it fell short, and how I think future seasons should play out! Spoilers, obviously.

The Good:

-The most important thing to get right was the casting, and they nailed it: all the Straw Hats and their supporting cast are just about perfect. Inaki Godoy just is Luffy, Emily Rudd does a fantastic job shouldering the season's core emotional weight as Nami, Vincent Regan steals the show every time Garp is on screen, and Jeff Ward is an absolute riot as Buggy. Special shout-out as well to Morgan Davies for nailing Koby's expanded screen time.

-Speaking of, I love how Koby and Helmeppo's title-card story is fleshed out into a proper B-plot throughout this season. Following their journey under Garp's command is a perfect way to introduce us to the Navy's inner workings and the more explicitly political side of the story up front, as well as foreshadowing plenty of future story beats to come.

-The action. Is. So. Good. Thank god we're finally remembering how to film proper hand-to-hand brawls, cause every punch-up is a blast to watch.

-Luffy actually has more of an arc here than he does in the manga! Manga Luffy can be a pretty static character a lot of the time, which I know is kind of his appeal, but this adaptation gives him a bit more to work with as he grapples with the responsibility of being a captain and the consequences his mistakes can have for his crew.

-Seriously Buggy is so fucking funny they nailed him so perfectly

-Putting more of a focus on Nami's struggles throughout the season was a great way to give it more structure for a binge format. Her emotional journey is really the heart of this adaptation as we watch her go from a paraniod recluse to fully embracing the Straw Hats as her new family.

-One benefit to being live action and produced in America? Way, way less casual sexism. Dare I hope that future seasons will avoid ruining Sanji's character among other pitfalls Oda fell into? Fingers crossed!

-The production design is immaculate. It strikes the perfect balance between the wacky cartoonishness of One Piece's world and the demands of filming in live action.

-Fantastic soundtrack too! It knows just where to deploy instrumental renditions of We Are while charting its own musical identity.

The Bad

-Some of the dialogue is a liiiiiiittle cringey? I know dialogue has never been OP's strongest suit, but there are definitely a few moments that feel overly anachronistic and "how do you do fellow kids?" There's a moment Buggy jokes about toxic fandom that really made me roll my eyes (especially since the OP fandom has by and large really embraced this adaptation, so it comes off like a cheap shot at a demographic of haters that doesn't even really exist).

-While the camerawork and editing are pretty great, the color grading is very much... not. Can we please stop shooting everything in boring desaturated yellows and greys and start lighting our night scenes so we can actually see what's going on?

-Shockingly, it's the strongest parts from the manga- the backstories- that I feel suffered the most here. Some of that's due to most of the child actors not being that great, which, well, that's a risk you take with child actors. But it also cuts out a lot of the personal culpability that made a lot of those backstories so compelling? Like how Sanji used to be pretty wasteful with food until his experience stranded on an island taught him how important it was to respect every bite? That aspect of his character is completely missing in his flashback here.

-Hoo boy, they made some... choices with how they depicted Arlong's crew. I know the Fishmen are a big racism/discrimination metaphor, but between the trap music that plays whenever they show up, their overall "urban gangsta" fashion aesthetic and the design of Arlong Park, the fact Arlong himself is played by a black actor... there is some coding going on here, is my point. And considering how much I hated the direction this story arc went in Fishman Island, that does not give me confidence in this adaptation's ability to escape sucking just as much on that front.

Future Season Wish List:

Season 2: The Alabasta saga, starting with the arrival at Roguetown and ending with Vivi's send-off

Season 3: The Water Seven saga, maybe with a brief stop in Skypiea beforehand but not long enough to get bogged down in there like the manga did

Season 4: Possibly controversial, but I think this should take us to the timeskip. Spend an episode or two in Thriller Bark but cut out all the bullshit, one episode in Sabaody for the Shit Gets Real(tm) section, one episode in Amazon Lily, then onto Impel Down and the Marineford showdown, with one episode dedicated to the fallout of that battle and getting us to the timeskip.

Season 5: Big focus here should be Dressrosa IMO. If you must spend some time in Fishman Island then do it, probably don't need that much time in Punk Hazard since barely anything happens there, then get into the thick of Dressrosa.

Season 6: This should be the Wano season. One episode in Zou, maybe a couple in Whole Cake Island to set up Big Mom, (honestly we might not even need the extra Sanji backstory if this adaptation gets rid of his worst traits), then get straight into Wano so you have all the time you need for all those moving parts. Also, Gear 5 Luffy in live-action should just be him turning into his anime self Roger Rabbit style. Tell me that wouldn't rule.

[richtercard]

points you. Opinions on the GBA/DS era of Castlevanias if you've played any of them.

circle of the moon - i put it down after 15 minutes of playtime and never touched it again because of that FUCKING WALK SPEED. it felt like i was walking through molasses with a 40lb backpack on or something. also the protagonist has the exact same name as my dad and that just makes me feel weird.

harmony of dissonance - i find it to be a kind of middling game but at the same time i think it's way overhated by some people. it's got its flaws, sure, but the castlevania series has put some real stinkers out there and to put it on the same level as, say, haunted castle or the gameboy games is a bit unfair. also i unironically love the soundtrack and can't be trusted with the aux cord because i WILL start blasting offense and defense.

aria of sorrow - it's a great game, what more is there to say? it's fun, the music and art direction are great, the characters are lovable, and i adore how the castlevania series now comes with a pre-built modern au (well, i guess it's more of a near future au since it takes place in 2035, but it definitely feels closer to modern)

dawn of sorrow - i have. complicated feelings about this game. dawn's version of the soul system focuses way more on the grinding aspect than aria, and the luck stat is fucking broken, meaning the only way to actually increase the drop rate of souls is to get the $300,000 soul eater ring, so either you're spending hours grinding souls or hours grinding money with no real in-between. also i don't like the story and feel like it took away a lot of the impact that the ending of the first game had. in aria, soma rejecting his role as the dark lord felt like it had weight, like he was effectively putting an end to the thousand-year cycle of death and violence that dracula started. but in dawn of sorrow, it turns out that no, the cycle didn't end, soma's actions just meant that someone else will become the dark lord. it's something that's always left a sour taste in my mouth. but at the same time.......... i think the game's kind of fun?? for all of my gripes, i had a blast playing it (especially julius mode) and i think it's really charming. i know everyone constantly gives this game and portrait of ruin shit for their budget anime art style, but i've always thought that at least the in-game sprites are pretty cute. idk. i hate dawn of sorrow but i love it but i hate it.

portrait of ruin - THEE best game of this era!!!!! it's SO fun and plays SO well i love the dual character system so fucking much. the music and overworld design are on POINT it's such a perfect jaunty vampire movie pastiche of a game. i've gotten 1000% completion in every bonus character mode (or at least the closest i can get) because it's just so fucking good and replayable. in terms of raw enjoyment it's probably my absolute favorite castlevania game of all time (in terms of true favorites it's only beaten out by symphony of the night, purely for emotional attachment reasons) it's the goat!!!!!!!! THE GOAT!!!!!!!!!!

order of ecclesia - UNDERRATED AF!!! i really really love the first half of the game and how it strikes a happy medium between linear progression and non-linear exploration, and i think it's nice to see other locations in a castlevania game beyond dracula's castle itself. also shanoa is hot.

[arachine]

LEXI I CAME TO ASK IF YOUD SEEN ACROSS THE SPIDERVERSE JUST TO SEE ALL THE STUFF YOU REBLOGGED??

I LOVED IT SOOOO MUCH LIKE I WAS SHAKING IN MY SEEATTTTT MANNNNN IT WAS TOO GOODD

(i am soooo close to becoming a spiderverse blog istg)

tell me alllll your thots abt it plzzzz🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️🧎‍♀️

BAE LEMME FUCKING TELL YOU!!//!/!

i watched it a few days ago and??? i’m still in a state of utter shock and bewilderment??? like physically i’m home, but mentally i am still sitting in my theatre chair, with my jaw agape.

it was brilliant and—i truly can’t stress this enough—a MASTER CLASS of a movie. animation as a medium is so underestimated, but i really believe in my heart of hearts that it’ll open up so many doors for other films to come.

there’s so many things i can get into, but first i wanna talk about the color palettes designed for each character!!! i think the animators’ use of colors bode exceptionally well to showcase the characters’ emotions and innermost thoughts/feelings. take gwen for example: her color palette is usually hues of blue and cold tones, and when she’s unsure of herself or feeling down, the background/environment around her, reflects that. you see it a lot when she’s switching back and forth between her earth, and miles’—but especially so when she’s in her room. all the furniture appears abstract, and it’s constantly changing in appearance because she isn’t allowing herself to really focus on her surroundings.

another thing i noticed (this has to do with colors too) is that miles’ color scheme on his earth is blue and red (like every other spidey), but when he’s on earth 42, the color scheme changes to purple and yellow (the colors associated with the prowler). looking back at it now, this was probably obvious and may have been intentionally in-your-face but i was so caught up in other things that i didn’t even really notice it until a friend pointed it out.

beyond all that though, i have so many theories. for one, do you think spider-byte helped miles in good faith? or do you think it was unintentional? a friend and me were going back and forth about it but i think it was in good faith and we even see her in the little group gwen recruits at the end. i mean, i guess i can see the other side of the argument? people think she knowingly sent him to the wrong earth but i don’t think she knew what earth he was actually from. the machine that sent him to earth 42, scans dna. so i’m assuming while she knew he was an anomaly, she wasn’t aware of the fact that earth 42 wasn’t his actual earth. i’d like to think that she helped him escape bc it was either: 1) let him caught by miguel & co. or 2) let him take his chances.

another theory i have is that maybe miles’ dad can be saved. miguel said the canon event was inevitable but so far, miles has been disproving that he’s not like the other spider-people. him being an anomaly is quite literally a miracle within itself. he wasn’t supposed to become spider-man on his earth, but he did it anyway! so maybe…nobody will have to die? they make it a point in the movie that all the spiders go through suffering, and that their suffering is inevitable, but idk…that doesn’t sit right with me. there has to be a reason for miles’ transformation. and i think he can break that cycle.

sorry for rambling!! i’ve got a lot more theories and insights but this reply is already sooooo long 😭 if you wanna talk about it dm me!!!

[furox]

I didnt take my ADHD meds today (they really help w emotional dysregulation) bc I woke up too late (couldnt sleep) and they keep me up if I take them too late (12:30 pm I woke up, my god) and I'm trying to fix my sleep schedule now (I am Not too optimistic about this endeavor but gotta try) and I had an Experience that I was able to step away from and notice The Patterns from:

I am not suicidal (just need to get that out of the way up front, you'll see), but a lot of the times when I'm self-critical (all the time) and unmedicated (I try not to be, precisely for chiefly these reasons, not to mention Functioning in society (barely)), my feelings of frustration and despair really do manifest in like... something that is NOT suicidal, exactly, but is so fucking close. It's like the cousin of being suicidal.

It's like... the wayward yearning for the fact that you feel like you deserve to implode and give up and drown in shame and failure and be forgotten and just. Have some sort of fucking Release.

In these moments I am not literally, genuinely suicidal; I don't actually want to die, I have no intention of dying, especially not by my own hand, and often times I even still feel a tiny flicker of motivation to carry on (tiny, medium, it varies). But that sense that I want it all to go up in flames and that I deserve for it to, and that sick sense that I want to revel in destruction are still very akin to the same sort of hopelessness and despair of suicidal ideation, but maybe even sharper and more manic, because there's less of a tired, defeated, depressed edge to it; it's much closer to a lance through the chest than a growing sickness.

It's cool I'm able to now point at it and be like HEY this is that thing... that crazy cornered animal that rears its ugly head in your psyche every now and then when there's even less of The Good Chemical in the brain. And also it's just. Kinda wild??

Anyway. This all happened because I couldn't draw a cat how I wanted to. :|

[rottenbrainstuff]

I’m up to ep nine on Trigun Stampede now, it’s getting quite sad and I’m enjoying the emotional burn. The birthday party fucked me up. Frustratingly I still feel like although there’s some really great stuff happening in this show, they’re fumbling some of the other beats. The last two multi part eps especially felt like they built up some great things in the first part, then the second part just drops everything and methodically ties up all the lose ends all in an unsatisfying row and moves on. I don’t know if that makes any sense.

I think I notice this mostly in that… there’s been a lot of big scenes where I feel like… there’s a big emotional reaction that should be happening, but it never does. This would be a great time to cut to a character and give us some close ups and a dramatic emotional reaction to what just happened, but instead it sticks with medium shots and moves right along.

Does that make any sense?

I’m thinking especially of (spoilers here) in ep nine and Vash’s fight with Knives. There’s so much happening, Vash having to watch his brother do horrible things, people getting brutally ripped apart, dying plants all around, and just… I found myself thinking? there’s not enough emotional reaction. I kept waiting for it to happen and it never did. Why is there not more screaming, or crying? Is it because it’s hard to rig these CG models for good facial movement? But you don’t even have to animate it, you could even show it from a wide shot and rely on the voice actor?…. Perhaps, perhaps, you might be able to argue that maybe Vash freezes when he’s frightened rather than reacting, and I might be able to agree if this was the only scene in the show where I felt unsatisfied with the reactions. Plus like. There’s still interesting and emotional ways to animate a character freezing with fear rather than just… doing nothing!

It’s just so frustrating. Some parts of this are so good, such slick fights, such nice character design, but it keeps dancing around missing that sweet spot that would make it perfect.

Anyways.

It’s weird to think there’s only three eps left now.

It’s so fun seeing what’s up on AO3 for new shows and discovering the topography of the fandom. Every show has its own unique flavour. A lot of people are writing fics that blend ideas from Stampede, the old show, and the manga into their own distinct thing and I think that’s fun.

[number-1-kuaidul-fanboy]

The upcoming Lion King prequel hurts me personally

I really want to consistently keep this a Yugioh blog, since Yugioh is so expansive and ongoing and it’s what pretty much everyone who’s following me is here to see at this point...

But to be honest, I don’t know where else to talk about this. So... here goes nothing. The original 1994 Lion King is the single most influential movie on my life.

It was my absolute favourite movie from a very young age and for many years after. There are movies I prefer now but the influence this movie had on my life cannot be understated.

(Rant continued under the cut so I don’t flood people’s dash)

The direct to DVD sequel, Simba’s Pride, (which is actually pretty good!) is the earliest birthday gift I remember asking for, I watched it and the original over and over again, I basically watched every single Lion King related piece of media I could get my hands on (never got around to the Broadway unfortunately), including the Lion King 1 and a half, the Timon and Pumbaa show and eventually The Lion Guard, despite me being much older when that show came out. Hell, my very first crush, like ever not just fictional, was a character in this movie. (I was like 7 at the time, give me a break.) This thing was basically my first fandom.

I remember as far back as when I first got a phone with access to the Internet, I mainly watched videos about The Lion King. And among those now ancient ass videos, my favourites were videos about the lost character Kopa and more relevant to what I’m going to talk about, fan theories about Scar’s backstory. These videos, or the ones I saw when I was younger at least, were essentially numerous pieces of fanart telling the story in order, either set to music or narration explaining the respective person’s take on the story in more detail. Some of these art pieces were used so often in these videos, I still recognise them to this day. The story of these once close brothers drifting apart due to bitter rivalry spurred on by the preferential treatment given to the one who would be king was one that really fascinated this fandom, myself included. These and the Kopa videos were basically my introduction to the concept of fanfiction, which I now currently write as a hobby (for other fandoms, but still!) and am very passionate about. I still find the potential of a Scar and Mufasa backstory really fascinating but what I really wanted, more than anything, for so much of my life, was a version of this story on the big screen.

That is... until it was actually announced...

*long sigh*

I’ll be honest. Before the announcement of this prequel, the one piece of Lion King media I never intended to watch, was the CGI remake. I’m still insulted by the very notion of Disney remaking one of their most perfect timeless films, one completely comprised of talking animals, in stiff lifeless CGI and trying to pass it off as “live action.” When I talk about this movie, I call it “the Lion King remake” or “Lion King 2019.” Calling it “live action” is an insult to the animators who worked tirelessly to make it, and is an insult to the whole medium of animation. So I never bothered to watch it. And again, this is coming from the guy who watched THE LION GUARD, a Disney Junior show about the second son of Simba using his magical religion roar to fight the evil ghost of Scar in a volcano. I was willing to watch THAT, and even enjoyed most of it, and not Disney’s sham of a remake. That is how low the bar is.

It wasn’t until this prequel’s announcement, and watching YMS’s amazing video on it, that I decided to watch the remake and... yup. It is the worst piece of Lion King media ever conceived. They completely ruined the music, sucked all the character and emotion out of every single frame, and even massively fucked up the writing despite this supposedly being a shot for shot remake of the original movie. Again, YMS has a great video covering this in more detail, I pretty much agree with every one of his points. He’s only covered up to Mufasa’s hilarious butchered death so far but I have faith he’ll do a good job tearing the rest of it to shreds.

And it’s this piece of garbage that Disney is making a prequel of. This story I’ve wanted to see my entire life, and they’re going to tell it in the most flat lifeless animation in the world. How are they expecting that to work? The animation of TLK 2019 is so expressionless and stiff that it’s impossible to tell what’s going on moment to moment without the context of said moment from the original film. This prequel doesn’t have a well known movie it’s adapting. As far as mainstream media is concerned, Scar and Mufasa’s backstory has never been told in any official way. Sure, there’s the picture book where he was scraped by a buffalo in a stempede, countless fanworks where his dad scratched the fuck out of him in an an act of abuse, Lion Guard where he becomes evil after getting the scar from a venomous snake.

THAT IS REAL. I DID NOT JUST MAKE THAT UP:

Again, I unironically consider THIS better than the Lion King remake. (The song slaps ngl.) But anyways, the prequel definitely isn’t going to do any of these things. In fact, the 2019 movie kind of implies Scar got his scar from challenging Mufasa for the throne. Okay, that’s a decent idea but idea is nothing, execution is everything. And the execution of the 2019TLK, with its complete lack of facial expression, emotion in the performances, or anything to get the audience invested outside of nostalgia, how can they possibly think they’ll be able to grip anyone by doing more of the same only this time without the exact outline of a story millions of people are already invested in? Normies won’t give a shit and us more dedicated fans already have other versions of this story we prefer. 

Honestly, I don’t think even fans of 2019 movie are really going to care about the prequel. Because while I’m sure legitimate fans of it exist, the 2019 movie just didn’t stick with people. Sure, it made a shit ton of money but apart from that, it made no impact. No one talks about it anymore, apart from dedicated TLK fans like me and YMS saying how much of a piece of shit it is. As dumb as The Lion Guard could get at times, I’ll always remember it for both the insane dumb shit, and some of the genuine good stuff in it. Scar getting his scar from challenging his brother might be a more logical story but its execution isn’t one I’ll remember. The evil venom snake however? You’re damn right I’m humming that song every time I bring it up here, that shit slapped for real.

So basically... the story I’ve dreamed about seeing nearly my entire life, the spark that lit the fire to me becoming passionate about telling my own stories, is finally getting the movie I’ve always wanted and it’s almost definitely going to be a boring lifeless mess and be remembered by no one after it potentially bombs. Great. Love this studio. 😒