#the atomic bomb will always be unforgivable

[murasakikagekitsune]

Original Cursed Technique: 影激減/Kage no Geki (trans. Shadow Puppet Theatre)

Asano-sama has an ability that's odd, for lack of a better word, given His nature as a River Kitsune. He can wield the light and shadows around Him in order to create puppets to do things for Him. They are controlled by gestures that mimic the action He wants to perform. You could argue that this is just run-of-the-mill telekinesis, and you'd be right, to a point, but drawing power from the light and shadows in the environment (or rather, the energy within them) is the key difference.

To me, it seems like He's always been to do this - create temporary vessels for the dead - and it feels separate to the fact He is a River Kitsune because most of Their powers are hydrokinetic. I know that zenko may have powers over everything, but Asano-sama seems like the kind of Being to tie His sense of self to His local geography, so He won't use powers that take Him too far from His place or sense of origin - that would be a river. Specifically, Asano-sama comes from the Otagawa, or the Ota River - that feeds into why He uses Kage no Geki more now, rather than His childhood; He has to, because of His catastrophic vision loss in 1945. This also is the reason Kage no Geki we (meaning Asano-sama and myself) think of it a Cursed Technique instead of a superpower or Quirk; there are negative emotions hidden in the shadows and in the fragments of people's souls. This, if you consider the Shinto view of animism, also applies to objects - He can befriend the object if it's more than 100 years old or pass on the soul of a puppet to an object so it becomes their vessel.

While, in truth, Kage no Geki was always a personal Cursed Technique, it was only recently classified as such because of it its rise in usage - the nuclear fallout of Hiroshima gave Him plenty of shadows to befriend.

[talas-first-lady]

Post the ranking of the male legends. Let the world burn. Let chaos reign. It's on brand for the show (please read this in a funny tone)

The official, correct ranking of male Legends from best to worst along with foolproof evidence which you can trust because I am a lesbian and I am not swayed by men of dubious attractiveness.

1: Gwyn Davies

Pros: Invented time travel so he could save the poet he spent his entire adult life pining for. Has some of the absolute best throwaway lines of S7 (with flawless delivery). Has literally never done anything wrong ever.

Cons: Not around for long enough, which was in no way his fault.

2: Ray Palmer

Pros: Delightful. Hilarious. Has great chemistry with every other character. Loves showtunes and Star Wars.

Cons: Spending billions of dollars to create a suit so you can be a superhero in a city that frankly has too many superheroes already is not a good look. Also he's way too intense in relationships.

3: Nate Heywood

Pros: He somehow manages to be the perfect combination of himbo and really smart. It shouldn't be possible. Also, I too am an overeducated nerd who is really into Tala and Maisie, so I relate to him.

Cons: He really sucks whenever he's in a relationship.

4: Jefferson Jackson

Pros: He's such a good guy through and through. He has been put through some deeply unfair things but still manages to always be a positive force. Deserves all the hugs.

Cons: His accent is ridiculous and I can't take him seriously because of that.

5: Mick Rory

Pros: Has any character on the show evolved as much as him? Probably not. He's a sweetheart. He writes romance novels. His relationships with other characters are always amazing.

Cons: We all had to watch him birth alien eggs through his nose and that can never been unseen. Way too attached to his shitty ex boyfriend.

6: Wally West

Wally is right in the middle because he is true neutral. Does he make the show better? Not really. Does he make the show worse? Not really.

Pros: Good karaoke choices.

Cons: It's really dumb that Death Totem Sara appeared to him as his ex (who he really wasn't with that long and who was very much still alive) instead of his mom (who was his only family for his entire childhood and fairly recently died).

7: Gary Green

Pros: Sweet, funny, endlessly relatable. He adds so much character to every scene he's in.

Cons: Does not understand boundaries at all. He's also very inconsistently written because obviously they didn't plan for him to be an alien from the beginning.

8: Behrad Tarazi

Pros: I enjoy the way his relationship with Zari has developed. And he's a great singer.

Cons: Weed is not a personality. They didn't bother to give him an actual personality until season 7, at which point I was already over him. I also don't like his fixation with Astra which was entirely about finding her pretty on Highcastle Abbey and has nothing to do with who she actually is.

9: Carter Hall

Pros: Had the good sense to die quickly before he could really annoy me.

Cons: Manipulative towards Kendra. Actively detracted from the 100th episode.

10: Martin Stein

Pros: Victor Garber. A+ singing.

Cons: Drugged and kidnapped Jax in the pilot. Racist, sexist, deeply selfish. He started to improve slightly but it wasn't enough.

11: Rip Hunter

Pros: Saw the potential in Sara Lance.

Cons: Told Gideon he loved her and then TURNED HER INTO A TRAINING SIMULATOR FOR THREE YEARS. He also flew her into the sun and into an atomic bomb. Lied to all the original Legends. Lied to Ava.

12: Leonard Snart

Pros: Had the good sense to die quickly. Also, I do enjoy him on The Flash.

Cons: Cruel and abusive to Mick almost constantly. Talk about kicking someone while they're down. He's an asshole to everyone, but the way he speaks to Mick is unforgivable.

13: John Constantine

Pros: He's a useful foil for some of the more optimistic Legends. Decent bisexual representation. Never met a weird unidentified substance he didn't want to put in his mouth.

Cons: He forced Charlie to face thousands of years worth of trauma, got Behrad and Charlie's friends killed in the process, and put the entire world at risk. Why? To save Astra, who he immediately forgot about and left to struggle on her own (again). He sent Desmond to hell. He abandoned Nora when she was a kid. He altered Spooner's memories despite knowing that having her mind messed with is a major source of trauma for her. Put the entire world at risk again by teaming up with Bishop. Lied to and manipulated Zari and had the gall to call it love. Also, if both Ava and Mick don't like you, you are clearly highly suspicious.

[glattandblade]

Glatt & Blade’s 100 Follower Event!

Hello everyone! We’d like to preface this with a huge THANK YOU! When we started, we had no idea how far we’d go, but reaching this milestone made us realize we’re in it for the long haul. So again, thank you to everyone who likes what we do and has supported us over the past month <3

Now: Onto the event!

Glatt and I wanted to do different things: I’m into song fics, Glatt wanted prompts. So boom! You get both :D Glatt and I have picked 10 prompts/song lyrics each, to which you can choose one and a character and we’ll write you a thing! (Remember you can be as detailed or as vague as you want to!) 

Remember the rules & who/what we write! You can find that here. (We don’t write for the same people, so when requesting make sure the person you’re requesting to writes for that character!) Also make sure you follow the cc’s boundaries, too :)

Prompts under the cut! (Requests for this event are: OPEN!)

Blade’s Song Lyrics

1. “Won't you stay with me, my darling, when this house don't feel like home?” (Curses - The Crane Wives)

2. “I am not the sunshine, I am not the moon at night. Well, who else could I be when I can’t hardly see?” (Dr. Sunshine Is Dead - Will Wood and the Tapeworms)

3. “Girl it's you that I lie with as the atom bomb locks in. It's you I watch TV with as the world, as the world caves in.” (As The World Caves In - Matt Maltese)

4. “Keep the promise sealed in pain. Every time we change, it rains.” (Leopard - Jack Stauber)

5. “I don't mind the sun sometimes, the images it shows. I can taste you on my lips and smell you in my clothes.”  (Pepper - Butthole Surfers)

6. “It seems unforgiving when a good thing ends, but you and I will always be back then.” (Time Adventure - Rebecca Sugar)

7. “I’ll hold you closer in a second. There’s something weighing heavy on my teeth. What’s my deal? I’m just so glad that you’re real.” (Coconut Ranger - Jack Stauber)

8. “After leaving my apartment, I feel this cold inside me. It howls away all through the market, it calls your name.” (Apartment - Young the Giant)

9. “We got no money but we got heart. We're gonna rattle this ghost town. This house is falling apart.” (Anna Sun - Walk The Moon)

10. “I fell in love with you and you fell in love with me, what shall we do?” (Oh No! - Mindy Gledhill)

Glatt’s Prompts

1. “Don't touch me!” “How am i supposed to bandage you if you won't let me touch you?”

2. "For the last time no this is not a date, we are fighting, I am actively trying to murder you at this very moment!" "You say that buuuuuuuut…”

3. “When did you stop loving me?”

4. "When was the last time you said you loved me, and meant it?"

5. “Don’t look at me like that.” “Like what?” “Like you still love me.”

6. Being forced to watch the love of your life move on with someone else, you’ve gathered enough courage to tell them you want to be with them, only to catch them holding hands with someone else 

7. I’m finally ready to be with you, but you’ve finally moved on from me, and i’m too late

8. “I despise you with every inch of my being.” “That’s not a lot of inches.”

9. “Y’know, when I said you’d fall for me, this is not what I had in mind.”

10. “Whenever I’m around you I get super nervous and get this weird feeling in my stomach. So, I’m either in love with you or allergic to you, and I don't know which one is worse.”

Event Masterlist

[crossxskulled]

“ it’s okay to be angry, you’re allowed to be upset about what happened to you. ” ((Did someone order two physically-fit Phantom Thieves with pent-up anger issues? :3c ))

-

☠ - For a moment he’s quiet due to the one who’s telling him this said advice. A stir of realization settles within those bluntly honest eyes of the delinquent as he’s left silent, caught off in how casually this is spoken of, rightfully armed with it’s silver lining of flame. Surrounding them in the thinning halls of Shujin would be the emptiness of an otherwise shitty day. Old scars still managed to creep from the heavily ingrained society that aimed to always see him kicked to the side one way or another.

Not that he entirely faults them. Ryuji knows that it’s left by the machinations of  despot who aimed to bleed his image into all of Shujin itself. To claim any woman as his rightfully owned property and make examples of execution for any man who hadn’t fell in line with his whims. Broken bones highlighted by mortification, only to be puppeted by the strings of subjugation had left a history of where repressed anger simmers under his veins like fresh magma. Their lives within the Phantom Thieves highlighted their release of pain through every enemy crushed.

Part of him had to worry if he was gaining a sadistic streak by allowing the full feast of anger to be indulged. To burn and let burn despite the inherent risk of being of being consumed by it all. There was a touch of guilt in knowing that part of him was happy to partially imagine the faces of people who slighted him as those shadows, seeing their twisted amalgamations become saturated in fear before applying the final strikes. Always ensuring he stops the fantasy during the end so it’s always a shadow he falls, never a person he wished to just rough of.

Remaining slouched against a nearby wall of the school, Ryuji’s eyes bore deep into Makoto’s, a steam like sigh spilling like fresh exhaust. “And stewin’ solely in that feels effin’ worse then holding it back. Makoto, if I don’t do somethin’ with it, feels like I’m gonna lose my damn mind.” Reliving those pained days isn’t what he wishes to do.

To conquer those days like the unforgiving sea served to be a lot more appealing.

”Let’s go smash some shadows.” The suggestion is dropped like an atom bomb with it’s lack of finesse. Yet he’s entirely serious, the particular burn within his eyes, the aspect of Skull showing itself to his fellow ally without a lack of shame. What kind of good with shame with your name was tarnished and stepped so deep in mud, it’d be impossible to return? “Gotta improve our game anyways, yeah? If you’re down for the whole idea of feelin’ pissed, best if we can go and use it productively.”

[goodbysunball]

Quarantine Rock

Been a minute. I’ve been driven back to the ‘net by the unfortunate situation the entire world is in. I’m trying hard to keep occupied and keep cool instead of binging news and Instagram, and music, as always, has been a salve. Most of the below titles are just new to me, though not necessarily new - but we’ve pretty much all got the time to reminisce or to go back and search for buried gems, so here goes.

Tori Kudo, The Last Song of My Life LP (An’archives) / Tori Kudo & Kayo Makino, Ein Traum Für Dich LP (Black Truffle)

Tori Kudo’s always been on the periphery of my listening, but aside from the Mu Ji Ge 7″, this is really my first time diving into his extensive body of work. His newest solo LP is The Last Song of My Life, where as bandleader Kudo leads a melancholy saunter meditating on one motif for its duration, occasionally pocked by noise, apparently “depending on their response to the film work that was being projected.” You don’t need the film to get to the emotive heart of this, and the motif will be stuck in your head for days. Strangely beautiful, and somewhat disarming, even if the errant elbow strikes you in the ribs now and then. My go-to reading soundtrack lately. Beautiful presentation by An’archives, as usual. This one flew off the shelves, so be sure to grab it if you see it in the wild.

Last year Kudo released a collaborative LP with Kayo Makino on Black Truffle, and if you’re daunted by The Last Song of My Life, this one goes even further down the rabbit hole. I prefer Ein Traum Für Dich though; Kudo’s on piano, playing Satie on the A-side and some meandering progression on the flip, and Makino digitally distorts and heightens Kudo’s playing, occasionally adding spoken word samples and processed noise. The A-side is interesting, both of them playing with the possibilities of this pairing, Makino layering and offsetting Kudo’s melody to nauseating effect. The B-side is the reason for tuning in, though: Makino’s static stretches and overwhelms Kudo at points, making for a hypnotic and immersive 20+ minute ride. It’s a trip, the whole album acting as an audial blackout curtain, or the mesmerizing escape we all could use. Grab the LP from Forced Exposure for 15% off now.

Hardijs Lediņš, Tiny Crabs of Deep Waters LP (Musiques Electroniques Actuelles)

Been digging into the NSRD collective’s work a bit lately, though I’m not gonna pretend like I’m some sort of expert - the Latvian Centre for Contemporary Art published a comprehensive book about the group a few years ago if ya wanna become one, though. I’m partway through the book; my takeaway so far is that the NSRD collective, led by Hardijs Lediņš and Juris Boiko, found ways to subvert oppressive Soviet rule through a freedom of expression and thought seldomly encountered. Part of that expression was of course music, and the Workshop For the Restoration of Unfelt Feelings compilation on Stroom is the best introduction (good luck finding the LP). The music was largely electronic, somewhat ahead of its time and also totally cracked given the relative isolation of Latvia during this time. Tiny Crabs of Deep Waters is another entryway to the group’s music, this time a reissue of an impossible-to-find CDr from Hardijs Lediņš. The synth-heavy, largely instrumental record should appeal to fans of the soundtrack work of Tangerine Dream or John Carpenter, but the whole thing carries this strange sense that something is a bit off. Cartoonish keyboard effects collide with rich bass tones in a conventional yet dizzying manner, if you lean in close. The LP’s been a great shot in the arm when the day gets too sleepy, especially when the beat kicks in on the 13-minute “La Danse Binoculaire De Paris.” Top notch reissue, released at the end of last year, and can still be had on Discogs.

Teitanblood, Death 2xLP (Norma Evangelium Diaboli/The Ajna Offensive)

Yeah, this one makes sense right now: absolutely blistering black metal from Spain, the 2014 follow-up to modern classic Seven Chalices that I didn’t check out for some reason until now. Teitanblood is smothering and chaotic, and hardly conventional, but an admittedly complicated method exists behind the screen. There’s hardly a more cathartic record available to me than Death, especially the duo of “Plagues of Forgiveness”/”Cadaver Synod” that takes up face B. The band released The Baneful Choir last year, and that one smokes, too. Grab both LPs from Hell’s Headbangers or direct from the Ajna Offensive and burn straight out of this reality.

Martina Lussi, Diffusion Is a Force LP (Latency)

A totally engrossing and absorbing sound world created by Switzerland’s Martina Lussi on Diffusion Is a Force. The samples used - wheezing breaths, dribbling basketballs, roaring crowds - introduce a human element to the rich, warm tapestries. No beats to ride on here, but a track like “Higher Energy” cuts to the core with a Loren Connors-esque guitar part, which is then slowly displaced by rumbling, punctuated bass. The album feels very light and warm, as if in a fog, and the careful sequencing shifts the mood imperceptibly from track to track. Obviously I am not well-versed in electronic music, and there’s probably a name for what Lussi does so well here, but whatever it is, Diffusion Is a Force hits me right in the chest while gettin’ the synapses firing. Find the LP on Discogs, or support 2 Bridges Music Arts during this time of small business strain.

Reek Minds, s/t 7″ (Edger) / Suck Lords, True Lords Music 7″ (Edger) / Pig DNA, Mob Shity MLP (La Vida Es Un Mus) / Pig DNA, Strong Throat 7″ (Square One Again)

It’s inevitable that some anger will boil over from time to time, from the ineptitude shown by governments worldwide to the jackass hoarding hand sanitizer right here in Tennessee. These four records will stomp the anger right outta ya so you can get back to staring at the ceiling and forcing yourself to breathe calmly. Reek Minds’ 7″ is new this year, and they blaze through 8 tracks, coming off like the late, great Sickoids while still sprinkling in some mosh-worthy bits (see “A.M.”). Matt K. at Yellow Green Red thinks Iron Lung will be calling for Reek Minds to join their ranks soon, and I agree. Apparently there are 2 copies of Reek Minds’ self-titled 7″ left at Bandcamp as of this writing. They share members with Suck Lords, who somehow play even faster, approaching powerviolence speeds, their drummer giving Jerry’s Kids’ Brian Betzger a run for his money. The Lords are a little more goofy than Reek Minds, though you wouldn’t know it if they hadn’t included a lyric sheet and a “Getting to Know the Lords” insert with last year’s True Lords Music record. Grab some Lords from Not For Everyone.

Pig DNA, for their part, drop an atomic bomb on the whole thing, their 2015 MLP Mob Shity sounding strangely prescient and utterly unforgiving. From the opening track “Foire,” Pig DNA throw down the gauntlet, every track seeming to possess more ludicrous levels of noise smothering the piledriving riffs than the previous one. There’s d-beat in there somewhere, but I’m not gonna stick my hand in the caustic stew to find it. “Scums (City Rockers)” is my pick, but the whole thing is an unrelenting assault and worthy successor to Kriegshög’s s/t LP. Hard to handle nuclear material, so it’s still available for as low as $6. The band followed up Mob Shity with Strong Throat, possibly the shortest 7″ record I own, that continues down the same path. It’s worth hunting down (here ya go) for the B-side, where the drums drop out and the band still gnashes and claws at the walls with all its got. Insane. May their message live on in these chaotic days ahead.

[tessatechaitea]

Justice Society of America #4 (1992)

Ultrahumanite exhibits all the characteristics of a man happy to be reunited with friends: cheerily laughing, bright happy expression, hands on hips, weirdly-shaped massive hard-on.

Forgive me for the erect penis joke but I felt it was in the tradition of Grunion Guy. You might find it funny if you knew how uncomfortable it made me to type it and how worried I was for a second that my mother might see it. But then I realized that if my mom saw it, it would mean my mom read Grunion Guy's blog, and then I almost threw up. That would be so embarrassing! Normally I would be on the side of the Justice Society of America because they are the good people with the good values. But how good are their good values if they are trying to stop a job creator and upstanding corporate citizen like Ultrahumanite who is just trying to run his Ultragen business the best way he knows how: with stormtrooper bodyguards to defend labs where they experiment on animal-human hybrids? Anything that hurts corporate profits is a bad thing for capitalism and the Justice Society of America should know that, being that they have "America" right there in their name. Although they also have "Society" in their name and that is a bird whistle for socialists. The bird whistle is the dog whistle of the left because it is more pleasant to listen to and it isn't aggravating or obnoxious and it makes the world a better place for everybody (except people who hate birds and probably own guns to shoot those stupid birds. Stupid birds. So dumb).

Oh no! Nobody warned these old timers that we aren't doing prison rape jokes anymore!

Wildcat has some great words of wisdom in that previous panel. It is the most scienciest science statement I have ever read (unless it was the mathiest math statement): "If X did not happen, Y would have happened! Thusly I have proved we are better than you! QED! In your face, Ultrahumanite!" Whenever I would lose a game of Dungeons & Dragons with my friends Bullpup and McGroover, I would say, "Oh yeah? Let's see you make a delicious sandwich!" Then they would back down and they would be all, "Yes, you are correct, Pickle Boy. You are the better friend with the most useful skills and we are only good at pretending to slaughter Kobold families for copper coins." That's pretty funny if you realize Dungeons & Dragons is about adventurers invading the lairs of creatures to steal their material possessions! Doctor Mid-Nite does not quip with the others because he might be dead. Do not forget these guys are really old! It does not matter how many muscles they have or what kind of cardio breathalyzer tests they can pass; they still have super old bones and a lifetime of clogged arteries. One slip or the slightest bit of extra exertion could mean Stroke City or Brokenhipsville for these cool cats! That is old person slang! It is very humorous!

Now they goof on his stutter? I am beginning to wonder who the real villains are in this story!

Look how happy the Ultrahumanite is! And these old guys have been nothing but bitter, cynical old winds from the butt! Plus he is a successful businessman and scientist who has created life! It sounds like he has turned over a new leaf now that he no longer has to steal bodies. I am not ignoring the laboratory full of hybrid creatures; I'm just going to assume that they were all volunteers until it is proven otherwise. You cannot go through life never eating the buttered bread that fell on the floor buttered side down! Ultrahumanite decides to recount his past for some reason. This made me laugh because I was thinking, "Yeah! They are old men. They cannot remember stuff from so long ago and also they have enlarged prostates!"

But which is actually worse: making fun of somebody's disability or sympathizing with Nazis? I've got some hard questions to answer!

Some things are unforgivable but one thing I think we can all agree to forgive is a hot woman who sided with the Nazis.

How does a huge ape body reflect the Ultrahumanite's desires? Please do not answer, "He loves to copulate with monkeys," because that's what I an suggesting by the question and you would look like one of those fools on Twitter who thinks they are hilarious by restating somebody's joke in a less subtle manner.

Ultrahumanite continues to explain how he became such a pillar of the business community. It is as boring as you would expect a PowerPoint presentation from a business man would be. That was probably the joke! Why is not the trademarked name "PowerPoint" two words? If you are going to bother capitalizing the second "P", you might as well just separate the words. Maybe it was somebody's online name when they were fourteen years old. It is always a smart decision to just run the two words together rather than separating them with an underscore. And it is easier to read when the second word is capitalized (as opposed to every other word capitalized or just the consonants. I do not understand young people). Nobody remembers to put underscores in when searching for a name online!

"Ultrahumanite! You are experimenting on innocent people, ruining the environment, causing unknown amounts of damage to the populace of every city where one of your labs operates but Ted Grant and the world just want to know one thing: was that hot Nazi body the real you because 'Rrrrrow!'"

You think I am making a joke but I don't joke about things that I don't joke about and one of those things is that Ted Grant has previously expressed interest in cultivating an intimate relationship with hot Nazi Ultrahumanite. Specifically, he said earlier that she "swept him off his feet." He only used that phrase so Al could make a joke about how they were hanging upside down so the sweeping off of feet is still happening. But I think, in his heart, he wanted to say, "She made me spontaneously become a man every time we wrestled. Is that okay under the Hays Code? Can I get away with that amount of innuendo?!" The Ultrahumanite has to go deal with The Flash who has literally suddenly appeared. Weird how the word "literally" is never actually needed when it is used properly. I guess using it in a hyperbolic and exaggerated fashion is really its only job. While Ultrahumanite is gone, Doctor Mid-Nite "double joints" his wrists to escape. I'm pretty sure Grunion Guy's wrists were double jointed by the amount of times he wrote about masturbating. He was a crude jerk but I still hope he rests in peace in that pauper's cemetery down by the toxic sludge factory. Doctor Mid-Nite takes on the guards while The Atom and Wildcat rush out to save The Flash who is The Flash and almost certainly does not need saving. While Doctor Mid-Nite is beating up the guards, he suddenly becomes a stand up comedian. Was I wrong to assume he was an actual doctor? Is that just his stage persona? I would tell you why his jokes were funny if they were but I cannot figure them out. Why is this an old joke (and if it is, why would he even retell it when it is nonsense): "I know you're out there because I can hear you breathing"? The Flash gets encased in some living green goo that absorbs heat and kinetic energy which might also be a definition of heat? I'm just a sandwich maker slash writer's assistant who has never once showed an ounce of curiosity about the real world so forgive me for languishing in my ignorance. At least I own a thesaurus. Back in Gotham City, Jesse Quick appears for a page or two to remind everybody that she exists. "Hello! I am the hot daughter of the infomercial guy! I have also deluded myself into believing a mathematical equation gives me super speed! It makes no sense!" Jesse takes some papers proving that Ultragen is breaking laws so the JSA has the right to beat the crap out of its CEO. For comedic effect, they have a little more confusion over Ultrahumanite's pronouns (which, to be fair, he has not expressed any preference for and doesn't seem to mind using whatever pronouns match the gender he seems to be expressing) before rushing off to punch her in the face. I don't know what pronouns to use either but she was a super hot Nazi so let's just go with that one.

See? She is a scientific genius!

At first I was all, "Oh, big deal! So The Flash is trapped in goo!" And then the Ultrahumanite was all, "You cannot breathe without oxygen!" And then I was all, "Oh no! I had not thought of that! Somebody save him, preferably an old guy from the JSA or I will feel cheated out of my hard earned buck twenty-five." I keep laughing at that previously scanned panel and how Wildcat and The Atom are hiding behind trees the way characters do in comic strips. So ridiculous! It is even funnier if you remember that they are old men! I bet you are laughing a lot more now! Doctor Mid-Nite arrives because he "smoke bombed" with his previous stand-up gig. Get it?! If you understood the play on the word "bomb" there and that I meant the fight against the guards when I said "stand-up gig," you would be cracking up like crazy!

Yeah. A smoke bomb! We all know that is where he keeps them!

The Flash breaks free and Doctor Mid-Nite punches Ultrahumanite in the nose, breaking it. Ultrahumanite is so vain that he falls to the ground, defeated! And that is when the Calvary arrives! That is funny because I used the wrong word and now you are picturing a crucified Jesus riding up on a horse to save the day instead of Green Lantern, The Flash, and Jesse Quick arriving on a Green Lantern construct! Justice Society of America #4 Rating: A. I have not read as many comic books as Grunion Guy but this one seemed pretty good in comparison to the ones I have read, like WildC.A.T.S. #1 and pick any issue you want of Youngblood. One more "What gender is Ultrahumanite?!" joke for the road!

Alan felt this was the kind of thing a heterosexual would say. It's funny because he "New 52" comes out of the closet later!

[thegoodbitchofthesouth]

Jack in the box

If I am doing this wrong or you don't want to be tagged in this post, please let me know and how to fix it. @metafest @letswarriorfangirl @amwritingmeta @emblue-sparks @angelneedshunter @verobatto-angelxhunter @magnificent-winged-beast @staycejo1

I needed to take a bit to get my thoughts more in order, I should have done that before I made that rambling post before. Anyway, there seemed to be a few themes in this episode-  One is about the similarities and differences in the characters, and how they are destined to repeat history because of it.

 For example, Dean is just as prone as Jack to reaching a point of emotional meltdown and saying/doing things when he is angry, afraid or hurt that he shouldn’t and that hurt the people he loves, the only difference is that Dean isn’t a two year old and teenager at the same time, the two stages in a person’s life when they have very limited self-control, and Dean doesn’t have Jack’s powers. If Dean was as powerful as Jack, he would have destroyed the universe long ago in one of his meltdowns.

 The parallel between Dean and Duma is obvious, so I won’t go over that one. But there is also a parallel between Dean and John. The first time Mary was killed, John basically did the same thing Dean is doing now- he went looking for revenge on Azazel and was so blinded by it that he couldn’t see he was basically doing to his kids and Dean hasn’t seen how he is following the same path as John. John basically locked Sam and Dean in a metal box (though Baby is a much nicer metal box) or in cells in the form of hotel rooms alone where they had very limited exposure to other people and had very little reference for normal human behavior and healthier ways to deal with things, and expected them to behave like adults when they were just children. He didn’t accept that they were kids who would make mistakes, he always expected them to follow orders, behave as adults and it put an incredible amount of pressure on them, especially Dean. He basically set Dean up to feel like mistakes were unforgivable and accidents should be harshly punished, except when Sam made them, and even then, Dean may not have wanted to kill Sam, but he did lock him in a metal cell (a much bigger, more comfortable one, but still a cell) and when he let him out, he spent months reminding him over and over again of his mistake and making him feel like crap about it. Also Dean looked up to John and wanted his approval so much that he let himself be manipulated, he accepted blame and guilt for things that should never have been put on him (he should not have been left to protect Sam from a monster when he wasn’t even ten years old yet) and was willing to do anything John said to get his approval, and he never felt like he got it.

 Jack has been shown doing all sorts of things to indicate that he wants Dean’s approval, he sees him as a father (he asked to go fishing because he said Dean told him about fishing with his father, and he mimicked Dean all the time) and at the moment, it looks like he may not get Dean’s approval. He wants so badly to meet these expectations that shouldn’t be put on him because he is essentially a toddler, and as we have seen, having all the pressure of those expectations proved to be too much. I don’t think that Jack killed Mary out of wrath, he never wanted her to die, he was just in a panic and having a meltdown because of the overwhelming fear of falling short of Dean’s expectations when Dean found out. I don’t think he ever wanted to hurt her, he had an emotional meltdown normal for anyone as young and under as much pressure as Jack has been, and unfortunately when he has a meltdown it’s like an atom bomb going off, and Mary was just in the blast radius.

 I just read a fic on Tumblr that pointed out that someone with glowing yellow eyes was responsible for Mary’s death both times, and both times she died trying to protect a child, but that is where the similarities ended. Azazel was a centuries old Demon, intent on malice who consciously chose to kill her in a painful, slow way and she stayed in that house as a ghost, unable to move on. Jack killed her by accident, he never wanted to hurt her, he didn’t plan on it, he loved her, and her death was instant, and she did go straight to heaven. Dean may subconsciously be seeing the parallel of Azazel and Jack both killing her, driving his urge to kill Jack in revenge, but not seeing any distinction beyond that, not caring that it was an accident made by someone who lacked the maturity, experience and self-control. All he can see is that he lost her again and he is hurting.

 Sam on the other hand, is like Jack in that he was different from his family and everyone he knew, first in that he was highly intelligent and didn’t want to be a hunter, and then later when he learned about what Azazel did to him when he was a baby. He felt trapped by his family and expectations and he was desperate to get out of the metaphorical Malak box he was in, and he also found a way to escape. And we have seen him relate and sympathize with others who know they are different and have the expectations of others pushed on them but want to not be what the world sees them as. He even told Jack that he understood how he felt because he was in a similar situation growing up, this was why he was Jack’s ‘go to man’. He can also relate to having Lucifer be way too interested in him.

 Sam also parallels Dean in this episode in that he cares deeply about Jack, he has been trying since Jack’s birth to be there for him and try to give him at least some normalcy in any way he could, he protected him and stood between Dean and Jack in the beginning when Jack hadn’t even done anything yet and Dean wanted to kill him just for existing. After Jack killed Mary, he still wants to help and protect Jack, but he finds himself in the same position Dean was in when they were growing up that Dean mentioned in Prophet and Loss when he said he knew that it seemed like he took John’s side a lot growing up, but he was just trying to keep the peace. Sam caved and went along with this scheme of Dean’s even though he hated it, the same way Dean backed John up when they were kids a lot of the time.

 Dean does have a history of deceit and manipulation prior to this episode, mostly with Sam, and I think Sam remembers how Dean manipulated him in the past to say yes to Gadreel and essentially forced him to take his soul back regardless of what Sam want. He took away Sam’s free will. Dean also has a history of being a hypocrite, saying free will is all important, until it means he might lose someone, and then it’s negotiable. Sam knew this about Dean, Dean has done very similar things to Sam in the past, but when Dean asks him to help do the same to Jack, he goes along with it, allows Dean to manipulate him into taking part and in turn manipulate Jack, probably in the same manner that John would use Dean and Sam’s trust in Dean to get Sam to do what John wanted.  Sam is basically stuck in the middle.

  Jack parallels Sam in that he trusted Dean and Sam and allowed them to lock him in the box the way Sam allowed Dean and Bobby to lock him in the panic room, and later when he trusted Dean and Dean tricked him into saying yes to Gadreel. He wants Dean’s approval the way Sam does, and he trusts Sam and Dean to the point that he allows them to manipulate him. There is a metaphorical similarity also in the way Sam escaped John, Dean, and the prison of his life by getting out and going to Stanford, the way that Jack escaped the prison that Dean and Sam locked him in.

 There is even a parallel between Jack and Chuck, and kind of between Dean and Chuck. The things that Jack did to the professor, televangelist and pastor were all acts from the Old Testament, reminding us that God/Chuck didn’t always write books in his underwear and wasn’t always as mellow and forgiving as he is now, and more prone to making rash decisions and punishing people a lot more harshly. Even Chuck/God was prone to immaturity and lashing out when he was young, but he learned from it and got better. Hell, he flooded the entire earth once because he didn’t like the way people were becoming, and he burned an entire city to the ground and turned a woman to salt, *just because she looked over her damn shoulder*.

 The other theme is about blame, assigning blame and forgiveness. One of the first things Duma said to Jack that made him so easy to manipulate was, “It’s not your fault.” Dean challenged both Cas and Jack by asking “So this was her/our fault?!” Because Dean needs it to be someone’s fault, he needs someone to blame. If he can feel like someone is at fault, he can take action and feel justified in it. Not that he felt it was Mary’s or their fault, he just wants someone else to say it was, someone he already blames/blamed. Last episode he was convinced it was Cas’s fault.

 Another pattern is being so desperate for absolution and forgiveness so badly that you are willing to blindly trust people when you shouldn’t, the way Jack is so easily swayed by Duma just because she said it wasn’t his fault. When he met her before, it wasn’t actually her, it was the Shadow, trying to take him away to the Empty and making that horrible deal with Cas. All of his experience with her outward appearance should have been enough to make him distrust her. We see it again later when he goes into the church and promises the congregation that he will take them to heaven and make them angels and they just blindly follow him. He might as well have been a stranger in a van offering them candy. Along that same theme, there is the way the people who show doubt or question are treated. Even though Chuck said it was okay not to believe in him because he included free will in the kit, Duma convinced Jack that it was right to punish the atheist professor by turning him to salt, and Jack later tortured the pastor for questioning him. I believe that the reason Chuck included free will in the kit was that he learned with Adam and Eve that a little bit of skepticism is a good thing, otherwise they wouldn’t have been so easily tricked by Lucifer in the Garden.

 Last of all, not a theme of the episode, but did Bobby seem weird to anyone else? I can’t decide if it was just weird writing, or intentional because he is the AU Bobby who doesn’t have the same history with Sam and Dean as our Bobby, or intentional to indicate something else. For one thing, he never called either Sam or Dean, or even Jack by their names. He called them ‘You boys’ and called Dean ‘the other one’, and Jack was just ‘the kid’. Maybe you could chalk that up to being because he is the AU Bobby who didn’t practically raise Sam and Dean, but the way he was talking about hunting down and killing Jack seemed very strange to me. Even as the AU Bobby, he seemed to take the other AU hunters and survivors under his wing and see them in the same way our version of Bobby saw Sam and Dean. He was angry with Sam when he felt like Sam sent Maggie and possibly other hunters out on missions alone before they were ready. He had a son of his own that he lost. Previous appearances of AU Bobby seemed to indicate that he shared our Bobby’s strong parenting instincts and our Bobby wouldn’t shoot Sam when he was trying to kill Bobby, or when Sam escaped from the panic room and was going to leave, he managed to over ride a demon and stab himself, putting himself in a wheelchair, to keep from hurting Dean. And he told Sam that he would never have written him off and cut him out of his life like that, it was the demon talking. He was helping to train Jack the way our Bobby trained Sam and Dean. All of this and all that we know about Bobby just doesn’t fit with Bobby being able to just turn on Jack like that and say he wants to kill him without any qualms. Everything about his behavior in this episode just seemed off, and he was only there for a few minutes and then he was gone, almost as if he was there just to plant the seeds in Dean and Sam’s heads that something drastic had to be done about Jack and lend validation to whatever horrible thing they came up with.

 With all the mentions of Chuck in the more recent episodes makes me feel pretty sure he will appear in the next one. I don’t want him to simply snap his fingers and fix everything, though I do want him to fix Jack’s soul, but I think he needs to sit Dean and Sam down and have a serious discussion with them about forgiveness and Good Parenting. I mean, who would know better than Chuck from experience about making rash decisions and expecting too much and all the other crap that Dean especially has pulled, as well as parental guilt.

[believerindaydreams]

This is Threeeee Dog, bringing you the hot, the heavy, and the just plain hellacious of the Capitol Wasteland. Do yourself a favor and listen to Galaxy News Radio, it's cheaper than chems.

Only one news item making the rounds today, but boy is it a biggie- the Jefferson Memorial, ex-home of a whole lotta Super Mutants, has been cleaned out to play host to the first peace conference in Washington since the bomb drop. That's right kiddoes, representatives of half a dozen major communities are gathering to talk about making your wasteland a little less of a shithole, including the Brotherhood, the Enclave, and your favorite Moira Brown of Megaton! Who'll be checking in with us this Saturday as usual, for more tips from her ever-popular Wasteland Survival Guide.

That is, assuming the conference cease-fire doesn't segue like this segment, to a whole lotta hackin' and whackin'...

Whatever they had expected on entering the Jefferson Memorial, and Arcade's been ready for everything up to Autumn trying his damn Mesmetron again, the tiny woman in workman overalls immediately waylaiding them wasn't it.

"Boone! My favorite research assistant ever! I'd hug you but I know you're picky about that."

"Do I know you?" Boone growls, stepping back towards his wife.

"You'll have to forgive him," Arcade intercedes. "He had a...bad bump on the head. Some memory problems."

It doesn't seem that Moira's bubbly cheer can be dampened by much, but she makes a valiant effort. "Oh no! That's really terrible- you mean you don't remember jumping off that roof to help me with the chapter on injuries? Or getting rad poisoning? Or all the poor little moles that exploded when you tested my repellant stick?"

"...no."

"Oh, that's too bad, it really is. I hope you feel better soon- and the house in Megaton is waiting you know, whenever you'd like to move in."

"I have a house?"

"He has a house?" Manny says incredulously.

"He sure does! That is, it was going to be for the Lone Wanderer but he said he didn't need it and you could have it, and you've been fixing it up with all kinds of nice little goodies. The last thing you were going to buy was the Nuka-Cola machine, you were saving up for that and then you just disappeared. I was a teensy tiny bit worried, so I thought I'd hitch a lift with Lucky's Caravan and try out my own guide- and here you are, safe and sound! Or safe, anyway."

"...sure."

Moira beams. "Aw, you haven't changed a bit. I'll be sleeping in the gift shop tonight, come by if you want anything repaired! Right now I'm off to go see how Project Purity works, see you later!"

She departs; leaving quiet and a certain sense of relief.

"I thought we had a home already," Carla says, hugging her husband distractedly.

"So did I. Wish I knew what I was thinking."

"Whatever it was, you didn't tell me," Manny says. He sounds hurt. "Maybe I should have stayed home with Cindy."

"We need you," Arcade reassures him quietly. "You're the only one who can make a stand for Nacochtank."

Manny sighs, lets his hands stray to his hunting rifle. "I know. But that caught me off guard."

They move further in, down stone halls that someone has made an effort to tidy. Hannibal's been busy, it seems; Manny's keeps up a constant running commentary as to who people are, and who they represent. Canterbury Commons and the Regulators; which in turn has led to Littlehorn contractors and even a few Talon Company mercs. The Memorial feels like a powder keg, and it bristles with weapons.

This has so much potential to go terribly wrong.

Arcade can't help flinching when they see the first soldier in Hellfire armor; Boone places himself in front of Carla, who hugs Daisy closer. Any thought that they should have separated vanishes; none of them are whole, they have to come to terms with that or they'll never get over this fear.

"It's all right," Manny says. "They aren't taking you again, Arcade."

The warm hand on his shoulder stops him trembling.

*****

Boone

Don't think I've been minding this so much as the others.

Arcade, he hates not having all his knowledge at his fingertips, and Carla says the gap between who she was and who she feels like is still too wide. But I didn't need Manny to tell me I'm a good soldier, ready to take orders. Maybe if Autumn had pushed me the right way, if I'd been "clean", I would have disappeared into power armor and never seen daylight again.

And when Manny found us at Rivet City, told me who I was and what my blood-sight was, I gave him all that trust instead. Made the others see him my way.

Only now there's things about me that he can't account for, he looks at me with tenderness he doesn't have for Carla and Arcade, and I don't know what he's hiding. Or what I was hiding from him.

No, strike that. It was something unforgivable. There's no gun made can wipe away your mistakes, I guess.

But was I going to run from him, or with him?

*****

Carla

"The elder Autumn, at your service." He kisses her hand chivalrously.

She resists the impulse to deck him with it. "Charmed."

"Carla Boone, of the Nacochtank settlement," Manny says, a threat rumbling beneath his smooth words. "She'd be missed."

"I'm sure she would," James says, elegantly stepping back. "Still, it's a pleasure to meet the woman who's captured the whole Wasteland's heart- I do regret not meeting you before that grandiose escape, all the same. A good deal of...unnecessary drama could have been avoided."

There isn't a word in the Capitol for what she's thinking, his mixture of snake and wolf. She takes a crispy mirelurk cake from the buffet table, thinks about driving the metal pick into the more tender parts of his face.

"So when's zero hour? Everyone here knows the Enclave's here to show off its technological prowess."

He tuts. "Technically, Project Purity is separate from the Enclave, per se. I might be very proud of my son's success under President Eden's regime, but Purity is a Rivet City project and always has been. Its effects will benefit the whole Wasteland, of course."

Daisy starts to cry.

Just as well: changing diapers gets her gracefully out of the conversation, and stops her getting into debate.

And with the showdown that's bound to come, it's just as well to keep her powder dry.

*****

Veronica

"She likes yoooou."

"She does not," Christine splutters, taking my hand- the one without the atomic cocktail in it. "All Sarah sees is COS Knight Christine Royce, someone she'd like to have on her side."

"See? You're already calling her Sarah."

"She's more stuck up than Hardin. That takes some doing." My girlfriend leans in for a kiss, and gets it. "She's just playing nice and hoping for resupply from the Mojave chapter- V, are you sure this is how we want to play it? I trusted Carla, but that was before the Enclave captured her. She might be compromised."

The rest of my cocktail goes down quick. "Even if she is- even if those escapees are nothing more than Enclave puppets- she left a legacy. That Follower base is the brightest hope in DC, I promised her I'd defend it and I will."

"Then I'll back you to the hilt. Always."

"Always."

We clink glasses as Sarah comes back in, having swapped out her power armor for something...a little more sparkly and with a lot less back. If memory serves, that was the dress worn by the last First Lady at the First Street Wax Museum. Nice bit of salvage.

"C? What did I tell you?"

Christine drains her drink impertuably. "Ah, to be constantly the target of beautifully dressed women with their eye on me. What a fate."

"Oh, there you are Christine! It was silly to be wandering around in full armor- shall we pick up where we left off? I'll buy you a drink?"

"By all means," Christine says, as tranquil and unapproachable as I've ever seen.

Only thing that undercuts it is my giggles.

[leonthesemiprofessional-blog]

Leave Wes Anderson out of your woke conversations

With a smorgasbord of (very well-crafted) politically-rich films in the mainstream right now it can be easy to assume that every “masterpiece” that comes across our screens was made to appease our socially curious minds.

With the weighty addition of the #metoo movement, you could argue that it’s the duty of the filmmaker to give us a set of strong morals we can berate everyone we meet with. Because of this expectation, movies are under an unforgiving lens right now and Wes Anderson’s latest piece, Isle of Dogs, is no exception.

In his ninth feature and his second stop-motion film, Isle of Dogs follows an alpha pack of dogs try and survive a Japanese doggy dystopia, purpose-built for them by an oppressive Kobayashi regime. Their goals are recalibrated slightly from survival to rescue when a young boy, Atari, comes to their home, Trash Island, to look for his lost dog. The team lead by their new master undergoes a Great Escape-style caper.

Pretty standard Wes Anderson film right? The critics would agree so too. Only a lot of people are unhappy, even furious, with how the director has handled Japanese culture.

There are no two ways about it, this film is heavily appropriated. It cements very old, westernised ideas about Japan: playing heavily on the mispronunciation of words, Samurai ideas and culture bookending the film, skirmishes and explosions in atomic bomb-style mushroom clouds, sushi, the Yakuza are the bad guys… the list goes on.

Behind the camera, there were many native Japanese hands involved, as Kunichi Nomura namely helped develop the story and voiced Mayor Kobayashi, the authoritarian ruler of the make-believe Megasaki City. In the hands of a lesser filmmaker, this cultural tourism could have turned out to be actual racism. Critics and people like myself would argue Anderson should have known better, even if the seeds were sown for this film in 2007, well before this ‘woke epidemic’.

The insensitivity to race issues is even made worse with - one of my favourite problems - white saviour complex, with added sprinkles of misogyny. Although our hero this time is Tracy Walker (voiced by Greta Gerwig) a young exchange student from America, who just happens to be in the area to help overthrow an oppressive regime, our diversion from the unexpected is steered right back onto the heteronormative track with Tracy winding up with a crush on our male protagonist, Atari (yes like the console by the way). In case that wasn’t enough to embed into children the idea that women can’t do anything without a man by their side, the relationships between the doggos of the film follow a similar formula.

On top of this, the ensemble cast comes together to form a kind of whitewashing avengers, who have, interestingly, all been criticised for starring in films that are insensitive to aspects of East and South Asian culture. Tilda Swinton in Doctor Strange, Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in a Shell and Lost in Translation with Bill Murray, and Fisher Stevens in Short Circuit.

To simplify things, let’s umbrella all the problems with this film and concluded that Anderson made Isle of Dogs for a white, working to middle class, straight audience, who probably haven’t been to Japan or know much about it outside of what they learned from school or popular culture - viewing the film with a “white gaze”. A rather outlandish -some would argue accurate- claim to make against a director who has done nothing the audience, now more socially conscious, deem too unjust, right? To only talk about Isle of Dogs this way is not fair on Wes Anderson.

“This is his love letter to Japan though” you might say. “How will we understand different cultures if we don’t even get to show them on screen and talk about them? Besides it’s not even real, none of Anderson’s films really adhere to reality”, “P.C. gone mad” blah blah. Wes even said the story “could happen anywhere” and he and his team (Japanese natives included) made it because of “a shared love of Japanese cinema.” Herein lies the problem: Anderson’s use of the white gaze has gone unchecked for a long time. As a white filmmaker, he has benefited from structural racism and current gender dynamics well before Isle of Dogs.

From Moonrise Kingdom to Bottle Rocket to the marvellous Grand Budapest Hotel, we follow the same white characters play out the same heist-like escapades, playing off of trends and stereotypes the white gaze has seen and consolidated time and time again. Under all the pretty pastels and fully utilised thirds, there are a lot of people (filmmakers like Anderson and audiences in general) patting themselves on the back for believing they have interpreted and appreciated a culture - say Japanese culture - extensively and not in bad taste. We’ve known for a while that a lot of Hollywood films only highlight how the majority of Westerners view the world around them. Some people are only now coming to realise this is not always the right thing to do, and even fewer are willing to elicit change. I fear Anderson falls into the latter category.

The fact that Anderson can now pretty much hand-select a cast for a film means he has access to the best Hollywood has to offer, who tend to be stars we adore for their humanity as well as their ability. I wholeheartedly believe no one in the making of this film is racist or meant wrong by anything they did but it can’t be ignored that with the release of Isle of Dogs, it’s become clear that Anderson doesn’t want to use his position to incite any meaningful social development in the film industry. He doesn’t have to or have to want to, however, it is disappointing to know that someone we consider so effective at storytelling is choosing to tune out the calls for change. We’ll have to look for our innovative films elsewhere.

As Reni Eddo-Lodge might put it: Wes Anderson is one white person you shouldn’t talk to about race or anything else woke for that matter.

[oceanwriting]

The fabric of the universe is violent; Spacetime radiates in the shape of a guillotine. Atomic bombs have been fashioned by man, But only from what had always been hiding in the maelstrom. The unforgiving endlessness destroys itself for eternity; Black holes eat black holes, Stars collapse because the external force of gravity is too much to withstand. Heat and pressure melt atoms until existence, at its most basic level, is disintegrated. The reality we call "home" is no more than the shrapnel of an endless stellar war On a great celestial battlefield.

[murasakikagekitsune]

I Just Want to Applaud Ghostbusters: Afterlife for Something

The year 1945 was etched onto Ivo Shandor’s sarcophagus. This is clear evidence that the production team chose to classify Hiroshima/Nagasaki as apocalypse-level events. They could have picked any year from 1939 - 1945 to regard WWII in general as this, but an apocalypse-type event is usually something that happens on a single day and not over several years. The horrific incidents of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are also consistent with the explosion/implosion theme all apocalypse-level events in the film seem to share; the destruction of property combined with the loss of human life on a massive scale All the other battles fought in ‘45 came with a huge death toll, obviously, but none featured the second factor as well, which leaves Hiroshima/Nagasaki primed for the candidacy of 1945′s apocalypse-level event.

[mageinabarrel]

The only righteousness which we can truly claim is to understand the fallibility of our own humanity.

I’ve been wanting to write this post ever since Concrete Revolutio finished airing, but never had the words to put exactly what I thought and felt about the series to digital paper. What I knew for certain was that I really believed that Concrete Revolutio, despite its 1960s setting, is the most relevant political anime of the last decade – even more so that similarly excellent productions like Gatchaman Crowds. That believe has only grown stronger in the year since, a feeling perpetuated not only by my frequent mental returns to the show but also the deteriorating political situation across the globe.

Whenever a particular piece of news ends up sitting in my head for a while, I always somehow seem to return to thinking about Concrete Revolutio. I’m not especially proficient at political analysis, even so but I think I can offer my take on Conrevo‘s ideas effectively. After all, although Conrevo uses interpretations of real historical events as allegories by which to communicate its ideas, it ultimately speaks less to specific political moments or ideologies than it does to the universal failings of the human heart that lie at the center of it all.

Jiro is both the question and the answer in Concrete Revolutio, a conceptual struggle embodied in a very literal way – something that makes him, at least to me, one of the most iconic anime characters ever put to screen. Throughout the course of the show, he battles with the ugly realities of the Superhuman Bureau he once called home as well as his doubts about his own actions. In fact, the best way to characterize Jiro is to say that he is defined by action within uncertainty. He believes unwaveringly in the existence of Justice, but lives in a state of perpetual self-doubt about his own ability to enact that justice. The “one righteous thing” he pursues, finds, loses, despairs over, and eventually finds enduring hope in is both his greatest inspiration and the cause of his suffering.

However, were Jiro to be defined solely as someone who moves forward despite his doubts, he would be little better than a lost man in the mountains – something contradicted by the purpose with which he usually (although not always) acts. This is because Jiro’s certain belief in the existence of Justice coupled with his uncertain experience with it in his world means that he is constantly engaged in the act of self-reflection. Beyond action within uncertainty, Jiro is also defined by this, by his constant questioning of whether the justice he seeks can ever be truly realized and whether the justice he attempts to enact actually lives up to the Justice of his ideal.

What’s perhaps most interesting about Jiro, though, is that his doubts are often precipitated by the failings of others rather than himself (although, as he learns more about his past, his own actions and identity increasingly dominate his concerns). When he learns that the Bureau, the place where he was more or less raised, is little more than a hypocritical (“We protect and manage superhumans”) government-controlled shell, he doesn’t just become disillusioned with the institution. He also becomes disillusioned with himself, both for his role as an enforcer of that hypocrisy and his failure to see through it.

This, I think, is a key point – that the monstrousness our institutions perpetuate is not something we can simply wash our hands of by simple rebellion, but something that demands a degree of doubt in ourselves as well. Perhaps we are not as complicit as Jiro was, but the need for self-reflection remains.

The most demanding challenge for Jiro, though, is that of his only true foil—Claude. Where Jiro is unsure, Claude is terrifyingly – and, as the show very clearly demonstrates, mistakenly – assured. He believes he has found Justice and is capable of wielding it true, but the events of the Shinjuku Riot at the end of the first season show Claude to be “wrong” even though he may be “right.” The lesson of Claude is that the moment we allow ourselves to believe in our own righteous is also the moment we give ourselves permission to do anything, even the most horrendous things, in pursuit of our beliefs. Jiro fears this more than anything else; after all, he carries inside him the force of an atomic bomb – and what clearer symbol of violence begot by righteousness is there in modern times?

This may sound odd coming from a Catholic like me, who believes in an objective Truth, but I think Concrete Revolutio‘s criticism of self-righteous ideology is deeply wise. Or, perhaps it’s more correct to say that Conrevo condemns belief in Rightness without constant reflection. One of the most valuable themes in Concrete Revolutio (and the one I found personally most impactful) is the truth that doing the right thing, even if you know what is right, is really damn hard. This is something I’ve struggled with oftentimes in the last few years, as my deeply held religious beliefs (simple in theory) have ground up against the incredible difficulty of applying them to the complexity of the world I inhabit.

This was something I knew before watching Concrete Revolutio, but to me the show is a warning against extreme reactions to this dilemma. Claude is one such extreme, a decision to prioritize ideology above all else. His fall is perhaps the one I see myself most inclined to succumb to, as “knowing what’s Right” leads to the temptation that all else is enemy. Claude’s certainty, his righteousness becomes ugly – and the only antidote is Jiro’s struggle. The constant self-doubt that forces Jiro to be always reflecting about his actions, what he believes, and what he should do is something that’s perhaps even more necessary for people me who profess adherence to a certain Truth – lest I become like Claude and be swallowed up by the force of my own righteousness.

But Claude’s response is only one form of lack of self-reflection. The people who suffer most in Conrevo are those who are by nature unable to self-reflect. Earth-chan, who is programmed to help people who cry out for help, breaks down in the face of the contradiction between programmed mission and the reality of the world. Ratio, likewise, suffers a complete mental breakdown against the nuances and ambiguities of justice – a situation that concludes with his tragically certain line, “I am justice.” Their certainty makes them fragile, and without the ability to self-reflect they each crumble.

It’s worth noting that the only response Concrete Revolutio paints as truly evil and without some merit, is that of media mogul Satomi, who holds that in the face of all this uncertainty, the only answer can be that there is no answer and it’s not worth trying to find one. Instead, as his actions prove again and again, he believes all that remains is to act for one’s own selfish interests. The cynicism of Satomi is poison. It is as monstrous as the worst institutional hypocrisy and as damaging than the failings of Claude the ideologue. It is, at its core, hopeless – and the violence of the result as damaging as anything any of the show’s other antagonists do.

But even Satomi falls. Hope reigns. In the end, the answer Jiro comes to, and the one Concrete Revolutio asserts as its final message, is that all we can do is continue to search. To continue to believe in Justice knowing that we may never achieve it ourselves. The impossibility of realization is not a proof against the existence of Justice, but rather a call to be mindful always of our actions. It is this that I find most inspiring about the show, that despite the difficult of doing right, if we believe that it can be done and are willing to hold ourselves against the unforgiving microscope of the ideals of Rightness we profess (in our personal lives, in our religion, in our politics), hope will carry us through.

The only righteousness which we can truly claim is to understand the fallibility of our own humanity. The only righteousness which we can truly claim is to understand the fallibility of our own humanity.

[bornfromscarletcords]

A WOLF’S VERSE

Frederick, Faris, and Conti sitting by a campfire in the Willows.

Conti: Chief, you said something about the world, it being in our heads or something. How does that work exactly?

Faris: Strangely.

Frederick: Look, it’s not perfect, but I think that’s one of the better ways of describing it. Existence is too willful to be chained for very long. At best we can try to sketch its shape with a couple of ideas and analogies but they often have inherent flaws which have to be addressed and or balanced at some point.

Conti: That sounds...annoying.

Faris: It is very annoying, but it provides us with options; nigh endless room for improvement.

Conti: If it’s one of the best ways of describing it, why doesn’t everyone agree on that, in your opinion?

Frederick: There are a number of reasons, one of the more popular ones that I’ve witnessed is pride. Even if someone knows something in their core, understanding it can prove harrowing and heartbreaking. Existence is confusing and so often drifts into tragedy. This mad sorrow can put people to war with themselves, unable to accept who they are and what their world is...or at least what these things could be.

Conti: But if what you’re saying is true, wouldn’t that make us like gods or something.

Faris: Or devils, though a sorry lot of divines we’d be if any rat, or pebble on the road, could claim the title just the same.

Frederick: Words, like ideas, are strange things. They can lose their substance if misused, however, when in capable hands, they can level worlds.

Faris: We were all human, or at least were very good at pretending to be, at one point. Maybe that’s why we focus on them so often. Why we continue to live amongst them. Regardless, humans are very confused creatures, or perhaps they just dance to a chaotic hymn that is entirely their own. From what I’ve seen they are often numb to each other. Every once in a while you’ll encounter a couple who, for one reason or another, are in tune with the existence of their fellow man, but more often than not it’s like watching an ouroboros; a serpent constantly consuming itself.

Frederick: And even those rare few so often become lost in what they feel, as few others will acknowledge it or seek to understand. One of the first things I noticed about this wolfish curse, or blessing, was that it wanted...it needed connection. Its subjects would heed their birthright and their burden or they would die and disappear.

Conti: Their birthright?

Faris: Their connection to all things.

Frederick: Their existence within all things.

Conti: And this is all because of our minds?

Frederick: Language is tricky. Metaphorically, and literally, speaking one of the greatest obstacles to people understanding one another is translation. Communication is difficult even between people who share the same language let alone people who are from completely different linguistic territories. Not to mention that just because it looks like a person understands what you’re saying and responds relatively appropriately, it doesn’t mean that they’ve actually registered what you’ve said.

Conti: Like a coincidence.

Faris: More like a mistake, a misunderstanding, an intentional sabotage. In our every moment, waking and otherwise, there is a power at work. Just because a thing is not seen doesn’t mean it is nonexistent.

Frederick: Like the mind, though I suppose in this case the word “soul” would work just as well. Invisible and difficult to track at times but in its wake, in the space that forms around it, we can feel its presence, not unlike existence.

Faris: Our wolves, our werewolves, they’re given less room to ignore the connectivity in the design of existence. They need a potent system, potentially more so than a human, or at least in a different way. Humans have families, and organizations, and what they call friends but their use of these bonds compared to how we use our wolf packs is like a comparing a lighter to an atomic bomb, or the sun.

Frederick: As was said, humans are relatively confused, and unfocused, at least from what we have seen. They don’t need the type of energy one of our packs could generate and even if they did, it would probably destroy them.

Conti: And why do our packs generate this much “energy”?

Frederick: I suppose...because we’re “hungrier” than humans.

Conti: Hungrier?

Faris: Or perhaps we just have a different “diet”.

Conti: I’m still not sure how this relates to this all being in our heads.

Frederick: Well, humans are creative and some do come up with relatively interesting theories about the nature of consciousness and the potential of a soul, but too few experience or remember what it means to transcend one’s limitations; in a sense, to make theory reality. Our wolves have to change often, and this change reminds them of what they are, what is possible and what is, in many ways, inevitable. We share each other’s pain, we sacrifice it and in exchange our minds, our souls are no longer limited to what we assume to be our physical shells. We exist as a singular self yet we also exist as each other.

Conti: So part of our mind is in the pack?

Faris: Yes, more or less.

Frederick: And what we’ve sort of been dancing around is that a mind, a soul, or whatever you want to call it is not a stagnant thing. It has a life or at least an animation to it. Existence can exist within these things because they have a spark to them, miraculous portions full of possibility. When people stop fighting these portions and instead seek to understand and utilize their best aspects these people often find that they too were made worthy and can shape miracles.   

Conti: So anyone could do something amazing? Doesn’t that sort of hurt the legitimacy of your office chief?

Faris: Ha! More like it shows just how amazing he is. We earn our place, or at least that is the intention. Frederick is who he is, what he is, because of the hardships which strengthened him and his choice to be a walking talking phenomenon. Plus, if at least a small part of us didn’t like having him around then he’d have a tough time staying. What I mean to say is that he leads our packs because part of all of his wolves wants or needs him to lead.

Conti: That true?

Frederick: Mas o menos.

Conti: So what I’m getting here, and correct me if I’m wrong, is that all our minds or souls or whatever are connected and through that connection we have something like existence. However existence is miraculous so often it’s hard to describe outside of using a series of analogies which are often all flawed in one form or another. Humans have trouble coming to terms with this “soul-network” and by association their own selves and so often war against it/each other. This is in contrast to our werewolves which are obligated not to ignore it or fight it unnecessarily because if they do they’ll probably die or be damaged in some way, at least when it comes to their own immediate packs/packmates.

Faris: So far so good.

Conti: The added complication being that creatures like us, creatures with a conscious duality or multiplicity to our minds sort of prove, just by existing, that a mind can have layers which do not always work harmoniously or at least homogeneously. In a sense, existence or the universe, or the multiverse or god or whatever is this giant structure broken up into many tiny pieces which can look and function very differently. It is large and small. One and many.

Frederick: The greatest of us and the least of us.

Conti: And all of this would be...is painfully obvious, however, because of the way it is structured, at least as far as we’ve seen, it is extremely difficult to communicate effectively.

Frederick: Possibly because to even acknowledge it is to commit an act of supernatural heroism and unforgivable heresy.

Conti: Because we’d realize that we are the true giants and could crush everything in our path.

Faris: Or that even as slight and nigh insignificant beings we could slay titans all the same. That even a common anybody, or nobody, could stand for everybody.

Frederick: And fall for them.           

[kayostesting]

test

The Ace: She's a pro gamer, an expert mech pilot, a pretty good shot with her energy pistol (managing to impress even McCree with her shooting), and if the posters in the Hollywood stage are anything to go by, a successful actress as well. Action Bomb: Her MEKA has a self-destruct ability that does 1000 damage to anything in direct radius of its Area of Effect. Before a patch adjusted it, it could also harm D.Va herself. Always Someone Better: Amusingly, despite being one of the most mechanically-skilled players in existence, one of her pre-battle lines is "솔직히, 스타로 아빠는 못 이기겠더라" translating to "Honestly, I can't beat dad at Starcraft." Animal Motifs: The rabbit. Her gameplay icon consists of a white bunny, she has a bunny decal sticker on her chest, and her gun even has a pink rabbit keychain. Even her Mini-Mecha somewhat looks like a bipedal rabbit with machine guns for hands. One of her skins from the beta is even titled "White Rabbit". As the icing on the cake, her Facial Markings resemble rabbit whiskers. Her "B.Va" skin has a bee theme, complete with yellow-black color scheme and stylized insect wings and carapace, in addition to being a shout-out to the Transformers character, Bumblebee. The "Junebug" skin, its recolor, is alternatively based on June bugs. Artistic License – Military: Given how much of a tactical and security risk it would be, it's unlikely that someone like D.Va would be allowed to stream her combat operations...let alone expressly displaying real, dangerous battles for entertainment purposes. Ascended Meme: Though she doesn't transform into a nastier diminutive version of herself, one of D.Va's new emotes of August 2016 has her chowing down on D.Vas and soda while playing video games like her infamous "Gremlin" counterpart. The Halloween 2016 update turned Cardboard Meka D.Va into an official spray tag. Attention Whore: She's a very visible celebrity, appearing in live streams, movies, and other forms of mass media. Some of her dialogue gives the impression that she's more interested in putting on a good show and getting cheers than whatever the mission is about. Attack Its Weak Point: While every character receives critical damage when shot in the head, D.Va's weak point in her mech is her cockpit, which is comparatively easy to hit because it's in the center and very large. This is to offset her MEKA's high HP pool of 600, the fact that it can be hit only from the front and her ability to completely shield it with Defense Matrix. Awesome, but Impractical: When reloading her pistol, she does a little Gun Twirling before slapping in the next magazine. If she didn't, she'd presumably reload much faster, but it wouldn't look nearly as cool. The Baby of the Bunch: Though technically an adult, she's by far the youngest human member of the cast (Orisa is even younger at one month, but being an Omnic, her case is more ambiguous), and some of the older members will brush her off as Just a Kid. Badass Adorable: She's a 19-year old girl who is a professional gamer that can keep up with seasoned combatants. Badass Armfold: Her default pose in the game's menus. Balance Buff: Pre-patch, D.Va's Defense Matrix was rather lackluster: it only lasted for a few seconds, had a monstrous cooldown, and would shut off immediately if she fired her main weapon. Since said main weapon only does good damage at point-blank, this made D.Va a non-issue at a distance and (thanks to her unforgiving headshot hitbox) laughably easy to kill in close quarters, which is pretty bad for a Tank class. Post-patch, Defense Matrix's cooldown was instead replaced with a charge meter a la Reinhardt's shield or Pharah's jetpack, giving the player more control over it and making it much easier for D.Va to do her job. Bare Your Midriff: Her "Junker" and "Scavenger" skins replace her jumpsuit with a cropped top and a pair of pants. Becoming the Costume: Her B.Va and Junebug skins give her a few bug-related lines, including "All systems buzzing!" or "Did that sting?" Her Junker and Scavenger skins adds "Hear me baby? Just hold it together," as one of her respawn quotes. Bilingual Bonus: Her name means "one" in Korean, and one of her voice lines translates to "I'm number 1!" in Korean. Bland-Name Product: No, those aren't Doritos she's chowing down on in her Game On emote. Those are "D.Vas◊". Blue Is Heroic: Her suit is predominately blue-violet. She's also one of the playable characters, and all her ego problems aside, she's still genuinely committed to the defense of South Korea when the Omnic struck there. Body Armor as Hit Points: Or rather mech's armor. If she loses all armor points, her mech is destroyed and she has to fight on foot, and if she sets her mech to self-destruction, she loses all armor points. Bottomless Magazines: She can fire her mech's fusion cannons all day long, no reloading needed. The catch? Her movement speed drops to a crawl. Bubblegum Popping: Does this during on of her intros and victory poses. Bunny-Ears Lawyer: While most heroes have this to some degree, D.Va is notable in that she talks and acts like combat is simply one big video game to her. Yet she's a hero to South Korea who was deployed on the front lines. Justified, in that the government was scrambling to find new recruits and decided that drafting professional gamers was the best answer. Car Fu: Her Boosters give her mech enough momentum to damage and knock enemies down. Chicken Walker: Her mecha has this design, with back-bent legs and very claw-like toes. Close Range Combatant: Her Mech's Fusion cannons deal well above-average DPS at point blank range, but at a distance deals some of the worst. She can also use her boosters to ram an opponent and follow up with a quick melee. This starkly contrasts her Mechless form, which is a Long-Range Fighter. Comically Missing the Point: D.Va is fully aware of the fact that Sombra is a hacker, but the reason the latter has earned the gamer's ire is the fact that D.Va thinks Sombra uses her skills to cheat at video games, making it easier for less skilled gamers to believe that the skill of professional gamers are not genuine. Sombra is rather baffled at this accusation. Competition Freak: From her dialogue, this seems to be her reason for fighting at her best. She seems to treat battle like a game, but one she "play[s] to win". In the Hanamura arcade, she boasts, "No one's beating my high scores!" Concealment Equals Cover: In regards to her mech's ultimate, as long as you get out of its line-of-sight, it won't even scratch you. Theoretically, someone could stand behind a wall a foot away from the explosion and not be harmed in the slightest. Or, alternatively, one could survive her ultimate at ground zero of the explosion by standing behind a pole about an inch wide. It won't kill, but it will hurt like hell. Conscription: She, along with other top Korean gamers, was drafted into service. The Cutie: Youngest human character in the game, in her late teens, has a highly competitive streak, and has a rather petite body in a form-fitting plug suit? Yes, she absolutely qualifies. Damage Reduction: Armor in general allows a significant portion of damage-per-bullet to be reduced and (prior to the Year of the Rooster patch, D.Va (in her mech) had the highest quantity of armor in the game). However, the effect is negated by other factors in her design—particularly, the wide hitbox of the mech, as well as the absurdly large critical hitbox directly in the center of it. Also, armor is not very effective against weapons with high damage bursts (such as Pharah's rockets, Junkrat's grenades, or Zarya's fully-charged Particle Cannon — all of which, again, are easy to hit her with thanks to her bulk). Thus, she takes so much damage and so easily that many players don't even realize she even has Damage Reduction. The aforementioned patch brought her down to 200 armor, which is the same amount of armor as Reinhardt. Death from Above: Since the self destruct took time before it actually explodes, a common tactic that is used by D.Va players when they use her ultimate is to boost her mech upwards right before they activates the ultimate, taking advantage that the boosters would remain active even after D.Va activates her ultimate. When her mech drops to the ground, the enemy team are potentially being caught off-guard and would have less time to avoid the area covered by the self destruct explosion. Disintegrator Ray: Defense Matrix completely atomizes any projectiles in range, hence why explosives don't even detonate. Drop Pod: It's never specified, but her Call Mech ability looks like an orbital deployment via teleportation. And it can be used to flatten people. Early-Bird Cameo: She was initially revealed on Blizzard's Battle.Net page as a Starcraft II player who had to retire to defend her nation. Also, in the Hollywood Attack stage, she appears in a poster of a movie, apparently her pro-gaming sensation turned her into a celebrity/actress as well. Eject...Eject...Eject...: When her mech is about to be destroyed, she gets a warning about imminent ejection; a bright red message will flash on her HUD, reading 비상탈출 (pronounced as bisangtalchul), or "Emergency Escape". Ejection Seat: Well, not an actual seat, because D.Va lies in the cockpit instead of sitting, but her mech is equipped with ejection system. Explosive Stupidity: Averted in the current patch, but back when D.Va was subject to the same "Your own explosives hurt you" rule as every other character, she was notorious for dying to her own Self-Destruct Ultimate. The devs mercifully removed this weakness later on, partly due to Self-Destruct's countdown being made shorter. Facial Markings: Pink "whiskers" on her cheeks. Fighting Your Friend: If she kills a character she's friends with, she'll lovingly quip, "I still love you!" Frickin' Laser Beams: Her Defense Matrix fires very small lasers that shoot down incoming projectiles and other hazards. Frothy Mugs of Water: She can be seen on advertisements for Nano Cola, which looks exactly like Soju. This ad can also be unlocked as a spray. Future Spandex: She wears high tech skin-tight jumpsuit.h Fun with Acronyms: Looking closely on her default skin, will reveal that MEKA stands for: Mechanical Exo-force of the Korean Army. Gamer Chick: She's a professional gamer. It seeps into her actual combat speech; when using her Defense Matrix, she calls it raising her APMnote and when she activates her MEKA's Self-Destruct Mechanism, she boasts "Nerf this!" Additionally, her MEKA makes distinct low-bit sounds that one would expect from an older video game, and her sidearm is called the Light Gun, even going as far as to resemble a controller from a light gun game rather than having realistic ammunition and firearm colors. Gatling Good: Her mech is armed with twin rotary fusion cannons. Genki Girl: She's rarely ever not cheerful, and she treats the action around her like a game rather than an actual combat zone. Glass Cannon: In her mech-less state, D.Va can do heavy amounts of damage with just her pistol, but she can die to one or two high damage attacks and has no means of escape or defense. Goomba Stomp: It's difficult, but very possible, to crush someone with D.Va's mech when calling it in. Gun Twirling: Part of her reloading animation. Hell-Bent for Leather: Her "Junker" and "Scavenger" skins give her leather chaps, bracers and a cropped vest. Hidden Depths: A conversation with Mei reveals that D.Va has an adventurous side. She loves reading the former's journal, and wishes she could visit all the different places the climatologist explores. A quote on Eichenwalde also shows a quieter, more pensive side to her. I Know Mortal Kombat: Her mastery of video games, including Starcraft II gave her the reflexes and instincts necessary to pilot the mech. McCree: D.Va, just tell me one thing. Where'd you learn to shoot like that? D.Va: 16-Bit Hero! Improbable Age: She's only 19, in a game where almost all the other characters are at least in their mid-20s, if not 30s and up. Doesn't stop her from kicking ass alongside and against fighters with far more experience. Irony: In her MEKA, she has the most durability of any Hero in the game, at 600, a good fraction of which is armor (Roadhog also has 600 HP but it's all health that offers no damage reduction or self-regeneration).However... Outside of her MEKA, she ties with Tracer for the least HP of any Hero in the game, at 150. In-Vehicle Invulnerability: Nothing can hurt D.Va personally until her mech is destroyed and she gets out, though Sniping the Cockpit does do more damage to the mech for some reason. In the Back: D.Va's design makes flanking or attacking enemies from the rear the best way to use her offensively. Going head-to-head with anyone is a bad idea because they can "headshot" her much more easily than she can do the same. For the most part, D.Va's job in a head-on fight is to cover the rest of her team with Defense Matrix until the other team falls apart and scatters. Jack-of-All-Trades: In terms of a tank, she has the basic tools to achieve whatever the team needs (she has decent mid-to-close-range DPS, mobility and flanking options with Boosters, and her on-foot form system gives her slightly more survivability and long-range options). She excels in primarily two areas. One, her Defense Matrix destroys any projectile that comes near it, allowing her counter most forms of burst damage. Two, her ultimate itself has the highest burst damage of any attack in the game, making it instant death if the enemy is stunned or has nothing to get behind. Jerk with a Heart of Gold: D.Va's a bit bratty and arrogant and absolutely relishes the spotlight, but she takes her mission seriously and her interractions show her to be pretty chummy with other heroes, accepting without a second thought to sign autographs for Reinhardt and Lucio and complimenting Mei on her travel journal. Its also shown with some of her voice lines that she is legitimately saddened by what the Omnic Crisis has done to her country and hopes to restore it back to normal. Jet Pack: Her Boosters ability. The Juggernaut: While she activates her Boosters, few things can stop her. She can push enemies away with it, and yes, that includes punting them down into Bottomless Pit. Kid-Appeal Character: The closest Overwatch has to one, being the youngest human hero and clearly made to appeal to the young gamers. Kid Hero: Slightly older than the usual example, but is otherwise the closest example of one in Overwatch being that she's 19 in a game where the majority of the cast are above 30. The Knights Who Say "Squee!": Is a fan of Lúcio's music. When Lúcio asks her for an autograph, she will ask for his as well. Knockback: Her Boosters can push enemies out of the way, disrupting their positions at the least and potentially sending them into a nearby Bottomless Pit. Call Mech will push back any enemies in proximity of the incoming mech, meaning that someone who tries to go against a mech-less D.Va may suddenly find themselves falling off a cliff to their deaths, not helped by her Ultimate gauge charging very quickly while in this mode. Leaning on the Fourth Wall: An interaction with Soldier: 76 displays this but it isn't certain if D.Va has fourth wall awareness or she just thinks this as a philosophy or if it's just a reply to his statement. Soldier: 76: War isn't a game. D.Va: Are you sure life isn't a game, Soldier: 76? Lethal Joke Character: Mechless D.Va might seem like an easy kill, but her Light Gun shouldn't be underestimated: it has a fairly fast fire rate, doesn't suffer the harsh damage falloff of her MEKA's Fusion Cannons, and is capable of headshotting. If the player's aim is good, it's entirely possible for them to take an enemy from full HP to zero with one clip. She also gains a lot of Ultimate charge on each hit, meaning that a good on-foot D.Va can get a new MEKA within seconds, essentially negating what would be death for any other character. Lightning Bruiser: In her MEKA, she's one of the most mobile characters, has a ton of health, deals good damage, and can block incoming fire as well. Outside of her MEKA, she becomes a Long-Range Fighter. Long-Range Fighter: Outside of her MEKA, D.Va has access to an extremely accurate automatic pistol with no damage drop-off at range. Provided that she can land all of her shots (preferably headshots), she can kill most average-health characters in seconds. However, in that form, she has no mobility, no offensive or defensive abilities, and low health, so most characters able to close the distance can kill her easily. Magic Skirt: Averted with her Palanquin skin, her short skirt behaves much like a real skirt would in a fight, luckily she wears some Modesty Shorts. Meaningful Name: Her first name, Hana, means "one" in Korean. She was a world champion professional gamer who was enlisted in a special mecha division of the Korean army before joining Overwatch. Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She has two different states (in mech and on foot), and a different Limit Break for each (manual self-destruct, and summoning a new mech respectively). She also changes to a Fragile Speedster when outside her mech, and she can stay alive after her mech is destroyed if she can survive long enough to summon a new one. Military Superhero: Even though she's supposed to be a gamer, decal MEKA logo stickers on her suit and mecha indicate she's a member of MEKA - "Mobile Exo-Force of the Korean Army". Mini-Mecha: Rides around in her MEKA, which is a relatively small mech shaped like a rabbit. She calls it a "suit" when summoning it, but it's not actually Powered Armor, since it uses a cockpit and its limbs are controlled via joysticks. Modesty Shorts: When wearing her Palanquin skin, she has a pair of white biker shorts under her skirt, which is a good thing considering how often the skirt rides up when she is taken out on foot. Ms. Fanservice: She isn't the most curvaceous female member in the cast, but that bodysuit is pretty form-fitting. Additionally, D.Va also fulfills the non-looks fanservice, being a Gamer Chick that drops in a lot of gaming lingo and references, thus she's also won the hearts of male players in the 18-21 age range. Mundane Utility: Apparently her MEKA Defensive Matrix can also be used for dancing lights and playing a top-down shooter. No Sell: Her shield has a very small effective zone compared to Reinhardt or Winston, but their shields will break under fire. As long as hers is up, she will stop every projectile that meets the shield. She can negate an entire Roadhog ultimate, completely nullify Pharah's ultimate, and prevent Hanzo's, Mei's, and Zarya's ults from happening at all with her shield. Pink Means Feminine: She decorates her entire arsenal as well as parts of her costume with the color pink. Post-Apunkalyptic Armor: Her "Junker" and "Scavenger" skins wouldn't be out of place in Fallout or Mad Max. Power Fist: Her mech can punch enemies with its fusion cannons. Product Placement: Referenced and parodied In-Universe with her own brand of chips◊ named D.Vas◊, in the Game On emote, and played straight in the real world with Blizzard Entertainment's logo can be seen on her right leg of her out-of-mech suit. Pre-Explosion Buildup: Precedes her mech's self-destruction, complete with Pre-Explosion Glow and Sucking-In Lines. Product Displacement: It isn't clear just what type of soda Hana drinks during her Game On emote. The white label over the can completely obscures whatever it could be. Punch-Packing Pistol: At range, her laser pistol is more deadly than her mech's Fusion Cannons...and more accurate, too. Ranged Emergency Weapon: Her laser pistol has no damage dropoff from range, and has no accuracy spread. If you can line up every shot at a distance, you can deal massive damage in one clip. Self-Destruct Mechanism: Her ultimate has her eject from her mech while it self destructs dealing a wide area damage. She Cleans Up Nicely: While she was never unattractive to begin with, her "Palanquin" skin has her wear a traditional hanbok and a braided haircut, and she looks gorgeous. She's Got Legs: Her "Palanquin" skin has her in a hanbok with a very short skirt that accentuates her slim, feminine legs. Shoot the Bullet: Her Defensive Matrix ability is actually two laser arrays plus incredibly fast reflexes. Sore Loser: When she's killed and revives, she says, "I'm not a good loser!" That seems fitting, considering that she was a professional gamer. Stance System: Using D.Va in her mech and outside of it means essentially learning to play as two separate characters: one, a Lightning Bruiser mixed with an Action Bomb, and the other a Long-Range Fighter Glass Cannon. Super Reflexes: The reason she was drafted. It also shows up when she uses her Defense Matrix, where her Mech deploys holographic distance markers and lets her individually shoot down every projectile that comes into it. Fans have done the math, and it turns out her APM is frankly superhuman: An individual Tracer's Pulse Pistols fire 40 rounds per second. If 6 Tracers were to simultaneously fire into D.Va's Defense Matrix, D.Va can shoot down 240 rounds per second without fail, meaning she's fully capable of 14400 actions-per-minute. To put this into perspective, the highest real-life APM ever recorded was Park Sung-joon's 818. She can also fully withstand Roadhog's ultimate, which according to this post fires approximately 145 projectiles per second. If she were to face against 10 Roadhog ultimates (5 enemy Roadhogs and 5 on her team deflected by an enemy Genji), in a best-case scenario, her maximum APM would be 87500 APM. Damn. Throw-Away Guns: Taken to an extreme whenever D.Va's mech is destroyed or she triggers its Self-Destruct Mechanism. Given a little time she'll just summon a new one without incident. [Verb] This!: The enemy team hears this when she uses her Ultimate. D.Va: Nerf this! Victory by Endurance: A D.Va vs D.Va fight is this by default. Since D.Va can't fire while using Defense Matrix, one D.Va blocking the other is a complete wash. Also, trying to charge at another D.Va only results in taking the full damage of her Fusion Cannons. Thus, the vast majority of D.Va mirror fights are decided by who attacked first and who had the most health. V Sign: Does this during one of her intros and victory poses. We Are Experiencing Technical Difficulties: Not unlike Gazlowe in Heroes of the Storm, if D.Va is hit by Ana's Sleep Dart, she will move the joysticks desperately to try and get her MEKA back online. Wearing a Flag on Your Head: Her Summer Games skin changes her bodysuit and mech's colors to those of the South Korean flag. What a Piece of Junk: Unlike her shiny, high-tech regular mechs, her "Junker" and "Scavenger" ones look like they were made from whatever parts were scavenged from the nearest scrapheap.

[moontheoretist]

Choujin Koukousei isn’t the first isekai anime I ever watched, thanks to what I can compare it in my head to any other series I watched till now. 

From them all Choujin Koukousei has the best foundations for storytelling lied down, because even though it is about seven genius teenagers whose abilities and knowledge are far beyond anybody else in their world it doesn’t lose focus and always lies down the storyline in a way which makes you realize how deeply author focused on all topics mentioned in the series. It doesn’t though mean that this anime doesn’t have flaws. One of them at the start was portraying fatter people as evil and only recently we got more slim evil people to balance it out. There is also blatant sexualization of women and fanservice made for young boy audience, which I could live without off. The third though happened to rise its head from a place I didn’t expect it to even appear. 

Dr Keine, the genius surgeon of the group was revealed as yandere type of character, whose desire is to make humanity perfect. The yandere trope is nothing new in anime as a medium, but in this case yanderism isn’t the problem. The problem is why she yanders in the first place and where she comes from. Even though I disagree with everything she stands for as a person who once wanted to be perfect myself and realized it’s not worth anything I still understand her frustration with human race. I just  do not subscribe to anything she wants to do in order to change humanity. I also never believed in God myself, so it’s not weird for me that she came to the conclusion that “if just God made everybody’s minds and bodies proper and healthy there would be no diseases or wars”, hence why he is responsible for humanity’s suffering and should be despised. I very much feel that as an atheist. 

The problem with Keine’s attitude and beliefs is that our flaws are exactly what makes us human. The potential to dehumanize others, start wars, murder and hurt other people just lives in us all, but it never just comes out of some evilness or improperness. It all comes from the place of unity and compassion inside the group. One group tends to despise and dehumanize other groups, especially if their values or look differs from theirs. That concept is called “otherness”. We can murder other people for the sake of our own goals, desires and loved ones, which means that empathy is our greatest strength but also the greatest flaw when we do not direct it at anybody else outside our own group. It is also exactly what makes people into terrorists. They all feel empathy and desire to protect what they and the people like them believe in. And to top it all, all of those people are also completely sane. They aren’t mentally ill, which excludes the idea that only mentally ill people are prone to violence. That’s bullshit, we all are dangerous and prone to violence, because it’s just how we are as a species. 

So even though I understand Keine’s desire I cannot really stress enough how wrong she is about everything she does to achieve that. There are better ways to make people stop dehumanizing others, eradicate wars and violence than messing with someone’s brain, which was all on its own violation od someone’s human rights, because Keine manipulated a person, took their autonomy and flipped a switch inside their head to make them as she desired them to be. It’s very much an abusive technique pushed to the extreme and tossed into a jar with a nameplate “surgeon”. It’s interesting though that her inner face was revealed in the very same episode in which Shinobu showed Jeanne the evilness behind Azure Brigade. I think it’s supposed to convey that even Seven Lights Faith has a dark side and this dark side is military power (supposedly atomic bomb which Ringo made) and Keine.

The Healer Angel isn’t a machine though. She is a person, not much different from everybody she targets, because just like them she will cross the line and do morally ambiguous things in order to achieve her goal - help others. It though doesn’t make her much different than the guy she threatened, who did bad things for his Guild, for something he built, for his own goal - business. Yes, she did something horrible for a noble cause, because she did it to ensure that nobody else will suffer because of guy like him, but in the process she lowered herself to the same level on which he was and became the exact same. She may not want to murder people as she is a doctor and her work is to protect people, but she still did something unforgivable to another human person – changed them by force. Squashed their human rights and made them “proper”. 

That is though not only problem with Keine as her desire to change humanity and make everybody into perfect proper humans is even worse. It’s worse all on its own, because it’s inherently ableist.

There are stereotypes, generally inaccurate, associated with either disability in general, or with specific disabilities (for instance a presumption that all disabled people want to be cured, that wheelchair users necessarily have an intellectual disability, or that blind people have some special form of insight). These stereotypes in turn serve as a justification for ableist practices and reinforce discriminatory attitudes and behaviors toward people who are disabled. Labeling affects people when it limits their options for action or changes their identity.

Keine is a person who wouldn’t be able to live in a world in which disabled and mentally ill people exist and are happy as they are, because it’s against everything she stands for. It would be impossibly hard pill to swallow for her as  her desire basically boils down to eradication of disabilities, mental illnesses and “evilness” of humans by curing them by force and all due to the fact that she assumes it will make all human kind not only happy, but also flawless. The problem is that she doesn’t take into consideration the idea that she may be wrong and it’s not what those people truly desire. 

It is just naive and narcissistic of Keine to think that she can change everybody, mold them to be as she envisioned them to be and reach perfectness of human kind in the process, because that’s not how world works. Changing people to achieve such a goal is also cruel all on its own. 

Perfection of human kind means no flaws, which we can equate to the world in which only good, healthy and “proper” humans exists. It also means that humanity as a whole would never have to learn how to not look down upon disabilities, because they would just not exist. It just screams “I care too much about other people” at best and “Eugenics is great and just” at worst.

[graciela8602-blog]

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Short Review about The Saboteur by Andrew Gross Book :

February, 1943. Both the Allies and the Nazis are closing in on attempts to construct the decisive weapon of the war. Kurt Nordstrum, an engineer in Oslo, puts his life aside to take up arms against the Germans as part of the Norwegian resistance. After the loss of his fiancée, his outfit whittled to shreds, he commandeers a coastal steamer and escapes to England to transmit secret evidence of the Nazis’s progress towards an atomic bomb at an isolated factory in Norway. There, he joins a team of dedicated Norwegians in training in the Scottish Highlands for a mission to disrupt the Nazis’ plans before they advance any further. Parachuted onto the most unforgiving terrain in Europe, braving the fiercest of mountain storms, Nordstrum and his team attempt the most daring raid of the war, targeting the heavily-guarded factory built on a shelf of rock thought to be impregnable, a mission even they know they likely will not survive. Months later, Nordstrum is called upon again to do the impossible, opposed by both elite Nazi soldiers and a long-standing enemy who is now a local collaborator—one man against overwhelming odds, with the fate of the war in the balance, but the choice to act means putting the one person he has a chance to love in peril. Based on the stirring true story, The Saboteur is Andrew Gross’s follow-up to the riveting historical thriller, The One Man. A richly-woven story probing the limits of heroism, sacrifice and determination, The Saboteur portrays a hero who must weigh duty against his heart in order to singlehandedly end the one threat that could alter the course of the war.