#the overthrow trilogy

[foxqlove-draws]

ESTA TIME ESTA TIME FUCK YEAH WORST BIRD

SPOILERS FOR THRIVE

[toxictoad]

Luke is such a funny character because he perfectly encapsulates the reality of growing up in a small town and when you finally get to leave it's a complete shitshow but you're still having the time of your fucking LIFE

[the-nameless-wacky-inventor]

You KNOW things are getting bad when suddenly the political state of the British government portrayed in Ptolemy’s Gate is becoming relatable to real life.

[cl0-ud1]

ALRIGHT i see a bunch of kenneth oppel stuff on here but no one talks about the overthrown trilogy.

I (personally) HATE ESTA. i’m sorry but i just do not like her, i have a hate club (with just me) dedicated to esta, i hate that stupid fucking bird lady.

i see seth and petra as very close friends and esta ruins their dynamic because SOMEONE DECIDES TO FUCKING RUN AWAY WITH A GIRL THEY JUST MET *cough cough* SETH *cough cough*

also, personally, darren was cool. aside from what happened, he was cool…

[superlintball]

One of my absolute favorite things about the Mistborn series (era 1, specifically) is the bait-and-switch of the overarching plot.

Like, you go into it and you're like, "Yeah, okay. I'm reading one of the Big Fantasy Trilogies of the modern era. Hell yeah. What's this all about?"

And so you read. You get introduced to the characters, the magic system, and, most importantly, the central conflict: it's an assassination plot.

Clearly, the whole trilogy is going to be about finding a way to kill the god-emperor of the cruel and oppressive regime, and the final book will have them overthrow him and everything will Be Good.

"Of course that's what will happen," you think to yourself. "That's a pretty standard narrative structure."

So you keep reading.

But as you read the book, something doesn't feel right. The pacing seems... Off. Isn't this book moving too quickly?

And then, as you get around the second act of the book, it hits you all at once.

"Are they... Are they gonna successfully assassinate the Lord Ruler?? IN THE FIRST BOOK??"

It sure looks like it.

SO WHAT THE HELL ARE THE OTHER TWO BOOKS GONNA BE ABOUT.

[warrioreowynofrohan]

Me, reading “On Faerie-Stories”: Star Wars is a faerie-story.

Of course, it’s been called ‘science fantasy’ or ‘space opera’, but that doesn’t entirely get at the same thing. Tolkien may be the source of the popularizing of the fantasy genre as we know it today, but much of fantasy is arguably not faerie-stories. (Which is not to say that they are bad! Only that they are doing something different than a faerie-story as Tolkien describes it.)

But Star Wars (the original trilogy) is. It feeds the imagination, the desire for the strange and wonderful and terrible. It gives us not only shining swords and magic, but strange worlds, cities in the clouds, and ogres in forms like Jabba the Hutt. It is concerned with Good and Evil, with the overthrow of a usurping tyrant and the return of the rightful form of government.

And it has eucatastrophe in in the same way that Tolkien does. The key moment on which Return of the Jedi and the entire trilogy turns is the renunciation of power, the moment when Luke throws away his lightsaber and refuses the temptations of power that are offered by evil. And then it takes us up to the very edge, the expectation that this renunciation will lead to nothing but a horrible, torturous death – and it says no. It says that clinging to Good against all hope can give it the power to reach into the very heart of Evil and draw out goodness from it, and in that moral power rather than physical power lies victory. It is not inevitable and it does not always happen – in the words of Tolkien “eucatastrophe does not deny the existence of dyscatastrophe, of sorrow and failure: the possibility of these is necessary to the joy of deliverance” – but it can happen and the heart of Star Wars is that it does.

[medievalandfantasymelee]

THE HOT MEDIEVAL & FANTASY MEN MELEE

FIRST ROUND: 37th Tilt

Ahmad, Marco Polo (2014-2016) VS. Aragorn Elessar, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (2001-2003)

Propaganda

Ahmad, Marco Polo (2014-2016) Portrayed by: Mahesh Jadu Defeated Opponents: - Glenstorm [Cornell John], The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008)

“1) Nails, hair, hips, heels, treason, fat, beard real, purse full, big bills, BITCH! He’s a BIG deal!! 2) Get yourself a man who is an evil vizier AND gets pegged. 3) Ahmad your hair is too luscious. Your plots to overthrow the khan are too farfetched. Ahmad the murder mural in your office is too detailed. Ahmad they’ll kill you!”

Aragorn Elessar, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (2001-2003) Portrayed by: Viggo Mortensen Defeated Opponents: - Isildur, Son of Elendil [Maxim Baldry], The Rings of Power (2022-)

“I don't even know where to start with Aragorn because everything about him just makes him so ridiculously hot. He's brooding and mysterious, but he has a great smile, he's an incredible fighter but also recites Elvish like the most beautiful love poetry, he looks great all grimy but also very fine when he's all cleaned up, his voice is sexy when he's whispering gently to those he loves and when he's barking out an impassioned speech on the battle field. He's brave, loyal, humble, selfless, intelligent, compassionate. And then just look at his face and his hair and his hands. All so hot.”

Additional Propaganda Under the Cut

Additional Propaganda

For Ahmad:

For Aragorn:

“Does this guy really need propaganda? Is it not enough that he led an entire generation into having unrealistic hopes in their choice of partners? Does he not just drip hotness out of every pore of his being? Well. Let’s sum it up: - mysterious ranger with cool hood - loves his wife - wears cool jewelry - sharp humor - hair - cool sword - opens doors like no one - can and will sing - horse girl at heart - king - do I need to continue?”

“He looks great scruffy, he looks great cleaned up. He's kind and smart and caring and also really good at fighting. He's everything.”

[deramin2]

Meta: Bell's Hells Plan: Self-Determination for Exandrian Mortals

Bell's Hells keep repeatedly saying what their plan is out loud, so I'm surprised it's still a mystery to so many viewers:

Bell's Hells want the Exandrian Pantheon to no longer have control of Exandria.

After much debate and talking to a lot of people, they've concluded that the Exandrian Pantheon having nearly unlimited power and control over Exandria is bad, and it needs to end. They've considered all the good those gods do personally and through their institutions and concluded the harm outweighs it. Exandrians deserve true self-determination, and they can't have that while the Gods treat them as pawns.

They don't want Ludinus or the Ruby Vanguard to have that power instead. That was definitely going to make an even worse situation.

Their preference was to reason with Predathos about eating them and instead let the gods leave. That plan is clearly not working. While talking to the Raven Queen they formed a new plan to undo the gods' divinity, the thing Predathos wants to eat, and allow them to live as mortals with much diminished power and control.

They do not have a plan for what mortals do with their freedom once they have it. They took so long to commit to this path because it means the full overthrow of global power structures, and that's a really big and unfair decision for one group to make for everyone. But in their heart of hearts they feel like those institutions are so corrupt they have to be undone so something else can grow. That something else will still have problems, but different ones. They were thrust into the position of having to choose revolution or the status quo that just kicks the can a bit farther down the road until that inevitable overthrow, and they couldn't stomach kicking the can. As is often the way with major change.

This is not a story about good and evil. That framework doesn't fit around the events being told. It doesn't explain anyone's actions or motivations. Even a softer binary of altruism and selfishness doesn't fit. It's all too muddled in every single choice. Because that's reality. This is not heroic fantasy. They've said out loud the entire campaign they're not heroes. They're normal people thrust into impossibly large decisions and the story is about the changes that come out of that. Almost all the media influences they cite are stories about change, not morality. (Kentucky Route Zero is one example.)

People keep trying to order a milkshake at an art gallery and then complain the paint water is a bad milkshake. Milkshakes are great, but not every place you go makes them. And since the cast have repeatedly talked about what kind of story they're telling for years, the mismatched expectations aren't on them.

The thing that's kept them coming back to Exandria after nearly 10 years is that they get to see how all their actions, big and small, changed the world. Taliesin planted guns into a fantasy world, Matt added on that tech escaped Percy's control, and now it's a major political force in the world and Percy just has to live with that. Travis sees a big red button and he longs more than anything to press it just to see what happens. Matt made an entire Campaign 3 of big red buttons. They're not trying to protect the world from their decisions, they're trying to see what happens when they make interesting choices.

(I think the doubt about making the "right choice" is largely driven by the hostility of the audience to interesting choices with messy consequences. Especially the women who have faced a ton of misogyny-amplified criticism for every perceived "mistake" they make. But that's a different meta.)

They all know that an age is ending, and big changes are coming to Exandria, no matter what they choose. It's only a matter of whether they try to steer the runaway train or give full agency over to people they trust even less. Matt has said he now sees this as an end to a trilogy. Remaking the world to fully separate from WotC IP and probably switching systems to Daggerheart makes a lot of sense for both creative control and business.

Matt and others have reshaped these deities and their institutions away from WotC's versions pretty strongly, but they still by their very nature exert control over them as independent creators navigating the unfathomably vast and powerful cosmic horror entities that are mega corporations like Hasbro. Taliesin's closing remarks at the Candela Obscura: Circle of the Silver Screen live show are about how the Hollywood machine eats people. I wrote about the symbolism in my essay A City Made of Aspirations.

Just this week, and after Matt said "Fuck AI!", Polygon reported that a student project had used their work to build an AI Dungeon Master using a data set created by Microsoft engineers out of fan wiki summaries and the linked transcript database maintained by Sil. Geek & Sundry used fan captions, so a significant amount of the caption work in the data set is fan labor. Critical Role switched to professional captions as soon as they went independent because they saw the value in that labor. Those same fan information labor projects have allowed them to be the most academically studied AP due to the ease of collecting information, which has added to their success.

They're beset in the real world by forces that want to devour their aspirations to maintain their youth. They barely escaped the wreckage of one such entity in 2018 with their Critical Role work in hand, but a lot of their other innovative shows like Sagas of Sundry were lost. The system that propelled them into the spotlight and has allowed them to chase life-long dreams they thought were impossible, has also been trying to devour that work. They've fought for worker's rights through their union for a good reason.

Campaign 3 isn't a story about good and evil, but it is a struggle for who gets to control the future. It's about overthrowing the hegemony of systems whose manipulative, selfish, and destructive influence outweighs the benefits they provide. Even if that's confusing, terrifying, and a known sacrifice. Ludinus was a piece of shit, but he wasn't entirely wrong. Tragically the worst person you know occasionally makes a good point.

There are only two ways to solve a problem: do what you're doing better or do something else. Campaign 3 is the story of ordinary people who have decided the world needs to do something else. They found themselves in extraordinary circumstances through a series of decisions they couldn't know the outcome of. They don't have a firm idea of what they want the new world to be or how to achieve it, but they do know that things have to be different. Sometimes that's all the seed of change you get to work with.

On the Wednesday Club episode Love is Love (2017-06-28) Taliesin put it, "Culture is not a rocket ship. We all don't get on the rocket ship to the planet culture and go up to the moon. Culture is like life: it is chaotic, it is violent, it is hungry… It is not normal for everything to just keep getting better all at the same time. It's normal for everything to get better over a period of the long game. In any internal point, chaos—"

That's often how the world is. Most activists don't know what happens after they win their battle. They can't predict what knock-on effects anything from legalizing gay marriage to forcing the military to clean up Superfund sites will have. We don't know what happens next when the lead industry is overthrown, or tobacco companies are forced to admit their product causes cancer. We didn't know what movies would be made after the Hayes code or what effects streaming would have on film, television, and music. Early researchers into generative AI had no idea it would get used this way. We don't know the future or if what we're doing is "good" or "bad" on any long timeline. We can only choose what's in front of us one decision at a time and just hope we don't live to regret them too badly. That's what Critical Role has always been about.

Now is the time for different people to choose their own fates, for good or ill, without the Exandrian Pantheon dictating them. Whatever happens next is for Campaign 4 to sort out.

—

This essay is also available on AO3.

[bryngreenwood]

This is the book. The Book™️. The one that made me obsessed with books. I read The Tombs of Atuan, when I was 8. I’d read tons of books by then, so it might seem I was already obsessed, except this book made me aware that I was much more interested in fictional worlds than the real world. (And who could blame me?) The copy I first read was one of those battered yellow library books without a cover. The kind of books that were meant to last for decades. It was the only LeGuin book my tiny grade school library had, and I confess, I had no idea it was part of a then trilogy. I didn’t learn about that until the internet came around and it became easy to look up books. While I like and respect the other EarthSea books, they don’t make up a cornerstone of my life the way this one does. You could even say this is the book that radicalized me, because the main character, Tenar, overthrows a lifetime of indoctrination and turns her back on brutal superstition. May we all have that kind of awakening.

[secretagentspydetectiveninja]

(Alright, going to stop procrastinating and finally make this post.) After playing through the new trilogy in French to see what was different, here are some things about the French localisation of Spirit of Justice I thought you should know:

First of all, I usually like the French and English versions of the games equally. This marks the first time I've actually enjoyed the French version... more than the English one?? Especially Turnabout Revolution? Don't get me wrong, I already loved it in English, but I think the next time I replay it I'll actively choose French. Idk man it just hits different when a bunch of French people are talking about revolution and overthrowing the tyrannical regime etc

Oh yes, speaking of which, yes, the "Japanifornia" parts of the game take place in Paris, France, as usual. No, I have no idea how Kurain village can be next to the mountains and also the sea while also being in the vicinity of Paris. I also don't know why the entire population of a small country in the Himalayas are fluent in French and use it on a daily basis. But seriously, the main characters mention SO OFTEN that they're French and from France, like, all the fricking time. Remember the incredibly Japanese rakugo case? Imagine that taking place in France.

The Khura'inese pun names are hysterical in French. An example that English speakers can get too: the first culprit's name in French is Sterh'uey Tu'heiven. I'm not making this up. That's his name.

RAYFA'S FRENCH VOICE ACTUALLY SOUNDS LIKE A TEENAGER INSTEAD OF A 30 YEAR OLD, THANK THE HOLY MOTHER

Unfortunately the Holy Mother giveth, but she also taketh away, and they gave Nahyuta a crunchy old man voice that doesn't suit his ethereal appearance at all...

Athena has now added German and Italian to her random English and Spanish phrases from the prev game. I mean... it made sense before, since she was meant to have lived in the USA in this version, but now I guess she just does it for fun? Who knows

French Roger Retinz uses €50 notes (euros) to fan himself instead of dollar bills

Inga's full name is "Inga Karkhuul Kel Nomh Bowkhou Tro'lon Pohm'peu Eh'Duhr Apronh Ons'ai Khura'in III" ("quel nom beaucoup trop long, pompeux et dur à prononcer")

Nahyuta's nickname in French is just "Yuta"

Ema and Apollo now use informal pronouns for each other, so do Ema and Trucy now, Maya starts using informal pronouns for Apollo from almost the first moment she meets him (though he uses formal pronouns for her lmao), and yes Dhurke and Apollo use informal pronouns with each other the whole time, even when things are awkward at the start. Rayfa and her mother always use formal pronouns for each other, which is a little depressing.

AS FOR NAHYUTA AND APOLLO... HOHOHO. Obviously they're both using "vous" (formal) in court, but in the scene afterwards Apollo switches to "tu" (informal) when he asks Nahyuta if he remembers him. Later in Turnabout Revolution, Apollo has gone back to vous but he's at least saying "Nahyuta" rather than "Prosecutor Sahdmadhi" or whatever (I think that happened in the English version too). Then during the final trial, after that one insanely angsty scene, Apollo starts using tu again and even (internally) uses the nickname Yuta once! Nahyuta eventually starts referring to him as Apollo and starts using tu after finally openly acknowledging Apollo as his family aaauuuuuugh ;o;

(Listen Apollo usually always tries to be formal and professional in court so this is a big deal!!! It's a big deal to me at least!!!!!!!!!)

In the English version there were a few times our good ol' American Apollo had a sort of "haha I'm just a foreigner I don't know anything here" vibe which... no you're not lol. The French version didn't have that (or at least toned it down a lot) and made him feel less like a tourist and more like an immigrant returning to his old home country with complex feelings, which he is. It makes it more personal that he's the one to bring about the revolution imo -- he's not some random foreigner swooping in to save the day, this is his home and his family, he belongs here. (As an immigrant myself I find aspects of him relatable and will defend his Khura'inese backstory to the death DON'T TEST ME)

The "what's crack-a-lackin' homie" line in all its glory:

[nyaagolor]

One of the things I find funniest about 5/6 is how much more insane the stakes get for the finales. Every AA game has had really broad themes but ultimately every final conflict in the trilogy+4 was pretty small in scope, with your villain representing a problem rather than literally Being it. Manfred and Kristoph represented corruption, but they were only ever a face, a consequence, or a symbol of it. Phoenix is taking down one specific symptom of a broader societal conflict within his world because This Specific Person has a personal connection to him in some way. Can you imagine if Engarde actually WAS the assassin? Or if at the end of AA4 we were trying to literally take down the bar association instead of just Kristoph? bc that’s how 5+6 feels to me it's honestly kind of hilarious

The finale cases of the trilogy really stand out to me because while the broader themes are represented through the villains, ultimately our final culprits are Just Some Guy and it makes the conflict so much more personal to Phoenix and resonant with the audience. Then 5 and 6 are like “we can and WILL take on international spies and overthrow the government”. Why. What about the villain as a representation of the protagonist’s grief? What about smaller scale conflicts as a vehicle to represent abstract ideas about truth, corruption, and justice? Why is there power creep in my lawyer game?

[wisteria-cherry]

a finnick odair fic where reader is a capitolite, aged somewhere around 18 where finnick is still a forced pr0stitute

reader buys his time but as it turns out they’re looking to overthrow snow, and so asks that finnick gather secrets for them that would aid them

this is what initiates finnick’s love for secrets in the actual trilogy bc 1) he sees their worth as opposed to money and 2) they remind him of reader

and then reader dies at the end womp womp

[pumpkinrootbeer]

something that stands out to me on my reread is how present haymitch is even when he's not physically there in the books. they kind of undo this in the movies by showing us him running around to get sponsors but how much he comes up during the games, especially in catching fire just really highlights how necessary he was in everything.

a change i absolutely hate is them having haymitch send katniss notes in the movies when in the books they could just communicate effortlessly. two poor kids from seam, they knew each other. we don't really see that kind of communication from anyone else in the trilogy, it's both a testiment to how alike they are and how uncannily clever haymitch manages to be throughout the entirety of the series. I keep thinking about specifically "... a water source for those who don't have mentors as smart as Haymitch."

just. yeah that's my drunk genius who overthrows a government. u go king ily

[scholliski]

my university unknowingly asking me to write an essay on Edgar Allen Poe, not knowing I’m insane and have spent years decoding his life and works to compare them to a trilogy about a teenage boy overthrowing the mafia through the power of stubborn idiocy.

[overlyinvested]

Only 53% into The Finale Empire and ohh they’re gonna Martyr this man they’re gonna martyr his ass so badly. That talk between Marsh and Vin about the reverent way the skaa see and talk about kell??

Oh he is not making it through the end of this damn trilogy 😭 He’s gonna die fucking overthrowing the government in Hero of Ages and the Skaa are gonna martry his ass and turn him into a god

[marietheran-archived]

Thinking how TBoSaS as a whole seems to have more mentions of anything alluding to religion than the previous three books together... By no means is there a lot of it here either - but there's Sejanus' District 2 funeral customs and it crops up in Lucy Gray's songs... "I know the soul that you struggle to save" is explicitly religious terminology (likely not correct religious terminology, but never mind) and of course "You're headed for Heaven, the sweet old hereafter". I'm almost hesitant to count the latter, because the characters in the trilogy also have some vague ideas about some sort of afterlife - Katniss comforts herself thinking "Rue is safe and happy now" after the girl dies, and - I'm not sure it's in the books, but it's in the movies - there is the "If I see you again it will be in another world" line (meaning "either we overthrow the Capitol or we all die"). But neither actually says the word "heaven" outright.

And I know I'm sort of grasping at evidence here, but I do like to think it points to the conspicuous lack of religion of any sort in THG being a state manufactured by the Capitol, if it increases the longer it has been in power.