#the way i had to fight myself to not write all the exposition as well from doc's side because i have a tendency to do that

[doctorbrown]

The last place Clarissa expected to be spending her Christmas season was stuck in 1980s America, Earth. If she had her way, the holiday would have come and gone without her having even noticed its passing before all the cheesy lights and corny commercialised holo-ads—designed to tug on easy hearts to encourage the careless opening of wallets—were disappearing into far away pricks on the Thunderbird’s rear viewing screens.

Speaking of the Thunderbird, Clarissa still has yet to locate her missing mech. Its whereabouts still a mystery, since the day a fierce slipstream dragged her machine off of its Voidspace trajectory...shoved both it and its pilot through time and space. As physics crumpled and haemorrhaged around them, Clarissa doesn't know when or where that it was that she had phase shifted through her cockpit like a bad video game collision glitch, falling through the sickening rainbow slick of the void and waking in a ditch beneath the glow of Earth's moon. No Thunderbird in sight. One would think that a 12-metre-tall shining metal bird falling onto Eighties California would cause a bit of a public panic and/or media sensation, making the silence on the airwaves and the era's primitive, skeletal internet, deafening in the same sick manner as waking up from an accident unable to feel one of your limbs.

Until she tracks down her machine, figures out how to make any needed repairs in this backwater century, and figures out how to get the thing back into Voidspace, and from Voidspace, back to the future, Clarissa is fucking stuck here. She’s an outlier here in this little time capsule of retro Americana. Her mere out-of-townness, the unplaceable accent, her otherness as an East Asian in this blindingly white little town, her avant-garde mode of dress (her pilot suit)...oh and, of course, her long deep natural blue hair, which loud and nosy onlookers have concluded amongst themselves to be some kind of garish fashion statement (definitely some manner of party wig. To go with her fancy dress outfit, obviously). The only person not to look at her with boggling eyes like she’s some kind of mutated animal that wandered into their peaceful little town is the one other person Hill Valley seems to have condemned as some kind of freak. The very person whom one of the first people bold enough to actually strike up some excuse for a conversation with her, asked if she were a visiting friend of his. Of course Clarissa had sought such a person out.

Doctor Brown has been a valuable aid in her situation…with no mech, no money, and no roof over her head to speak of. Clarissa is wary to receive help, however needed—yet the older man’s assistance had been easy to accept, perhaps because she recognised the scientific vigour in his eyes once he realised she were more than just the sort of wandering vagabond her ripped clothing might suggest.

She’s less sold on the hypothesis of his younger acquaintance who periodically stops by, that falling in step with the current holiday will help her stick out any less. Perhaps there was at least a point to be had about her wandering around in the snow with her jacket hung wide open and a wide-necked shirt that exposes her collar beneath. Clarissa finds herself in an itchy old sweater, a hand me down that she’s uncertain whether it was Brown’s originally, sitting cross legged on the cold garage floor while gingerly pulling knots out of strings of Christmas lights. As unenthusiastic Clarissa feels to be stranded, she’s at least eager to do something with her hands. Aiding Brown on his own scientific tinkering, tidying the garage space, detangling lights, sure. Whatever. Anything to keep her from wanting to rip her kindly host’s entire place apart. Her chest hurts and her head starts spinning any time she stops working on the Thunderbird Problem and spirals instead into fretting over what might have become of her prized machine…to think of Thunderbird lost out there, who knows where in America or even the world, perhaps smashed in the desert or sunk into the Atlantic.

The wall plug to the Christmas lights lays visibly, conspicuously, un-plugged at the centre of the floor, yet the bundle of lights strewn about the concrete, threading through Clarissa’s fingers and draped across her knees begin to glow, each shining in their colourful rainbow hues. Clarissa looks not to notice, her brows furrowed as she works at a particularly stubborn collision of bulbs that have become twisted together. She thinks of Thunderbird’s onboard AI sending distress messages nobody will be able to hear. Wonders whether the on-board computer is panicking to realise that its pilot is missing from its locked cockpit. The bulbs glow to an eye-searing brightness that burns the retina.

“Gh—!” There’s a tight, hot little popping noise. Clarissa flinches as shards of green glass spray over her face and the backs of her hands. As the string of lights all fade out. “Shit. Say that this crapped out old box has a couple spare bulbs...”

He'd promised Marty that this year, he would have the garage decorated in a timely fashion. Last year, he'd only missed Christmas by two days, and when Marty commented that the lights were supposed to be up well before this, he had to make the apparently blasphemous confession that he hadn't owned any lights, prompting an almost immediate trip into town and a very enthusiastic explanation as to why he needed them.

Rather than argue, he'd acquiesced, and even let the kid pick out the lights he preferred most.

Colours bounce off every available surface, and he whips around just in time for the lights to get so blindingly bright that he's forced to screw his eyes shut. He expects a much more violent blast, a string of bulbs to blow in quick succession from that surge of energy, not just a single pop there and gone in the span it takes him to breathe.

Einstein bolts up off the couch, hackles raised, looking around for an intruder that doesn't exist. Emmett shuffles over to his companion, patting him thrice on the head comfortingly. ❝There, there, Einie. It's just a blown bulb, nothing to worry about. You should be used to these sudden loud noises by now.❞

Einstein looks sceptically between his master and his master's new friend but seems to accept that. As he sits down, still watching the pair, Emmett walks over to Clarissa.

It doesn't escape his notice that the lights, each glowing like miniature suns only a moment ago, are not plugged into anything. They're lying in a mostly untangled heap across her legs, and when he follows them back to the plug, it's there, three feet away from her, forgotten in the centre of the room.

No power. No outlet whose wiring may have been damaged and caused a surge that overloaded the lights.

Just her.

That's something he can tackle later.

❝How's your face? Your hand?❞ Emmett asks, sweeping his gaze across the broken glass strewn about around her. There are shards caught in the fabric of that old sweater and he presses his lips together, running through a quick inventory of spare clothes he can offer rather than concern himself with whether or not she'll cut herself on the small shards still caught in there.

❝There should be spares. These lights may be relatively new compared to a lot of other things in the lab❞—and he has Marty to thank for their existence here at all—❝but that isn't the first time they've broken. They're in the box over there.❞ He gestures toward a box that has seen better days.

❝I'll get a broom, too, hold on.❞

[adultemophase]

A VERY LONG ARCANE S2 REVIEW (Not spoiler free below page break)

Firstly, these are all my opinions and everyone is entirely entitled to their own. If you hated S2? That’s fine but I didn’t. So, I will be doing a kind of general breakdown of my thoughts on each act below but first my general review is that I think in terms of overall story telling, season 1 is better.

To ME, S2 seems like more of what they initially had in mind for the show, and they just really nailed the exposition of S1. This is what I think made S1’s pacing feel a lot better - it’s all exposition for S2. Season 2 had to fit a climax and resolution for all of these characters in the same amount of time that they took to set up all of these story lines in the previous season. I genuinely think that each act could have been it’s own season but w/ how expensive the show is to make and the amount of time production took between seasons, I see how that’s not practical. Especially if they want to explore other regions sooner than 15 years from now.

TBH I really enjoyed this season. I understand some people are hating it because of the parts they don’t like but it’s still a visually stunning show with great characters. Do I think there were areas where the story fell flat? Yes. I also think given the time constraints and restriction of this being the last season, the visual story telling was very well done and a great way to move along the story without sacrificing time. I genuinely think it’s such a phenomenal feat of animation that characters expressions convey thoughts and emotions that feel real without dialogue. I still am blown away that it’s a LoL show because despite my love of league lore and characters, I never would have expected that Riot could produce such a heart wrenching show about the tragic nature of love and loss, the things we do for love, and the flaws of our own humanity.

I also think some people set their expectations WAYYY too high for the social commentary aspect of the show after s1, as far as I’m aware there was never any claim made by any part of the prod or writing team that it would be one. Idk overall, I thought it was a lot of fun and still an exceptional show. Not what I was expecting but I’m not upset about how it ended. I think it was conclusive but also not so finite that it leaves zero room for interpretation of the characters implied futures.

It is a little disheartening to see so many immediate negative reactions to it but, again, people are entitled to their own opinions and as much as I complain about people not using critical thinking skills or passing grade 9 literature - art is subjective. Animation, ESPECIALLY at this scale and complexity, is a form of art. I, as I’m sure many other’s did, found it a fulfilling end to one of my favorite shows. Yes, I wish there was more but I can’t bring myself to be disappointed with what we did get.

Below is my (again PERSONAL and NOT SPOILER FREE) 1-10 rating and my thoughts on each act (not really going to analyze anything because I need about 3-5 weeks to scrub through every episode so only my little reviews) :

ACT 1 (7/10) : I think this act is the one with the worst pacing, but I said a whole back in a previous post that I believe to some degree it was intentional. There is suddenly a war happening so I think it’s supposed to feel chaotic a bit chaotic. However I can concede to part of it just being, well, bad pacing. This act is definitely one I wish could have taken up more episodes if there were more seasons since I would prefer flushed out development as opposed to music videos at the beginning of each episode. However, for what it was, they serve their purpose narratively and relay the information that the viewer needs to know. Otherwise, as heartbreaking as the act is, I gotta put myself on blast and say that I LOVE the end sequence of ep 3 when Ambessa makes Caitlyn commander. Like it’s so daunting and cool. Ep 1 fight scene at the memorial? super sick. I also loved the development of the dynamic between Sevika and Jinx. You can feel the characters devolve into a version of themselves that truly is worse and I think that’s so fun. Most of my drop in rating is from how fast it feels.

ACT 2: 9/10

I simultaneously have so much and so little to say. I won’t talk about Isha’s death because to me it was fairly evident that she was going to die from act 1. Anyways, for me this was the most tragic act and I’m still trying to decide between this and act 3 as my favorite. I love them both, in different ways. Seeing Jinx and Vi be brought together and Vander was so touching and sad. You get a real look of how much they still care for each other despite the fact that they’re perpetually ripped apart. I’ve already made a post about the scene between Caitlyn and Vi, so I won’t just say the same thing I’ve already said. I also honestly am not upset that Vi’s “six-ish months of going insane” wasn’t drawn out. Again, I don’t LOVE the music videos, but narratively, it tells you virtually everything you need to know about what’s happened to her and where she is mentally. It’s literally a montage of her life for the past several months. As a recovering addict and someone known to self destruct, I would much rather they condense that like they did rather than draw it out and not handle it well. If you’re going to be cynical, you could say they didn’t anyways but, recovering addict, so I was more worried before the act 2 release that it would be triggering rather than handled poorly.

Jayce coming back and tweaking out was also such a fun touch when it wasn’t explained until the next episode why he was acting that way. Like I figured it had to do with the hex crystal now fused with his body but it was still so interesting.

ACT 3: 9/10

Maybe unpopular but I LOVED this act. Everything was so visually intriguing that on my first watch I wasn’t even fully locked in just because I was focused on how good the imagery/animation is. I thought I was going to hate ep 7 because, unfortunately that leak was real (no I won’t be changing my pfp to a clown like I said I was bc I’m stubborn) but the implication to me of that episode was not “Vi dead so everything good!” it’s that they saw a kid die because of the crystals Jayce had and, in brevity, saw what the tension between the undercity and Piltover was doing to people. I am curious what happened to THAT universes Jayce but I imagine he was probably imprisoned.

Obviously, I have to address the sex scene, and honestly? I don’t mind that it’s in a jail cell BECAUSE of the very obvious parallel to how they first met. It was also done in such a wonderful way that it feels like a legitimately intimate scene between the characters and not just a “man well I suppose they need to fuck, huh.” or male gaze-y “lesbians 🤤” way.

I will be honest and say I don’t like multiverse stuff since it kind of kills the whole “arcane is cannon” thing. I also just don’t love it in general because in recent years it’s been just a cop out for companies to make more money off of IPs (see Marvel) but it makes me want to go back and rewatch s1 again to see if this has always been the plan. I don’t mind Viktor being the wizard that Jayce sees when he is a kid since they tied that up in a way thats really cool. I do think it’s an episode though that, after seeing it a couple of times, is easily skippable since it doesn’t really do a ton for the main plot. Like Ekko gets his Z drive, heimerdinger (i think?) dies, and Jayce discovers the damage hextech can do. Don’t get me wrong, I really like the episode, unfortunately it is just one that I feel like viewers can skip over upon rewatch because of the AU stuff.

Also MEL, I love her storyline with the black rose and I really hope that her putting on the Noxian clothing in the end is an indication that we will get more of her if Riot does a series based in Noxus.

[livelovecaliforniadreams]

The chemistry between you and Rider I is just, it's instant. It's, it pops through the screen. It is just, it's right. It's there. It's there right away. -Will

And to start the episode with us together was such an interesting and perfect part because it's like, oh, you already see us together. And then you're kind of like, oh, but this works. Why are they, why are they doing? And then you're just waiting for us to get back together. It's really well written. It's so good. -Rider 

Was, it was, you know, I just had this revelation the other day that there should be like a dating show called The Purse. Where you only know the context of the, you have to pick the girl or pick the guy and you only have the purse...And you know, I remember being so nervous and when I look at myself, I don't feel like I was acting my best. You know, I was kind of stiff and my mind was racing like, am I getting this right? You know? And so, and I think people that knew me were kind of like, treating, you're not doing your usual. You know, I usually try to pop more, but I felt like I had to like yeah you know, be more like this.... I never felt like I was really emoting like I wanted to emote, but I, but when I look at it now, it's fine. You know? -Trina

I think, I think what you're feeling like when you're talking about like how you're not popping or you're kind for me, like it's the writing of this episode, it's just like, it's just a sort of like unraveling or the unrolling of like what was started in the last episode. The last episode was so good and so well written. And then this one just feels like one kind of scene. Like we, the reveal of, you know, and I really, besides the dinner table stuff, which I, you know, with the Cory/Topanga, which I thought was hysterical and like, you know, big but funny. The stuff between Shawn and Angela is just like, they're great for each other. So let's just show that. And like, you know, they don't allow us to have any inter conflict between us really. Like, the conflict is that there is no conflict or that I'm anxious about it. It's like an anxiety show as opposed to real conflict. And so you're like, we're mostly just speaking exposition to one another. Like in every one of our scenes we're just like, I'm scared because I feel this. And you're like, I'm scared because I feel this and I'm, we, you know, it's like, I don't know. It didn't sound like the way people actually talk to one another to me. So if it, well, I wanted, like, I wanted it to happen. And I like these characters. I didn't feel like they were played for realism or it was just sort of like, let's just bring this together. Let's wrap this all up. Yeah. So like, the whole episode felt a little inevitable to me and a little like, ah, and there was like, okay, cool. You know? So I don't know that would, and so I, I feel like that, you know, if, if like Angela had come in with more personality or more attitude and that had been a problem, or like they, they disagreed about something a little more like intensely like in scenes we would've more to do. -Rider 

I liked how it was, I liked how it was, you know, with, with very little intro to Angela's character, you got that she was Sean, essentially. It's like they had something where neither of them had really been, you know, this unfolds obviously as the episode's going, but neither of them had really been in a relationship before. Yeah. They're, they're kind of both scared for some reason, but we don't know why yet. Why they're scared to get into a relationship and they both realize at the same time that they do want something more and they want it with each other. I don't know. To, to me it kind of worked. It worked that it was, you know, it's a sitcom, so it's going to be inevitable that they're gonna get together. But I liked that it was, it wasn't opposites attract. It wasn't we're fighting and now we love each other. It was, they're both realizing at the same time they're kind of the same person and they're gonna do it together.  And I liked that. I thought that was cool... I also think it was kind of the idea of, and that's why what you get when you're looking at CO and Topanga is the idea of love to them was better than love. It's what love is. Because when they saw it, and I love that Topanga finally explodes and it's like, we're 80, I don't wanna be 80. So it was that kind of like, do we want to jump right into that? I don't know. It worked for me. I think you're right. It didn't work as a second episode. Meaning like, you didn't need the week in between. I think you're a hundred percent right. But if they just played it for an hour straight without a break, I think it was a great one hour episode.  Frankly. To bring the two of them together. 'cause you're so rooting for the two of you Right. Because you do have such chemistry that you just, you wanna see this and where it's going...But I was over co and Topanga halfway through the episode and was concentrating more on Shawn and Angela...'cause you're like, okay, I, I get now that we now just have to accept that Cory and Topanga have, this is the 19th different version of how they met the 19th different version of how they've been together. We now just have to accept that this is what they are. They're the old married couple. -Will 

I loved the Cory/Topanga energy this episode. -Rider

At that time I was worried about so many a plethora of things being 10 years older than you guys. You know, the thing I like the most about that particular, the episode we're talking about too, is just the fact that they didn't really get so into, of course, the color of our skin. You know, it really just, you know, and, and I've always grappled with that over the years. I've talked about it or whatever, but it's such a human testament of, of, of how we can feel each other and, and love each other and be interested. And I also like the fact that it was a different kind of trope for a black girl on television to not be, you know, extra sassy or, or be able to be nice and feminine and loved was, and not in conflict. Or, or, or, or, I mean, we were in conflict and struggle, but the love was always there. -Trina 

Like the whole point of the purse is that I fall in love with the contents of your character. Just, you know, without knowing anything about the surface of who you are. Which is another sort of way to talk about race without talking about race. Right. Like, and that, so it's, so, it's so interesting to revisit now after all these years of like, conversations between us or with fans about like, whether we should have referenced race or not, or did we reference race? I'm like, it is there, it's just not, it's just not as explicit. -Rider

He just needs to look into her eyes and he'll realize it. A new type of ensorcellment. -Danielle

This is a callback to the first season. The giggles, right? But that was about touch, right? Remember that was about touch. Don't touch your head. Right? It wasn't about looks, but yeah. -Rider

 I'm just, I'm just, I love how many types of ways women can ensorcell men. -Danielle

We're the weaker sex. A look, a touch, a kiss, and we turn to jello. That's just the way it is. -Will

[galvanizedfriend]

List your nine most favorite books

Tagged by @jinxedwood

It was so hard to keep this to nine. I feel like this is a list that changes a lot, depending on my mood (with a few exceptions). Like jinxedwood, I feel I must add a disclaimer: some of these books are great, some of these books are great to me. I like what I like.

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. I've lost count of how many times I've read this. It's totally nonsensical and hilarious and I absolutely love it. I collect Alice in Wonderland editions, and I have read every single one of them at least once. Don't feel the same way about Through the Looking Glass though. Wonderland is very uniquely insane, which is what makes it great.

1984 by George Orwell. I fully realize this book is much more impressive when you're 18 and reading it for the first time, but I will absolutely fight anyone who trashes it. It stands the test of time to an eerie (and somewhat depressing) degree. I remember getting to the end of this and being so completely disheartened by the way it ends that I was upset for a week. I was 18, but still. It's a great book.

Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton. I am OBSESSED with Jurassic Park, ok? It's my favorite movie ever. And precisely because of that, I postponed reading this book forever because I was fully convinced it would suck and I didn’t want to live with the source material of my favorite movie letting me down. But then these really really beautiful editions of the series came out and I just had to buy them, and so eventually I had to read them as well. AND LO AND BEHOLD! The book is actually great! Not better than the movies, mind you, but really good. It's different enough that it's surprising even to someone who's seen the movies 30 times like me. And it's also very philosophical, whereas the movie focuses more on the adventure and the T-rex (for obvious reasons, to great success). 10/10.

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. First time I read this I was 13 and it was this 1936 edition written in Portugal Portuguese, maybe even the first translation of this work into the language, and I hated it. Then many years later I found this stunning Barnes and Noble edition in English and decided to give it a second try. Instantly obsessed. It's a huge exposition in vanity, hedonism, ego and the human nature, monologues can last for pages and pages, but it's so interesting, so insightful and the dialogues are so good.

Epitaph of a Small Winner (Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas), by Machado de Assis. This is a masterpiece of Brazilian literature and probably my favorite thing I've read by Machado de Assis, who's one of, if not the most revered writer of all time in my country. Brás Cubas is a wealthy 19th century dead man and the narrator of this book, in which he makes reflections and digresses on many chapters of his life - after his death. It's a basically a fictional autobiography written by someone by a dead man. I just googled to see what the first paragraph was like in English, because it's one of my favorites ever, and it's still great. "I am a deceased writer not in the sense of one who has written and is now deceased, but in the sense of one who has died and is now writing." He dedicates the book to the first worm to eat his flesh. Brilliant.

Vicious by V.E. Schwab. I love Victoria Schwab so much, have read almost everything she's ever written. If writing talent was something you could buy at a supermarket, I’d get myself doses of hers. I love her style. Even the things that I objectively don't like, I still enjoy for the writing alone. This is probably my favorite thing she's ever written. I love the duality between Eli and Victor, I love their rivalry, I love the ideological war between and how ruthless they are, how far they are both willing to go just to prove a point. Neither of them is a good guy or a hero, and I love that about this story. It's not really that original, you can see where she drew inspiration from, but still. I love it.

Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann. The moment I finished reading this, years ago, I wondered how the hell this hadn't been turned into a movie yet. Thank you, Martin Scorsese, for listening to me. Please, don’t fuck this up. It's not fiction, which is not something I read very often because I’m easily bored, but this is amazingly written. And the story is so crazy. Maybe Americans are more familiar with it, but I wasn't, and it stunned me from start to finish. If you don’t know what it’s about, at some point in the history of the USA, the members of the Osage Nation were the richest people in the country, and then they started dying, one by one. The investigation into those murders was crappy because of racism, but it also led to the foundation of the FBI as it is known today. David Grann is a genius. I've read other books by him, all of them non-fiction, and it's always an unbelievable true story that's just shocking. His investigation into the topics is fantastic. He has one about the lost city of Z that is WILD. I’ve told everyone I know about that book.

The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne. I know John Boyne has some controversial books (which I have tried to stay away from), but this is so good. His writing is amazing. It's such a heartbreaking story, but the way it's narrated is so light that instead of being depressive, it just made me so hopeful. The main character is probably one of the most naturally likable MC I've ever read, too. Every other character in the story is either insane or absurd, sometimes both. Probably the best dialogues I’ve ever read in a book.

The Conqueror's Wife by Stephanie Thornton. Listen, this is one of those books that I'm sure not everyone will like. But it's almost like it was written for me. It's a historical romance, it has multiple narrators, it’s based in real people that existed and it's about Alexander the Great. I have an inexplicable obsession with Alexander the Great, don't ask. I’ve read tons of stuff on him, so the fact this draws a lot from the real stuff makes it even better. The title is a little misleading, makes you believe it's about Alexander's wife (or one of them anyway), but it's not. The four narrators are two of his wives, his younger sister and Hephaestion. It paints a very gruesome and realistic picture of Alexander, beyond the myth. 10/10 for me.

Honorable mentions: The Song of Aquiles by Madelline Miller, Battle Royale by Koushun Takani.

Tagging: @definedareasofuncertainty, @misssophiachase, @amandakc, @austennerdita2533, @purplesigebert, @sekretny and anyone else who might want to do this. :) Tag me back so I can see your book list, I love that!

[prowerprojects]

I will not lie, I'm easily bought over by cute Sonknux and Sonamy interactions (Sometimes I hate how easy I am to bait)

But I'm still a bit disappointed by the fact that Tails is once again relegated to mission control... And he's billed as "the sidekick" once again as well... (And why do they keep using such an unflattering pucture of him??)

I guess I could gloss over it because Frontiers hasn't yet happened in the idw universe, that with it starting off with Forces and MV being the last major event they had to go through (as confirmed in the special itself). But the special also has Sonic calling Tails "partner", which is a cute Frontiers reference... except Sonic calling Tails "partner" is supposed to be Sonic's direct response to finding out about Tails's problems during the events of the game and switching up the nickname to assert Tails as his equal. Having him call Tails that even before that kind of cheapens it. But whatever. Chalk it up to a badly placed reference.

And I guess this issue is the right way to utilize Tails, why shouldn't he be providing support, figuring out how to dispose of the problem while Sonic is doing the legwork and calling up the allies? (He is the support character. He is "the sidekick". I guess. But I also wish people didn't give credit to idw for not writing him as just a sidekick because this is literally how he's described in his introduction box)

But I don't know. I don't actually hate the way he's written in the special itself, it just once again reminds me that despite being probably the most often appearing character after Sonic, Tails has never gotten a story that explores him as a person? (Aside from that one Classic Special which is great! But also like. It's his anniversary special. They were basically forced to write about him and isn't that sad) Maybe a couple of panels that show that he's still a person and isn't just a magic box that fixes up robots and provides exposition, but not an actual story.

I was so excited for Kit's inclusion because wow! An antagonist forTails. We've had a bunch of evil versions for Sonic before, but for Tails? What would Tails's relationship with his evil doppelganger be? How would having one affect him? Isn't that intriguing? And the Tails & Kit first interaction fight is probably my favourite Tails scene in the entire book. But afterwards? How silly I was thinking that Kit's inclusion was meant to explore Tails as a character. No. Neither of them gives a shit about the other as soon as Sonic enters the picture. (And now that Kit is around Tails is never gonna stop getting billed as "the sidekick", we gotta parallel them or whatever) It's all about Sonic, Sonic, Sonic. Even when Tails does something cool someone (maybe even himself) has to comment on how good of a job Sonic did raising him. Sonic getting credit for everything Tails does because isn't he such an amazing big bwother.

I'm upset not because I like being a hater, but because I get hopeful but keep being disappointed. I guess I just have to accept that the people currently writing the comics don't really like or care about Tails and stop expecting anything. (And liking or disliking a character is a completely neutral thing, it's not a moral failing or anything. I'm not condemning them for it. But also he's my favourite character and I can't help it if I feel upset about it. )

Yeah this post kinda went off the rails... but this is just how I feel. Can't make anyone like my favourite character, but also can't stop myself from being upset about him being underused.

Cute picture of Tails to brighten my mood (and yours after reading all of that).

Also nice to see the return of the M.E. Junior after it got destroyed in Urban Warfare.

[nanowrimo]

3 Things NaNoWriMo Taught Me That I Didn’t Learn In College

NaNoWriMo can teach you a lot about writing, especially if you’re not used to writing novels! Ellen Relac talks about three valuable things she’s learned as a NaNo participant.

I concentrated in creative writing with a short story emphasis at UCLA. My technical writing improved greatly and my prose was able to develop its own distinct and unique style because of the amazing instruction I received there. However, writing a novel brought up three challenges I had never encountered in my short story career.

1. All the ways long form writing differs from the art of the short story

The short story process often entails a fight to keep said story short. You can’t dwell on irrelevant events or dabble outside the scope of the story you’re telling. I have often had to take out entire extraneous scenes to let my short stories stand on their own and affirm my confidence that they contain all the information they need to be a story worth reading.

I’m used to the compulsive concision of a neat short story, as well as my own personal habit of delivering exposition through breezy lines that cover entire seasons (“Spring turned into fall, but Jessie never once looked out the window to notice the change”). The contrasting challenge of filling an entire novel with things happening forced me to do the opposite of condensing my plot and let it breathe.

Recognizing the challenge of filling the page (of the hundreds of pages—in my specific case, 197) doesn’t even begin to get at the mounting challenges of continuity. If you, like me, enjoy throwing in random details as flavoring, you’d better remember that that second-chair flutist is named Cormac Ingalls and that he and Sierra are two years older than the protagonists.

Sometimes during NaNo, it felt frivolous to add scenes depicting idle conversation or day-to-day interactions. Allowing myself to recognize these scenes as pivotal opportunities for characters to develop was key to my understanding the art of the first draft.

2. The uncomfortable truth that being “good” is the wrong goal

Writing a novel in a month is a Herculean endeavor. I think the well-adjusted writer considers themselves lucky if they make any progress that feels substantial during NaNoWriMo. You don’t have to hit 50K to make potentially life-changing progress. It’s natural that doubts crop up about the quality of your writing, but do not let this dissuade you from accomplishing the amazing task you’ve undertaken! I truly would not have finished my draft if I had allowed myself to go down the rabbit holes I occasionally eyed of “this book probably sucks.”

Bottom line, it’s okay to suck sometimes. But you’ll rarely be any good if you don’t make peace with the possibility of sucking first.

3. You can write so much more than you think!

Focusing on the short story in college allowed me to hone my writing abilities with a micro-lens. I had to embrace the exact opposite of this in Nano.

I’ve gotten away before with letting a story flow out of me the two days before it was due and giving just the palest skim of a revision before finalizing it. NaNoWriMo demands much more.

It demands that you cajole yourself into writing the bare minimum on days when you would rather bathe in Elmer’s Glue than hit your word goal. It demands that you get your laptop out on the Wifi-less commuter train en route to a weekend visiting friends so you don’t fall too far behind. It demands that you carve out a five-hour day to slog through the 3000 words you need to make up on the following Monday. It demands that you are creative, clever, and extremely persistent in problem-solving. It demands an astonishing level of self-discipline and tenacity. It demands a set of triage skills (mostly to save yourself in those moments when your book appears an irredeemable wreck).

Rising to this challenge, though, pays infinite dividends. You emerge from the process of drafting a book—particularly your first—insanely proud of the difficult thing you’ve done. It gives you enough confidence to qualify as one of the best cures for imposter syndrome imaginable. NaNoWriMo gives you a community to cheer you on, a particularly satisfying word-tracking meter, and best of all, the indescribable boost that comes from doing the would-be impossible. It’s probably far more possible than you think.

Ellen Relac is an LA-based actress, writer, and photographer originally from the southwest of Connecticut. This year, she's kept busy graduating from UCLA, producing a film (https://www.instagram.com/bedtimefilm/) and tackling her first novel. Current favorite books include Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, The Firekeeper's Daughter, and Daisy Jones and the Six. Photo by Hadis Malekie on Unsplash

[metawatts]

Justice League x RWBY: Super Heroes and Huntsmen Part One

I've been workshopping this review for a week it is 9 fucking pages but anyway: It's dangerous to go alone! Take this!

Table of Contents

#1. Introduction: Not for DC Fans

#2. Starting off: “The Good-

#3. Propping Up RWBY over the Justice League

#4. The Texas Character Massacre

#5. Oh boy lets talk about the writing

#6. Other General Notes: -The Bad, and The Ugly”

#7. Final Scores!!

TL:DR- They better not make the 'part 2'. Let's get into it.

#1. Introduction: Not for DC Fans

Let’s get this out of the way: this is a movie made for RWBY fans. It’s made for people who are familiar with RWBY, with the characters, with the worldbuilding, and it’s made with the idea that the people watching are RWBY fans, with DC fans as the backburner. The first reason why I think this? The DC characters get a lot more exposition on who and what they are, while the RWBY characters get to exist and be ‘cool’.

The second reason? This movie is, lets face it, mean-spirited towards DC. And yeah whatever, a DC comic writer wrote this, but to be fair with the state of comics nowadays that says absolutely nothing about respect given to the characters that are popular and well-known (hint: it’s not RWBY). This movie is drenched in schoolyard meanness. It’s all about pointing and laughing at the DC characters. Our introductory scene to this film involves Superman being systematically humiliated in his first scene (unable to use his powers, having his hero codename be mocked, etc.), and that sets the tone.

Meanwhile, the RWBY characters are introduced with action set pieces and knowing about the world they are in. The DC characters are the ones who are comedic relief, who need to be ‘taken down a peg’, who must struggle and prove themselves to RWBY to get the ‘honour’ of working with them, while RWBY doesn’t have to struggle and instead gets to just be ‘cool’. And that’s detrimental to the RWBY characters as well too, by the way, so don’t think I’m being unfair. No one in this film has a character arc, except Jessica, supposedly, and Batman, unfortunately, and you would think that coming off the back of volume 9, often called the ‘character development’ volume, people would be complaining that RWBY and JNR are quite flat, in how they progress through the film.

Basically: The RWBY characters are set dressing; the Justice League are punching bags. With that as our thesis, let’s review this movie. (warning for spoilers)

#2. Starting Off: “The Good-

Now, I won’t pretend this movie was enjoyable for me by any means, but I’m not unreasonable, it had its positives. Four, specifically.

The first one is obvious: the Spectacle Fight Scenes. This movie had a bunch of fights packed away in it, and the overall quality of them was on the whole, in the higher tier of rwby’s Maya fight scenes. Bar a few bits of wonkiness and the general writing surrounding the fights, they were fun. A particular shout-out to my favourite one at the end, Hacked!Flash vs Everyone, that one was fun and fast and highly enjoyable.

Number 2: Batman’s semblance. I’ll fully admit that I’m pretty sure my enjoyment of this power implementation was purely because I like Batman: Arkham Asylum, and this is literally just ripped right from that down to the aesthetics, but, well- I like Batman: Arkham Asylum, and therefore I like Bruce’s Detective Vision semblance and how it was used pretty creatively compared to most other semblances.

Third times the charm: Superman was my shining light, my beacon of hope in this film. He was kind, he was polite, he was supportive and brave and friendly and also, surprisingly for RWBY, managed to do all this without being spineless, he was willing to stand up for himself when he thought he was being treated unfairly (at least, 80% of the time). I wouldn’t even normally consider myself a massive Superman fan, I like when he’s well-written and I notice when he isn’t, but this movie had me actively rooting for any time where he was on screen, he was my absolute highlight in this film, love him even if his fit is fuckin ATROCIOUS. (and his voice acting was, by and large, one of the strongest performances, beyond Kilg%re and Hacked!Barry, who were just clearly having a delightful time villain monologuing)

Number four: the idea of Grimm absorbing dust. It’s a brilliant idea that really ups the stakes in RWBY fights, considering dust is their go-to offensive weapon and literally powers all their bullets, and, amazingly, it was also a cool idea that was carried throughout most of the film. Every Grimm in this film had the ability, more or less, and they used it often and to great effect. Very nicely implemented.

(Final tiny shout-out: the Justice League’s superhero outfits in their own world, that we regrettably only see in a few flashback images, looked GOOD. I wish they kept them instead of getting the outfits in the film proper)

But alas, this film really did have a lot more negatives than positives, so lets get into the first big flaw, and the one I would consider the movie’s biggest failing:

#3. Propping Up RWBY over the Justice League

I mentioned it in the intro, but this movie is consistent in how it utterly devalues the Justice League characters and does everything in its power to showcase RWBY and JNR as ‘better’ in every way. Now, the argument is that this is intentional, seeing as the villain deliberately nerfed the JL characters into being teenagers to weaken them. To which case I point at probably what is probably the most referenced episode of the Justice League cartoon in regards to this movie, the one where they’re turned into literal children, appropriately named ‘Kid Stuff’, and I’ll also point out the lesser known episode of Justice League Action called ‘Trick or Threat’, which had the added bonus of wiping the JL character’s memories of being superheroes.

Now, why am I bringing these up? Its because both of these episodes had the same villain idea as this movie: de-age the Justice League to weaken them, and both of these episodes also did something that the movie failed to do: keep the characters in-character and acting their age, and treat them with respect. I’ll get to the character issues in the next section, but the idea of treating characters respectfully is not done in this film.

Superman, as stated prior, is nerfed, his name is made fun of, he’s talked down to constantly, he’s insulted, he’s distrusted, and not just by team RWBY. But he is not the only one. Wonder Woman has a mishap when trying to get the hang of her new abilities and Blake and Yang laugh at her. Flash, Vixen, Cyborg, and Green Lantern spar against JNR and despite still maintaining most of their adult memories beyond the immediate, and supposedly their skills minus powers, end up on the defensive. Against JNR, not even against the main team RWBY or against Pyrrha. They are outclassed by the side-character team. Batman, the hand-to-hand specialist, is outclassed by Weiss in close-quarters and then a few random SDC guards, Wonder Woman and Superman mostly escape unscathed, beyond the new drawbacks of their semblances, but it’s telling that most of the fight scenes are more focused on the cool things RWBY and JNR do instead of the JL characters (bar the Big Three). Cyborg’s biggest combat moment that’s given any narrative weight is him powering up Nora. Vixen doesn’t even get a moment, and Flash’s only moments come when he’s being the Villain and not Flash. The JL characters are supporting characters in a movie that’s supposed to be about teamwork.

Second point: they really hype Grimm up as scary, even stating ‘Grimm aren’t like your normal monsters, they’re soulless beings that only care about destroying and killing’. And it’s treated as a big moment of internal revelation and horror for the Justice League. Let me say that again, the fact that monsters only care about destroying things, is played as horrifying. For the Justice League. The guys who faced down, canonically in this film: Vandal Savage, an immortal sadistic genius who literally just wants to destroy the world consistently, and Brainiac, a hyper-intelligent alien android who’s goals range from ‘destroyed krypton in some continuities’ to ‘hobbies include horrifically mind controlling people to do evil and shrinking Actual Cities for his snow-globe collection’.

But yes. Grimm are scary now. These are the same Grimm that basically act as cannon fodder in all of RWBY’s actual run time, bar one-offs, and exist just to give the protagonists something they can guilt-free rip their way through to show off. Those Grimm. Those are the scary ones now, supposedly. Despite this artificial attempt to make RWBY seem more badass then the league for fighting monsters, the Grimm are still cannon fodder, the movie doesn’t stray that far from RWBY’s conventions.

Finally, there’s a consistent running theme that ties into the leadership qualities of Ruby vs Clark, but mostly ends up as ‘the Justice League try to come up with ideas and plans, and team RWBY and JNR yell at them for daring to tell them what to do’. Most particularly, it’s Wonder Woman, Superman, and Batman who actually spark Team RWBY into realising that there’s a problem that needs solving. It’s them that comes up with 90% of the plans, and its them that put their money where their mouth is on being not only a good team and smart heroes, but also as friends (more on that later). But instead, whenever they come up with good ideas, it’s shut down, mostly by Nora, and also Yang, as ‘I’m not going to listen to you/don’t tell us what to do/you’re not the boss of me’.

There’s a very big sense of undeserved ego there, especially since the RWBY characters haven’t actually given a reason why they shouldn’t listen beyond general contrariness. But also, it’s a sentiment that does not work on a battlefield, and it does not work in a movie that tries to have a theme of ‘coming together’. Mostly because in a standard plotline about ‘working together’, the disagreements usually require resolving, or meeting in the middle. There is none of that here. The Justice League just bends the knee and goes with being mistreated by teenagers who have not shown their chops as heroes, but it’s still given the ending of ‘we’re all friends now’. The first of many character assassinations throughout this film.

#4. The Texas Character Massacre

This one’s a doozy. No one escapes. Not even Superman, who is almost entirely spared, even he gets a dose of a ‘RWBY Heroic Speech that is just Empty Token Hero Stuff’ (AKA the thing that’s been plaguing Ruby since vol4). But I’ve used Superman already a lot, and he’s probably the least egregious of what happens here, so let’s get into the meat of this topic.

Everyone and their mom on twitter has been commenting about how Batman does not feel like Batman in this. And it’s true. Batman, the self-admitted ‘I haven’t been a kid since I was eight’, the man who is so obsessed with Gotham City it will one day kill him, the man who, even if in this continuity is not a father of 4-8+ adopted children, still has Alfred who he would die for and would die for him, the man who in the current comics run of RWBY in the DC universe says with his mouth ‘I don’t want this semblance, relying on it is detrimental in the long-term’. This Batman. Wants to ditch Gotham because he has wings and powers now.

‘Batman getting powers’ is not new ground, by the way, but the absolute moping this version of Batman does is not only annoying and actively unlikable, it also makes no sense. In the span of ten seconds, in the same conversation, he goes from ‘I want to go home’ to ‘I want to stay where I have powers’. This isn’t presented as a conflict of interest either, by the way. He just completely switches his mind because Weiss said ‘hey stay here’. There’s no consistency, there’s no internal character motivation, it felt like they just wanted to have one character conflicted about leaving HoloRemnant and decided just to throw a dart at a board without caring who it fit. So yes, Batman? Massacred.

Wonder Woman also got severely screwed over too. I had this in my notes that Wonder Woman only acted in character when she was reuniting with the rest of the Justice League and was allowed to show kindness and compassion. The rest of the time, Wonder Woman, a character defined by her love for the world (and was created to showcase feminine power, btw), is a Strong Female Character, and I do mean that in the Negative Way. She’s literally got a Batman Growl on her voice for 99% of her lines, she talks about how tough she is, about the ‘warrior’s life’, and she’s the first character to get violent in a situation. Yes, even beating out Yang ‘punch first, talk later’ Xiao Long. This feels like a parody of Wonder Woman written by someone who read the Whedon Wonder Woman script and took ‘some crazy strong bitch in a tiara’ as their entire central concept for the character. It’s not a Wonder Woman who believes in anything, she’s just a sidekick for the bees to prop themselves up with as ‘warriors’. I could write a million thinkpieces on what makes Wonder Woman an excellent hero character, but all I’ll say is this film’s Wonder Woman would not count.

Green Lantern will get her own post on how this movie handled her so fucking badly because that would balloon this review to a massive size when it’s already a Longk Boi, but suffice to say: she was whitewashed, her anxiety was mishandled, and fucking HELL I miss Simon Baz, why are we erasing Jessica’s friendship with Simon for some screentime-sucking white boy. (Racism and islamophobia, the answer is racism and islamophobia)

Cyborg, Flash, and Vixen all aren’t really characters in this movie as much as they are there to fill out the cast, but suffice to say, they were handled badly. Flash was at his most interesting when being visibly possessed by the villain because beyond that he was just entirely forgettable to the point that you will not notice he has been written out of a fight scene until Vixen goes ‘where’s Flash’. Vixen herself literally is the most sidelined of all the characters in this film, she doesn’t even get a Cool Action Moment, and has just two character traits: Sassy and Vaguely Animalistic Sometimes, not just because she’s a faunus, but her first scene we’re introduced to her sniffing a paper plane for what is literally the only ‘plot point’ she’s involved in, namely, that Flash ‘smells wrong’. And Cyborg. Man, Cyborg. They literally handed the hacking plotline to Weiss with the excuse of ‘the tech here is weird’ and instead shoved Cyborg into some weird jealousy triangle where he was so disrespected by Ren and Nora that even his goodbye to them is met with disdain. Cyborg and Vixen deserve so much better, guys.

Now, onto team RWBY and JNR. Remember how I said they were flat characters? Yeah, this bit’s gonna be a bit shorter. Ruby had probably the most ‘characterisation’ in the film, in that they literally just took volume 9’s idea of ‘Ruby has self-doubts’, slapped it on her, explored nothing, and then Clark gave her a quick Friendship Speech and she’s all smiley again. Weiss has a bit of flirting with Batman, suddenly gained hacking abilities out of nowhere, and is mainly the ‘nice but snobby’ archetype she’s been in main RWBY for ages. Actually, Weiss, Blake, Yang, and Jaune all mainly exist to serve plot points in some way. Weiss and her little storyline with Batman is just designed to reveal the villain, Jaune is there to push Jessica’s storyline of getting her powers back by Literally Curing Her Panic Attacks, and Blake and Yang? Well, they get Wonder Woman to the places she needs to visit, first Beacon, then Atlas, and then Vale again. Oh, and they have Moments. Your mileage may vary on if that’s good or not, it’s mainly superfluous to the film overall. Ren and Nora don’t actually contribute anything, beyond Ren being jealous of Cyborg and Nora, and Nora getting mad at both of them for being overly protective (I think it’s meant to be pushback against misogyny but. It’s poorly handled).

Actually, I lie. Blake does have at least one big thing of characterisation. But I’m going to put it in the next section, because it’s more of a writing problem. The final other characters in the film are Kilg%re, our villain, who is laughable, and the simulated versions of Glynda, Kali, Jacques, Ozpin/Oscar, and Pyrrha. All of whom are there just to… show that it’s a simulation, or something. They don’t do anything beyond Pyrrha being so obviously a trap for Jaune and Jessica that of course only Jaune ignoring Jessica’s common sense could have made it worse. Now, Onwards!!

#5. Oh boy lets talk about the writing

So. The Faunus racism plotline. Listen. It’s bad. We all know its bad. I’m not going into it because there are a million people smarter then me who already have done elaborate and well-thought analyses on why its bad. Can we just accept the Faunus plotline is horrendous and go from there? Okay? Okay.

So: Blake introduces the concept of faunus by describing her own race as ‘humans with ears or a tail’. As I saw someone else put it when the movie dropped, ‘people don’t describe themselves as a white person with darker skin’. Anyway, the faunus plotline. It’s not really touched on in this film beyond Jacques being racist towards Bruce and Blake being generally weird about it, and the idea that ‘the animal-themed superheroes are faunus now’, but it’s a plotline that RWBY will never escape and therefore must be mentioned as having some impact.

So lets talk about the actual racism in the movie and mention how the black woman is a Sassy Side Character, the two men of colour are shoved into a jealousy plotline over a white girl (again, reiterating: Weiss and Bruce have the hacking plotline), and the Latina girl has a white boy solve her mental illness for her after her character design was whitewashed. While I don’t think it’s intentionally racist, it is a bit of a pattern for all of RWBY’s stuff that characters of colour are either written off, villainised, or sidelined. I also want to mention: Oscar shows up in this literally just to get slammed hard into a pillar by Wonder Woman. They really can’t go five minutes without beating up this kid). This movie is not kind to the characters of colour, whether its by Actively Fucking Whitewashing Them or by just making them non-characters, and it’s just, unfortunately, exactly what was expected from a piece of RWBY media.

The mention of Oscar above reminded me: the simulation characters are… handled oddly. Ozpin is the most obviously fake, even before he starts glitching between his old self and Ozpin. But what’s strange is that out of all the simulations, Jacques of all characters has the most personality of them. Kali was always a side character, Glynda just creates exposition and sets up a fight scene, Ozpin isn’t even given a character he’s just Creepy Hologram, and Pyrrha has about one minute of ‘no wait its totally me’ before she goes The Most Evil (sidenote, they keep bringing Pyrrha back just to be evil, I hope that’s not another pattern). It’s just… strange. The way the whole villain thing in this film works is strange. Which leads me to:

Kilg%re. When I found out who the villain of this film was I went on the mother of all rants on discord. And I will post it here for posterity, just so you know exactly what the gut reaction was.

As for why this reveal sucks: well. I mean, first of all, if you introduce the concept of your surprise villain as a joke earlier in the film, which they did, then it doesn’t really make them feel all that villainous. Sure enough, it gave Kilg%re a chip on the shoulder in his villain monologue, where he was whining about being ‘the one who finally trapped the Justice League’ (bestie they’re a superhero team from comics, they get trapped once a week and twice on Sundays, you’re not special, babe, sorry). And a character desperately yelling at the screen that ‘no I’m really cool trust me’ is not… fun. It’s just sort of awkward. Sorry, Kilg%re, they treated you badly. Also, they didn’t reveal the second villain on Remnant’s side beyond saying ‘he’, even when setting this during the Vol7 Montage, so I guess that’s a mystery for the next movie, if it’s ever made (personally I’m hoping for Dr Merlot, why not).

On the flipside of villains being written badly, this film also has romance written badly. It’s just jealousy and love triangles, jealousy and love triangles. Not even interesting love triangles either, just ‘character A shows interest in character B, which makes character C get really possessive and (in all but one case) mean to B’. The As: Cyborg, Yang, Bruce. The Bs: Nora, Diana, Weiss. The Cs: Ren, Blake, Diana (again). It’s not cute, and it’s especially not cute when it’s repeated three times in the same film. It’s just boring.

Finally: and this is the thing that truly, genuinely, made me want to write this whole thing because of how rage inducing it is, is this monologue given to us by Blake:

"They sound lucky. They've never had to worry they were gonna die just from going to school. To train like your life, or worse, your friends' lives depend on it. To have to live with the fact that there's a real chance you're gonna lose them. They had a childhood."

Lets count it down, people!!

Superman: literally an allegory for illegal immigrants, refugee orphans (an alien who was adopted and raised in America after his home was made unsafe) and in many case Jewish people, what with all the Moses Allegory. Had to hide the fact that he was an alien all his life, starting from childhood.

Batman: watched his parents get gunned down in front of him at age 8. This is so integral an event that it is a fulcrum point not only of his character, but also of most of the main Dc Universe that Bruce’s Parents Die.

Flash: his mother was murdered in front of him by a time-travelling speedster and his father was arrested for it. Barry grew up with the stigma of having a murderer for a father who he is generally seen as visiting constantly in jail.

Cyborg: he is a disabled black man whose father fused him with alien technology to keep him alive after a near-death experience that also completely replaced 90% of his body and meant he had to give up on his dreams of being a sports star. Usually also has a dead mom around there too.

Green Lantern: a Latina woman who had a decent childhood by most accounts in the comics, but had the unfortunate luck of witnessing gangsters hiding a body while out hiking with her friends. Watched her friends get gunned down around her, spent the next four years extremely agoraphobic to the point of never leaving her apartment because of her trauma and the fear that the gangsters would finish the job. Family’s alive, but that was only the start of the ‘Jessica Has A Bad Time’ train.

Vixen: Mari’s backstory is a bit more nebulous as long as the main points of ‘was born in an African village, got the tantu totem, moved to America and became a superhero and usually also a model’ is met, but she also tends to have a dead mom or dead parents floating around too most of the time, whether that’s by poachers, warlords, or some other awful human-caused tragedy.

Wonder Woman: raised on an island that was in comics literally called 'Paradise Island' by her loving mother, trained with all her Amazon family to become a warrior, the island is explicitly protected from all of the evil of Man’s World by magic, and willingly chose to leave to go do good and protect people.

So we have one princess raised on a paradisal island ethnostate with loving, caring parents telling another princess raised on a paradisal island ethnostate with loving caring parents that ‘yeah your friends have horrific backstories, but they were lucky because they didn’t do what we did and WILLINGLY sign up for a job as a monster killer where we get four years of training and preparation and also are paid well for our actions instead of freelance vigilante work for charity, so if you think about it, us RWBY kids are the real victims/warriors here’.

Just in case anyone was wondering why I think Wonder Woman’s OOC in this film.

Oh also this monologue is an allegory for gun violence and school shootings, as confirmed by the writer in this article and I am including the quote for posterity and also so people can’t say I made it up: https://animemojo.com/other/exclusive-interview-with-justice-league-x-rwby-super-heroes-huntsmen-writer-meghan-fitzmartin-a14773#gs.w1iou8

“These kids are warriors and these RWBY kids are a really good look at what we’re putting a lot of kids through today. There’s a statistic I saw recently that said 1-in-5 kids will die in gun violence in America. That sucks. That’s the level of warrior stuff we’re putting our kids through and it’s a good example of what’s happening to this current generation. I wanted to make a point of saying, ‘What does that do to us?’ Looking into the leadership or what these characters go through, it’s interesting to see what they have to give up to give future generations a chance. I think that resonates a lot with kids today.” - Meghan Fitzmartin

Just. In case anyone else wants to be angry about this with me. Hey, RWBY, you can’t have the actual tagline of your show be ‘it’s also a gun’ and then go ‘gun violence is bad tho’ because oh man then your main characters look like real monsters for all the times they pull guns on people (such as all the unarmed civilians or people who they pulled guns on first who then pulled out their own guns in self-defence). Also, if this is one of the themes of the movie, then this is also the only time it’s touched on. The concept of ‘being a warrior’ becomes instantly watered down to mean ‘badass fighter’ and not ‘person carrying constant fear of death by rising gun violence’, so it’s also a really shallow use of an actually serious theme, which is par for the course with RWBY but is also still very annoying when it happens.

#6. Other General Notes: - the Bad, and the Ugly”

The music in this film was very weak. No hate to the composer but it’s barely noticeable and doesn’t really have anything of note. Normally I find a lot of DC stuff has decent music and RWBY in particular is praised for it. This was disappointing, audio-wise

The designs: Listen, RWY and JNR were fine, the Beacon designs are serviceable even if they aren’t my favourites overall. But anyway, lets rank the Justice League, best to worst!

#1. Vixen: even, somehow, in the world that is RWBY modelling, Vixen slays. She simply cannot look bad, ever. The focus on black and orange contrast instead of a million eye-searing colours, the sleekness of the jumpsuit, the fact that it’s not overly complicated, and that she actually has hair with curls in it? If not for the tail and the fact that it is literally just Harriet’s model, top points. You cannot keep a bad bitch down.

#2. Cyborg: Listen. It could have been worse. It could have been. So much worse.

#3. Wonder Woman: girlypop’s gonna cut someone on that chin, and her arm muscles look like braided bread. The ponytail would be passable if not for the way they modelled her hair tendrils, and the outfit… also could have been worse.

#4. Superman: The babyface and the way his hair is plastered to his head does not work, but I like how expressive his eyes are. The outfit is an atrocity to god but they all are from this point so at least his boots are cute and the whole denim jeans and denim jacket would work if they didn’t have that massive gold S on the shirt or the Fake Cape.

#5. Batman: ugly as sin. He has No Hood, Cowl, or Mask, his hair is bad, the scar on the eyebrow is the one cool thing, his outfit is awful, and when it’s folded up it looks like Weiss is swinging around an empty pizza box. Gotta say, at least the ears in the comic were kinda cute, the bat wings are just bland in comparison.

#6. Flash: Sir your zipper is in the shape of a zigzag and it’s very cringefail of you. The one redeeming feature is the visor but like, the hair? No. The scarf? No. The way they placed the colours on his outfit? Yikes. Throw the whole man out, Kilg%re did.

#7. Green Lantern: they put her in a blender with Ben 10 and hit ‘emulsify’ (this is insulting to Ben 10 which I am very sorry for, Ben 10 didn’t deserve this but then again neither did Jess). Her long curly hair is gone, her melanin is gone, her cute jumpsuit is gone, her brown eyes are GONE like I had my issues with the comic designs but at least it was a design and not just Ugly Bad Wrong.  

Final note: they really want us to believe that Batman beat up a guy and stole his tuxedo to blend in but during the entire time he was changing out of his hero costume and into a suit he somehow didn’t notice a pair of big honking WINGS on his back. Yeah right.

#7. Final Scores!!!

Plot: 2/10

Characters: -100/10

Spectacle Fights: 4/10

Themes: 1/10

Overall score, not including the points for ‘characters’: 2.5/10

Do NOT make another fucking movie with this premise. (I will write up Jessica's personal meta in the future, keep an eye out).

[cosmicjoke]

Alright, last post on this shit, but I just want to clarify, I'm not mad Gojo died, and that isn't the reason in and of itself why I'm hating so hard on JJK. Hell, some of my favorite manga's end up with my favorite characters dead. I'm hating on this manga because the writing is trash. It's bad writing and that's all there is to it. Gojo dying makes sense thematically, but the way we got here makes no sense at all, and Gojo saying Sukana didn't ever go all out renders everything that's happened in this months long fight meaningless. That's such bad writing, I don't even have the words. It means we just went through three months of some of the most dragged out, boring af chapters for NOTHING. That's the definition of wasting the readers time. On top of that, JJK has turned into almost pure exposition at this point, just one pointless fight after another, having to sift through endless narrator boxes explaining yet ANOTHER cursed technique that nobody gives a shit about, with no plot progression or character development, and then Gojo just gets offed, off screen mind you, so we don't even get to see how or why it happened. No, like usual, we're TOLD why it happened, some horse shit about the "world" being cut in half. WhatEVER. Gege sucks. You don't tell the audience what happened, you're supposed to SHOW, but this manga has been almost ALL telling. That's why I'm so down on it. It's just terrible. Worst writing ever. And I'm mad because I've invested years in this crap, forcing myself to read through chapter after chapter every week, not skimming, and I feel like I've wasted my time. It's obvious that Gege doesn't have any sort of actually interesting plan in place, that most of what's gone on in this manga for the past three years isn't actually going anywhere. Gojo had to die so one of his students could assume the mantel of "the strongest", that was always obviously going to happen, but none of the events leading up to this point have any seeming relevance or point. Gojo's whole fight with Sukana was pointless, because he never posed any threat to him in the first place. Fine, if it had been a fight to the death, and Sukana barely got away with his life, that would make more sense. But not this trash. I don't trust Gege at all anymore because of this. You get invested in something that seems to be happening, and then in one panel, he just undoes all of that investment and tells you none of it mattered at all. Like the whole plot point of getting the governments of the world involved that went no where. That's this whole manga. Just pointless.

Ah well, whatever. I'm going back to anticipating the conclusion of SnK now. Can't wait for that. Can't believe anyone ever compared JJK to SnK on any level.

[solarishashernoseinabook]

Solaris reviews Murder as a Second Language, by Joan Hess (2013)

Me: I should've turned this book into a drinking game. Take a shot every time it's racist. Take two every time Claire's a bitch. etc etc Angel: You'd be dead. You'd be in an ambulance and Claire would be withholding your insurance card

Content: I thought the first eleven pages were bad and rage-inducing. Folks i had no idea what I was getting myself into, oh my god.

Who I think would like it: Someone who likes cosy murder mysteries, who feels like turning their brain off for a bit to read something low-stakes.

Things it does well: On a purely technical level, the writing was competent. No major plot holes, unless you count Claire flip-flopping about her motivation to volunteer. Red herrings are successfully set up and disposed of, and clues were laid effectively.

Things that could be improved: The dialogue was a major weak point. Exposition was shoved into sentences without any thought to how difficult that would make them to read, and Caron didn't talk like a seventeen year old. Keiko's grasp of English (as well as Jiang's, frankly) got better or worse depending on the paragraph. The racism, of course, was bad, but Claire was by far the weakest point in the novel. I've read trashy books, but never have I read a character so unintentionally unlikable. Not all protagonists have to be good, upstanding people, but they should at least be compelling - think Fight Club, or The Godfather. Claire was neither likeable nor compelling, I can't see any interest she and her husband have in each other besides wanting to bang, and Caron is an insufferable brat. I'm glad my time with them is over.

My review: The last book I reviewed that was anywhere near this terrible was The Great Zoo of China. As I vented about this book on Discord with Angel, I couldn't help but compare them. The Great Zoo of China is objectively worse on a writing level. Riley's writing was repetitive, basic, and kept defining words for us (you'll recall the line, "The hole was already four storeys - or forty feet - deep."). And, while Claire and Caron were unbearable characters, at least they were characters - no one in TGZoC had any identifiable personality. Initially, I was firm in my conviction that TGZoC was more racist, but by the endpoint of MAASL I was starting to rethink that. Riley's racism was very targeted, specifically calling negative attention at the Chinese characters in his book. Hess's racism is equal-opportunity: everyone who's not a White US American is a fair target for stereotyping and hate. Riley's racism was extreme enough that I don't see most people openly agreeing with it - remember, Riley openly stated that Chinese people are inherently uncreative and only useful as manual labourers to help white people. Hess's racism is banal, common, the sort of thing your apparently decent co-worker might let slip one day without realising they said anything off while you're left scrambling at how to explain that it's not okay. Both are damaging and hurtful in their own ways, but Hess's is so much more normalised that many of her readers are likely to laugh it off as a joke, or try to forgive it by saying Hess is a product of her time. Look, I like cosy murder mysteries. Sure, a lot of them are the equivalent of literary potato chips, but I still read them. But there are much better ones than Murder as a Second Language, so don't waste your time on this one.

Does this book have…: ✅= yes ❓= not sure ⭕= possibly/mixed ❌= no Romance? ✅ Claire is (supposedly) happily married, and keeps going on about her dream husband. Miao and Jiang are engaged, Caron and Inez are boy obsessed, and dating features heavily in the background of the book. Sex? ✅ No on-screen sex or masturbation, but there are frequent references to it. The only thing Claire and Peter seem to like about each other is the possibility of sex, and references to their escapades are frequent in the novel. There's also a perverted old man in a senior's centre who sexually harasses Claire (all in good fun, apparently (sarcasm)) and also tries to grope her. Racism? ✅ So, so, so much. The best I can say for this book is that, unlike TGZaC, it didn't drop any quasi-slurs. I've covered the racism against Asian characters, but Hess is no better towards anyone else - one the book's two Black character is very large and physically intimidating to every white woman who meets him, and Claire automatically assumes any Arabic men she encounters are violent and misogynistic. Sexism? ✅ Yes, with a racial element. All three of the East Asian women in the book are small, demure, and youthful. It's considered a twist that Keiko, the program co-ordinator, is old enough to be married with kids. Miao exists only to be a sexual object for the men around her. On the other hand, the Eastern European women who feature in the book - Ludmila, a Polish woman, and Yelena, from Russia - were both written with sexist, unflattering stereotypes of loud, overbearing, tough European grandmothers. LGBTQIA-phobia? ⭕ Remember in the 2000s, when "metrosexual" was used to insult any man who brushed his teeth and wore clean clothes? Yeah, Hess unironically uses that term on page 20. Other than that, no mentions of queer characters at all. Ableism? ✅ ⭕ One off-hand use of the term "psychopath" at some point, but that's about it Swearing? ❌ Drug/Alcohol references? ✅ References to marijuana with the sort of gravity typical of the early 2010s, and a lot of drinking - as well as the implication that various characters drove tipsy References to or actual violence or suicide? ✅ Well, it is a murder mystery, after all. In addition, Greg's former wife died by suicide before the story starts, which is referenced in detail later on. References to or actual animal death or cruelty? ✅ ⭕ There's references early on to a dead bird left for someone to find as a threat, but nothing on-screen

Recommended: Hells no

[kob131]

Velma Episode 1 Thoughts

“So, how’s that promise to not watch the Velma show go-”

*Sees a list of Youtube reviews*

“...May as well check out for myself then.”

-Wow, you guys are trying so fucking hard to cause a rise out of people. This is some of the most pathetic baiting I have ever seen. And I’m autistic- I am literally wired to not get this stuff.

-And because I’m feeling cruel-

‘Tall handsome guy given even more power’- Ever heard of Spider man?

‘Oh hey, what made this hot chick go crazy?’- Ever heard of Samus Aran?

-’Not Fred and his creepy sex van’. Five bucks says you end up riding around in that ‘creepy sex van’ with Fred giving you orders because your show will be tanking so hard you’ll need to pander to the original audience to survive.

And as an original fan, I say ‘die in a ditch’

-’I hate Daphne. >:(’ Wow, the nerdy girl hates the popular, conventionally pretty girl. Real great work subverting those stereotypes. Especially since that notebook has ‘Velma Dinkley-Jones’ written in it too.

Fun fact, my own little Team STRQ headcanon has Raven and Summer hating each other’s guts due to ideological differences (Raven believes that people need to survive on their own while Summer believes that people should help if they have the power) among other things. But I’m insecure about it because it can also be read as ‘two girls fight over a guy (Taiyang)’. In short- I have more awareness of stupid tropes regarding women than this show.

-’This is my story, told MY way!’

Which is why you’re not even remotely Velma Dinkley and this told through the same fucking story telling seen everywhere nowadays.

-...This show is going to use swearing as a substitute for actual maturity, isn’t it?

*Shows two cockroaches bumping uglies*

... Yay...

-Is...is this bitchy girl Daphne? The sweet, emotionally intelligent, kind hearted Daphne?

-You know, you guys could have given the girls some variety in their body types other than ‘curvaceous, busty and leggy’. I’m no prude but coming to be more true to myself, I’ve come to appreciate the variety in the female form. I also say this because this involved me coming to terms with how I appreciate the male form as well.

Also just because sex sells (I have checked out series because I found a girl hot) doesn’t make shoving gratuitous nudity in my face entertaining. At least let the girl fully check them out.

-You know what, here’s a lesson to any aspiring writers-

If you’re gonna be sensual, be sensual. Fully examine the beauty of the female and male bodies. The graceful curves and the hardy stockiness- be free, be open, be true to yourself! That is what it means to be an adult!

 -Nobody gets physical over these kinds of discussions. Where the writers fucking high when writing this?

-Maybe they were because the chick I’m pretty sure is Daphne is DROWNING SOMEONE.

Please for the love of god, someone ax her ass!

-THANK YO-

‘And how do you feel about race blind casting, Daphne?’

Oh god FUCKING DAMNIT!

- “I wasn’t expecting such an enlightened answer from such a bitch.”

https://youtu.be/CN2s-rFYQqI

VELMA WOULD NOT ASSAULT SOMEONE!

-... Solid JJ did this better.

-... I want everyone whoever called RWBY’s writing as ‘exposition dumping’ to write an apology. NOW.

No one would respond to ‘How long has it been since X has had you over’ with ‘ever since my mom died. Two years ago.’ It should be. ‘Two years ago, ever since Mom...’. That is something people SAY.

-Oh god, this is so painful. 

You-you know how a lot of dialogue in media can be boiled down to how it advances the plot or characters but the extra fat is necessary to make the dialogue digestible to your average viewer since media is an exchange between the audience suspending their disbelief and the creators presenting a nice story in exchange?

No one ever taught these writers that. It’s ALL just plot progression and obvious references with nothing to give it any taste!

-*Slicked over blond hair, blue jeans, white sweater, bumps into Velma while on his phone*

Oh no no no no no no no-

“Oh hi, Fred!”

“I have a disease where I can’t remember anyone who isn’t hot-”

-NO, FUCK YOU!

The one. ONE! Guy who was never even close to anything to being toxic in his masculinity. A kind, cheerful, calm, caring man who suffered from single mindedness but was nonetheless a man who carried himself with dignity and kindness who was beloved for basically creating the ‘himbo’ archetype-

You FUCKED HIM UP! IN ONE SCENE!

-... Fred’s gay and in the closet, isn’t he?

Of course he is. Because of course any man who dresses fashionably must be sucking dick. Just like Velma’s probably LGBT because she’s nerdy and not conventionally feminine. Because as everyone knows- if you deviate from the overly strict definitions of masculinity and feminity, you MUST be LGBT.

-Can we have ONE good father in a fucking cartoon for once?

-Whatever is inside her...isn’t a baby.

-’Oh we’re ABOVE the ‘slutty girl deserved to get murdered’ trope~’

And yet you roll around in those other, even more cliche tropes. No credit.

-Oh yay, this really is a ‘toxic masculinty’ plotline with Fred. And ten bucks says it will still get its ass beaten by Jaune’s.

-’I’m at fault for my mom leaving my dad who knocked up a waitress’

And you’re supposed to be the smart one...

-’Wow, I am emotionally invested in your journey and it’s stakes!’

Cool. Glad someone is.

-...Why is Shaggy even here? What’s even the point without his connection with Scoob?

-’I hate drugs! *wink*’

Shaggy being a stoner was a joke, not canon. May as well give him Ultra Instinct at this point.

-Oh cool, the fucking waitress knows ‘Velma’ better than her fucking father. Yay...

-’Maybe Velma’s mom left her because she was a brat...’

... Judging from how Velma looks and her size, she’s likely no older than 6-8 during those flashbacks.

If that is true then Velma’s mom bore a grudge or resentment towards her child for...acting like a child. And no, the eyeball injury is not an excuse because in no universe is spray water into someone’s eye going to cause enough damage to make it pop out.

Velma’s mom was a fucking bitch and her dumbass dad is implied to be the better parent...because she’s a bitch. Fucking wonderful.

-... This show was some tax write off, wasn’t it?

[lyriumflames]

Second playthrough done, final thoughts!

Man that last few hours is so tight, I know there's the long cutscene leading up to the final fights and I assume at some point they had to decide whether to have a weaker combat line or an extended cutscene, and I definitely think they chose well.

This game is definitely the most "Story" game, in the sense of needing to prioritise because of their hellish dev cycle and making what they want to portray the number one goal.

I think any criticisms are things the devs are already perfectly aware of and probably share, and it did start to get a bit ridiculous (we have a little joke about Rook falling off things but then I see multiple posts saying 'I miss invisible walls 🙄' like....do you? do you actually??)

I'll be honest I think the criticism against the writing is close to unfounded. It's expositional at times but at no point was I taken out of the scenes because of writing, and I found myself laughing out loud at multiple points with banter.

Rook, I LOVED having a geordie Rook, I'll confess that my first da2 playthrough I found Hawke distractingly posh (I know that's just me), so this really made her feel grounded as the character she was.

I romanced Emmrich both times (barely paid attention the first time I was too distracted). My first time I was a veil jumper and honestly? I hated that every scene was in the necropolis. My Rook was used to Arlathan and I have to fuck in a coffin??

SO second time I was a mourn watcher, and it was SO MUCH better. You felt so in sync with him about everything and all the necropolis scenes felt way more natural. I think this is the case for most factions really.

The level designs! I mean we all know Weisshaupt was incredible and like I said the final fight, but also once I got used to the layouts and format I got into it quickly, I actually liked that non-open option because it gave them more creativity with how you get around. You can tell love was put into them.

Of course I, as with many others, was most concerned with the Solas story. At first I really wasn't a fan of a new protag because I thought "how am I supposed to look at this objectively?" but actually I loved being in a new position as well as having the inquisitor there. I appreciated that even though we didn't control the inquisitor we could still make "decisions" for her by speaking to her.

I also learned to be a Solas hater. I am SHOCKED at the amount of people who played that whole game and their conclusion is "Mythal when I catch you". Were you listening???

Judging by what's set up in inquisition and what the concept art looks like that they really wanted to do this long, deep exploration into Solas' motivations, intentions, inner conflict etc... that would result in the final decisions. Obviously they couldn't do that so I believe they shifted things onto Mythal more than they'd originally have liked to, but EVEN STILL they didn't just make it "Mythal bad". I think Solas' regret murals aren't intentionally misleading but perhaps defensive. My biggest piece of evidence for this is the ending conversation between Flemeth and Solas is completely different to what we saw at the end of inquisition. I believe what we saw then was what actually happened, and what Rook and the crew saw was Solas' personal interpretation.

This is backed up by us saying to Mythal we saw Solas' memories which she immediately responded with "You saw a recollection he cultivated, like a tree twisting itself to catch the sun" but I digress.

I will say I'm confused as to why the gang had a whole convo about their relationship, we all know what their relationship is I don't know what the point of muddying things was, I think it's just devolved into dumbass discussions that I'm already sick of seeing, it's the whole "was Gale groomed" shit again.

I feel like those combined things has made some people forget that Solas does care about the elves, and the world and its people and wants to tear the veil down, he's not simply doing it because "it's what she wanted" and I think it cheapens his whole story by viewing it that way.

Now this is slightly embarrassing. Idk if people are lying or if this really is just me but, as someone who loves her romanced lavellan with all her heart, this game made me so embarrassed and made me feel so stupid. This isn't a criticism it's almost a testemant in showing a story. It's one thing being told your boyfriend is actually an ancient elven god but it's quite another seeing the story through a different person, with a homebase that is surrounded by his history, spending 60 hours learning about just how long a life Solas has lived. I actually was really not enjoying myself for a decent chunk of it lol it just felt like every new piece of info and codex entry was another sucker punch.

Nothing we learn in Veilguard negates anything in Inquisition, there's not actually any doubt that Solas loves her as much as she thought he did, but it's sooo crazy being Rook, being tormented by a god and seeing the devestation he's causing, then meeting with the inquisitor and she's like "Yeah I still love him and still want to be with him" like girl pull it together. If I was a stronger woman I'd actually leave him and go back to Cullen but alas I am not.

WHICH makes me even HAPPIER about the ending, because it's like okay, you're mortal and you spent very little time with him, we'll make it up with eternity. I never ever thought about that ending being a thing (I should have done really) but it makes perfect sense, puts them on an even playing field.

Overall? Solid game. It's not the ideal DA4 the devs planned but what they were able to do I really liked. I can already feel the heat dying down post-release and a good community cropping up so I'm hoping that with time it'll be able to settle in properly.

[thotbugatti]

The Audra Diaries

Hi. So recently, I had a silly and goofy idea. Before I even talk about it, let me hit you with a recommendation. If you haven’t already, watch Jenny Nicholson’s video about the Vampire Diaries. I was watching/listening to that video today for the umpteenth time despite never actually watching the show myself, and I figured I should go ahead and watch it for the first time. I don’t want to just watch it though because that’s lame, that’s boring. Instead, I’m going to sit down and review every single episode of the show. So here’s the plan: I’m going to share the bullet point notes that I take while watching the episode, then afterward I’m going to write an actual review for the episode. That’s it. (The notes themself are often out of context comments, which is something that I personally enjoy looking at because I think that kind of thing is funny). Anyway, I hope you enjoy it. :3

Season 1 Episode 1

• why was he just standing in the road and why did he land on his back so perfectly

•so if vampires turn people by biting them, why did it kill that guy

•the thing that CW shows do where they have to make every plot element super obvious through exposition is amazing

•I PREDICTED OBAMA!

• “I predict that we’ll get into a fatal car crash just like your parents huh *nudge*”

• TRANNY MESS??? HELLO????

• why is Jeremy just watching them make out walk away bro

• you’re STONED

• chill myself? What is that, stoner talk?

• give him a break damn your parents are dead girl

• she said hubba hubba

• hawt-e. staring (@) u

• CAW!

• why does the gravestone only have the death date and no birth dates

• she’s going to fist fight the crow

• why are you in a graveyard FREAK?! is he not allowed to be there why are YOU here

• there is a bloody gash in your leg and somehow you don’t feel a thing

• he stole her diary he’s a pervert

• “when’s the last time you hooked up with a puppy?”

• “you keep a journal too omg fuck me now pls”

• Matt looks like an anemic Heath Ledger

• running up that hill instrumental? Ope nope just a cover

• “cute becomes dumb in an instant” what teacher is talking like this to their students

• WHAT TEACHER HER PARENTS ARE DEAD BRO

• why does he have a confederate flag on his desk

• I’M DRUNKKKK 😭

• his smolder is so dreamy

• so if Jeremy didn’t show up would that guy have just r*ped her???

• fog monster FOG MONSTER

• so she was almost r*ped then she was murdered. If I didn’t know any better I’d say that TY killed her

• she’s not into you bro

• OMG my brother is drunk at the party where everyone is drunk what the FUCK

• omg secret brother

• the crow is my fav character

• Damon looks kinda like Glinner if Glinner looked normal

• so is Vicki alive or dead cause they took her away in the ambulance covered

• can vampires teleport in this universe what’s up

• I love the way that people drink beer in movies and tv. It’s always so animated

• she basically told him to get over the death of their parents. CHILL, it’s been 5 months, you’re not over it either

• Vicki: “vampire…” Matt: 😯

• mid 2000s shows all using Fray songs is so on the nose

Review: I actually kind of liked this pilot. I think it’s compelling enough on its own and establishes most of the characters well (with the exception of Jeremy). It’s certainly not without its, uh, dicey moments. Tranny mess? The confederate imagery? From what I can tell, there is 1 (one) black character in the show. Also, the way they transition between scenes can be a little jarring, but that’s not even exclusive to this show. It’s a very CW thing. I think the actor they got for Stefan is a pretty rock solid choice as well. The mysterious, hot boy vampire that serves as their answer to Edward Cullen, that doesn’t sound insanely awkward when he speaks. I’ve had my reservations about this show for a while now, but after the pilot, I’m at least a little interested to see how it goes, and that’s how a pilot should be.

(I’m also posting these on substack if you’re interested in that: https://open.substack.com/pub/thotbugatti/p/the-vampire-diaries?r=302je1&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post :) )

[completelyordinarycat]

Compiling my TFTR end notes so they clog up the fic less but tbh it's mostly for sentimental reasons. Fun Facts:

Chapter 3:

Harry rambling about the Pale as a way to talk about wanting to disappear is based on a real conversation I've had.

Chapter 4:

I used Korean as a Seol language because it's the Asian language I'm most familiar with. I speak neither Korean nor French fluently (I don't speak French at all) so please correct me.

For reference, I switch between sounding out, anglicised, and characters to indicate the way characters are hearing language and tonal differences.

I am a white person, so I'm not in any way the person to be talking about experiencing racism but it felt wrong to ignore the place that has in DE and Kim's story especially and it's role in cop work especially. I work a lot with people who speak English as an Additional language, so I've tried to respect the bravery it takes to speak a language like English when you aren't fluent, and base that conversation on actual ones I've had. While I've tried to be actively anti-racist from a narrative standpoint, I won't do that perfectly.

The fire, and its cause, is based on one where I've lived that I won't go into for obvious reasons.

Eomma is based on my Italian great-grandmothers.

Chapter 5:

if you see me misspelling characters names: no you don't. I learned via this fic that they aren't columbinimus clouds, which is the best spelling I can offer for what I spent my life reading and pronouncing. Plus side: every spell check I'd laugh because I'd get to remind myself it's spelled with CUM not COL.

I find it really, really hard to keep real life geography straight let alone in-game stuff. I'm taking Messina to be an Italy stand in because it's literally a city in Sicily, which is where my family is from, so when I saw it in the game I was like bwuh??? If that's wrong let me know and I'll change it.

The reference to culturally insensitive ads is a reference to a real pizza place where I live, as well as various chain Asian food places with actually completely racist ads.

Chapter 6:

Had Harry been not caught up in his own stuff, Katya's song choice would have been more illuminating to him than any other piece of information thus far. But there was a reason Judit said that sometimes we get caught up in the little internal things that drive us (b/c its foreshadowing) which is what Harry and Katya do. Idk if you’ve ever had a fight with someone that, while it has valid points, you think back on later and are like oh. That wasn’t really about that at all, was it? They’re both still learning about how to do healthy relationships.

Having a character whose entire character trait up until this point is being secretive meant I had to do so much exposition I would have rather included earlier ughhhh.

The entirety of the case discussed is plotted out in full despite being only mentioned briefly.

I never name male perpetrators because in reality they always get the headlines when their victims don't and it pisses me right off.

I am ACAB and continue to be (and yes, ACAB includes all these characters and the RCM) but what Katya and Liza are implied to be doing is a form of the PEACE method including focusing on establishing known factual events.

Some of the city's reflections of love are inspired by me re-reading this answer at the time of writing. I think "If you found love right now, you would run it straight into the ground in seconds," applies to Harry though he's not at a place where he's ready to understand what that would mean in this fic, imo.

I had to remind myself how to do medical notes for this and they may or may not be accurate, idk. They're meant to obscure information, though, so non-accuracy works in this regard. I'm a suicide attempt survivor so I tried to be sensitive about this. For a disclaimer, I’m not a medical professional and my work lies in health advocacy, hence how I know a lot of this. You can tell, because I abbreviated a medication which is one of the first things they tell you not to do but hey, it was on purpose. Here is a translation:

TW for domestic violence, attempted suicide (with potential context as to a method), abortion and miscarriage:

“02:00 5mg/h AC bolus pushed via NGT. 10ml/h IV saline bag replaced.

03:40 PT semi-conscious but non-responsive, pulling at NGT. IV sedative admin.

5:30 RR 27, HR 114, BP 160/110, other VS normal. ECG shows sinus pause reduced but bradyarrhythmia remains.”

This is basically not that important really lmao. I could have skipped it, in retrospect, but I think it gives some nice context to say that Katya is okay, health wise, in that moment. In summary: she’s being given activated charcoal via a naso-gastric tube which is a common treatment for some kinds of overdoses (and why you shouldn’t use activated charcoal tablets/toothpaste if you’re on prescription medicine!). She’s sick and her heart is being a bit funky, but she’s okay. You can say this is why Katya refers to this as a “heart attack” rather than what it is.

“Emergency Department (ED) admission 23:39 by neighbour for suspected overdose (OD), no known next of kin. Blood alcohol level .32, suspected drug use. Became physically aggressive when asked if deliberate OD, requiring intramuscular sedative. Transferred mental health ward 00:48. History: childhood Pale Related Acquired Brain Injury. 3xED presentation for gun shot wounds and stab wounds relating to RCM work. 2x presentation for injury relating to suspected assault and battery, patient denied intimate partner violence and left against medical advice both times. 3 pregnancies and 0 live births: ED presentation following miscarriage after fall; ED presentation for miscarriage after suspected assault and battery; ED presentation relating to suspected termination of pregnancy haemorrhage requiring blood transfusion and overnight observation.”

Again, I’m hoping no one is learning how to take case notes from this. I re-wrote this a million times, no lie, and if I saw this on someone’s records I would probably be like UM WTF. But for storytelling purposes, it got the job done lmao. I hope the original gets across what I wanted to get across: that something really significantly bad happened in Katya’s past that explains her motives and behaviour. I wrote it with the intention that Harry has just gotten enough information to want to push, but not to know that he shouldn’t. Having said that, you could make the argument that he should have known at the very least what the abbreviation for Assault and Battery is, so if he knew, would he have pushed anyway? Canonically, I think the answer is yes because even a high-empathy Harry can be remarkably tactless on a fail. Which is why I think this interaction is fun(? Oh wow I’m a freak) because it’s pushing (fanfic) Harry’s assumptions of himself and his goals. His stated goal is to do good, but he actively doesn’t do that in this scenario (though, neither was Katya, tbf).

In his defence, he’s right but he’s also kind of wrong. Yes, Katya’s background makes her empathise with this case a lot more, but the other implication that Harry misses is that she was actually involved with the case to some capacity while it was ongoing, and therefore she feels responsible

If you care about the OCs at all: Katya, as a mirror to Harry, has been going through a parallel to Harry's plot and she's really going through it. At the end of this chapter she is off-screen having her own "I don't want to be this kind of animal anymore" moment. We only just get to glimpse it.

Chapter 7:

Mee's Kitchen is a reference to a beloved take out place where I live, and again I'm sticking with Korean stuff because I'm most familiar with it.

Harry feeling like he has no control and slapping himself and being terrified of that is based off of my entire life lmao but particularly a few years ago when I started to slap myself without consciously deciding to do it. Then I 1. started dealing with some of my mental health stuff, and 2. started being treated for ADHD, and, surprise, it happens less now and when it does I don't freak out about it. Harry is very flippant about it, which I was too for a long time. I have a lot of body-focused repetitive behaviours and repetitive behaviours in general and no one has ever formally told me if that counted as one of those or not. I don't like to call out specific things as me obviously projecting but I also wanted to be clear that if you also have those kinds of behaviours, there's nothing wrong with you and don't listen to a guy in a fanfic. Talk to someone about it if you're worried. <3 I tagged it as self-harm because it seemed to cover all bases.

Chapter 8:

This was a hard chapter to walk the line on and if I wasn't doing the poetry chapter title thing, it would be titled "What if Rigorous Self-Critique Was More Helpful and Less An Opportunity to Hate Yourself into Self-Destruction, and Therefore Allowing Your Shitty Behaviour to Continue." And I never want to demonise addiction or mental health struggles and I hope I don’t. In my own experience to do better you do need to face up to things you've done that you’re not proud of. No joke, a lot of this fic is me exploring the idea of restorative justice and how and when we can forgive someone, especially when that person is a victim too. But I also don't want to woobify Harry and I recognise that I could have gone harder on this and that's a flaw in this work. Very few things destroyed me in DE like Rigorous Self-Critique. My reaction to reading it was physical horror and I still remember how it felt. And I just couldn't play that out to its extreme in this. It would be too much of a tone shift, for one. And for personal reasons, I just couldn't. Also, In editing this chapter, I removed a bit of context I didn’t fix. Specifically, there is no doubt in my mind that Harry is abusive towards Dora and I realise I may have presented it as if to imply he wasn’t. Harry was specifically asking about sexual violence, and that is what Jean investigated. I may fix this in the future, when I’m in a better headspace.

I love to write bi-Jean being no-homo, I don't know why. Jean constructs intricate rituals to allow himself to hear that he is loved.

Other fun facts, grabbed from my notes:

MoralIntern/Coalition politicians declaring that homo-sexuality no longer existed in Revachol is based on a comment from a politician where I live who said that there were no gay people in his state. It’s also very inspired by real life anti-homosexuality laws stemming from racism and colonialism and eugenics.

This fic works from the assumption that Dora ended that cycle of untreated mental illness and abuse by leaving as soon as she realised what was happening, by virtue of having a better education and resource access through being middle class. She is my idealised version of myself here haha. So the question becomes less, is Harry a bad guy? But what can Harry do to make sure he doesn’t continue a cycle of violence that probably pre-dates him by centuries?

I also can-opened myself writing this fic because I was like, why do I write stories about people being at their worst and still being loved? And my brain was like, because it’s the kind of story you needed to hear when you were at your worst, that it’s still possible to be loved, and never heard. And then I had a little cry :)

 If you think that Harry is a bad and an irredeemable man, you’re totally valid! Maybe I will write a fic about that at some point.

I love Jean now :)

I was like haha what if I make the chapter titles a poem from the city to Harry and immediately regretted it because I'm bad at poetry :)

[totallypatrick]

long time no see. i’m back after many years of not posting. i read all of my past posts and am glad to report that i have indeed grown up a little since then. but i also did google why i want to die every day about an hour ago so my day-to-day struggles are still in the same arena of depression they have always been. i guess the fight for priority left existentialism in the top position - eating disorder and self harm have lost their places on the leaderboard. thankful for that. i’m in a new relationship now, after having been in a few pairings with people that i had varied feelings towards. honestly happy that we didn’t capture any weird writings about a certain man i met that i got way too infatuated with. is it wrong to still think of past crushes? i do it all the time. i wonder if my boyfriend does it, too. if he does, i wouldn’t like to know about it. that doesn’t stop me from being curious, though. if he’s thinking about other girls, who are they? what are their names? have i met them before, and what about them makes them so charming that he can’t help but think of them again and again? every answer to every question would devastate me. thank god i can’t read minds - i definitely would have had an even harder time existing on this planet with an ability like that. as of late i’ve made it a goal to romanticize my life. i’m now sort of putting together that my version of romanticizing my life is just being extremely toxic in secret. writing about my desire to die, my unhappiness, random grievances, and creating an image of my private side is incredibly indulgent for me. it makes me feel alive and in ownership of myself. instead of being afraid of this and where it will take me, i’m going to try and embrace it. i miss feeling like i owned my thoughts and feelings - nowadays (and for the last few years, really) i’ve been very focused on becoming healthier and improving my cognition. it’s been quite helpful but really has put a damper on my imagination. the logical and well-rounded approach doesn’t leave much room for romance or fantastic thinking and that’s what i feel i need.  hoping to make this a habit so i can be more in touch with myself. to satisfy my left side brain, i’ll say that this is a form of shadow work. it’s funny because writing is a left side brain thing and it’s the only way i’ll get connected to my emotions and shit. feels good not having to be coherent here - not many life updates or exposition, just feelings and musings from my head to my fingers. thanks 

[weekend-whip]

What was your process with Jesse, then? And Miranda?

*trembling sobbing crying* There was supposed to just be a running gag where the Fuchsia Ninja would crop up inexplicably from time to time, similar to the movie but more frequent (and then he'd help out the ninja at one specific point in Season 2)........but THEN:

the whole thing with the Elemental Compass was devised (as that didn't even EXIST until after the first story was completely posted), so I had to then flesh out the Element of Surprise which has spiraled into characters like Mystake and Harumi as we know now, and then figuring out how that would manifest into an actual user of that element (i.e. his magic tricks)

I then thought if I could turn Olivia into a full character, why not do the same thing with the Fuchsia Ninja? So then I devised his name, his "secret" identity, tossed him in with the high schoolers, and initially planned to use him to help bridge any loose gaps between Show!verse and Movie!verse that couldn't be naturally resolved (hence why he has a copy of the Elemental Compass itself and why'd he's kinda Captain Exposition at times)...and then he grew a personality. And I was like. Ohh no. I adore this nervous dramatic fool. What have I created

....and then. AND THEN. The day for writing Chapter 6 came...I STRUGGLED with SO MANY drafts on how to make this work. Nelson getting bullied by the Cheer Squad was on one draft (and Jesse was initially gonna be like Nelson's babysitter), Nya was going around as a "Rainbow Ninja" at one point, I juggled through every combo of Ninja to go on this mission before landing on Nya and Cole because it made the most sense, and Mystake's parts weren't even a THOUGHT until the last second (because I realized I wanted a less bizarre way for Lloyd to get the Map of Dens, and could use this as foreshadowing for later). But then, to spice up the fight with the generic Shark Army thugs I was like.....we could sprinkle some lore here.......we could put the Fuchsia Ninja here...that could be a fun....surprise....

............................and then I was writing all their interactions during the fight. They've all got some hilarious friendly chemistry. And. Then. My. Silly. Little. Foolish. Brain. whispers to me in the heat of the moment: "What if...Wouldn't it be funny if the Fuchsia Ninja had a crush on Cole?" ha. Funny. Just something for a small, amusing laugh every now and then. I would never actually ship some pink/purple OC with Cole? That had already been done countless times, and probably better! Imagine being so uninspired. Ha. hahahaha. Ha.

...But it was too late. The seed was planted. The flower was blooming. The daydreaming started. The ideas and scenes and possibilities and the development became clearer by the day. The ship was SAILING...well, eventually. It was sailing in my heart, and that was enough. I just had to pace myself with it...and my god I now see why no one writes slow burns anymore JUST HUG

AAAAAAAaaaaaannnnnnnd from there that blew up Jesse's character arc (as in, MADE IT BIGGER). More backstory was born that helped me flesh out what was already there, a history with Wu was devised, a family blossomed to support/intimidate him, goals, motivations, fears, imperfections, insecurities spiraled into existence from just the single act of this lil' blorbo falling in love...! Suddenly all of his character beats fell perfectly into place! Divine intervention took my hand and dragged me forward in full force! Jesse Marvell became a character and he was here for the long haul! And I've never looked back *-*

...now, as for Miranda, I...can't quite remember when she popped up as a concept, but I'm pretty sure it was because I needed/wanted someone to keep Jesse in check. Such as:

keeping Jesse from being too OP with his powers (because she's studied his powers extensively, she can anticipate them more than most people. Hence, Jesse struggles to surprise her easily, so he's near powerless whenever he's in her vicinity unless he gets really creative)

to help keep his character/personality from falling into the horrible, horrible trope of only being about his "pursuit" of Cole (which I'd...like to think I'm doing okay with especially for my first real Oc x Canon ship but I don't trust my hands—they're just so LOVELY—augh—!)

Giving him some extra motivations for his character, as we've seen the tip of the iceberg of in Ch40. I think I mentioned this before, but Miranda's related to why he doesn't fully have his True Potential. So. Um. There's that to look forward to~

Unrelated to Jesse, she also exists to help fill Nya's vacuum via her becoming a ninja much, MUCH earlier (similar to Bridget for Olivia's personality tweak as I mentioned in the other post), especially in Season 3. She's one of the Techies too, but she specializes in software and data organization, thus she can't actually engineer anything, but she loves streamlining the interfaces/UI/software for the things Jay invents or keeping Zane up to date internally. (This also leads her to have a small rivalry with Pixal).

...Except all this kind of made her a tad sueish in turn soooooooo...I dropped a building on her. And then that blew up her character arc. (Prosthetics, baby!!! But now she can smack people around with her own arm, so like, who's really coming out on top here?)

...buuuuut then I was like "no wait I can use this" because if she's kind of always been "easily perfect", that also feeds into Jesse's jealousy/envy of her (because he struggles just to reach the bare minimum at times) and then that loops back into his guilt for letting her get hurt under his watch and then that loops back into annoyance at how she's thriving anyway and then he feels guilty about feeling like that and I oop—

(Thus, her biggest character flaw becomes being almost entirely oblivious to just how much she affects Jesse...and other people. But Jesse especially. Primarily because she's still so young. But still. And my god is that a fun heart-wrenching train wreck to watch).

[demonslayedher]

Ramble on Exposition Serving the Plot

Writing is hard, let me just get that out there first. Developing stuff is fun, but writing--conveying that interesting stuff in equally interesting ways--is hard. Gotouge-sensei had so, so, so much to convey, while also keeping readers wanting to come back for more every week. And, with this being Sensei's first serialized work, it's unsurprising how much it improves once the characters have been established and the manga finds its flow. I could say (and have said, when asked) a lot about the writing flaws, but I find the flaws so endearing nowadays that I don't like to criticize this manga. KnY wouldn't be KnY without its inherent silliness.

But on the first time around, when I didn't know and feel everything I do now, I found myself disappointed with Inosuke and Zenitsu's introduction to the story. I hated them both at first, though I had come around to Zenitsu by the end of the arc. Inosuke, though, ugh. That fight between Tanjiro and Inosuke felt so unnecessary, and weird what with that 'your face is pretty' bit, and Inosuke bending like a circus performer just because he can, but then especially how there's so little tension remaining after the fight, like Inosuke was all bark and no actual bite. I didn't actually like Inosuke until I saw him moping in bed, hahaha. XD Looking back it's so typical Tanjiro and Inosuke though, isn't it?

That all having been said, I really appreciate some details in how the exposition was worked into the plot.

What got me thinking about this especially was that showing us Zenitsu and Inosuke's heightened senses was actually relevant to the plot. It's really easy to mistake Zenitsu's first mention of sound for a trite exposition drop about how we're liking up a cast of heroes that can be sorted out as easily as Power Rangers, not for what color they wear but what sense they have special abilities with.

But since they were going up against a drum demon, with the drum being played being the very indicator of a demon's power being used, it was the most relevant way to both have Zenitsu notice something that would be very in-character for him to notice, and to get us looking for how sound might be relevant in a demon's powers. This is a laying of exposition groundwork, a red carpet for us to walk on as we march in with our hands cupped and ready to receive worldbuilding info about the demon, as opposed to simply having it dumped on us.

The introduction of Inosuke's senses comes on much, much more subtle, we don't actually gain a good understanding of his abilities until Mt. Natagumo, at which point we've already gotten a good understanding of Zenitsu's hearing, as well as Tanjiro's ability to smell world-specific stuff like Lines of Interval. However, it's first hinted at while Inosuke is running down the halls, dodging right before he'd have been attacked. As first time readers, it's easy to dismiss this entirely as him just having a good reaction, but on second reads you get the "ohhhhhhhhh I know what's happening here" satisfaction.

But what really drives the plot forward is here, when Inosuke has followed the aura of a demon.

Had Inosuke not sensed Nezuko: --Inosuke would have otherwise not had any reason to interact --Zenitsu would have had no reason to protect the box, thereby not giving Tanjiro (and readers) the chance to appreciate an entirely different side of Zenitsu's character --Tanjiro would had been the only one injured to go on to the next arc, leaving him with still only Nezuko to do much interacting with

That's another thing that works really well about the choice to make Inosuke fight Zenitsu as a way of driving the plot--as we had just been introduced to Inosuke and Zenitsu, thereby realistically not caring about them as much yet as we care about Tanjiro, it was too early to give either of them any serious injuries in battle against demons. In their introductions it was crucial we get an understanding for how they function as capable demon slayers and what their fighting style is like. They were fighting zako-oni (random background demons of no consequence) so as not to overshadow Tanjiro's battle with Kyogai, and you couldn't have them get seriously injured by zako-oni.

But if you need them to have some reason to stay in a long-term recovery at the same time as Tanjiro so as to build some bonds with each other before the following arc...? Oh, have them survive their demon encounters only to go and break each other's ribs instead, yes. Excellent work-around. Throw in some Corp rules exposition while you're at it, sure.

As much as I love Kyogai and I believe that fight showed a lot of Tanjiro's maturation as a Demon Slayer (as well as established Gotouge as extremely creative and established Ufotable as very, very ready and willing to show off), the scuffle over Nezuko's box--made possible only by Inosuke and Zenitsu's unique abilities, as well as the two of them revealing aspects of their personality by the decisions they made--was the most meaningful interaction in that whole arc, even if the 'your face is pretty' thing came right after it.