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lovecanbesostrange · 6 months ago

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Here's a tip on how to read and enjoy neverending superhero comics. My credentials for this is being a lifelong X-Men reader, so ~35 years of ups and downs with the mutant soap opera.

Initially you have to find something that speaks to you. Gods, mighty powers, more of a solo book with an expanded cast, a team to follow - nobody can help you with that. With all the comic book adaptations from cartoons to live action movies, you might already have your preferences, go with that.

Now, this is about the big two mostly. Those run on cycles. The writers will come and go (as do the artists), they will try new things, they will broaden the story, they will retcon things, they will go for a big change - and in the end, every book has a core status quo it will return to. Always slightly different, going with the times, but the deep down core is there, trust that.

Many people will pick up your fav characters and write for them. And if you've talked to other people you might have noticed by now that two people can like the same character and still view them a bit differently. This will happen. Some writers will align with what you value most, some really won't. In the worst moments your fav character feels so OOC, you will question how you could ever go back to loving them. But don't worry:

This too shall pass!

A single issue can give you the best scene your little blorbos have been in that you want to rub your face all over the page to absorb it all. And suddenly there is one throwaway line of dialogue in there that is the most disgusting shit you've ever read. Sometimes the idea is super intriguing, but the execution is lacking. Sometimes the art is perfect, but you can't even explain the plot. Sometimes it's overall a meh-story, but the little details with the interactions are just right.

And here's the thing - a few years later nothing of that really matters. You can cling to all the cherished moments. Funny domestic hilarity, a big twist that really captured your emotions, the perfect heartbreak, some cool action that lives rent free in your head. And then you run with that. And you can forget about the rest.

Any in-depth analysis of a character that has been around the publishing block for a few years (but really decades upon decades by now with the well known names) will come with a huge bag of inconsistencies. Please keep that in mind. Also that goes both ways. Your fav will have had a shitty period. So don't take this whole thing too seriously, especially when interacting with other fans (or just writing/reading meta).

Focus on the things that bring you joy and time will help to soften out the edges. Loving superheroes is either a very short sprint - where you care about one specific moment in time only - or the longest marathon through a lot of uncanny valleys.

Also don't believe the always looming "this is the worst they've ever done". Go read some fan mail in older issues (and I mean old, read fan letters from the 70s or 80s, read letters in now acclaimed classic storylines) - people have been saying that since forever. But even the worst stories have some wonderful moments worth remembering. Worth loving.

It's also okay to not have big opinions on everything going on. Sometimes you have to shrug your shoulders and browse through some back issues for a while. That's allowed. Or to take a break entirely until the creative team changes once again.

#I am looking forward to the end of Krakoa and yet it's also a bit sad #what I disliked most was the failure to account for mutants being raised in non-mutant cultures first #how mutant culture itself isn't a separate thing entirely but built on diverse human culture #also the whole Arakko thing and Apocalypse and... ugh...#and maybe don't have them deal all those pills it opens this big can of worms we ignore with suspension of disbelief for a reason #but I did enjoy a lot that came just from this whole paradise island like living situation #there were fun teams and some very fun times (sorry Moira for being thrown under the bus so hard for all of this)#it was a great way to bring so many people together that never interacted much before especially all the 'younger' generations #I know there are things I will look back on very fondly #it's the only way to keep the joy alive

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fiirelords · 5 years ago

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I know we’ve been through this and I’m constantly coming back and then I leave a while and then I come back again and so on (although I don’t think many people notice) but damn it I’m trying and I really do want to be active here again if not I wouldn’t be constantly trying to return every so often

To try and force myself to stick to it I’m doing blogrates, compliments and requests (although I wouldn’t get my hopes up with the requests bc I’m just terrible at following through but do take a shot and I might actually finish it!)

• Follow me (@delacourr)

• Reblog this post

• You can check out my creations if you’d like

• Blacklist “ana does shit” if you don’t wanna see these

• Send an ask with what you want (no limit) and write something else! let’s chat: it could be a blog rec, something that makes you happy, a compliment about my blog or someone elses, your favorite character, ship, book, movie, ask me something, do whatever you want!

BR formats + request info under the cut

BLOGRATE

url: /10

icon: /10

mobile theme: /10

desktop theme: /10

creations: /10

content: /10

overall: /10

following: yes/no/+f

DETAILED BLOGRATE

REQUESTS

this section only exists to clarify that the requests should be of one of my fandoms so if ur not as familiar with my blog maybe scroll down a bit or visit my navigation page, there you can also find films/tv shows you might like and want me to make a gifset/edit/moodboard of (maybe even some icons???

#ana does shit #please signal boost and don't let it flop fam #tagging some people now #tusermillie #userelena #expelumos #ginnypcttcr #dementvr #parkerpete #userpatty #userjamie #and idk who else to tag so that's all folks

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kaywriteswords · 5 years ago

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Love your body, Love yourself, Love your life 5/13/2020

Welcome to the most inconsistent blog you’ll ever read. Meh, As always, I am what I am. It seems like every week or even every day I’m diving deeper into my being, stripping away those things that while they may have seemed important or relevant at one point, aren’t really in the grand scheme of things. So, what am I backtracking on this week? The online class of course! Currently lowest on the priority list, I’ll do it eventually. I absolutely find it mentally stimulating and challenging, but giving it time as part of my daily routine is not something I can do right now. But why? Because I find it to be more of a burden on my time and creative pursuits than I initially thought it would be. I’ve done this before, gotten really excited about doing something new only to get bored with the routine of actually having to do it. I find myself in the same trap of trying to do too much and doing nothing as a result. This whole online class thing started as a way for me to put tangible skills on my resume. Check that one off the list because I did finish the first class I took. I thought I would roll right into the second, but nah, I don’t really want to, and guess what? That’s okay.

Most of us are in the habit of over scheduling ourselves because of good old FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out, for those of you who may not know) and also because we always want to do and be more. What ends up happening is a constant state of being overwhelmed leading to burnout. I didn’t come to this realization lightly, I spent hours on the couch last week watching TV. While laying there, I knew I should have been writing, taking class, exercising, but I just wouldn’t. So, I laid there some more and didn’t just mindlessly watch TV, I asked myself what it was about the schedule I had planned for myself that made it so easy to blow off, it was because once again, I had scheduled something that served as more of a distraction than a goal. I feel great right now. Because this is the trap I had fallen into at other times in my life and thanks to all work I’ve done on myself in the last couple years, I can now make that connection with my past and refocus my energy before wasting too much time. So, I took the eraser to my calendar and removed the blocks for the online class and smiled.

My initial go to was that I lacked discipline, but I don’t think that was the case. Discipline has been a recurring theme for me in 2020 because I previously didn’t have any. I did whatever I wanted on every whim. No more. Now that I’m fully focused on my health goals and writing every day, life is pretty great. I don’t know what comes next, but I plan to keep on sharing my journey. Especially because tracking my weight and reporting back on healthy habits holds me accountable to actually doing those things. Plus, it’ll be fun to look back one day and see the kind of progress I’ve made.

Quarantine continues to gift me with the ability to eat as horribly as I want. Today was the first time I stepped foot inside a grocery store in over a month. I’ve been making due with the non-perishables on hand, ordering take-out, and sending my husband to the store with a small list. I watched a sad video of a cow crying while trying to back away from being pushed into the slaughterhouse and now I’m having issues with eating beef. The only upside to that is at least I’ve cut down slightly on my red meat intake. I’m going to continue to monitor my diet. Hubby and I already agreed the amount of take-out has been excessive so maybe I’ll try to get crafty with meal prep for the coming week? We’ll see. At the very least, I bought my salad stuff today so I can get back in the routine of having salad for one meal a day. Ever seen the episode of Seinfeld where Elaine asks for a big salad? That’s what I’m talking about. No dainty meals here. I love to eat!!

Just incase you’re wondering, I am still jogging regularly. And yup, it’s still the worst. We’re a year overdue on buying our new bikes so now we’ll get to contribute to the current bike boom that I’ve heard about. We’ll look like we’re participating in the current fad, but I assure you I am a lifelong biker and the delay in replacing my previous one is just another thing that I love to procrastinate on. Bike riding is the best and as soon as I have my new bike, I will jog no more. I eagerly anticipate that day, which could be as soon as this week. Yay!

Perhaps the most important aspect of an overall healthy lifestyle is loving yourself and spending time doing things that make you happy. So, after stripping down all the layers, I’m getting down to what I really love and what makes me happy. It feels wonderful and light and free.

Future posts in this series can be found at my new site: https://kaywriteswords.wordpress.com/

#kaywriteswords #Weekly Weigh In #accountability #jogging #health #wellness #quarantine #bike ride #be who you wanna be

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moononmyfloor · 5 years ago

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Review: The Tyrant's Tomb by Rick Riordan

Thoughts on The Cover

Well, if you've seen my previous posts by now you'd know that I'm not a big fan of loud and action-packed covers. I prefer classy, if not always subtle. But you might like it! See, Reyna is owning the bigger portion of it, which is a nice change. :-)

Ok to Low Points

Halfway through the book, I was STILL unable to "get" into the story

Literally, not much was going on for 2/3 of the whole book, which is very surprising considering:

The time between the release dates of The Tyrant's Tomb and The Burning Maze is the longest as of yet. Whereas other books within a series have come out within twelve months of each other, these two books will be released within eighteen months of each other.

.....and that even the most boring books by Uncle Rick had some silver linings here and there to keep you engaged. Even The Dark Prophecy had the gang arrive and settle in Indianapolis, visit the zoo and free Griffins and REVISIT the emperor. Here? Apollo and Co. escorted Jason's hearse into Camp Jupiter in a frankly insulting manner(more about that later), Apollo got sick, we see that the noble prophecies are being tattooed on Tyson's back, Apollo and Co. went on a lil' trial quest and returned, Apollo got more sick.🤷‍♀️ I was so confused I opened the previous books to see how far those stories had progressed by midpoint.

It got slightly better later on, but it doesn't change the fact throughout the 1st half of the book I just kept on turning pages SIMPLY because I wanted it to get it on with and finish the story. Sad.

2. The so-called Tyrant

I didn't see much tyranny, like...only 3 pages were spent in the Tyrant's Tomb and his company, bad old Commodus and Caligula had more appearances than Tarquin who re-appeared in the very last chapters only to get immediately vanquished courtesy of Diana.....yeah. That's that.

3. How Jason's final voyage was depicted

Uncle Rick doesn't write emotional crying scenes well.

People talk about peeing and pop chewing gum bubbles while delivering the hearses of valued, honored characters.

And I seriously wonder in what position and condition poor Jason's body was after all the drama his coffin underwent.

And based on the spoilery lines(which sadly turned out to be not spoilers at all) we saw in the Magnus Chase series I thought we'd at least get a Percy-Annabeth cameo in this, that Jason will have more of his closest comrades mourning and sending him off. Nah. Nada. Not even a mention of Annabeth. Then why did Uncle Rick mention things like Annabeth and Percy being at California and even Magnus joining them at their time of crisis? Utter puzzlement. And we were also robbed of Nico's reaction to Jason's demise, considering how much Nico valued Jason as a brother-in-arms and a friend. Let's not even talk about Thalia. Why, Uncle Rick? :-(

Which brings us to...

4. Plot Inconsistencies

Why do I have to talk about this in each and every book? :-( Seriously, why would you write about Percy and Annabeth going to New Rome to attend college and being broken hearted over Jason DURING the period of Demigod communication malfunction, only to have us know they have YET to travel across the country and when we meet them again it would still be at New York? And now the communication is working, proving that Uncle Rick conveniently forgot about the clues he conveniently dropped.

AT LEAST I'm glad one thing is consistent in the Trials of Apollo series, that when Zeus decided they'll stop meddling too much in demigod affairs at the end of Heroes of Olympus, he meant it and now it's super duper hard to seek a god even for dire needs, no matter how wonderfully (ill)timed that decision was, costing lives of valued heroes.

5. The Haiku-titles weren't amusing at all this time.

I found one fun haiku .

O, blood moon rising

Take a rain check on doomsday

I’m stuck in traffic

6. The whole Apollo-Reyna debacle.

I would say Uncle Rick pulled a clever twist by turning fan theories on their heads here, but it too way more plot space than needed and when he got to the "Gotcha!" part, I was not feeling it. For YEARS now, we heard abut this no-mortal-no-demigod thing over and over, and fans predicted it might mean Apollo's the one for Reyna. And when it initially seemed like it was the route that Uncle Rick was indeed taking, the only thought that circulated inside my head was; "Reyna doesn't need this completely random and unwanted baggage! Give the girl a dam break!!" But then he was like; "Lol nooo. You kids are wrong", but STILL I was not happy...well, for obvious reasons.

What's the point of this whole plotline? So unnecessary. I mean, the fans always wondered WHY exactly would Reyna think she needs a partner in her life, but now I see Reyna might not have had time to contemplate her personal life logically like WE had what's with her dramatic life. Of course the shallow gods would think her heart was something to be "cured" and Reyna never stopped to think that it's quite the opposite till Apollo provided her with a breather and reason. And to answer why din't she choose to join Amazons instead of Hunters is probably that she wanted to be her own person and not be under her sis the Queen once again. She'd indeed have the freedom, calm and few friends so she wouldn't feel lonely and bored with the Hunt. She might even choose to leave Hunters after she found herself in her own time. I get it. But the way it was dragged and executed was meh.

If Uncle Rick intended this plotline of Reyna to be empowering for female readers, in my opinion it was not. Yes, even a badass girl could have weaknesses, not enough self-confidence and wobbly life choices, but Reyna took too much time with her "Eureka!" moment.

It was funny while it lasted, at least.

“Lester.” Reyna sighed. “What in Tartarus are you saying? I’m not in the mood for riddles.”

“That maybe I’m the answer,” I blurted. “To healing your heart. I could…you know, be your boyfriend. As Lester. If you wanted. You and me. You know, like…yeah.”

HAHAHAHA. That Totally came from the left field Lester, even for you.

“Your girlfriend was pregnant when you had her killed?” Reyna launched another kick at my face. I managed to dodge it, since I’d had a lot of practice cowering, but it hurt to know that this time she hadn’t been aiming at an incoming raven. Oh, no. She wanted to knock my teeth in.

“You suck,” Meg agreed.

I mean, if THIS is not the ultimate deal breaker then what is? Apollo might have changed for better by now, but it doesn't mean we can overlook what he did. I for one certainly don't need a loveline for him in this series. I'm glad Uncle Rick drew(or at least seemed to have) a clear line here.

High Points

It took half the page count even for Uncle Rick's special brand of snark to return. Nonetheless I managed to find some good ones. Which is what matters, right?

“So,” I said, making a second attempt at nonchalance, “are you and Thalia, er…?”

Reyna raised an eyebrow. “Involved romantically?”

“Well, I just…I mean…Um…”

Oh, very smooth, Apollo. Have I mentioned I was once the god of poetry?

Reyna rolled her eyes. “If I had a denarius for every time I got that question…Aside from the fact that Thalia is in the Hunters, and thus sworn to celibacy…Why does a strong friendship always have to progress to romance?"

Preach, sister. But then again I would have to ask did YOU have to swear to celibacy to prove your independence....which is sort of the point🙄..

Even when I was a god and could speak any language I wanted, I’d never sung well in Italian. I kept mixing it up with Latin, so I came off sounding like Julius Caesar with a head cold.

LOL

It was time to be helpful. I needed to be repulsive for my friends!

Which you're most of the time...the latter sentence I mean.

4. Don't we all relate? 😂

“O protector of Rome!” I read aloud. “O insert name here!”

5. And one more.

I bet Gregorix was wishing he’d pursued that business degree his mom always wanted him to get. Being a barbarian bodyguard was mentally exhausting.

Heartrending quotes.

This was the source of all our communications troubles—one sad, angry, forgotten little god.

2. This was the wisest quote I saw in the book. The simple indescribable deepness of letting go.

“Good-bye, Apollo,” said the Sibyl’s voice, clearer now. “I forgive you. Not because you deserve it. Not for your sake at all. But because I will not go into oblivion carrying hate when I can carry love.”

Even if I could’ve spoken, I wouldn’t have known what to say. I was in shock. Her tone asked for no reply, no apology. She didn’t need or want anything from me. It was almost as if I were the one being erased.

3. I was saddened to learn about Julia's untimely loss, but I'm sure everybody had a meltdown moment at the following scene.

The old god’s face hardened a bit more, which shouldn’t have been possible for stone. “I see. Well. I’ve concentrated the last bits of my power here, around Julia. They may destroy New Rome, but they will not harm this girl!”

“Or this statue!” said Julia.

4. Honestly? I too forgot until Apollo pointed it out and then I had *shivers*! They're one immediate family, grieving over one loss that affects all of them in various ways, and having mixed reactions about each others the members who survived!

I shivered. How easy it was to forget that this young woman was also my sister. And Jason was my brother. At one time, I would have discounted that connection. They’re just demigods, I would have said. Not really family.

Overall Conclusion

This is the most bored-outta-my-mind I felt after reading a PJO universe book. Am I finally growing out of the Percy Jackson and the Heroes of Olympus fandom? Oh dear, I hope not. I can't imagine living without it and I'm SO not happy with this new development. Just as I feared, Uncle Rick couldn't keep it up after the excellent Burning Maze and now.....please, for your fans' sake who had been loyal for years, I hope at least the final book delivers. Just so we could at least part ways/go dormant with pleasant sentiments and a content heart.🙆‍♀️

#rick riordan #trials of apollo #Percy Jackson and the Olympians #the tyrants tomb #book reviews.#reviews #pjo

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i-see-london-i-see-klance · 6 years ago

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Voltron Season 8 - Overall Thoughts and Reactions

Okay so let’s break this down a bit. Into the good, the bad, and the eh???

The Good:

I love that this season took the time to give us some character moments. Moments when it was just people talking about their feelings or just spending time being people. At points it was clunky, but even then I appreciated that they took the time to actually let us see the characters, not just the plot.

The Allurance romance was also really organic to me. It wasn’t in your face, but it wasn’t brushed off once they’d hooked up either. The show gave them moments together, but didn’t make it a major focus. I also loved that, yeah, they loved each other, but it wasn’t one of those true love, destined to be together romances. They loved each other like normal people did. And so when Allura...became one with the big bang(?), Lance was sad, yes. But he wasn’t emotionally destroyed. He was able to move on, which is totally realistic for a relationship that new. Just, slow clap for the writers on that one

Honerva. God, Honerva. She was just amazing. I don’t think the series did a very good job as setting her up as the ultimate Big Bad; she was kind of on the sidelines and in the shadows too much for it to feel completely organic that she kind of took over at the end, but GOD the season worked her up beautifully...well, up until they castrated her character right at the end, but I’m choosing to focus on the good. She was ruthless, she was powerful, she was badass. And her motivation was so refreshing. She was evil, but her drive was love of her family, and my god I loved that. She was amazing this entire season. I ADORED what they did with her.

The character cameos were incredible. I don’t remember that many new characters, if any, getting added, which makes sense because there’s no point in introducing us to new people and expecting us to care about them at this point. The cameos were mostly well used, and I loved how many old characters they managed to cram back in. Most shows make their characters a one off and the fact that Voltron doesn’t was something I loved about this show in general, not just this season. It was sweet to see so many familiar faces.

While I was NOT a fan of the last 2-3 episodes, the last 5-10 min of the final ep actually managed to be really touching and sweet, and I thought it was well done. Allura’s sacrifice kind of came out of nowhere, but at the same time it made sense. She’d been showing off all these fancy quintescence powers since the first season, when it became clear that it was going to require fancy quintescence powers to save the day it’s perfectly logical that she’s the one to do it. And having her have to sacrifice herself to save everything feels more realistic after the extent of the damage that was done rather than have her and Honerva just fix everything and then carry on like nothing happened. It makes her seem less overpowered, even though SHE AND HONERVA ARE TOTALLY GODDESSES YO. And then I’ve always been a sucker for those “where are they now” type endings where we can get a brief bit of final closure when the show doesn’t really have time to spend on the aftermath. And the end results seemed very fitting and in-character for the team, unlike some “where are they now” segments I could mention (*coughDIGIMONcough*)

The Bad:

Ugh so many things

The writing felt all over the place this season, and a lot of details were handwaved or really badly explained. I don’t need an in-depth explanation for everything that’s happening, but too many times the answer the show gave for things happening was “Whoa that’s weird but hey moving on!” and it felt really lazy to me. Worse is there were a few times where they actually acknowledged the gaping plot holes and then never explained them (i.e. Earth’s defenses, Voltron and the Atlas fusing) which just draws more attention to the poor writing. I wouldn’t mind it so much if there had been a precedent for this kind of thing throughout the show, but the only example I can think of where some random superpower shows up out of the blue without explanation was when the Atlas turned into a giant mecha the first time, and it pissed me off just as much then. I get that this is the final season. I get that the stakes have to be raised because this is the climax of the entire show. But if you’ve upped the danger so high that the only way you can make the heroes believably triumph is by giving them random new powers, you have done a really shitty job of writing your climax.

Bringing back the original paladins. Don’t get me wrong, I love the characters, and any extra screen time for Alfor and OG!Zarkon brings me so much joy. But the entire segment felt really unnecessary and out of nowhere. These characters had already gotten their arcs, we already had closure when it came to them. Sure, it was sad. They all kind of died. But there was no need to bring them back. They were really dead and gone. Not to mention having them interact with the new paladins just made it more obvious that they were supposed to mirror the original team, where Lance piloted Blue, Keith Red, and Shiro Black. Blaytz and Allura had pretty much nothing to do with each other, they weren’t foils to each other’s characters, and their interaction was just kind of weird. And while Alfor chatting up Lance was kind of cute in the “meet the parents” kind of way, once again the personalities don’t match. It was awkward and out of place and overall those episodes felt really meaningless and forgettable

A lot of Allura’s actions this season kind of bugged me as well. She did something risky and stupid, starting doing questionable things, and then in the end she essentially faced no actual consequences for these actions. I mean, sure, in the end she kind of DIED, but that wasn’t related to her mistakes so I don’t think that counts.

The meh:

The fanservice. I’m kind of torn on this one because while it’s nice that the show took the time to add in little extras to please the fans who have been with this show all along, a lot of it was really blatantly fanservice. Lance’s altean markings come to mind as an example. They just appear, they never get explained or acknowledged or have any reason to exist or impact on the story. He’s just got altean markings now. And the only reason I can conceive why they added that in was for the fanservice.

The season’s treatment of Coran really irked me too. It was really inconsistent with how it treated his relationship with Allura, sometimes making it very clear that he’s her closest remaining thing to family, and other times ignoring that connection completely. I THINK what they may have unintentionally implied based on when and who was showing the emotions was that Coran cares a lot more about Allura (acting as her guardian when Lance asks her out, weeping in the flashback when Alfor asks Coran to stay by her side) than Allura cares about him (telling Lance on their date that she has no family left at all), which, yeesh. As if I didn’t already have problems with Allura’s writing this season

The lions were a mixed bag this season. I can’t say they had personalities anymore, and I suppose they haven’t for a long, long time but at least they had a few moments here and there where they were acknowledged to be their own characters, rather than just machines. It just wasn’t enough. Remember when Red was actually finicky and temperamental? Remember when the Black Lion actually seemed to care about her paladin? Remember when Blue had sass? The show clearly doesn’t

Overall, did I think this was a good season? Yeah, I’d say it was decent. Not the best by far, but also definitely not the worst. And considering the path the show has taken over the last few seasons, I think we got an ending that was as satisfying as we could expect. It didn’t blow me out of the water, it didn��t change the world, but it met my (admittedly low) expectations. It’s over and I walked away being okay with how it ended, rather than disappointed or frustrated. I’m sure I’m one of many people who will say that the show definitely started out way stronger than it finished, and that it never quite lived up to the potential of the first few seasons, but at least I can say I saw it through, and I did enjoy at least seeing how it ended. But I’m also really glad it’s over, because I think it was starting to wear itself out, and that’s why the quality slipped. It got too big and epic, and it needed to end before it turned into Supernatural, where there’s always got to be a bigger threat. I don’t know if I think the good of the final season outweighed the bad or vice versa; while I think there were more little things and moments that made me happy this season, the problems I had with it were pretty huge. And they REALLY ticked me off. But it’s probably close enough that I can say they balance each other out.

I guess I’ll just say that while I’m kind of sad it’s over, and I wasn’t entirely thrilled with how the series progressed, I’m still happy I watched it and I got to be a part of this fandom and phenomena. Someday I might watch the whole series again, for nostalgia’s sake.

But I also might just stick to the beginning, when all we had was a small team of misfits, and a universe of possibilities :)

#voltron season 8 #Voltron #voltron s8 #Voltron Reactions #Voltron Season 8 reactions #Voltron Spoilers #Spoilers #My stuff #text post

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kurogabae · 6 years ago

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Tsubasa: Trainwreck Chronicles

And Why Bee Train Personally Owes Me At Least a Grand; an Essay by Popular Demand

part 1 part 2

For those of you who might not know, I love Tsubasa Chronicle. So much. But for the love of Kurogane’s beautiful biceps is the anime awful. Now, I’m not one of those “manga purists” who always insists the manga is better than the anime, I tend to find them equal pretty often. This is not one of those cases.

Once upon a time CLAMP made a deal with Bee Train for a Tsubasa anime. Cardcaptor Sakura had done so well! CLAMP was a solid name to back! Bee Train had nothing to lose - except the trust of every CLAMP fan ever. I don’t know how hands on CLAMP (or rather Ohkawa) were in the production but I feel like “not at all” is a fairly solid guess. It was a mess folks. Production was rushed, story was disregarded, plot was cut up and Frankensteined back together, I’m not even going to talk about the English casting.

In fairness, it wasn’t without it’s good points. The soundtrack was flawless, the Japanese cast was amazing, and when Bee Train tried they really did manage to make the series look nice, which imo makes the rest of the subpar animation even more of a slap to the face. They even had some genuinely enjoyable filler episodes - the chibi episode and the Kero and Mokona episode are always the first to come to my mind - but overall? Not even a hot mess, just a mess.

Under the cut we’ll go arc by arc. I’m not going to rewatch the series just to write this so forgive me if I’m missing facts or if something I say is slightly inaccurate. Also, beware of spoilers for the manga if you haven’t finished reading it. That means you Nick. I’ll write you up a spoiler free copy of this later. Anyway, let’s go.

Opening and introductions:

You’d think, as the start of your series, you’d want the first episode or two to look really nice right? Catch the eye, impress the new viewer. Not Bee Train! [x x] The whole thing is subpar at best. Syaoran and Sakura’s introduction isn’t so bad for the most part, they’re cute and Bee Train tried to add a little more interaction between them before Sakura loses her feathers, which I am all kinds of behind, but... there’s a point where they run from castle guards. And Syaoran sort of just... grabs her and runs and Sakura is left literally flapping in the wind? [x] Also Sakura looks stoned out of her mind in like 90% of the shots she’s in. Touya probably thinks Syaoran is giving her drugs. But honestly, I don’t have too many problems with how the intro happens, mostly just the way it looks.

Fai’s intro can go by with almost no comment aside from the fact that his face looks like it’s melting. Sadly, this is not the worse his face will ever look. Pretty meh.

Personally I think Kurogane’s intro got the short end of the stick visually and I’m not just saying that because he and Tomoyo are my favorites. They both look pretty awful and, as always, where’s the beef???

Also Yuuko deserved better.

Hanshin:

If possible, the animation gets even lazier. We’ve added Mokona to the party and they cannot decide how big she is. I’m not being nitpicky either. Her size fluctuates wildly. Here are just a few examples set only in Hanshin. This problem persists throughout the series. Also I don’t know how to exactly put this into words but... everyone’s eyes are just extra jacked up.

Plot wise we mostly follow canon. Until they decide Sakura should get more screen time. “Great idea!” I can hear you say. “We love Sakura!” Well so do I. Problem: she has one (1) feather to her name and is comatose. Sakura is not really going to do anything. Yet the camera keeps going back to her- oh wait she’s awake. Sort of. Oh she’s getting dressed now, we even get a very weird little montage of her trying on clothes. Now she’s wandering the town, meets up with the leader of the Mohawk Gang whose kudan Kurogane beat the crap out of. Luckily she’s a super cute girl (who is barely conscious and doesn’t even talk? She’s so far from Mokona she probably can’t even understand these guys anyway but...) so they take her out to lunch instead of doing something Terrible. To the restaurant Touya works at. He serves her and doesn’t recognize her, meaning there is no Sakura in this world, at least not one related to him. This happens a lot.

In the anime Sakura is sometimes, for reasons unexplained and inconsistent, “drawn” to her feathers. She’s looking for her feather. There is an absurd Looney Tunes moment where she climbs some sort of tall thing (oil rig? construction site? world’s weirdest flag pole?) and jumps off of it before Syaoran and Co. (who have located her after Arashi, who would never have lost track of her in the first place let’s be real, tells them she’s gone AWOL) can stop her.

And then she flies. Literally and truly fucking flies. Through the sky. Thanks I hate it.

Syaoran catches her, brings her back home, and the story pretty much continues. One fun change was that the whole family had to share a room, they didn’t get separated like in the manga, so we get treated to this Gay Fucking Scene(tm) of Kurogane waking up and the first thing he sees if Fai sleeping while angelic music plays in the background. So that was nice.

Oh god hang on, I had to come back and add this because I literally always forget: Kurogane sees a version of Tomoyo in this world and goes running after her, leaving Fai and Syaoran to meet Touya and Yukito on their own. This results in both of them missing Kurogane’s kudan fight and Kurogane missing the “same face, different person” talk/reminder. They still can’t draw Tomoyo.

Also this.

Koryo:

Where’s the beef?

Much in the spirit of Hanshin, Koryo keeps mostly to the plot and has overall meh animation with a few choice moments of dear god why. Surprisingly, they made a few changes that I didn’t hate - the village had gotten a group of rebels together against the Ryanban. He also stole Chu’nyan’s mother’s body, making it so that her spirit could never find peace, making him even more of a dick.

This is where we see the first instance of the anime really being geared towards younger audiences than CLAMP had planned for. In the manga Sakura wins everyone new clothes via dice gambling, but in the anime she wins a lottery. Not a big deal, but we see more of this. Another thing change is that there’s a whole secondary plot added to everything when they try to, again, give Sakura a more active role. There are better ways to do this, but Bee Train sort of just tosses her into action and then tosses Syaoran in after her. It’s always bad and pointless and never amounts to anything.

Anyway, she ends up inside the castle, somehow Syaoran manages to follow after her. Goodness knows what the dads are up to. (Probably this.) Some Really Weird Stuff happens and from what I remember the spirit of Chu-nyan’s mother hops a ride out of the castle with Sakura. Who, uhh, teleports her and Syaoran out. Yeah.

The rest of the arc goes pretty much how the manga does with a handful of minor changes - like the fact that Kurogane never bought a manga in Hanshin, so in order to block Kiishim’s killing blow he’s tucked the hammer he was using to fix the roof in his shirt, which is a much smaller shield than a whole ass book and I think that’s dumb. Still can’t get Mokona’s size right, to awkward and hilarious results.

And remember kids, we won’t show you dice but we will show you this.

Big Lake and Shipper Fish:

The animation in this part is actually pretty nice. Considering. The things they changed were needless and weird.

Sakura and the fish talk. How? Why? We don’t know, it’s never explained or examined. We are meant to accept it Because Sakura, which only works most of the time. The fish tries to tell Sakura that she knows Syaoran - we all know this will not and cannot work. Why does this happen? What was the point of adding this? It is so weird and awkward. It messes up the flow and is so extra. I understand your desires Shipper Fish, but please, let things take their course.

Jade:

Fuck you and fuck your animation. It looks The Worst, which is a bummer because this world changes the fewest amount of things. Anything I could point out are really minor:

somehow Fai can read

they never show how the family gets their clothes, and 99% of the scene in the tavern is skipped

breaking and entering!

Mokona bites Kurogane in the ass

they don’t have horses

no Kuro-dork looking at the snow like an excited child

they nerf Kurogane’s BAMF

the feather isn’t hidden behind a wall, they need the pure hearts of children?

Kyle was a way lazier villain

Filler #1 - Lightning Jazz Hands:

Alright, that looked neat as hell, I’ll admit. My compliments end here.

Story: nosy little shits got themselves cursed. Gonna fight in a competition to win a Big Magic. Is the Big Magic a feather? Stay tuned! (It’s not, because then the girl would die and that would be Too Sad.)

So the people in this country can shoot lightning out of their hands, that would be awesome and possibly scary, but I guess Kurogane is water/ground type because he gets it and only says, and I quote, “it tingles”. So your lightning powers mean nothing, add no stakes, and the Fam can’t do it so what is the point?

This filler is also famous for its KuroFai baiting, which is impressive, seeing as the anime tried very hard to make them Not Gay. I mean it failed but yeah.

Syaoran is the only fighter they have left because Kurogane and Fai are children and Sakura is making friends with the cursed girl. Keefer... Keepha... fights Syaoran, and obviously Syaoran wins because we’re supposed to think this is a feather. They really play it up to, even after we learn the Big Magic isn’t a feather Syaoran still hesitates before handing it over. For dramatics I guess? I don’t know, there’s literally no reason for him to not give it to the needy couple.

Boring filler. Only fun was watching Kurogane get excited over fighting people.

tbc... with Outo

[part 1] [part 2]

#Tsubasa Trainwreck Chronicles #my meta #sort of?????#TRC #spoilersTRC

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queeenpersephone · 7 years ago

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hey loves so I can’t believe it?? but I just reached 700 followers! I want to thank all of the lovely people who follow me and especially all of you who have reached out to talk to me - I love each and every one of you!

anyways so here’s a little celebration that I hope you guys enjoy!

RULES

mbf the president of the sansa stark fanclub

reblog this post

maybe check out the following wonderful blogs: @melqomene @ohmargaery @ohmelisandre @darylvdixon @jaimelanniser @meerareeed @expelumos @weasleyrose @ladvystark @ladybaelish @petyrbaelish @goodqueenalys @tommenbaratheon @briennister @bbrienne @samtcrlys @liittlefinger @sevenkingdms + the rest of my lovely blogroll!

THINGS TO DO

send me an ask with a 🌹 for a detailed blograte (template by @fleurrdelacour)

send me an ask with a 🌸 + two names from my fandoms for a make me choose edit

send me an ask with a 🔥 + a short prompt + a ship and I’ll write you a drabble (but I do reserve the right to ask you to send another if it’s my notp or too cracky lol)

and that’s it!! please be a little patient as classes are kicking my butt this semester, but I will get to you! block ‘liv celebrates 700′ if you don’t want to see any of this, and I hope you guys enjoy!!!

template for the blograte under the cut:

detailed blograte:

compliment/advice:

#fionasfam #sabrinasfamily #liv celebrates 700 #personal #myedit #follow celebration

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golfnomad · 7 years ago

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Birthday in Vegas, Part 1: Summer in Summerlin

I was already planning to be in the Las Vegas area on Wednesday for a Greenskeeper.org GK Review Guru outing at one of my favorite courses, Cascata. It just happened to coincide with my birthday on Monday, so it was a great excuse to spend a few days in Sin City.

I ended up playing three rounds on Monday, all on the western side of town (aka Summerlin). As you might expect, I got started early...

Highland Falls Golf Club • Las Vegas, NV • 8/7/17

Prior to this trip, I was down to just a handful of public courses in the greater Las Vegas area. My goal was to knock out the final few (well, the ones not named Shadow Creek anyway) while there. Therefore, I needed to play Highland Falls on Monday because they were set to begin their second summer aeration on Tuesday.

I booked a 6:02 tee time directly with the course for $45. I was paired with another single and we went off behind a few really early bird member groups. One group did let us play through on the front nine and then we caught a couple slower groups toward the end of the round, but it was still a nice pace of under three hours.

Highland Falls is part of the Sun City Summerlin 55+ community, but all the courses (including Palm Valley and Eagle Crest) are open to the public. Now that I’ve played them all, I would easily say Highland Falls is the best of the bunch. It has a similar overall feel as Palm Valley, but a more interesting design, some decent elevation changes and some better scenery being situated a little closer to the Red Rock mountains to the west.

Now, Highland Falls isn’t anything that dramatic. In fact, I found it to be a very forgiving layout that allowed for plenty of good scoring opportunities. The greens are large and feature some undulation, and most fairways have ample landing room. Houses line most holes, but really won’t come into play much unless you really spray one.

I found the 5th hole to be the most interesting. It is a short-ish par-4 with a water hazard guarding the green. Longer hitters may want to lay-up to avoid rolling into the lake, and then it’s a short shot in to a well-protected green.

The course was in pretty good overall condition for mid-summer. It seemed pretty similar to what I experienced last year at Palm Valley. The tee boxes were fine. The fairways were mostly pretty good with some inconsistencies (multiple grasses in play, some thin spots, some shaggy spots). The rough was pretty similar to fairways with some really thick clumpy bermuda patches where the ball dug in deep and other places where the ball perched up nicely on top. Rough lies were either brutal or very favorable. It's clear they had some flooding throughout the course when the recent rains hit because there was some debris/trash gathered up in some of the low-lying areas. Sure that will get cleaned up soon enough. I wasn't in a bunker here.

The greens were soft and rolling pretty well at medium speeds, starting to show some summer wear with browning around the edges. Also, they were barely just healed from the July aeration (still dotted in appearance) before getting ready to aerate again the next day.

The Sun City Summerlin courses are solid options to consider when looking for something that’s somewhat reasonably priced in an area where most golf isn’t that cheap. They offer friendly local atmospheres and good enough courses to satisfy the golf itch..

Some pictures from Highland Falls Golf Club (8/7/17):

My next two rounds were convenient, as they are located at the same facility and were only a short drive away from Sun City Summerlin...

Angel Park Golf Club • Las Vegas, NV • 8/7/17

I was very happy to finally cross Angel Park off my list on this trip. This is a great golf facility with two full regulation courses (Palm and Mountain), a fun 12-hole par-3 “tribute” course (Cloud Nine), a large practice facility/range, and even a really diabolical 18-hole putting course.

Previously, I played the front nine of the Mountain Course with a friend. It was late in the day and that’s all we had time for. I had played the putting course on that first visit and the Cloud Nine course on a separate visit to Angel Park. That left 27 holes I needed to play, including the back nine of Mountain and all of Palm. My plan for Monday was to play both of the main courses in their entirety.

I had booked a TeeOff.com deal time at 11:57 for $30 on the Palm Course. However, I finished quicker than expected at Highland Falls and wasn’t sure what to do with the extra time in between. I headed over to Angel Park and the guy in the pro shop was super nice. Because it was a pre-paid time that was so much later than my arrival, I wouldn’t be able to play my Palm round early. However, he said I could play Mountain first and then they’d get me out on Palm whenever I finished the first round. We both figured it would end up being later than my original tee time.

Ultimately, it worked out well. He charged me a mid-morning rate of $45 for Mountain and I was teeing off around 9:30 by myself. I ended up playing through a few groups, but the course was pretty wide open and I finished in about two hours, 20 minutes. In fact, I was checking back in the pro shop just a few minutes before my original 11:57 tee time on Palm!

Mountain Course

When I played Mountain last time, it was very late in the day. The first half of the front nine faces due west, so it was staring directly into the setting sun. We couldn’t see much and it was hard to enjoy. By the time we turned around and started heading back east, it was starting to get dark.

This time, I actually got to see what the course really looked like and I liked what I saw. Mountain reminded me of a somewhat tamer version of Badlands (R.I.P.) or TPC Las Vegas. It makes sense because they are both very close by. It has similar rugged terrain with a small canyon running through parts of the course.

The Mountain Course (both courses at Angel Park in fact) were designed, at least in part, by Arnold Palmer. I typically enjoy his course layouts and aesthetic presentations. I think Mountain is the much prettier of the two. There are lots of pine trees. You have mountains providing a nice backdrop on one side and then some okay views of Las Vegas on the other side. The Suncoast Casino is right next door, as well, so the first few holes play right alongside it.

There are a number of memorable holes here, including the short par-4 3rd and the demanding par-4 9th. On the back nine, the 11th is a cool little par-3 over a canyon. Lastly, the two finishing holes are quite challenging. The par-5 17th is very tricky with a large canyon bisecting the fairway about halfway through the hole. The 18th features a large water hazard that runs along the entire right side of the hole.

Conditions were pretty good for mid-summer. I guess Mountain is different from Palm because they keep the rye grass (or is it actually all poa?) through the summer rather than transitioning to bermuda. That gives Mountain a deeper green overall look, but perhaps somewhat spottier coverage this time of year. The tee boxes were nice. The fairways were good for the most part, with some thin/brown areas scattered throughout. The rough was pretty similar in terms of coverage. The greens were very soft and rolling at medium speeds. Speaking of greens, they were doing some maintenance on the par-3 11th green, so about half of the green is roped off as GUR to make it an extra-small target hole for the time being.

Good deals can be found at Angel Park, especially if you are an OB Sports card holder, to make it a reasonably affordable mid-range option. Now that I’ve played them both, I would personally rank the Mountain Course higher than Palm. However, I know a lot of people feel the opposite way.

Some pictures from Angel Park Golf Club (Mountain) (8/7/17):

Palm Course

Though I checked in just in time for the original Palm tee time, I wasn’t in any rush. It was clearly not busy out there and I had time to grab a quick bite at the snack bar. I scarfed down a pretty tasty hot dog and headed over to the first tee of Palm.

I ran into a couple groups out here, but they both let me through and I was finished in under two hours. That meant I played three full rounds on three different courses and was finished by 2:00!

Palm starts off near the clubhouse and the first few holes are kind of boring, if you ask me. I was ready to write this course off as “solid” and pretty basic desert at best, but then I went through the tunnel and onto the other side of Summerlin Parkway where the majority of this course is situated.

Everything on the other side of the street is much more enjoyable. There are a lot of good holes in this stretch. Most notable would be the double-dogleg par-5 6th. It has numerous risk/reward options with a split fairway and all sorts of different angles to consider. The short, but deadly par-4 9th is also a good one. It is a sharp dogleg left around a lake. I wish I had more local knowledge before playing both of these holes because I took some aggressive lines that I shouldn’t have and it cost me a stroke or two on an otherwise really good round.

Both of the par-3s on the front nine are also nice, with water hazards to hit over.

Eventually, you come back across the parkway for the final few holes. I liked the par-3 17th and 18 was decent, but otherwise it gets a little boring again once you are back on this side of the property. Overall, I would say I really liked 2/3 of the course and the other third was just “meh.” That’s why I would easily lean toward Mountain as a more interesting 1-18 layout that also has more eye-catching scenery and landscaping.

I would say Palm is in slightly better condition than Mountain, primarily because it is fully transitioned to summer bermuda. It's a little lighter in color and there were some more light brown streaks throughout the fairways and rough, but the playability is more consistent. There were still some thin spots scattered throughout, though, so it was far from pristine. Overall, the tee boxes, fairways and rough were all in pretty good mid-summer condition. The greens were definitely a bit firmer on this side, but still pretty receptive and rolling at medium speeds. I was in one bunker and it was typical crappy Vegas sand—a bit thin and rocky.

Both Palm and Mountain are good courses and I can see why they are popular with a lot of local players who want to avoid the resort courses and inflated prices that come with them.

Some pictures from Angel Park Golf Club (Palm) (8/7/17):

#Angel Park Golf Club #Las Vegas Golf #Highland Falls Golf Club #Sun City Summerlin Golf

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fleur · 8 years ago

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🐝 + lily evans OFC ♥♥♥

yaaaas ugh, i just associate her with you now - tbhh 💕

detailed blograte under the cut! | want one?

compliment/advice: idek where to begin?? i could write paragraphs about how much i love you and your blog!! everything looks like some multimillion company paid to have it set up or something, like?? also plz your about page needs an update bc you def CAN make edits omg, i love them all sfm????

#maliasbr #br #jilys

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paradoxicalca · 5 years ago

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r/hockey NHL Power Rankings Week 7: Spicy Edition

/r/Hockey NHL Power Rankings Week Nov 11, 2019 - Nov 17, 2019Thank YouThank you to all of the volunteers doing the power rankings. Each ranker has their own system and have their own reasonings and analyis. It truly is a lot of work.RankersSpoilerOrganizersSpoilerVisualizationThe visualization contains historical data, so you can see how your team has done over time. Hopefully, we can run this for many years in hopes that we can see the rise and fall of teams by /r/hockey opinion.It automatically updates so feel free to bookmark. You can find it hereProcessHow does this work? Throughout the course of the week rankers are able to access an app that will allow them to rank teams. At the end of the period we calculate the average ranking for every team and collate all of the analysis provided by rankers.The app then generates a post that is first proofread and then posted to /r/hockey!Rankings (29/31 Rankers Reporting)Ranking (avg)TeamDeltaOverall RecordRecord This WeekComments1 (1.34)Washington Capitals-15-3-42-1-1Best team in the league, full stop.2 (2.2)New York Islanders114-3-12-0-0The magic continues. Point streak of 14 games, of which 13 were wins. It looked in danger down 3-0 in Philly, but the guys who have been really hot, Barzal and Beauvillier, stayed hot bringing the Isles back. Brassard is playing amazingly on Nelson's wing, currently looking like the best signing across the league this past summer. Goaltending showed some signs of regression this week but the team still found a way to win. Ladd looks to have returned to full health, or at least as close as he can get anymore, but is in Bridgeport for the time being. Will be interesting to see if he makes his way up to the NHL or gets hurt before he gets the chance.3 (3.69)Boston Bruins-112-3-51-0-2Well, at least it's a point streak as the injuries mount up with Krug joining the IR and Bergeron not playing against the Caps. I hope Bruce made the team bagskate penalty shots until they scored 3 each on Halak and Rask. In Bruce's tenure as Head Coach, the team has a record 3-14 in shootouts. I can't fault the goalies either but it's pretty much a given that if you take the Bruins to a shootout, the other team will get the W. I'm not expecting miracles there but at least near 0.500.4 (5.63)St. Louis Blues-12-4-50-1-2The Blues have been winning a lot despite relatively poor play for a while now, and this week they finally had some down games. Just from the eye test, they look good but not good enough. If they don't rebound in the next week expect them to severely drop5 (6.03)Edmonton Oilers-13-6-31-1-1This team needs to make up its fucking mind. Blown out by the Sharks then blowing out the Avs then tossing away a victory with an OT loss against the Stars. The team still lives and dies on the Powerplay. Best Powerplay in the league, but nearly all the offence is produced through the Powerplay. The 5-on-5 play needs substantial improvement. The bottom six is a disaster. And then the reason we still lead the Pacific: Leon Draisaitl and Connor McDavid. WE ARE MERE MORTALS IN FRONT OF THESE GODS. Solid shout-out to Nuge, Klefbomb, Bear, Koskinen, Smith, Khaira and Nurse. 4 consecutive divisional games next week. If the Oilers do well here, they will continue to stand above the Pacific, but any faltering here and they will take a dive in this competitive division.6 (6.4)Colorado Avalanche-12-6-22-1-0Injuries yay! This week started off taking out Francouz and having us call up our 3rd and 4th goalies to play games. Also RIP Calvert hope he is ok. Adam Werner stole the show against the Jets, but he had a lot more trouble with McDavid and Drai. Bibeau was serviceable vs the Canucks, but we would love Grubauer or Francouz to get healthy, both are on the trip as we carry 4 goalies. The good news is the team looked good with solid chemistry and MacKinnon and Makar have just taken over. On the bad side the defense looks scattered and it doesn't help our young goalies. Next up is the second half of our Western Canadian trip and Saturday finishes with a Hockey night in Canada game against the Leafs in Denver. Makalder Watch: Cale Makar is amazing, on track for the best rookie season by a defenseman in decades. He had 6 points in three games with another Game winner against the Jets. His defense has also been getting better and better he had some great plays against the Canucks.7 (8.74)Carolina Hurricanes212-7-13-0-0Rob the Bod has the team back on track but the competition they faced wasn’t overtly difficult and they barely eked out wins against the Wild and Buffalo. For a team that is considered to have one the best overall defense in the league giving up a tying goal late each game is unacceptable.8 (9.23)Arizona Coyotes612-7-23-1-0The Yotes went 3-1 over the previous week, setting NHL history by becoming the first team to sweep the previous 2 Stanley Cup Champions in back-to-back games (of 69 potential times in history). The success is being driven by the rock-solid goal tending tandem in net, with Kuemper picking up a shutout over Calgary, and almost picking up a goalie fight as well. Defense has also been rock tight. It isnt consistently pretty, but this team is finding ways to win, taking 3 of 4 games this week (2 through the shootout).9 (10.77)Pittsburgh Penguins-111-7-21-1-1"I need to be fire," he said with a laugh. "I will be fire." This is Geno Malkin as we know him stepping up in the absence of Crosby who needed surgery and will be out for a couple months. Geno along with the rest of the walking wounded that is the Penguins lineup, struggled to finish their many chances in losses against the Rangers and Devils this week. The Pens controlled possession, got solid defensive efforts from the backend, and played tough and resilient for a team whose players are dropping left and right. Saturday the Penguins got their bounces and lit up the Maple Leafs unleashing the power of Geno’s fire straight to the seat occupied by Leafs coach Mike Babcock who got an earful from his home crowd. The Penguins are no strangers to playing without Sid, and with a continued effort to solid defensive hockey they will tread water until he can come back and lead the Pens into the playoffs once again.10 (11.29)Montreal Canadiens811-5-42-0-1After earning 5 of 6 points in an emotional week highlighted by a stunning road upset of the NHL-leading Capitals, the Habs cruise to the quarter-mile post in 2nd place in the fierce and unforgiving Atlantic division. They've done it with a high-octane and well-balanced offense that's been a nightmare to defend. Even slumps by Domi and Drouin haven't slowed the Habs down, thanks (in part) to Tatar's great start and Suzuki's emergence as the most exciting rookie east of the Rockies. If Price, Petry and Weber stay healthy this team could do some serious damage in the 2nd half. Keep in mind GM Bergevin has the cash (cap space), the credit (draft picks/prospects), and the biceps to make a major purchase at the trade deadline. This is a team to watch.11 (13.31)Dallas Stars1111-8-23-0-0Where has this team been hiding all season?? The stars seem to have suddenly figured how to do that hockey well.12 (13.34)Buffalo Sabres-210-7-31-1-1We are playing for a top pick right now. I can't honestly believe we beat Ottawa, let alone in regulation. This incredible trainwreck would be unfathomable in a vacuum, but given that this same sequence happened literally last year, I'm less shocked. If we don't have either Jack or Sam for any length of time, we can write this year off as a straight-garbage-fire loss. How many games has it been since someone other than them has scored? Our secondary scoring is so cold that if you lined Jimmy Vesey up in interstellar space, heat would flow from space into his body. We were first in the league!13 (14.03)Winnipeg Jets712-8-12-1-014 (15.09)Tampa Bay Lightning39-6-21-1-0Tampa looked amazing against NY, but meh against the Jets. Did a great job of capitalizing on PPs during the NY game, but went back to spending too much time in the box against Winnipeg.15 (15.74)Vancouver Canucks-310-7-41-1-1The Canucks went 1-1-1 this week, finishing off a four game home stand with a total of 3 points. Underlying numbers remain promising, but results are sporadic and it appears we are seeing the Canucks settle closer to what can be expected out of a young team. I've seen people discussing the DJ again, which usually says more about dissatisfaction with the on-ice product than it does about whatever cheesy tunes are being played. That said, the Canucks still potted 11 goals in their last 3 games, Hughes had 2 assist Saturday night, Demko remains solid (and at times brilliant), and the hockey is fun as hell for a bubble team. The power-play remains inconsistent, because this is ice hockey and nothing is consistent. After a too-good-to-be-true start, fans may need to re-calibrate expectations in order to enjoy the grind as the season wears on.16 (15.77)Nashville Predators-99-7-30-2-0Well this is the easiest blurb I've written in my time doing these power rankings: something is fucked with this team right now, and the fanbase is quickly turning against itself questioning what the problem is. Has Lavi lost the room? Is Pekka on the decline? Is the defense breaking down too much? Was Duchene worth it? What does it say that Bonino is our second leading goal scorer? Is our third D pairing holding us back? Is everyone just overreacting to a cold streak? What should our next banner say? I don't really have any answers, but I do know watching the last few games has not been fun. Also, we're currently on the outside looking in at 5th in the Central so that's cool I guess. Oh look, Chicago won another game so now we're 6th. Fuck.17 (16.43)Vegas Golden Knights-610-9-31-2-0The most recent win can't hide the fact that the Golden Knights were just in a 5 game winless streak. Underlying numbers suggested that the Knights are playing better than their record shows but blown leads, missed opportunities, and 3rd period collapses we're a theme during the team's slump. We'll see if the win against Calgary is a start of fixing those issues.18 (16.94)Philadelphia Flyers110-6-40-1-2I mean taking the top two teams in the league (Islanders and Caps) to the SO means we can Fly with the best of em. But losing in regulation to the Sens means that we can Die with the worst of em. We still need the veterans to step up a bit more, but the young guns have been doing well to keep us in games (TK, Lindblom, Hart). Also can the NHL STOP SETTING GAMES ON THE ONLY NIGHTS THAT I WORK LIKE COME ON GUYS I LIKE WATCHING HOCKEY TOO. Ted Talk over, Praise Gritty19 (17.49)Anaheim Ducks-310-9-21-1-1This season feels like a rerun. Looks like a losing home stand came 1 month earlier than last year. A poor effort against the oilers after 4 days off. Similarly poor effort against the wild. I don’t see the fight. I don’t see the ducks ready to start any game lately. Song of the week: Free fallin’ - Tom Petty and the heartbreakers20 (17.89)Florida Panthers110-5-52-1-0The Panthers had a fantastic comeback victory against the Bruins early in the week. They showed a lot of character and determination. This team doesn't quit when they get scored on and fall behind which is great because goaltending has been, let's put it nicely, garbage. Overall it was a good week with a rare regulation loss and win.21 (18.51)Calgary Flames-610-10-30-3-0Oof. The Flames scored 1 goals in 3 games this week, and conceded 12. They have not led at any point in about 220 minutes. In short... the Flames are a bad hockey team right now.22 (19.54)San Jose Sharks210-10-13-0-0The San Jose Sharks are 6-0-0 in the (2019-20) Radim Šimek era! In all seriousness, the team is looking much better than they did for the first ~15 games. The offence is getting more creative and it's showing, and the D has tightened up. I really like the line of Meier-Hertl-Goodrow and I hope PDB doesn't blend them too soon, and Kane-Cooch-Labanc have looked pretty good too. Karlsson and Vlasic have cleaned up their play since they've been together, and Šimek has really anchored Burns, which is exactly what we needed from him. The Sharks aren't out of the woods yet and there's improvements to be made, but we're playing much better than we have been. G23 (20.37)Toronto Maple Leafs-109-9-40-3-0The weather is getting colder, and the leaves are falling. Big time. After a rough start for the backup Hutchison v Chicago, he was waived on Monday and the Leafs called up Kaskisuo to backup Freddy Andersen. On Wednesday, the Leafs fell behind twice but only came back once, losing 5-4. Then, a 4-2 loss to Boston extended the Leafs losing streak to 4 games. This was further extended to 5 after Kaskisuo's NHL debut against the Penguins, as he got completely hung out to dry, as the Leafs got clobbered 6-1. Offensively, it doesn't look like there's much effort or care. Too many passes. Defensively, too many passes to the other team. It's bad. Be sure to check out r/leafs for any information you need about leaves!24 (23.54)Chicago Blackhawks29-7-43-0-0The Blackhawks beat the Golden Knights for the first time in franchise history. The Hawks are 5-0-1 since tweaking their system, scoring 4+ goals in each of those 5 wins. Kane has 8G, 9A and points in each of our last 9 games. Dach has 4G, 2A and points in each of our last 4. 5-on-5 goals by Hawks defensemen: 1 in our first 17 games, 4 in the last 3. The Hawks are 4-0-0 on the tail end of back-to-backs, thanks to an excellent goaltending duo.25 (24.94)New York Rangers-28-8-21-2-0Shitty week overall. Started off solid with a OTW against the Pens with Kakko scoring two goals including the overtime winner. After that, the Florida trip got real bad real fast. The Lightning blew us completely out of the water 9-3. Chytil scored two goals, but beyond that there wasn't too much good. In the game against the Panthers, Panarin attempted to carry us to a W singlehandedly, but we came up short. Hopefully once Zibanejad comes back, we'll find a little more consistency and we can pull out some more wins.26 (26.46)Columbus Blue Jackets-17-8-41-0-1"We are one god damn uptight team" - John Tortorella27 (27.37)Los Angeles Kings38-11-13-0-0The Kings had a perfect week- despite being against mostly low opposition. The lower half of the Pacific is getting spicy- although the Kings still sit at the very bottom.28 (27.4)New Jersey Devils17-8-42-1-0Suspicious shifty eyes * 2 wins in a row? All that did was probably buy Hynes more time before the inevitable. 3 games upcoming, Bruins, Pens, Red Wings. *The Good:** We won 2 games against decent opponents in the Pens and Habs, back to back, with Blackwood in net both games. Simmonds has 3 goals in the last 4 games and the goals seems to be coming in from all over the roster in general. The Bad: We dropped the game against the Sens and let Pageau walk all over us and get a hatty. Hall still isn't putting the puck in the net despite leading the team in points. His shooting percent has now fallen below 3%. The Ugly: Cory might as well not be rostered. He's played once since Halloween. His save% is 0.852, and his GAA is 4.59. It's really, really hard to watch the player who was the reason the Devils weren't the worst team in league for several years get hurt and completely fall apart post surgery. In a span where we've played 3 back to backs, Cory has played once and lost.29 (27.91)Ottawa Senators-18-11-12-2-0Another unexpectedly strong week. Even if the Sens did hand Eichel 4 goals on a silver platter on the 2nd stage of a back to back, they were still hanging in the game (albiet barely) right up until the final backbreaker goal. Beating the Flyers was also pretty huge. This team is starting to be defined by a "work insanely hard" culture which is exactly what we've been needing! Somehow we find ourselves closing in on the Leafs in the standings...I think most Sens fans would honestly rather have a high draft pick instead of making a playoffs push this year. Still, with the Sens looking less awful than expected and the Sharks on a winstreak thanks to Radim Šimek - the Czech god of the blue line - one must already wonder who will make it to the wildcard spots and what draft day is going to look like. Even with barely a quarter of the season played out.30 (28.8)Minnesota Wild-37-11-21-1-1The Wild aren't as good as they could be, and not as bad as they should be. The one thing that's been consistent over the years however is reigning as the league's worst 3-on-3 team, and it's not even close. Since the implementation of the arcade-style OT, Minnesota is a laughable 12-30. Translate those results over to the first 60 minutes and it's Lottery City baby!31 (29.8)Detroit Red Wings-7-12-31-0-2This is the worst Red Wings roster in some 30 years. A defense this week led by Dennis Cholowski(21) and Madison Bowey(24). Seriously read that again, that’s the first pair! Despite this, the Red Wings have finally made a return to playing the kind of games that makes any rebuilding team successful. Down to the wire, come from behind, and battling hard for each win even if they come up short. Andreas Athanasiou has picked up heat scoring a couple signature goals with his speed and quick hands. Larkin is still creating awesome chances and looks fantastic in the faceoff circle. This team actually does a great job in that department despite not capitalizing on many of the opportunities. Furthermore, the league worst PK has actually been getting extremely better in the last two weeks. While it sits at 70.6%, the last five games the Wings have killed 12/14 PP. Things are swinging back up for Detroit lets hope they can maintain this pace for more than two weeks. r/hockey NHL Power Rankings Week 7: Spicy Edition Source

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ciathyzareposts · 6 years ago

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Waxworks – Final Rating

By Deimar

We come to the end of HorrorSoft. And it is a pity that it seems so rushed and a bit unfinished because I really liked both Elviras. The good things in them easily overcome their flaws, at least if you are interested in an horror themed adventure. However, in this game there are simply too many design mistakes, too much repetitiveness, too many dead ends… And even though I ended up the game with the mine, which is the most elaborated level, mostly well designed and interesting, it came after three sections ranging from meh to borderline infuriating. In the end, it didn’t left a good taste, neither as an adventure game nor as an RPG. Let’s check its flavour in our PISSED rating.

Puzzles and Solvability

First let me praise the game for the in-game hint system. The crystal ball is a welcome addition as it avoids getting stuck in the most nonsensical puzzles, in spite of not having that many of them and although it sometimes doesn’t help with dead ends such as missing the purse next to the dead girl in London. The game even has some memorable puzzles – not groundbreaking, but at least enjoyable – for example, killing the alligator in the pyramid or putting the dog to sleep in London. Oddly enough, they all involved inflicting damage to animals but let’s not dwell too deep into that. The special traps in the pyramid are also a nice addition as they pose a different kind of puzzle that suits well with the theme of the level, which is a play on old adventure movies, and serve as a break from the dungeon crawling experience that is the main game for the most part.

I don’t know why, but I felt quite fond about some of the “puzzles” in the mine and Egypt, like for example figuring out how to make the gas mask work. They achieve a good balance between challenging and wonkers

However, I have to point out that for the most part the puzzles are based on the worst kind of pixel hunting. Excluding London, the rest of the levels are quite straightforward in what you need to use to solve a puzzle, but the main difficulty relays in finding the needed item, not in forcing you to think about the problem. For example, to get the soldier to blow up the mine, the main challenge is finding the drill equipment. In a completely dark screen. Which is not very remarkable as it is showing you a blank wall for the most part. London is the same, don’t get me wrong, but the sheer amount of objects you can take at least makes you think about which ones are useful for a problem and which ones aren’t.

Add to that an excessive amount of backtracking which in some levels can take you quite a long time as the game forces you to get back to the beginning of the level for some location or item. One example of this is the graveyard, where you have to go all the way back to the other side of the level, continuously fighting enemies. But it is not the only one, the same thing happens in the pyramid where you have to keep going up and down through it to solve several puzzles, trying to avoid getting killed by a wire trap, or London, where the game has you going from the north part to the south part in a level that is mostly empty and devoid of any interest. It just smells of padding to be honest.

The two images are the south and north sides of the same tomb. So the game not only makes you backtrack all the way to the start of the level, but you also need to be very observant

The other main problem I have with the puzzles is that the main focus of the game is avoiding deaths, not solving puzzles. What I mean by that is that the most common difficulty is avoiding traps. And once you learn to avoid a trap, it is simply very uninteresting to have to “solve” another 20 versions of the same trap. And again, solving the traps is a matter of pixel hunting or of finding the right item. This is for the most part the RPG nature of the game showing up, but the problem is that as neither combat nor the trap finding parts are that interesting, this makes the game more boring instead of more exciting.

Oh, and I almost forgot, the dead ends in this game are such a waste of time for the player that it is not even fun. I would put them at the level of the yeti puzzle in King Quest V.

Rating: 4

Interface and Inventory

I must confess that I was checking my final rating for Elvira II at the time of this writing. Waxworks is basically Elvira II 2.0, using the same engine with very little improvements and a very similar gimmick with the game overall design, so it just seems fair to compare the rating of both games. And after reading this section, the impression is that this game has gotten worse in both interface and inventory. The game has more non-descriptive items; we no longer have the “room” inventory and hence we can’t drop items or see what is in the room; the use of verbs is inconsistent as sometimes you have to pick and drop to use and at other times you need to use a verb, sometimes both… Add to this that inventory management is a complete joke because you can’t drop anything. If you want to combine an item with another and they don’t appear simultaneously in the same screen of inventory you have to repick both items on the inventory so they appear at the top. Horrible inventory system. To be honest, it is such a pity they decided to drop the spell casting system. It was one of the main charms of both the original Elvira and the revamped version in Elvira II.

Seriously, look at all that crap. Most of it is worthless and not very distinctive

And don’t get me started with the interface. Combat interface is more complicated than in Elvira II, but somehow it has become more a nuisance than an interesting system. It is never clear which attacks are more effective than others. I think there is no difference at all between slashing from the right or from the left, and this only matters in the graveyard. There is only one combat in London and it is just a long boring click fest, in the mine it is just simply better to ignore combat and abuse the sprayer and I didn’t notice any difference between attacks in the pyramid. In fact, the most reliable weapon, the spear, can only thrust. At least the inflicted and received damage is more clear to read, not that it helps but that could count as an improvement.

When not in combat, you can just ignore the interface. Apart from the inconsistencies I already mentioned regarding use of items, which can be extended to interaction with the environment, the interface shows quite a lot less useful information than in Elvira II. You have the compass, which is nice to draw the maps, but overall the left part of the screen is completely useless. The right part also has a lot of buttons that serve no purpose. It is a simpler game, but the engine was designed for a more complex one, which means now most of the functions are useless and just fill a part of the screen that could have been used for expanding the play screen. Rating: 4

Story and Setting

Regarding the overall story, this is basically same as Elvira II. I will give the game some points because it at least has a detailed back story, but it is told in the manual and there are some inconsistencies between that prologue and what you find in the game. But if you were to change the twin brother to Elvira, the plot would be basically the same: you need to save Elvira from <evil_entity> and to defeat that entity you need to recover <magical_item> from several different fictional environments (studio set/waxworks) which come to life. It is a backstory that can draw you in, and I think it certainly paid off to hire a writer. Sadly the story is told outside the game, but it is still very nice even in spite of the bad guys being your twins having no relevance to the in-game story. In fact, in the only level where that is remotely relevant you are chased because you were seen next to a dead girl and not because you look like Jack the Ripper.

I don’t know why they didn’t start the game with this very image. It would serve better as an introduction instead of dropping just in the game

However, the execution of said overall story is better here. Each individual waxwork is an independent story with its own way of exploring it, which avoids some pitfalls from the previous game where sets had to be related to the studio premise. Granted, some levels are more interesting than others in this regard. For example, in the pyramid or the graveyard the story of the level is not very interesting. The graveyard however is the only level that ties in with the overall story and the main focus in the pyramid is the adventure, not the story. London and the mine are the ones with more story, and I think they make a good job of conveying it. This is no Shakespeare, but at least there is some sense of being part of a particular story in each of those levels and you are not simply dropped there to kill your brother. For example, you have the story of the dead prostitute and her sister in London or the professor and how he managed to stop the evil from spreading from the mine.

This is possible thanks to the idea of the waxworks that serve as portals to other times. The main story acts as the glue between otherwise unconnected scenarios, making everything come together in a way that invites you to explore each waxwork, surrounding the whole thing in a layer of mystery. I think this is one of the main draws of the game, if not the most important one. From what I have read from the time, this game was considered superior to Elvira II and I would even dare to say that is remembered more fondly. After some thought I believe this feeling is mostly because of the setting, which to me proves that no matter how flawed your game is, if the setting is interesting and the story doesn’t get in the way, you can leave a good impression on most people, even if the engine doesn’t help with the depiction of Victorian London or a graveyard.

Rating: 5

Sound and graphics

This is a surprise for me. Why? Because even though there has been not that much time between Elvira II and this game and considering it is the same engine, the graphics are considerable better. The monster design is quite detailed and gorgeous, with the only problem being that reuse of models gets boring very fast, especially with human enemies that all look the same. But otherwise the graphics are quite nice. In fact, I would even go as far as to say that this game has many of the most visually interesting graphics up to 1992. Even walls look really good. Sadly, animations are a bit clunky, with many of them feeling like missing some frames to reduce costs.

I love how crammed the crystal ball appears to be after releasing our ancestors in the graveyard

Another area not so well crafted is sound. It is pretty unremarkable and repetitive. After having played some 20 hours I can’t say I remember any tune or sound effect, but I do recall thinking very often that I wished the game had a volume control. I would take any of the zombie soldier shouts from Elvira 1 to the completely forgettable sound effects in this game.

Rating: 6

Environment and Atmosphere

I said that the engine didn’t help with the depiction of what the levels are supposed to be. But the genius of it is that the game does manage to convey the several feelings they were going for – or at least what I think they were going for. And this is where the game truly shines and perfectly plays on the theme of different periods. While Elvira II always played with the idea of each environment being a studio set, it never really got away with giving an individual personality to each one beyond “this one has more combat, this one more puzzles and this one is in the middle”. I always felt like playing an Elvira game. This game however goes full time travelling with each waxwork removing any link or dependency between them, and the game is better for it.

Each level can have its own individual personality, based on movie genres. The two best crafted levels, not only in the atmosphere but also overall design, are the pyramid and the mine. The pyramid really manages to get the feeling of an old pulp adventure movie – the ones that inspired the creation of Indiana Jones. And so there we can find devious traps, easy-to-defeat foes, ancient hieroglyphics and even a lady to rescue. The mine goes for a horror B movie feeling. Fighting against a superior enemy which we can only defeat using our cunning and the help of all the other humans. A horror we can’t kill but that we can defeat and bury for eternity.

Even the mutant in the cell contributes to this feeling. My precious

The other two levels, London and the graveyard, are not so well crafted, and the differences can be felt. It is not that they don’t have a theme, they simply don’t manage to convey it. London because it tries to be a … erm.. well… I would say it tries to be a mystery movie. Maybe one of those Sherlock Holmes ones, with Peter Cushing or Christopher Lee. But it falls short. The mystery is not very interesting or well put, and the graphics, while a commendable effort, never really manage to make you forget you are playing a dungeon crawl.

Then you have the graveyard. I would guess the designers went for a Night of the Living Dead vibe. Sadly, there is no level where the “walls” of the dungeon are more obvious than in this one, as crosses and tombstones should not be such an obstacle for navigation. It is also very confusing. Although the constant threat of zombies attacking does impose a sense of urgency, the monsters are so easily defeated and numerous that it ends up being more annoying than thrilling, and the ending with the vampire seems completely random and just an excuse to put a vampire in the game somewhere. I really hate this level.

Of course, there are two more locations in the game. The waxwork gallery and the witch’s waxwork. As a mere hub for entering the other locations, the waxwork is not very interesting, but utilitarian. The witch’s waxwork is more of a rollercoaster than a real level so… None of them counts I guess.

Rating: 6

Dialogue and acting

Dialogue in this game is mostly exposition. Most of the weight is carried by our uncle Boris, but if he has any personality whatsoever it is never shown. The same can be said about any of the characters in the game. There is little to no difference between talking to a 20th century doctor, a low life thug in Victorian London or the high priest of Anubis cult in ancient Egypt. There is no characterization in general. And the dialogue trees… Well, the best I can say about them is that they exist and make the game feel slightly more interactive. Even if picking a wrong line can pose a real threat, or even end up in a dead end.

It is quite sad, but plaques of each waxwork are the most useful and interesting texts in the game

This laziness in characterization is even worse when talking about item descriptions. The game texts are not very interesting in general. They are sparse and rarely useful, providing no clues about what they could be used for.

Rating: 3

4+4+5+6+6+3 divided by 0.6 is 46.66, so 47.

I am actually kind of surprised, because I can say that I enjoyed far more either Spellcasting 301 or Elvira II, and somehow this one got a higher score. Also, I would say that most of my woes with this game are to do with the RPG side of this game and its dullness, which I believe can’t be measured well in PISSED – and by that I mean punish of course. In the end this is a very mediocre game, neither a good RPG nor a good adventure, but with something to appeal to everyone and a very interesting premise and atmosphere.

In any case, this is the number I have reached, so deal with it, as TBD did. We must also applaud ShaddamIV and Agrivar as they got the closest to the number of deaths. Congratulations to the winners!

CAP Distribution:

100 CAPs for Deimar:

Horrorsoft’s Number One Fan Award – 100 CAPs – For playing through this game for our enjoyment

150 CAPs for Joe Pranevich

Infocom’s Number One Fan Award – 50 CAPs – For playing through Wishbringer for our enjoyment

Meretzky’s Number One Fan Award – 50 CAPs – For playing through A Mind Forever Voyaging for our enjoyment

Christmas’ Number One Fan Award – 50 CAPs – For playing through Humbug for our enjoyment

70 CAPs for Will Moczarski

Medline Systems’ Number One Fan Award – 50 CAPs – For playing through Labyrinth for our enjoyment

Classic Companion Award – 20 CAPs – For playing Wishbringer along with Joe

23 CAPs for Michael

Evil Cats Award – 3 CAPs – For revealing how adventure game producers hate cats

Evil Telepath Powers Award – 10 CAPs – For the closest guess of the score of A Mind Forever Voyaging

Oops I Did It Again Award – 10 CAPs – For correctly guessing the score of Labyrinth

20 CAPs for Laukku

London Daily Post Award – 5 CAPs – For keeping us up to date with the latest news in adventure game history

Evil Telepath Powers Award – 10 CAPs – For the closest guess of the score of Wishbringer

20 CAPs for TBD

Evil Telepath Powers Award – 10 CAPs – For correctly guessing the score of Waxworks

If You Fail, Try Try Again – 10 CAPs – For an attempt to play Waxworks along with Deimar

20 CAPs for Leo Velles

What’s Your Story Award – 20 CAPs – For sending What’s Your Story answers

10 CAPs for Ilmari

Mutant Engineer Award – 10 CAPs – For managing to solve the missing poll widget problem

10 CAPs for ShaddamIV

Twinsies of Death Award – 10 CAPS – For almost guessing the number of deaths (who is the good one and who is the evil one?)

10 CAPs for Agrivar

Twinsies of Death Award – 10 CAPS – For almost guessing the number of deaths (who is the good one and who is the evil one?)

10 CAPs for Lisa H.

I Know My Infocom Inside Out Award – 10 CAPs – For telling interesting details of the Infocom games throughout Joe’s playthroughs

5 CAPs for Andy Panthro

Madame Tussaud’s Award – 5 CAPs – For pointing out how to keep the waxworks opened!! (via Kickstarter)

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/waxworks-final-rating/

#retro games #dos games #retro #crpg #adventure #amiga #oldcomputers #8bit #16bit #blog #repost

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fansonia · 6 years ago

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The Ramblings of a Dork at Disneyland (well, technically California Adventure but STILL

Imma warn you all now: this is gonna be long and rambly and weird, buuuut idk what to do with all this brain info, so I'm just gonna put it all here. Long story short, my inner MCU fangirl is hereby more alive than ever and I'm slightly pissed at my phone. Oh, also I met Cap and Spider-Man, which is kinda the whole reason I wrote this whole thing. Yeah. If you're down for a bit of "light reading" *insert me cackling like a maniac here*, well.....buckle up and let me tell you a story.

(Tumblr mobile doesn't have the "read more" so I apologize for that, just pretend it's there until I edit it back in later. Curse you Tumblr mobile, curse you)

So I got to see Cap first, and he was super sweet and chill and thought I was a sorcerer. Why would he think that, you ask? Well, one, I had my Harry Potter merch, aaaand I may....or may not have.....messed with my flannel and turned it into a makeshift Cloak of Levitation. We talked and I explained my "magic" trinkets (dragon bracelet was a talisman that summoned an ethereal dragon for battle purposes, obsidian/dragonglass necklace, pizza necklace from a friendo (which he said could be my greatest weapon of all...who knows, he could be right), and....yeah. Also he was super confused about what Harry Potter was, and my dad and the staff told him it was like hair-covered pottery or soup or something. Explaining Ravenclaw was even harder, so I kinda simplified it and Mister 1940s kinda got it. Oh, and also we compared Voldemort to Redskull. That was cool. And we got a cool "pose 4 battle" picture.

Oh, side note, he asked me what powers I would have. He theorized maybe something like the Aether or Earth-based, I just....had no idea so I was open to his suggestions. Yeah. He was cool, I got his signature. I was probably super awkward and weird but hey, we still talked and my dad wondered if the dude had a possible crush on me. That's a dad thing, I think, thinking that maybe random dudes would actually like me. Meh, it's sorta reassuring I suppose, thinking that I may not die alone in this world.

OKAY ONTO RAMBLING LIKE AN IDIOT ABOUT SPIDER-MAN, BUCKLE UP MY DUDES

So, first time I went over there, HELLO NERVES MY OLD FRIEND!!! At least, while I was in line. Once I got up to meet him, he was super cool and awkward and sweet and I was totally cool just hanging out with him and talking about stuff. Like, we talked about me maybe being a part of the Avengers, we talked about some possible evil plot stuff involving Edna Mode (long story short: Spidey thought her 'no capes' philosophy was suspish and I was like 'eh you have a point there, there's more to the story that we don't know' and all that. God, I sound like a fangirling Peter Parker writing this. ANYWAYS, we took some pics together and I told him my friend Natalie said hi. Also side note: the suit was a little more Tobey-Maguire-Spidey-esque in design, which was kinda cool and stuff.

So the SECOND time around, I showed up because I realized I never got his signature. Thus, I was like "I gotta go back, that's an important thingy thing" and all that. I waited in line and hung out and sort of sang stuff to myself to keep my nerves from reappearing, because what if someone noticed I'd been there before and said "uh no ler other people get a chance"? Well, the staff up there (this one dude was cool, he was a Hufflepuff and we talked HP the first time I was there, and then this time he asked me what I did since I was last there, and talked and stuff and that was cool), he noticed. Probably since I was still wearing my lucky flannel/cape, but still, he understood and was super chill. And so was Spidey, heck, he even seemed happy I was back! I mean, I get it, how many people come back twice to see you at a Disney park? The chances for that are probably suuuuper slim. So anyways, I went back and got his signature (which my stupid fucking phone thought was the PEEEERFECT thing to DELETE.....THANKS A LOT LG IT'S NOT LIKE I WANTED TO KEEP SPIDEY'S SIGNATURE OR ANYTHING), and I told him some more info about the Edna conspiracy.

I think actually the Edna conspiracy needs its own paragraph. So it all started because Spidey liked my makeshift (short) cape. Going off of that, he told me he thought it was a bit suspicious that she was so hardcore against heroes having capes. I was like, I mean, I get chu, I just don't know if it's worth going evil for, but I get chu. So yeah, it started off of that. Well, to the surpise of many, the new Incredicoaster broke down! People were even STUCK on it! And lucky for me, I got to ride it earlier so it was nbd for me. BUT, I remembered my conversation with Spidey. That's when my inner "oh shit" siren began to wail. I knew I had to tell him. Sure, in terms of ridiculousness, or plausibility in this icky icky real world, totally wasn't the fault of one person. BUT, this was California Adventure and I was (technically) talking to a teenage superhero. So, who needs realism when you can have fun?

Alright, back to the thing with Spidey. So I told him that it was super suspish (like he said) that Edna was RIGHT THERE near the Incredicoaster, and it broke down. I mean, theoretically if Edna Mode ever WENT rogue, being the exclusive suit designer of a popular superhero family would be a PERFECT way to divert attention away from her! That, and she's short so she can hide, according to Spidey. So we basically talked about that, but then I told him I had a darker theory. He was all like "well it's dark out, so I don't mind," (it was nighttime so this actually worked), so I told him my theory. I tokd him that Seán....oh! I told Spidey that Seán loved him and said he was his favorite MCU character and I swear Spidey was so giddy and adorable about it, it was funny....yeah. So I told him Seán made a bunch of characters for his channel, and he may have inadvertently created a monster with glitch capacities to bring down YouTube AND Disneyland.....the one and only Antisepticeye. Immediately, Spidey was like "yep that's definitely who it is, that's our top suspect" and stuff. I mean, DUH, it's Anti. Unless Anti turns out to be being controlled by one of the other egos, or something like that...like he's GOTTA be the top suspect.

Not to mention that my phone MYSTERIOUSLY DELETED SPIDEY'S SIGNATURE, DOTH I SMELL SOME ANTI KERFUCKENING RIGHT THERE, I THINK I DOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Okay, I need to end the rambles soonish here. So last but not least, we took more pictures, I hugged him (both times I actually hugged him, he was sweet about that), and I said my goodbyes. I still REALLY wish my phone had saved the signature....but I have a lot of pictures and video so that's a good. Also both my parents think he had a crush on me. Like, that's TOTALLY a parent thing and I think he was probably just doing his job and stuff, but it's a nice thought to think that maybe people would like me. 'Ya know?

On a more realistic note though: to the guy in the Spidey suit on October 18th 2018, you is a good bean. I seriously loved being able to just talk and act as if I didn't have crippling social anxiety for a little while. Same goes for the guy dressed as Cap, you were cool too. I also seriously doubt either of you guys had crushes on me, so if you wanna help me explain to my parents that 'conversation does not equal romance', I'd be cool with that too. Or if by some weird chance either of you dudes liked me, I'm cool with that too (like I said, kind of a nice thought to be like "eyyy people like me, I may not die alone and stuff"). Yeah.

Okay yeah, that's mainly the gist of it all. Imma go and try to maybe rest and go through the fifty bazillion pictures of California Adventure I have, and the ones my dad has on his phone. I may have gone a bit overboard with memory capturing today. But yeah, anyways, overall it was fun!

If you got to the bottom of this....I don't even know what to call it, I commend you. I'm shocked you have the time and mental willpower/dedication to read though all of this (especially considering the run-ons and inconsistencies), but I'm still proud of you nonetheless. Besides, maybe if you all end up at Disney, you can find these dudes like I did and talk to them! I mean, if me, a hooman with some extremely rusty people skills and anxiety can feel like all was well and cool....I mean, that's gotta be a good sign you'd like hanging with them too, you know?

Anyways, thanks for reading, I'm gonna go and try not to limp a lot, because apparently I'm actually limping rn from walking so much XD. I'll see you lovelies sometime later or so!

💙fαnѕσníα💙

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loavesofoaves · 7 years ago

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Finale Thoughts

Well. That was a season. And I have to say, overall, it was even worse than season 5.

As stupid and offensive as many of the changes in season 5 were, at least there was *some* semblance of internal logic and storytelling in some storylines. But by now, it’s just so obvious how done D&D are with everything and it really, really shows in how sloppy and rushed the writing was. The show has become a parody of itself; a meme-bating hour of catering to audience reaction over story. This would be all well and good if this were purely entertainment, like The Walking Dead, but the fact that this season will probably be nominated for Emmys in writing as per usual astounds me at this point. This is not GRRM’s ASOIAF and it hasn’t been for quite some time. And the fact that D&D continue to ride the coattails of his story and book fans helping to make the show popular, taking the credit for themselves and blatantly disrespecting the very people who made all this possible...God, I hope they get their comeuppance when Confederate ends up being a failure.

Now, the final episode itself was actually the best of the season, but that doesn’t say much.There were still gaping plotholes and inconsistencies and cringeworthy moments. The first five minutes were head-scratching, as nothing came of the Lannister-Unsullied standoff except juvenile dialogue and then a sudden teleportation to King’s Landing without explanation. Why even bother showing us this at all, as it did not change anything other than to show that the Unsullied were still alive? The next thirty minutes were quite meh, and half of the characters in the dragonpit scene did not need to be there. The one good exchange from that was between Sandor and Brienne, talking about Arya like proud parents. (And the begrudging respect I always headcanoned them having when meeting for the first time. Sigh.)

And although it was hard to suspend my disbelief that Cersei would not have Tyrion killed on the spot, it was so refreshing to see some acting. Peter Dinklage hasn’t had any good material to work with since season 4, which is just such a shame (especially since D&D seem to fanboy him so hard. You’d think they’d give him better material to work with).

Jon and Theon had a nice scene too. Like with Peter Dinklage, I was happy to see Alfie Allen finally get some good material to work with after seasons of mishandling his PTSD for laughs.

And then what do they do?

They mishandle his PTSD (and mutilation) for laughs. Even though if you kicked someone in the crotch it would still totally hurt. Sigh.

Next, some wrongs were righted and I drank the kool-aid even though the process to get to these points failed miserably.

I cackled in ghoulish delight when Littlefinger finally got what was coming to him, even though the setup was so corny and it robbed us of seeing the Stark siblings figuring this out for themselves. Seeing him begging and crying? Pure gold. It was so stupid but it felt so good. I’m still shaking my head at the smug shownlies insisting Sansa and Arya had been playing him the whole time. Even if that were true, it seems ridiculous to have them be so committed as to make threats to each other in closed rooms. When you actually think about the situation, it’s rather silly, and so unfortunate that this was the Stark sisters’ plotline in season 7. It was nice to see them take down Littlefucker and reconcile but at what price to the story? Can’t wait to see how it REALLY goes down.

And finally, FINALLY, Jaime leaves Cersei, although again, when you really think about it, THIS is what is the straw that broke the camel’s back? And not her basically doing the same thing the Mad King threatened to do? RIP Book Jaime, RIP. At least we got a lovely snow montage with Ramin Djawadi’s beautiful score as Jaime left. God, the people who work on this show deserve better.

Oh, and we can talk about how Rhaegar was a fuck boy and Elia deserved better, or how Sam stole the credit away from Gilly, or how Baby Miss Cleo’s spidey senses are poorly explained, or how stupid it is to name two of your sons the same name, or how gross incest is even when the two people involved look nothing alike and are hot (lawdy Kit Harrington’s ASS), or how Tyrion’s reaction makes no sense, but there’s nothing to be said that hasn’t already been said. Boatsex was actually quite underwhelming, and frankly, I’m glad.

The wall coming down was also a great scene. I’m salty some of that budget from episode 6 couldn’t have been spent on Ghost, but...oh well.

ALSO IDGAF IF TORMUND LIVES OR DIES BECAUSE I WANT PEOPLE TO STFU ABOUT HIM AND BRIENNE. It was funny the first few times. Then it became gross when she totally wasn’t into it and he kept pestering her and everyone squeed “TRUE WUB.” No, that’s creepy as fuck. Yet again another perfect example of how the base audience doesn’t care about actual character development, but what makes for the best memes and reactionary entertainment, and D&D are serving it up on a silver platter. STOP TRYING TO MAKE BRIENNExTORMUND HAPPEN, IT’S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN.

Interestingly, the one major leak that did not end up being true was Cersei’s miscarriage. I am curious as to whether this will be moved to next season or will not occur.

Now I will crawl back into my ASOIAF cave for 1-2 years, await to see how D&D will butcher season 8, and pray to the old gods and the new that GRRM lives long enough to write both TWOW and ADOS.

#got #game of thrones #episode 7 #7 x 07 #spoilers #7.07 #book snob

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years ago

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A Closer Look At... Tamako Market/Tamako Love Story

Heyo and welcome to a brand new series that hopefully actually becomes a series called “A Closer Look At...”! The goal of this series is to write reviews on anime series and for me to get a closer idea of why I love/hate a show. I’m still sort of tinkering with how I want to structure this, but for now I’m gonna do a standard rundown of the basic categories, you know stuff like Animation/Art, Characters, Story, Enjoyment, and Final Thoughts (that’s a basic category right?). So yeah, let’s kick off this double special with the first show on this list. But first, a WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS FOR TAMAKO MARKET AND TAMAKO LOVE STORY. You’ve been warned.

Tamako Market

First, a question for those of you in the audience. Raise your hand if you thought that Tamako Market would be my highest rated show I’ve watched this year, a show I rate higher than Bakemonogatari and Madoka Magica. Now put your hands down you liars.

Yeah, what a world. This show was many things: a show I’ve been told to trudge through to get to its movie sequel; a show I’ve been told is one of the worst Kyoto Animation works; a show I’ve been holding off on for a while. And here we are: writing a review for it so I can exclaim its praises. For those of you that don’t know about this show, Tamako Market is about the life of Tamako Kitashirakawa, a girl in a family of mochi bakers living her life in a shopping district with her friends. Shenanigans ensue when she runs into a bird named Dera who is looking for a bride for his country’s prince. Dera ends up eating too much mochi, becomes too fat, and cannot return to his faraway home. And thus the story begins.

Animation/Art

I mean it’s Kyoto Animation. That’s all that really needs to be said for this category.

But let me try to dive in deeper. The animation is great: I didn’t notice any inconsistencies with it, other than some weird CG in one of the episodes with the people in the market. Nice to have a show that doesn’t distract from the story with its inconsistent character models.

The character design itself isn’t anything amazing: most of the characters look liked they could have come from a different KyoAni show: Choi and Azusa from K-On was a similarity that really stuck out to me. I didn’t have a problem with it for the most part though: they were still really good looking and the stark similarities were few and far in between.

Color design-wise, the show used bright colors that popped, which reflected the overall tone of the show: happy and bright. Not to mention it helped create the carnival-like atmosphere that I think they tried to portray the shopping district as. Well, not try, more like did. Because it worked.

Overall, the art/animation of the show is a solid 5/5 stars. Sasuga KyoAni.

Characters

Let me start this off by saying I loved all of the characters in this show. Yes, even Dera. Before I started watching Tamako Market I was warned of the “annoying bird” and told that he ruined the dynamic of the show. To be honest though, I think that without him I wouldn’t have enjoyed this show as much. He acted as sort of the butt monkey (err butt bird) for the others and the jokes, which made him less annoying in my eyes. Plus adding him to the cast of “happy” characters prevented a Flying Witch situation where everybody was too happy, something I like to call the “/r/wholesomememes conundrum” (if you don’t know the Wholesome Memes subreddit is filled with people making happy comments and no negativity or even sarcasm, and it creeps me out a lot).

Other than that, yeah the other characters were nice. Tamako was your standard genki girl, Mochizou was cute AF in a good way (and I related to his struggles), Kanna was low-key best girl, and Midori was all right I guess. Then there are the people in the shopping district, who all had their own little quirks with them. Individually they didn’t offer much, but putting them together really helped create the feeling of being in a shopping market, in sort of a village setting. Them helping Tamako with all of her stuff reminds me of that saying: it takes a village to raise a child (or something like that). Characters are super important for me, and for this show they were a solid 5/5 stars. Good on ya KyoAni.

Story

If there’s one thing that this show fell flat in, it’s this category. Not that it’s necessarily a bad thing. In fact, I didn’t mind it at all. This was a slice-of-life show, so the story doesn’t have to be amazingly original or creative, it just has to flow in a decent way so that I can enjoy it. I know for most people it was pretty boring, and that’s kinda true in a sense. The whole storyline of the show is that Dera is finding a bride for his prince, but that kinda doesn’t get prioritized until the last few episodes when they introduce Choi as a character and then when the prince comes to visit. Those last 2 or 3 episodes were for me the weakest in the show, only because it was heavily focused on that plotline. I enjoyed Tamako Market for the shopping market shenanigans, so it was kinda boring with the whole “wow Tamako is a princess??” stuff. And the ending of it seemed... anticlimactic: when the prince already knew she wasn’t the princess but went with the whole procedures anyway, it kinda gave those last 2 episodes no point. Even with that though, it was still a super fun watch, so I don’t fault it too much. Overall 3/5 stars on the story: it was all right for the first few episodes but the whole princess storyline was a bit out there.

Overall Enjoyment

I mean yeah it was a really fun show. I wouldn’t say it would be fun for everyone, but it just hit all of the right notes for me, and I really had a good time with it. A 5/5 stars for enjoyment.

Final Thoughts

So overall, Tamako Market was a pretty fun watch, complete with KyoAni visuals and good characters. Though the story is sometimes meh, it works out overall and became one of my favorite shows. A 9/10 show for me, would recommend to those of you who enjoy slice-of-life shows.

Tamako Love Story

“Haha, you thought it was over? No sir, there’s more.”

That’s what I assume KyoAni said to the anime community when this movie was announced. Because there was absolutely no indication that a sequel movie about LOVE would come out, given how dense Tamako was towards the crushes of both Mochizou and Midori (though the second one is more understandable). But what a great surprise, as this movie ended up becoming more popular than its prequel series. In fact, the movie is how I ended up getting into the show in the first place. So yeah, I was pretty excited to see how it was given I enjoyed the show so much.

Note that most of what I said about the show above is still the same in the movie, so I’ll just be talking about the story and overall enjoyment of the show.

Story

If you didn’t know the plot of Tamako LOVE STORY, then let me tell you. It’s about the LOVE STORY between Tamako and Mochizou. Simple as that. Though even with its simple premise, it executes it super well. The movie kicks off with Mochizou wanting to tell Tamako that he plans to go to Tokyo for college. Stuff escalates as he tells her this plus confesses to her, to which Tamako goes into love shock as she runs away and spends the next few days not knowing what to do. It’s cute stuff, really. But then she decides yes I do love this boy, so she runs off to the train station to catch up with him and confesses via the cup telephones that they used to communicate. And then the movie ends. Yeah, that’s my biggest complaint with this movie: like many anime romances, it ends with the confession, and the actual couple-y things don’t happen. Like come on man, I want some nice vanilla romance in my life.

To be fair, though, it was still really cute to see how Tamako handled her feelings and the whole process in which she accepted them. And I was still pretty dang happy when she confessed (though a bit confused and angry at first when the credits rolled). Overall, though I wanted to see more time between the two as a couple, I can’t complain too much considering it was what the title says: a nice love story. A nice 5/5 stars on the story: simple but well-executed.

Overall Enjoyment

Well what do you think? I think 5/5 stars, would re-watch multiple times.

Final Thoughts

This movie was a joy to the eyeballs, and to the brain as well. Writing about this movie makes me want to go watch it again, and that I will. 10/10 would recommend (but please watch Tamako Market first: it actually is pretty important).

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jokerxtreme36 · 8 years ago

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Kyuranger 4-5 thoughts (Spoilers)

Well after being busy, it’s time I get around to writing my thoughts on this series, however since this is going to take me more than a day, I decided to separate the others shows for now. Last Time: The Kyurangers dealt with a mysterious scorpion being, whom Champ remembers killing his professor, only for them to shift focus on Lucky for no reason. This series is losing my interest and I’ve heard a few people I know (I won’t say who they are cause I don’t like namedropping) have already quit on the series after watching the recent episode (and from the screenshots I’ve seen I can see why, but I’ll get to it when I get there). I on the other hand will keep watching for the most part, I’m not the kind of guy who quits on a series just cause I don’t like it, once I start something, I do what I can to make it to the end. I did it with Toqger and Ninninger, so this won’t be as different. I’ll keep watching to see if the series does improve on it’s writing and character growth as well as the potential it has. With all that said, can this series save it’s potential from being executed horribly? let’s find out.

Uchuu Sentai Kyuranger episode 4:

Raptor fantasizes about her being a hero, then they warp their way to another galaxy where they enter Earth, where it has many Jark Matter ships and only five of them are chosen to go.

They see Earth is pretty damaged. Yumepakkun eats a childs dreams and the Kyuranger’s battle him, Raptor wishes to fight, but she gets beaten. They ask Raptor what’s wrong, but she leaves.

Spada reveals that she wants to fight despite her directives. Lucky talks with Raptor about her dream, but Yumepakkun strikes and they head to the others, but the humans are mad at the Kyurangers for helping.

They battle Yumepakkun and Lucky believes Raptor can fulfill her dream, a Kyutama appears and Raptor becomes Washi Pink, they beat Yumepakkun and the children regain their dreams.

,He summons his mech and they defeat it with Kyuren-Oh Aquila. They celebrate Raptor becoming the eighth Kyuranger and Raptor talks with her uncle. Elsewhere, Stinger and Eridrone are headed for Earth.

Next Time: All nine unite

Overall Ifound this episode to be meh, I’ll get this out of the way: So now they’re on Earth and there’s no Zyuman around? 0/10, would not recommend, lol. But now let’s get started on some of the good in this episode, I do like how we get some small backstory and development for Raptor 283, with her wanting to join the others and become a fighter despite that she isn’t built to be one like Champ, most of us have been there, we wish to make a dream a reality. I also dig the suit, but after seeing burnttoastmaster’s drawing, I kind of wish they designed it like that to make her stand out. Also I liked how she made a Sailor Moon reference, which is always good to see.It is interesting to see them on Earth, but I felt they should’ve gone to earth maybe around the second half of the series rather than early in the series. I’m hoping they’ll only be on Earth for a few episodes and then they can continue to search other planets, cause otherwise that would be pretty weak, but keep in mind nothing is stopping them from leaving, if they wanted to have them stay on Earth, they would’ve have the Orion ship be damaged or the Jark Matter ships would’ve surrounded the planet. Now for the things I didn’t like, while it has a good message of following your dreams, the execution for it was done horribly, I get Lucky is suppose to be the moral support but him bringing Raptor to fight without any way to defend herself was just stupid, the way Lucky had to force Raptor to achieve her dream rather than her achieving it on her own. Maybe do something like: Lucky talks with her about her dream, she stays out opf the fight for now, but gains the courage to stand up and achieve her Kyutama that she had in her hands. Another issue I have is how Raptor’s Kyutama appears out of nowhere, the way they’re handled is very inconsistent and lazy, from the previous episode where Xiao Long Bao appears with a bag of random Kyutama’s that he found, to this episode where they just appear to the person they feel is worthy, make up your mind in what you want the Kyutama’s to work and stick with it. Also the commander really sucks as a mentor, he hardly does anything and feels mostly pointless, I was expecting him to be this badass mentor when they first showed him, but so far he’s just there for convenience sake and weak humor (and yes I know what they’re gonna do with him later, but it just isn’t handled well). Even with the few good moments,the bad somehow outweighs it with poor pacing and execution, but let’s see how they can keep afloat. Can’t wait for the next episode, where Eridrone attacks the Kyurangers, Stinger takes some kids hostage, he gets some backstory and all nine of them unite

Uchuu Sentai Kyuranger episode 5:

They decide to stay on Earth and wonder if Stinger can join their side. Elsewhere, Yumepakkun is greeted by Eridrone and Stinger. so they cause havoc and the Kyurangers arrive, only for two kids to attack.

Kotaro and Jiro introduce themselves and the others take on Jark Matter until they leave. Eridrone arrives to attack the Kyuranger while Stinger gets the kids so they can be used as a hostage for their Kyutama’s.

Lucky still believes in Stinger since he could’ve killed the kids there. Stinger sees Kotaro caring for Jiro and is reminded of his brother Scorpio,who betrayed him and left his people to die.

The Kyurangers give their Kyutama’s away until Stinger reveals that he’s a spy working for Xiao, who forgot about him. They transform and battle the Jark Matter, while the humans see them winning and cheer.

They beat Eridrone, but Yumepakkun grows and is defeated, Eridrone battles with his ship, but gets destroyed by Kyuren-oh. Stinger decides to work alone and they see their quest to protect Earth is just beginning.

Next Time: let’s dance, Kyu edition

Overall I felt this episode was a huge mess, let’s start with the good, I like the two kids Kotaro and Jiro, I have a feeling this won’t be the last time we’ll see them. Also, I like the one good smart thing Lucky did when he still believes Stinger’s a good guy by pointing out that he could’ve just killed the children right then and their, since he could’ve killed them all when he had the chance (which he did have), but ended up changing the plan. Now that the’s done here are the things I didn’t like, I hated how they handled Stinger’s motivation, we get how he wants revenge on his brother Scorpio (played by Takatora from Gaim), but it makes no sense that he would work for them, also he really sucks at being a spy since he nearly gets himself caught in a few occasions. Another issue is that he was working for Xiao and he never bothered to inform them that this mysterious Scorpion man was on their side because he forgot, it just makes him look real incompetent. Another issue is how they kill off Eridrone way too early in the series, we hardly got to know this guy and I fear that they’re gonna do the same with the others, which would pretty much make our villains for this series incompetent. Also it was really annoying how they forget Champs issue with Stinger by the end, they could’ve brought some closure by saying it was someone else, like Scorpio, since they said he was Jark Matter’s top assassin, maybe have Scorpio say it wasn’t him, but then remember’s Eridrone’s words and tells him that he might have a clue on who might’ve done it. This series just keeps getting irritating and I can see why some people ended up quitting on this series (with one of them also bringing up way more problems with this episode better than I could have). I still am going to keep watching cause I’m not the kind of guy to just quit, I’ve been doing this for a long while and I’m not gonna let some weak episodes stop me from speaking my mind on a series. The next episode looks alright, where Lucky uses the Pegasus Kyutama and can’t control it, so Xiao decides to help them practice dancing, which ticks off Hammy and two new general’s appear

#JX36 says something

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