#this is what happens when you combine WW2

[nastyburger]

Please say more about the awful Asian designs in Danny Phantom. I'm not Asian but I'd love to have a rundown on the elements that make them offensive so I can avoid and critique those elements in other works. And also you deserve to speak your mind about it

im gonna mostly talk about southeast asian designs since thats what i am and the most familiar with and also what i feel are the show's worst transgression with their casual depictions. tw for racist imagery im gonna link pictures.

there's not much to say about the designs aside from, you know, everything but things to note are the unnatural yellow tone for the skin and closed slanted eyes. veggie burger (fan name for the bg character in the middle) also suffers from the huge nose that sometimes shows up in racist depictions. the straight edge/cut hair as well is somewhat stereotypical. this one isn't as bad but in conjunction with everything else its not ideal. i will give the smallest molecule of credit that at the very least dp never gave any of these bg characters buck teeth.

some depictions are better than others, but theres still missteps happening in one aspect or another. kwan's eyes in a lot of shots/episodes can be too skinny and even too slanted, the girl in the middle is almost perfect but her skin is too yellow (she looks kinda okay on my computer screen but i remember when watching dp on my tv she looked real brightly yellow), and principle ishiyama (who was weirdly forgotten about pretty early on in the show and was replaced by lancer doing most of the school stuff despite not being principle?? which is a whole other issue with how dp treats its poc characters) the same usual notes about the slanted eyes but also the upturned nose is pretty reminiscent of racist japanese art during ww2. again it is not the worst way to draw a nose but combined with everything else in this show's depiction of asian characters its not great, they are on thin ice man.

not to mention, principle ishiyama is the only character here with brown eyes. this is a problem that extends to all poc characters in dp and to my knowledge i think ishiyama might be the only one with them tbh. this is, again, a whole other issue though.

i think the thing that bothers me most about these designs though is that dp is very clearly aware that these depictions are bad. the only difference between the first set of characters and the second is one singular thing: they have a clear speaking role.

suddenly when theyre not stock background characters, dp knows how to act when drawing them. i cannot for the life of me find the image of it, but the last jock guy in the first set gets a speaking role in reign storm (he's cosplaying phantom) and he is drawn with proper open eyes! (theyre also blue but whatever) it just makes me sad that this was a clear choice they made.

the show also went in a different direction in the final product, but early development stuff was really drawing from a lot of japanese/asian influences like danny was originally gonna have a motorcycle (pulling from ghost in the shell) and was even referenced in the show via the akira motorcycle reference (which i once again, for the life of me, cannot find. danny took johnny 13's motorcycle and did the classic akira slide i think it was in million dollar ghost?? idk whichever one where the giw are trying to blow up the ghost zone). danny's name was originally gonna be jackie, named after jackie chan, this i assume was given to jack fenton afterwards. and i think the show having a more martial arts direction with the action was also gonna be a thing? that one could be wrong dont quote me on that, there was an episode where danny and vlad have like a weird ninja fight though im pretty sure.

either way my point here is that they wanted to pull from all these influences and it was prominent enough during development that they sprinkle references to it throughout the show and yet their portrayal and treatment of asian characters in the show is so abysmal it just feels Bad™, you know? i cant really put it more eloquently than that, like its very take and no give with it.

it overall just puts a bad taste in my mouth, and its sad that it still affects people years later. like i mentioned in the tags of the post that started this discussion with that whole old trend of putting yourself into the bg of dp screenshots, i felt alienated by that. and its not the people who participated's fault obviously but most of the people i saw participating were white fans (going off of how they drew themselves) and it made me a bit mad that they were able to enjoy the style of the show in a more carefree manner than i ever could. i didnt want to ruin anyone's fun obviously, but a small part of me wanted to bring to light how i wasnt on equal ground with them in that situation.

[iamonlyhereforthefood]

I see once again people on the internet complaining about giving aid to Ukraine, with the usual beats of "I support Ukraine, but ...", "I am sympathetic, but ..." followed by a combination of "it doesn't seem to do much difference", "Ukraine should just negotiate with Russia" (read: give up), "we have our own problems"/"the government should give the money to our own poor/homeless/struggling citizens" or my especially hated "it is inevitable that Russia wins, they are too dedicated and the only difference is that mamy people will die in the meantime".

First of all, unless you are certain that in the case of armed robbers breaking into your house, you would be willing to let them steal everything, watch them rape your partner and children, kill your pet and then blow up your house as they leave, and be grateful that they didn't just kill you without any expectations that someone will come and help you, then shut the fuck up about negotiations.

But what I wanted to say, especially to people from the US and UK, because it is appalling that this is not talked about at every opportunity: your governments are not expected to provide aid just out of the goodness of their hearts. They are required to, as per the Budapest Memorandum. Ukraine gave up their nuclear weapons and USA and UK promised to guarantee their safety. If they kept them, a lot of this would likely not happen, because Russians are cowards and wouldn't attack a country with nuclear weapons.

I will argue relentlessly that all the rest of us, especially those in the EU, have moral obligation to help Ukraine and that even if we want to be selfish and pragmatic about it, it is also in our own best interest, because showing bullies that they are free to do what they want benefits nobody who wants to live in a free and democratic world. But US and UK have also legal obligation to help. Unless, of course, they want to look like their words can't be trusted and there is no point in signing any documents about global security ever. But then don't make surprise Pikachu faces when every country goes on to try developing or otherwise obtaining their own nukes, because it sure looks like having them is the only real guarantee of safety. I was under the impression that this sort of thinking is what we have been trying to change in the last couple of decades.

As for it looking like Russian victory is inevitable, that is in huge part because of how slow the supply of aid has been. No, we can't ever know for certain how things would develop in alternative timelines, but a lot of experts agree that if Ukraine got everything they asked for more quickly, the situation now would be much better for them. So it's not an argument to stop aid, on the contrary, we must provide more of it and more quickly. Imagine if USA was not providing military aid for millions of dollars to USSR in WW2 (yes, that is another topic that is not talked about enough), who knows how the war would have ended or how many more people would have died.

Please, people, think in context and remember your history, before you give into those pseudo-pacifistic talking points.

[pencileraser1]

u were keatposting in my asks. now i must do the same in yours since my brain is so obviously filled with him. share ur keating thoughts i know theyre hiding in there!!!!!!!!

i'm just gonna thoughtsdump about this it might not be coherent?but here we go

a lot of my keating thoughts are kind of depressing uh

i think the really tragic thing about this movie (or one of them i guess) is that in the end basically everything that happened likely didn't matter enough in the long term. and one of the biggest losses is that i kind of do think that after keating left, almost none of the students would continue to apply what he taught them. the biggest exceptions to this would be todd and sort of half charlie, i do pretty much agree with the post canon idea that it's likely that todd would end up an english teacher. and i think that he's probably the only person who would genuinely continue to actually apply what keating taught him. charlie i think would continue to be rebellious for a bit longer and then eventually sort of fall in line with what his parents wanted from him in the end, the best outcome is probably that he'd go on to be some sort of artist but i don't think it's super likely that that's what he'd do long term/all the time if that makes sense. for the rest of the poets, i think they'd all go back to how they were before pre-keating. i think you mentioned that neil was really the person who understood keatings lessons the best, which i agree with, and him dying likely prevented the rest of the poets from really getting it before keating left. basically my thought about this is that at the end of the movie, todd and keating are both fundamentally changed, but the rest of the poets aren't, and how much they were able to change is not enough to create a lasting impact.

on a lighter note someone said that possibly the most impressive mark of what keating did was that hopkins stood up on the desk at the end. and while i think that the combination of todd being able to stand up on his desk first, and how keating and neil made it possible to do so is more impressive, i think it maybe comes in in close second for me (i know i just went on a tangent about this not mattering that much but it did matter a little bit and this is still very impressive. like the guy shown to be the Most skeptical stood on the desk that's a lot)

i've seen a theory floating around every once in a while that keating's experience with the first dead poets society might have been similar to what happened with neil, like he had a friend in the society who also committed suicide, and i kind of don't like that theory very much? i guess there are a few elements to it, the biggest being that if someone died the first time, i don't think that keating would even entertain the thought of restarting it. and the second is that i honestly think we could come up with something a lot more interesting.

keating went to welton during ww2, (there's a small possible plothole/timeline issue which is that nolan tells keating he taught english "way before you're time," per the annual, keating begun attending welton in 1941, when nolan was probably about 40 and i suspect not principal since there isn't really any familiarity between the two. my personal theory which i actually really like now that i'm thinking about it is that nolan wasn't at welton from 1941-1944 for some reason, probably ww2 related. not sure Exactly how, nolan's old enough that it's unlikely he would've actually fought unless he had been in the military before, but that could also be interesting, idk there's a lot of possibilities) the us joined ww2 at the end of 1941 so for almost the entire time keating was in school, that would have been going on. and i think that would have put a very unique type of stress on the school and i think it would be really interesting to think about the poet's experience during that time. what i do think happened in lieu of someone dying is probably that they got in some significant amount of trouble at some point, or possibly that they didn't exactly get in trouble but that there was some other issue related to the administration.

other interesting details from the annual: keating was varsity soccer captain and editor of the school annual, likely how he got dps under his name. also btw keating was the soccer coach during the movie if that wasn't clear since the soccer team is. just keatings class minus cameron whose doing fencing. and i only realized this after reading the book (which i do not reccomend if you want to read the book just read the old script it's got all the same stuff and i honestly think the writings better in the script)

anyways i think we should come up with more theories about the original dead poets. bc i think that could be interesting.

i think we were kind of talking about the keating/neil parallels a bit and i'm just gonna talk more about that as well bc i'm a bit insane about it. so like as previously mentioned!!! neil is the one who fundamentally understood keating the most probably (todd and charlie also understood keating but in different ways kind of??? and i think you've spoken about this before too) and there's a lot of like; keating likely starting the original dps/neil starting dps 2.0, both being editors of the school annual (sort of), both encouraging people (todd) to express themselves in ways they might not have thought possible

the way keating and neil's storylines end are also similar. they both set out with a specific goal and while they are successful at first, they are both stopped in ways that are ultimately kind of catastrophic. not fully coherent about this yet but. wanted to add it.

also just wanted to briefly mention keating and mcallister bc i really liked their relationship, all of m thoughts have already been said but i just wanted to add that

keating is in a position where he understands what his students are going through in a way that none of the other teachers do and throughout the movie i honestly think his goal was at least partially just to make their lives just a little bit better. like some of his students would get it and some wouldn't, but for all of them they have one class where the teacher is nice and not as strict or exhausting or gives them ridiculous amounts of homework. and even if keating is just. the one class that's a little bit easier. that still probably helps so much with how the environment at welton was. obviously keatings ultimate goal was probably to teach his students to think for themselves and about what they specifically want but i think the smaller impacts of like. ok here's one class where the teacher isn't a hardass is meaningful too.

[crepes-suzette-373]

Every other day I find more Kamen Rider nods/callbacks in Germa, and it's getting really obnoxious, I just keep wondering what sensei is trying to do with this. If he's just having fun because he really likes Kamen Rider and Super Sentai, this is kind of going overboard.

Maybe he's just trolling Toei with this nonsense??? Toei as a studio runs Kamen Rider, Super Sentai, Sailor Moon, Pretty Cure (another magic girl show), and of course One Piece. Maybe he thought it'd be funny to make this bizarre combination of all the above and he just happens to really like Kamen Rider the most??

Sometimes the nods are too serious to be a joke, but on the other hand it's also super absurd at other times.

The Super Sentai team look is almost a camouflage, lore-wise they're definitely closer to Kamen Rider. Plus, Kamen Rider itself did have its "evil team" with rainbow scarves (all identical suits, though). Funky belts and scarves? That's the classic Kamen Rider's iconic look.

And then the Germa leader in the comic book resembling the military-looking guy (a KR villain commander). Based on the rough drafts that military look almost was designated to be how Judge actually looks before sensei scrapped it (too obvious, maybe?).

Kind of hard to see but in the screenshots you can also see the evil organisation's logo (on the floor in the middle of the table) looks like the Germa eagle symbol. And the setup of the "table under throne" in the left screenshot looks more specifically similar.

He's been mixing up various tropes from multiple seasons so it's just really

The term "modified humans" 改造人間 that was used to refer the the siblings is something that was characteristic of the Shouwa Riders (the really old ones from 90s and older). This is not "cyborg", by the way, just genetic modification. Like, in American superhero terms, Captain America or Winter Soldier would also categorise as 改造人間.

Sanji's backstory and the exoskeleton mods and even "evil twins" is more specifically Kamen Rider Black. The raid suit can transformation pose are the newer riders (Heisei Riders) from later in the 2000s onwards.

The original Kamen Rider villains, the Shocker group, were legitimately just flat out Nazis (or affiliated to them), and I honestly think the weird look in Germa is because of the Kamen Rider Easter Egg. Not because sensei was thinking "Germa = Germany".

Certainly we don't know when this stuff turned into this, as the old drafts proved that there was a time he designed "Sanji's family" to just look mostly normal. The father who was named Saint Germain looks just kind of like Pedro but human. Yonji looks like pre-timeskip Sanji but has a sword.

To me it felt more like he was going for the French/Saint Germain angle at first, then suddenly it became Kamen Rider and the Third Reich stuff crawled in. Sensei does a lot of research I'm sure, but I mean, most Japanese text usually calls Germany "Doitsu". Even the WW2 stuff would refer to them with something-Doitsu.

Unless he picked up a text with English words in them, he might not have really noticed Germany is spelled "Germany" in English. We don't know either way, that's why I don't like to assume for certain.

Anyway, I'm not sure how much of this can serve as a predictor. If it really is a straight reference, Sanji might then just adopt the mods completely. As mentioned above, the old Riders were "modified humans". The evil organisation were the people who forcibly gave them the powers they never wanted. They just reject the evil intent, but embrace the power because they're using it for good.

But if this is all just trolling, then scrap all that and now I know nothing.

[wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee28374728]

Ok, so I just got done with House of Ashes, and this is my thoughts on the first 3

Spoilers under the cut for Man of Medan, Little Hope, and House of Ashes

So I was sorta disappointed by Man of Medan because there was no supernatural stuff at all even though that was the plot of the whole game. It is cool that it's based on the actual case of the SS Ourang Medan(really cool actual ghost ship story btw) and I also see some influence from the movie called Ghost Ship(not very good) and a little bit from JAWS. I was hoping at first that the game would be ww2 era about some ghost on the boat. Then I was kinda hoping they would be diving for the sunk ship and slowly running out of oxygen while being hunted by the ghost kid. But nope. Overall the ending was pretty disappointing that it was just a gas, but at the same time, a toxic gas is one accepted theory of what happened to the real ship. 6/10

Little hope also had a disappointing ending, hut one I like much better for being more satisfing and properly set up and within the theme. This one seems to be more inspired by Silent Hill than anything else. All 4 demons were cool, and I think read that you can get an alternate demon for Taylor depending on how her 60s doppelganger dies. I actually do think this one was good, but after there being nothing supernatural in Man of Medan either, it was a little more annoying than it would be otherwise. But this one was more thematically put together and coherent. I also see some inspiration from The Blair Witch Project, but not much. I haven't seen that many witch horror movies recently. 8/10

I like House of Ashes the best of all of them so far. The vampires were the coolest monster design so far, the most interesting and engaging character relationships. And of course, I'm glad the monsters are finally real. The temple wasn't as cool as the town of Little Hope, but the caverns full of green stuff were awesome. This one seems to be inspired by Aliens, both visually and plot inspiration. Thought that even before I found out they actually were aliens, but that was a better twist than the other two combined. The vampires also looked a bit like the monsters from A Quiet Place. 9/10

Will update when I finish The Devil in Me

[kneelbeforezod]

Just gonna go ahead and say it. Since so many people are missing the nuance.

The reason so many Western powers do nothing to stop Israel is because it means admitting their own antisemitism was a driving force behind Israel's very creation.

Literally every country/kingdom/empire in which the Jewish people have lived, throughout history, has villified them and tried to kill them, cast them out or some combination of both. The very reason there are Jewish people across Europe is because the Roman empire found them to be too hard to manage in large numbers as they did not respect Roman authority. So the Diaspora or "dispersement" happened repeatedly and the middle eastern Jewish population was spread across Europe as far west as the UK and as far east as Russia.

Antisemitism was running rampant in the UK, the US and many other places before Hitler came along. The very reason that there is a stereotype about Jewish bankers, is because for a very long time (particularly in England) they weren't allowed to work most jobs in most fields. Their options were limited, and lending (not borrowing) money is not allowed by the Roman Catholic Church, which ruled over England from the 6th century to 1534. A thousand years of being a nation's only bankers is going to make you rich, but when times got hard economically, the British began to default on their debts and the stereotype of the "greedy jew" was born from this.

Antisemitism is thousands of years old and the aforementioned countries and others were looking for a way to deal with this "problem" and the idea of giving them their own country to go live in. So they leave yours, was presented and initially rejected, until Hitler came along. What the Nazis did allowed for this idea to move forward, now with the entire world feeling sympathetic to the horrors the Jewish people endured under their occupation.

Uganda was actually the original site planned in 1905, but their government and WHITE settlers their fought tooth and nail until another site was chosen, Palestine.

People seem to think Israel has always existed, but that is simply not the case. The word Palestine derives from Philistia, the name given by Greek writers to the land of the Philistines who in the 12th century BCE occupied a small pocket of land on the southern coast, between modern Tel-Aviv-Yafo and Gaza. The name was revived by the Romans in the 2nd century CE in “Syria Palaestina,” designating the southern portion of the province of Syria, and made its way thence into Arabic, where it has been used to describe the region at least since the early Islamic era. The Romans literally wiped Judea off the map, reduced it to rubble, before renaming it, and it stayed that way for the next 400 years.

Around 30% of the Palestinian population was already Jewish and living in relative peace before 1948. They could've easily increased their numbers without drawing new borders, but the Jewish lead British government (the Rothschilds and others already had their hands in everyone's pockets at this point) made it clear in 1917 with the Balfour declaration, that they intended to take Palestine from the Ottoman empire during WW1, and designate it the Jewish homeland. Actually, as soon as the war kicked off, British War Cabinet member and zionist Herbert Samuel proposed the government express support for zionist ambitions in order to gain more Jewish support (money and soldiers) for the ongoing world war. This effort continued through to WW2, finally gaining global support upon the world's realization of Hitler's atrocities.

This situation is anything but black and white.

[tomoyorecs]

Ninety One Whiskey

Author: komodokits

Rating: E

Word Count: 401,183

Summary: In the spring of 1944, the 104th Medical Battalion of the United States Army is disbanded, and its men reassigned to various infantry companies in preparation for their invasion of occupied France. For First Lieutenant Novak, this is less than helpful, as he has so far met his platoon’s designated medic a grand total of twice, and has both times found Sergeant Winchester to be the optimum combination of reckless, arrogant, and downright insufferable so as to make cohesive platoon function near impossible. When the time comes to move out, however, Castiel has to reconcile himself to the fact that men are going to go down and trust that Dean Winchester may well be the only person who can put them back together again. WW2 ETO infantry AU.

Commentary: You know that fanfic you read that for a while felt more real than canon? This happened to me and 91W. I started reading this not knowing it was a fandom classic – I read So Says The Sword, by the same author, fell in love with their writing and wanted more. I don’t usually read AUs, because often the characters are too out of character, but I gave this one a shot. Had to skip some scenes in the beginning to make sure I wanted to read it (to get to Dean and Cas’ scenes), but had to go back to read it after, because this story is AMAZING.

I don’t understand or care much about war, but the author is so good at storytelling that they made me want to go watch war movies.

The fanfic follows Castiel’s POV through WWII – he is a lieutenant and goes to Europe in 1944. Castiel is aware he is queer but hates it about himself – as would be expected of a man in that time. He meets Dean, a medic, who is funny, charming, impulsive, brave and begins showing interest in Cas, which is very dangerous in their context.

The author says in the tags it’s “not a nice story” – and maybe it’s not. As we follow Castiel in the war, he describes many details of what he sees and feels, many times causing the reader feelings and anxiety, fear, sadness and helplessness. He is a queer man in the 40’s, in the war, being a leader. That happens because the author is so so so so good, the way they write is so immersive. You can tell the author did their research about everything they talk about here.

Dean and Castiel’s relationship start as something not physical nor friendly, but…There’s something physical, of course, about what attracts them, that is described beautifully. Watching each other, their relationship also becomes admiration and interest. Cas has a very hard time with it, being scared most of the time. Slowly we see him fall in love with Dean, and Dean fall back.

The characters are incredibly in character, despite of the context. Castiel is very similar to season 5 Cas – lost, confused, angry, lonely. Dean is very similar to pre-hell Dean (and Dean in general) – understanding, laidback, focused, brave, compassionate, nurturing,

Unless you’re a very sensitive person who can’t read about violence, self-hate, death and other war related themes, please please read this story. It’s so good.

91W has two sequels (that are much shorter), called 4-F and At Ease.

[lestweforget5]

🌌 and/or💧!!

Hello, Nonnie! Thank you for the ask!

Answers to both questions are under the cut, given the length of my answers. For 💧, it references the outgrowth of some of what happened to Millie prior to her arrival at Stalag Luft III, as discussed in Chapter 18, so those trigger warnings apply here by extension.

🌌 MILKY WAY - what was the inspiration behind your oc? what was the first thing you decided about them?

Well, the main characters of my stories are always OC because I have an easier time consistently getting into their heads than canon characters when I’m writing an entire long story/series primarily from one POV. And @precious-little-scoundrel's early thoughts for her Those Who Can Integrated AU gave me brainrot and impetus to start plotting out how I would handle an Integrated AU with women in the USAAF during WW2. This quote by General Kuter was also very influential, “‘We just closed our minds to [long-range escorts]; we couldn’t be stopped; the bomber was invincible’" (MOTA, 42, emphasis added). Given the social customs of that day, it gives a very plausible place that women in the military might have ended up.

Then I needed a character for my AU. I don't remember what the first thing I decided about her was, but from the beginning, Millie was always related to Kenny, always an engineer (a likely career for a farm kid who grew up helping with mechanical work like Kenny did), and always on Curt and Dickie's crew. But she was not originally named Millie and her relationship with Brady was actually a very late addition. My first idea for a name was "Gayle," which would have given her an interesting point of connection with Buck Cleven (like her last name does now with John Brady), but "Gayle" was quite rare as a first name for women c. 1920, so I abandoned that idea.

Early on in my planning process for this fic, I flirted with the idea of Millie being on Escape Kit and whether there was a way to get Dickie off the plane. My research into parachutes told me that one parachute probably could have carried the weight of both Millie and Dickie, but there was no good way for them to be strapped together, especially given the time crunch to get off the plane. So eventually, Millie ended up on a different plane at Regensburg, and the scene with Millie and Curt and Meatball on Stymie's hardstand in the fog was actually one of the first scenes I wrote for this fic.

💧 DROPLET - random angst headcanon

Okay, this is sort of two angst headcanons in one, but they fit together. So Millie has a deep-seated and very understandable fear of male doctors, and I think this continues well past the end of the war, even when she's back in America, and maybe for the rest of her life to some extent. I was scanning through an article on female doctors in the USA in the first half of the twentieth century, and female doctors in the USA had fallen from around 10% of doctors nationwide c. 1900 to only around 4% c. 1940. So I've been thinking about how difficult it would have been for her, dealing with that fear of doctors and yet having to deal with mostly/entirely male doctors during her recovery from being a POW and afterwards. And, to make it worse, many women have been victims of rape/sexual assault can also deal with infertility issues afterwards, and combine that with her fear of doctors generally, and it's like ... poor Millie.

These answers are rather rambling, but hopefully, they give you some of the answers you were looking for. Thanks again for the ask!

[bluberimufim]

Hi, and happy WBW to you! (as usual I am @writeblr-of-my-own) Sorry that I missed last Saturday ask, but it was a busy week and stuff happened!

So, for today's question something a bit easier and relaxing: tell me a piece of worldbuilding you are extremely proud of! Go on, blabber about it as much as you like!

Happy (late) WBW!!!

I'm sorry I took so long to answer! I got distracted. For 2 days.

You are about to read one of the nerdiest things you've ever seen.

The dystopia WIP (bc of course this is about the dystopia WIP) is set in a world very different from our own in terms of general philosophy. My inicial concept for it was basically "Hey remember the period in between the two World Wars where people were weirdly obsessed with industry and thought machines were the Best Thing Ever? What if it just never stopped being like that?". If you're thinking "wtf?? I don't remember that???", allow me to exemplify by mentioning that Le Corbusier, the architect poster-boy (man??) of modernism, referred to houses as "Machines for Living" (as in, the house is a machine designed for you to live in it).

But I digress.

And from this idea, I developed a sort of... mainstream art movement, I guess, for the world of the dystopia WIP. It's kind of a mix between two real-life art movements: Futurism and Baroque.

Futurism is all about striving for improvement and technological progress above all else, and actively eliminating all history behind you. The quote that basically became Futurism's slogan is, I think, "a car is sexier than any woman", meaning that industry and progress is the most important thing in the world. The futurists were also obsessed with war and thought that countries should constatntly be at war because it breeds inovation. There were fascist undertones, as you might guess. 'Twas pre-WW2 Italy, after all.

Baroque is all about taking the canons of classical tradition and altering them to fit your style, while displaying mastery over them. It's basically about innovating and expanding on Renaissance-era art. The general idea most people have of Baroque art is the drama and pathos of it all, with oblique compositions and tons of light-dark contrast. It technically started off as catholic propaganda and is regarded by many as the origin/prototype of totalitarian architecture (think Nazi Germany or Soviet Union government buildings).

What would the combination of these two be called? Baroque-Futurism? Futuristic-Baroque? I don't know. And I honestly don't think I will ever need to name it in the story, so I just leave it.

In terms of how this would manifest visually, I've kinda drawn some ideas but nothing too final. I remember making a prototype of a variation on the solomonic column, a staple of the Baroque period.

And this shapes the way the characters see the world. There's a scene (the only scene I wrote, I don't even know where it would be set in the timeline) where two characters are discussing the night sky and they say that a starless sky is beautiful because it means humanity's power (expressed through light pollution in this case) is so great that they can blot out the cosmos itself. There's even a city in this world, called the Humming City, that is considered beautiful and awe-inspiring because there are so many machines and technological equipments running at the same time that they create an audible hum, like the one you hear from home appliances at night when everyone is asleep, but much, much louder.

I literally sound insane. But I had a lot of fun!

[whatisthismandoinghere]

Do you happen to have any headcanons for Crittendon or Hochstetter?

Sorry this took so long! Got a little busy this week and I didn't have my laptop with me but here we go

Crittendon: I think Crittendon served in WW1 and had that attitude at first that “war is adventure, so let’s go fight!” Probably came from a rich and well known family considering how class played such a huge role in becoming an officer (I’m assuming that the same applied to the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) considering the attitudes of those in the RAF during WW2 regarding lower class airmen wasn’t exactly what you would call friendly). But anywho while Crittendon was definitely posh, he didn’t mind associating with those that were considered lower status than him. I can honestly see him being a bit like Hogan when he was younger and serving during WW1, not exactly following the norms and a bit of a risk taker and show off (a much more toned down version of Hogan, I don’t mean to say they were exactly alike, I just mean to imply slight similarities and that Crittendon wasn’t always so steeped in tradition). Now there’s a few reasons that I have in mind as to why he is not like this anymore: 

1. Associating with people of a lower class than him was gaining him a, shall we say, unfavorable reputation with his superiors and since he absolutely dreamed of being this heroic, well known, and well liked officer, he slowly dropped those friendships because he couldn’t stand the thought of disappointing his family. I think they for sure put a lot of pressure on him to make a good impression, climb the ranks, uphold the family name and honor, and I see Crittendon just having this terrible fear of letting his family down and being disowned. His father and his grandfather were likely big military men themselves so there is a reputation to uphold that comes with the name Crittendon. So he regrettably falls into this strictly traditional, by the book military life. 

2. I think this attitude is solidified by seeing his buddies get seriously injured or dying or suffering from PTSD (or what they would call shell shock at the time), and it gets to the point where he stops making friends in general because he can’t bear to lose anyone else (and I remember reading somewhere about an officer, not exactly sure if it was WW1, but anywho the guy just stopped learning new soldiers’ names because the casualties were so high). I see him adopting this “play by the rules and no one gets hurt” attitude and simply refusing to take what he deems unnecessary risks (hence the stance he takes on not participating in sabotage in “the flight of the valkyrie”).

So I conclude that a combination of pressure from his family and the terrible things he saw during WW1 shaped him into the man we see in Hogan’s Heroes. Now I realize it’s a bit strange to say that Crittendon’s insistence on tradition, his inability to fathom and accept Hogan and his unusual ways, and his inability to adapt to this new war landscape were not with him from the start. But I think this is what makes it so interesting because Crittendon knows what worked for him during WW1, he survived by following tradition and following the rules, so naturally when he sees Hogan for the first time, who reminds Crittendon slightly of himself when he was younger, he thinks he can set Hogan on the right track so to speak by being so insistent on how he would do things. And in Crittendon’s mind I think he believes he is doing Hogan a favor by passing on his knowledge from WW1, even though he most certainly is not. So I think Crittendon definitely means well and at times is genuinely trying to help Hogan, but he’s just never gonna be able to adapt to this new war that the Allies are fighting.

I can definitely see the possibility that Crittendon was also a POW during WW1 and that also played into the views he held. Maybe he and a group of men planned this escape and it ended up going horribly wrong (trying to decide if someone just slipped up or if there was a snitch, the details are a bit foggy at the moment) and a lot of guys got hurt or killed. That would completely explain Crittendon’s escape only attitude in “the flight of the valkyrie” This part of my hc isn’t as fleshed out as I’d like it to be cuz I’m still working out some details but I’ll post about it once I have everything I want.

Side note: As for Crittendon’s arrogance and overconfidence, I’d have to say maybe that stems from his experience during WW1 as well. Like “I’ve been around the block before, I know how this works, who does this kid colonel think he is trying to tell me what to do?” For him at least, following military norms and playing by the rules worked for him. He rose to the rank of colonel (or group captain I suppose) and he made it out of WW1 alive. This way worked for him, why shouldn't it work for everyone? Crittendon just fails to realize that WW2 is a whole new ballgame though. So although he does eventually come around to the idea of sabotage, he isn't very good at it cuz he still holds that attitude of "I have experience, so I know what I'm doing." He just can't stop seeing Hogan as this kid who is too young to be a colonel and therefore has no credibility and that is a good chunk of Hogan's dislike for the man.

Side side note: This is unnecessarily deep, I do enjoy Crittendon even without all this backstory I made up for him, purely for his comedic value and the distress he causes Hogan 😂

Hochstetter: I’m gonna be honest, my hcs for Hochstetter are pretty basic and aren’t super elaborate. He for sure needs to be more fleshed out but this is what I have for now:

Disgruntled WW1 veteran who was very unhappy with how the war ended. I think he struggled a lot afterward, had a hard time finding work and making ends meet and maybe some struggles with mental health. Then this hitler guy comes along and he’s just ticking off all the boxes for Hochstetter cuz he’s making these promises of a better Germany and throwing off the shackles of Versailles and Hochstetter is sold. He becomes an early member of the nazi party and that’s about all I got

I’d really like to come up with some stuff about why he hates Hogan so much. Like I know Hogan is just really good at pushing buttons but he makes Hochstetter absolutely irate. There’s gotta be a little more to the story. Maybe something happened when Hogan first became a POW and he was being interrogated at gestapo headquarters… I’m excited to build on this later

However a friend of mine mentioned a story where the author ties in Howard Caine’s Jewish heritage into Hochstetter’s character and makes him a spy and I haven't had the chance to read it yet but I could easily be persuaded, my hcs on Hochstetter aren’t set in stone

[all-devouring-history-hub]

Korean War: The Forgotten War and why it matters.

Hello, and welcome again, my amazing readers to another history blog lesson. Last time we talked about the black death and how it changed Europe as a whole, now we talk about the Korean War.

When It comes to wars in the 20th century post ww1 that people talk about, It's mostly ww2 and the Vietnam War that people talk about. In ww2 Americans celebrated the end of the war. It was a momentous victory and many soldiers came back as heroes in post-war America.

Two decades later, Vietnam was the opposite. The Vietnam War was a humiliation for any American serving in the war. They were shamed and hated. the deaths of a lot of Us soldiers tend to have that effect.

But there was one war that wasn't loved or hated, It was just right there. The Korean War. To say that this war was forgotten would be an understatement. It might just be one of the most forgotten wars in history.

Often today, it's never taught. The one time I learned about it was when I was 12 years old, That was it. But millions died in a footnote in history including some 33,000 Americans.

And we are left with the ramifications of the end of the conflict. So what was the Korean War? Why does it matter? Well, strap in, and let me tell you about the forgotten cold war proxy war.

The Buildup To War

This whole thing starts before ww2. Korea was once independent before being annexed or taken over by Japan in 1910. The Koreans were subject to awful treatment by their Japanese overlords for at least three and a half decades.

By 1945, the Japanese empire was defeated through a combination of two atomic bombs, a Naval war, and the Soviets invaded Manchuria. The United states and the Soviet Union( Russia) proceeded to divide Korea amongst themselves.

It was divided and held between Soviet and American occupation with both deciding to divide it by the 38th parallel.

The Un attempted to give free elections to Korea, However, the Soviets blocked it and boycotted it real quick, the reason being that it would be unfair. By December 1945, Korea was stuck in a hard place between both sides. They both agreed to a trusteeship that would last for five years.

There was an attempt however to establish a new provisional government in the American zone, Known as the People's Republic of Korea, or PRK. The issue was they were pro-radical communists. The American military quickly smashed its legitimacy as a government and outlawed the Prk.

In the north, the Soviets hired a man and veteran activist called Cho man sik and saw that he could be a leader for a potential Korea.

Cho however disagreed with the Soviets and only worked with them under his own terms, which annoyed them. The final straw came after he refused to sign the trusteeship. As a result, he was removed from power and sent under house arrest before he disappeared.

This was Stalin after all, so guess what happened. Cho's leave of absence convinced the Soviets to find a new leader for a new Korea. This new puppet was Kim il sung, a former. communist guerilla leader.

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea, or what would become known to the world as North Korea was born.

Meanwhile, in the southern part of Korea, the elections were held and the presidential candidate, Syngman Rhee came to power. Thus south korea was born in 1948

Rhee was a hardline anticommunist and proceeded to have the military hunt down and kill suspected communists across the south to suppress uprisings. About 100,000 people were killed in the south for being suspected communists.

Things came to a head in 1950. Kim il sung believed he could invade South Korea and so proceeded to meet with Stalin to ask for equipment and support for the invasion.

Stalin was wary at first, but eventually, by April, He gave Kim his support. However, he made it clear that he would not send Soviet ground troops if a conflict broke out as to avoid conflict with the Americans.

North Korean forces Numbered around between 150,000 and 200,000 troops. 10 infantry divisions were organized, one tank division and one air force division. 210 aircraft as well as 280 tanks were prepared for the invasion of South Korea.

The South, by comparison, was nowhere close to that. By the day of the invasion, they only had around 98,000 soldiers, 0 tanks, and a 22 aircraft force, Most of which were trainer and liaison aircraft.

On the 25 of June 1950, North Korea launched an invasion of the south. The Korean war had begun.

The course of the war.

The North Koreans easily smashed their way into South Korea. The S South Korean military or Rok military had virtually no tanks or anti-tank weaponry to speak of. They resorted to blowing up a bridge in the Han River, killing many refugees. Seoul, the capital fell on the same day, the 28th of June.

The South Korean military had been reduced to just 22,000 troops from its original force of 98,000 in the spend of five days. While the North Koreans were consolidating their success, The Us was deciding whether or not they wanted to get involved or not.

They were concerned about the fact that if Korea fell, the communists could easily follow the same line with other nations, domino theory, and all of that. China had fallen a year earlier to communism, while half of Europe was encompassed under the Soviet sphere.

At the same time, they were also concerned about escalating the situation in Korea into war with the Soviets, believing that Europe was more of a concern than Korea.

Eventually, however, they agreed to send a Un peacekeeping force from several different nations, led by the Us in order to support South Korea. The generals were tasked to rebuild a force that was a shadow of its ww2 self.

Meanwhile, Us forces in Korea were fighting the Kpa, or the Korean people's army, for control of the south. The battle of Osan was one instance when task force Smith was fighting the North Koreans and highlighted the failures of poorly trained men and equipment such as bazookas and recoilless rifles, which were unable to penetrate the t34 tanks the North had.

Task force Smith retreated from the battlefield, but not before succeeding to hold off the enemy.

The battle of the Pusan perimeter was a battle where Un forces managed to hold back the North Koreans for a long time, with the air force and navy's amazing overwhelming superiority, And the grit of the un troops, they succeeded in holding the perimeter long enough for reinforcements to come.

During the battle of Pusan, efforts to relieve the defenders were underway. The Battle of Inchon however was a turning point in the un's favor. While I would like to go more in-depth about Inchon, All you need to know is that the landings were a success and they destroyed the North Korean forces there.

As a result of the landings, the defenders of Pusan were relieved. On September 15th, they broke out of Pusan. That same month the Un forces launched a counteroffensive into the south and managed to retake lost territory.

On September 22, 1950, Un forces fought for Seoul In what was known as the second battle of Seoul. The battle was a Un victory and Seoul was freed from the north.

Wanting to stop any future incursion from happening, the Un decided to eliminate North Korea once and for all by invading the North. They succeeded in capturing most of the north by October, as Kpa resistance crumbled. It finally culminated in the capture of the capital Pyongyang on October 19th, 1950.

Regardless, They continued to pummel the Kpa and pushed them all the way back to the Chinese border. And this is where things take a huge turn backward.

Chinese Involvement in this Conflict

As the Un pushed up north, China was starting to become increasingly wary of an approaching American force, which was pummeling a fellow communist state that they supported from the start. Mao Zedong, the leader of China, feared that America might not just stop at eradicating communism in Korea and that China might be the next one on the block.

After a series of emergency meetings that lasted from the 2 to the 5th of October, China decided to send in troops to support their ally. After enlisting Stalin's support, the Chinese were ready with about 200,000 troops. On October 19th, 1950, Chinese soldiers crossed the border in secret and across the Frozen Yalu River.

Wave after wave of Chinese soldiers crossed down the mountains and borders, Overwhelming the Un forces and forcing them back. They successfully retook Pyongyang as well as North Korea from the American forces.

Enraged so much that the Chinese had done this, the American commander Douglas MacArthur began looking for a way to defeat the Chinese, One of which was atomic weapons. Truman had said earlier at the beginning of the war that all options were on the table, including the bomb.

However as the months went by, This decision slowly changed. By 1951, However, Macarthur wanted to still use atomic bombs on China. Eventually, Macarthur's requests for the bombs were too much for Truman, and on April 11, He fired him and replaced him with this man, General Matthew Ridgeway.

Meanwhile, the Chinese and North Koreans were rapidly advancing and had taken Seoul again. However, Ridgeway hatched a counteroffensive known as Operation Thunderbolt. The counteroffensive was a success and they once again took Seoul back into un hands as well as South Korea.

However, from this point forwards, The war became a back-and-forth between the Chinese and North Koreans vs the Un and the South Koreans. Un forces were unable to get to Pyongyang while Chinese and north korean forces were unable to reach Seoul. Any gain both sides make was just taken back by the next offensive.

Now while the war on the ground was a stalemate, the war in the air was a far different story. This was the first war in which jet fighters played the central war in combat. No longer are piston fighters the main fighter plane, Jets are the new rage.

Fighters such as the ww2 era gloster meteor, the f-80 shooting Star, Mig 15, And especially the f-86 sabre became the standard jet fighters in the Korean War. This was a decade when fighter jets were still new and looked exactly like this.

See what I mean. North Korea was also subject to a huge bombing campaign that left thousands dead and injured. It still ranks among the highest countries that have been bombed. both sides continued to fight,

But eventually however by 1953, both sides were tired of conflict. After gaining no strategic advantage for several years, The combatants agreed to an armistice that was officially signed on July 27, 1953. The fighting was over.

The aftermath and conclusion

With the fighting over, Both sides created the Korean demilitarized zone, or Dmz for short. The Zone still exists to this very day.

With the war over, there was no cheering in the streets for Korea. Most people barely even paid attention to the war at all. Soldiers went back to their civilian lives. the 1950s continued, that was it.

North Korea was somehow better off than the South, With better health care and a better standard of living in the South, which is weird considering it's North Korea we are talking about here. But by the 80s, It began to stagnate and became a poverty-stricken place with concentration camps and famine.

South Korea went through a lot of regime changes and had a poor economy and living standards than the North. However, by the 1980s, South Korea's economy increased big time to the point of being one of the richest economies on earth.

The Korean War also had the highest causality civilian count than ww2 with approximately about 3 million civilian causalities in the entire war. 1.5 million North Koreans fled the country during the war. Millions of Koreans from both the North and South died during the war.

33,000 Americans were also dead, as well as 114,000 Chinese.

Ironically even though it's called the forgotten war, It's still ongoing. There was never an official peace treaty signed, meaning the Us is still at war with North Korea. The North in many ways sees the war from all those decades ago as a constant part of their ideology, with generations born to hate the Americans.

And a constant paranoia that the war may start again, which explains most of their craziness and general hostility towards other nations that aren't allied with them.

Even though the Korean War may be remembered today as a forgotten war, It's a war that impacted the lives of two nations and has defined generations of young Koreans. And it will continue to define future generations, as we still live with the consequences of a small conflict that began on that fateful day on 25 of June 1950.

[historyherstory]

Chapter Sixteen Notes

The insignia that Eleanor is seeing on the field (the pyramid with the 2 at the top) is the badge of the 2nd Armored Division. In the same way as the 101st has the Screaming Eagle patch? This is the 2nd Armored Division’s. I didn’t do much research into what they did in Normandy, just went off Nixon’s identification of the tanks as 2nd armored (”Why hello, 2nd Armored”).

The battle that takes place in Episode 3 is known as Bloody Gulch. There’s quite a few details about the battle that my chapter didn’t get into (and that the HBO show also doesn’t really touch on) so if you’re curious about WW2 history, it’s worth doing some independent research on. The relevant details that we do see (in the show, and referenced in the chapter) is that Easy Company was left exposed - F Company retreated under intense fire, which exposed D Company’s flank, who then (also against orders) retreated which left E Company’s left flank completely exposed. Notably, Easy did not retreat: they held their position. However, you can imagine how poorly received the retreats were (XO of F Company was relieved on the spot).

The show depicted HQ company watching from the rear with binoculars (which is when the retreats are narrated; also timed with Harry Welsh’s “there goes our left flank!”) so that’s where Nixon was during the battle. For purposes of my story, he found Ellie after the fact - it’s presented as he wanted to go see what happened first hand and thought she’d be useful but from Omnipotent Author Perspective, I think he just wanted to keep an eye on her. He’s trying, anyway.

What the officer from the 2nd Armored wanted is anyone’s guess, I didn’t really script it beyond “you’re a french woman on a battlefield that doesn’t seem right, time to go”. It’s worth noting “Silver trumps gold” is a reference to rank - 1st Lieutenant bars are silver. 2nd Lieutenant are gold. Winters outranks this officer. Notably, Ellie is aware of that (familiar enough with the insignias of rank to immediately recognize this). After their initial action in Carentan, Easy was pulled into reserve. You can read more about this in just about any of the Easy Co men’s biographies but Winters details it best, along Ambrose’s BOB. 

More Roe because I love Roe. (Also, from a narrative device perspective, he’s the easiest to have Those Intuitive Conversations with. I don’t know if this is a reflection of his nature as a person or his position in the army, a combination of both, or something else entirely, but he comes off as Less Overtly Macho compared to, say, men like Guarnere or Toye. It’s easier to have those sensitive conversations with Gene.)

But also, Ellie’s still slipping between the cracks.

For now.

(Honestly, Nixon’s not on the wrong path with assuming Someone has to be accountable for keeping an eye on her. It just so happens that she feels she’s a fine custodian for her own actions whereas just about every other man feels Somewhat Uncomfortable With That, and would like to, you know, have a better idea of what’s going on.)

You can find the chapter here!

[lunacyn24]

Hetalia: Axis Powers (EP 1 - 19)

Hetalia is not what I was expecting it to be. The poster for it is definitely deceiving because I thought this was going to be a slice of life series about some guy, but nope. It’s literally about the relationship and events that took place between several countries during the time of World War 1 and World War 2. As the name suggests Hetalia: Axis Powers centers around the formation of the Axis Powers and the Allied Powers. Countries like the US, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, Britain, and many others (Holy Roman Empire too) make appearances in this series that take a comedic approach towards “educating” its audience about the events that took place in WW1 and WW2. This series even portrayed events that took place before the World War like the American Revolutionary War as we see in the episodes concerning America cleaning its storage room. 

The stereotypes in this series are constant throughout this series. Please note that unfortunately I chose to watch the 19 episodes of Hetalia: Axis Powers assigned to us in English Dub…Continuing on, America is always chowing down on fast food like hamburgers and sodas. America is an individual who thinks highly of himself and always wants to be the hero, without truly doing the work most times. Japan is reserved, quiet, and observant. Germany has an accent and is very stern, buff, and disciplined. Italy is portrayed as being very naive, nonchalant, and weak. Italy also turns out to be a thorn in Germany’s side because of their care-free nature. That thorn grows bigger once Germany realizes how flaky and insufficient Italy is in battle. Something that the reading cleared up for me was why the series is called Hetalia. As I was watching the episodes, I kept wondering why Hetalia sounds so close to Italia (the Italian word for Italy), and it’s because creators combined the word “hetare”, meaning useless, with Italia. Useless Italy… but I’m not sure why the whole series should be called Useless Italy because it covers other countries as well, perhaps that’s the “humor” behind it? Even still, you have countries like Germany that are portrayed in a positive and hardworking light, when it wasn’t like that at all. Especially when looking at the time period this show takes place as I’ve mentioned before between WW1 and WW2, meaning the Holocaust was happening then. Germany is portrayed as this helpful and determined individual who helps out his allies when, in reality, it was a raging racist and anti-semitic totalitarian state. The depiction and behavior of Germany wasn’t the only thing that stood out to me, but it was definitely at the forefront of my mind. Italy’s not safe at all seeing as it was also under fascist rule, but by Benito Mussolini. I can definitely see how and why this show caused controversy with various populaces’ and governments around the world because it depicts and impacts the people of those respective countries. All in all, I wasn’t expecting this kind of storyline from Hetalia, at all.

[studiomkm]

Today in the shower, I started thinking about the native Americans in Peter Pan. Specifically, Disney’s Peter Pan. When you go to watch the movie on Disney+, it has a sensitivity warning about the outdated caricatures of Native.

Which is good, don’t get it twisted. It just also got me thinking whether or not you could retell Disney’s Peter Pan without actually omitting them. Here’s what I came up with:

Since the movie depicts a pre-WW2 England and Peter’s essentially immortal, the story of the Native tribe on Neverland precedes it by at least a century. Peter, champion of children & childhood that he is, flies to America one day from Neverland and comes across a large group of Native kids running from colonizers who’ve brutally destroyed their homes and ends up rescuing all the kids by bringing them to Neverland for safety.

At first, everything is great. Peter has a very large group of friends to play with on his island and all the kids are safe but over time something begins to happen.As the rescued boys & girls spend more time together, romantic bonds inevitably begin to form between them.

You can’t fall in love without growing up in at least some capacity so the kids Peter rescued start growing up in spite of Neverland’s magic. Slowly, they each all fall to love and then aging. Peter’s lost all the friends he’s rescued and now there’s a Native Neverland tribe made up of a mishmash of what little each of the now-adult kids remembers about their original culture.

Obviously, this event sours Peter on the whole concept of falling in love in general and girls specifically (because he’s a kid from who knows how long ago and so only boys and girls fall in love with one another) which leads to the creation of the Lost Boys and their no girls allowed mentality.

He still looks after the tribe on his island because he’s the Guardian of Neverland and he still misses his old friends but refuses to get too close to any of the new generations to avoid getting hurt again.

The Natives regard Peter highly as a savior & guardian figure (maybe even making up stories about him that combines the reality of him with elements from Native American trickster gods).

Anyway, that’s what I got. Tragedy, character development, and (I hope) a much better depiction of Neverland’s tribe that keeps the cultural inaccuracies but provides a solid reason for it instead of just resorting to unflattering stereotypes.

What do you think?

[thecanadiantimetraveler]

Lightning War

You can guess from the name is that I was talking about Blitzkrieg. Yes, the legendary "Blitzkrieg" used by the Germans during WW2.

I was eager to see the failed Austrian Artist, alongside other major characters like him. Of course various battles and operations, different periods of the war. I decided to go all in for WW2, unlike other stories that I will also tell in my blog. I took me more time than I realized or wanted.

About how much time I spent, it doesn't matter, because the Lightning War is what I want to focus on. People threw shade at German for losing the war, but I like to think the powers or what they did are pretty significant. I am mesmerized by 2 things, 1 is the ability to convince other people like Hitler. The guy literally convinced his whole country to go to war against giants of the war. He is literally the best public speech figure ever, and people often look over him, because he is "the guy who lose", but in many ways, he won.

The second thing is their revolutionary warfare, "Blitzkrieg". It is stunning, and dangerous, but overall, beautiful for a guy who likes to study history and warfare. It is what Sun Tzu would be proud of. It was quick, logical, smart, and definitely cheap. Nothing is destroyed but the enemy in Blitzkrieg. One thing to mention here is that the best army in the world at that time is French, and an inferior army like the German can absolutely not do anything against such army.

Only in 3 days, the incredible speed of motorized army crossed the German-French border through the Ardennes into Sedan, ONLY 3 DAYS ARE YOU KIDDNG ME. The barebone defense of France in the mountains has to endure the combination of 60,000 Germans, all are using crystal meth, which transformed them into superhumans, 22,000 vehicles, 850 tanks and the full force of the Luftwaffe as aerial artillery, and radios, which is incredibly new at the time. Look at France, they have to send messages through horses! The move was made possible by the Germans invasion of Denmark and Sweden before as a decoy. Only in 5 days, the German knocked out the Dutch, and encircled 1 million combined troops of France and British on the next day in Belgium and Holland, waiting to die. It was dreadful, and I could see it.

It is this point that the Germans was ordered to stop by Hitler themselves, and the Luftwaffe are ordered to destroyed them, like destroying sitting ducks. Anyway, that's how the Dunkirk miracle happened, but that is another story. I guess one of the wisest thing that France did was moved out of Paris for the German for taking, without it being bombed and like that. And just like that, after 10 days, they did charge into Paris, like heroes, because they are in fact, heroes (for the Germans). They took the city, and just like that, reverse the result of a 4 years old war in the past, which was known as WW1. The feeling of shambles of the French commanders when they have to go into the old carriage that the treaty of Versailles was signed. In 10 days, Hitler did just that, that took German 4 years ago, in a losing state.

Reflective corner: Anyways, those 10 days are legendary (as a historical significance perspective), and was the peek, and the peak of modern warfare. It was awesome to spectate as a 3rd person. And welcome to "what can Canada learn from this?". Well, not much, except that they should use the best technology available out there to their advantage, in every field there is. Also listen to the UK and the US for war advices, they had no history of losing a world war.

Description for those who need it: VROOM VROOM NEW HORSE IN TOWN BOYS. THE FUTURE IS HERE. T MINUS 10 DAYS FOR TOTAL FRANCE DOMINATION.

Jedi mind trick, you don't see anything:

Work cited: “Watch Greatest Events of WWII in Colour: Netflix Official Site.” Watch Greatest Events of WWII in Colour | Netflix Official Site, 8 Nov. 2019, www.netflix.com/title/80989924.

[arcane-ish]

I doubt the writers thought that much in detail. But if I had to take a stab, what I think fits what was presented?

IMO it looks too pretty and happy for there to have been a major violent confrontation. Powder, Ekko, Mylo and Claggor just don't seem like they've been to war. And let's be realistic, if there had been a war just 5, 6 years ago there would be more signs of it, at least more nationalistic displays as you noted.

And as you noted, no signs of Shimmer, so I think it just didn't play a role. Either Silco never had it or was talked out of using it.

I could see Vi's death making Vander mad enough to get him back into the fight. But I could also see Vander just being a totally fucked up mess and Silco steps in to help the family and one step is exerting moral pressure on Piltover. Like people protesting mostly peacefully, Vander being shown off as the big grieving father. Piltover being at first "wtf, she's a thief who got herself killed" and Zaun being "well, if she wasn't in such dire circumstances she wouldn't have gotten the idea". Maybe combine it with them revealing the secret deal between the enforcers and the undercity and either cancelling it leading to crime in Piltover or threatening to cancel it. IMO just having a political/negotiator person like Silco in a position like that without having to worry about the buildup of allies/Vander just being good at getting the city's support could help a lot.

Maybe there were arguments again about how violent they should let things go and about what Felicia would have wanted and what would be best for the kids.

As for the "themes of season 1"..., well this is season 2 and that has some pretty stated themes as well. Such as posing the idea that even Silco would support walking away rather than repeating the cycle of violence. Such as Zaun helping Piltover out even though Piltover just recently gassed the shit out of them, tortured their people, threw tons of them in prison. And maybe gaining a slightly better status because of that shared fight, not because Zaun was fighting against Piltover. (btw, I actually think that is not that removed from life. There's narratives of rights advancements being made/the majority population being more in favor of it because minorities being heavily utilized in wars, there's quite a bit of "this group or that group fought really bravely for us in WW2 and that's why they have special status" myth building in real life).

I sometimes think "murderhobo revolution fans" ;) sometimes have a very narrow view as well about how real life status change happens too. There are plenty of violent revolutions that failed or changed nothing (especially if we subtract all colonial conflicts simply because imo they just do not suit).

And acknowledge that "people gain indpendence because the larger entity that controlled them lost a war or imploded on its own due to there being a general trend away from monarchy or communism" (ie Soviet Union, Ottoman Empire, Austro Hungarian Monarchy) also work quite different. Neither Silco nor Vander nor Ekko has really proposed an ideological change away from aristocracy (that they for example could try to sell to non house member Pilties as well) nor is there a sign that they are in contact with groups trying to achieve similar things in Noxus or Freljord or whatever.

Or all the revolutions that succeeded only because a superior force intervened on the revolution's behalf (ie the US toppling Saddam, or NATO in Yugoslavia).

I dunno, I'm just sad that the Silco fans aren't into the idea of "Silco, master manipulator of Piltover public opinion", when I think that that would be plenty of sexy and interesting as well. Yes, he uses violent means in season 1, but we can also read that as him reacting to circumstance (ie he just killed apparently popular leader Vander and now has to waste time installing his own people who keep down any Vander loyalists and spend at least some his resources on fighting his own people aka the Firelights rather than trying to get them on board).

But if in a different situation a different tool (like speech) was also promising rewards, maybe he would be willing to use it. Especially if in this universe Silco was a little bit more trusting with Vander and was rewarded for it, maybe he could be persuaded to also trust that different tools could work on Piltover rather than "the only language they understand is violence".

>I am also wondering what exactly Vander did to get and keep Silco that... pliant.

I'm willing to spend much, much, much time pondering all the options and methods ;)

Say, where was the Arcane kinkmeme link again?

Episode 7 - Silco's Zaun or Vander's undercity?

We all love "Pretend Like It's The First Time", right. But there's two ways of interpreting it, and I like one better... 1. This is Silco's Zaun. At some point, possibly right after Vi's death, he got Vander back on side for his revolution. Using Silco's unethical but very effective methods, they got freedom for Zaun and it worked out pretty well for everyone. Silco runs the place but he's trying to hand responsibility on to the next generation, and it's sufficiently easy a job now that at 5pm every day his adoring husband knows to have a post-work cocktail ready for him. 2. This is Vander's undercity. At some point Silco went back to Vander - maybe he got the letter, stormed into the bar to yell at Vander, and Vander poured him the best liquor and let him continue yelling for three hours. At which point he fell into Vander's arms and bed and has been there ever since. No more Shimmer, no more unethical methods or exploiting Lanes kids like Deckard, he's Nice Now and talks about forgiveness. It doesn't matter that the undercity isn't free, it is clean and safe and prosperous and they're happy together in it.

In both cases this appears to also improve the weather, with Mylo, Claggor, Heimerdinger, Powder and Ekko working on poison absorption and air cleanup technology (I love that).

I like 1 better, of course - I think it fits better with the season 1 themes of there being things worth fighting for. But... we don't see any Zaun symbols or flags, as far as I can tell, and only a few hints of Shimmer colour (like the lanterns over Ekko and Powder). It doesn't even really look like Zaun - the glass is a Piltover-style glass, the people don't look that rough and vibrant, they're having a cute competition.

Also Silco seems to be drinking from his hipflash initially. I know the hipflask is a symbol of zaundads understanding, but it's odd to be using a hipflask in your own house if you're a person of importance and responsibility. Also, he's lost his trademark Shimmer eye, hopefully because he has better medicine in this AU but if not... (At least he got Vander to dress properly. As soon as I saw Vander in this AU I thought "ohhh is that the influence of- ") The second option... well I can see how they could leave that open for the Silco-haters and extreme centrists. But it's a bit darker, isn't it. I am also wondering what exactly Vander did to get and keep Silco that... pliant.