#this isnt the most cohesive set but i had to let this out of my skull

[dreadfuldevotee]

#the doctor will say everything but "I love you"

Bonus: #comeuppance

[raven]

As someone who plays persona I feel you’re a good person to ask: should I play a persona game

you know a game is a real one when the answer is "if you do, please dont think im stupid for liking it". the first persona game anyone should ever play is persona 5 royal and that game is. well. the best part isnt until 70-90 hours in on average. tries really hard to be a social commentary but fumbles basically every aspect. can barely keep a cohesive character arc for most main characters. "the gameplay is really good though" -karl marx. so like short answer, do you have a hundred hours or so and want an excuse to hate on something's story and politics while also having a good time in the actual gameplay, sure... i feel like i can recommend this to any general person but i feel less confident recommending it to you specifically as i feel you are a woman of taste. but you're also someone who loves the slop at times. and what is this game if not slop. i put the rest under a read more because i said too much. My bad for being loquacious

like storywise i do like it... Mostly. and i do like the characters. and i think akechi is genuinely a great character, well written, well acted, yaoibait, knocked everything out of the park with him. he is what kept me going, but if you dont like characters whose main flaw is that theyre a teenager and therefore stupid, he might not click with you. like yeah, everything he does is poorly thought out... it's consistent. it's in character. and he does it with such swag, too. everything in the game's story seems designed around him, including the phantom thieves themselves. but i dont know whats in it for people who dont like him. not that you'll really get to know him for a good chunk of the game. which is the biggest thing... i could say "keep going, it gets better" but... does it? for everyone? it did for me, but it was made in a lab for me.

the game can understand that violence against women is wrong, but it doesnt understand what violence against women is. it can understand that the current system isnt working, but is too weak to actually take a stance on how to fix it. it's too obsessed with giving the player a power fantasy than to give them any challenges at all, or to make them think for a second. which i like in a game. i like it when games fuck up hard because theres more to discuss. and one of my biggest issues was discussed in the very last part. not necessarily to the depth i would have preferred, but it lets you draw your own conclusions. it also really shocked me at one point near the end there, which really colored my view in a positive way. i had grown complacent. i stopped thinking. i didnt think the game could do anything interesting... and then it did. but that level of shock was only because of my specific proclivities... i dunno. like it's hard to defend.. oh also theres a massive climax that builds up to a twist and reveal which is genuinely one of the worst ive seen a story ever do it, especially with such a strong set up. like genuinely laughable. but once you reach that part you're about 3/4 of the way through so you cant really stop there just have a laugh and know it's almost done.

the gameplay IS good though. like it's not only flashy, it's fun. i think the only issue is that it can be too easy, and the merciless mode is famously easier than hard. but as persona games go, it really is the best. it's just fun! the social sim elements are... well lets just say the majority of character writing in this game is stupid. otherwise, it can be fun to try to balance everything. it's possible to do it all on your first playthrough even if you don't know the perfect strategy, but if you fuck up too much you really wont be able to finish them all.

but heres the thing: metaphor refantazio just came out, which, aside from the time aspect (you have so much time lol) almost improves on persona 5 in every way. it's slightly less misogynistic. the social commentary... well, its fantasy racism, but it's a little more well thought out than p5's. but the main thing is the gameplay. and like, the gameplay in p5 was already good! metaphor is much more balanced for difficulty than p5's, but if you really get a hang of character building you can really take control. the slight differences in battle systems really take it for me. press turn system every day. i adore it. basically you get turns if you hit a weakness but if you miss you lose two turns. same goes for the enemies, so you can really get destroyed, but you can dodge every attack and they wont be able to do shit. but the story is, well, it's okay. there were some really good moments, and i liked it mostly because its kind of.. the least bad anyone could ever do it? it's pretty idealistic but just seemed like, nice in a way that i really cant describe. like, i have my issues with it that i could go into detail, but i still generally liked it. beautiful presentation as well-- and is that not all that matters? give me literally anything with a beautiful cutscene and I'll be tearing up. and the words "election magic" are so potent to me. its also shorter than p5r. but will it stick with me as much? no. would it have caused me to play the rest of the persona games? unsure. have i listened to the soundtrack so often while falling asleep that atlus is my number 5 artist on my spotify wrapped, not because the soundtrack is so calming or because i especially like it, but because i was trying to conjure a character in my dreams? NO. and persona 5 was a resounding yes on all fronts.

in terms of the other persona games, i dont recommend 4 unless you want to feel like, actually bad? i dunno it just put me in a foul mood. it was like radiation emanating from my switch for several weeks. incredibly homophobic with a side of (possibly slightly unintentional) transphobia. as well as some very fatphobic jokes (what game from this time period doesnt, but.. well it's bad every time!) and of course our classic misogyny. all this and the gameplay is worse than every other (new) persona game, and the story is fine. it thinks its twin peaks at the beginning. it is not twin peaks. LMFAO. 3 is better than 4 but theres not really a definitive edition even though it just got remade. each version has its ups and downs. if you look it up and any of it compels you i can give you more info on that one. the aesthetics alone are enough to be compelling , I'll admit. if you like boring and repetitive gameplay this ones for you! Im being serious. the story's pretty good though, and the characters are probably the best in the persona series. 2 (which is a duology, but the gameplay is the same and the second is well, a sequel) is pretty bad gameplay wise that i would only recommend if you're really into the series. i really liked the story but yeah i dunno. eh, it's fun. hard to recommend. 1 is okay. underwhelming. nothing much.

[kudzucataclysm]

owowowo got tagged in a Writer Tag game thing by @vacantgodling :D i tag whoever sees this or whoever wants to do it :D

it'll all be under the cut huehue

Do you write in order?

FUCK NO LOL. i just jot down the most important scenes first, or at least the scenes in my mind that stand out the most. Then i just…tend to fill in the blanks…but sometimes i try to work backwards! Like figuring out the ending first sometimes helps me in terms of structure and pacing

Do you start with something in particular?

HRRRRM well, it depends on the story i suppose…i usually like to start with either the inciting incident or like…not a prologue exactly but a bit where the story is set up asking a QUESTION narratively so to speak. the 2nd one tends to be hard for me to do cuz i have to make it interesting enough to keep people reading…

in the case of SE, the inciting incident happened decades beforehand, and the story itself is like…the consequences manifesting!! after being held off for so long if that makes sense

How fully formed does your writing come out first try?

usually 40% of the time. i write down what happens beat for beat then i usually have to hit my head against the wall to come up with cohesive sentences and prose…which doesnt work anymore now vv’ i have to get back into reading books tbh

How many drafts do you go through?

ive never had a fully formed draft in my life so i wouldnt know

Tell me about your process

the characters tend to come first. they just kinda show up expecting to be put somewhere, but first i just kinda let them run around a bit on their own. i let them develop a base personality, then introduce more characters to flesh them out.

the world comes into existence at roughly the same time as the characters do- not fully fleshed out, it DOES in fact, start out as a vibe. bits and pieces abt what it looks like, which leads to ‘WHY does it look like that? what happened?’ which leads into more questions obviously, but the nitty gritty details of the setting dont really come into fruition until i get the inklings of a plot

the plot, while secondary, is actually very important to me. i truly hate the “no plot just vibes” aspect of a lot of writing communities these days for some reason (not being mean just. i dont like it…) so i usually have a plot surrounding the characters in some way- there isnt “OOOH the fate of the wooorld!!” sort of thing. the plot doesnt come first to me, but that doesnt mean that its not equally as important. ‘The Thing’ is happening and what the characters want, and how they react to Thing is usually how i let the plot drive itself. which can obviously be chaotic…and thats why the last year or so of me working on SE has been equally as chaotic, but its been simmering down recently to the point where i really SHOULD be starting to script things…. if that makes sense at all

throughout the entire process theres usually a ton of research into a shitload of different topics. what-ifs and what not- “oh what if THIS thing happened? what if this historic event went differently? what if robots were meat? what if the earth got cracked open? everything is ‘WHAT IF’ or ‘HOW WOULD’, and then the story is just me exploring the answers to those questions :D

the steps arent usually in any particular order and i tend to bounce around a lot, but to sum it all up i develop stories by consistently going 'this would be sick as shit if [x] was a thing/happened'

[betawooper]

rating every demon fight in kny bc i can

non-biased, completely objective rating (more or less) of every significant demon fight in kny based on a number of factors, including:

cleverness of fighting tactics

placement in the story’s timeline

integration of character backstories

cohesive themes between characters

etc

by non-biased and objective i mean i’m not skewing the rating if a death felt fair or whatever

everything past where the anime ended will be under a read more so anime onlys who havent watched mugen train, youre safe lol

oh and i reread the manga like 20+ times (reread the latter arcs at least 40 times, haha hyperfixations am i right?) so be rest assured im not pulling these ratings out of my ass

also ill randomly be bolding certain phrases just to improve readability

anyways let’s gooooo

VS NEZUKO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and Nezuko. Tanjirou is fending her off by putting the axe handle in her mouth, keeping her from eating him. End Image Description.]

10/10

i like how realistic it is, because yeah tanjirou would react the way to he did with zero fighting skills against a demon

very clear why tanjirou is fighting nezuko and shows a bit of worldbuilding on how normal people react to their family becoming demons

always nice to see worldbuilding

giyuu is the perfect example of a seasoned demon slayer who’s good at his job, and he juxtaposes tanjirou very well in that aspect

my only complaint is not directly in this fight itself but how nezuko is handled throughout the story as a whole

like bro, it is literally never explained why nezuko is different from demons

could have been easily explained if maybe her family’s ghosts like slapped her hand every time she wanted to eat a person but nope

she’s just built different lol

so yeah youll see future ratings get points docked off bc nezuko unlocks some secret power with no prior explanation other than she angy >:3

VS TEMPLE DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a demon. The demon has a sharp-nailed hand over his neck and there are four text bubbles around him saying “But a wound like this... will heal in no time! See? The bleeding already stopped!” End Image Description.]

10/10

may be more forgettable compared to like rui but still good

tanjirou did exceptionally well in this fight and his ability to think on his feet is once again beautifully illustrated here (trapping this dude’s head against the tree trunk with the axe)

very clever

again, establishes more demon worldbuilding regarding regeneration and still being able to move without their head

and the demons burning in the sunlight thing since nezuko wasn’t able to show that

the ending where tanjirou hesitates to kill the demon also serves to show his sympathetic nature towards demons that will last throughout the entirety of the first 60-ish chapters

:)

we’ll talk about what the hell happens to tanjirou after that

or not, it could honestly be its own post

VS HAND DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a many-handed demon. He has six hands around him, three of them covering his mouth while he chuckles, two of them grabbing his cheeks, and one holding on to the top of his head. There are two text bubbles saying “That’s how many of Urokodaki’s students I have eaten! I’ve decided to kill all of his students!” End Image Description.]

10/10

ooooh probably the first big fight against a demon in the series

oh yeah not doing the two random demons tanjirou one shot in a single blow bc eh

anyways hand demon’s pretty goddamn scary, considering the fact that this is the 5th demon or whatever tanjirou has had to face so far

very nice way to show us how much tanjirou’s innate intuition and all his other random abilities (sense of smell, hard forehead) can come together and help him decapitate this guy

i liked the mini history with urokodaki this dude had and why he had beef with our favorite mentor figure, it establishes that urokodaki was in fact a super good demon slayer and its cool to see that actually shown

i also liked that small moment of compassion tanjirou gave this demon, staying consistent with tanjirou’s established kindness

the demon’s sad tale with killing his own brother very much humanizes him when all the reader has seen up to this point is that this guy is a monster who eats people

sets up the theme of demons just being humans but being victims of circumstance that unfortunately doesn’t hold up as well in arcs past mugen train

VS SWAMP DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou fighting off three horned demons as they appear from below. There is a spiky text bubble saying “Three of them!!!” End Image Description.]

10/10

not my most favorite fight but it still portrays everything alright and im not allowed to let my personal opinions mess with the rating so

i like how tanjirou mentioned the fact that he trained in conditions similar to the bog and explains how he pulled off the whirlpool form

using past experiences to aid him in the present, nice nice

tanjirou and nezuko dont quite work together very well but its yknow the first mission so ill chalk it up to simple inexperience

also the way the muzan curse thingie was hinted at here? fantastic way of showing that little bit of demon worldbuilding

...

oh god, it mentions nezuko being stronger than normal demons

ok its not a problem here per say since i can still suspend my disbelief, but later on it just becomes a glaring problem that gets worse over time

VS SUSAMARU AND YAHABA

[Image Description: Manga panels of Susamaru and Yahaba. The first one is a joyful Susamaru about to throw a temari ball. There is floating text saying “Is she one of Kibutsuji’s minions?!” The second image is an annoyed Yahaba, holding one of his eye-hands to cover himself. There are two text bubbles around him saying “My kimono got all dusty. Tch!” End Image Description.]

9/10

why dont these bitches have a good looking panel together dammit

anyways amazing entrance, the way yahaba used his hand eyes to track down tanjirou is really neat

the synergy yahaba and susamaru have is incredible, its awesome dude, they work extremely well together and it shows

tanjirou actually mixing his water breathing forms together is a god tier move and i absolutely love how he can show off his ability to think on his feet once again

establishing how yushiro’s bda works early on is really well done

establishing tamayo as a fugitive this early on is also super well done

not to get into spoiler territory but both these things pay off

how tamayo ended up defeating susamaru is literally awesome in so many ways

shows off both how smart she is by exploiting the muzan curse

and speaking of the muzan curse, we actually get to see what happens to demons who even say his name, back when it was hinted with the swamp demon

tamayo is amazing dude, and we get some real evidence of the horrible suffering demons go through if they even accidentally attempt to betray muzan :D

...

now heres what keeps this fight from being perfect

nezuko somehow grew stronger against susamaru’s temari

with no explanation

which could have been easily explained if tamayo was like “oh yeah the drug also boosts a demon’s strength temporarily”

but nope

god, i just dont like how gotouge handles nezuko’s power boosts throughout the series bc like i said before

no explanation is given anywhere

this is a huge issue, this isnt a pokemon game, you cant just kill demons and get exp at the end of every battle, level up, get some sweet stat bonuses and move on

(actually if gotouge established that this is how nezuko grew in power, than all my complaints about this would be gone, im not even joking)

anyways i get that nezuko is supposed to be “special” but thats too vague of a descriptor

how the hell is she special? ya gotta be more specific and stick with that explanation or that suspension of disbelief is going to disappear

VS TONGUE DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a four-eyed demon with horns and a long tongue. He is crawling in an awkward position, one foot in front of his tilted head. There are two text bubbles around him saying “Heh, heh! I’ll slurpy slurp your brains out through you ear!” End Image Description.]

10/10

not much to say, showcases zenitsu’s true abilities really well

nicely done

VS HORNED DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a big, single-horned demon. There are three text bubbles saying “You dodged! You’re awfully lively for a human! It’ll be a treat to carve away your flesh!” End Image Description.]

10/10

would have ignored this fight if not for the fact we havent seen inosuke fight before

it definitely shows how very fast-paced and wild inosuke is

no complaints here lol

VS KYOGAI

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kyogai, a demon with tsuzumi drums attached to his shoulders. There are four text bubbles around him saying “Why?! Why does everyone keep sneaking through my house? It’s so aggravating. It’s my prey! It’s my prey! Found in my territory!” End Image Description.]

10/10

establishes marechi blood pretty early on, once again expanding the worldbuilding of kny which is always cool

interesting terrain where it’s always shifting, tanjirou once again proves his ability to adapt really quickly by altering one of his forms to work with the turning room

(man, i wish the form mixing/form modification thing carried on throughout the rest of the story, but it really didnt which is just a shame)

the injuries tanjirou had prior to this mission actually affecting him was a nice touch

oh yeah, kyogai gives us more worldbuilding (which is always nice) regarding the 12 kizuki, and the aspect of him being cast out due to being weak shows a lot about muzan’s indifference towards his own demons if they arent strong

his backstory being a failed writer once again humanizes kyogai as a former human being and not just a monster

tanjirou shows his sympathy and compassion again by not stepping on his written work and complimenting his bda

well, tbh tanjirou’s actions kinda came out of nowhere but its a very minor thing and not enough to dock a point off, like it didnt affect the outcome of the fight that much if at all

(so if you see future battles where points are docked off for things not logically making sense, its bc whatever nonsensical concepts were integrated into the fight actually turned the tide of the battle and thats a big no-no)

very good fight and if you remember how kinda bad tanjirou was at accurately slicing the swamp demon, you can see that he’s already improved leaps and bounds

im so proud of him

VS MOTHER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and the Mother Spider Demon. There is a light shining down from the top right on to the demon as Tanjirou slices her head off, rain following in his wake. There is floating text saying “Water Breathing: Fifth Form - Blessed Rain After the Drought!” around them. End Image Description.]

10/10

i mean does anyone disagree?

all the demon slayers getting their necks snapped by her threads was pretty horrific, probably more horrifying than anything else we have seen in the entire series if im gonna be honest

the death scene is probably the most beautiful one in the series

it reveals a water breathing form that we havent seen before thats the 5th form

as far as i know, no other breathing style has this merciful sword stroke so it shows a lot about the original water breather and what they might have been like

but enough about them, really the focus is on tanjirou bc this is like the best example by far of how kind and sympathetic he is to demons

dunno what else to say, its perfect

VS SON SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Agatsuma Zenitsu performing Thunder Breathing 1st Form: Sixfold on a spider-like demon. Zenitsu is crashing through the roof of a shed, and a zig-zag path is left behind. There are sound effects all over the panel, saying “Bam!” in large font. End Image Description.]

10/10

chose a picture without a huge spider on it bc i would like to not scare myself half to death

anyways extremely amazing fight, showcases zenitsu’s immense talent and skill, adapting the 1st form of thunder breathing to be a more versatile move

theres a moment where his backstory with kuwajima and kaigaku were revealed and his hidden insecurities are out in the open which is super nice and further develops a character weve only considered as comedic relief until now

the anime made the backstory scenes and the killing scene so much cooler

while there is no thematic connection between zenitsu and the demon, it really isnt necessary to keep this fight interesting

anyways another pretty much perfect fight

VS FATHER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and Inosuke slashing at the Father Spider Demon. The demon has blocked Tanjirou’s sword with his arm, and Inosuke is slamming both his blades down on the demon’s other hand. End Image Description.]

10/10

again, not my most favorite fight but it does everything right

i do have to say it was excellent how gotouge hyped up the father spider demon to be the big bad, only just so the plot twist later takes the readers by surprise

nicely done

VS DAUGHTER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kochou Shinobu and the Daughter Spider Demon. Shinobu’s back is seen and her haori looks like a butterfly’s wings keeping her afloat as she holds her stinger blade out to the side. The demon looks surprised as blood gushes from her side, arm, shoulder, chest, neck, and forehead. There is floating text on the panel, saying “Insect Breathing - Butterfly Dance - Caprice!” End Image Description.]

10/10

first time weve seen shinobu and her fighting style

what i love most about this is how much it shows her true character, appearing as a carefree and naive individual so she seems underwhelming

then bam, reveals exactly how dangerous and uncaring she is of demons, listing out the specific ways she would torture the daughter spider demon in grotesque detail

her using poison to take demons by surprise is also super clever and brings back the worldbuilding established way earlier about wisteria being poisonous to demons

amazing integration of that concept

anyways this fight really encapsulates who shinobu is as a character and thats why it gets a perfect score

VS RUI

[Image Description: Manga panel of Rui holding his hand out directly towards the viewer. There are two text bubbles around him, saying “Give me your sister. If you hand her over quietly, I’ll spare your life.” End Image Description.]

8/10

not only is it a super scary fight but there is a deeper conflict between rui and tanjirou, what it means to be family

they are opposites in the sense that while tanjirou believes love is what makes a family, rui’s subconscious desperation for an unbreakable bond drives him to use fear to keep his “family” together

excellent juxtaposition of their values, and this is only further emphasized when rui expresses out loud what he was going to do to nezuko

i also like the symbolism regarding rui’s bda, how he uses threads or the “familial” bonds to cut up his fake family with it if they act out of turn or annoy him

super neat detail

alright what i dont like about this fight is nezuko (again)

mostly her unlocking her bda to turn the tide of the battle bc her mom was like “yo, wake up, your brother is going to be killed”

feels... forced ig

her bda in general is confusing and not consistent

man, i wish i could make a stronger argument for this but i do believe the problem stems from the fact that we dont ever know what nezuko is thinking, and what she thinks of tanjirou specifically

if she even cares for him as a sibling or if shes only going along with what her family is saying to her, things like that which would have been fixed if gotouge actually gave her thoughts some screen time

so the action feels pretty shallow

im also conflicted over tanjirou somehow remembering how dance of the fire god works

on one hand, hes using past information and applying it in the current setting so he doesnt die, which is understandable

but on the other hand, this was a teeny bit random?

i think what could have fixed this is if there was a scene in the beginning of the series where tanjirou was performing it himself, like practicing before he actually had to do it for new years

so that when the rui fight rolls around, it would have felt less like throwing dry spaghetti at a wall

but yeah

overall super good fight, giyuu ending up having to kill rui instead of tanjirou was super good in that tanjirou didnt become a pillar this early in the series and to show how strong giyuu is

there are some odd bits regarding the ultimate “beheading” of rui using nezuko and tanjirous supposed bonds but it doesnt kill the fight entirely so it deserves its pretty high score

***under read more is manga-only fights so beware***

VS ENMU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Enmu holding his hand out directly at the viewer, with a mouth on the back of it. There is floating text to the top right of Enmu that says “Whispers of Forced Unconscious Hypnosis!” End Image Description.]

9/10

id say this fight is definitely overshadowed by the dream stuff prior to this but its pretty good in its own right

enmu fusing with the train was kinda confusing, like when was it established that demons could fuse with objects?

this worldbuilding element doesnt even appear again so yeah thats why it loses a point

how the kmbk gang end up defeating enmu is pretty sweet though, tanjirou using dance of the fire god to sever the neck bone was really nice and shows that him using the breathing style in the rui fight wasnt a one time thing

while kyojuro’s role was smaller in this part, the next part makes up for it so i cant complain

anyways ye, almost perfect score but its pretty good

VS AKAZA (MUGEN TRAIN)

[Image Description: Manga panel of Akaza holding his hand out to the viewer’s left. There is a text bubble saying “Why don’t you become a demon?” End Image Description.]

10/10

this encounter is literally amazing okay?

after the crew kills the big bad, it seems like everything is fine

but plot twist, upper moon 3 appears out of nowhere

this is the first time the reader has seen an upper moon, let alone the 3rd/4th strongest demon in existence and the way gotouge handled this twist is fucking amazing

kyojuro’s death scene really shows just how human even the strongest pillars are against demons with incredible power

its just

amazing

VS OBI DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panels of the obi-like demon. The first image shows the obi hung in the air and strung over each other like decorations, with women-shaped patterns in its folds. The second image is Hashibira Inosuke fighting the Obi demon which now has lips and eyes. There is floating text in that panel saying “Breath of the Beast: Sixth Fang - Jagged Gnaw!!” End Image Description.]

10/10

on to red light district

this fight is admittedly super forgettable and not very interesting at least compared to the main fight with daki and gyutaro

but it wraps up the sub plot of the women and uzui’s wives going missing so it gets a perfect score for not messing that up

oh and it establishes the stretchy neck thing daki has going on which is very good

VS DAKI AND GYUTARO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Daki and Gyutaro. Daki is sitting on Gyutaro’s shoulders. There is a text bubble on the top right that says “The two of us are one, after all.” as well as floating text that reads “The power of the irregular siblings...!? Next issue lead color and the fight reaches its climax!!” End Image Description.]

8/10

love how this battle challenges tanjirou’s sympathy and kindness towards demons, just simply bc daki and gyutaro are horrible people

(too bad nothing came of this, which ill explain in the hantengu portion)

daki and gyutaro are very good villains and kept this fight super interesting from start to finish

uzui acting as a foil to gyutaro is nicely integrated and properly shown with how jealous gyutaro gets over seeing uzui’s perfect form and stature

tanjirou not only mixes forms but mixes breathing styles as well, which is so fucking awesome

(too bad it was only used like once throughout the entire series, its quite unfortunate)

the super high tension right after inosuke gets stabbed and tanjirou wakes up was expertly portrayed and handled, it felt like the kmbk gang and uzui were actually going to lose

super awesome

the tanjirou and gyutaro parallels are expertly portrayed, with how gyutaro taunts tanjirou over failing to protect his little sister, and the more visual thing where tanjirou imagined his own neck underneath his blade, that was super duper nice

the ending is extremely tense and emotionally gripping, gotouge did a really good job with that artistically too

the demon mark acquisition scene was surprisingly not frustrating, considering that it wasnt really explained prior to the battle

i do think it has to do with how it was explained later just exactly how they worked so its not just some random thing gotouge pulled out of their ass

so pretty good

/

what i dont like is nezuko and her full power demon form

first of all where the fuck did that come from? she just got angry and suddenly shes as powerful as an upper moon

like

how?

that doesnt make sense???

her extremely quick regeneration makes no sense

her ability to manipulate her blood’s properties makes no sense

and it doesnt even appear again so what was the point of that existing

none of this is even explained later which annoys me

that one part where tanjirou sings a lullaby to her to calm her down was alright ig but nezuko in this fight makes me extremely irritated and frustrated

just ugh

VS HANTENGU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Hantengu opening a shoji door. He is crawling inside, his hand in a gnarled, unnatural position. There is a text bubble saying “Eeeeeeek.” End Image Description.]

1/10

swordsmith village

this fight can go fuck itself /j

no but seriously it has so many problems that it would be shorter to name its redeeming qualities (which ill do later)

first off, the nezuko full power form thing again

i hate it so much with a passion

again, where did her ability to regenerate instantly even come from???? this is never explained, ever

and why did she cut herself on tanjirou’s sword anyway

did she somehow know that it was going to turn red if she burned it?

gotouge what the fuck, there is literally no reason why nezuko would do that and we cant even read her mind to see her thought process

gotouge hates nezuko, i swear

/

remember when i said uzui is meant to be a foil to gyutaro in the rld fight? its pretty obvious that those two are opposites, it was nicely done

... what the hell does mitsuri’s insecurities about strength have to do with whatever the fuck hantengu has going on (which is basically nothing)?

so no meaningful connection between mitsuri and hantengu

theres no meaningful connection between tanjirou and hantengu other than tanjirou getting pissed off for like the second time

also tanjirou’s thing with being kind and sympathetic to demons was entirely dropped at this point

but instead of it leading up to a corruption arc of some sorts, it just doesnt

like honestly if something actually came of that anger he exhibited in this arc and from red light district from this point forward story-wise, i would have counted this as an amazing writing decision

but it literally doesnt so who cares

(god, i really start to hate what happened to his character after this )

and genya’s revealed motivation also doesnt fit at all with hantengu’s thing, he’s not a foil, not a parallel, nothing, there is nothing

/

tanjirou being the catharsis for development for mitsuri and muichirou, who he has only talked to like twice

theres definitely a better way to handle those two’s developments without his help

like gotouge, you have a big cast of characters, use them lol

/

i want to kick hantengu in the face for being boring as fuck (at least his clones have cool looking weapons)

doesnt even have a proper backstory, just a single spread of him being blamed for shit as a human

like... thats it? this is upper moon 4 what the hell

/

theres no clever form mixing here at all (regarding tanjirou) which probably would have helped with foreshadowing the 13th form for dance of the fire god/sun breathing better

also gotouge established that as tanjirou’s thing and now he doesnt do that stuff anymore which sucks

/

oh hey remember when tanjirou actually learned how to do zenitsu’s speed boost thing?

if you didnt, i dont blame you bc it literally doesnt appear again, ever

you could argue that he adapted it into his “waltz flash” technique or whatever the fuck that is but the way it was integrated into this fight was like throwing dry spaghetti at a wall

which is just a shame bc its meant to be representative of how tanjirou and zenitsu are good pals but the way it was utilized is forgettable as hell

/

i absolutely loathe the crimson blade concept as a whole and im mentioning this now bc its going to come into play why future instances where this goddamn thing comes up again causes points to be lost

its inconsistent as fuck ill tell you that

/

at least some yoriichi stuff appeared here and not shoved into the final battle with everything else

so the yoriichi stuff later didnt come out of absolute nowhere

genya and mitsuri’s unique fighting styles expand the kny worldbuilding just a little more which is always nice

tanjirou got a cool sword out of this which would have been cooler if him and yoriichi had a deeper connection that was actually explored

but we didnt get shit so whatever

other people getting demon marks being revealed here is also okay so that again, the final battle isnt filled with absolutely everyone getting their marks at once

demon marks have their own slew of problems but its not as bad as the fucking crimson sword shit

god i hate the crimson sword shit

...

dude this section needs a tldr, even i cant sit and read through my shit

TL;DR - this fight sucks and crimson swords are bullshit (more on this later)

VS GYOKKO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Tokitou Muichirou and Gyokko. Muichirou is looking to the left while Gyokko is looking to the right, both with their backs to each other. There are mist clouds billowing in the foreground and background, as well as a slash mark going across Gyokko’s neck. End Image Description.]

7/10

this fight suffers from the same lack of cohesive themes through characters like the hantengu battle bc the antagonist is given nothing

but its better

we havent actually seen mui fight before so theres no consistencies that the reader has to keep track of for now

and there arent like 10 characters in the fight so this fight gets a lot of points just for being a lot more coherent

i do like that this fight shows just how good mui is that he can defeat an upper moon by himself

mui’s backstory is neat

gyokko’s bda is very interesting too

... thats pretty much it lol

ye, anyways not the best fight but not the worst fight either

VS KAIGAKU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kaigaku holding the hilt of his blade with one hand. There is two text bubbles around him, saying “...As usual, you’re still shabby. It’s been a while, Zenitsu.” End Image Description.]

9/10

alright on to final battle arc

theres some good fights and then some really sucky ones, but this one was pretty incredible and very emotionally charged

theres a clear reason why zenitsu and kaigaku are battling each other (kai betrayed the corps and inadvertantly caused the only parental figure in zenitsu’s life to die, and zenitsu is rightfully pissed off about that)

the visual yin-yang symbolism is awesome too

zenitsu winning due to using the 7th form he created himself (which i have reason to believe was inspired by tanjirou) was the perfect ending to the fight, really couldnt ask for anything better and is a perfect example of how much of an effect tanjirou has had on zenitsu

the 7th form is what tanjirou’s waltz flash should have been lol

/

what keeps this fight from being absolutely perfect is lack of development prior to this conflict

(since the final battle arc is basically a culmination of all the hinted developments through the series, im going to actually factor in how much and how well these conflicts were foreshadowed)

anyways if we had actually seen zenitsu, kaigaku, and kuwajima actually interacting with each other and showing how they were essentially a family (not just through flashbacks), it would have made zenitsu placing the responsibility of killing kai onto himself a lot more tragic

but like, apart from brief flashbacks where zenitsu actually met kaigaku off screen and that one thing all the way back in natagumo where both kuwajima and kai were introduced, thats pretty much it in terms of thunder family development

so yeah its underdeveloped for sure

also one random thought, i personally think zenitsu should have gotten his demon mark in this fight, it would have been cool to see

VS AKAZA (INFINITY FORTRESS)

[Image Description: Manga panel of Akaza’s face. There are two text bubbles around him, saying “Okay, let’s get started. It’s time for the feast.” There is also floating text saying “The inspection of the strong has begun...” as well as a simple box on the lower left, denoting its the end of chapter 147. End Image Description.]

6/10

oh god please dont hate me for this

ill list the good things first how about that

this conflict was foreshadowed perfectly in mugen train, you bet the readers were expecting a tanjirou vs akaza battle after the death of kyojuro and gotouge delivered

akaza’s power is shown extremely well with how many close calls tanjirou and giyuu had while fighting him

akaza eventually giving up on his own volition was really nice and fit into the context of the battle very very well, like sure tanjirou and giyuu wouldnt understand why he gave up but us readers do know

akaza is a really good character and a good villain

/

now notice how im only mentioning akaza and not giyuu or tanjirou in the good aspects

bc those two are eh

no form mixing at all from either tanjirou and giyuu

i know i said form mixing was kind of tanjirou’s thing but you’d think giyuu would have gotten more creative with his moves once akaza said that he was getting predictable

(well he said he “ran out of water breathing forms” but same thing)

so its kinda bland lol

speaking of giyuu, his whole thing with his insecurities of being weak wasnt handled well (it was sort of immediately brushed off in pillar training, and its unclear what part of his character arc he was in)

like sure him announcing that he’s going to protect tanjirou is cool but it feels like he was haphazardly dropped into the tanjirou and akaza conflict

isnt he supposed to be both their foils? that wasnt really explored that well in this fight and theres no deep meaning behind him even being here just analyzing what he did in it

he could have been handled better or even given more focus is what im saying

the anatta state came out of nowhere, im sorry okay? just bc inosuke like barely hinted at not being able to sense grandma hisa bc she had no fighting spirit and tanjurou magically taught his son how to achieve this state doesnt mean it was properly integrated into the fight

if the anatta state was actually explored prior to this battle, i would have given it a pass but it just feels like a cheap and poorly developed trick to get around akaza’s technique development (which is overpowered as fuck might i add)

gotouge should have just given akaza a plausible weakness to his technique development instead, especially since they dont use or even mention the anatta state after this

the transparent world shit makes no sense but ill elaborate on that in the koku battle analysis

oh and this thing doesnt affect the score but why wasnt there a “yoriichi visage overlapping” moment when tanjirou was fighting akaza? hes an upper moon, he should have gotten those visions but he didnt

for some reason

anyways this battle was alright and has good set up but the middle and end parts didnt hold up as well bc random concepts were thrown at us without prior explanation or development

VS DOUMA

[Image Description: Manga panel of Douma licking Shinobu’s butterfly pin. There are two text bubbles around him saying “Anyway, tonight is a good night. Such fine feasts keep showing up one after another.” End Image Description.]

9/10

damn, such an amazing fight

the build up to this was properly foreshadowed

shinobu finally showing her true anger after hiding it for so long is amazing

douma is a super interesting character and fantastic villain

shinobu showing off her true power and determination against douma was sooooo nice

shinobu’s poisonous body plan is so clever and so interesting

if i was to rate the shinobu part of the fight alone, it would have gotten a 10/10 no question

the reason why its knocked down a point is because of the kanao and inosuke part

dont get me wrong, the way kanao is able to hold her own against douma by herself is pretty cool, how shes meant to parallel douma with their similar struggles surrounding human emotions and demonstrate how she has grown as a person, how she regains the ability to cry

that shit is cool, inosuke also getting in touch with his emotions after learning what happened to his mom was super neat as well

however

bc this battle takes place in the final arc with everything else, there wasnt proper build up regarding many things, the kotoha reveal especially

so inosuke feels kinda forced into the kanao shinobu and douma conflict, similar to how giyuu felt forced into the tanjirou and akaza conflict

its quite unfortunate bc if the kotoha stuff was actually explored prior to the confrontation, this “forced” feeling would have disappeared

i know some people have suggested that the douma fight should have just been its own arc, and i very much agree, it would have certainly helped fix this problem regarding inosuke and kotoha

last random thought, i wish shinobu, kanao, and inosuke got their demon marks

VS KOKUSHIBOU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kokushibou looking directly at the viewer, holding the hilt of his blade as if he’s going to pull it out. There are text boxes around him saying “This... is Upper Moon One... He’s so different compared to the other Upper Moons. He looks so dignified and majestic.” The text boxes are narrated by Tokitou Muichirou. End Image Description.]

5/10

this fight is... mediocre

at least theres a more tangible connection between muichirou and kokushibou

even though that was handled kinda poorly

tbh there really was no point to revealing that mui is koku’s descendant like at all, it just had no significant bearing to the plot of the fight

sanemi’s backstory being here is... okay ig?

idk the whole shinazugawa conflict has fundamental problems that i just cant think of any other place to put it without changing the entirety of canon

the marechi blood concept coming back was nice though

genya is there

him getting his bda was cool and helped turn the tide of the battle in a satisfying way (before kicking the bucket but thats not the focus here)

gyomei is a hollow husk of a character who barely got anything at all

but his fighting style is extremely cool and conveys his immense power very well

oh and him and sanemi are amazing at working together, like better than giyuu and tanjirou, and better than kanao and inosuke

theyre that good yet pretty much nobody acknowledges it which is sad

koku himself is pretty interesting and pretty tragic, very nice villain

but everyone together?

gonna be honest but this is such a random collection of characters, there was basically no foreshadowing that these four were going to go up again kokushibou, they are not that connected very well

i know there was this one post that focused on the theme of family that was common in all 5 characters in the fight but its just not enough

it would have been more cohesive if gotouge emphasized gyomei, mui, sanemi, and genya being like different aspects of yoriichi coming together to kill kokushibou hundreds of years after yoriichi failed to kill him

lmao its not like the 4 of them defeated koku with the power of family or friendship, they just smacked him over and over with a flail, shot him with magical bullets, and stabbed a crimson sword into his abdomen

wouldnt have been too hard to switch over to koku’s pov and go “damn these bitches are like my stupid brother”

...

speaking of crimson swords

i fucking hate the crimson sword concept oh my god can i complain about it now? im gonna complain about it now

unlike demon marks, the crimson blades werent even given any proper conditions, you just hold the stupid thing hard enough and it somehow imbues it with magical properties with no logic behind those properties

what part of crimson swords completely destroys a demon’s body in an instant? even muzan didnt go through that process when he was almost killed by yoriichi so where in the goddamn fuck did it come from

it could be explained bc the sword was left in the same spot for a long time but this tactic doesnt even appear again in a meaningful way (didnt kill muzan when tanjirou and giyuu held the sword together) so what the fuck was the point of having this even exist

its so underdeveloped and confusing and i hate it

the transparent world stuff is also confusing as shit and its pretty much never explained how they work aside from the vague “close your mind” advice, like why did it exist, it did nothing to help the present day demon slayers

its just so... poorly integrated

yeah anyways this is around the same rating as the akaza fight but a little worse bc there wasnt that strong set up beforehand

VS KOKUSHIBOU (SENGOKU ERA)

[Image Description: Manga panel of a bag getting ripped open, pieces of a wooden flute tumbling out. End Image Description.]

10/10

easily 10/10

this fight shows the tragedy of kokushibou giving in to his envy and hatred, when yoriichi cries over seeing his own family commit terrible attrocities against the people he wanted to protect

and yoriichi dies, now carrying the fact that he couldnt even save his own brother from the influence of muzan on his conscious forever

what a sad ending for yoriichi

and after koku angrily slashes apart yoriichi’s corpse, having him find and keep the flute he gave to him when they were kids to the present day gives him a small shred of humanity in the midst of his monstrous anger

VS NAKIME

[Image Description: Manga panels of Nakime. The first one shows a low quality version of her playing her biwa. The second one is a close up of her eye. There are spiky text bubbles saying “It’s Upper Rank... 4!” End Image Description.]

0/10

no nakime backstory

not even a goddamn fight

forgettable

useless

VS MUZAN

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kibutsuji Muzan in his white-haired, mouth-covered form. There are text bubbles around him saying “Not a single one was of use to me. I will crush the demon hunters tonight. I’ll massacre them all right now.” End Image Description.]

1/10

._.

i have many complaints but ill try my best to not make this another hantengu rant section lol

first off, obanai deserved better

im serious, this poor dude was forgotten until pretty much the end when we finally get a backstory out of him

and then he died

what a waste of a potentially amazing character

mitsuri getting taken out early was ehhh

pretty sure someone else made a post about her supposedly being extremely strong but she was nerfed in this battle which i agree with

literally none of the pillars work together very well, like remember how i praised sanemi and gyomei for being super coordinated? lmao that doesnt exist anymore

you could say this is caused by desperation though and you wouldnt be wrong, its just boring to sit through

that causes issues bc this now basically requires the crimson sword and transparent world concepts to be there to spice things up

but in this fight, they do nothing in the long run (except for tanjirou using the crimson sword at the very very end)

youve already heard me talk about why those two things are super shittily integrated and i cant be bothered repeating myself so moving on

kanao, inosuke, and zenitsu

they... exist? they didnt do much tbh, which i guess is the point but like, now its boring again

nezuko could have been used as a potential way to raise the stakes and make things interesting again (like “ah shit, muzan might actually be unkillable if he gets nezuko but its okay bc shes not here- oh fuck shes here this is not good”)

but nothing came of her running off except confirmation that she became human again so whatever

uzui and shinjuro are useless, why werent they at the fight?

like they could have followed nezuko and contributed to the battle even a little but they just didnt and now theres literally no point to them appearing in this arc at all

wasted potential

tanjirou

i wish him going absolutely apeshit had actual substance behind it, like it being a part of his character arc or something

i remember having this one theory that he had a corruption arc (due to dropping his kindness thing towards demons) and i wanted this to be true so badly

but it doesnt exist

not with how the series ended

god

the only thing that saves this fight from being complete trash is tamayo’s poison thing being amazingly executed

and the part where everyone got blasted away, losing limbs and shit, that made things a little more interesting again

but thats it

VS MUZAN (SENGOKU ERA)

[Image Description: Manga panels of Kibutsuji Muzan, Tamayo, and Tsugikuni Yoriichi. The first one has Muzan and Tamayo, while the second one has Yoriichi pulling out his sword. There are text boxes saying “And the moment I met him, I understood that I was born into this world to defeat this man.” End Image Description.]

9/10

finally something good again

while short, that’s just the nature of all of yoriichi’s battles with demons

anyways pretty nice, theres a clear reason why this battle exists (shows the scenario that made the original breather get super close to defeating muzan in detail)

adding tamayo here was a nice touch

my only complaint is that it seemed extremely coincidental that yoriichi somehow developed a breathing style specifically countering muzan’s multiple organs without even knowing prior that he had all those brains and hearts floating around freely in his body

like thats kind of ridiculous, even for yoriichi whos supposed to be “blessed by the gods”

could just be me though

VS TANJIROU

[Image Description: Manga panels of Kamado Tanjirou in his demon form. The first image has his eyes closed. The second image has his eyes opened and the tumor on his face almost completely faded. There are text boxes around him saying “You will destroy the demon hunters in my stead.” End Image Description.]

1/10

hoo boy

ok first off, demon tanjirou lasted for 2 chapters

thats it

2 chapters

so thats already a problem

i am aware its meant to parallel the beginning of the series but also its ridiculous how completely vague and rushed this entire thing was

nezuko doesnt do shit through not just this battle but this entire arc which i already explained so not gonna go into it further

kanao magically having a demon cure on her made very little sense

the scene where tanjirou leaves muzan in purgatory is pretty but if you look at it in the context of everything else, its ambiguous and confusing

(if someone could explain it and see how it connects to the original theme of “demons just being victims of circumstance,” i would love to hear it)

/

actually you know what makes me so mad about this “fight” as a whole? there was so much potential to do more with this concept

and im not talking about him escaping and nezuko becoming a demon slayer roleswap au (even though its a pretty cool concept)

him becoming a demon could have been a metaphor for his lost kindness and sympathy towards demons halfway through the series

it could have been a punishment for letting his anger towards muzan cloud his judgement

it could have symbolized literally anything about him losing his humanity as he got stronger

but those three things are just scenarios from my head, they dont exist in this series just based off of what weve seen from these two chapters

its disappointing

the only thing keeping this from getting a 0 is the one part where inosuke couldnt chop off tanjirou’s head bc he cared about him too much

that at least shows inosuke had grown as a character

everything else is just meaningless and convoluted garbage and “convoluted” is not what you should be aiming for if this is supposed to be the ending of your series

IN SUMMARY

early kny is very good, later kny is questionable and the ending is just a mess of wasted potential and disappointment

i get why gotouge had to have the transparent world ability, crimson blade ability, and the demon marks appear before they all appeared on yoriichi but theyre all just so underdeveloped and terribly handled in the battles they are used, it makes me want to kick a wall

like lmao, i could literally think of so many ways they could have been properly integrated, hell, im even writing a whole goddamn rewrite using my ideas for these three things (link to that is in my pinned)

just, god

if you want to debate over these ratings, my ask box is open ig? idk

[tomcriuse]

hi payton!! i love your "congratulations" gifset so much, especially the font choices and how well they work together! could you please give some tips on choosing appropriate fonts, their colours and some favourite ones of yours? hope this is not a bother!

asfjdhfasd this is absoulutely no bother!!!!! and also STOP thank u i love u <3 im gonna put this under the cut bc idk how long this is gonna be

i think that chosing appropriate fonts really depends on what you're going for! congratulations, for example, is a very upbeat song with lyrics that arent like particularly sad (and thus the set isnt going to be very sad), if that makes any sense--you can get away with a lot more when it comes to the fonts. like, if i had done it's quiet uptown, i probably wouldn't have used some of the fonts and typography styles that i did, just because it wouldnt fit the mood of the set! typically, for sad sets, i stick to a cursive or handwritten font. however, in this case, because of the nature of the song, i just kinda messed around!! 

so like for this gif i was thinking about what words have the most impact/are emphasised when she sings it. to me, the biggest part of this is the "school-yard taunts" bc it like really roasts him and calls him a child basically, so i knew that i wanted those to stand out the most. for the less important/smaller text i usually use a font like arial (i'll put a list of my favourite fonts at the end of this!) or times new roman or something just pretty lowkey. the "school-yard" font is actually also times new roman, but i really liked the way that it looked when it was bigger (also, for cohesion, i felt like i shouldnt do more cursive on this one since the gif above it had cursive in it). 

the word "taunts" was a little more difficult for me to find a font for because i thought it might look a little odd if i was using the same cursive font for this word--like it would just look a little out of place since "school-yard" is pretty thick. so basically what i did is i just went through all the cursive fonts that i had and one by one saw how it looked. im sure there are easier ways, but i find that im always the most satisfied with my sets when i take time to really think about the choice im gonna make, and not just rush through it!! 

lets take the first gif for example as well! i REALLY really love the main font on this, so i knew that i wanted to use it for the main emphasis word/phrase! after that it was trying to find a good font to compliment it! i thought a sans-serif font looked a little messy i guess? or kinda hard to read? im not sure how to explain it, but it looked wrong to me. so i just picked the basic times new roman! 

 i think that a big thing about picking suitable fonts is that they really have to compliment each other and not detract from one another!! this is why i think it's easy to pick a couple words or a phrase and make that your "center" of the typography!! 

as for colours, i usually pick the colours AFTER i colour the gif!! the first gif i made in this set was actually the second one (a damage you can never undo kind of stupid), so i was trying to find a colour that complimented it that i could also replicate in the other gifs, hence the yellow colour! the same thing can be seen in this set that i did (even though i used gradients instead of solid colour)! i decided that since the scenes i was using had orange/yellow and blue as their primary colours, i would base the colouring off of the scene (and if i couldnt, then i would change the colours fdhahdf).

here are some of my favourite fonts!! and if you click on the names it takes you to the download :) 

cursive fonts 

darkfather: this is the main cursive font i used in this set 

kunstler script: i dont really use this font much, but i think im gonna start because its just clean 

rage (italic): this is a little messier than the above font so it just has more chaotic vibes idk 

 sans-serif 

franklin gothic (bold): this is the main sans-serif font that i used in this set!!! 

arial: very basic but very Clean 

eras light itc: this is actually one of my favourite fonts (i used it as the main font in the "you took a rumour" and refuted it by sharing an affair"!!) 

serif (i dont really use serif fonts much because it doesnt look as clean to me BUT)

times new roman: a classic and the only one on this list 

i really hope this helped!! please dont hesitate to reach out again if you wanna know anything else or just want more info!!!!!!!!! i love u

[irmacornelia]

30 Days of WITCHversary - 14-18

This week was hectic so Im dumping the last few days all at once.

Ahhh the shit-talking ones, I adore WITCH, but boy do I have some salt.

14- Something that irked you

I have to say the biggest thing is the fact that there simply wasn’t enough dragons, especially past the 2nd arc. Their power origin is dragons(until the late-series retcon nonsense), the motif is ‘you are something more than human now’, and then???? nothing? They forsook the ‘you are not fairies, you are not witches, you are something more ancient, strange, and lovely’ stuff and went sparkle fairy. Oof ouch the retcons.

Dragons all over the four dragons issue, dragons on the restaurant, Nerissa’s panel here? dragon.

This isnt something that the comic is guilty of only either, the show is guilty of it too, and they had no excuse, the comic was already out pretty far, and they wanted a show that appealed to boys, so why didn’t they go all in???

There were dragons on Taranee’s laptop when they talked about quintessence, there were dragons in the origins episode, there was dragons in the Phobos fight, in the one where Nerissa tries to take Earths Heart the first time, and there was the mention in the last episode, but did we see anymore dragons? Especially as their Zenith forms which I’ve complained about before was the PERFECT opportunity to tie in the motif? No.

There should have been way more dragon flavor.

Some dragon-shaped auras, the zenith deus ex transformation should have been dragons, Id have even taken totally western dragons, just,,, pls. More dragons emblazoned on coats and people referring to them as dragons. Maybe have part of Phobo’s goal be becoming a dragon. IDK just toss more in there!

And why did they strip the dragons out in the later arcs? My answer is Marketing. Things needed to be pink and sparkly or they are seen as encroaching on different demographis, and not sellable, as CEOs love the minmaxing. Dragons aren’t considered cute, for some reason, and so they had to go. That cash cow was primed to be power-milked until it died. And well. It did.

Im not saying that the shift in priorities from juicy dragon-flavored undertone creeping horror of being uninformed newly minted child soldiers against their will to sparkily faerie idols who do magic sometimes and smooch a lot of boys totally killed it but... Well... 

You know.

You can tell im salty about this, and have been salty about this for over a decade, can’t you.

15- Something that needs a quick fix

In the beginning issues, some of the wording implies the only worlds are Meridian, which is just basically hell, Kandrakar, which is basically heaven, and Earth, and no other worlds. Which is all well and dandy, except.... 2 arcs later that stops being the case.

Change that, because it goes off the rails from that view so fast its not even funny. The simplistic, ‘Meridian evil lizards, Kandrakar good glowing green immortal gods or whatever’ can stay, I guess, because its part of the deconstruction of the ‘evil’ world and ‘good’ world, with Earth as the purgatory thing that media does but just. Right from the start say ‘multiverse’ ‘many worlds’ ‘many dimensions’ one or any of those. It would be just the tiniest, but most wonderful continuity fix.

Just a couple word changes, no panels need to be changed at all.

Something that needs an overhaul

The retcons and plotholes in general. Ive spat quite a bit of salt about the retcons and plotholes already but. WITCH has an undeniable plothole and retcon problem. I love WITCH more than anything, but oh man. It has that one glaring, unfixable flaw.

There are regular adaption plotholes in the cartoon (Biggest one- Why did Yan Lin not give them lessons on how to fight, negotiate, what powers they have and can grow to have, the species that live on Earth and Meridian, a primer into the history of Kandrakar and the other worlds when she was ALIVE to give them?? They didn’t have them and didn’t know anything in the comic, because she DIED and Kandrakar wasn’t gonna go shit for WITCH! They were ALONE!) but oh no, im talking about the comic more than anything.

Everything contradicts itself just. So Much.

It would be fine if it were an american-style comic where each run is its own canon, but its trying to be serial and im dying squirtle.

Decide whether their wings are stylized feathers or butterfly wings or what (in ONE chapter book they changed the canon 3 times!!). 

Decide whether dragons are their powers or not, how their powers even work, what time of year and how old they are judging from the canonical minimum of days that have passed, how serious their job of defending the universe is. Pick a set of truths and stick with them!!!! Twists are ok and you can change the focus and tone over time but you cant just. Kick out established truths and replace them with shit that makes previous nonsense invalid. The overhaul needs to chose their truths BEFORE they start and then stick with it the whole way through!

And their truths they say and then never talk about why they came about need to be de-plotholed. Kandrakar has a noninterference policy? Why? What the fuck does that mean and how come they can send the guardians then? Kandrakar commands the dragons, yeah? Ok, why do they leave them alone all first arc. Matt was part of Kandrakar? Yeah, why didnt he train them into the dirt and not tell them anything whatsoever? Why did he base his relationship with Will on a den of lies that totally shit on his character before that arc????

What it needs to get this overhaul is just a total reboot that takes all these truths and plots, and makes them one cohesive thing.

Only problem. I dont want this fandom getting The V0ltr0n Treatment. I couldnt bear it, to have it get really popular and be filled with people who think its ok to threaten VAs and suicide bait and viciously bully people for daring to have redemption arcs in their fics. I don’t want this place to become a place of fear, I dont want to have the cozy atmosphere be transformed into a hectic high-traffic disk horse zone, even if it gets us an official Perfect WITCH Cartoon.

So no matter how much I want WITCH to have this flawless unfucking of the plotholes... I think I’ll be content with it the way it is.

17 - Something that needs to be revisited 

CHYKN

P… ple ase,,, give me flashback arc.

Previous guardians can give us padding arcs until the writers figure out how to plot the main stuff, previous guardians can give us worldbuilding, previous guardians can give us backstory for characters we have met, and can give us villains that feel connected to the current plot.

How neat would it be if we had an issue following Kadma and halinor setting up their magic Illuminati? 

How neat would it be if we had Luba and Yan Lin working together while Yan Lin was still active?

How neat would it be if we got a more in-depth Nerissa origins story, complete with what she plans to do after she stamps all over Kandrakar for the inhumane 40+ years of solitary confinement?

How wonderful, storywise, it would be to have villains and allies who knew past guardians, howevermany cycles back, to see and hear of guardians before, and how they failed, but this time, WITCH wont?

Day 18 - Something that needs more love from the fandom

Hi Yes Have You Heard The Good News Of The Four Dragons And Xin Jing?

Dragons,,,,, good. Please let us make more dragon content.

I am a biased dragon who wants more dragon things, yes. I am aware.

But oh, I cant be one of like 3 people writing dragon AUs. I mean, considering the fandom size, thats like a whole 3% but You Know.

‘What fan content do you want to see more of?’ Dragons. Always dragons no matter the fandom or appropriateness of giant flying lizards.

Everything is improved with dragons.

[niennavalier]

Okay, belated Star Wars thoughts under the cut; no particular order, just as I think of them. Possibly some unpopular opinions, I dont really know, I'm not all that active in the SW fandom. So maybe I'll get roasted alive but...eh, whatever, this site is somewhere between an void and hell anyway.

Also SPOILERS BELOW (OBVIOUSLY)

[[MORE]]

Okay, so first things first: I enjoyed episode 9. A lot. It was really fun to watch, and just talking in terms of my experience in the theater, it was fantastic. It was so much fun to see the old crew back, all of those appearances were basically like happiness shots in the arm. It was really very cool. The Palpatine reveal and everything around it was pretty damn epic for the obvious reasons. And I absolutely loved seeing the trio bantering and arguing and passing each other - I always love stuff like that. I swear, just give me hours of good character interaction and I'll be happy. Kylo and Rey fighting together/him using the blue lightsaber was also some cool shit and basically like "yaasss heres the payoff for the entire trilogy let's fucking gooo"

Oh, and I need to mention that little droid that Rey fixes. That little guy was adorable and I want merch for him and I will not hear otherwise. (The droids are always great in all the movies fight me)

Also Zorii and Jannah. Badasses, loved watching them and the way they got to interact with the main cast. Just...wanna spill all the love for them in this sentence.

But there are a lot of other things I have to say about the movie - especially the more I think about it and the trilogy as a whole. Dont get me wrong; I still really loved watching the movie. There are just...certain things that feel like missteps or missed opportunities?

(Not counting how badly Oscar Isaac wanted Finn and Poe to be boyfriends, which I just discovered is a thing. And reminds me a lot of anytime anyone mentions Julian Bashir to Andy Robinson and his response is always "oh Garak wanted to have sex with him from the start". Which I literally love so much, this man is a treasure, and I'm glad that apparently the same thing is happening here. And it's not that I'm not gonna talk about it here cause I dont think Poe and Finn should've been boyfriends, but I'm pretty sure Oscar Isaac has much more to say about it than I do)

Gonna start where I always start when I have problems with writing: romance. Because IMO badly written/unnecessary romance can ruin any good story real quick. I'm talking about the kiss at the end. I'm not saying this to bash on the Rey and Kylo shippers. Generally, I dont care what you ship so long as you dont start harassing everyone else; I care even less when it comes to this fandom cause I just participate in it so little. So this isnt me bashing on the ship itself or the fans, but I just think that, in the context of the movie itself, the romance was really poorly handled. To the point that I saw the scene going that way and all I could think was "oh god please dont kiss, I'm begging you". And well...we all know where that went. But I just never got a romantic vibe from the two of them in terms of what was shown on screen. The chemistry always felt familial, at least to me, across episodes 8 and 9 in particular. I dont know if that's just the chemistry between the actors or what, but the tension between them never struck me as romantic - more like two people desperate for someone who understands the chaos around them, not lovers.

Again, granted, maybe that's just the way I read stuff, especially considering I really appreciate movies that don't feature romance arcs. I'm not sure how it read to other people, and I'm not gonna bash on the shippers who like it. I may feel like JJ Abrams didnt write a convincing romance - or just stuck the kiss in there at the end to fulfill some plan from episode 7 that didnt actually pan out - but I have no problem with the ship itself, or the people who ship it. (Because at the end of the day, this is all fiction, and I couldnt care less how anyone chooses to interact with it)

(And this isnt an entirely rated point but because I've seen it around:

In all honesty, I'm starting to think that the romance thing was just a symptom of a bigger problem with this trilogy: it doesnt feel cohesive. It's like JJ Abrams and Rian Johnson had two separate sets of notes and just refused to actually look between them. Two separate sets of ideas that they were too stubborn to compromise on.

And I have a feeling (at least, talking to my little brother, who definitely feels this way) that a lot of people are pinning this fragmented feel to the trilogy on Rian Johnson and The Last Jedi, but I honestly don't think that's fair. Because, and here's the unpopular opinion: I really don't think Last Jedi is that bad. At least, not bad enough to deserve all the flak it gets.

Won't get into that entirely here because that could be a whole separate post, but that's my opinion. Sure, it's not perfect, there are definitely a lot of parts that are pretty irrelevant and not really necessary, but that's true of everything. Frankly, its biggest problem was that it was written for the wrong audience. Which is a major problem, yes, but taken for what it is, it's perfectly decent. As I said before, I could write a whole thing on this movie and why it's not that bad (because I have my brother's points as to why it's terrible for me to argue against) but overall, my reading of 8 is that it's a movie meant to introduce wider ideas and concepts to the universe - particularly this very gray and murky area of morality and character - through stories that are closer to the characters and tied to harsher realities of war. Things aren't always black and white, people are complex, sometimes our heroes can be gravely wrong in ways that aren't glamorous.

Frankly, it feels somewhere between a super deep indie movie and Star Trek (particularly DS9, at least to me, because I love when that show gets to twisty moral stuff). So yeah, wrong audience, yet he decided to stick with his storytelling despite that. No matter I personally might fall into the audience that movie resonates with, it wasnt gonna resonate with most of the fandon.

Again, Last Jedi is far from perfect in other ways too, but it sets up some great ideas that I was really hoping to get some closure on. Honorable mention here is when Rose saves Finn when he's speeding out to sacrifice himself and because of the desire to save the people they love, which I always end up likening to the "we dont trade lives" sentiment. Mentioning this cause my brother always complains about it, but I was thinking this would be one of those virtues that separate the good guys from the bad guys and ultimately allow good to triumph. Yknow, sorta like how Voldemort's lack of understanding of love contributed to his downfall, to liken it to HP. I was under the assumption that would be the concept at some turning point in the climax, but...guess not.

Big one though, which was actually a pretty big disappointment IMO, was the whole neutrality argument, the existence of a grey area. The most interesting thing from Rey and Kylo's scenes in 8 was the notion that the Jedi and Sith could be left to die, and the two of them would essentially find a way separate from those two sides, walking a path down the middle. I know I'm not the first person to bring this up, especially because of how the Force just...works. That the scales need to be balanced. And so, given that, to have the Jedi always destroy the Sith - that's not balance. Give it a few more years and the same problem is gonna happen; if there are Jedi, there will be Sith and war is gonna break out. That's hardly resolution, so neutrality is the way to go. And, personal opinion - I loved that this ended up in 8. It's just a lot more nuanced than "good vs evil, good is victorious" and brought in new ideas to this universe that I really wanted to see explored.

But that just...never happened. Sure, Rey has that yellow lightsaber at the end, but it's really very little more than the barest hint of lip service to that entire concept. Because it's never built on throughout the movie. Kylo's insistence that they look for a different way turns into a demand that she basically become his Sith queen. Which isnt playing with the gray area - it's more firmly dividing light and dark. And as she's fighting Palpatine, he's all the Sith, while she's all the Jedi; doubt that needs further explanation. Sure yeah, she's dealing with the revelation of her bloodline throughout the movie, but that interaction with the dark side is very different than in 8; she's afraid of it (a character arc I love, dont get me wrong), not lured by it. The Sith are very clearly evil, and despite her family, she comes to embody the Jedi as a whole. The opposite of what was laid out in 8.

Which actually just makes her choice to take the yellow lightsaber make even less sense? Because...she has no reason at all to turn away from the Jedi and every reason to keep using the Light side. The only possible reason by that point is if she knows about the balance and makes that choice intentionally to prevent the rise of a Sith lord. But that choice is never shown, so I dont give that a pass. It just feels like the lamest nod to something from 8 - no buildup, no explanation, just there because it technically should be.

And that fucking sucks. What a waste. Puts so much space between these movies.

The romance might be another aspect of that - 8 didnt really give me a strong romantic vibe, and then 9 tried to benefit off of buildup of romantic tension that just wasnt there. And that romance isnt the only other one. Just the existence of Palpatine at all? Like, awesome plot yes, but not at all foreshadowed. The banter between the trio at the start? One of my favorite parts to watch, but it comes out of nowhere, and I guess we just have to live with the idea that all of the development happened off screen. Lame. The return of the fucking helmet? Fuck, i actually have more i can say about the way i interpreted the helmet, but this is getting long. So point being: it's like we just got zipped right back to episode 7 all of a sudden and didnt even get a symbolic moment of him losing the helmet in 9 (at least, not that I remember).

Really, on the whole, JJ Abrams basically did the beginning of 9 such that most of 8 could be made irrelevant. Because that's how I felt throughout the whole movie; like 8 didnt matter. And I know a lot of fans are honestly happy with that (so maybe if was actually the right choice on that front) but god does it make the whole trilogy clunky. Literally nothing flows.

And I think that's my main problem with the trilogy as a whole - or, rather, with the production behind it. It's like JJ Abrams and Rian Johnson were just so goddamned married to their ideas that they wouldnt budge from the story they wanted to tell. Like they put their individual creative visions above the quality of the story as a whole. Like they weren't willing to deal with any changes that they didn't put into play themselves. And the trilogy suffered for it.

Which is really so obnoxious to me. Because it is very possible to be flexible and improv and incorporate other ideas into what you already had; just look at D&D. That's the job of a DM. You can plan everything out perfectly, figure out the story you want to tell, decide how you want everyone to interact with your world, but the players will invariably fuck those plans over. And you just have to roll with the punches. But beyond that, those changes can be for the better, because those are ideas you never thought of, and incorporating those makes for an even richer story than anyone expected. All because the people involved are willing to see where the story naturally takes itself.

Just wish these directors could understand that.

(Also...what was Finn gonna tell Rey? I mean...? This is honestly the strangest thing about the movie because it literally felt like the writers just...forgot they ever had this plot point after halfway. Which just feels like sloppy writing, and I feel Poe when he seems to be really curious what Finn wants to tell Rey. Because...me too!)

[thedeadflag]

Hey, pretty soon I'll be playing a friend of mine is gonna be DMing Tyranny Of Dragons for me and a couple of friends, and I can't decide whether I should play a Monk (probably Open Hand, maybe Kensei) or a Ranger (either Beastmaster or Horizon Walker), 'cause I've never played either of those classes, nor has anyone at the tables I've played. Can you tell me a little about your experiences with these classes?

The Ranger has been one of my favourite classes throughout the editions of D&D in terms of flavour, and I’ve had some fun with monks as well. In 5th edition, both took a fair bit of a hit in utility (individual and within group dynamics) and power at pretty much all ranges. The Ranger was propped back up a little bit in Unearthed Arcana in the revised ranger archetype, but both are still largely considered at best middle of the road classes, and at worst, the lowest tier of classes in the game in utility and character. 

That’s not to say they can’t be fun and have a lot of flavour, and still find use. If you’ve watched Critical Role, you can see Vex and Beau weren’t useless by any stretch. No class is junk in 5e due to the improved parity compared to some past editions. So power and utility aside, if you feel drawn to any class/subclass, and you want to dive into its particular brand of flavour, then I say go for it. I would gauge the rest of the party’s makeup in making your decision, because group synergy is important, but you have to make yourself happy, too, right?

Anywho, I’ll break down my take on both.

When it comes to Monks, I like Open Hand the best. If you want to have a Monk-style gameplay with weapons, then Mystic or Fighter are probably better options with some more flair and utility involved than Kensei imo, but if that’s the route you want to take, it’d be alright. However, Open Hand has quivering palm, which is pretty incredible late game as far as damage and flexible timing from a single person through 3 ki pts and an action. If you do ever reach level 17, I would recommend multiclassing after that if you’re allowed, since the rest of the Monk’s class progression is kind of junk in comparison, and it could use some much needed utility from 3 levels of another class. Anywho, I like open hand not just for the flavor of being a class that’s capable of being an unarmed beast in battle, but also because of the way it can work in alignment with fighters who can also control the battlefield, like any fighter with a sentinel/polearm master. The ability to shove an enemy up to 15ft with one of your flurry attacks, launching them into the range of a fighter who gets a free opp attack against them and can from then on lock down their movement with a successful hit? That can be an excellent tag team. The Monk isn’t excellent for utility, but the Open Hand technique is probably the best at providing utility in combat among all the monk disciplines. Like, another option after hitting with flurry of blows is to steal all reactions for the opponent until the end of your next turn. This can be especially helpful against casters, as stealing reactions = preventing counterspells. And Monks can get a lot of attacks = lots of attempts to disrupt concentration of enemy casters, so the open hand monk is especially helpful at being a designated mage wrecker with having the mobility to reach casters and the ability to destabilize them. It’s arguably the one thing (aside from unarmed damage) that (this one kind of) monks do better than just about anyone else, arguably.

Now, to Rangers.

Honestly, I don’t like beast-focused Rangers. I think they’re a lot of work in order to get the mechanical payoff most other classes can achieve without a lot of thought or effort. Generally, any class that can let me focus more on flavour and RP is one I’m going to prefer, and beast master’s just…unwieldy. A lot of people say the class is junk, and if you run it without getting into the headspace for optimizing, it’s probably going to be more of a frustrating experience than you’d have hoped for. With BMs, you’re managing not just your character, but your companion, and you have to keep up with the different mechanics of both, you need to be 100% on top of choices made while leveling up, you need to have a strong understanding of battlefield control and your companion’s capabilities from the get go, and you really ought to be the kind of player who is happy to take a backseat to everyone else in and out of combat because the way you’ll shine is by helping everyone else do what they do with a little bit higher odds of success than otherwise. Personally, I like playing that sort of character, but I can do all of that with other classes a lot easier, and usually better, so this isn’t the kind of archetype I’d choose for a character myself. If you really want to, and think it’s cool, go for it, though.

The first thing I’d do is ask if you can use the UA revised ranger instead of the PHB ranger if you’re going the beast route (it’s “beast conclave” archetype in UA). If your DM allows that and insists you choose your companion from the list provided here, take the wolf (pack tactics is v helpful, same with 40ft speed and being able to send enemies prone after attacking) or ape (climb 30ft, melee/ranged ability, good stat baselines). 

The second thing you’ll need is to lock down a quality companion, and that can take a bit of wheeling and dealing with your DM to let you use one of the supplementary books as a source, which is especially necessary if you’re not able to use the revised ranger class from UA. You do not want a hawk, mastiff, or panther, the PHB offers some shit examples out of the gate (panther and hawk are only conditionally good if you’re only ever going to have your companion rushing around the map using the ‘help’ action, or scouting to some extent, and the latter becomes less useful and reliable the higher level you become). Don’t choose a CR 0 companion, or one under ¼. If you absolutely must use a hawk for character flavor, then a blood hawk that at least has pack tactics would be a must. But if you are hoping for a companion that can do damage, look for something with certain damage if it hits, like added poison damage. Look for good AC if you want a tank. Look for versatility in mobility and senses. Look for special abilities (the boar having a relentless ability where it’ll go back to 1HP if it falls below 0; the wolf spider has web walk and web sense which can really help with casters using web if players don’t want to wade into the difficult terrain or are having difficulty finding enemies caught in the web; etc.)

But yeah, beast-focused rangers  will be best when they’re spamming the help action with their beasts, using their beasts to get enemies out of cover, using their beasts to help control the field and give others advantage/take advantage, etc. You need to be quick mentally to know what you want to do with your character and your companion each time your turn comes around (most DMs, myself included, aren’t going to let you have as much time as you need to figure out what you want to do on both fronts, so if you can’t juggle two characters at once without losing a step, it might not be the archetype for you). This type of ranger requires you to know exactly what you want to be able to accomplish for yourself and your party right out of the gate, so you’ll want to gauge what your party members will be specializing in, what they want to be able to do, and see if there’s a way to shape your ranger to aid in that, particularly in choosing a beast that can be the most effective in ensuring that. Group cohesion is the name of the game with this form of ranger, so you’ll want to consider race selection a part of this process, too. I’ve had one player bomb hard as a BM and re-roll a different ranger, and I’ve had a friend who ran one who was the group’s unsung hero a lot of the time during their campaign. If you’re looking at Vex from CR as inspiration, keep in mind she had an excellent set of stats from lvl 9 onwards, and plenty of magical weapons to make up for much of any class shortcomings as characters scale up…look at how often Trinket was useful (very rarely) and understand that the bear was essentially just flavour for most of the campaign, and Vex would have been considerable underpowered compared to the rest of the party if not for some considerable DM intervention in ways that make things a lot trickier for DMs (adding magical weapons/items can easily unbalance a campaign, and it’s a matter of experience in knowing how to dole them out without throwing balance aside…Matt Mercer’s comfortable handing out flying carpets and multiple +2AC items  and superpowered magical weapons by level 9, I wouldn’t give them out before level 14 or 15 and it would really only be if a player was severely struggling and refused to re-roll a more appropriate character while dying or nearly dying most combats). Other classes and archetypes have features and abilities that scale as you level, some earn specific spells as they level up that others can’t get, etc., but with beast conclave rangers, it’s their beast that slightly improves in a few meaningful ways. So if you’re going that route, you need to commit to a great beasts that’s a great fit for you and your party, and you need to commit to making the absolute most out of them and knowing how to make the most out of them.

Horizon Walker’s a simpler archetype that has some badass spells, but the flavour for the class can be a bit…strange in some adventures. It might not fit well with Tyranny of Dragons, I’m not sure how much planar travel’s involved in that adventure. Which might not be a problem for the DM, or you. I still prefer the UA ranger conclaves, but out of the PHB ones, this one’s probably the best of the bunch, even if it’s mostly going to lean towards being a melee build (which, again, check your party comp to see if that’s something that is workable). 

Anywho, those are my late night D&D ramblings. You can take my words with a grain of salt if you’d like, and as always the rule of cool applies…if you think it’s cool and you really want to go with something, go for it and I hope the DM will find a way to help you make it work, but yeah, these classes can be a bit of an uphill battle, though I suppose potentially a rewarding challenge if that’s what you’re looking for.

Best of luck with the campaign, I’m sure you’ll have fun! 

[theeyeofinfinity]

Nostalgia?

Man oh man, time sure seems to fly. It seems to move even faster when i see people i went to high school with already having children & getting married. It’s probably the one thing i have any desire to achieve. Not in a “when is this going to happen already i want this now” kind of way but more so a “it’s the last thing really to check off before i realize everything ive set out to achieve in my life” kinda way. This post doesn’t really have any set purpose, no rhyme or reason, only to immortalize one out of the plethora of thoughts that happen meander through my expansive & decaying mind. That thought being you. Yes you. The same you that it was the last time & time before. While i don’t think about you as much as i did before, you happen to cross my mind in the weirdest ways. Most common being by smell. I don’t know how many times ive been walking by some place & catch that all too familiar smell. The same smell i used to not be able to get enough of when I’d be next to you or hug you. Today as i walked in & out of a freshly renovated gym, it has a new car smell for some reason. The same new car smell in your car & whenever i catch a whiff of anything i used to smell around you i almost freeze like a deer in headlights & my heart rate spikes. How is it that after all this time you still make me do that? We don’t even talk anymore because we borderline hate each other & yet my mind & soul had bonded so tightly to you that i find ways to miss it. I think its rather ironic they say ghosts don’t exist, given how ive been haunted by you from the beggining. While we both live much happier lives now, part of me is always going to wish you were in it. I guess you never really left, i check my activity every so often & saw youve recently followed this blog & my main one, i figured youd still spy on me from time to time just to see what i was up to. Not to sound concieted or anything, but we’ve been inseperable since we met & even when we do take these long pauses i know the day will come when we start talking again. & then stop. & then start. Such is the nature of what we’ve devolved into. But who knows, maybe the last time we talked really was it. Youve always had a way of surprising me just when i thought i had you nailed down & its one of the things i used to adore about you. Good ol you. You get me feeling some type of way, no one has ever tied me in so many knots. Guess we’ll never find out how things would be with our spark still going. This blog makes it seem like I’m stuck on this but if you pay attention to the update dates i havent actually written something in almost a year. That, & this blog was primarily made for you. So you always being the subject shouldnt really be that big a shock. Because ive had plenty of memorable experiences i could write about, the couple times ive nearly took the highway to hell on my bike, being jumped & pulled over by like 7 cop cars, things like that, but you’re the memory i feel for the most. I guess my heart decided on you & isnt too pressed to let it all go. So i guess it’s just more of the same, my thoughts arent too cohesive in this post because I’m kinda bouncing ariund while i write it but you get the jist. I’m happy for you tho, i see your posts about how happy you are with where you’re at & who you’re with & you just seem over the moon every second you’re awake. I hope it stays that way for you. I guess thats pretty much all i got for now, i don’t know if i’ll even update this thing again honestly. I think it’s finally time this became... just a memory. A lot can happen in a short amount of time tho, so if we ever end up in the same path again, you know ive never taken you off the shelf in my heart. I keep that trophy polished & dust free & shining like i just got it yesterday.

[sometipsygnostalgic]

peoples responses to “adventure time vs. steven universe”

so when i wake up tomorrow morning im going to do a megathread about this, but im going to start responding to people now:

@hellafa hmmmm im not really sure that i agree here, because SU was written with cohesive characterisation in mind whereas AT will contradict itself entirely based around who happens to be storyboarding that week... the magical thing about SU is i can never tell who is boarding an episode cos its all in rebecca sugars vision, and she wants to stick to it, only giving leverage when it comes to humorous eps. AT will have an ep w peebs fucking up the fire kingdom and the very next week shell be having fun on a cat w starry eyes, not out of natural character but because the writer of the second ep is a bit weird. imo the most ooc moment she EVER had was tryin 2 convince lemonhope to fight lemongrab because of “”pacts and treaties””; these have certainly never been a thing shes respected and it seems absurd that shed put a candy person, especially lemonhope, at risk over that. if it was tru to her season 5 character shed have Sorted It Out herself w force.i do love the lemonhope eps tho. but what a destructive way to set them up! 

o right i forgot to mention the bigger character sin: finn will one week be a depressed young adult with the philosophical knowledge of a demigod and the next week hell be a bratty child w a lack of empathy for others, and this is cos of tom herpich and jesse moynihan’s disagreements w each others’ characterisations, which ill get into in a bit

hellafa @monsterdoodles and @fernbrandt: this is a double edged sword for steven universe. the whole theme behind it is the show grows up with steven, and we only know as much about the world around him as he does. this gives SU an air of childish mystery that AT quite harshly lost around its fifth season, and imo the AT eps w other characters arent really its strongest cos finn and jakes friendship is the heart of the show (though there are some amazing gems out there especially the ice king/marcy and season 7 bubbline eps)... but at the same time i really dont like SU eps that have a lack of crystal gems, and when steven isnt around the crystal gems it just kinda sucks. connies a lot of fun to see! anyone else its kinda boring. thats just a personal preference though and not a solid complaint. and like hellafa said, it’s not like w Adventure Time when theres a natural reason for characters wanting to mind their own business (heck in Red Starved they outright say “sometimes its better NOT to ask”); Steven doesnt ask questions that the audience would reasonably be begging to ask in his position, which sort of fucks up the audience/Steven immersion that the shows aiming for, and doesnt seem right to steven himself....

once again i disagree. finn has points in season 5-6 especially where he acts like hes an emo 25 year old one ep, then acts like a sociopathic 10 year old the next. all this while he was 15-16 years old. and yeah, its the lowpoint of the show, but its the longest two seasons adventure time has ever had. it takes up half the freaking show

@martianmaximum SU has just reached its point, production-wise, where season 5.2 started. in the EXACT latest episode of SU, the adventure time equivalent had Finn break up with Flame Princess. 

....but if we compare them in this way, its clear AT’s protagonist has gone through a more natural growth than SU. because in season 4, Finn was a much more mature character than season 1, right? hed gradually grown across seasons 2 and 3 to get to where he was at, say, Burning Low. whereas STEVEN has grown in ways that... dont feel like a kid becoming a teenager, so much as a kid going through a series of traumatic events and not knowing how to handle it, certainly not getting help for it. to put it simply their lovechild would be OotP Harry Potter. steven’s more emotional than in the past but he feels more like he nosedived into a similar state of mind as depressed season 6 finn but without the philosophy or bees thank god. and considering steven is the same age finn was at the end of season 4, and steven has a smaller emotional range or growth rate than finn, the latter is a better representation of a 14 year old. lets just hope steven doesnt go through an asshole phase but even that allowed finn’s personality to settle down later when they started, yknow, writing him better. the years have been kind to adventure time..... 

 ...and every source ive researched, including @slickdoggo and even myself, believes that AT is a far more exciting show because of how out-there it could be at any time. the world feels natural because of how many characters you see doing random stuff, everybody feels like a person not overwhelmed by drama but simply trying to live their life. this is the distinct part of the show’s humor; it focuses on showing people being people. they can have happy days, they can have sad days, they can have an entire range of emotions because AT focuses on the human rather than the dramatic, but also gives room for tension, silliness, sadness. compared to adventure time’s greatest episodes, SU’s emotional range is that of a puddle.

the weakness i’d say AT has here is, it dulls itself down too much. sometimes characters dont express as much as they should. once again jmoyns had this freaking issue with his emotionless characters just blabbing about how they feel in an advanced philosophical way with no humor or body language (BORING), and tom always makes everyone sound like theyre made of cardboard, relying more on the confusing themes of his eps than the characters themselves.... this is so different to SU’s ways of demonstrating emotion through song, expression, tone of voice... when SU wants to display an emotion it does so well. sadly SU has less emotions TO explore, but thats because AT has infinite potential in this area. people in AT feel all sorts of emotions about the most random crap, just like people. its natural and hilarious and oh so complex.

@inbarfink and thats the fundamental difference between the two shows. SU’s linearity makes it such a CONSISTENT show that its ratings have barely raised or dipped at all in the past 4 years. meanwhile adventure time has had great episodes, its had bloody awful episodes, its had time periods where  all sincerity and humor was thrown out the window for bullshit... adventure time reaches for the stars and sometimes it falls. 

steven universe reminds me, in a way, of a riskier Ben 10. you have the starchild protagonist, the support characters, they all go on their adventure and its very much an old story with a new coat. quite entertaining to watch but you dont expect much new out of ben 10.

su is riskier because of its relationship with gender, sexuality, and identity.  if you remove these factors its almost identical to ben 10′s type of journey.

and this, my dude, is my greater accomplishment.

[bsleycasestudies]

Resy

Portfolio: Resy

I spent a year at Resy, helping them relaunch their guest experience on iOS and Android. I've taken a stab at summing up what me and my team did below.

I left Starbucks in January 2018 to join the Resy team in New York. I'd worked with my friends at Canlis for years and gotten a glimpse of what good software could do to a dining experience and buisness. Resy and only a few other players were at the center of that.

In the reservation space, OpenTable had long been a monopoly and Resy was challenging the behemoth, going after some of the best restaurants in America.

Resy had spent most of their time focusing on their primary product: the restaurant app itself. Reservations, hosts, and servers used Resy to take reservations, cater to guests, and organize their inventory for years. This was the bread and butter and what ultimately sat at the center of their business proposition.

The next big step for Resy was the guest side of things. The iOS and Android app had been largely underserved and the user experience hadn't seen much change since its launch.

I worked along side of John Neidermeyer, on the heels of the work he and the engineering team did in relaunching a new resy.com. I began revisiting their iOS and Android apps for the best reservation experience and updating the whole suite to feel like one cohesive brand. I dig into some specific features below.

I worked closely with the Tomor Molovinsky (Product Manager), Tobin Schwaiger-Hastanan (iOS), and Rob Glover (Android) to prioritize where we wanted to put our focus the most. Core parts of the app were litered with dsyfunction and we had to juggle a big pile of low hanging fruit along with some bigger aspirations like a rewards model and smart ways of personalizing the app.

Component-Based Design:

Product designers tend to like systems but beyond a loose ideal, I learned the value of a component-based design system at Starbucks. I was at the center of developing a design system for our web and ultimately all native platforms.

First on the list at Resy, regardless of the feature we needed to tackle was to reign in dozens and dozens of styles and build a small system of reuable parts. This included typography, color, UI components and some rules around when we used custom components vs. just relying on tried and true native interactions.

The challenge was that iOS and Android had a wildly different look and feel from the newly redesigned resy.com. We wanted to leap forward into the future of what the app could be but we also didn't want to c reate scenarios where brand new screens that looked entirely different than a screen you'd just screen would disorient you and ultimately impact our user e xperience.

The compromise was to settle on an interim design languagen that used the same font as the existing UI and a dark theme. Later, I'd go through these same set of components and revisit them to reflect the visual choices on resy.com. In fact, this was consistently updated in tandem.

Performance:

Resy app was built when Resy was small. So many of the issues we had were a direct result of growth that wasn't kept up with. It's a soapbox of mine, but user experience isnt limited to visuals and the things a designer is typically assigned to. In this case, our biggest issue was performance, specifically when you opened the app. I worked with Kevin Schumacher and other back end engineers to take our 16+ second load time down to 4. From there, Tobin and I built in ways to load the content incrementally, not letting things like large images and big map areas block loading content that could be immediately visible.

Sign up:

As far as features go, we started with the top. A lot of users were bouncing due to a difficult sign in process which required an email, full name, location etc just to look at what restaurants we had in the app. I simplified this a ton, asking for just a phone number, then using Twillio to send the user a code, that they could easily pop into their app and become a user immediately. This increased new user conversion a ton, drove up our app store ratings, and gave us a much more dependable phone number for guests that we'd later use for reservation confirmations.

You can see this feature live by downloading the Resy app here: XXXXX

Profile:

There was a lot of appetite for change in the app but when it came to making big shifts in the UI, allegiance to the way things were became a barrier to getting things done. One of the ways me and my team navigated this was by choosing a relatively isolated part of the app, Profile and proving we could make big, meaningful improvements without interupting the core experience of browsing restaurants. I have Tomer to credit for driving this strategy.

Profile was all the obvious things you'd expect under "Account" but also managing your reservations, past and present. The existing screen was a flyout menu of titled sections. The terms in many titles were unclear and the most important actions a user would want to take were buried under a couple taps. I worked with real users in testing and data from Mixpanel to identify key actions and figure out a way to elevate those beyond just browsing a heirarchy.

This also required revisiting the whole information a rchitecture and parent/child relationships within Profile. I used a tree test to validate and investigate multiple different models of organizing the sections before landing on the one Resy uses today. Listening to the language real users used to describe their actions was key to clear labels and easy to find actions.

You can see this feature live by downloading the Resy app here: XXXXX

Map vs. List:

This interaction was tough. We explored a bunch of different models. Tested them in coffee shops. Used principle.

Search:

Before leaving Resy to work at Goodthings, my last feature was Search.

Reccomendations

Autocomplete

Filters

Sort

Testing different models of re-arranging the screen.

Everything is search!

Tada!

big image to tie it up.