#we finally have some realistically flawed characters and everyone wants to hate them cause they’re not perfect

[gaycatwizard]

I feel like "bad/flawed characters that are still likeable" are just some of the Best characters and tend to have a bit more emotional staying power, that they're more relatable and more interesting, more memorable. We need more of them, but they're really... hard to do? Not necessarily hard to make, but hard to do well. Because the amount of flaws and Badness (in a moral/philosophical sense, not quality of a character's design and personality) can vary so drastically, along with the amount of redeeming traits and their potency. It can be hard to want to "copy" or mimic the exact ratio from the character that inspired you. Tangent: it's fine to be inspired by one or more works. It's fine to allow it to influence your works. It's hard distinguishing from "I want to do x, but that's basically just rewriting one of my inspirations but with a palette swap" and "this inspires me so I want to use certain elements/themes/ideas/technical aspects of it." That's not the issue here, y'know. But like... I think the sheer variety you can have in Loveable Asshole characters like that, in the ratio of how bad and how good they are, is part of what makes them so interesting, so realistic, so powerful. Like... there are characters who are overall pretty good people, but are rough around the edges in a way that clearly makes them sympathetic and likeable. There are characters who are basically layer upon layer upon layer of mistakes, hatred, and bile with the tiniest nugget of good at the center, that you rarely get a glimpse of, but feel something raw and enthralling because of that. Like... I think Bojack Horseman is a good example, especially because it has a lot of different Likeable Bad People varieties and it does them all really well. Also Bojack Horseman is a good show and, not unlike JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, I want to talk about it at every given opportunity. Bojack himself is a cynical, selfish, destructive, defensive, spiteful, jealous, vain, self-loathing, stubborn piece of shit. He's a bad person and that's... kind of the point of the show. But his entire character, his entire arc that spans the whole of the series, revolves around the diamond buried deep in that rough. He wants to change, but he's so set in his negative ways (and so used to being surrounded by such negativity and toxicity) that he doesn't really know how. Every time he wants to change, he doesn't know how and fails to keep up with his new habits. Every time he's doing well and making progress, some external factor comes in and pushes him violently back down the mountain, back to square one. But he makes an effort, it's very obvious that he doesn't like being this way, that he regrets the things he does, that he feels remorse for the pain he's caused, and he does finally change and improve, things do finally get better for him. His foil (who has such an AMAZING dynamic and relative arc with him I could write a whole essay just on that), Mr. Peanutbutter, is sort of the exact opposite. They have similar careers and positions in the world, but everything goes right for Mr. Peanutbutter. Everyone likes him, everything is handed to him on a silver platter, he's perfect, he's happy, he's attractive, he's popular, he's everything Bojack isn't, and yet somehow he's drawn to Bojack and always wants to try and be his friend. But as Bojack slowly improves over the show and the softer, nicer, Better side of him becomes more and more prominent and common, the negative side of Mr. Peanutbutter slowly gets revealed over the show. He's also selfish and stubborn and stupid and persistent and dangerously disconnected from reality and his interpersonal skills are absolute shit. He puts on that act to make people like him. As the show goes on, it's slowly revealed that he doesn't really pay attention to the wants or needs of others, like, at all. That he only ever really cares about himself and just wants to do and be everything and anything as long as people like him and it makes him happy, regardless of who it hurts. It's amazing. It's in F is

for Family, too. Netflix Adult Animated Sitcoms are very often hit or miss, but these two are absolute homeruns. Frank, the protagonist, of F is for Family is selfish, violent, short-tempered, arrogant, judgmental, ignorant... but he's remorseful and introspective and intelligent and, in a very convoluted and misguided way most of the time, incredibly caring and devoted. He is a piece of shit and he's terrible, and a lot of why he's still likeable, why he's allowed to be so politically incorrect and abusive is due to the setting. Parenting norms were different back then and, now with hindsight, we know that those norms weren't good and you should NEVER hit or yell at or emotionally degrade your kids. The show is a perfect mix of "everyone is a product of their time and environment" and "no matter the time and place, people are people and we have the same thoughts and feelings and struggles," all without glorifying or excusing the terrible actions of the characters with the excuse of the time period or due to being "protagonists" or having redeeming traits. They're human, flawed, some incredibly so, and that's what makes it so good. It's part of why I like F is for Family more than most Adult Animated Family Sitcoms. You've got the typical stupid, selfish, arrogant, etc. Bad Dad and his Housewife, but there's still chemistry. They're still unique, three dimensional characters that clearly love each other and have a reason to still be together despite arguing and hardship. Same with how Frank and Sue treat their kids. They're not great parents, but they're trying to do their best (which isn't always good) and they do clearly love their kids and want the best for them. Their kids are resentful at times and hate their parents for some of the things they do, but they do stick together at the end of the day because there's that underlying realization that none of the mistreatment is done with malicious intent. That doesn't excuse it, but they're all just fucked up and trying to do their best. And they do have sad, relatable characters that are clearly bad people and aren't likeable, despite having sympathetic traits. Like Ginny. Her husband, that she loves dearly, is gay and simply doesn't love her the way she loves him, their marriage is hollow and empty. But she constantly forces her suffering on others, regardless of whether they want to hear it or are emotionally equipped to do so. Attempting to leave the conversation or explain that other people have problems too means, to Ginny, that you're a terrible human being who can't be there for someone in pain or that you're selfish and disgusting and never stop thinking of yourself. She has every right to be upset, but she takes it out on others and manipulates them, and that's not okay, and the show depicts it that way. There are so many options for character arcs with these characters, too. They don't even have to be related to their flaws, they can be entirely external or related to something like relationships or interests. You can show someone working on their flaws, acknowledging that they're not perfect and they might be bad, but that they want to do better and actively try to do so; they don't avoid responsibility or blame others, they own up to it and do their best to improve. Hell, even just coming to the realization that you are responsible for your actions, not anyone else, and that you have to put in effort to change could be that arc. You can have someone get worse, whether an intentional path of bad decisions without regard for others or a failure to understand which decisions are right. Some people have redeeming traits, but still aren't redeemable. Some people don't get better. Some people still get better, but get worse first. There are so many real, relatable options that show the darker, uglier side of life that we so desperately want to experience and perceive (likely due to the cathartic and taboo aspects), and bringing up flaws and shortcomings and anything else in this context can start interesting conversations and challenge

us to think about things we may not have before, or from a new perspective.

[boundless11]

I’m quite new to this fandom.  I love all the characters on CK and I’ve enjoyed watching their growth over the seasons. What I can’t understand is the amount of unnecessary hate Sam gets.  What’s worse is, other characters (who I won’t mention) have made mistakes, yet nobody complains about them. I like Sam as a character and sometimes we forget that this show has teens, who make mistakes. Sam is no different. If she was perfect, she would be boring.  But the fact she has flaws makes her more realistic and interesting.  I came across this Youtube channel called Watch Party, which had negative videos regarding Sam, while taking it all out of context.  She’s had so many positive developments over the three seasons and I feel they’re really underrated.

‘Everyone’s got a sob story.  Doesn’t give you the right to be a bully.’  This is where some fans have had a problem with her.  Didn’t she confront Kyler about him bullying Miguel and the boys? Have they forgotten that she was also bullied in season one?  Kyler tried to take advantage of her during their date, but she fought back.  He then spread those nasty rumours about her, she got dumped by her friends and she was the victim of cyberbullying.  Over the course of the seasons, she has learnt to become a better person. She could’ve easily been against Yasmin and Demetri’s relationship.  Afterall Yasmin was the cause of the cyberbullying in season one and now Sam and Demetri are good friends, you’d think she’d have a problem with it. But she didn’t; she was surprised when she caught them making out, but nevertheless, she was happy for them at the end.  

Sam doesn’t take responsibility for her actions, she is the cause of all the drama:  Another argument from fans.  Well if there was no drama, it wouldn’t be interesting. She’s not the only character to cause drama.  She does take responsibility for her actions countless times over the course of the show and due to this, she does then go onto have better relations with Miguel, Moon and Yasmin by season three-she’s even approaches their table during lunch after Hawk destroys Demetri’s model.  When Miguel asks her whether they could start over, she agrees. During her date with Miguel, when she’s bragging about the season tickets for the Lakers, she stops herself realising Miguel isn’t as privileged as her, but invites him to a game with her.  She even felt guilty about keeping her relationship with Miguel a secret from her parents and she admitted this to Robby as they drove to the canyon party and from what I remember, she sped down as she was eager to get to Miguel and make it up to him.  She is constantly apologising:

·      To Aisha regarding their strained relationship

·      During 80s night, she apologised to Tory telling her she just wanted to order food

·      During that same night, she did brush Miguel off after he wanted to make amends and later, she thought it was him and began her apology, but it turned out to be Robby.  

·      She was about to come clean to Robby about the kiss but the bell rang.

·      She apologised to Miguel at the hospital because she felt guilty that he’d seriously been hurt because of her actions.

She knew the school fight had started because of the kiss at the party and acknowledged it, therefore taking responsibility for it. Some of us forget that Miguel also kissed her back.

Sam is flirtatious especially with Robby while she was with Miguel: she was being friendly.  That’s who she is. She even thanked Miguel for sticking up for her and for allowing her to join his group for the pig dissection.

Sam is a caring individual:

·       ‘What’s with the doom and gloom?’ Sam knew Miguel was upset over something and was supportive telling him: ‘I’m sure you did amazing again.’ She tried to distract him by telling him about the student in her class who hadn’t showered.  During their date, she let him ‘correct’ her stance before flipping him on the ground. She wanted to impress him and you could see it from her face when she finished the move.  

·      She even defended Cobra Kai to her dad insisting that just because the kids who were a part of it, it didn’t mean they were horrible kids.

·      Robby would still be on the streets; Sam realised Robby’s living arrangements weren’t great, so she told her dad.  

·      When Miguel fell following the school fight, she along side Hawk were one of the first ones to reach him.  She later admitted that she didn’t care about Tory and she just wanted Miguel to be okay.  

·      She was supportive of Miguel at the hospital telling him he was the one who could beat the odds knowing how worried he was about his surgery.  Wasn’t she the one who came up with the idea to raise funds for his surgery through the car wash?  She didn’t want Carmen to be in debt.

·      She did keep in contact with Robby while he was in Juvie, but eventually stopped when he didn’t respond.

Sam is fiercely loyal/open minded:

·      She’s defended Demetri from CK and Miguel from Robby

·      She didn’t want the Myagi Do name to be tarnished, so along with Miguel, tried to get the All Valley reinstated and succeeded.

·      She stopped her dad from annihilating Kreese in the season 3 finale; she knew about guilt and it’s effects on a person and she didn’t want that for her dad.

·      She listened to Robby about Myagi Do needing more offence and tried to beg her dad to teach them some more offence.  

·      She also accepted Mitch (after he’d tried to attack Demetri) and the others from CK.

·      She also came up with the idea of uniting Myagi Do and Eagle Fang because she realised CK was the bigger threat.  Fans loved this team up of Johnny and Daniel but forget that Sam was behind it.

·      Didn’t she also tell Miguel that Eagle Fang was welcome to train at Myagi Do, knowing that they were training in a park?

And yes she’s made mistakes:

·      She should’ve told her parents about the accident but how many of us as teens kept stuff from our parents?

·      She told Miguel to change dojos, but that was only so her dad could approve of the relationship, because she really liked Miguel.

·      She ignored Miguel’s attempts for reconciliation; maybe she needed some space and wanted to focus on karate to help clear her mind. She didn’t like what Miguel was becoming –a bully-because she had already dated a bully before-Kyler. She wasn’t going to make the same mistake again.

·      She did accuse Tory at the Beach Club, but it didn’t help when Tory had stolen a bottle and was bragging how she could steal everyone’s silverware?  And Tory was the one who tripped Sam at the rink. Sam just retaliated.

·      She did lead the Myagi Do into an attack, which didn’t go as planned. But that was only after she got sick of the way they were being treated by CK and Blatt.

What’s funny is she told Miguel she wouldn’t come to the tournament, but she ended up going. In a way, I feel her presence there allowed Miguel to do well because he wanted to impress her and the more she tried to hide it, the more driven he became. He used that anger, which was directed at Robby to win the tournament.

Feel free to add your thoughts guys!

[digitalzombie]

Ok. I read it, I cried, and now I feel empty inside lol

*Chapter 139 Spoilers*

The ending wasn’t as bad as people make it out to be, but that’s because things were headed in that direction anyway. I won’t say that the ending was incredible, though. There are still some things that need clarification.

My thoughts, what I understood, and questions I had while I read the chapter:

The Rumbling… It’s the worst thing that Eren has done. It was still something he caused with Ymir’s help. To me, this chapter confirmed that Eren was always behind the Rumbling; it wasn’t Ymir’s doing. I don’t see that as a positive thing for his character, though a lot of fans who supported his actions might… I see people argue that the Rumbling was for nothing, or that it was set off because of Eren’s love for Mikasa. I guess that’s true, but he was also thinking about everyone he loved including Mikasa. It wasn’t because he was a “simp;” he addressed that he wanted to sacrifice himself so that the so-called ‘avengers’ could be seen as heroes, to destroy the allied forces and buy Paradis time to build an army large enough to protect the island, his home. It’s a highly flawed strategy on his part, but this is the gist of what I understood.

Eren’s outburst about Mikasa to Armin took me by surprise, but that’s because I haven’t seen Eren lose his composure like that since the cave scene in Season 3 (where Eren begs Historia to take the Founding Titan). He was devastated about what he was doing (or going to do), and somewhat childish. He reminded me of a child having a tantrum. He was selfish. I think it showed his humanity was not completely gone. I had to keep in mind that he was reduced to a child during the Rumbling. Perhaps what we were seeing in those panels was something similar to that. He was a traumatized individual and was never really able to express his feelings well. He was vulnerable and expressing his deepest desires. He wanted to be with Mikasa and his friends. He wanted to live a normal life.

Eren and Armin’s friendship still remains true to the very end. Eren was vulnerable in front of Armin as he had been before. I like that Armin gets closure.

Mikasa Ackerman and her memories… I’m kind of stumped. I wonder if her memories were manipulated despite being an Ackerman. I’m also wondering about Levi under the assumption that Eren also spoke to him via Paths.

Mikasa and Eren’s head. It is kind of weird, but humans respond to death differently. I had to keep in mind that she’s the one who killed him. She’s respectful of what’s left of his body. How else was she supposed to carry his head?

Also, Mikasa leaving with Eren’s head: Again, a little weird, but she wanted to let him rest in peace. I’m assuming that if she stayed behind with Armin and the rest of the survivors, Marleyan authorities (or at least of what’s left of them) would have taken his remains into custody.

The Survey Corps’ final salute made me ugly sob. I love that Levi got to say goodbye to them a final time. Same thing with Sasha… However, I wish that Jean got closure about Marco. I also wish that Bertholdt got closure, or had a final interaction with the warriors.

Marleyans vs Eldians after the titans disappear: I’m not surprised. They were almost killed by the titans that had transformed. They were being cautious. It reminds me of Season 1 when Eren, Armin, and Mikasa faced canon fire after they learned about Eren’s titan.

Also, what happened to the parasite-thing? I assume that it died after Eren was killed. But did it just disappear like the titans did?

What happened to Ymir? Seriously, where did she go lol. I also don’t like the idea that she loved King Fritz. It’s awful. Although I do see her as someone who wanted love and approval. She was a slave and the King used her as such for power. This was probably the closest she ever got to feeling loved and wanted. It’s a sad thought. I can’t help thinking that she had Stockholm Syndrome.

Also: the power of love prevails! And by that, I mean Mikasa’s love having an influence on Ymir. My understanding of this was that Ymir felt someone’s love through Eren. Again, all Ymir wanted, aside from freedom, was to be loved and wanted.

Annie and her father: I obviously cried. She finally got to see him.

Annie and her titan’s abilities: What was the point of telling us that she could mimic the powers of other titans? I was hoping to see that happen during the final battle.

The warriors and the remaining soldiers get to live. I’m semi-bitter about Hange’s death. I’m indifferent about the others’ survival just because somebody had to have survived.

When it comes to Historia’s pregnancy, I still see it as a way for her to save herself from taking the Beast Titan. It was implied before, and it was implied now. There’s this idea of her pregnancy being pointless, but I think it was to save her skin and buy Eren some time to meet with Zeke. It’s selfish of her, yes, but she didn’t only do it for Eren; she did it for herself, too. She didn’t really want to be queen, she didn’t really want to be a titan, and maybe she didn’t really want to be a mother. But she did want to live, so she found a way to survive. At least she’s seen happy with her daughter. I hope that she named her Ymir, after the woman who sacrificed everything for her.

Paradis, the Eldian Empire, and the Yaegerists: Paradis is basically a stratocracy (a military-run government). It’s not shocking that they became a powerful country after the rest of the world was left in devastating states. Historia seems to be in power, though I can’t say she has complete authority over everyone. The Wings of Freedom were changed to two rifles and similar wings, a huge hint that their military is a high priority. Did anyone else notice that those in power are younger than the ones who used to be? Not to mention that the civil war in Paradis is very reminiscent to what happens in real life when small countries have civil uprisings. This “cycle of hate” will not end, and it’s a blatant message that can be applied to the real world. Theirs isn’t a happy ending, though it is as realistic as it can get.

Kiyomi is alive but what happened to Yelena? Also, Mikasa is pretty much royalty… Why didn’t that get addressed? I get that it’s not a central part of the story, but it is a major fact about her.

Reiner’s crush on Historia bugs me. It’s… weird? It seems like the little bit of comic relief we get in the chapter… It makes me wonder if the titans never existed and the world wasn’t at war, would Reiner actually be this creepy? lol

Armin and Annie? I guess it’s implied that they’re a couple, but I’m not so sure… She listens to what he has to say and watches him fondly. I think that’s enough to say that they’re canon… (for me, anyway lol)

Levi living outside of Paradis is fitting for someone who wants to live in peace, given that the Yeagerists tried to get rid of the older military leaders. Not to mention that it became a country that seems to be a stratocracy. He was injured severely during the Rumbling, so being in a wheelchair shouldn’t be surprising. The fact that Gabi and Falco are hanging out with him is adorable. I also like that Onyankopon lives!

Mikasa by Eren’s grave shouldn’t mean that she doesn’t have a life that doesn’t revolve around Eren. She lives on Paradis, her home. I’m sure that Historia looks after her. I’m also sure that she visits his grave frequently. Does Eren deserve her love? Probably not. But Mikasa does love him. She still mourns for him.

Overall, I liked the chapter. I wish my questions were answered. I’m sure I missed some things, but that’s all I have so far. I’m willing to reread SnK later on, but for my sanity’s sake, I’ll hold off on that lol.

[ophezio]

yes, i think harry and luna makes more sense than harry and ginny. hear me out

ok so before any hinny shippers get me, please hear me out. a lot of points might be unjustified but only because jk rowling is a shit written and wrote a lot of horrible tropes. but anyways, let’s continue.

let me start off with harry as a character. harry has always been rather opposed to the fame he receives, and hates when people pay him attention only for the purpose of him being The Boy Who Lived. he always feels rather shut off from the world, even though he clearly has people on his side. you can tell he wishes everyone would just look past his legacy and see him for him. hermione and ron do that most of the time, but still do fall into the trap of seeing The Boy Who Lived first. a lot of people do, and it’s quite understandable as that’s the first thing you notice about harry. but anyways harry is just a boy who wants nothing but to been seen as anything but that. moving on to his personality, he’s very hotheaded and very opinionated, and never lets his opinions falter. he of course has a lot of built up anger over the way people have treated him his whole life. he struggles with people just not understanding him the way he longs for someone to. he wants to seen as an ordinary dude who has emotions just like anyone else, simple as that.

now let’s look at ginny as a character. ginny is a very nice girl who’s an enjoyable person to be around. she’s confident, outgoing, funny, and can bring a good energy to room as all eyes automatically go to her. she’s quite popular as she’s extremely pretty, automatically pushing her up the food chain of hogwarts. also, being on the quidditch team helps with the popularity. so naturally, attention follows her. she’s your stereotypical perfect-girl, which isn’t at all a bad thing as most stories need that girl. the one thing i will say that bugs me about ginny is her judgefulness, especially when it came to fleur. now of course this is just plainly jk rowling’s internal misogyny and pick-girl writing style, but it still is ginny, unfortunately. ginny feels like a person who can be quick to judge a situation for what it is rather than accessing it first. and that isn’t exactly a positive trait.

ginny and harry definitely have a lot of similarities and get along extremely well. they both love quidditch, both are hotheaded and opinionated, and overall have a lot of the same personality traits. most importantly, they share the trauma of being controlled and tormented by voldemort. this is a very big thing to share in common, and is most likely why harry can confide in ginny. but, all the similarities can create a dynamic where they butt heads a lot as you do when someone is so similar to yourself. i know personally when i meet people who are a lot like me, we tend to butt heads more often than not. i can definitely get along with those people though, and have great friendships. it’s just anything beyond that wouldn’t work in my opinion. and that’s why harry and ginny sometimes makes me scratch my head a bit. harry and ginny did work in the books because they were always written to be together. but if we think from a realistic standpoint, it wouldn’t have worked at all. similar trauma would definitely create a bond, but now in a way that could be romantically. you are welcome to disagree all you’d like, but i just simply can wrap my head around it.

moving onto luna as a character. luna is a very freeing character who does as she pleases and doesn’t let others people’s harsh opinions affect her and her hobby’s. people have always talked down on luna, and separated her based on what they see on the surface. they first see her as “loony lovegood” because it’s what their first reaction is. i can see at first seeing her as a bit odd, as she does talk about things that are out of the ordinary. but if you look beyond that, she’s so much more. she’s extremely intelligent (hence the ravenclaw), and has such an open mind that anything seems possible to her. with having such an open mind, she’s willing to see situations as they truthfully are, and would never wrongfully judge as she never enjoys when it happens to her. she listens to people, because she knows she’d appreciate if people listened to her. with this comes her calming demeanor that could especially help when someone’s in a state of panic or is just riled up. luna is a very fluid character who can very relaxing to be around.

harry and luna would more realisticly work, in my personal opinion. if they had been written to be together from the start, more people would agree with any opinions regarding harry and luna. but jk rowling being the shit writer she is, she would rather see the main character get together with the perfect girl with seemingly no flaws on the surface, rather than the girl who clearly does have flaws but is more realistic. ginny was written as jk rowling’s projection, clearly representing what she so desperately wanted to be. if she had just written characters as they should be, ginny would an even better character than she already is.

but anyways, harry and luna. harry and luna relate on many different that in the long run matter a lot more than you might realize. harry and luna have always been objectified for things they have no control over. harry for being The Boy Who Lived, and luna for being herself. they’ve both been on the receiving ends of weird stares and harsh words. hogwarts has seemingly created a lot more problems for them than anything, yet they still manage to find more redeeming qualities than anything. especially with found families. harry and luna both know what’s it like to lose a parent, and what that sort of thing does to you. no one else they know have gone through that, making it hard to connect with others on that level. they’re able to understand each other, and sympathize for each other without it being pity because they know how it feels. and i think this shows when luna comforts harry after sirius dies. she knows the feeling, and makes harry feel known and understood, something he constantly needs from people. he needs people to see him on a personal level, and see him beyond his fame, and see him as harry, a ordinary boy who has just had unfortunate things happen to him. i think luna really gets that feeling, hence why she’s able to make harry feel more comforted about sirius’s death. luna generally has a calming effect, and it works extremely well for harry, who desperately needs a person capable of doing that. luna can see straight though him, and can sense when he’s feeling down and lying about being fine. not many people tell him they can see through him, rather just believing when he says he fine and leaves it alone. luna is very straightforward, and sometimes harry does need that. yet she doesn’t pry for information. she’ll tell him she knows he’s not fine, but she’ll let it go rather that press on him for details. harry is always appreciative of people who don’t pry for details, but when someone can see past your facade yet still give you the space you need, it helps a great deal. especially someone like harry who is only ever looked at from the surface. he’s seen as an object rather than a person. but luna never does that. luna never looks at him as The Boy Who Lived, she looks at him like he’s an normal boy who she just happens to go to school with. harry can talk to luna with fear of being seen just for fame, and can obviously talk to luna without being bothered. people generally avoid luna, and realistically, harry would find comfort in that. harry enjoys when he escapes the fame, and can be normal. luna is one of few people he can be like that with. hence why i would assume harry finds more comfort in that than what’s written in the book. i always take everything in those books with a grain of salt, and this is one thing that i think otherwise on. if these books were more better written, harry would naturally find comfort in someone he can lay low with and find peace with. someone who understands him and wouldn’t turn their back on him. luna is that person. all throughout the books, luna is constantly standing behind harry, never for one second leaving him behind. in the 5th book, she reassures harry that she certainly believes harry and has no reason not to. she also helps harry tell people his truth by putting his interview with rita skeeter in the quibbler. that’s a very important thing for harry, as not many people would be willing to do that big of thing for him, especially during that period of everyone accusing him of being a liar. luna also constantly stands behind harry in the 6th and 7th books. she asks a lot of times if the DA will ever meet again, showing she’s willing to meet again if harry ever speaks the words. after almost getting caught the previous, people might not want to return to the DA so willinging as luna seems to. and in the 7th book, she stands behind him too, comforting him when dobby dies, casting those patronuses when seen harry in danger, and when she offered to cause a distraction so harry could get some privacy after the final battle.

luna is a very strong support system, and never falters her support. this is very important for someone like harry, who a lot of times gets a nagging feeling that people are going to leave him, which is understandable for the life he’s lived. luna is the definition of a ride or die. now an argument i see a lot is harry wouldn’t be good enough for luna. if we look at it canon wise, then yes, i might agree. but that’s simply because he wasn’t written to be romantically involved with luna, hence why it does seem he would be not be good enough for her. if he had been written to be interested in her, it would appear totally different. i mean canon does show us he does care for her and doesn’t think poorly of her. he clearly always appreciates her kind gestures, and he clearly enjoys her presence enough to invite her along to the slughorn christmas party. he wouldn’t have invited her if he didn’t like and care for her, simple as that. if a romance was written and developed between them, things would look a lot better than they do when we look at canon. i personally hate most canon things, so i simply ignore certain canon aspects a lot of times. most importantly being harry being an auror and settling down with ginny. the auror part being because he doesnt like attention from a lot of people, and isn’t ever really shown to be enjoying fighting dark wizards. personally if i had been hunted down by dark wizards my whole life i wouldn’t go into a profession where i’d often be fighting them, but that’s just me i guess. and settling down with ginny just for the fact that usually high school sweethearts don’t make it far out of high school, and i also don’t see ginny wanting to settle down so early in her life. like c’mon, does ginny weasley honestly seem like the type to settle down at the age of 22 or 23? not really. ginny wouldn’t willing give up a professional quidditch career for some kids, let’s be real here. in a most realistic setting, i see harry laying low for a while, living a peaceful life where he doesn’t have to have people constantly prodding him because of his fame. and luna obviously would never settle down early either. they’re similar in that retrospect, and had they been together, would probably live in a cottage where they don’t have many neighbors. i also see them traveling and just enjoying the peacefulness of seeing new things and finding the joy in the simple things. it’s something that would be so important for harry and could truly help with his recovery, because him not having any mental health problems is so painfully unrealistic. and luna would be wonderful for improving his mental health, as she understands him and can see straight through him. also, she’d bring him out of his comfort zone into things he’d never though he’d find himself doing, but enjoying nonetheless. he needs someone to bring out a different side to him, and show him all the different possibilities life has to offer, people i can easily see harry have troubling with seeing the light in life after everything he’s been through.

i’m definitely rambling at this point so let me conclude : i love ginny to pieces, she’s one of my absolute favorite characters. but with the careless way she was written, and the unrealistic terms in which her and harry’s relationship was written under, i can’t help but see harry and luna being a more realistic match.

[hamliet]

Am I My Brother’s Keeper?: Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng

Or, how the two most virulent Wen-haters in the story tragically mirror each other in far more ways than just their issues with the Wens. 

I’ve written about MDZS’s use of character trios as a narrative structure before (here and here). In this meta I’m going to talk about the main three and the Venerated Triad. I’ve also written before about how Lan Xichen and Jin Guangyao’s relationship (however you interpret it) parallels Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian’s, with Lan Xichen as a strong Lan Wangji foil (fitting, as they are the “Twin Jades”), and Jin Guangyao as a strong Wei Wuxian foil (as Wei Wuxian himself acknowledges in the story’s final chapter). So let’s talk about the third member of these trios: Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng, who also closely foil each other... in particular, through their respective relationships with Jin Guangyao and Wei Wuxian. 

But wait, you say. Jin Guangyao killed Nie Mingjue, which parallels Jiang Cheng killing Wei Wuxian!

True. There are some parallels between Jiang Cheng and Jin Guangyao (such as JC killing WWX to avenge JYL, even though she wouldn’t have wanted that, and JGY doing it when NMJ hurts NHS, even though NHS adored NMJ), as well as between Chengxian and Xiyao, but this is not a meta about those specifically. 

Nie Mingjue tried to kill Jin Guangyao in life (twice), and actually does do so in the end, and Jiang Cheng helped kill Wei Wuxian even if he did not do it directly. The reason both Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng were able to treat their brothers like this was because of their immense privilege, the privilege neither acknowledge until it is time to weaponize it. In those moments, both chose not to empathize but to see their brothers as an “other” instead of as someone they loved (and I do think both Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng loved Jin Guangyao and Wei Wuxian in a realistic, flawed way). In the otherizing of their brothers, both Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng put on robes displaying society’s flaws as blatantly as Sect Leader Yao does, but with a lot more humanity than the flat, static Sect Leader Yao. Thus, MXTX tells us we cannot even “other” society as a whole. 

If this sounds like I’m hating on either character, I’m really not intending to. They’re great characters and I enjoy both of them (Jiang Cheng’s one of my very favorites), but they’re flawed, and in fact that’s the whole reason I like them. But I do admit this essay will be scathing to an extent; just know it doesn’t touch on my whole opinion of their characters, and isn’t meant to excuse Wei Wuxian (who had a savior complex) and Jin Guangyao (who sought society’s approval to his own doom); I’ve just previously excoriated those two.

I. Defining Justice as Trauma 

Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng both lost their fathers to Wen Ruohan (as did the Lan brothers), and both vowed to wipe out the Wens as a result. However, both of them fail to think about the Wens as people, and wind up, well, becoming eerily similar to the worst Wens.

Jiang Cheng has lived through the pain of losing everything (status, family, home) and he not only refuses compassion for the two Wens who saved him so that he could fight to get those things back, but inflicts the same traumas on them. In fact, Jiang Cheng’s reaction to Wen Qing’s predicament post-Sunshot campaign is paralleled explicitly with Nie Mingjue’s:

Jiang Cheng’s brows were knitted. He rubbed the vein that throbbed at his temple and soundlessly took in a deep breath, “… I apologize to all of the Sect Leaders. Everyone, I’m afraid you don’t know that the Wen cultivator whom Wei WuXian wanted to save was called Wen Ning. We owe him and his sister Wen Qing gratitude for what happened during the Sunshot Campaign.”

Nie MingJue, “You owe them gratitude? Isn’t the QishanWen Sect the ones who caused the YunmengJiang Sect’s annihilation?”

...

Lan XiChen responded a moment later, “I have heard of Wen Qing’s name a few of times. I do not remember her having participated in any of the Sunshot Campaign’s crimes.”

Nie MingJue, “But she’s never stopped them either.”

Lan XiChen, “Wen Qing was one of Wen RuoHan’s most trusted people. How could she have stopped them?”

Nie MingJue spoke coldly, “If she responded with only silence and not opposition when the Wen Sect was causing mayhem, it’s the same as indifference. She shouldn’t have been so disillusioned as to hope that she could be treated with respect when the Wen Sect was doing evil and be unwilling to suffer the consequences and pay the price when the Wen Sect was wiped out.”

Lan XiChen knew that because of what happened to his father, Nie MingJue abhorred Wen-dogs more than anything, especially with how intolerable he was toward evil. Lan XiChen didn’t say anything else.

There’s a lot of irony in this. Wen Qing didn’t speak up because she wanted to protect her little brother--something Nie Mingjue should have been able to relate to, considering he sent Huaisang to safety in the Cloud Recesses during the war. Also, I mean, Nie Mingjue, you didn’t exactly rise up against Wen Ruohan until you knew you had the forces to win. He likely spent several years in begrudging deference to him, even sending Nie Huaisang along as tribute when Wen Chao demanded it. Jiang Cheng starts to do the right thing in this scene  by speaking honestly about Wen Qing, but then Nie Mingjue reminds him of society and propriety, and Jiang Cheng  backs down, crushed under society again. Both of them commit sins of omission, in that they stand back and allow society to belittle and vilify people.

The “sins of omission” is a motif that continues in both Nie Mingjue’s and Jiang Cheng’s arcs. For example, Jiang Cheng stood by to let Mianmian be brutally killed in the cave of the Xuanwu of Slaughter, and even stood by to let Lan Wangji and Jin Zixuan die too as they protected her. He goes on to blame Wei Wuxian for the deaths of his family because of Wei Wuxian saving them. Nie Mingjue keeps the truth about the saber spirit from Nie Huaisang, and additionally, the very same conversation about Wen Qing referenced above, Nie Mingjue is directly stated to know Jin Guangyao is lying to help his father, and he says nothing at all even though Wei Wuxian’s life hung in the balance. (It then karmically backfires on Jin Guangyao).

Jin GuangYao came to save the day, exclaiming, “Really? That day, Young Master Wei busted into Koi Tower with such force. He said too many things, one more shocking than the next. Perhaps he said a few things that were along those lines. I can’t remember them either.”

... As soon as he heard it, Nie MingJue knew that he was fibbing on purpose, frowning slightly.

...

One of the sect leaders added, “...Excuse my bluntness, but he’s the son of a servant. How could the son of a servant be so arrogant?”

With him having brought up the ‘son of a servant’, naturally there’d be some who connected it to the ‘son of a prostitute’ standing in the hall. Jin GuangYao clearly noticed the unkind stares. 

While Nie Mingjue is quick to accuse Wen Qing for her inaction but languid with his own, this isn’t exactly unique. He also is quick to accuse Jin Guangyao of standing by as Jin Guangshan manipulates to acquit Xue Yang for his crimes against the Chang Clan. (I’m not defending Jin Guangshan or Jin Guangyao in this.) How dare they stand there and not argue for justice? 

In spite of Nie MingJue being a junior to Jin GuangShan, he conducted himself in a strict manner and refused to tolerate Xue Yang no matter what. With an angry lecture, Jin GuangShan was left with no words and a great deal of embarrassment. Nie MingJue, as the irritable person he was, unsheathed his saber on the spot with the intention of killing Xue Yang. Even when his sworn younger brother LianFang-Zun, Jin GuangYao, attempted to ease the situation, he ordered him to leave. After a harsh scolding, Jin GuangYao hid behind Lan XiChen, not daring to say anything else. In the end, the LanlingJin Sect could only give in.

But, Nie Mingjue never offers a critique of Jin Guangshan when Jin Guangshan lied to Nie Mingjue’s face about Meng Yao. He discovered that Jin Guangyao’s stepmother is routinely beating him, and Nie Mingjue does nothing. Even if his hands were tied, if he really cared about doing the right thing, why didn’t he intervene somehow, some way, for his brother? If he really cared about holding people responsible for their actions, about making sure justice was served above everything else, why is it that the only person he consistently holds accountable is Jin Guangyao?

Could it be that, much like society, what Nie Mingjue was angry about was not injustice, but actually his hurting self? His hurt pride, his hurt child self still reeling from the cruel way Wen Ruohan betrayed his father and left him to die an agonizing death?

Likewise, Jiang Cheng knows, when he leads the siege at the Burial Mounds against the Wens, that no Wen there is dangerous. They are all elderly or children, not soldiers. He knows even that his sister died saving Wei Wuxian’s life, but chooses to ignore her wishes to satiate his own anger and the inner child inside of him still crying in loneliness. No one had ever chosen Jiang Cheng: his mother viewed him as a disappointment, and his father preferred Wei Wuxian, but Wei Wuxian promised to stick by Jiang Cheng no matter what. When Wei Wuxian breaks this promise, Jiang Cheng never gets over this, and carries out revenge on him for choosing actual justice over staying close to Jiang Cheng (looking back, this adds a symbolic irony to Jiang Cheng refusing to intervene and save Lan Wangji and Jin Zixuan in the cave: they are both the people who will be his siblings’ spouses).

But the sad reality is, it’s a false dichotomy. Wei Wuxian did not choose the Wens over Jiang Cheng. Jiang Cheng, like society, chose society and conformity over Wei Wuxian.

I’ve said it before, but while Jin Guangyao isn’t correct that the siege on the Burial Mounds is “all” Jiang Cheng’s fault, he’s not wrong when he makes this point:

“But what you have to understand is that, for what happened to Young Master Wei in the end, you are responsible too and in fact, you are very much so. Why did so many people crusade against the YiLing Patriarch? Why did they shout their support, no matter if they were involved or not? Why was he one-sidedly condemned by so many? Was it really their sense of justice? Of course not. A part of the reason is you.”

...

“… Back then, the LanlingJin Sect, the QingheNie Sect, and the GusuLan Sect had already finished fighting over the biggest share. The rest could only get some small shrimps. You, on the other hand, had just rebuilt Lotus Pier and behind you was the YiLing Patriarch, Wei WuXian, the danger of whom was immeasurable. Do you think the other sects would like to see a young sect leader who was so advantaged? Luckily, you didn’t seem to be on good terms with your shixiong, and since everyone thought there was an opportunity, of course they’d add fuels to your fire if they could. No matter what, to weaken the YunmengJiang Sect was to strengthen themselves. Sect Leader Jiang, if only your attitude towards your shixiong was just a bit better, showing everyone that your bond was too strong to be broken for them to have a chance, or if you exhibited just a bit more tolerance after what happened, things wouldn’t have become what they were. Oh, speaking of it, you were also a main force of the siege at Burial Mound…”

II. Privilege 

The main villain of all of MXTX’s novels is privilege (I’ve touched on this here and here and here). Unfortunately, both Jiang Cheng and Nie Mingjue are heavily infected with it, and it’s partially why they treat others as they do. 

Jiang Cheng speaks negatively of Mianmian in chapter 56, noting that she’s probably just the daughter of a servant. When Wei Wuxian challenges this by pointing out he is also the son of a servant, Jiang Cheng expresses that Wei Wuxian is somehow different (and to be fair, he is indeed treated with more respect because of Jiang Fengmian’s background with Wei Wuxian’s mother), but the implication is also classist. Ironically, again, when Jiang Cheng will not speak up for Wei Wuxian or Wen Qing during that same conversation referenced earlier, Mianmian does; though Nie Mingjue expresses admiration of her for doing so, he does not do the same. 

Additionally, Jiang Cheng says the following about Jin Guangyao:

Wei WuXian, “Isn’t Jin GuangYao here now? Jin GuangYao seems so much better than him.”

Jiang Cheng... “So what, if he’s better? No matter how much better he is, no matter how clever, he could only be a servant who greets the guests. That’s all there is to his life. He can’t compare with Jin ZiXuan.”

This pretty much sums up how society treats Jin Guangyao, and Jiang Cheng doesn’t think to question it. Wei Wuxian, on the other hand, points to Jin Guangyao’s character, which at that point looked decent (even if... later... sigh). Additionally, it’s hard not to see this as a commentary on how people think Wei Wuxian should be acting. Even though Jiang Cheng is, er, wrong about how far Jin Guangyao can rise, he contrasts with Jin Guangyao in how Jin Guangyao builds the lookout towers to provide justice for the common people, while Jiang Cheng encourages Jin Ling’s initially snobbish behavior (leaving common people in traps).

Not only that, but Jiang Cheng routinely commits atrocities under his protection as a sect leader. He’s described as having whipped the flesh off the backs of people accused of demonic cultivation, and supposedly no one arrested for that survived his tortures (ironically, Wen Ruohan is also known for torture). As someone pointed out once, the people who would turn to demonic cultivation are likely those unable to form golden cores (Wei Wuxian), or those taken in as disciples too late/too untalented to do so (Mo Xuanyu); Xue Yang was also taken in late as a disciple, but is noted to be unusually talented. The interesting thing is that all three of these people are from impoverished, humble origins. Thus it’s very likely the people Jiang Cheng was arresting and torturing to death were not wealthy cultivators (not to mention other sects would complain if so), but common folk. 

As for Nie Mingjue, Jin Guangyao goes further than Wei Wuxian and directly attempts to challenge Nie Mingjue to acknowledge his privilege with brutal honesty on his own part, only for it to go... poorly.

Nie MingJue, “There’s no need for explanations. Come back to me with Xue Yang’s head in your hand.”

Jin GuangYao still wanted to speak, but Nie MingJue had already lost all patience, “Meng Yao, don’t speak such pretentious words in front of me. Your whole thing stopped working on me since a long time ago!”

Within a second, a few degrees of unease flashed over Jin GuangYao’s face, as though someone with an unmentionable illness was suddenly exposed in the public. There was nowhere for him to hide.

He spoke, “My whole thing? Which whole thing? Brother, you’ve always yelled at me for calculating people and being too dishonorable. You say that you’re a proud, righteous person, that you aren’t afraid of anything, that propen men shouldn’t need to play with schemes. That’s fine. Your background is noble and your cultivation is high. But what about me? Am I the same as you? First, my cultivation isn’t as firm as yours. Ever since I was born, has anyone taught me? And second, I have no prominent background. Do you think that I’m in a steady position, here at the LanlingJin Sect? Do you think that I can rise into power the moment Jin ZiXuan dies? Jin GuangShan would rather bring another illegitimate child back than want me to succeed him! You think that I should be afraid of nothing? Well I’m afraid of everything, even other people! He whose stomach is full believes not him who is starving.”

Nie MingJue replied coldly, “In the end, all you mean is that you don’t want to kill Xue Yang, that you don’t want your position at the LanlingJin Sect to waver.”

Jin GuangYao, “Of course I don’t!”

He looked up, unknown fires dancing within his eyes, “But, Brother, I have always wanted to ask you something—the lives under your hands are in any regard more than those under mine, so why is it that I only killed a few cultivators out of desperation and you keep on bringing it up, even until now?”

Nie MingJue was so enraged that he began to laugh, “Good! I’ll give you my answer. Countless souls who have fallen under my saber, but I’ve never killed out of my own desires, much less to climb up the ladder!”

Jin GuangYao, “Brother, I understand what you mean. Are you saying that all of the people you killed deserved their deaths?”

With courage gathered from nowhere, he laughed and walked a few steps closer to Nie MingJue. His voice raised as well, asking in an almost aggressive manner, “Then, may I ask, just how do you decide if someone deserves death? Are your standards absolutely correct? If I kill one but save hundreds, would the good outweigh the bad, or would I still deserve death? To do great things, sacrifices must happen.”

Nie MingJue, “Then why don’t you sacrifice yourself? Are you any nobler than them? Are you any different from them?”

Jin GuangYao stared at him. A moment later, as though he had finally either decided on something or given up on something, he replied calmly, “Yes.”

He looked up. In his expression were some of pride, some of calmness, and some of a faint insanity, “I and they, of course we are different!”

Nie MingJue was infuriated by his words and his expression.

He raised his foot. Yet, Jin GuangYao neither avoided nor took defense. The kick landed right on him, and again he rolled like a pebble down Carp Tower.

Nie Mingjue, here, is being compared to two other people: the man who kicked Meng Yao down the stairs at a brothel as the man dragged Meng Shi outside naked to humiliate her, and with Jin Guangshan--the very person Nie Mingjue’s enraged with--by doing the same thing: kicking someone he views as lower than himself down the stairs. Instead of addressing the actual problem (Jin Guangshan), he finds a scapegoat. It’s not a good look. All three of these instances are linked with society standing by and allowing it to happen, with a few exceptions: Sisi intervenes with Meng Shi, and Lan Xichen intervenes to stop Nie Mingjue from killing Jin Guangyao. 

Nie Mingjue never had to kill to climb the ladder within his sect. He did have to kill to climb the ladder in the cultivational world--and he actually did so, through killing the Wens. Yes, I know Nie Mingjue killed the Wens because he wanted revenge for his father and protection for himself and his brother, but the problem is... that’s exactly what motivated Jin Guangyao: protection. Jin Guangyao just had more to fear than Nie Mingjue.

The irony of the above scene that Jin Guangyao knows killing is wrong, but it’s how to survive in this world, so he does it anyways. Nie Mingjue thinks the problem of someone thinking they are entitled to kill can be solved by killing the one who says such a thing, because he’s entitled to kill someone who thinks they’re entitled to kill-- You get the point.

That sad thing is that being shoved down the stairs doesn’t even end that scene. Nie Mingjue directly attempts to murder Jin Guangyao:

Just as Nie MingJue unsheathed his saber, Lan XiChen happened to leave the palace to see what was going on, concerned after having waited for long. Seeing the situation before him, he unsheathed Shuoyue as well, “What happened, this time?”

...

Nie MingJue, “... I know what I’m doing. He’s beyond hope. If these keeps on going, he’ll do the world harm for sure. The earlier he’s killed, the earlier we can relax!”

This does not at all justifying Jin Guangyao’s subsequent murder of him, but again, Jin Guangyao kills to protect himself, and he’s not without cause for fear of his life (this does not justify, because neither is Nie Mingjue entirely without cause, but people have gotta acknowledge that reality). 

III. Reasons to Kill

I often see Nie Mingjue held up as someone who judged people based on their actions and was countercultural in that he was willing to stand up to Jin Guangshan when Jin Guangshan wanted to acquit Xue Yang of slaughtering the Chang Clan. However, this is decidedly not the case. Nie Mingjue is very much acting within society’s principals here (calling someone else out is hardly unique or noble: see, Su She, Jin Zixun, etc.) Nie Mingjue stood up to Jin Guangshan then because the crime was so severe he knew he might actually be able to win; otherwise, he let Jin Guangshan do as he wished. 

To illustrate this, I’ll share the  piping hot tea a commentator spilled on one of my fics recently, because she says it perfectly:

She isn’t wrong. You can hold Xue Yang--and Jin Guangyao and Wei Wuxian, for that matter--responsible for their actions and also point out the hypocrisy of a society that holds to ideals of how people behave, yet is constantly making exceptions for themselves. Nie Mingjue does just this by demanding Xue Yang’s head as a price for not killing his own sworn brother. Jiang Cheng does just this by murdering the older, helpless Wens at the Burial Mounds, and turning his back on the Wens who saved Jiang Cheng’s own life.

Why do these characters kill?

Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng killed out of revenge to honor their families and save themselves.

Jin Guangyao killed to get his father to acknowledge him as his son, and then in revenge when he realized he never would, and to save himself.

Wei Wuxian killed out of revenge and then out of despair--really, revenge against the whole cultivational world that had set him up for failure no matter what he did.

Xue Yang killed out of revenge for his little finger.

What do all of these have in common? They reveal what each person prized.

Jiang Cheng and Nie Mingjue prized the honor of their culture and of society.

Wei Wuxian prized his loved ones.

Jin Guangyao prized himself as his father’s son, a sort of combination of JC/NMJ’s status love and WWX’s wanting to be loved.

Xue Yang prized his body.

Xue Yang seems condemnable on paper, but let’s look at this a little deeper: what else did Xue Yang have? Nie Mingjue inherited a sect and had his beloved little brother, men who would die for him, people who admired him. Wei Wuxian had his loved ones, and then they were gone. Jin Guangyao had his dead mother’s wish for him to be approved for by society, and a famous father. What exactly did Xue Yang have besides his own body? He didn’t have parents, as far as we know. What else was he to value? Why is Nie Mingjue venerated, and Xue Yang condemned? Why is Jiang Cheng allowed to torture the poor under him for so many years, just because they reminded him of his brother, and Xue Yang hunted down?

The only answer is privilege. It’s privilege that allows Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng to decide when and how they want to enforce justice, and if they do at all. It’s privilege that they had families to avenge. It’s privilege that enables them to commit atrocities and get second, third, fourth chances. It’s privilege of his birthright than enables Jiang Cheng to never once die in the novel (Nie Mingjue not so much). But when Nie Mingjue dies, he seeks revenge on his murderer, not justice. He kills countless others in his quest to kill Jin Guangyao, people who had nothing to do with his death, and he could have killed his own brother. Even when he succeeds he ends up battling Jin Guangyao in a coffin sealed for a hundred years--hardly a victory. 

So since we’ve brought him up, let’s talk Xue Yang and the Yi City trio now. The “judgy” member of the Yi City Trio is decidedly not privileged (A-Qing, as @thisworldgodonlyknows​ wrote about her, foils Nie Huaisang, but also she foils Nie Mingjue), and her character reveals these precise flaws in Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng. She is a beggar girl and a thief, but she seeks justice for Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan out of nothing more than love. She herself does not kill, and frankly I’d say she is the moral backbone of the series more than any other character (along with perhaps Mianmian). She was never a part of society, after all.

A-Qing dies young, alone by a river, mutilated. She has no privilege, but her spirit survives as a ghost solely because of her desire to ensure justice for Xiao Xingchen and for Song Lan. Her condemnation of Xue Yang is at first admittedly selfish--she was jealous--but then honestly understandable and easier to swallow, since she came from a similar background. But because of this, and because A-Qing is willing to empathize, she ends up understood and her wishes fulfilled. In the end, Song Lan leaves with the remains of her soul, determined to heal both her and Xiao Xingchen. 

As I wrote here, A-Qing is also faced with a dark version of herself in Xue Yang. Similarly, Jiang Cheng is faced with a dark version of himself in both Su She (jealous of Lan Wangji, jealous of Wei Wuxian; he calls out their arrogance) and in Jin Guangyao in the temple, and only then is he able to move forward and grow. Nie Mingjue, unfortunately, did not recognize the dark version of himself in Jin Guangyao, and ends up trapped with him. 

[angelhummel]

since he doesn’t get enough appreciation; what do you like about tristan milligan (:

So much stuff!! Thank you for giving me an opportunity to rant. I'm gonna hide it under a cut cause it'll probably get long. And keep in mind I'm at the tail end of season 12 in my rewatch so it'll probably focus more on early Tristan lol

For starters, Tristan is just iconic. Period. I mean they had him make an early appearance when Bianca was supposed to be showing future niners around (in s11 ?) and he had like two lines and everyone immediately knew "this kid is iconic, we need to get him back as a main character". So they did! And Degrassi was better off for it

I know this was just pulled out of the writers' asses at the last minute but. The fact that Owen is Tristan's brother?? And Owen is so nasty and rude and THREW ADAM THROUGH A GLASS DOOR and thank god that none of that rubbed off on Tristan. He can be sharp and sassy but he's still such a sweetheart underneath it all. So that’s impressive since we know who he grew up with

Related to that, an underrated hilarious moment is when he's bonding with Adam. (Which was super cute btw and we needed more of that). When Adam is telling him about how being lgbt at Degrassi isn't always easy. And one time some asshole threw him through a glass door. And Tristan is like "oh wow my brother got suspended for throwing someone through a door" and then they're both like .........

And okay, I love this entire batch of niners. They're just all so sweet and adorable. And while I'm not a fan of love triangles/squares, I do enjoy all their friendships together. But none more than Tristan and Tori. Idk what happened to Tori but I'm forever bitter that she disappeared without a trace. Especially bc she played baby Angela and was there before literally anyone else, and was also Cassie Steele's irl sister like ??? she deserved WAY more. But I'm getting off topic there lmao that's another rant

Tristan and Tori’s friendship is one of my faves on the show! It doesn’t feel forced like some people will be like “we’ve been friends since we were kids!” and you’re like no you have not you just met each other when you all got cast in these roles. But nah Tristan and Tori totally feel like they’ve been friends all thru middle school. I love how they both want to do an embarrassing musical number in front of the whole school just bc they like it and they have fun :-) They don’t care what people think

I also love Tristan’s love of performing lol. Like the cute little number with Tori, or wanting to be in the school musical. And I’m glad that Eli could appreciate his greatness. Tbh Eli and Tristan is another little friendship I was sorely deprived of. At least as working musical buddies or something. And the fact that Eli changed Romeo and Juliet into Romeo and Jules with two male leads for Tristan is just great. And Tristan totally killed it

And while I like that Tristan is always unapologetically himself, I also appreciate that he struggles with realistic issues about his self image. Mainly in the way of finding romance. Thinking that no one is going to love him if he looks or acts a certain way. It’s disheartening to see him think he has to change, but it is a very real issue that teens face, never mind gay teens

And I love his relationship with Miles! I don’t care, I really do. Like at first you think the gay guy catches feelings for the straight boy and it’s going to end horribly. And it’s nice enough that Miles is cool about it. But nope, turns out he’s not straight and also he likes Tristan too! And then they have a cute little relationship for a while. And their final scene together at the hospital really made me cry </3

And I know that the biphobia he exhibits is a big deal breaker for most people. But it’s like with Glee. I’m not going to throw the whole character away for something like this, when the whole show exhibits the same flawed thinking bc it’s what the writers think. And Tristan isn’t the only offender so idk why he’s the only one that gets dragged for it. It’s not good, and I’d really rather do without it, but it’s not enough to make me hate him

I really don’t see why he gets such a bad rep in the fandom. Like nearly every other character on the show has done something equally offensive or even worse than biphobia and people don’t have a problem stanning them. But it’s like everything else. People just bitch about what they wanna bitch about, and let things slide what they wanna let slide

But overall I think Tristan is a great character and I’m happy to contribute even a little bit to the general love that’s out there online for him <3 

[theschizoidblog]

Snape, the Schizoid

Blog 4: 30/07/2020

While I usually write about how Schizoid personality disorder affects me, I think there’s a lot to be learned from drawing comparisons to fictional characters. In fact, before I got my diagnosis, I was writing fanfiction in which I poured very large portions of my soul and very being, often without realizing I wasn’t really writing about other characters, but I was exploring my own inner self. I loved writing about outcasts, about recluses and sometimes I didn’t know if I just was in a sort of love with the characters I wrote about, or if they were me.

At the age of 18, we’re talking about 2001 here, I got into Harry Potter. And with that I mean: I got into Severus Snape. Described as an ugly git and a mean bastard, I still loved him to pieces. (And Alan Rickman portrayed him beautifully, RIP)

And here might be the reason why he lured me in straight away: Snape is a schizoid, like me. And that only clicked when I got my diagnosis a few months ago. 19 years after first encountering the character. And after rereading some of my own fanfictions, I started realizing that what I’d described as Snape’s problems and needs in those stories, were my own. Strange how that works!

In this blog, I’m going to run over some traits of SPD (schizoid personality disorder) and explain how Snape fits into the criteria.

This post serves three purposes:

To people who have no idea what schizoid personality disorder is, this is a means to familiarize yourself with the disorder by exploring the traits while you imagine a character you already know.

To people with schizoid personality disorder, this is just meant to be a fun little blog where maybe you can recognize some traits of yourself. No worries, I have not forgotten we’re all on a spectrum and each schizoid is different.

To fans of the Harry Potter novels, I hope that you come to realize that people can identify with flawed characters for very personal reasons. Don’t be mean to fictional characters (unless they’re Umbridge I guess XD), because you never know who identifies with them. Your rejection of a character can feel like the rejection of a person who struggles with the same things. Anti-culture, in all fandoms, has to end. It’s not adult. It’s not wise. It’s mean. It’s exhausting.

I also feel like I need to make a statement about JK Rowling’s intent: I doubt she knew what SPD was when she wrote Snape. She said she based him off of one of her old teachers – no idea if that man had SPD or was just generally unpleasant. The way that Snape matches SPD is eerie though, just like Luna matches schizotypal personality disorder rather well. (More on that later.) An actual psychologist might disagree with me and say “No he’s not schizoid because….” – and hell, I’d love to hear it. I don’t mind it if this post, written by a schizoid but not a psychologist, starts a discussion that will help people understand the disorder even better, even if I’m wrong in assessing Snape. Or if we can learn to understand Snape better because of me being wrong, that’s also a win-win situation.

Ready? Let’s dive into it!

Cause

SPD is said to be caused by a combination of genetics and environment – as is the case with many other personality disorders. But ask around in schizoid groups, and most will tell you that there were issues in childhood with abuse, lack of warmth or understanding at home, or the presence of a “bad parent”. According to webmd: “Some professionals speculate that a bleak childhood where warmth and emotion were absent contributes to the development of the disorder.”

We all know that Snape’s early childhood was not a happy one. He had an abusive muggle father and grew up at Spinner’s End, the opposite of what you could consider a happy childhood home.

When you grow up in a loveless home, it ruins a lot of your own enjoyment of life. You get trust issues, you become awkward, and so when Snape finally arrives at Hogwarts, he gets bullied. He’s already rather isolated (he only had Lily), and they picked on him because kids can sniff out weaknesses and he was an easy target.

The bullying did nothing to stop the disorder from developing further. Many schizoids have gone through bullying themselves, and it does nothing to help you grow closer to human beings as you get older, quite the opposite, a bond of trust is broken and it’s incredibly hard to heal that. You’ll be suspicious of everyone you meet once that sort of thing happens. The more bullying you receive, the more you hate the world as you grow up. Maybe that’s not true for all people or all schizoids, but I bet some can relate.

You might say: “But Harry also got bullied at the Dursleys and he turned out fine!” Well, I guess he did. That’s the thing with many heroes – their tragic backstories make them poster boys of “look what they overcame and how he saved the world!” – but it’s not that realistic, and if you’ve got a genetic predisposition to develop a personality disorder instead, you’re screwed. Let’s also not forget that Harry’s first year in life was a very loving one. The very first year in a child’s life is crucial, and if things go wrong in early childhood, that leaves scars that most people carry with them for the rest of their lives. Snape never had that steady sort of home, not even for one year, or if he did, there’s nothing to indicate he did.

Diagnosis Criteria

Okay, time to get digging! According to the DSM-V, you need to display at least four symptoms in order to be diagnosed with SPD. Also keep in mind that these traits need to be present for longer than just a few months or a year or so. You might recognize some of these traits as something you’ve gone through yourself if you’ve ever been depressed – it’s when these traits last for what seems like your entire adult life, that a diagnosis with the disorder can be made. (I’m also not familiar with every other trait of every other disorder in the DSM-V, so as I stated in the beginning, it’s possible that other personality disorders are even more fitting of Snape, but that I just don’t know them yet.)

The seven criteria are:

Lack of desire or enjoyment for close personal relationships

Always chooses solitary activities

Little or no interest in sex with other people

Experiences little pleasure from activities

No close friends other than immediate family

Indifference to criticism or praise

Emotional detachment and lack of emotional expression

➤ Emotional detachment and lack of emotional expression

While this is usually at the bottom of the list, I want to put it on top. This is what they also call “flat affect”. You can give us a present, and it might seem like we’re not truly grateful. We may laugh with a joke, but the light never reaches our eyes. Emotionally, it doesn’t seem to an outsider like there’s a lot going on, and if it is, it’s going on so deeply within our souls we’re hardly aware of it ourselves. Think of Snape’s monotonous voice when talking. Now Alan Rickman is a brilliant actor and emotes with very very small signs sometimes, and it’s not like when talking to me, you’re talking to a wall. (But my empathic mask makes me appear rather normal to most folks.) (I don’t think Snape has a mask like that.) Other characters that have schizoid traits are, for example, Mai from Avatar the Last Airbender or Geralt of Rivia from the Witcher. If you know and visualize these characters, you may understand better what I mean with the “lack of emotional expression” then. Also, Snape being a great Occlumens? It’s because he’s the reigning champion in suppressing his emotions, like all schizoids are. We would make wonderful Occlumens, I think. XD Snape being mean? Not all schizoids have a good amount of empathy, they’re too emotionally detached for that. (Others are very empathic to some causes, but might be picky in what they are empathic about. For example: they can be empathic towards animal cruelty and Black Lives Matter, but don’t give a shit about other causes.)

A lack of empathy is what makes plenty of people an easy prey to fascists. Without empathy, what moral compass is going to stop you from becoming a bigot? (And I also want to state that within the disorder you’ll probably find people of all political leanings – many schizoids also seem to have a thing for the underdog, and thus seem to often lean towards the left instead of the right side of the political spectrum. But as with ‘regular’ people, you’ll find people swing both ways.) But here, in Snape’s case, his hatred for his bullies and his father (a muggle) pushed him right into the Death Eater’s arms, and they were glad to welcome a man of his skill, maybe even giving him the illusion, for a while, that he had found a new family. It didn’t last, and eventually his eyes opened to what the Death Eater’s really were. He was too young and naïve to see what they wanted of him (and the one person he loved), and it basically ruined his life. He was a teenage fool, and after losing Lily’s friendship, he had no one left to keep him out of that bad group of friends.

  ➤ Lack of desire or enjoyment for close personal relationships

Does Snape strike you as the social type that’s trying to make new friends all the time? Have you ever seen the man enjoy the company of another character in the books? Not just tolerate, not just need, but ‘enjoy’? Even when it comes to Lucius or Karkarov, it seems he is just keeping an eye on them, observing them rather than offering true friendship.

Maybe McGonagall might be an exception. He seems amiable towards her, in a competitive way. He might get a kick out of their arguing. She’s certainly an intelligent woman so he might enjoy her company for intellectual reasons.

  ➤ Always chooses solitary activities

We see Snape engage in a few activities at Hogwarts, such as going to Quidditch matches, or being present at the Yule Ball. Death Eater meetings and gatherings in the staff room might be social activities, but let’s not pretend Snape has a lot to say about whether he attends those or not. As a teen he already excels at potions, a solitary activity, and when we are given a glimpse of his “summer” lifestyle at Spinner’s End in Half-Blood Prince, he’s just reading. He certainly doesn’t entertain a crowd in his spare time, like, for example, Slughorn does.

  ➤ Little or no interest in sex with other people

I hear you coming now. “BUT LILY!” Schizoids are often asexual, but not necessarily sex-aversive. When asking around in a schizoid group, about a third of the schizoids seem to be in relationships or are even married, perhaps even more. And many of the others have had sexual relationships in the past. Many have tried to make relationships work, only to realize at a later point that that sort of life was not for them and that they would never be truly happy in a relationship. Other schizoids are happy in relationships – so it exists! It’s not impossible! (Remember: you need 4/7 traits, not 7/7 to be schizoid.) Also keep in mind, if Snape really was interested in sex, why would he pine after a dead woman for 16 years? He’d be over her way sooner and into someone else’s pants way sooner too. Lily was the first person in his life that gave him any kind of warmth, so him pining after her is not strange or inexplicable behavior. She offered what he craved, what he lacked, and he mourned her for the rest of his life, because he feared no one would ever give him that warmth. (And he kind of turned that into a self-fulfilling prophecy by being such a recluse.) He dreamed of love, but we have no idea what it would have been like had he actually ever had his affections returned. Maybe he’d have enjoyed a relationship with her for a long while and she would have been the only person he could have tolerated, or maybe after a year or so he would have thought “this is suffocating” and ended the relationship.

  ➤ Experiences little pleasure from activities

Can you recall Snape laughing in any scene? Smiling, even? I can imagine him to feel rather content when brewing potions or studying the dark arts, and he does have passion for what he does. But to a schizoid, passion and pleasure are not necessarily the same. We experience emotions differently. In some ways we don’t experience them at all, in other ways, we might feel like there’s a wall around our emotions, and we have no idea how to get over that wall and check what the currently active emotion is. But with logic, we can determine “I guess I’m happy now that I’m doing this thing I like doing.” Intellectual pursuits are fun too – like solving a puzzle, it gives a little boost of dopamine when you make it to the next level, so it’s not surprising he excels at Potions.

  ➤ No close friends other than immediate family

Basically, Snape only really had Dumbledore, and that bastard only used him to win the war. (I have beef with old Dumbledore, okay?) But Snape confided in Dumbledore, and the other way around, and so I think it’s safe to say that there was a true friendship between the two. When Dumbledore died, Snape was truly alone. (Which is incredibly tragic and heartbreaking when you think about it – in the last year of his life, Snape had no one, really no one, as he tried to keep Hogwarts ‘safe’ and eventually died. And everyone hated him for killing Dumbledore, not knowing the truth about his allegiance. Everyone who had once spoken kindly to him, like the other professors at Hogwarts, now considered him arch enemy #2, behind Voldemort.)

➤ Indifference to criticism or praise

Compliment or insult a schizoid, and it’s not like they won’t give any response at all. They might say “thank you” or they might get a little defensive about the insult, but they won’t always lose a lot of sleep over it. It kind of depends on who the praise or criticism is coming from. I can imagine that it did mean something to him if it came from Dumbledore, whom he cared about. I don’t think it meant anything to him what his students thought of him, since he didn’t give a personal level of shit about them. There’s also a moment where Umbridge shrieks “You are on probation!” and it’s described as “Snape looked back at her, his eyebrows slightly raised.” Then she says that she expected better after how highly Lucius Malfoy always speaks of him and she dismisses him. Snape then gives her “an ironic bow” – he really doesn’t give a rat’s ass and I love him for it.

These are the 7 criteria that you need to fit 4 of to be diagnosed with SPD – I managed to link all 7 to Snape – so I think it’s not unlikely that Snape is truly a schizoid. Now, for the next part I would like to highlight some other comorbidities which many schizoids also have, that seem to appear in Snape as well.

Comorbidities

➤ Depression In about half of all schizoid patients, depression is or has been present. How do you notice that in Snape? The greasy hair, among other things. Bad teeth. Always wearing the same outfit. If you’ve ever suffered from a bad depression, you know how difficult it suddenly becomes to shower at a regular interval, how you can go days without brushing your teeth, how wearing comfortable clothing is more important than looking fashionable – how it is absolutely meaningless to look fashionable because who the fuck cares anyways. Snape doesn’t seem to give a hoot about himself or his appearance, which strikes me as a sign of depression. And what does he have to be happy about? He knows Voldemort is going to return and he’ll have a cursed job as a double-spy. He knows he’s probably going to die. I wouldn’t be happy either.

➤ Anger Outbursts/PTSD Not all schizoids have this, but it’s something I have myself and which I’ve written about extensively in one of my previous blog posts. I look at it as a way of my inner self breaking down the walls and coming out to say “I know that I’ve been quiet for the past 37 years but what the fuck I’m really angry about this and have been for a while and I’m not going to contain it any longer” – and then the anger comes out disproportionately. It’s hard to impossible to really control such an outburst. And often, there is a very obvious cause to the outburst. Sometimes it’s PTSD related. For Snape, while he does not emote often, you see a few outbursts – like when he is face to face with Sirius Black in the shrieking shack, his childhood bully. He seems mad at that moment, not at all composed anymore, the sign of a real anger outburst. (I think it’s PTSD helping that anger build.) A few moments later, he thinks he has turned in Sirius Black to the Ministry, Sirius, who he holds responsible for the death of James and Lily (and it’s especially the latter’s death he can’t cope with), so when Sirius escapes, he loses it again. Then the next time he gets really angry is when Harry enters his “worst memory”. That’s a few years later, during the Occlumency lessons. While he’s no longer shrieking, he’s white with rage. My pro tip: don’t impose on the privacy of a schizoid, we get mad. XD In Half-Blood Prince, he’s got a moment where he’s like “Don’t call me coward!”, looking ‘inhuman’. I too can get anger outbursts over false accusations, and this one must really hurt, because at that moment, he’s trying to save Harry’s freaking life while the boy is all like “lemme at you I’mma kill you like you killed Dumbledore for fun!” – Snape was probably grieving the loss of his only friend and confidant and knew he was on his own from that point onwards, and then you get this bloody teenager trying to drag you into a wizard’s duel you’re not in the mood for, calling you a coward, which is the last thing you are. Man it has to suck to be Snape. I also want to state that there are many moments when things go wrong in class, but Snape never loses his temper like that. He’s not pleasant and he punishes students, but he doesn’t get mad – he gets even. That makes it all the more interesting to analyze the moments that he does go bananas.

Random Thoughts

Before I finish this blog, there are still a few small things I’d like to get out of my system about Snape and SPD.

➤ Snape and Luna

They are my favorite characters, but also because they’re very, very alike and very, very different at the same time. Both didn’t have a great childhood (Luna lost her mother at a young age) and they get bullied as kids at Hogwarts. Snape is called Snivellus and Luna is called Looney. All the suffering they endure, affects them differently though. Snape gets meaner, Luna only seems to get nicer. I see them as two sides of the same coin. One dark, one light, both a little eccentric in their own way. When you look at it from a personality-disorder point of view, then they both have personality disorders that are related to one another. Snape has Schizoid Personality Disorder, Luna has Schizotypal Personality Disorder. Schizotypal Personality Disorder is where you’ll find a lot of eccentric people who believe in conspiracy theories. Both are class A personality disorders. Some people might even have the two personality disorders at the same time. Schizoids seem to be rooted in reality with their thoughts, schizotypals can really start believing strange things if they’re not careful, alienating them from others And, in case you’re now wondering: “So many schizo-personality disorders! Is this also schizophrenia?” No – schizophrenia is when you have delusions and hallucinations as well. Read up on those disorders if you’re interested, because these descriptions of mine are too brief and don’t do it justice.

➤ Snape was a bad teacher

Not fully, and yes, he was. I think knowledge-wise, Snape was way better at Potions than Slughorn ever was. You notice when Hermione can’t keep up in her sixth year while Harry is sailing through Potions thanks to Snape’s book. Snape’s a genius and would have been able to instruct his students to be more efficient when brewing potions. But personality wise? Don’t put a schizoid in front of a classroom. And for that, I kind of blame Dumbledore. Snape wasn’t asking for a job as a teacher, but that’s all Dumbledore had to offer, and thus he put Snape and his unwilling students in a room together where none of them wanted to be. I think Snape would have been better off as some kind of a scientist, just him and his books, inventing spells or potions. But he was not given much of a choice, and he was forced to socialize with teenagers (ew, gross), and that must have drained him terribly. It’s a wonder he was usually roaming the hallways at night because I would have been too exhausted to get out of bed. That makes you realize it’s truly a work of fiction because who on earth has that kind of stamina? :-P (No, in all seriousness it’s probably also depression at work, keeping him up.) Snape was a jerk to Harry and Neville and Hermione on various occasions, and not all of it was to “keep up appearances” to the Slytherins. He seemed to even enjoy a bit of sadism here and there. You could contemplate why he poisoned Neville’s toad. Was it just to spite poor little Neville, or was he hoping his student would perform better under pressure? (Which Neville did.. The toad didn’t die.) It’s a cruel way to teach a lesson, but I think he must have thought the end justified the means. But what a traumatic experience to Neville, who then had Snape become his greatest fear.

➤ Purity culture vs Snape

We’ve seen a shift on both Tumblr and other social media where fandom is about purity culture. Back in 2002 folks were like “We love the baddies, deal with it”, and the people that didn’t love the baddies actually dealt with it and you could joke with people who preferred the Gryffindors and just poke a little fun at one another, but it was fun fandom. But over the years I’ve seen fandom change. Nowadays you can’t even express love for Snape without someone seeing it as their moral obligation to remind you of what a “bad person he really was”. To them I can only say that I like him for his best qualities, and forgive him for his worst. And honestly, I don’t need to justify liking a character to anyone. If I want to put Umbridge-posters in every room of my apartment, are you going to stop me or call the cops on me? Purity policing is weird. Very American, too. (Though I’ve seen some Dutch folks go apeshit as well over purity concepts.) And as a Belgian I don’t have time to put up with that shit. XD And purity policing also is just nasty when you consider that some folks are like “I relate to this character” and the next person is like “THIS CHARACTER IS EVIL AND DESERVES TO DIE!” My response to that part of fandom is: “Just fuck off already, jerkface.”  Personally I was heartbroken by his death, because I feel like he could have made up to the people he’d hurt, I would have loved to see relationships mended between him and McGonagall and him and Harry and such, but instead we were left with him passing on some awkward memories to Harry and then dying. (Tbh I’m not the greatest fan of his crush on Lily, but whatever, I can accept it and understand it. She was the only light he ever knew.) It’s not his fault he didn’t get to redeem himself as a character, not fully - and that’s what makes fanfiction fun. So if people want to explore that in fic, let them. A character like Snape is too much of a treasure to shove under a carpet and pretend he never existed. Write all the things about him, have him have all the adventures! 

I think I’m done now! If you stuck around until now, 10 points to Slytherin or whatever house you’re from. (Probably Slytherin if you’re reading about Snape.) What do you think? Feel free to leave a comment, send an ask, or whatever!

[spill-the-milk-tea]

My Thoughts On “A Whisker Away”

Warnings: spoilers, mentions of suicide/self-harm

A Whisker Away could have done better in a lot of areas, but it’s by no means bad, and the plot and overall concept make up for most of its shortcomings. Clearly Netflix is working hard to emulate the Ghibli formula, and while their attempts have all been misses so far, they have been gradually getting closer—and this is a big step away from the disaster that was Ni No Kuni. Better script writers and more time spent on animation is my only suggestion—scripts have always been a struggle for Netflix, which goes hand in hand with my second suggestion, because they’re focused on churning out new content.

Still, I think this would be a great film to show to children and young adults struggling with suicidal thoughts. Having this omen of destruction in the form of a cat, representing Miyo’s constant self-doubt, was actually very poignant. The first time we see Miyo’s mask fall and we see her real, bitter feelings is when she sees the first cat in the movie, which perfectly reflects her self-hatred. The way the Mask Seller speaks is clearly meant to represent Miyo’s inner dialogue, as she is hesitant to protest to them at first, but when they suggest going full-cat, she adamantly tells the voice to shut up.

While a lot of the other messages were sort of thrown in our face, I appreciate that some of the best symbolic ones were kept subtle rather than exposition-dumped on us. For example, Hinode only turning into a cat via his hands keys us into the fact that the cat transformation is dependent on self-hatred. Hinode feels like he’ll never be good enough to become a potter, thus he loses his hands. I actually like that they chose to go this route, as ridiculous as it was, because it subtly suggested to the audience that “becoming a cat” (aka suicide) isn’t a choice anyone can make just based on difficult circumstances.

I feel like the creep-factor on the Mask Seller could have been played up more, but I guess presenting him as this eccentric character that almost seemed to have the main character’s best interest at heart works better for the metaphor. He seemed mostly unassuming and non-threatening, and weird as he was, he made a convincing case. His concept as a villain is actually very cool. This idea that he steals the lives of those who don’t want them anymore, combined with his drug-dealer archetype is very unique. He preys on people who already hate themselves, luring them into thinking their lives aren’t worth living anymore, giving them a taste of freedom through his cat mask (aka self-harm). Once they’re hooked, he convinces them to make the full leap, whether they truly want it or not. The sort of momentary, but ultimately unsatisfying relief of self-harm to a suicidal person is captured very eloquently in the cat transformation metaphor. It’s actually quite dark how Miyo is so adamant about not transforming at first, but in a matter of days, after one particularly traumatic incident, she’s fully committed.

The connection between the feline and depression metaphor got a little messy near the end, but still nonetheless made an emotional impact. The cat believed that by taking someone else’s face, they could show their owner the love they deserved. Kinako showed a clear disdain for Miyo for not showing Kaoru the love she deserved, and sort of acted as this physical representation of Miyo feeling like she didn’t truly belong in the family. Of course, the owner loves them as a cat, not as someone else. The whole cat stealing human lives thing doesn’t play much into a bigger picture past just representing how as much as it may seem like it, becoming someone else or trying to take someone else’s spot won’t make us truly happy. And I think Kinako realizing it’s better to live out her own short life making Kaoru happy was a short but very sweet subplot.

The scene that really touched me most, surprisingly, was just seeing how Yori so persistently apologized to Miyo as she ran away from her. It so perfectly encapsulated the guilt that friends and family of suicidal ones feel when they see this person they care about clearly suffering. Yori clearly had Miyo’s best interests at heart and genuinely stayed by Miyo’s side through all of her troubles, and is a great example of how to be a supportive friend to a depressed person. She never coddled or pitied Miyo, but she was clearly worried when Miyo started acting “off”, and even then tried to stick by Miyo’s side and be supportive.

Muge is definitely eccentric and painfully cringy, but that in itself makes her a realistic teenage girl character (and a neurotypical adult male doesn’t get to paint her valid character flaws as failings on her or the writers’ part damn it.) Her feelings and thoughts start off as seeming very weird and childish, but gradually you come to understand her reasoning the more the movie goes on. Having been abandoned at such a young age, she pushes people away deep down in her heart, thinking that no one can ever truly love her. She was deeply damaged and never felt like she could really trust anyone again, viewing everyone as either selfish or irrelevant (represented by scarecrows.) This at first seems to just symbolize how other people seemingly don’t matter when she sees the guy she likes, but when she transforms her own parents into scarecrows, we see it represents her pushing people away from her. She tries to act like she doesn’t need other people to love her, when deep down, she really wants proof that someone can truly love her despite her eccentricities, as seen in her obsession to make Hinode confess to her.

One of the points in this metaphor I felt was lacking was that they didn’t really address how Miyo’s psychological reliance on Hinode as this perfect guy that would solve all her problems because of his apparent loyalty was sort of toxic? They definitely established it as over idealized and somewhat exaggerated with that whole Cinderella-transformation scene, where you can clearly see that she believes Hinode loving her will solve all of her problems. In the end I suppose it’s countered with her finally being accepted by Hinode and her accepting him in return, and her realizing that’s all she really wanted.

I did appreciate the background noise of Hinode telling the Mask Seller that it wasn’t Miyo’s fault her life was difficult, because it really puts things into perspective. The Mask Seller took advantage of Miyo’s trauma, just as it isn’t the fault of a suicidal person when their negative thoughts overtake them. That’s why we first see the mask seller when Miyo is at one of her lowest points—when she’s with her mother, attempting but failing to overcome her feelings of abandonment as she first begins to shut her out; and having just moved in with her stepmother, clearly overwhelmed with emotional burdens. I also thought it was interesting that they explained her not transforming back as deep down not wanting to be a human again. She still didn’t believe herself as being capable of being loved, and it took her realizing that she needs to love the people in her life first before she can truly start to heal. And it’s true, there’s a difference between not wanting to die and actually overcoming your depression.

In any case, Miyo’s thought process was almost painfully accurate. The way she lashed out at her parents for wanting her to stop smiling if she didn’t feel like it was something I definitely went through. It’s hard to explain, and definitely irrational, but in the most cold and logical sense, being told to give up your coping mechanism by the people who you feel are causing you to use said coping mechanism feels really offensive in the moment. She was using up so much emotional energy acting like she was okay for her parents, so she felt like it wasn’t their right to ask if she was okay. 

It was a really brief, but sad moment when we saw the difference between how she perceived her favorite meal at her house as opposed to when Hinode gave it to her. It wasn’t meant to show that her feelings of depression were circumstantial so much as it highlighted her abnormal mood swings, as well as how the root of her depression, so to speak, stemmed from her home life. And while I don’t agree entirely with how their relationship played out, I cannot agree more that seeing a person you care about suffering from self-hatred snaps you out of your own dark thoughts so quick. Miyo was quick to see Hinode’s good traits and to rationalize that he didn’t need to hate himself, but she couldn’t do it with herself. It took the thought of Hinode also possibly losing his life for her to snap out of her suicidal state of mind. Most suicidal people rationalize that the people around them would be fine if they died, or even preferred it, so Hinode showing through both actions and words that he didn’t want her to “turn into a cat forever” helped her start to value her own life. 

It was a stark contrast between me as the viewer, feeling like Miyo’s transformation was technically Hinode’s fault, and Miyo, who felt like she needed to transform for Hinode’s sake because she loved him so much. Wanting to die because of the boy she loved may seem like a stretch in the terms of the metaphor, but that’s the point. The things the Mask Seller says are inherently illogical, but he says them when the person is at their weakest emotionally, which makes it easier to convince them. In the end, both Miyo and Hinode were able to free themselves of their masks (aka their irrational self-hatred) when Miyo realized that Hinode genuinely wanted to get to know her, and Hinode stopped feeling like he needed to hold back so Miyo wouldn’t see he was a “nobody”. Essentially, being honest and vulnerable with one another.

Overall, I think having this “Mask Stealer” as this antagonist representing suicidal thoughts gives new meaning to the idea of one “taking away their own life” and is actually really eye opening to those who may be facing similar situations as Miyo. The message is cheesy, but the creative way in which they tackled adolescent depression and suicide is worth watching.

[joyofcrime-elinorhigh]

 Hello everybody, my name is JoyofCrimeArt, and legacy can be an fascinating thing in regard to animation. Since cartoons are made with the intent of being seen years or even decades after they're created, it can be interesting to see how the general consensus people have about a series can change over time. One day you can be on top of the world, and your series is loved by critics and audiences alike. But then, something happens. Sometimes it's a specific episode. Other times a season. Maybe it's a controversy within the fandom. But whatever it is, something happens that causes peoples opinions to turn. And suddenly your show has gone from being universally praised to becoming much more divisive. And when something like that happens, it can be hard to recover. It happened to Steven Universe.  It happened to Rick and Morty. And it happened to Star vs. the Forces of Evil.

 Created by Daron Nefcy,  Star vs. The Forces of Evil  premiered on the Disney Channel and Disney XD in 2015,  and quickly became one of the hot cartoons that everybody was talking about. It makes sense, as it came outright around the time where more continuity based fantasy series were really starting to take off, so it's natural that it became a hit. While the series was generally well regarded upon its debut, as time went on the series became much more of a "love it or hate it" type of show. And while that's not too uncommon for any show that amounts a large flowing, what makes Star vs. so interesting is that it seems like nobody can seemingly agree when the show got bad, if it did at all. Some people say the quality dipped after the first season. Others say the third. Some say the fourth. Others say that the show was good until the finale. And some say that the show was solid throughout. This divide among fans is why I feel confident calling Star vs. The Forces of Evil one of the most divisive shows of the 2010's, even if the debate around it isn't nearly volatile as other series. But now that the series has ran its course I have to ask, does it hold up? Did the show really go down hill, or is the hate undeserved? That's what I'm here to find out.

 I feel like I'm in an interesting place to talk about this series because, while I tend to try to keep up with all the big name animated show coming out, I actually didn't watch most of Star as it was running. I watched the first season until my family cut cable right before the finale of season one (You know, around the time people started to care about the show.) And only caught up with the show in the last year or so while doing research for my "Top 30 Cartoons of the Decade" list. So I went into the series mostly blind with the exception of a few spoilers. I just felt like this was important to point out as I feel it may have an effect on my view of the show.

 Also, while I usually try to go spoiler free when I do a general overview of a series, for this review I may have to go into some spoiler territory. Since this series features an ever changing status quo, as well as a lot of major characters who aren't introduced until late in the series' run, doing this review completely spoiler free would be difficult. So I'm going to be doing this review under the assumption that anybody reading this has already seen the show, and are just curious to hear my take on it, or don't care about being spoiled.  So if you wanna go in blind I suggest you sign out now.

 But to everyone else, let's dive in and talk about Star vs. the Forces of Evil.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hJ5ecrpp8k

 Star vs. The Forces of Evil stars (He, get it. I'm funny.) Star Butterfly. A princess from the dimension of Mewni who, upon her fourteenth birthday is given a wand of unbelievable magical power. However, after causing nothing but trouble with her new found powers in her world her parents decide to ship her off to Earth, where she can be somebody else's problem. There she befriends a human boy named Marco Diaz and the series mainly follow these two as they go on all sorts of magical adventures as they battle all sorts of evil monsters and ne'er-do-well who want to take the wand and use its power for themselves. Or at least that's how the series goes at first. As the series goes on it begins to focus more on the world building, as Star and Marco discover that the kingdom of Mewni isn't as great as they first believed, and are forced to battle political corruption, conspiracy within the royal family, and the generation spanning systemic racism against monster kind.  

 The best place to start when talking about the show are the characters. Lets start with the main leads.

 We got Star, your typical fun-loving, ditzy, hyperactive action girl. Which seems to be a common trend in Disney Channel cartoons now that I think about it. But she does enough to stand on her own. She's a fun character, and an overall good lead for the series. I admit that her bratty nature and general stupidity could turn some people off, and there are times  where it can get a little annoying, but I never minded it all that much. I think that's kinda suppose to be the point of her character. She's a royal, and spent her whole life with a silver spoon in her mouth. So it makes sense she would be a bit selfish and be unaware of the world around her. And she does improve over the course of the series, as she begins to take her job as a princess more seriously and spends much of the series actively fighting against monster prejudice. Though I'd be lying if some of these less desirable elements of her character don't continue to pop up every now and again, even later in the series and especially in the last couple of episodes. Also she's kinda a sociopath. Like especially early on in the show there are like...a lot of casualties to Star's antics. I'm kinda surprised Disney let them get away with that.

 Also, can I just say that I am sick and tired of people asking "When is Disney going to include their first LGBTQ+ princess, completely ignoring the fact that Star is bisexual as fu*k. Like, come on now!

 Marco is also a good lead. He's a neurotic, responsible, karate student who often acts as the straight man to Star's antics. However, I like the fact that he's not a total stick in the mud. Sure he's more cautious than Star is but he's still capable of getting in on the adventures as well. He comes across as a realistic teen with his own set of flaws. Namely his insecure nature and general social awkwardness. I also like that due to his expertise with karate he's able to hold his own in a fight even without magic. He always feels like Star's equal and never like a sidekick. He and Star have a great dynamic in general, and the two play off each other well. They contrast with each other and It feels like the two really cover each other's flaws. And it's kinda refreshing seeing two characters who are so different manage to genuinely get along with each other.  

 But of course, we also have the forces of evil that the shows title so clearly mentioned. Each season focuses on a different villain, and something that I really like is how all four major villains are introduced relatively early on. So the show doesn't suffer from that "Dragon Ball Z" type thing where it's like "Haha! I know you just defeated the villain, but now's there's an even BIGGER villain who we just haven't happened to mention until now!" They've always around in the world, and many of them even start out as joke villains only to become more serious later down the line. And they manage to do that in a way that feels very believable.

 The best example of this is the shows first villain, Ludo. Who upon introduction is portrayed as a completely comedic villain who Star could easily take in a fight. But things change when a new more serious villain, Toffee, usurps him as the season one antagonist. Stealing his castle and army in the process. Come season two and Ludo is left alone, having lost everything, and is forced to toughen up in order to get back what he once had. He builds a new army, stronger than his first. He finds a new castle to form his base in, and becomes a genuine threat to our cast. Scrappy underdogs villains who lost everything might be one of my favorite tropes in fiction. Other examples of this trope used effectively would be Peridot in Steven Universe and Jamack in Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeast. However, while those shows use this trope as an opportunity to have these villains go through a redemption arc, Star goes the other way and uses it as an opportunity to make a character become more of a threat. That said, he never loses the comedic charm that made his fun to watch in the first place. Part of me honestly kinda wish that Ludo stayed the main villain of season two, instead of being usurped Toffee yet again. That said, the episode "Princess Quasar Caterpillar and the Magic Bell" does a good job giving his arc a satisfying conclusion.

 Speaking of antagonist, let's talk about Tom Lucitor. Star's demon ex-boyfriend. While not a season spanning villain like Ludo or Toffee, he has several appearances early on as a recurring antagonist only to go down the more traditional "redemption arc" route later on. And I just want to say upfront, Tom is one of my favorite characters. Not in the show, but in fiction in general. It would of been so easy to make Tom your generic "toxic boyfriend" arch-type but even early on it's made clear that even though he's an antagonist, he isn't pure evil. His love for Star is genuine, but the problem is that he hasn't earned it. He tries to improve himself and become a better person but his own anger issues and jealousy keeps getting in the way. Specifically jealousy of Marco because he seems him as a romantic threat. But as time goes on, he does become better. He learns that he and Marco have a lot in common and eventually accepts that he can't make Star love him, and lets her have her space. And that, ironically, causes Star to becoming willing to open up to him again. They become friends and eventually get back together. But what I like is that while he has gone through efforts to improve and work through his problems, they still persist throughout the series. He's still very insecure and is looking for constant approval from Star. He still is jealous of how close Star and Marco are even though he has become friends with both of them. And it's shown several time that Tom tends to put his own problems above the problems of others. It shows that even though he wants to change and is willing to change, that doesn't mean that change come easy. It takes time and can be a long process. These are realistic character flaws that make Tom such a more complex and relatable character in my eyes. I relate a lot to Tom with his desire and constant struggle to improve as a person, and I feel like it's a struggle that's easy for a lot of people to relate to. Also...he's just such an edgy dork. He's...he is good boi.

 Another fantastic character is Eclipsa. Introduced about halfway into the series, Eclipsa was a former Queen of Mewni who was imprisoned in crystal due to dabbling in dark magic and for running away from her arranged marriage and marring the King of the Monster, Globgor. The show builds up mentions of Eclipsa early on, with characters talking about how evil and dangerous she was. Eventually she becomes free from her prison (cause lets be real, whenever there's a villain sealed away somewhere you KNOW they're going to get out.) But surprisingly, when we see her she actually doesn't seem that evil. She's polite, kind, and is even willing to go through the proper legal channels to prove that she isn't as bad as people say she is. She is an excellent example of a morally ambiguous character cause for the first several episodes we the audience don't really know if she is actually a good person who's just been judged too harshly by society or if she is actually evil and this is all an act. As even as the show goes on and it becomes clear that Eclipsa is a good person at heart they still manage to keep the audience guessing. Much like Star, Eclipsa can be kinda selfish and impulsive, making her a bit of a loose cannon.  Despite the shows title "Star vs. The Forces of Evil" Eclipsa goes to emulate one of the shows major themes. That life isn't that black and white.

 The show deals a lot with shades of gray when it comes to its characters, as all characters have there own motives and backstories and relations with each other that can make them either allies or enemies depending on the circumstances. An example of this is the Magical High Commission, a group that monitors magic across all the dimensions. throughout the series it is shown that they stand on the side of Mewni. So in season two when Mewni is being conquered by  Ludo and Toffee they're good guys. But just like most most people in Mewni they hate monsters and believe that Eclipsa is evil. Making them antagonist in seasons three and four. Their motives stay the same, but their role in the series changes.

 However despite my praise not all the characters are  great. In fact the show can be kinda hit or miss with their cast. The characters that are great are really great, but then you get characters like...

(Art by JelloApocolypse)

 You know what, I have to be honest. I kinda like Pony Head. I know a lot of people say she's annoying and selfish and contributes next to nothing to the plot...and they're right. But I also just kinda like her. I think what makes her more bearable to me is that she's kinda disliked in-universe. Even Star, who is Pony Head's best friend, often times get sick of her crap. Real talk though, can we all agree that Pony Head is basically just a discount Lumpy Space Princess from Adventure Time?  Like, they're nearly the exact same character.  

 A character who I don't like as much though is Glossaryck, the magical spirit guide that lives in Star's spell book. I never really got his deal. Sometimes it seems like he likes Star and genuinely wants to help her become a better magic user, while other times it doesn't seem like he really cares. He dies in the beginning of season three only to come back a few episodes later acting like a wild animal and yelling "Globgor" over and over again without any explanation as to how or why. Than at the end of season three it's revealed that it was all an act and he was fine the whole time. Like...why? We later learn that is a highly recognized historical figure in Mewni. Why is he yelling his name? And why does nobody question why he's doing this? I can buy that Star and Marco might not know who Globgor is but most everybody else seems to. I keep expecting that moment for his motivations to click. Where it's revealed how everything he's done was all an elaborate ploy to help Star or something, but it never really happens. Though my opinion of him does slightly increase in season four, but that's just because Keith David took over the role of voice actor. And adding Keith David can make anything better.

 Some characters can even change in quality between seasons. Janna is this edgy punk girl who joins the main cast in season two as a new friend to Star and Marco. I liked her well enough in season two even if some of her more abrasive elements could be somewhat obnoxious. She's more or less absent for most of season three. Then come season four she returns and I found her more annoying. I don't know if her character got worse or if it was just the fact that her character didn't work as well in later episodes after the show had become more dramatic. But near the end of the season, they give her some long overdue character growth. Not a lot, but some. And I found myself liking her more.  

 There are other characters in the series as well, and they tend to vary. Star's mom, Moon is a BAMF and I like Buff Frog a lot. Jacki and Kelly are fine characters, though I admit there's not that much to them outside of being love interests for Marco, though they still have there own personalities. King River's kinda annoying but I've seen worse examples of the "dumb dad" trope and Alan Tudyk gives a great performance.

 And since I don't have time to go over my thoughts on EVER character in this series, I'll do what ever online review does when they don't have time for nuance. Create a tier list!

 If It's not apparent by now, the characters in this show run the gambit. With the best ones being some of my favorite characters of all time, and the worse one's just being generally annoying. However, if there's one thing that this show excels at is not painting things as black and white. No character is evil without a reason and all the heroic characters have un-heroic flaws to their characters with unique motivations that make sense for their characters. (For the most part anyway.)

 The shows animation is also really good. Featuring thick outlines and a lot of nice coloring on the characters. (Even if some of the background colors can be a bit drab at times.) Most of the first season is done in flash, but it's good flash, which does well to accentuate the character expressions and the fluid action scenes. Part way through season one though the show's animation changes to more traditional animation. I think there is a bit of a divide on which style people consider to be better, but I personally prefer the look of the later seasons. The bouncy look of the early season one episodes look good, but I don't know how well that would of worked in the more dramatic and somber moments that happen later on.

 I also appreciate the world building. The first two seasons are set mostly on Earth in the town of Echo Creek, but the last two seasons changes things up and focus much more on Mewni, allowing us to explore both settings. I know some people don't like the change as it resulted in several of the characters introduced earlier being written out of the show but I never really minded that. I think Mewni and the cast of characters who inhabit it are on the whole more interesting than the people of Echo Creek. (I mean does anybody really miss Sensei Brantley?) Plus the change in setting allows us to get a bit of a role reversal with Marco being the fish out of water, and Star having to show him how her world operates. And even if you do prefer the Earth setting we still cut back to it on occasion. And when you add it all up the total series runtime between the two setting is fairly evenly.

 I like how characters can kinda come and go in this series, as it shows that the world doesn't revolve around Star and Marco. And it allows the writers to see which characters people gravitate to and focus on them while keeping less interesting characters out of the way. It also allows for character arcs to actually have conclusions, without the need for them to be drawn out just for the sake of keeping characters around longer.

 Let's talk about themes for a moment. Specifically the main theme of prejudice and  systemic racism in the show. It's handled...okay. It's kinda standard stuff and it doesn't go super complex on the issue, but for what it is it works though. That being said the show can be a bit confusing in terms of what counts as "monsters" and what are just regular races in this world. Which can make the metaphor a little muddled. I get that the idea is that there is no difference, and that monsters are only deemed as bad as an excuse for mewmans to justify their mistreatment of them, but it can still be confusing as to who's oppressed and who isn't and to what extent. I feel it would be even more confusing for a younger children watching who might not understand all the nuances of this stuff. However, the way the show tackles this isn't bad either. And the fact that the show tackles this element at all is admirable.

 But who cares about systemic racism! That's not the real reason people are watching this show! We all know that everybody is really here for the shipping!

 Yeah, as the series went on the shipping seems to become a much more major element within the series. So much so that to many the increased focus on the shipping is often cited as one of the main elements that caused the show to go down hill. However I never really minded it. I mean Star vs. has always been a bit of a love letter to the shojo/magical girl genre and romance is a very important element to those types of shows. So it makes sense that it would be used here. And I think it's used pretty well here overall. These are just kids struggling through these types of feelings for the first time, So it makes a lot of the stupid decisions that they make feel a lot more believable. But if this kind of thing isn't your cup of tea, it might end up bothering you. Because they do devote a good amount of time on it.

 But you're probably wondering, who do I ship? Am I team Starco or team TomStar? And honestly, while shipping has never been something I've ever gotten too invested in, if I had to pick I would probably have to say team Starco. Which may be surprising as I previously went on and on about how Tom was one of my favorite characters of all time. But this is the way I see it. Tom's whole arc is about learning how to get over his jealousy and controlling nature regarding his relationship with Star. And it's shown that even after he's dating Star, and has everything he thought he wanted, he still couldn't fully get over his hangups. Even though he loves Star and Star loves him, it's clear that the relationship still isn't exactly the most healthy. And it's clear that they are going in different directions in their lives. Tom knows what he wants. To be with Star. But Star doesn't know what she wants. Not all relationships have to end because one person does something wrong or because one of the parties involved is a bad person. Sometimes two people just aren't compatible in that kind of way. And seeing Tom be the one to break up with Star shows just how far he's come as a character. Plus, like I said earlier, Star and Marco have great chemistry. And I do genuinely see them working as a romantic couple, beyond the fact that there the two main leads.

 Besides, StarTom is technically incest so....

 *record scratch!*

 Oh wait, you didn't know about that.? Yeah, according to the official "Star vs. the Forces of Evil Magic Book of Spells" Star's Great Great Great Grandmother Rhina Butterfly was in a relationship with John Roachley, a second cousin to the Lucitor's. Now granted that would mean that Star and Tom aren't THAT related. But still. Incest none the less. Not that it even matters anyway since all of the Mewmans are descended from like five random people!  

Seriously, this is some Ishigami Village levels of incest we got going on here.

 But despite how heated the flames wars can be, I think we can all agree that Tomco is the best ship anyway. Like come on now.

 So yeah, even the shipping elements didn't bother me. To be completely honest, while the show did have some problems here or there, I found myself enjoying the show well into the fourth season. But I knew it was coming. Since I was watching the show months after the series had concluded, I had heard things about the finale. A finale that figuratively "cleaved" the fan base. But in order to talk about the finale we have to go a few episodes back and talk about the episodes leading up to it. Obviously spoilers ahead.

 To briefly recap, at this point in the series Eclipsa had become Queen of Mewni along with her husband Globgor after Star relinquished the crown to her. And many of the Mewmans are upset by Eclipsa's new "pro-monster" policies had left to live with the former Queen Moon. Meanwhile Mina Loveberry, a legendary monster fighter from generations far gone, had begun building up an army to invade Eclipsa's castle and take Mewni back from the monsters. A lot of people I hear don't like Mina as a final villain, but honestly I was surprised by how threatening they were able to make her despite how goofy she is. And her backstory about basically being a magically altered super solider driven to the point of insanity really helped to make her sympathetic. (Like I said, in this show everyone is painted with shades of gray. Even genocidal lunatics.) She invades with a Solarian Knight, a giant magic powered mech and it takes all of our heroes working together to barely defeat it. Until it is revealed that it was only one of many. It's an amazing twist that really leaves you wondering "How are or heroes going to get out of this one." Up to this point I was digging this final arc. But that's when I finally got to it.

 To me, the moment where Star vs. the Forces of Evil got bad was the moment it was revealed that Moon was working with Mina to reclaim the thrown from Eclipsa.

 It just doesn't fit Moons's character to do this. While it is shown throughout the season that Moon does not agree with Eclipsa more extreme policies, It was still shown that while Moon may be against Star's decision to give the crown to Eclipsa, she acknowledges that since Star was queen at the time and was within her right as queen to decide what was best for the kingdom. And in previous episodes she seemed generally happy not having the responsibility that comes with being queen anymore. But now she suddenly wants her kingdom back? If she wanted it back, all she had to do was say so from the start. At the start of the season most Mewmans still hate Eclipsa. It would not be that hard to stage a coup if she really wanted, especially since the magic high commission and all of Mewni would be on her side. Why would she work with Mina, who Moon knows is insane and racist even by Moons standard? Sure Moon and Eclipsa definitely don't see eye to eye on a lot of things but Moon still wouldn't want her dead, and Moon knows that Mina wants to kill her. I know she thought she could control Mina's army but that's still a big risk. It seems uncharacteristically reckless for a character as intelligent as Moon to make these choices.

 So then, after it turns out that Moon can't control Mina's army, our heroes are basically screwed and are forced to hide out in a special tavern located at the edge of the universe to wait things out while Mina begins rounding up all the monsters in Mewni. They are all trying to figure out a plan on how to possibly defeat Mina's army when Star suddenly goes on a rant about how magic is bad. And this idea had been brought up a few times in the series, but overall had never really been portrayed as a major aspect. But suddenly the show treats this as if it's all the magics fault, and that everything would be better if it was gone. And that's when Star comes up with the genius plan to use go to the magic dimension to destroy all the magic. Thus making Mina's forces useless. And while I admit that yes, they are very much been pushed to a wall here, this has to be one of the most overkill ideas they could of possibly think of!

 Now, I've seen a lot of people online saying that by doing this, Star would be committing mass murder on a multiverse scale, potentially destroying many universes. And I think that is a bit of a reach. From what we see in the series, it seems to me at least that magic is kinda a rare thing in the universe. That's why so many villains are trying to steal the magic wand away from Star. And I see very little implying that there are whole universes that are reliant on magic outside of Mewni. THAT SAID THOUGH, this would result in the deaths of a lot of innocent people. But Star really only seems concerned with the fact that once magic is destroyed, all people who come from parallel universes will return to their home universe, meaning she won't be able to stay with Marco. Which makes Star seem beyond selfish and generally pretty horrible.

 Hekapoo, one of the high commission members, despite being made of magic and knowing that she will die from this, is totally on board for this plan because plot. And our heroes travel to the magic dimension to destroy all the magic. Which they do. Defeating Mina's forces and leaving her powerless. She still manages to escape however because nobody decides to actually, you know, try to arrest the person who just committed a political coup and nearly whipped out an entire race. They just let her walk off, because she's powerless now. I mean what's the worse she could possibly do, right?

 So yeah, Mina is defeated, but everybody is sent back to their home dimensions. But somehow, through the power of love I guess, the universes of Earth and Mewni begin to merge. Thus allowing Star and Marco to be together. Happy ending, I guess? I don't know.  Like Star and Marco being together is treated as a good thing. But we also see humans screaming as there world have now been overrun by monsters. Is this suppose to be a joke? A bittersweet ending? I'm not really sure.

 In concept the idea of a universe merge is actually a pretty interesting idea. As it feels like a natural progression of the shows themes of racial tolerance and mutual understanding. Now that we've gotten semi-tolerance between monsters and mewmans we could now have an arc about trying to bridge the cultural gaps between the humans and the mewmans. Plus it would be a good way to appease both the people who enjoyed the earlier seasons focus on Echo Creek, and fans of the later seasons who preferred the stories set on Mewni. It's not a bad idea, but it needed to A.) be set up better and B.) needed more time to be fleshed out. I get that it's designed to be a sequel hook, but it's not like this is something that the series had been building up to to the point where we the audience can put together what happens next. As is, it's just weird.

 So yeah, the last couple of episodes of Star vs. where a total mess. It's fitting that the finale to Star happened to come out the same day as the finale of Game of Thrones. While I'm not going to act like there weren't some parts I liked or some good ideas sprinkled throughout, this finale was pretty bad. How do you have a show that preaches acceptance and equality and end it with a genocide?! But hey, genocidal problems call for genocidal solutions am I right?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ufmrn7BCuA

My God, It's Dragon Ball Super all over again.

 And the worse part is that the series didn't have to end this way. Cause the show actually had a pretty good episode about half way through the season, "Cornonation" which would of acted as a great series finale! With the series ending with Eclipsa as Queen and ruling with Globgor by her side, with the mewmans finally accepting monster kind. You'd have to change a few things, like rap up Mina's plot and put Star and Marco together, but other than that it could of really worked. Admirably it may end up feeling more like a finale for Mewne as oppose to a finale for Star but it would thematically fit with the message of the series. Or if you really wanna keep this finale more in tack just don't have Star destroy the magic. Just have Star, Moon, and Eclipsa go off and do the one thing the three of them had never tried doing. Working together. And have them defeat Mina the old fashion way. They even allude to this idea in the tavern episode before Star goes on her whole "We gotta destroy the magic" kick.

 It is a bit ironic to think that a show that's whole message is about unity could end up being so divisive with it audience. I genuinely believe that had the show ended on a better note, people would look back on the show more fondly. Despite the flaws. To the people who don't like Star vs. The Forces of Evil, I can understand where you are coming from. Even if you ignore the finale there are things to not like. A lot of things aren't very well explained and the show has its fair bit of plot holes. The series can be repetitive with its frequent shipping and "racism is bad" episodes. And some of the characters can be a bit annoying, including our main lead at times.

 That being said though, I have to say, I can't bring myself to hate this show.

 I don't know what it is, but I just found myself getting really invested into this series. Maybe it was due to me hearing so much bad things about the later seasons that I had low expectations, and while that may be part of it I don't think that's the whole reason. When you watch as many cartoons as I have, and for as long as I have, it becomes harder for things to impress you. Sometimes it can feel like your just checking shows off of a box, which is something that I've been trying to improve upon. But watching this show, it brought me back to the way I felt back in the early 2010's when I first started getting into these types of series.  For all of Star's flaws, and trust me there are many flaws, it felt like it was doing something unique. Like it was in it's own little world that wasn't quiet Adventure Time and not quiet Steven Universe. And the series stuck with me after I finished watching it, which is surprisingly kinda rare. It's why I became interested in doing this review in the first place.

 Star vs. the Forces of Evil is a flawed show. Very flawed. But I'd rather have a flawed show that's unique than a perfect show that's something I've seen a million times. And while I may not be a fan of how it ended, I don't think that should completely take away from all the good that this show has to offer. This show isn't going to be for everybody, and If you somehow made it this far into the review without seeing the show than I hope I've said enough to help you figure out if this show is right for you. But for me, despite everything, the series still has it's magic.

 What did you think of Star vs. the Forces of Evil? I really genuinely want to know on this one.  Did it go downhill and if so than when? Leave those thoughts in the comments down bellow. Please fav, follow, and comment if you liked the review. And have a great day.

[spartanlocke]

Idk why tumblr made me unfollow you again. But ANYWAYS, can you explain the battle of Azeroth? I’m looking at the wiki but I’m confused. I’ve never played WOW but I’m curious (and afraid) of why Battle of Azeroth is another example of this Blue Skin Fetish Man at play.

(Tbh I should probably delete that comment cause I realized that unless you’ve followed WoW’s story for years, you won’t know how badly BFA contradicts everything to the point of receiving the title of “bad fanfiction.”)

This is the shortest way I could explain BFA and it’s still very long, because if I went into detail explaining every single flaw I could beat haruspis’ record for word counts. So, this is less of an explanation and more of a list of aspects that gave it the Blue Skin Fetish Man’s Fanfiction title. Here we go:

Battle for Azeroth revived the faction war - a decades long feud between the Horde and Alliance - despite it contradicting and invalidating previous expansions. Blizzard spent years writing the faction war arc for it to conclude in Legion with the Horde and Alliance finally putting aside history and uniting. Not just “Oh we have to work together it’s convenient.” but actually uniting. Aside from two faction leaders who hate the shit out of each other (Genn and Sylvanas), there was no conflict between the Horde and Alliance. There was barely any “faction” content at all. The war had pretty much ended, and it was clear from previous expansions it had been leading up to this.

But instead of respecting this, Blizzard went “Actually let’s bring the war back” and had the Horde attack the Alliance unprovoked. How did they make this work? They threw out everyone’s personalities. Out of all the Horde leaders, the only ones who’d actually want a war are Sylvanas (who proposed it) and maybe Gallywix, if he thought he could make a profit. Saurfang, Lor’themar, Baine and Ji Firepaw are all either pacifists, aren’t in a position to deal with a war, or straight-up hate war. So Blizzard just tossed their personalities and made them blindly agree. Aside from Saurfang, none of them even have opinions on the war, they’re just doing what their Warchief Sylvanas tells them to.

The Alliance, meanwhile...only four leaders are even present in the story, and they’re completely incompetent. Mind you, the Alliance is vastly more powerful than the Horde. Some of their leaders are the most powerful magic-users alive, and they straight-up have a space-ship that can shoot lasers. If WoW were written realistically at all, the Alliance would’ve maimed the Horde years ago. So instead Blizzard made half of them absent from BFA, and the ones who are present are dumb as shit and forget they’re demi-god tier magic-users.

...Or they don’t forget, and are nonetheless beaten by Danuser’s self-insert, Man With Bow, who has plot armor thicker than a bowl of oatmeal. (Seriously, this dude went up against a powered-up Tyrande and her demi-god husband and got out without a scratch. It was so bad it became a bitter meme.) 

Which brings the next big problem: plot armor. Like I said, this is a fanfiction, so alongside everyone acting out-of-character for it to work, we also need plot-armor, AKA the script. This is where Blue Skin Fetish Man comes at play. This whole expansion happens because Sylvanas wants power, and she’s an extremely cunning tactician....or so we’re repeatedly told. Instead of making her actually do anything clever, the plot simply works in her favor. Every. Single. Time. 

The Alliance attack her city in retaliation? She blows it up. Was this an intentional trap to kill important Alliance leaders, or just “If I can’t have the city no one can”? No one knows! Horde is trying to get a powerful empire of trolls to join them, but the trolls don’t want to? Alliance attack trolls for no reason, kill their king, and his daughter join the Horde for revenge. Horde loses their ship fleet? Alliances loses theirs, too. Horde suddenly decides This War Is Bad, Actually and team up with the Alliance to take down Sylvanas? She was gonna ditch them anyway because the faction war was never part of her masterplan. Also she made a deal with a death god to get power in exchange for everyone killed in the war, so she’s basically a god now. And no this wasn’t explained in-game. She’s too busy being a Flawless Tactician for us plebs to possibly understand her motives (which Blizzard never even gave us hints to.)

Naturally, the fanbase didn’t like this. Even if you didn’t follow the story like I did (I’m like, one of the 2% of people who know Blizz was writing the faction war arc to eventually end.), there was just SO little reason for the Horde to agree to reviving the war that pissed off just about everyone. Everyone is also pissed that every time Blizz wants to cause faction conflict, they make the Horde start it.

But that won’t stop them from demonizing the Alliance for retaliating against the Horde! A big example was having this character who didn’t care about the faction war, saying he joined it because Jaina “went too far” when she was literally just protecting her people from a Horde assault.

...Wow, that still ended up being pretty long, but I needed to explain how Battle for Azeroth not only contradicts lore, but so shamelessly contradicts logic that it can only be described as “Steve Danusar’s fanfiction.” It threw anyway everyone’s personalities, ignored everything written in previous expansions, then made every plot-point happen because the script said so instead of giving logical reasons. And they didn’t even bother to look at fan theories and go “Uh yeah, yeah that’s totally what we planned.” They just...didn’t care! They didn’t bother to make sense in the slightest!!!

All this, because Steve Danusar wanted Sylvanas to become the story’s antagonist - instead of N’zoth or Azshara, who’d been built up as the antagonists for OVER FIFTEEN YEARS. And mind you, in Blizzard, the antagonists are THE main characters of the story. They’re the poster boy, plot-roller, and favorite of the writers. Everything is about them - even the merch. Sylvanas fans will tell you Blizz did this because they hate Sylvanas, but I assure you it’s quite the opposite. Blizzard absolutely loves their antagonists. (Also, you know, Danuser is the HEAD WRITER AND HER #1 FANBOY.) 

...The only difference here is that Blizzard has the tendency to give out-of-jail-free redemption “arcs” to characters they like, even when they were merrily committing genocide five minutes ago. They’ve done this every expansion since WoD; Grommash, Illidan, and Saurfang. And next will probably be Sylvanas, in some poorly-foreshadowed “plot-twist” that reveals she was just “helping us” all along. All the characters will go “Holy shit you were helping us.”, forget she has a higher body-count than Garrosh, and proceed to praise her as a savior while all her victims are either forgotten or told to hush.

...Or she’ll maybe just die in the first raid to make room for The Jailer guy, but Steve Danuser has shown to be so shamelessly horny for her I doubt he’ll let her die.

(Oh, also the whole “N’zoth and Azshara” thing? Turned out just to be a side-plot to give Sylvanas more power, since she’s partially responsible for N’zoth’s death, she gets tribute...uh, sorry, “power” from it. These two had been hyped up for nearly two decades. Turned into plot-tools. For Sylvanas. Who is once again the center-of-attention for the oncoming expansion, SylvanasShadowlands. Which isn’t even out and is already written terribly.) 

[citrussunrises]

pretty much all of my thoughts on tros (new star wars movie spoilers!!!)

ok so clearly i just saw tros and like i don’t care if it was a flawed movie i don’t care if the storytelling sucked or it wasn’t true to the series or if the characters were inconsistent or the directing or it was cliche or how much of it was just a marketing ploy or anything you can throw at me. i just really loved the movie. and of course i’m really sad that rey and ben didn’t get to like be together, but i got the best and most realistic ending i could ask for. because even though to me there’s a clear line between kylo and ben, to the republic and the resistance there wouldn’t be. i can’t imagine he could just come home. so he’s just, he sacrificed himself for the cause he loved, for his family, and the girl he loves. and i just, they saw each other. they really saw each other. they didn’t see each other as what side they’re on or what mask they wear or anything they just. saw each other. and i’m just so full of emotions. 

i read a post about how adam driver changes how he acts the character from kylo to ben and honestly it makes so much sense. ben is such a beautiful character -- he’s curious and nerdy and loving and tender and desperate and just wants to love and be loved -- and he’s so distorted by kylo. which is why i loved tlj so so much. it slowed star wars down. normally the movies feel just too action too fast too much. but tlj felt like it slowed down and focused on the peopel -- which i Loved. and you kind of see hints of it with tros. (i know that’s the difference between directors.) but ben, ben loves his family, and he’s desparate to go back. he’s so scared that he’s gone beyond repair. he’s so young and he has so much power at his disposal. he’s in too deep and he just kind of hits a point (rey plays such a hand in this) that he just wants to get out. 

and there’s such a genuine connection with rey and ben. they’re both stuck -- trapped by their greater role, their connection with the force, and their lineage/family. they’re trapped and scared and overwhelmed. but they see each other eye to eye. they understand each other. kylo’s an edgy white boy who thinks he’s invincible. ben, ben’s just scared. 

and ben at the end of the movie?? amazing. i just want to watch that over and over and over again. how he just goes immediately to rey. the connection they have. the comfort they give each other. how he crawls (crawls!) to her. how he revives her. how they kiss. how they hold each other so tenderly. the love in their eyes. the sweetness and understanding. aggh! not to be a hopeless romantic on main but i just, i can’t breathe. it was so good. 

on another note!!! they did rose so dirty!!!!!!!!!! she’s such a good character and i love her so much!!!!!!!!!!!! she’s such a unique character and so different from so many other female characters out there. she’s curious and she’s bold and she’s brave and she’s tender and she’s, she’s lovely. and i see myself in her. because she’s not the like traditional hollywood type beautiful, but she’s so beautiful to me, you know? and they just, threw her away. made her an extra. and i don’t know what behind the scenes stuff happened to downgrade her from a beautiful, important character to just another person, but it bums me out. she deserves better. 

also!!!!!!!!!!!!!! they threw so many things out there they just, never addressed again. i really liked poe getting some backstory and how he was a spice trader and everyone’s reaction to it, but they threw in the girl just to assert that poe’s straight. like come on. and she was such a cool character, but he sole purpose was to make poe look straight and look like a player. and he’s not. disney really wanted us to see him as a flirt and a player, but he’s just not. he’s tender and he’s loving and he’s sweet. he loves his friends and he loves his droid and he loves his cause and he loves those he looks up to. and he’s passionate and intense and. and he’s just not the heartless player they wanted him to be. 

and finn!!!!!!! good man!!!!!!! i can’t believe they set him up for a romance with rose (felt forced, but i wasn’t too mad about it) and then just!!!!!! threw it away!!!!! never addressed it again!!!!!!!!! and how finn was going to tell rey something before they got sucked into space quicksand?????? what was that supposed to be!!!!!!!! 

and honestly y’all, if disney wasn’t like queerbaiter supreme, i totally would’ve expected poe and finn to end up together. and i’m kind of conflicted on this for a few reasons. first off, i hate that every time that people see a real, intimate, lovely friendship between males they automatically decide they’re gay. male friendship is so important and it’s so overlooked and downplayed -- in life and in the media. i’d Love to see friendships between guys taken more seriously. but at the same time, we Know oscar isaac was playing up the romance. like absolutely playing up the love and yearning. come on dudes. 

and i’m glad that they didn’t try to force rey to be with either poe or finn. i was so sure they’d force her to be with poe and honestly i’d be so mad if they did. it would be too predictable and too cliche. and her friendship with finn is just to precious and too beautiful to throw away and manufacture into romance. her and ben though? they understand each other. they see each other. they know. 

and i don’t love that she says she’s rey skywalker at the end. i get that she did it to pay homage to luke and leia -- and honestly also to ben -- but i just didn’t love it. i think it would have been so much more powerful for her to just be rey. but at the same time, i get that belonging and belonging to a family is so important for her. and calling herself a skywalker meant for her belonging as a jedi, as a part of the resistance, belonging among her friends and her mentors. i get why she did it, and i get what it meant to her. but i just would’ve rather seen her as just rey. but not the thing i’m the most mad about. 

also, i just felt like at times the movie felt forced intense. like i got so caught up with how forced intense palpatine was (admittedly, i’ve never seen the prequels. sorry. just never happened. so i don’t care as much about palpatine as i could.) and the whole stadium of sith cult that i missed some really beautiful and tender moments with rey and ben. 

i feel like any one star wars movie is something that you have to look at as a cultural piece of something bigger than itself and as a happening in universe. like, perhaps it doesn’t make sense for all these people to show up for no reason or all these people to be related or chewie to finally get his medal or  tons of people showing up to fight at that last battle stuff like that like within the story, but when you look at the movie as a piece of something bigger, it’s kind of beautiful and kind of sweet. but you of course also have to look at is as people doing things in a world. i don’t know this paragraph makes the least sense but i stand by it. if something seems cliche you gotta understand that star wars movies aren’t just stories, they’re cultural icons. and so there’s a bit of dignity and love that goes with it. 

so all this to say, tros was flawed. oh well. i enjoyed it. i enjoyed it as a piece of the greater star wars brilliance. i enjoyed it as a piece of art that made me feel and made me think. the entire time i was rocking and fidgeting and twisting and gasping. it was flawed, but i see those flaws as disney and the corporation and the powers that be getting in the way of what the movie, the story, the piece wants to be. it’s flawed, but it’s beautiful. and it’s something that’ll stick with me forever. 

i might add to this later when i have more thoughts. but there’s no space for me to discuss them irl so i just. i have so many thoughts and feelings. art is supposed to make you feel something, and this made me feel a whole lot of somethings. and i love it. 

[cielleduciel]

okay okay, Black Eagles/Crimson Flower. this is very long and very rambly bc i was mad and i probably repeat myself a lot but whatever

keep in mind going forward that this was my FE3H first route and the only one i've played so far, and it was... disappointing. i really, really want to like Edelgard as a character bc she seems interesting and she has so much potential, but fact is the game never allows her any sort of true depth, and never lets you interact with her in any meaningful way

and i hate to say it bc i ALWAYS go to bat for complex underappreciated female characters, which is what i was expecting out of this, but that's not... even what she is. none of her potential is ever realized. she's one-note and static and the writers seem to think that just throwing in a traumatic backstory (that never gets explored, even as it very obviously relates directly to her worldview) and a few cute/quirky character moments will give her depth, but it doesn't

the game really LOVES to try and play up this special bond between Edelgard and Byleth and how much Byleth means to her, but it never feels earned. she always says that she feels like she can tell Byleth anything and everything, but she doesn't. i have no better understanding about why she felt like she needed to do the things she did than i did at the end of part 1. all she ever says is that she has to do it all in the name of her ideals and a better future and it's the only way, and all i ever wanted throughout the entire route was to ask WHY ? WHY is this the only way ? WHY do you feel like this is the only thing you can do ? WHY are all other options off the table ?

she's cooperating directly with Those Who Slither In The Dark (TWSITD), who not only experimented on and tortured Edelgard herself and killed her siblings, but also killed Byleth's father, but we never explore the implications of that. hell, Edelgard's issues aside, Byleth themself has their own stake in this, their own very good reasons to question Edelgard and the lengths she's willing to go to in order to achieve this future of hers, but they're NEVER given the chance. if you choose her route, the game apparently assumes that you've decided to follow her without question or reserve, regardless of everything that happened, even though it makes no sense in context. at the end of the route, Edelgard even admits that she couldn't understand why Byleth wound up taking her side, and i wanted to SCREAM !!! LIKE YEAH, I DON'T UNDERSTAND IT EITHER ??? i was HOPING we would get to explore that at some point but I GUESS NOT ????

at most, Edelgard offers platitudes by saying that she too hates TWSITD and regrets everything they've done but still maintains that her alliance with them is necessary for the time being, because they are the best allies she has against the church, and she needs their strength. again, my question is: WHY ? because while i can see how they may have been useful to her in part 1, i didn't see them do ANYTHING to help her during the entirety of part 2. they had literally zero presence in any of the battles, were not even shown or mentioned aside from the moments where they were being CLEARLY ANTAGONISTIC towards her, like when they NUKED ARIANRHOD AS A "WARNING" as soon as Edelgard captured the city bc they were mad she killed one of their officers,

and yet she felt like she needed to spin the story to say it was the church's doing so as to like, save face and rally morale while maintaining their alliance, i guess, but why ?** even in the FINAL BATTLE AGAINST RHEA HERSELF, Arundel shows up ONLY to literally say "yeah i'm just here to watch lmao". so like, as far as i know from everything i have physically seen, we defeated the church without their help at all--in SPITE of their "help", even--which does not help me understand why her alliance with TWSITD is so necessary that Edelgard has to just grit her teeth, bear it, and cover for them until the war is over so that she can finally turn on them

(**i get not telling the entire army about Arianrhod to avoid panic and questions, but what was the point of lying to the rest of the Black Eagles ? why is it that Byleth, Edelgard, and Hubert seem to be the only ones allowed to know about the empire's workings with TWSITD ? like what was even the point of Edelgard revealing herself as the Flame Emperor at the end of part 1 ((which was also a totally botched scene but i'm not even gonna get into that here))? i thought the reason for that scene WAS to reveal the truth to everyone that she was working with TWSITD, we even had that whole dramatic battle where Edelgard had to fight her own house and professor bc of it ? but i guess it wasn't, bc none of them ever bring it up again, and the game still treats it like they should all still be in the dark about it, so ???)

on top of that, i still don't understand why she felt like she needed to antagonize the Alliance, or even the Kingdom, when her enemy is the church. like i get it, there’s no negotiating with the church as it is, violent conflict with them is inevitable and i’m not against that, i understand it and i can get behind it. but why didn't she ever try talking to the other two factions or working together w them or FORGING ALLIANCES instead of resorting immediately to violence ?** maybe i can believe that Dimitri and the Kingdom are a lost cause, but for example--and again now i haven't played the GD route, but from what i understand-- Claude's values are fairly similar to Edelgard's, and he does a lot of digging into the church on his own and is able to discover much of the truth. her alliance with TWSITD is apparently "necessary" but it never occurs to her to reach out to GOOD PEOPLE like Claude who would share her interests ? why ? why can’t we even bring it up ?

(**my confusion with this is best summed up by that one interaction she has with Dimitri in part 2, where before they're about to fight, he asks her, "Must you continue to conquer? Continue to kill?" and her response is literally, "Must you continue to reconquer? Continue to kill in retaliation?" like WHAT ? WHAT KIND OF CHILDISH "NO U" NONSENSE IS THAT ? YOU'RE LITERALLY THE AGGRESSOR HERE, ARE YOU REALLY TRYING TO TELL HIM HE SHOULD'VE JUST SAT BACK AND LET YOU TAKE THE KINGDOM WITHOUT EXPLAINING ANYTHING ? HE'S TRYING TO REACH OUT TO YOU, WHY DO YOU ALWAYS REFUSE TO GIVE HIM A STRAIGHT ANSWER. WHY ARE YOU BEING SO OBTUSE ABOUT THIS. WHAT IS THE REASON)

this isn't even getting into the fact that it becomes very obvious that Edelgard does not have the whole story behind the church and TWSITD, but there's no way to call that into question either. from what i understand from a few spoilers i've been given, she even gets some parts of the story flat-out wrong. this is The Story that she uses to justify all her actions, to herself and to others, and yet she's clearly missing key details, but we never get to question it, or investigate it further, or do anything about it

and what makes it suck extra is that, as i said, i really wanted so, so badly to love Edelgard. i wanted that bond between her and Byleth to feel real, and earned, and substantial. i wanted to work together and interact with her, to  understand her, bc i genuinely sympathize with her goals. let’s erase inequality, abolish the nobility, destroy the crest system that sustains it, and tear down an oppressively intolerant religious institution ? hell yes sign me up bitch !!!! i don't like that we can't GUIDE her in her pursuit of that, or at least even try to understand why she's so committed to this horrific warpath she's on. bc why else would i have chosen to join her side and play her route ? why else is Byleth there, as her teacher ?

or maybe i'm not even supposed to sympathize with her or her cause, but they never make that point either ! like let's ignore what i want and entertain the notion that perhaps Edelgard's meant to be seen as clearly, dangerously radical and beyond all reason, that her route is supposed to be as close to a "bad" route as this game gets and you're supposed to feel guilty for helping her. i mean there definitely are points that made me go “uh, hey, what we’re doing here is kind of terrible”. the thing is they could've easily made that point at any time during her route, had moments where they highlighted the destruction left in Edelgard's wake as she "carves a bloody path" to her future with Byleth by her side, had her experience some kind of consequence for her actions or a "falling from grace" moment, exposed all the flawed logic behind her actions and examined how she came to be the way she is--but nothing like that ever happens. it’s just like “hooray we successfully invaded and conquered an independent nation :) on to the next one !” even in the epilogue, there's no downside to helping her win, no sort of realistic consequence like, idk, malcontent spreads, people aren’t happy that Edelgard took over their nation by force despite the reforms, riots flare up, etc etc., nothing that asks the player to stop and think about all this. they play everything straight but then refuse to give it meaning or make sense of any of it

and there's PLENTY of ways to make sense of it. even i can imagine some potential in-universe explanations to a lot of the "why" questions i have about Edelgard--why does she preemptively isolate herself from everyone that hasn't already demonstrated unconditional allegiance to her, why does she refuse to seek other allies or reach out to her peers like Dimitri or Claude for help and yet continue to associate with the dangerous group that is the source of her trauma, why does she rightly question one narrative while she never thinks to question the other, why does she resort to violence so quickly and easily even as she laments it, etc etc. the problem is that *the game itself* doesn't even THINK to try and address any of this, and so it's never able to make a point about any of it

so yeah, the point COULD'VE BEEN that she is too stubborn, too far gone, too caught up in her own narrative to comprehend that her actions are not as necessary as she thinks they are, too self-righteous to see the parallels between herself and Rhea as she needlessly sacrifices countless lives for her cause while she claims that HER life is too important to lose, too stuck in her own head to see the hypocrisy in her denouncement of the nobility and church and their treatment of the masses while SHE, Miss Imperial Royalty herself, throws others' lives away for her war--BUT the point is never made !! there's no statement from that point of view either ! there is literally no message ! Edelgard goes through no character development, positive or negative, despite all the groundwork for it being laid out plainly. she does not get a chance to grow, nor does she ever regress, nor is she ever faced with the consequences of her actions, and so no statement is ever made about her character or anything she represents

all the potential was there for Crimson Flower to have been a really good story, and that's why i'm so frustrated that i'm writing an essay about it. and it didn't HAVE to be a positive one with a happy ending, or even a mixed, bittersweet one, which i think would've been best. it easily could've been a tragic story about like, Byleth witnessing the fall of their misguided student firsthand as they try and fail to reach out to her, powerless to save her from herself as she drifts away from everybody, being forced into a position where her death becomes necessary in order to preserve the lives of others, or something--but it didn't try to do anything like that. it didn't try to do ANYTHING ! in fact, i would say her character is much more compelling in all the other routes where she DIES, if only bc at least then it feels like SOMETHING is being said about her character

the real kicker is that, at the end of Crimson Flower, it's said that Edelgard goes on to abolish the nobility, and yet in the epilogue she remains the emperor, and all your other units of noble birth still...... have noble titles and landholdings. not to mention i can't even be sure if the scene where Byleth's crest disappears is supposed to represent the disappearance of all crests, or just Byleth's ? so like i don't actually know what i'm supposed to think Edelgard accomplished ? what was the point of mindlessly helping her commit war crimes ? if not a character arc, or a plot resolution, or some greater message, or even the world state i was promised to get from siding with her, what exactly am i supposed to get out of this route ???

i keep thinking about how it feels in contrast to her progression in every other route, and to how Dimitri is written. bc when Byleth joins anyone else, Edelgard always dies, as Dimitri does. but unlike with Dimitri, intsys didn't adapt Edelgard's progression to Byleth's presence, beyond the simple facts of whether she wins/loses and lives/dies. what i’ve gathered from the other routes is that they portray her as a senselessly violent, incomprehensible, self-righteous kid with too much power who became consumed by it and then dies/is killed as a natural consequence of her own actions. i was expecting the difference in her route to be that we get to explore her side more and understand her inner workings and what could have led her down this path, and then to either get the chance to make a difference, or to be dragged down with her as a cautionary tale. but she STILL comes across as senselessly violent, incomprehensible, self-righteous and power-trippy, except now i get to enable her, and that’s presented as like, a genuinely wholesome thing ?

my gf has said that it feels like you're not meant to side with Edelgard, just from how poorly written and constructed her entire route is**, and i've been getting the same feeling. having finished it, the whole thing felt hollow. her actions and choices always feel absurd and frustrating because we never get any insight into what she's thinking, there's too much Telling and not enough Showing to back up any of the Telling, there are so many aspects of the route that don't make sense, and there's no ATTEMPT to make them make sense

(**seriously the production value felt so low at times that it got embarrassing to watch. like after part 1, Jeritza just dropped off the face of the planet with no explanation, and no one in the game ever brought him up again or even wondered where he was, not even Edelgard. then the recent game update suddenly added him to my roster right before i was about to finish the route, again with no explanation, and no in-game acknowledgement of this. which can only lead me to believe that Jeritza was actually SUPPOSED to be there the whole time but intsys.... forgot about him ? LIKE... THEY FORGOT TO WRITE THE DEATH KNIGHT INTO EDELGARD'S ROUTE ? WHAT)

in fact, it feels to me a lot like death was always the intended resolution for her character and everything was always written around that, but then they decided that wasn't an appropriate tone/direction to take for a route in which Byleth joins her, but then they weren't even bothered to really revise the route in any meaningful way so they just went "fuck it" and gave us.... whatever this mess is. but if so, if intsys really was so set on having her be this tragic misguided villain, i don't understand why they didn't commit to that narrative in her route as well, instead of just half-assing everything and doing nothing meaningful and wasting my time. hell i don't understand why they even bothered to include an Edelgard route if their hearts clearly weren't in it to begin with. just let her be the villain that you guys obviously wanted her to be and go

but, whatever. at least all the OTHER Black Eagle characters were great

[scarlett-olivier]

Writing Tip #9

Constructing great villains;

Expanding on "Every villian is the hero of their own story" can be a bit difficult to put to words, and can be misunderstood quite easily. A lot of people may see that sentence and feel like their villian has to have some kind of tragic backstory that makes the character sympathetic to the reader.

That's not entirely true.

What this sentence actually means, is that your villians are people too. They're not, nor should they be, cardboard cutouts of some one-sided stereotype. They should have their own goals and motivations. They should have desires and wants, same as any other individual. At the end of the day, they all have to shit and eat, just like everyone else. Granted, sometimes people are just bad, but they still have basics. They have reasons for doing things, even if we don't understand those reasons. The majority of them feel justified in their reasoning.

"Because I felt like it." Is a valid reason. Imagine not being able to feel anything. No emotion. No happiness, joy, love, hate, envy, satisfaction. Nothing. Then you discover that by doing this one thing, you can FEEL. It's heady. It's intoxicating. It's a fucking rush. Adrenaline pumps in your veins for that first time, and you can feel excitement. It's so strong you become aroused by it. Suddenly, the need to take the same action again, just to feel,something, becomes inescapable. Over and over, you seek out those feelings. However, like any drug, you eventually become numb to the dose. It requires taking bigger, more extreme actions just to get that same rush from before.

"I don't know why." Is also a valid reason. This time imagine that you once were able to feel emotions. You experienced the whole spectrum of human emotion, but, over time, those feelings started to fade away. You can no longer empathize, or sympathize with anyone. You're numb and there's nothing that can fix it. You start doing reckless and dangerous things, just because none of it seems to matter anymore. You hurt yourself, you hurt others, you destroy everything you touch. Why? Because nothing feels real anymore. Nothing matters. It's pointless. No matter what you do, everything will keep going on just the same. Day after day, after day, after day.

The above examples are extreme cases, but they do show that everyone has motivations. Whether it be just to feel something, or just to prove something to yourself.

Your villian can think that they're in the right. This is a valid villain as well. They believe that whatever the means, they're justified so long as they can reach their end goal. That's what makes them so dangerous to your protagonist. Both of these characters think they're in the right. They will fight tooth and nail against each other just to try and prove their point. This can cause your characters to become very morally ambiguous. Especially if the villain causes your protagonist to throw all of their beliefs into question. The villain can use their own past experiences, draw upon their own private pain, and use it to manipulate, twist around, and torture your protagonist.

There are many different types of villain, and they can all be very real threats to your hero. To construct the best villain for your story, it really comes down to a few basic questions.

What message are you trying to convey with your story?

· Construct a villain that is the antithesis to your overall message/theme. However, remember to keep them human. Give them flaws. Just like your protagonist. (Like the Borg were to STNG. They were driven to assimilate as many species as they could,in effort of achieving perfection, but they also had flaws that could be exploited. They were also the antithesis to The Federations Primary Objective.)

At what point did your villain become evil?

·There's a turning point for everyone. A moment that triggers them to act a certain way. It can even be a series of events, known as stressors, that eventually cause you villain to embrace the darkness within them. (Seymour from Final Fantasy is a good example of a tragic backstory if you need one.)

What are your villains ethics, or moral values?

· Villains are complicated, just like your protagonist. They can have codes of honor and ethics. They might be vile, but they never harm children, for example. They might make families a no touch zone. Or they might tale the rule of law to the extreme, and take it upon themselves to act as Judge, Jury, and Executioner. (Example; Alexander Pierce from the Marvel Universe. In an effort to create a Utopia, he killed, maimed, and tortured indiscriminately to try and reach that goal. Or, Light Yagami from Death Note, for you anime fans out there. )

What are your villain's positive attributes?

· Just like your protagonist, they have both flaws and good wrapped up into one. This makes them relatable to the reader. Maybe they love animals, and fly off the handle when they see one hurt. Maybe they despise bullies and will step in to defend a kid against one. Maybe they volunteer at a homeless shelter. The choices are limitless.

Do you want your villain to be redeemable?

· Decide if you eventually want your villain character to become a good guy. If you do want them to be a good guy, don't let them do things that are unforgivable. Like killing, or otherwise hurting kids. Or genocide. There are somethings that no matter what that character does to try and redeem themselves, they'll never be able to come back from. (Strangely enough, killing a few adults seems to be forgivable. Looking at you Arrow.) If not, Umbridge away.

These are just a few things to ask yourself and think about when crafting your villain. This is not, by any means, a definitive guide. Hopefully, however, it will get you started on creating a realistic, and truly threatening villain for your story.

[daeliariddle]

My opinion About Cassie Cage.

First of all, I write from my humblest ignorance having not read the Comics of Mortal Kombat. When I can finally read them I hope my opinion will change, or in any case, have more support.  Again, I don’t want to read myself as Cassie’s hypocritical Hater. And it’s just my personal opinion, we can discuss it, agree or disagree. Forgive my bad English. I try to learn slowly. 

I like Johnny and Cassie, but I can’t stand most of their fans, especially those who hate Sonya because "she’s mean to Johnny," "she’s boring," "she needs to be replaced by Cassie." And Cassie is a character fucking fanservice and Mary Sue lately, level with Kitana. And worse, those ridiculous arguments, usually created by men: “whose is the most beautiful, Sonya or Cassie?” Totally unnecessary and even machist Besides having her, Sonya (which is my favorite character but I hate to have her classic moves taken away, it seems that one plays with Ronda Rousey and not with Sonya Blade), I am bored by the Special Forces! Takeda and Kung Jin gave more diversity (a Shirai-Ryu with telepathic powers and a shaolin monk). I’m sick of drones and turrets for Sonya, that better be for Cassie and Jacqui. Something that I do not like is that they have (and people also think) that Sonya took hers out and will take her classic moves to give to her daughter. That would make me less like Cassie. And honestly, it wouldn’t help Cassie’s character. She already has her father’s power and personality. Her mother’s appearance and her own work, also her classical movements, which distinguish Sonya from other female characters? Oh, please don’t. That doesn’t even happen between Sindel and Kitana. Cassie seems like a mixed character of Johnny and Sonya, a mere recycling who desperately tries to grasp the trends to get attention.Something even Jacqui and the others don’t need so badly.  It’s kind of understandable because they’re her parents, but what NRS does with Cassie making her an exaggerated mix of Johnny and Sonya... It’s like seeing Kira at Deception! Who was a Black Dragon with the movements of Sonya and Kano.

Cassie is the easy way out of having a female character who’s nice to fans. And they’re wasting the genuine power that she has independently of her parents all the time remembering who they are. We know how inheritance and genetics work, we don’t need to keep mentioning it in the game, and worse fans. The obvious is not said.

Which is a shame, because for me, a more progressive evolution would have been better for Cassie. I felt very abrupt that her MKX debut was the one that defeats Shinnok, because the chance is incredible! She has the power of her father. Arguational convenience, where? I miss Kung Jin as the friend who annoys you, as the friend who puts your feet on the ground. sarcastic. Loose mouth. Sincere to the point of cynicism. (Although I don’t see people hating her character as they do Sonya when she’s not so cruel, either, but many will understand me.) That friend who will insult you in front but will defend you behind your back.  Like antithesis and some rivalry with Cassie worked great. Because I think he was helping to show more fluently and naturally Cassie’s flaws and insecurities, who’s trying to get away from her parents' shadows and make her way. But unfortunately they do not stop doing it. Kung Jin was like Jax to Sonya. And for me, he needed it. Jacqui is great, but she also had her own drama with her father.

{ And That’s Cassie, that hairstyle for her is a thousand times better than MK11’s sappy ponytail. Cassie is the cute, cool girl. Blonde with blue eyes. Centennial, modern. Fresh personality. witty, irreverent. A female Johnny with the physical appearance of her mother. Addicted to the phone, addicted to bubblegum, making the Dab. We just need to be told that he plays Fortnite in her spare time. And I’m not saying it’s wrong. It’s obvious that Cassie was created to be popular, but why not make her brown like the father, make her serious like the mother? But I don’t like the way I do it, to feel like I’m reading Ginny Weasley in Harry Potter and Half-Blood Prince.

That’s the problem. The difference between making a good character, and a character that likes. When you can do both, it results in a great character! But when you can’t. It’s very easy to resort to the popular, to the comfortable. Not to put too many defects on a character for fear that he/she might be hated. Which I didn’t feel with Cassie. And personally, I love when a character is not perfect. When he/she shows flaws. When that character is afraid, he/she may fall ill to others for his actions. He/she can be cowardly, liar, irrational, .When he/she’s vain, hypocrite. He/she does not want to listen. And yet it’s believable. It’s real. And that’s why I love Sonya on MKX, because she was real. She was believable. She wasn’t a good mother, and I have already expressed that in my previous post. And not only is Cassie the problem, the daughter’s first debut of an attractive martial arts celebrity and a beautiful Special Forces blonde woman? Defeat an Elder Fallen God: Shinnok? Let’s see, Cassie is about twenty and so many years old. She has gone through a teaching and military life as her mother, but with her father at her side, being her support. While her mother was away, Sonya spent more time on her mission, according to Johnny she used to devote more to family than to work. Surely in Cassie’s early years of life, and bearing in mind that Jacqui also came to Sonya for his father. That was the breakup, I must think, in marriage and family CageBlade. But the problem is not the characters, Cassie is great, D'vorah the same, the problem is, ironically, for me the time. The problem is the Time. And it makes the evolution, the progress of the character Cassie lacks something. I even found the evolution of Jacqui more realistic. Even though Jacqui’s character is the same as Cassie’s. It’s a female version of Jax. And at the same time it’s compared to her best friend. Which is highlighted by its physical appeal, to be like her father and to have defeated Shinnok. It’s a problem. If you are going to extol a character then what happens to others? They are "unbridled". It is not equitable. Especially since Jacqui and Cassie have lived together, among them is a bit of harmless rivalry/friendship. And fandom exaggerates this (and so does Cetrion when she says that Jacqui is jealous of Cassie). The same thing happens to Sonya because of fandom and Cassie, in a way. They have a complicated relationship of mother and daughter, and fandom ends up hating Sonya. On the other hand, I think Johnny is more natural about evolution, perhaps because of the years you’ve known the character since the '90s. And his adulthood. The opposite of Cassie’s evolution in the same game (MKX). Even he realizes how annoying and, to a certain extent, machist he was with Sonya, and his younger version. 

It’s ironic that Cassie could have (at least in the game, I remember I didn’t read the Comics yet) finally had a talk with her mother. A mother who could be her sister. Although she would have wanted this sister to have her leg grab, arc kick, air drop, rising bicycle kick, kiss of death, so that they would have differentiated better, showing what Sonya was before technology, when she used her legs and brains to fight (which she tells Jax on MKDOTR) Cassie instead in John Wick mode with infinite ammo weapons, drones and turrets. It would be a better way to show the past and present among them. Not with crude comments.

If a character will do something or have a big change, why not show it better? Even I felt that Scorpion/Hanzo missed more. Because in MKX at times I found two different characters, two different bodies even though we know Scorpion is Hanzo Hasashi’s manipulated spectrum at the hands of Quan Chi. We know it’s been decades, I personally don’t feel that weight of time. Especially with Cassie. Both she and D'vorah to my view must first "pay your dues" (or “pagar derecho de piso” as we say in Argentina). Or do hazing with the new characters: KombatKids, D'vorah, Kotal Kahn, Erron Black, etc. Otherwise, it’s very shocking to see new characters from nowhere taking so much prominence in such a short time against classic characters. Especially when they don’t measure up, their story falls short, their skills. Or quite the opposite, they end up devouring too much prominence in an unreal way. 

Although well, Erron Black is not hated because everyone loves that he flirts with almost all female characters, that he has JUST killed those characters that not even the creators wanted (Kobra and Hsu Shao), the design that he has, his voice, his movements. She also sins from the same thing as Cassie (created to be popular) although in history mode she is relegated to be Kotal Kahn’s bitch and then Kano’s.

Instead, D’vorah has an unattractive design (although for me original and it was time to have more characters who do not look like humans), treacherous, seeking (just like Tanya) their own survival. It has been involved OF THE SAME WAY that Cassie in the story (taking on MKX until her chapter), many things does in one game. To be loyal to Kotal and then betray him. And even, for many, take the courage to kill Baraka, Mileena, and for worse in the next game, kill Hanzo. 

And also, where does the relationship between Jade and Kotal Kahn come from? A classic character like Jade, linked to Kitana, Sindel, Shao Kahn and other edenians. Kotal Kahn who has his story tied to Shao Kahn although he is a new character, at what point in the story have they met? Because if I’m being honest, I don’t remember anything in MK9 or MKX.

Classic characters and loved by the fandom. I don’t dislike that he killed them (although I love those three characters) but it’s definitely surprising, a completely new character, in two appearances causing so much havoc. Cassie the same, but she just “killed” a not so dear but an ELDER GOD.

For me, it was missing that one knew Cassie and the other KombatKids, like the other debutante characters of MKX (and a little Skarlet if I’m honest), more development time to adapt to them, if they are going to replace classical characters (in theory) not to give him the debut of just giving us data of his story and finally they are protagonists; he also hoped to see more Kenshi who is of the few characters of the third era that give him his space. It is not pleasant that, characters with whom one lives for decades are abruptly replaced by others (and I remove from here to Liu Kang because we go, he is the main protagonist and was present in almost all the games, and has been the Chosen One) But the others have not been so lucky. Especially since I never know in the end what canon is or not, a pity. And now, with MK11 developing every character, every change has gone to waste.

So in short. To my eyes MKX must have been mainly about how Mileena tries to be Kanhum, fighting Kotal. Sonya, Jax, SF and Johnny versus Shinnok as it happened in the beginning. And, the flashbacks of the KombatKids must have been the present. And get to know D'vorah better, Erron Black. Make a second part with a more mature Cassie but at the same time reflecting on herself. And there defeating Shinnok. And then the plot of MK11. With some changes. Timelines are a good excuse to do fanservice, do, remake and undo. And then press reset and go back to the comfort zone. But, you know, if I have a great reason to love Cassie, it’s because, after all, what got her to beat Shinnok was love for her father. And at the same time, the endings of the CageBlade family are, are seen and will be a beautiful family. And that’s the most important thing of all, that they love each other.

[thecapturedafrique]

I’m an Eos stan and I’m not ashamed to admit it. He’s a smug, cocksure, compassionate, flirty, overprotective, charming, self-sacrificing thot and if you can’t tell how all his posturing hides some hardcore insecurities/fears then @ me and I’ll def drop the character analysis I’ve been writing/planning practically since day one. It’s called character development people.

More ranting in the tags so you have been warned lol.

[a-mellowtea]

This is a little bit delayed, ‘cause I’ve been having some issues with internet. It’s back for now, so... lemme talk some Avengers: Infinity War. 

First off, as a non-spoilery general recap of my thoughts: it was enjoyable. It had its problems, some rather large, but I loved it for what it was. I went in with no expectations beyond trailer hype and was thoroughly shaken and surprised.

From here, I’m getting into some detail so there will be spoilers below the cut. You have been warned.

I’m going to start off with what I didn’t like, because while I’m seeing it again on Sunday, these are initial thoughts and I’d best get the bad out of the way before I forget the specifics.

THOR: RAGNAROK

If there’s one aspect of the movie I can say that I outright - or damn near - hated, it’s the unraveling of Thor: Ragnarok. In a way, I can see what the Russos were going for - it showcases Thanos’ warped idea of mercy by mercilessly slaughtering a people with nowhere to run, who had just lost their home, all for the sake of getting the Space stone. 

However, and as the end credits of the aforementioned Thor movie demonstrated, this is directly after Thor: Ragnarok - I’m talking minutes. Realistic in its unfairness as it may be, all it feels like is a cheap shot. Thor: Ragnarok ended with hope; with Thor on the throne, his people bruised but having survived, and Loki choosing to stay. Infinity War begins with Valkyrie dead in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shot (I’m not... too angry at that, but I understand why some are and it’s rightly so), Thor beaten, and Heimdall and Loki’s deaths.

Was it a good punch to start the movie off with? Certainly. The scenes were great. Heimdall’s final act giving Earth a warning. Thanos beating Hulk. Loki not being able to bear seeing Thor in agony, him calling himself ‘Odinson’, using his classic trickery to try and kill Thanos. It was very well done.

Was it worth undoing almost the entire previous movie? No.

On top of that, we see Thor regain his eye (in a way) and a new, more powerful weapon. In the end, it simply felt as though Ragnarok was rendered a little... pointless.

KICKING CHARACTERS WHILE THEY’RE DOWN

This is an odd, sort of bottom-of-the-barrel downside for me, as I went into the movie having read the comics and fully aware that this was meant to be the low point for the characters of the Marvel Universe. That being said, there’s a certain point where it just starts to feel like a bit... too much?

The character I want to mention most here is Wanda (though the ‘they were so close!’ fight on Titan is an instance of it as well). I was surprised that the Russos went in for her romance with Vision, then ultimately had her actually kill him. The scene was beautiful in its tragedy at that, at least for me - I know some people adamantly dislike their relationship, and that’s perfectly fine.

For a second, while the ultimate outcome is hilariously predictable, the movie gets hopeful again. One of the Infinity Stones is destroyed. The good guys have a chance. But then Thanos gets it anyways, effectively letting Wanda know that she failed, making her watch Vision die again, and actually leading to her ‘death’.

There’s a fine line in writing. Your audience should, under most circumstances and to my knowledge, never feel like things are completely hopeless. That leads to a loss of investment. For me, the Russos just stumbled over that line, and it was irritating.

This also ties into another point about how the movie treats its female characters, which I’ve decided not to get into because I chose to avoid the topic most of the time. All I’ll say is that, while characters like Natasha, Gamora, Wanda, Shuri and Okoye get the limelight and are as badass as ever (whew, man, they were stellar), their treatment from a writing standpoint is somewhat disappointing.

PACING

Another rather minor, very subjective issue I had with the movie was its pacing. Some scenes felt like they lingered just long enough, while other plot threads felt like they weren’t given nearly enough time.

However, I fully understand that there’s only so much the film could do with its 2h 40min runtime and that it’s insanely difficult to balance everything you need to fit in there. Thankfully, I will say that there’s not much if anything I feel could’ve been taken out of the film to lessen this problem.

Upon initial viewing, that is all I can honestly say I disliked. Onto what I did, because there was some incredible stuff in this movie. That basically encapsulates everything I didn’t mention above, but there are a few things I loved that I feel are worth specifically mentioning.

PERFORMANCES

Everyone's acting was stellar. From Chris Evans to Tom Holland and everyone in between, the entire cast brought their A-game and it was a joy to watch.

THE DEATHS

Oh-ho man. It wouldn't be Infinity War without some genuinely heart-wrenching moments, and the film was not short on them. Thor losing legitimately everything made me want to curl into the fetal position. Gamora realizing she’s the one thing Thanos loves and her subsequent forced sacrifice broke my heart. Our baby Peter Parker dissolving into ash took about 5 years off my life. It was good.

I know some people - rightly - feel that almost every death was a cheap shot, and the entire movie itself crumbled at the supports because we know there are sequels coming for many of the ‘killed’ characters, and many others who they’d have to be out of their minds to get rid of. For me, while knowing that takes away from it after the fact, it didn’t so much in the moment.

THE MUSIC

Alan Silvestri was brought back, and I honestly have yet to be disappointed by this man’s work. I cannot tell you how loud the cheers were in my showing when the original Avengers theme first began to blare, nor can I put into words the stunned silence as the soft piano rendition of the aforementioned theme brought the film to a close. It was phenomenal.

THANOS

I love to hate him and hate to love him. He’s not a perfect villain, and perhaps not Marvel’s best - they’ve always had trouble in that field - but for what he was, he was fantastic. He wasn’t sympathetic, but understandable. While his ideas of mercy and universal balance could (and probably should) be easily described as psychotic, you could honestly tell that he genuinely thought what he was doing was right. That doesn’t mean it was, but it’s a step in the right direction for Marvel’s baddies going forward.

Other small, honorable mention/moment-to-moment things I loved were Steve 'I am EXTRA’ Rogers’ entrance; “You’re embarrassing me in front of the wizards”; Red Skull; Eitri and Nidavellir; my girl, STEM super-star Shuri effortlessly schooling Banner; Peter Parker’s continuing saga of pop culture references; Thanos being the definition of amazingly petty and actually doing the snap and; cutting Samuel L. Jackson off mid-”motherfucker” (and just getting to see Hill and Fury again).

All in all and despite some glaring flaws, I can honestly say that I enjoyed Infinity War. I was definitely a sobbing mess at the end (Peter’s death is what pushed me over that particular edge) and I cannot wait for Part II/Avengers 4.

Carol! Please come unfuck this!