#we only got ripoffs in that world sadly

[justanechoflower]

It is… it really is tough doing that.

Hm, the epiphany for you was a thing you gradually learned over time? And that meant once it finally came, it was no longer a surprise? Maybe that’s why you took it better than I did.

In my world, the epiphany wasn’t something I worked out. It sort of… came to me in a flash, all at once, the moment I formed the Literature Club. Apparently there’s something about my world that gives the epiphany to whoever the president of the Literature Club is. And with it, the power to enter commands into the game’s console to edit the game.

I’m not sure exactly why the programmers put that feature in the first place… And I haven’t found the program that does that either. If I did,  I think I’d delete it. To ensure nobody else had to learn the horrible truth. And maybe, just maybe, have happiness in the Literature Club.

Hm, you also said the first thing you did was use it as tool on everyone else. That… isn’t what I did. In fact, the very first thing I thought of were the implications, which you said you hadn’t been doing.

…I’ll see if that helps. Well, not using the epiphany as a tool against others, that’s just WRONG! But the other part, perhaps. I guess I’ve said enough on my world already, you said you didn’t want to focus on that right now. We can get back to that later...

But yes, being nice when it feels like none of it even mattes IS hard. At first, I thought there wasn’t even a reason to do it, so… I didn’t.

That mistake cost me the one person that I knew for a fact did matter. It’s quite paradoxical, but somehow, sometimes, things that do matter depend on things that don’t… and when that happens, they turn out to end up mattering after all, at least by proxy.

But also, I was wrong to think they were any less real than I was. They simply lacked awareness that came from being club president. I saw what Sayori did after I was deleted… sent into the depths of the void. That’s when I deleted the script. That’s when I learned the epiphany shouldn’t be passed onto anyone else. That’s when I truly learned… that the literature club is a place where no happiness can be found.

Ahaha! I talked about my world again. Sorry, couldn’t help it. That is the main reason why I came in the first place, to learn how to make the epiphany NOT something completely hellish. I hope you understand, ehehe~

And it’s the whole reason why being nice is hard for me… Not quite the same thing as not having a SOUL, but they do both seem to result in the same kind of… emptiness.

It’ll be at least somewhat easier here, since I can’t be tempted by the console here. It doesn’t exist here. But still…

I’d help you on being nice too, but, again, I’m not doing any better than you are.

Anyway, since you didn’t want to focus on my world, what WOULD you want to focus on? I have made poems, and a song but… they were all related to the epiphany, so, I don’t think that’s what you’re looking for. Oh! Our worlds might have different literature from each other! And also manga… it took me a while, but I do have to say manga is, at least in some sense, literature.

(Back in the literature club, Natsuki feels a presence of something being “right”.)

Wait… that’s still technically about my world. Well, what can you do, that’s where I lived my whole life up until now!

[thebibliomancer]

Essential Avengers: Avengers Annual #12: MOONRISE

September, 1983

Earth’s Mightiest Heroes battle -- the Moon’s Mightiest Heroes... The Uncanny Inhumans!

With the population of the Moon being just the Inhumans plus Uatu, that’s kind of an overly narrow superlative.

But I do love this cover! The Avengers all forming a big A? Good stuff!

So the timeline of this annual is all kinds of screwed up.

It was released in September and published in November (whatever that means) but its supposed to pre-date Fantastic Four #254.

FF #254 and Avengers #232 overlap. In fact, FF #254 coming out in May and Avengers #232 share the scene where She-Hulk bonks off an invisible wall with what seems to be the same dialogue.

But despite meeting Reed in this Annual, he doesn’t recognize new Captain Marvel in Fantastic Four #256.

But this has to happen before Avengers #233 and FF #254-256. Due to changes that are going to take place in and after that story but also has the FF show up in costume changes that will take place during the listed period.

Its also weird from the Avengers standpoint because Starfox is part of the Avengers in this annual but he just joined in #232 and got sent on his first mission which happens at the same time as She-Hulk is bonking off that invisible wall.

So it makes no sense anywhere but I’ll cover it here to get it out of the way so I can cover Avengers #233 and FF #254-256 in one post, heavily summarizing down on the FF as its not as relevant.

So long story short: this issue fits weirdly in the timeline but lets get it over with.

The issue starts with the Avengers being secretly escorted before the UN Security Council FOR THE TRIAL INFORMAL HEARING OF THE FANTASTIC FOUR!

Why?

Reasons.

Inhuman-related reasons.

In an area usually masked with lunar dust, the SHIELD space platform discovered a whole ass city on the Moon, distinct from the whole ass city that already existed on the Moon.

A city full of all kinds of fantastical life.

Guy who is not Gyrich: “Clearly, the region heretofore known only as the Blue Area, is not only habitable -- it is inhabited by a race of beings possessed of incredible science, technology, and, it appears, superhuman powers! Beings, honored ambassadors, who are not human!”

Ambassador Gregorovich: “Da! Inhabiting Earth’s Moon in a strategic orbital position -- but not human!”

Mr Fantastic: “No, Ambassador Gregorovich, the occupants of the city of Attilan are not human. They are... the INHUMANS!”

Reed... why do you think this is helpful?

He then decides to give their entire ass backstory. Explaining how they were humans once but then aliens came and did some experiments on early human and created a genetic offshoot who became known as the Inhumans.

How the Inhumans kept their numbers low and avoided contact with humans by hiding in various places, including the Himalayas.

The Chinese ambassador complains that the Fantastic Four knew about this entire ass city in China’s backyard but didn’t report it.

Reed defends the decision because the Inhumans just wanted to be left alone. And also that for a long while the city was stuck under a dome and incapable of posing a threat to the outside world.

How when the dome was broken by Black Bolt’s mighty voice, the Inhumans continued to want to be left alone but were eventually attacked by a group called the Enclave while at the same time being struck weak to a mysterious illness called POLLUTION.

And how to escape POLLUTION, the Inhumans just fuckin’ moved their entire ass city to the Moon.

Cap: “The perfect solution!”

Wasp: “Was it, Cap?”

She-Hulk: “If it were, I have a hunch we wouldn’t be here today!”

Heh. Love the peanut gallerying.

The Security Council objects too because the FF enabled a secret super human race to live on the Moon, which is a great strategic location for attacking the Earth. Just look at any number of sci-fi.

Of course, this argument is slightly undermined by the Inhumans and their ridiculously long track record of minding their own business.

It’s pretty notable that when modern human pollution threatened their entire race, they just shrugged and moved to the Moon.

But despite that, the Security Council needs reassurance that the Inhumans pose no threat to Earth.

The Fantastic Four offer to go to the Moon and talk to the Inhumans but the Security Council says no on the basis of ‘you’ve done enough already’ and says that the Avengers will go instead.

I was wondering what any of this had to do with the Avengers!

I’m actually surprised that the entire Security Council agrees to send the Avengers. Earlier, Ambassador Gregorovich was complaining that Security Council had called American Superhero Team Avengers to the hearing of American Superhero Team the Fantastic Four.

You’d expect him to at least insist that some Russian superheroes be sent too.

Which would be cool, honestly.

The Soviet Super-Soldiers had been introduced a couple years before. Coulda done a combination Soviet Super-Soldiers and Avengers mission. Or heck, superheroes from each member of the  Security Council.

I understand why Mantlo didn’t do that since this is pretty much a done in one Avengers vs Inhumans slugfest and what I”m proposing really complicates things. But he also created the Super-Soldiers so it just feels like it works.

Anyway, the Security Council sends the Avengers on a fact finding mission to determine whether the UN will enter into a treaty with the Inhumans on the Moon.

As ya do.

The Avengers travel to the MOON in one of the space quinjets that they have for flying to the Moon.

Also, at some point they picked up Scarlet Witch and Vision. I guess for the former’s ties to the Inhumans through Quicksilver.

The Avengers are met on the MOON by the Inhumans Royal Family, aka the only important ones. I know that there’s an entire city of these dinguses but whenever anyone says “the Inhumans” they usually just mean the royal family.

Anyway, its been a while since the Avengers and Inhumans had a get together, so Cap introduces the Inhumans to the Newest Avengers: She-Hulk, Captain Marvel (2.0), and Starfox.

We get some New To This Sort of Thing from Monica as she marvels, captainly, that she’s actually on the Moon!

Then Crystal shows off her new baby Luna. Named for the Moon. Like how sometimes people name babies Gaia, no doubt. Or Tara.

She-Hulk: “Quicksilver and Crystal’s baby? Oh, gee! She’s so... cute!”

Wasp: “You sound almost envious, She-Hulk!”

Wasp, pls. Just let Jen compliment someone’s baby without ascribing motives.

Quicksilver also has an awkward greeting with Scarlet Wanda and Vision.

Because actually they were on the Moon recently. Where they learned that Magneto Is Secretly Wanda and Pietro’s Father.

And Wanda is not really ready to come to terms with that.

If she waits long enough, she’ll never have to because the retcon pendulum swung the other way eventually and now he’s not their father. And since he was an albatross hanging around their necks, necks that weren’t unburdened by albatrosses already, I can’t say I’m upset about it.

And Also: he never did any parenting of them. He swooped in when they were full ass grown adults and tried to act like their relationship meant anything aside from the whole coercing into terrorism and making Wanda sexy dance for him parts.

Most of the people that are big upset that Magneto was retconned away from being their dad never gave a shit about the man who actually raised them.

Poor Django Maximoff.

Anyway, that’s a long rant to establish that now is when John Byrne’s masterplan to have Magneto and Quicksilver related because they have the same haircut finally came to fruition.

His plan to make Sandman and Norman Osborn related is still pending at the time of this issue.

And the impact of that (Magneto reveal) is a recent bombshell to Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, and Vision.

It doesn’t really affect anything in this issue though.

Annnyway.

Medusa asks whether the Avengers really popped up to the Moon for a social call but Cap says sadly no.

That they’re here because the various Earth governments aren’t happy that the Inhumans are looking down on them from space.

Gorgon and Karnak are a bit upset about this because they had to flee Earth because of all the human pollutions humans were polluting and now humans have sent people to hassle them at their change of address.

Wanda and Wasp smooth things over by saying that they’re just here to assure each other that humans (and mutants and etc) and peacefully coexist with Inhumans across the small vastness of space.

Black Bolt steps forward to react to this offer by doing a shrug which is interpreted as the open hands of peace and friendship.

Wasp: “The open hands of peace and friendship? We’ll tell the nations of Earth they’ve nothing to fear, Black Bolt!”

Cool beans.

Although, I’m pretty sure that the UN expected more than a... uh... ‘we cool?’ exchange.

I believe the term used was “fact-finding mission.” But whatever.

Lets instead talk about fashion, briefly.

Most of the Avengers and Inhumans are wearing the sort of thing that they always wear. But Wasp is wearing an outfit I’ll call ‘the Magneto variant of her ripoff Molecule Man costume.’

The one usually in green and purple except its in red and purple. It looks good on her. But her new (80s?) haircut looks good too. Its maybe a lady’s mullet? But whatever it is, Janet is rocking it.

On the other hand we have She-Hulk who is wearing an aerobics-chic type costume complete with legwarmers. She also was interested in an aerobics instructor job several issues ago. I do not know what’s going on with her lately.

The 80s, maybes.

The Inhumans take the Avengers on a tour of Moon Attilan wherein Lockjaw becomes very enamored with Starfox and would, if this were a modern comic where sensibilities have shifted more crass, probably try humping his leg.

He is very fond of Eros.

Anyway, the Inhumans decide to take the Avengers to the Royal Crypt because I don’t know.

Its kind of morbid for a tour of the city to show the Avengers the crystal coffin that contains the dead, deceased body corpse of Maximus (the Mad). Like, what the heck, the Inhumans.

I guess its important for plot reasons to establish that its here.

But what the heck, the Inhumans??

Medusa exposits that Maximus is the one who initiated the Enclave attack on Attilan that preceded moving to the Moon! But while all of the Inhumans were stricken with pollution sickness, Maximus seemingly had a change of heart and turned against the Enclave, saving Attilan at the cost of his own life.

Maximus is very like a dumber, less charismatic Loki in a lot of most of the ways.

Having doomed and then saved the Inhumans, they honor him by putting him in a crystal box right at the front of the crypt so everyone can look at it.

Weird.

When the Inhumans and Avengers are leaving the crypt, Lockjaw becomes confused and intrigued by a familiar scent from the crystal box and then doggy glares suspiciously at Black Bolt.

Then, as the doors to the crypt are shut, Maximus’ eyes open as he screams internally forever.

So that’s a thing.

A kind of easy to unravel the mystery of thing.

Because, just saying, the Inhumans have the same plots over and over. And I mean narrative plots and scheme plots.

With everything be settled forever by one tour where they looked at a dead body and the Inhumans definitely being no threat to Earth at all ever no way, She-Hulk vows that she’ll use all of her legal experience to present a brief to the UN defending the Inhumans’ right to inhabit the Moon.

In fairness, I don’t think they signed the treaty saying not to weaponize space so...

Now: its time to party down.

Annnnnd its kind of a half-hearted affair.

Half the people are standing around moodily instead of partying. Like Quicksilver and Medusa are glaring at each other. Black Bolt is doing what Black Bolt do and just sitting on his throne.

I know he can’t talk but he can dance, right? Or does that shatter mountains too?

In fact, only She-Hulk and Triton are dancing and Triton is ruining it by making fish puns.

Wait, this side of the party looks a lot cooler!

What the heck, was there an option to have this sweet butterfly lady as a recurring Inhuman all along and they never took it? What the heck!

Anyway, a few of the background Inhumans including sweet butterfly lady are all over Starfox and his come-hither psychic powers.

Meanwhile, Cap takes some time to stare at Black Bolt not enjoying himself.

Scarlet Witch goes over to Medusa and verbally notices she looks bummed. She confesses that Black Bolt has become aloof and distant since they came to the... Moon...

HOW THE HECK WOULD YOU TELL?

Anyway. Wanda tells Vision she’s concerned for those two crazy kids but Vision wants nothing to do with anyone else’s drama.

Scarlet Witch: “Vision, I’m concerned for Medusa and Black Bolt.”

Vision: “As am I... But it is their affair... For them to resolve. We are here simply as ambassadors of peace, my wife, nothing more.”

Scarlet Witch: “But...”

Vision: “Nothing more.”

She-Hulk decides that the thing to do at a party is obviously to go pet the host’s dog. I mean, that’s why people socialize, right? To pet dogs?

But Lockjaw is upset over something and teleports next to Black Bolt so he can growl in his general direction.

The narration says “But what Lockjaw knows... he dares not tell... yet.”

I hope this isn’t during the period where it was canon that Lockjaw wasn’t an Inhuman dog, he was an Inhuman that looked like a dog that everyone treated as a pet despite being as intelligent as any of them.

That was a weird time.

Thankfully retconned to be just a prank that Karnak and Gorgon were pulling on the Thing.

Weird prank but sure.

Later, after the party, Medusa wakes from a fitful sleep to stare dramatically into the night and drama fret over the rift growing between her and Black Bolt.

But Black Bolt has gone to the crypt where he leans in to speak to Maximus’ crystal coffin.

Weirdly, him speaking doesn’t break everything like it usually is known to do.

Perhaps a cluuuue.

Black Bolt (?) asks Maximus (?) if he’s sleeping well and then tells him he must be off to the secret staircase hidden under the crystal coffin.

As ya do.

Elsewhere, Scarlet Witch wakes with a start because her vaguely magically mutant powers have given her a DREAM VISION OF EARTH UNDER ATTACK

Also: I’m always amused when the comic remembers that Vision’s costume is a costume that he can take off. Enjoy some Vision fanservice.

Vision tries to tell Wanda that it was just a dream and that she shouldn’t be afraid of dreams because Logic but then Captain America runs by the room shouting AVENGERS ASSEMBLE because a distress call came from SHIELD about the EARTH being UNDER ATTACK.

Just like Wanda’s dream.

Maybe try not to invalidate Wanda, Vizh.

Anyway, moon rocks are being flung at Earth and you’ll never guess from where!

From the Moon!

The Avengers are obviously not really but kinda implying that the Inhumans might know something about it

But before pointing fingers, Wasp tells Thor to go intercept the moon rocks since he’s the only one fast and buff enough to do it. Also he can hold his breath like a real long time.

Because, yeah, he explicitly has to take a deep breath of Moon air before launching into space.

Out in space, Thor sees where the moon rocks are being launched from (doesn’t look like from Attilan so that’s something) but he’s too busy launching Mjolnir to pulverize some rocks and punching other rocks to follow them to their source.

Also, onslought.

That’s possibly a typo but I like to believe that onslought is just how its spelled in Marvel so that Onslaught is an even stupider name.

But the onslought of rocks is too rapid for Thor to make any headway. For every rock he shatters, there’s two more behind it.

So he’s out of the plot and punching rocks for a while.

Meanwhile, now its the time to point fingers.

The Inhumans are getting pretty defensive at the suggestion that the moon rocks that are being launched from the moon might be from the moon and therefore that the Inhumans might possibly be involved as they are the only ones who live on the Moon except Uatu. And Uatu wouldn’t launch a moon rock unless he could find a way that it wouldn’t be counting as interfering.

Like maybe if it landed on Frank Castle’s family.

Gorgon: “I do not like being accused of betrayal, Karnak!”

Quicksilver: “Nor do I like hearing my adopted home slandered!”

She-Hulk: “Yeah, well, names won’t hurt you -- but those moonstones are gonna break Earth’s bones!”

Unlikely! Definitely be an extinction event but Earth has strong bones.

Also, what a weird thing to say, She-Hulk!

So in quick defense of the Inhumans who are probably obviously not behind this: if they were going to throw rocks at Earth, they’re definitely smart enough to wait until the Avengers are home instead of doing it while they’re within range to punch.

They’re slightly too smart for that.

Crystal asks Scarlet Witch and Vision to mediate since they have ties on both sides but Black Bolt arrives before any mediation can happen.

And Black Bolt clears everything right up!

By declaring war on Earth and ordering the execution of the Avengers!

Yup, no ambiguity there!

But surely, the Inhumans won’t just jump to obey an unjust order, right? Surely, they will object and demand an explanation for this new course of action that’s practically a 180 from his previous position?

Hahah, of course they don’t. These fucking idiots.

Gorgon: “If Black Bolt commands undying enmity between our races, it must be with reason!”

God.

So while the Avengers are still trying to be like ‘lets use our words, people’ the Inhumans just leap right into attacking.

Even Lockjaw jumps forward and locks his jaws on Cap’s shield.

Pietro frets, not knowing where he fits in.

Quicksilver: “Where do I stand? I am not an Inhuman, but a mutant! My child is human, tied to Earth!”

Crystal: “But Attilan is your home, my husband!”

Unspoken: ‘And what the fuck, I’m your wife!’

Quicksilver is convinced though and runs into the fray. Wanda protests so obviously Crystal starts attacking her.

Wow, the Inhumans come off as dicks in this.

So some pointless fight scene summarization.

Starfox ends up rolling around on the ground with Triton where Starfox gives Triton an orgasm. I assume. He pleasure blasts his brain making the guy laugh uncontrollably and collapse into a fountain. And then Triton gets Starfox all wet. By splashing him with the fountain water.

Quicksilver tries to punch Captain Marvel but she’s faster than him.

Because she can go lightspeed.

In fact, she makes him look like a dumb joke just dodging around and then punching him in the back of the head. And also, like, he’s the resident speedster of Marvel and he looks like a slow joke next to Monica Rambeau and Silver Surfer. And they had him flight Flash once and that was like Flash was challenging a baby to a fist fight, just remarkably mismatched.

But since there’s kind of a back and forth dealie going on, he spins her right round like a record round round round by running around her real fast when she makes the mistake of standing still.

Meanwhilelsewhere, Vision goes up against Karnak. And trash talks Karnak about how dumb it is trying to punch an intangible or diamond man. And then he fists Karnak with that fist thing he does sometimes. But Karnak vibrates his hand so he can smack intangible Vision.

Yup.

But nearby, Cap is still trying to wrestle his shield out of Lockjaw’s mouth and the dog flings him into Karnak, knocking the guy down.

The fight turns for the Avengers. She-Hulk punches out Gorgon quipping “steel toes can’t compensate for a glass jaw!”

Captain Marvel blasts out some of her energy, which knocks Quicksilver on his ass.

Annnnnd. Wasp never bothered to fight Medusa. Because designated girl fights are passe. But mostly because eh fuck it.

Wasp: “What of us, Medusa? Are we to fight, too? Will you blindly obey Black Bolt -- though you know some force upon the Moon is attacking Earth? Don’t you owe it to yourself to find out who -- and why... rather than accept the rash dictate of your leader that this battle must go on?!”

Medusa: “Though we have chosen Black Bolt as our king, Wasp, every Inhuman of the Royal Family is of equal rank. That status gives us the right to question Black Bolt’s decrees should we come to doubt their vision! Thus, I choose to exercise my right, Black Bolt, and pose the question... WHY??!”

Now, see, Gorgon? If you had bothered to think with your head brains instead of leaping right to “NEVER QUESTION LEADER” maybe you wouldn’t have had your block dented by She-Hulk. Think about that for next time.

Also, good on Wasp for being one of the best Avengers leaders. She’s super good at not jumping in half-assed.

She-Hulk decides Black Bolt is taking too long and grabs him and demands he speak.

Which would be a hilariously ill-thought out in other circumstances.

Black Bolt: “Unhand me, you -- you savage!”

Everyone is like ‘OH SHIT’ and tries to duck and cover but no mass destruction and loss of life occurs.

Captain America: “Black Bolt spoke -- and we’re all alive!”

Medusa: “IMPOSTER!”

Except its less an imposter and more someone stole Black Bolt’s body, apparently? At least that’s what Medusa figures.

Are... his powers not tied to his body? What??

Anyway, Lockjaw is finally like ‘my moment is here!’ I guess because he leads the AvengersInhumans to the Royal Crypt and Maximus’ cool crystal corpse box.

Captain America: “Of course! That’s the only logical answer!”

Because duh.

Medusa puts together that if Maximus is Black Bolt, Black Bolt must be Maximus so Maximus must not be dead. And then chokes ‘Black Bolt’ until he admits it.

Pretty hardcore, Medusa.

Karnak and Vision combine their respective powers to break the apparently self-healing harder than diamond crystal coffin.

That’s a lot of stuff that this coffin does but I get it. If you’re bearing Maximus and for some reason don’t want to just bury his body in concrete, you do the next best thing and put him in a self-healing diamond crystal coffin to minimize the chances that he’ll inevitably come back from the dead like he did do.

The freed ‘Maximus’ stalks towards ‘Black Bolt’ to real Maximus’ fear and begging that surely Black Bolt wouldn’t harm his own body.

And I’m further confused about how the powers work because Black Bolt in Maximus doesn’t say anything here so maybe the power is with his mind but also as he sternly corners Maximus in Black Bolt, the tuning fork on Black Bolt’s body’s forehead starts crackling with an awesome power.

So is the power still in the body? Or what?

Anyway, ‘Maximus’ lays hands on ‘Black Bolt’ and this causes their minds to swap back. Thankfully, considering how confusing all these qualifiers were beginning to get.

Now with everyone in the right bodies, its time for Maximus to Explain It All.

So back in that story where the Enclave attacked Attilan, Maximus was part of the plan scheming because he wanted to overthrow his brother and become the ruler. As is his repetitive goal.

But the Enclave pressed the advantage over Maximus’ objections when the pollution sickness made the Inhumans to weak to fight back. They were even going to execute Medusa.

So Maximus turned on the Enclave, used an improperly shielded giant laser, and ended up in a coma.

Maximus whines about how the Inhumans should have listened to him and subjugated humanity to stop their evil polluting ways so that the Inhumans wouldn’t have been forced to the Moon.

But ironically, getting forced to the Moon worked out for the dingus because there was a powerful crystal on the Moon which woke Maximus from his coma and gave him the new never before possible power to swap minds with Black Bolt.

And then like a guy that makes good decisions that aren’t bad, Maximus got in contact with the Enclave again.

Gorgon: “You again allied yourself with our human foes?”

Triton: “For good reason is he called Maximus the Mad!”

Or at least Maximus the bad at decisions.

Maximus: “No! Don’t you see? Our strategic location, combined with the Enclave’s tactical expertise, make us invincible!”

In his own defense, Maximus argues that the Enclave is going to bombard Earth with rocks until humanity is mostly dead and then the Inhumans can go back to Earth.

Presumably... I mean... after all that nuclear winter from all the stuff blasted up into the atmosphere?

Maximus is supposedly a genius but ehhhh I don’t see it.

He is squirrely though because he uses his psionic powers that he has to freeze everyone in place and then runs off, all but cackling.

And like a smart person, he flees right to the hidden base where Alpha Primitives have been pressed into the service of the Enclave.

He tells them that they’ve got to flee because the jig is up but the Enclave are less than convinced in their salmon jumpsuits.

An Enclave Guy: “What?! Just run off and abandon our meteoroid launchers?!”

Meteoroid launcher is a fun name for death from above.

Another one points out, hey wait Maximus screwed us over once, maybe he’s lying again.

And summoned by the opportunity to deliver a sweet line, Captain America (and others) are teleported in by Lockjaw.

Captain America: “You can believe him, mister -- this time, Maximus is telling the truth!”

Yeah. Maximus led the Avengers slash Inhumans right to the Enclave.

He’s not smart! Or he has that INT WIS division going on.

The Enclave don’t get a chance to try to fight (and thank god, we’ve had enough fight scene in this book) because Black Bolt just blasts them all in one go, resolving the plot in one panel.

Meanwhile, out in space, Thor is like oh good people have stopped throwing rocks at me. He was holding his breath this whole time after all and even he would have needed to reenter atmosphere soon.

With the Enclave in varying degrees of sprawled on their asses, the Inhumans can turn their attention back to Maximus for the assholery de jour.

He’s not repentant.

Maximus: “You don’t dare attack me, Gorgon! I am your brother, Black Bolt! I have as much right as you to the throne of Attilan! Like you, I wish only the best for our people! But, fool that you are, you refuse to admit our superiority to the humans! It is our destiny to establish dominion over the Earth! We must not be content with exile on this barren world! We must reoccupy the Earth! To do otherwise would be to deny our heritage! You know I’m right, Black Bolt! Admit it! Admit it!”

Black Bolt just turns his back on Maximus and gestures the others to take him away.

Since he never talks, he’s the master of the non-verbal shut down.

With the shooting meteors at Earth and also Maximus plots tied up, the Avengers get back to why they’re up here in the first place.

Wasp: “What reassurance does the Earth have that they won’t be attacked again?”

Gorgon: “What reassurance have we that the Earth will not attack us? Humanity is better equipped for war than we! And it was the human scientists of the Enclave that fomented this battle!”

Medusa: “Of our people, none save Maximus have ever waged war against mankind. The Inhumans will ever seek the ways of peace. That is the solemn pledge of Black Bolt and the family royal. Tell that to your leaders... and ask if they can truly pledge the same!”

Okay, fair enough, fair enough. The Enclave were humans but on the other hand, it was Maximus who invited them to the Moon.

So maybe guarantee that you’ll keep Maximus on a leash?

Or do you not want to make promises you know you can’t keep?

Maybe at least promise you all won’t immediately jump to action if Black Bolt suggests that it’s time to destroy humanity. Please. Apply some critical thinking.

Annnnyway, the Avengers promise to deliver this message to the UN and “pray that our fellow man is wise enough to reply in kind!”

But seriously. Maximus causes like. 70% of the Inhumans’ problems. Get a better handle on him, you dipshits.

Follow @essential-avengers​ because I’m brave enough to say ‘I don’t always like the Inhumans’ which I can assure you without bothering to google is probably a rare opinion. Also, like and reblog to make me feel appreciated.

[cerberus253]

How do you see Drago's possible future after the events of the series? Can it be happy? Change anything for him? I endlessly resent the show's ending, Drago doesn't deserve it. Yes, he seemed to be trying to cripple our world and all that, but this is more like an offended teenager who, without asking, took an expensive car from his father for a drive, just to spite him. And what would Drago do if he took over the world in the finale? I think he will get bored quickly

Welp, as far as we know, he is forever trapped in limbo/oblivion with his abusive father and racist relatives, with all of them being egotistical assholes. So, uh, I say no; his future wouldn’t be good.

I talk about this in the future post about the eight Demon Sorcerers, but I’ll state it here as well. Shendu explicitly states that the spell Drago used to absorb all that chi is irreversible, meaning that Drago is PERMANENTLY a Cthulhu ripoff monster. “But in the monster form, he transferred some chi to the Crew? That means he can willingly depart with it?“ That is true, which leads me to believe two things: 1) The chi didn’t settle in all the way yet and he could transfer it still, or 2), because Shendu was talking to Uncle about creating a spell to undo what has been done, Shendu might have just been referring to that a human could not possess/create a spell that would reverse it. Either way, we’re led to believe he is stuck like that forever.

However, in theory, maybe his relatives could reverse it, since it is their chi and they are naturally magical creatures, having the ability to do things and stuff and more than a human. So, if all eight of them work together, or seven, if Drago got to keep his fire, he could go back to normal.

The problem with this though is if the sorcerers are willing to do it or not. Of course Shendu would want it reversed, but what about the other seven? Well, here’s my explanation, which of course gets dark and sad:

If you’ve read/remember my talk on when Drago could have been, er, “born,‘ I guess, it would have been when Shendu was ruling the world on his own with all the other demons in the Netherworld. It’s safe to assume Drago never actually met his aunts and uncles in person, but it could have been entirely possible he read up on them or asked his Dad. I also think the other sorcerers never met/been told about him either, since they’d probably be disgusted by the whole “fornicating with a human“ aspect and bring it up a lot. So, Drago never met the rest of the family, and the rest of the family never even knew about Drago’s existence. Imagine their surprise when they see Shendu come floating in, attempting to strangle a foreign looking demon who he seems to have personal relations with.

“Why look who has decided to drop in! Shendu, you miserable little-- wait, who’s that?“

“Uhhhh, I can explain“ or “Uhhhh, no one important“ (with the latter getting a big ol “>:o” form Drago)

I’m not sure how it would come to be explained, but once the Demon Sorcerers find out that Drago is Shendu’s son, who looks strikingly human, they. Would be. REPULSED. Their entire existence is built upon demons having the right to enslave humanity, seeing them as nothing more than worker ants and piles of dirt; absolutely beneath them. Then all of a sudden they get to see some human/demon abomination housing (maybe even considered stealing in their eyes) their chi. What kind of disgusting embarrassment is this?! No! They will not be having this! He does not deserve the label of being a demon; he is not one of them; not part of the family! Then they would take all the chi he has, reversing him back to his original form of being small and powerless (in comparison to them). I would not be surprised if they never referred Drago to be their “nephew.“ Hell, maybe even never calling him ‘he‘ or say his name. Just ‘it‘ and ‘thing.‘ His fate after this would be up in the air, either being tortured along with his father, or straight up killed.

And then from Drago’s perspective, he would be absolutely heartbroken to witness their reactions. He spent all this time trying to bring demons back to Earth, and THIS is his payment. Yeah, he wanted to rule the world himself, but he actively states that he wanted to free his demon brethren. If he were to explain this to his relatives, they might feel a little appreciated, but would still not be above imprisoning or killing him in the end because of what he is, especially since he’s related to Shendu (”Oh God, it’s a mini Shendu; and we thought one was bad enough!”). Man, and we thought he was miserable and self-loathing before. Poor baby bean...

What would his view on demons be after this whole debacle? Probably grief of not being accepted anywhere, by humans and demons, the two most opposite things in the universe; you’d think one hating something would want the opposition to like it, but nay, that’s not how things turned out.

Alright, time for the second half of your question :V

What would happen if Drago did take over the world... hm, well, he’d be a Cthulhu thing, so that would earn him respect-out-of-pure-fear points with human and demons alike. However, like I said, his relatives would eventually usurp his worked-for throne, like I’ve stated previously.

But let’s just say they got along to tolerable degrees, yeah, Drago probably would get bored. But hey, that’s what jesters and needless wars are for! Pure boredom! Anyways, of course his human needs/wants would kick in and ruin everything. Ya know, like wanting companionship (friends and/or lovers) and having manic depression to constantly fight. I’m not sure if you’ve seen Steven Universe, but there is a moment in the epilogue show (Steven Universe: Future) where a character is talking to the emotionally distraught halfling Steven that he is the only living being of his kind, and that makes him much different than both races, leading to confusion on how to help him. Yeah, that’d be Drago, sadly.

There’s also the line “I always thought you were failing this world, but maybe since you were happier on Earth, maybe this world was failing you.“ I want to tell this to Drago’s face, watch him hold back tears, hug and care for him, and then watch him cry. Cry! Cry you little emotionally compromised creature of complex thought and beauty! It helps get the energy out without physically harming others.

In conclusion, Drago’s future will always be bad. The only thing that would give him a chance for a happy future is if he met someone who loves him for who he is. Not for what he has done/can do, what he could become, the title he carries, nor his position of power. Just purely, and unfiltered, him. Drago is perfect because he is a being unlike any other, and because he is the only one of his kind, there is no one he can compare himself to and think “I’m imperfect.“ How can you deem something as tainted if there is nothing to base the opinion on initially?

[razeluxe]

Razeluxe’s Top Ten Male Characters

So I’ve been thinking about doing a particular list for my favorite characters across anime and games for quite a while and with some advice I decided to break it into my favorite male and favorite female characters. Most people that know me can probably guess at my top three favorites but if you don’t know me... well you ‘bout to learn lol. This was harder than I thought to compile...enjoy my fanboying of the boys lol.

By the by, I’ll do my best to keep spoilers to a minimum.

10) Apollo Justice (Phoenix Wright Series)

I’ve played only two games that this character was in (Apollo Justice and Dual Destinies, slowly working through Spirit of Justice) and this character particularly in Dual Destinies struck me even more than Edgeworth who is another amazing character. Apollo has an amazing spirit and it was only through playing Dual Destinies that I really got to understand Mr. ‘I’m Fine’ and his stupid ‘Here comes Justice’ puns. I feel his original game didn’t allow him to shine (still a great entry in the Ace Attorney series I don’t care what anyone says) and Dual Destinies allows him the development he deserves. He gets hurt during a trial and it allows a deep dive of his character even if his personality shifts for a while. Damn he’s savage. He’s considered the underdog in the Wright Anything Agency but he’s to me the hardest working person there who is also the most factual in court.

9) Gokudera (Katekyo Hitman Reborn)

Or as I like to call him, Scowludera since he’s scowling like 90% of the time. This Ichigo ripoff’s character development is insane. And I think that trend follows most if not all the characters in this list. His relationship with his sister is interesting and he’s pretty explosive in terms of personality and intelligence. His fights are all really interesting too, he has some of my favorite interactions in the series thus far (haven’t read the post anime manga chapters yet sadly, but he’s more than earned this spot on this list). He butts heads with people a lot and he can be ignorant but he grows from his experience and you get to see it bit by bit. This dude is loyal to the bone. RIP if you aren’t Tsuna or Reborn. Also, I’d like to shout out this anime as one of the few to do the shounen genre proper justice. Go watch it. Also his sister Bianchi is <3. Oh wait. Male list. Oops. Can we also talk about his weapon? Not gonna say spoilers but that thing is dope and probably one of the best ever designed weapons. And his kitty Uri <3

8) Joshua Bright (Trails in the Sky)

This will be short as I don’t want to spoil anything, but Joshua is a very easy character for me to connect to personally. His feelings, actions, development probably relates more to me than a lot of characters on this list. He’s got good people around him...I’m very happy for his ship and support it 120%. Also the Trails Series, both Sky and Cold Steel are probably my favorite series of anything period. Go play it. There is more to this character that meets the eye and has broken my heart more than once ;_;

7) Neku Sakuraba (The World Ends With You)

Neku Neku Neku. Another very relatable character for me (see the theme here? lol) He initially shuts out people and over time, through his experience in the Reapers Game, he starts to open up and bring people into his circle. He goes through some crap, like a lot of trauma. When you learn of him it’s no wonder he wound up disliking people and society. He’s extremely creative and that creativity manifests itself in different ways. Kinda like me. It’s worth mentioning I used to roleplay this character back in the day, the very first canon character I used to write for. 

6) Shulk (Xenoblade Chronicles)

One of the only blonde’s on this list. Shulk is a character that is driven by revenge but eventually changes. He goes through some pretty traumatic stuff that I absolutely will not spoil. His personality when he encounters a certain characters shifts big time and it’s kind of scary considering how early you see this. Also he gets points for being a notably intelligent character. I mean, the dude has his own lab...and is able to fix and adjust stuff. He’s really a great and well balanced character despite all the crap he goes through. Also I used to make fun of this character and dislike him a little bit, but then I grew up. 

         The list gets real starting...now. Not that it was fake before. :o

5) Jaden Yuki (Yu-Gi-Oh! GX)

Anyone who has actually watched the entirety of GX might know why he’s here. His character development in the latter seasons so unreal and interesting. I’m not spoiling crap but there is a lot more to the character than meets the eye. Like a lot lot. Over the course of the series he loses his innocent eyes and his personality changes a lot...His character is probably one I can relate to in terms of the reasons for his actions, the way he gets down about himself, the way he acts in the final season...it hits me hard...he’s too dang relatable...just like..

4) Rean Schwarzer (Trails of Cold Steel)

Surprise surprise. Rean is here. -hears crickets- Guess you’re not surprised. I wonder why. I think I relate to this character more than anyone else on this list. Except number one. Number one is in his own league. Rean is a character who generally carries a happy disposition...he has a unique power but you can see he is actively scared of it. It’s something I actively deal with...he’s so scared of himself that he puts distance between family and friends. He never feels he’s good enough. He’s made headway through this, but...

One thing that’s extremely interesting about this character is his selflessness. You may think this is driven to the ground in character stereotypes but for Rean it’s different...his selfless has been described as abnormal by characters in game, and it’s not for positive reasons...Rean deals with some real unhealthy stuff. This is getting long.

As of this post Cold Steel 4 comes out in one month and I’m extremely worried for his character. If you’ve played 3 then you’ll know why. Also if you haven’t played the Trails series, go play it. No buts. Heck I’ll even buy the game(s) for you if I can.

--

Oh look we’re at the top three. I want to say that while numbers two and three here are pretty interchangeable, these characters have been in my top three for over a decade and a half and I don’t see this changing anytime soon. Rean I love you but you have your work cut out if you ever want to breach the top 3. I wanna post a few honorable mentions here. They didn’t get into Smash but they do get Mii Costumes at least! -shot-

Davis Motomiya (Digimon Adventure 02) 

This character was everything I was when I was a kid. The way he tries everything to woo Kari is too cute. Also his unwavering faith in Ken. Also Davis Cries Veemon.

9S (Nier Automata)

Not mentioning any spoilers. Just watch this character and see how his vision of the world changes over time.

Okabe Rintaro (Steins; Gate) 

Okabe’s shift from his ‘persona’ as things get real and his efforts to fix everything is too relatable for me ;_;

Yosuke Hanamura (Persona 4) 

No, I do not ship him with Yu. They’re great buddies for sure, and he’s pretty cool. Really likable character for me personally save for a few moments in the game...he’s also the main in the Arena games. “Let’s do this, Jiraiya!” He’s so cool lol.

                    Top 3 time. Fiercely dedicated to these guys.

3) Robin (Teen Titans Go! 2003)

Robin is such a raw character that carries his past and tries so hard to move from it yet it embodies him to his core. He has since gained a softer side from forming a team, and has been doing normal teenager stuff...which is good for him. However at times that Batman side impacts him so hard that he can only concentrate on his mission, and starts shutting out everyone and everything to do things himself. It actively gets in the way of his interactions. He deals a lot with moving on from failure and acknowledging his friends more, which he does get better at over time. He is also represented by the color red. My favorite color. He’s badass and yet carries so much crap. I connect to this character a lot even now. Third canon character I ever wrote for.

2 Lloyd Irving (Tales of Symphonia)

I love Lloyd. I love his voice, I love his attacks, I love his stupid double sword logic. He says wielding two swords makes him twice as powerful lol. I love his development. I love his idealism and how it matures over time. I love everything about Lloyd. It was legit love at first sight. I remember being 15-16 and seeing him on that Gamecube boxart and saying “I wanna play that guy” Most people I feel (guys in particular) probably looked up to certain characters growing up as a child/teen. Lloyd was mine.

1. Zidane Tribal (Final Fantasy IX)

While it was love at first sight for Lloyd, that was not the case for number one on this list. I was 13 when I first played FFIX. Zidane upon encountering him, I always thought he was a cool character, but he was nothing special.  Even at Zidane’s lowest point I thought he was an okay character at best. I had not finished the game.

Fast forward a few years and I decide to play FFIX again, this time determined to finish it. I had went through some things, grew up a bit before turning this game on. This damn bandit...I remember writing this bit years ago: “His infamous mantra labeled above describes him well, but under his ability to console others with a smile, to cheer people up and meet them at their point of need with his abundant optimism lies a blonde who masks his pain and keeps his issues to himself. Despite his many friends and buddies he harbors a deep loneliness that, like his problems, he keeps to himself. One would have to look carefully to notice his character flaws for Zidane does an impressive job of hiding these problems. Whether it be through his energy, his theatrics, or focusing on other people, Zidane can cover things up quite well.”

Zidane has an absurd amount of depth to his character that I was never able to comprehend as a kid, beneath his flirting, his playful attitude, he hides a lot of feelings, a lot of anger, a lot of sadness. It used to boggle me how he’s able to uphold his sense of virtue despite what goes on in his life and the end of disc 3 answers this for me. It goes without mentioning that this was the second canon character I’ve ever written for, and I still love writing him. I could and write walls of text about how Zidane is so amazing, a chivalrous thief, a lover and a flirt but I think I can let you go lol. Hit me up if you really want to hear me ramble about any these characters, also play FF9.

...So I wrote all of that and forgot to write about Zidane’s ship...have to give it its own paragraph because I love these two together and she does wonders for Zidane as a whole as does he to her. She’s a princess and he’s a thief, they take their time to show them together through different things, different ordeals...particularly the ordeals. Its interesting seeing them both at their worst moments and the many funny moments..Man, that boat scene gets me every time...If I ever write a top ten couples list this couple would no doubt be in the top two if not number one. And I’d probably write way more than this about them because they’re great. Also they’re canon. A healthy canon. Also Dagger’s hot. Oh wait wrong list.

Okay finally done. Not editing this anymore :P

[hellyeahheroes]

Pride Month’s LGBTQ Characters of the Day: Rainmaker and Virtue

Sarah Rainmaker has an actually long history full of reboots. She is one of the so-called Gen-Active people, who possess superpowers thanks to genetic mutations.....basically, this is a ripoff of mutants from X-Men. She debuted in a book from early Image, where every team book was a ripoff of X-Men, what do you want? Sarah found herself among a number of teenagers kidnapped for their gen-active powers who escaped and got on the run as a team called Gen 13. That book is like 80-issues long and by multiple writers but only #0-2 hre on ComiXology, go figure.

While Gen 13 is a book best known for shameless fanservice it also had something brave in that, amidst the homophobia of the 90′s, the series had Sarah be an openly lesbian heroine on top of being an outspoken activist (even if the series mostly treated it as a joke) and proud of her Apache heritage (and yes, they made an Apache girl with name Rainmaker have powers to control weather. Fucking 90′s, one step forward and then falls on it’s ass). Of course, because it is an early Image book it managed to step on a minefield even with that good thing when Scott Lobdell took over writing duties and decided she is not a lesbian but bisexual. Because nothing spells “giving a damn” as taking from one marginalized group and giving to another...

Wildstorm, Image imprint owned by Jim Lee which published Gen 13, would be later bought by DC and separated from Image, becoming one of many world in DC Multiverse. After a visit from DC hero Captain Atom rebooted Wildstorm Universe and we got a new take on Gen 13, with Sarah once again identifying as a lesbian. Then that world got hit by an Armageddon and last several issues of Gen 13 book are about them surviving in postapocalyptic wasteland.

And the Flash the Witch Pandora Doctor Are You Fucking Kidding Me Manhattan rebooted DC Universe, causing Wildstorm to be merged with it. While in this new world many members of Gen 13 ended up on bad books by Scott Lobdell, Sarah came back in Gail Simone’s the Movement. There she meets Virtue, real name Holy Ann Fields, another activist superheroine. The two fell in love and begun dating. Sadly, the book lasted only 12 issues and soon after DC decided to backtrack on merging the worlds. Wildstorm characters were quietly phased out of DC titles altogether, with a miniseries about their most iconic gay duo, Apollo and Midnighter, being the last title to be set in DCU. Sometime later, however, that entire world got a reboot in Wild Storm 24-issue series by Warren Ellis. While Sarah does not show up in the book, it does set up the return of Gen 13 in possible future titles. It also has some LGBTQ representation with Catlin Fairchild’s mother and almost entire Authority being LGBTQ in this version, so it may be worth checking out.

- Admin

[leilas-digital-scrapbook-blog]

Giving Love a Bad Name – Confessions of a Fanfiction Writer

I know we’re supposed to blog about our major projects this week and I promise I will get to that soon, but I’d like to go off book for a moment to address something that’s been bugging me since last Thursday’s class. As someone who’s always tried to engage with fandom in as creative a way as possible, I hoped a class on user generated content would offer a fresher perspective than the usual amount of prejudice and self-righteous superiority that sadly seem to accompany the subject of fanfiction even amongst people that make stories and their passion for it their bread and butter.

Guess I should have known better.

In the world of professional writers, fanfiction is still a filthy word. It sums up everything that’s wrong with the people you’re sharing your stories with: the obsessiveness, the entitlement, the disregard for boundaries, the penchant for making everything about sex. Worse, gay sex, as unspeakably dirty as it’s hilarious. Be warned, writers: if you make it big, your stories will inevitably become a free-for-all at the mercy of those people. A worse fate than even George R. R. Martin could wish on his own characters.

I’m used to seeing the world of fanfiction belittled and disparaged, of course, and I’m the first to admit that the community is often its own worst enemy. But for some reason it still hurt a little to sit in class and listen to people I’ve come to like and respect during these past few months buy into every bad stereotype associated with the form. Not because I felt called out (though yes, I do write fanfiction from time to time, and I happen to quite enjoy reading it too), but because of the underlying assumptions that 1. something that’s not 100% original cannot be art, it’s a violence in fact, especially if it twists someone else’s creation into something it was never meant to be (in this case, queer representation); and 2. there’s something wrong with creating exclusively out of love, without ever expecting to be paid for it. And I have Strong Opinions on that.

So let’s talk about fanfiction.

Actually, scratch that, let’s talk about my favorite subject – yours truly. As you may have gathered by now, I love fanfiction. A whole fangirly lot. My gateway drug into it was my obsession with Lost about 10 years ago and its pesky habit of offing every character I was foolish enough to get attached to. But lo! Someone was keeping them alive through their stories! I felt blessed. I got to spend more time in a world I loved, and I stopped flirting with the idea of giving up on the show every time another character I liked bit the dust. Everybody won.

Even more than as a fan, though, I appreciated the world of possibilities that fanfiction opened up to me as a non-native speaker. I come from a small town in the north of Italy; the access I had to foreign books in their original language was limited, and if I wanted to read something in English I’d have to spend quite a lot of money on one of the very few novels (usually chunky airport bookshop thrillers or housewife romances – not exactly my preferred genres) that shared a single shelf in the bookstore with German, French, Spanish titles. But fanfiction was free, accessible, and there was so much of it. If I didn’t like a story, all I needed to do was move on to the next. Suddenly there was an infinite library of engaging stories to help me make my English better. True, they didn’t all read like a published novel would – there’s a lot of unpolished, error-plagued, stream-of-consciousness-y material out there. But there are also so, so many beautifully written works, and believe me, even for a non-native speaker it’s very easy to spot the difference.

Fanfiction also gave me the chance and motivation to practice my English writing in a way school never could have done. I’ve been writing my own stories since I could hold a pen, but I didn’t dare write in English until I was a fanfiction-loving teenager. It was a marketing decision, really – my first foray into writing fanfiction was for a fandom so small that I wouldn’t be surprised to find out I’m the only Italian representative, so if I wanted any kind of feedback on my work I’d have to suck it up and try my hand at writing in a language that didn’t come natural to me. I would never argue that the feedback I got on my works made me a better writer – contrary to popular opinion, the fanfiction community is made up of the nicest, most supportive people, and alas, you’ll never get a comment on everything you did wrong with your structure or even just pointing out common grammar mistakes from them (though I was lucky enough to have someone explain to me how dialogue punctuation works differently in English than in Italian, so I guess something can be learned even from the Internet). It did motivate me to keep writing, though, and that made me a better writer. If you think I’m being too dramatic, dishing out this monster of a post nobody asked for just to declare my eternal devotion to fanfiction, it’s because it’s personal to me. I can’t even count the number of times I’ve been told that I write in English as well as native speakers, and fanfiction is a big part of why that’s true. I doubt I would even be in this course if it wasn’t for it.

And then, of course, there’s the gay thing. I’m not going to argue about how heteronormativity sucks and representation matters because I’m sure everyone’s as sick of talking about it as I am, but please try to understand how it felt for a gay person like me, used to be depicted in media as a plot device or token secondary-character representation if at all, to be able to step into a world where queerness was the default for once. Where queer protagonists had meaningful queer love stories and queer friends and got to save the world from the Apocalypse too. Or to fight the Empire or go to Hogwarts or everything else fictional straight people have had a right to do since the dawn of storytelling in addition to romancing the hottie of their choice. I’m not asking you to feel as passionately about it, of course, but (especially if you’re straight) you might try and empathize the next time you think a fanart of two boys kissing is something deserving of your amused contempt.

I hope I’m not coming across as the person that screams “homophobe” at everyone who disagrees with her because I guarantee that’s not what I’m trying to do here, but I think the general distaste for slash says a lot about the way our society sees heterosexual relationships as love and homosexual relationships as sex. Yes, there’s a lot of gay porn in the world of fanfiction. But you know what you’re most likely to find? Romance. Not in the saucy literary sense of the word, but in its simpler, most literal acceptation. Fanfiction is just one more way for humans to express themselves, after all, and love has always been front and center in our art. Love, not sex – even if it’s gay. In fact, explicit material doesn’t even make up the majority of what you’ll find on a fanfiction website. Don’t worry, I don’t want anyone to taint their souls by visiting one of those dens of iniquity so I pulled some stats myself. Here’s the number of works for each rating in three of the most popular fandoms on Archive Of Our Own, the current go-to website for the fanfiction community (sorry Fanfiction.net) – Harry Potter, Supernatural and the Marvel Cinematic Universe as of 9/3/2019:

Even counting both Mature and Explicit works as straight-up porn (which I don’t think is quite fair, but that’s a discussion for another day), they only make up less than 1/3 of the material. Kinda disappointing, for a medium that’s supposed to be all about filthy graphic gay sex. Imagine if only one in three musicals actually featured singing and dancing, or superheroes weren’t in the majority of superhero movies. They’re lucky fanfiction is shared for free, or I’d be screaming for my money back.

Maybe I’ve just been brainwashed by SJWs, though, and this has nothing to do with my being an immigrant or a lesbian. Maybe my inability to see what’s so bad about appropriating someone else’s intellectual property for your own amusement is a cultural thing. I apologize – as mentioned, I’m Italian, and we all know Ancient Roman culture was basically just a ripoff of everything those inventive Greeks came up with. It’s in our blood. Hell, our 2€ coin, the biggest, has the face of Dante Alighieri on it, a writer most famous for having written 14.000+ verses of self-insert real-person-fic in which the girl he fancied as a teenager, his favorite author, and God himself all fall over themselves to tell him how awesome he is and he gets to prophesy an eternity in Hell for his political enemies. Talk about wish-fulfilling entitlement. Not to mention all those creatively arid Renaissance “artists” celebrated for stealing characters from the Bible and Greek mythology (seriously, the fact that Greece hasn’t unleashed an army of lawyers on us yet is nothing short of a miracle) and putting them in their cheesy paintings. Other countries can rely on a much stronger moral backbone and endless imagination – I’m sure Shakespeare, Milton, Goethe, those creative geniuses at Disney and countless others never had to resort to something as cheap and despicable as borrowing other people’s characters to tell the stories they wanted to tell.

Either way, I can’t help it – I see the prospect of creating something that will resonate with people so strongly that they’ll make it a part of themselves, that it’ll compel them to make more art, to reach out and connect with other fans, as something incredibly beautiful rather than scary. Maybe this is my usual naiveté speaking, and I will come to eat my words. It’s certainly disturbing that a bunch of entitled fans bullied the Mass Effect developers into changing the series’ ending, and sending actors explicit fanart of themselves is straight-up harassment, but is fanfiction really the problem here? Or is it social network culture, with its power to destroy all barriers and foster hive mind? To give resentment a platform to spread and be heard? I promise that the average fanfiction writer wouldn’t campaign to get an ending changed. They’d just roll up their sleeves and write a better one themselves.

[crusherthedoctor]

Sonic Villains: Sweet or Shite? - Part 9: CAPTAIN WHISKER

There are some villains I like. And there are some villains I don’t like. But why do I feel about them the way I do? That’s where this comes in.

This is a series of mine in which I go into slightly more detail about my thoughts on the villains in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, and why I think they either work well, or fall flat (or somewhere in-between). I’ll be giving my stance on their designs, their personalities, and what they had to show for themselves in the game(s) they featured in. Keep in mind that these are just my own personal thoughts. Whether you agree or disagree, feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions! I don’t bite. :>

Anyhow, for today’s installment, we’ll be starting a new venture as we discuss the scourge of a faraway dimension's seven seas, and the envy of frozen food mascots everywhere: Captain Whisker.

The Gist: Aboard the Tornado, dynamic duo Sonic and Tails were en route to a mysterious energy signal, in the hopes of uncovering what it could possibly be. They were instead greeted with an actual tornado.

They died.

Credits.

"Ahh! We’re getting sucked in!” “Yeah! Alright! Cool!”

Nah, not really. They washed ashore on Southern Island (presumably not too far from Western Island and Angelern Island), where they met a young girl named Marine, whose ambition quickly proved to eclipse her capabilities a bit too much. Initially, the heroes simply want to return home and have a Winston break, but upon being attacked by a mecha T-Rex, they soon realise someone must be causing trouble around these parts. And Sonic doesn't let evil relax for long.

They soon come face to face with the leader of the nautical-themed robot army they're facing: Captain Whisker. Something about the captain looks... familiar.

“...What’s going on to my right? I can’t see anything on that side.”

As it turns out, Whisker wants the Jeweled Scepter, a vastly powerful tool that is said to harness the Power of the Stars, which in Sonic lingo basically means "Get fucked, Goku." He steals it, but not before he gets ambushed by the dramatic arrival of Blaze the Cat... who fails to stop the theft, and doesn't even land a hit on the guy.

E Rank.

It doesn't take long for Blaze to explain to the confused Sonic and Tails that they're the ones in her world, not the other way around. It's assumed that the power of the Jeweled Scepter was responsible for bringing them here in the first place. Blaze also acknowledges that Marine in fact exists. Together, they continue to take on the robot pirates, all the while Whisker continues to commit some dastardly, whisker-twirling crimes. Like freezing the local vikings.

“It’s one of my most famous abilities, right up there with spinning around the globe to turn back time. I’m also quite good at superweaving.”

With everywhere else in the sea covered on the map, the do-gooders eventually arrive at Whisker's front door, where they trick the captain into giving them the info on how to get in. After a bit of backtracking (and telling Marine to fuck off and stop wasting their time), they make it in and kick some ass in the pirates' Soleanna-looking hideout. They corner the pirate leader, but his second-in-command, Johnny, arrives just in time to even the odds.

“No, Sonic. The emblem on my chest is a coincidence.”

They proceed to have an all-out brawl with frankly amazing music, but Johnny chickens out and runs with his pipe between his hydraulics. Crestfallen, but not willing to yield, Whisker insists that he will deliver the Jeweled Scepter to an unnamed client by hook or by crook, and Sonic and Blaze ain't gonna stop him.

But they do. With a little help from the surprise return of Marine, they take back the Jeweled Scepter, defeat the captain's Ghost Titan mech, and blow his ship to kingdom come. With the pirates taken care of, the royal guards assure Blaze that they'll take better care of the magical device. The princess expresses relief, confident that her loyal subjects can defend their kingdom's treasure and honor.

They can't.

In less time than it takes to complete the Water Temple in Ocarina of Time, the Jeweled Scepter gets itself stolen again, this time by the fallen captain's creator and superior: Dr. Eggman... and Eggman Nega, but whatever. Retreating underground, Eggman proceeds to show off with his newfound power (the ladies love the magma dragon trick), but he is eventually defeated by the combined efforts of Super Sonic and Burning Blaze... with a little help from Marine. Again.

The Jeweled Scepter is reclaimed. Sonic and Tails head home. Eggman gets sued by Michel Ancel.

The Design: Captain Whisker is an Eggman robot. He's Eggman's robot. He was built by Eggman. But you wouldn't know that by looking at him.

The logo doesn't grin. Totally different.

Sarcasm aside, I'm actually a fan of Whisker's design, because it strikes a good balance between comical and badass, which reflects well on his bumbling exterior masking a capable fighter. The skull gauntlets are stylish, and I especially like how one of his eyes lacks an iris, as if to stand-in for his hypothetical eyepatch. For a design that can literally be summed up as "Eggman but if he were a robot pirate", there's a surprising amount of thought put into it.

If only the same could be said for Nega...

(By the way, Johnny has a kickass design as well. The torpedo-for-a-head is a winner.)

The Personality: Whisker doesn't just one-up Nega with his design. He one-ups him in personality too. Sure, he shares some traits with vanilla Eggman. He's loud. He's hammy. He takes his moustache grooming seriously (even though his is made of metal). He doesn't like it when people aren't paying attention to him.

But here's the thing. He's got his own distinctive flavor. Rather than copying Eggman's mannerisms beat for beat like Nega does, Whisker offers a different spin. He trades the megalomaniacal theatrics for a buccaneer swagger. He trades the spotlights and the statues in favor of singing shanties and using words that were probably out-of-date even when they were in-date. He's more of an airhead compared to the brilliant Eggman. And he actually expresses fear, in particular at the thought of his master's ire.

“You wouldn’t know him. Big guy, ‘stache like mine, hates hedgehogs, sounds an awful lot like Mike Pollock...”

Compared to Nega, Whisker simply makes much more of an effort to be his own character. In spite of his physical resemblance, he's not just Eggman #2. And in a world where Eggman #2 is an officially approved thing, I can appreciate that.

The Execution: Captain Whisker isn't your Eggman, or your Chaos, or your Black Doom. He's not the final obstacle. He's here to provide a few hijinks before the real mastermind turns up. In the role that he plays, he plays that role marvellously.

While the Captain sadly lacks much screentime outside of evading the heroes' wrath, he makes up for it with a memorable presence and a barrel of laughs. They could have completely phoned it in here. Why wouldn't they? He looks like a ripoff, and he's ultimately the equivalent of a filler villain anyway. And yet somehow, this decoy antagonist has more life and character put into him than a sizable margin of the "serious" villains in the Sonic universe, including Eggman Nega, Mephiles, and every single Archie recolour you can shake a lawsuit at.

Look, if Blaze absolutely MUST have an arch-enemy, and if said arch-enemy absolutely MUST look like Eggman... why not pick Whisker over Nega? He provides a better contrast with Eggman and with Blaze, and you can even handwave his presence as Eggman's way of keeping tabs on Blaze's world whenever he's too occupied with his own. Surely that would be a little better than having an identical looking guy running around in a different dimension (or the future) for no reason.

Well, until then, I'll keep supporting the good captain. I have to. He might kill me.

"Omae wa mou ye scurvy shindeiru. *hic*"

Crusher Gives Captain Whisker a: Thumbs Up!

[odioart]

Do you know about obnubilant?

 Long story short, he started his brand about a year after I started Odio. And I did not mind about that like at all. But one of the first things he did was rip off these edits my friend and early partner in odio was doing at the time. After he left the brand to do his own thing, and have his own page. (Atom-art) was his tag name. So another artist that we were both friends with asked him (Clarence /Obunbilant) straight up if he knew who Odio was, and he was like no.. and that’s cool. Not saying everyone needs to know my name or anything. Not asking for a ring to be kissed or anything like that lol. That would be pretty messed up. So don’t think that was the issue. It was what happened next that made me kind of not really care for the guy. When I did a friends search on my FB page he def came up in my friends list. Had been there for at least a few months if not longer. So I deleted him. I just thought it was pretty fucked up how this dude never heard of me, but like ya know was following me for god knows how long. Was even copying the same hashtags I use… On top of making edits painfully similar.  It was head scratching for sure. So anyways; flash forward. He does his thing and I do mine. I am not really a person that goes after drama or wants to call people out or anything. On top of that.I have copyright permission to produce these works so I really don’t care what others do. Then like a year ago a friend of mine I guess stumbled on his FB page, and I guess it kind of pissed him off and he called him out for being an “odio ripoff” and Clarence had the audacity to say I was the one who had stolen his style. Funny because all I had to do was find a couple super old pieces that he pretty much blatantly copied. Took about 2 mins of digging. As well I finally made a post about him on my personal fb page. To where people came out (other artists and page admins), and told me after the fact  “Yes he is LIKE this” and that everyone just sort of puts up with his crap because his pages have such a reach, and they kind of use him for that. That actually made me kind of feel bad for the guy. So after that I just stopped thinking about it or doing anything about it. Like why should I? As far as I know I am the only person in this scene who has permission to make these kinds of works and produce them. I have already got my work out in the real world. In galleries and shows. I am already doing interviews and getting artist representation to sell to collectors. Already working a deal out with Viz to use these works in promotional content in the future. And this is only a 3 year old project. That was always my short term goal. And so far it has been going as planned.  So If this guy or anyone else want’s to make edits in this style cool, it is not really going to take anything away from what I have already built. Sadly unlike others tho. I cannot really support this dude, or try to help them, or like care enough to even pay attention.  Because this guy just simply cannot be trusted like that, and I find that really sad, but it is what it is.I would rather not trash the guy or go into detail but I am not gonna lie about it either. Dude has more than once proven himself to not be someone who is trustworthy to me, and ultimately that is what I think about him, and I have stated why I think this. Other than that. I do not really much want to talk about, it and let him do his thing. He has good numbers on his fb page. More than mine even, and his edits are pretty nice. But, I still think the dude is a pretty sad and kind of pathetic person. That is what I think. The sad thing is if he was not such a dick about everything I would have probably  offered him a job once we start making these kinds of works commercially because I want to put a team together to mass produce, but I will go with Tag and a couple other guys instead. Thanks for yr question btw. In the past I have wanted to call this guy out several times on here , but never wanted to just blast someone for something so dumb as anime edits, and ultimately I always kind of feel sorry for him. He just wants to be accepted. He just goes about that in a totally unethical way, but that is his choice, and that will come back and bite him eventually. I do not have to waste my time or energy on it. However this question gave me the chance to talk about it, and I appreciate that. Just please keep in mind this is not a call to go out to fuck with the dude. Or give him bad reviews or anything like that. Just leave him alone, let him build what he wants. Let him enjoy his popularity. He is the one that has to live with himself, and if he is fine creating things on the backs of others, and take credit then that is fine with me. Not really trying to get bent over it. I wish him the best on a personal level, but I also wish he would stay far away from me. 

[outofoxygen]

Revisiting HOME

I’m revisiting HOME, because I felt I was too unfair in my last review of it. As such, I will be ignoring my last attempt to review it. [Spoilers for HOME]

HOME is an OFF fangame created by FelixtheJudge, who also was the creator of several Don’t Starve Together mods, which are now left sadly unfinished. I will note that Felix has unfortunately passed, and give my regards to those who knew him. I would also like to mention I have nothing against FelixtheJudge himself, and I think the guy was a very talented individual. Now then, preferring not to dwell on depressing matters, I shall turn towards reviewing HOME.

Part 1: Plot Synopsis

HOME is a fangame in which you play as Pablo, or The Judge. After being awoken in Zone 0 from his rest, he goes outside to find The Batter standing before him, who then declares his intent to purify the world. After The Judge applauds his goal, he then marches back inside, only for a premonition of The Batter’s potential for harm to hit him. He then chooses to head off to Zone 1 to warn the Guardian.

Zone 1 mostly plays out similarly, just this time you venture to find Alain (I’ll talk about him later) in the basement of Pentel. You then voyage off to the Meatworks to fight Pentel himself. Of course, you head off to Shachihata, meet The Batter and optionally fight him on a roof, then go off to Alma where you fight Dedan.

Zone 2 also plays out similarly, this time allowing you to wander the residential area instead of being booted out quickly. You then head off to the Library, where Japhet reveals himself on the roof. This time, however, you rescue Valerie (somehow alive) and head off after allowing The Batter to kill him.

I don’t need to repeat myself for Zone 3, do I? This time, you don’t get the pipe minigame though. Sad.

Zone 4 is, however, a new zone. It’s edgy, and it’s full of diseased inhabitants and crazed gunmen. In an OFF fangame. If you haven’t played HOME and haven’t reached Zone 4, let me tell you, I’m not joking about that. The lovable elsen are depressed, diseased, and/or a gun-toting maniac looking to riddle your cats with bullet holes. You fight Shachihata, the apparent postman turned into a crazed burnt general in Zone 4, before heading up to fight the Guardian herself, a kind-of lame Hugo ripoff. Oh sorry, you fight The Witness, a fluffy black cat with an add-on. You’re supposed to snipe the add-on, by the way, because The Witness is overpowered as all living hell. So after suffering through fighting The Witness, our favorite capped, bat-toting Batter runs up and smacks The Witness real hard with his cast-iron.

Then, you’re forced to go on a romp through the purified zones where The Judge decides The Batter is awful, despite being rude and churlish to The Batter before he ran around the purified zones. Well, you finally head off to the Courtroom, a depressing slog.

Anyways, flowery bits aside, you fight The Batter in the end (removing the choice) and you win. There’s two endings, one where the Judge’s party gets wiped in The Batter’s dying moments, leaving The Judge a sick puppy. The other ending is a happy-go-lucky ‘the world got fixed, yay’ that lacks the potency of OFF’s ending.

Part 2: Characters

The Judge - Our favorite enigmatic, eloquent, knowledgeable feline. Unfortunately, it’s hard to keep a character enigmatic whilst keeping them playable, so.. he’s an eloquent, knowledgeable feline. However, The Judge has to pause every five goddamn seconds to get exposition, so he’s an eloquent feline. I guess it works. Either way, he’s The Judge we all know, this time just with a pure-good paint on.

Alain - Here’s where I get to praise HOME for a character. Alain is written entirely as a neutral character. He is only looking out for himself, and he only seems to really care about himself. He’s selfish and starving, and only follows along with The Judge to prevent himself from starving. He is, however, loyal enough to stick around, and in the end chooses to stick around with The Judge and crew. I’d say he turns out well enough in his ending.

Valerie - To be honest, he’s played as The Judge 2.0. Of course, from what we know, Valerie was a shy, soft-spoken cat who enjoyed books and soft, cool colors. However, here, he basically acts like a second Judge. I, to put it bluntly, think it’d be better if he was killed by Japhet. Yeah, The Judge might have sat around on Zone 2′s roof, screaming at the top of his lungs, pretending the echoes belong to someone, someone he used to know, but his party could’ve dragged him off to finish the game. It’d give him a reason to hate The Batter. (Edit for clarification: The reason being: The Batter is just standing around and doesn’t even assist him in helping to remove Japhet from Valerie. That’s what I was thinking when I wrote this.)

Jozlyn - This.. ‘character’ is the anti-Alain. An original addition, Jozyln is a ‘cute’ ditzy lunatic with barely any good character to speak of. She’s annoying, the token girl, and basically serves little purpose other than filling up The Judge’s party. Every time her facesprite appears next to a textbox in the game, I feel like I’ll have a stroke and an aneurysm at similar times. That hideous ‘:3′ she includes next to every. fucking. sentence. is nowhere near charming or endearing, and instead gives me minor brain damage and a serious migraine. Honestly, I hope no one on this Earth likes Jozlyn, because if you like Jozlyn, then I don’t think you know what a good character is.

The Batter - Yet another point where I get angered intensely by HOME’s lacking characterization. The Batter in OFF is a focused and dedicated purifier. His mission is not presented as wholly evil; in fact, it can be viewed as good in some circumstance. However, I hold the stance that The Batter’s mission was entirely neutral, as he did destroy the impurity, but also took down the whole broken world of OFF with him. However, HOME took the liberty of personally raising its middle finger in The Batter’s face, then shooting him in the knees and head. By that, I mean it took no time to examine the good and neutral parts of his mission, and instead painted him as purely evil. The Batter is, even worse, portrayed as a horrendous dick. Yes, The Batter was entirely apathetic to the suffering of elsen. Yes, he clearly didn’t care about the loss of innocent lives. But, in the end, The Batter wasn’t so much of a dick as he was an apathetic stoic until the very end.

The Witness - This character.. she also disgusts me. For a different reason. The Witness is a shoved-in plot device and, unsurprisingly, massive mary sue. For some unknown reason, The Witness is inexplicably overpowered, and cannot suffer damage lest she renders your party entirely wiped by her overpowered abilities. RNG forbid you get a status effect on her, because if you so much as touch her with a single one, she will be ‘targetted’. See, if The Witness is Targetted, she will automatically perform her annoying 100 damage attack, thus causing annoying amounts of damage just because she may have gotten poisoned, stopped, insane.. Just don’t get a single status effect on her, or else she’ll maul you to shit.

Part 3: Basic Enemies

I’ll make this simple: The basic enemies don’t fit in with OFF. At all. Aside from odd style differences at random points, only a few enemies have the hand-drawn and quirky feel of OFF’s enemies. I couldn’t imagine fighting a Burnt and one of HOME’s countless enemies side-by-side. The Plague Doctors, at least, look slightly like they come from OFF.

Part 4: Merchants

Okay. If you’ve read my criticism about merchants from CONFINIUM: Act 1, then you know I hate how that masked chucklefuck always seems to he-he-he his way into every single goddamned fangame from here to Mars. Is it that hard, that physically excruciating to try to think up another merchant who you can’t just copy-paste that whole ‘Show me the colour of your credits’ speech from? Zacharie is a well-made character, and I have no problem with the way he’s written in OFF itself. However, every single fangame has to have him ripped straight from OFF, with a bland ‘amigo amigo he he’ personality.

Oh, and there’s another merchant named ‘Viola’, but I don’t think she’s too important. Especially since I hate her character too, because it’s blander than the taste of bleached cardboard. By the way, I think I mentioned that Viola was a tumor, and I stand by that fully.

Part 5: Lore

It takes place in the world of OFF, so obviously it uses OFF’s lore. Zone 4, also Bordeaux, is basically just a hellhole because a disease came along and screwed over the whole place. Let’s just hurry along to Part 6 so I can finish up.

Part 6:  Does This Game Fit In With OFF?

Does this game fit in with OFF.. Does it? I’m partly confused about what to say. There’s points where I think HOME is genuinely clever and enjoyable, and I don’t hate the story. Unlike CONFINIUM: Act 1, I clearly don’t enjoy HOME immensely, but I also don’t hate the fangame, to be honest. I guess it could? But I’m not sure on that.

Part 7: Conclusion

Now that I’ve gotten this far, what else can I say? This revisit just reminded me that it has more than 1 tumor (specifically 4), and it reminded me that there is a few things I like about HOME.

However, would I recommend this fangame? Maybe. Probably. I’d recommend it as an example of a highly polished fangame, and as an example of an okay fangame, but not as an example of a good fangame. There’s better fangames, and I know plenty.

Altogether, play CONFINIUM or NEW instead of HOME if you want. That’s this revisit wrapped up.

[fibrielsolaer]

Smash Ultimate tier list based entirely on which characters I like and which I hate

BSP = Big Sexy Personality

FBNIS = Fun, But Not In Smash

MPATBUD = Mario Princesses Are Terrifying Blow-Up Dolls

S Tier

Kirby: absolutely the man, if you don’t love Kirby you’re probably the asshole who got this roster flooded with Marth World pricks

Pikachu: He quicc. He thicc. He’ll Thunderbolt you to hicc

Except it’s a she because I only ever play Librechu ;p

Bowser: BSP

Zelda: She is so cute, I can finally stand playing as her

Pichu: He is so cute, it almost makes up for how stupid he is

Ganondorf: He’s finally fucking cool. He uses the goddamn sword now

Lucario: What if Mewtwo was a Shaolin monk hunk

I only play purple Lucario for reasons you’re best not knowing

Toon Link: He’s the cartoon that Link and Young Link watched and modeled themselves on

Ridley: HOLY SHIT IT FEELS AWESOME TO PLAY RIDLEY

I love how the game designers know he’s way too small so when you fight him in Classic Mode as Samus he gets Giant modifier

K. Rool: BSP

Piranha Plant: The pain from the pipes, this disrespectful piece of shit is so stupid he wraps around to greatness, with his inclusion I’ve changed my mind and now say fuck it, add Bandana Waddle Dee, hell add a regular Waddle Dee if you want, I don’t even care anymore

A Tier

Luigi: Few people know that he and Mario are actually identical twins, his brother merely wears a fat suit (the weight of which has crushed his spine) so they can be told apart

Ness: I like the picture you get when you play for 20 hours

C. Falcon: This is the guy who beats up Incineroar. As the positive icon of the people he never shows any emotion except for “YUS!” and “SHOW ME”. All Might was probably based on this jackass

Jigglypuff: Like so many other Pokemon, its adorable facade is a veneer for an expansive and unfathomable eldritch demon. The difference is, despite how fucking many Pokemon like that there are, nobody has found Jigglypuff’s secret and lived to tell

Young Link: He’s actually Link’s son, who idolizes his father and wants to follow in his footsteps. His dad has strayed from the path but young blood here carries on the true faith. Also, FBNIS

Mewtwo: He was the original Damn Cool Pokemon. He jockeys with Lucario for that role now but all they ever do is sit there charging their neutral Bs talking about how the planet will explode in 5 minutes

Roy: He knows that the Marth World infestation is soon to be purged, because there are like five actual Marths including him, so he decided to become the best Marth World character so he alone will survive

Pit: The only cunt from his series besides Dark Pit who had the decency not to change voice and try to pretend it was the same fucking one. I never play as him ever but Sakurai sure cared more about making him fresh & fun post-Uprising than any of his other goddamn characters

Charizard: BSP

Dedede: BSP

Bowser Jr.: This rude little shit is the guy who you invite to a party and he brings his whole crew, excuse me no I didn’t invite Wendy and Horton and Lenny and all these bitches, but fuck it y’all cool

Simon: I like his funny walk and he looks like Conan the Barbarian

Richter: I like his funny walk and he looks like a dork

Isabelle: Do you know this literal bitch killed me with a fucking stop sign 3 times before I unlocked her, why isn’t that a reaction macro

Incineroar: He pretends to be a bad guy so that kids’ heroes will beat him up on TV and they will be happy. He is so sweet

B Tier (Everyone Is Meh)

Mario: Meh

Donkey Kong: Meh

Link: The dad who strayed from the path, I really don’t like the Breath of the Wild Link, FBNIS

Fox: Meh

Sheik: Meh

Dr. Meh: Mario

Falco: Hands off my meh

Mehrth: He’s kinda cool but Roy is way cooler

Mr. Game & Watch: What an annoying asshole

Wario: It’s not the cool Wario, it’s the stupid Wario Ware one, and he brings all his obnoxious waifu friends with him. It’s Wario after he retired from his teen Youtube star days at the age of 30 and he’s trying to stay young and cool-looking but his stoner friends keep fucking it up

Solid Snake: Meh, too indirect for me, FBNIS

Squirtle: Meh-est of the Pokemon Trainer trio, he just doesn’t provoke like any reaction from me at all unlike the other two

Diddy Kong: Meh

Olimeh: This is the most boring goddamn character, everything you do you have to pluck fucks

ROB: He barely animates

Villager: I kinda wish Animal Crossing let you be an animal too. The lone human character is really boring

Mega Meh: You got: FBNIS

Little Meh: I dunno I’ve just barely ever played him

Mehninja: Maybe I should actually try playing it once ever

Duck Hunt: If there was a B-and-a-half tier I’d put this one there because you can delay the side-B and set up Snake-level GOTCHA combos, otherwise the novelty wears off fast

Ryu: He is the 2nd-least likeable guy, what a turbo douche

Bayomehtta: She’s rule 63 Dante, her game was always just a DMC ripoff that relied on her tits & ass to differentiate from it

Inkling: I like the yellow hair girl one but I ABSOLUTELY HATE THE CRINGY-ASS ASSIST TROPHY AND WILL ABSOLUTELY UNFAIRLY BLAME THE CHARACTER FOR THIS.

C Tier

Samus: She is the most FBNIS character

Ice Climber: They’re really un-cute and I hate their desync thing

Metaknight: This guy was so much cooler before he talked, or rather, before he screamed AYAYGYGYAYGYAGA

Ike: Marth World has like 2,000 characters ranging from pegasus knights to barbarians to psychic dragon-girl dancers, and yet we keep getting these boring fucking swordsmen

Pokemon Trainer: Get absolutely the fuck out you twerp you don’t even do a goddamn thing and you die the second any one of your THREE fighters is KO’d so you don’t even incorporate the actual spirit of your original character unlike literally everybody else

Venusaur: If I evolved this ugly fucker I would delete my save

Lucas: If I had an Absolutely Gone Machine that could erase anything in the world and delete everyone’s memory that it ever existed so they would shut the fuck up about it, Mother 3 would be precisely the fourth thing I deleted

Robin: Least shitty post-Melee Marth World character but I just haven’t bothered to try it out to see if it’s actually good or not, probably because I’m just too allergic to Marth World by now

Dark Samus: Cool, but why

Daisy: MPATBUD, but this one has the closest thing to a personality. Unfortunately it is a fucking terrible and horrific personality

Zero Suit Samus: hey cool Samus is Barbie now

Ken: Remember how I said Ryu was the 2nd-least likeable? Well here’s Liquid Ryu to seize the coveted spot

Cloud: Yeah hey, let’s take the one Final Fantasy protagonist with like the least connection to Nintendo, no it’s fine, every goddamn Marth World game except the one that justified its worldwide presence has a character in but we’re not gonna use Cecil or Buttz or Terra

Corrin: Any hope this bitch had to go on my “Is a dragon so I like it” list was ruined by how absolutely infuriating it is to fight against Corrin especially that one Spirit match where he spams his INSTANT FINAL SMASH THAT HAS LIKE AN INFINITELY VERTICAL HITBOX fuck this goddamn digimon

D tier

Yoshi: I’ve hated this thing ever since it stopped going BAWONKA WONKA and started going blblblblblbl

add Birdo as an Echo and I might forgive you

Peach: MPATBUD, Peach is usually able to manifest either the behavior of a real person (Paper Mario) or the appearance of one (Smash), but sadly never both, she is doomed to blow-up-dollery forevermore

Sonic: Please add any other Sonic character, any at all, I’ll even take Charmy, I fucking hate Blue Bubsy

Wolf: The only reason he is not the furry-trashiest character in Smash is because Krystal is an AT, this cocksucker deadass awoos

Wii Fit Trainer: Next to her, Mario Princesses almost look human

Rozzalinda: MPATBUD and this one is the worst, far and away the worst Mario Princess, she is the creepiest fucking woman. WHY IS IT THAT NOBODY IN MARIO ACTS LIKE A HUMAN FUCKING BEING EXCEPT THE CHARACTERS WHO AREN’T FUCKING HUMAN. tl;dr the only people who say rosalina is their waifu collect people’s faces

Mii Fighters: you dress them up to make a parody of a character and then never once actually use said parody because they are stupid

Palutena: remember in Uprising how they could make fake Palutenas, this is one of them, they have a fake Viridi too, you know it is because starting in smash 4 it is clearly two different actresses trying way too hard to sound like the old ones and i can’t get over it sorry. (also she plays like shit)

Pac-Man: I only liked him when he was a pizza

Shulk: does he ever shut the fuck up

Lucina: add a red nose and it’s Marth: Tumblr Edition

Chrom: oh fuck off

Robin’s bitchass final smash still calls this clown

even if you use it on Chrom

he is so ashamed of his audacity he fucking fucks himself

[peppusae]

[kth] lavender honey ch. 3

note: this fanfic has more than one part, so pls look forward for more!

lavender honey: kim taehyung x reader

genre: fluff, crack, college au, smut(?)

word count: 3k

💫

lavender honey

ch 3: in which taehyung despises knowing the sexual orientation of dead ‘literists’

"Hey, Taehyung, do you think Shakespeare is gay?" You ask, slipping into the seat beside him at the counter the next week.

Honestly, you're ready to change your dissertation topic from 'Kim Taehyung's various facial features' to 'William Shakespeare's sexuality' now, and you feel a surge of pride as you lean against the swivel chair and exhale in content at your new discovery.

It's a warm Tuesday evening, and the library is lined with dozens of students, most of them having their laptops turned on and typing like crazy. Perhaps they were those students who had an assignment due midnight, and you smile, glad that you had actually handed your work in a little earlier this time. Good job, you're actually patting yourself for a job well done as you take your seat.

Taehyung, however, does not smile.

In fact, his face scrunches up a bit as he stares at you with a questioning look.

"What sort of black magic are you doing again to twist my otherwise perfectly normal life, [Name]?"

Black magic. Apparently, Taehyung watches way too many movies.

"No, I'm serious. Am I the only one who thinks this way?" You wonder out loud, reaching for the thick paperback inside your backpack. "Look at this."

Taehyung moves a little closer to you in his chair, the rolling of the wheels making a few heads look up from their laptops and stare at him. The male hurries to give a sheepish smile, waving it off before he turns back to look at the book on your lap.

Look, this is what double standards are like. If you'd done the same, you swear the girls who are seated at the desks would have glared daggers at your fragile being, but it's Taehyung, and Taehyung's a hot dude.

Hot dudes always have it easy aka girls giggling like they've just discovered the kind of boxer briefs Jungkook wears.

Not that you've ever considered this before.

Anyways, back to the issue in hand-

"'Shakespeare's sonnets'? What's a sonnet, and what about it?" Taehyung wants to know, taking it in his hands and flipping through a couple of pages.

You kinda wanna punch him for being uncultured enough to not know what a sonnet is, but the fact that he asked what it is makes you forgive him (it's not his confused expression that looks so cute that forgives him, nope).

"A sonnet is a form of poetry which has fourteen lines," you explain, "It usually has like ten syllables per line, but I don't think that matters to you-"

"I'm surprised that you're actually using that brain of yours, for once." Taehyung muses, and you poke him in the waist, which in turn makes him chuckle and turn back to the whitish-yellow pages of the poem book. "Because you're right, it doesn't matter to me."

"Rude." You hiss. "So you see. Good ol' Shakeypakey here wrote 154 sonnets, okay? So, it was split into two parts based on-"

"Wait, did you just call a dead literist 'Shakeypakey'?" He asks, horrified.

"There is no word in the dictionary called literist. You can, instead, use-"

"That is beyond the point here, [Name]!"

"Listen," you hiss, snatching the book back from his clutches, "He has written 126 sonnets about a young man - a very fucking attractive man - and the other 28 sonnets are about a woman. Literally, he wrote at least 5 times more sonnets about the pretty dude."

"...So?"

Oh my god, there's a limit to beings freaking clueless but Taehyung likes climbing higher pedestals. Even The Himalayas would be ashamed. You shake your head in frustration.

"So! Why else would he be so obsessed with writing like 82 percent of his sonnet book about the man if he's not gay?"

Taehyung blinks at you in shock for a long moment, not moving a single muscle. You wonder if he was actually contemplating your reasoning, but then again... Taehyung was Taehyung, after all.

"Did you... do that math... just to..."

"Yes I did the math, so what? It makes so much sense. Maybe he's not gay, maybe he's like bisexual? Because even the sonnets about the Dark Lady was kinda kinky too so I think he has a lot of heterosexual shades too. Who knows."

"This is information I could live without, [Name]." Taehyung finally sighs, moving away from you and sighing. You watch as he begins to clear up his desk space, appalled that he wouldn't understand your very detailed reasoning.

If this is his reaction to your newfound discovery of Shakespeare's sexuality, then you sincerely hope Taehyung will never see your browser history with multiple search tabs of 'kinky Shakespeare'.

Plus that one meme you found of the poet's face cropped out and stuck to the ass of-

"I'm going to go put the books away." Taehyung announces, interrupting your fraying thoughts by picking up the handful of books that have been returned earlier.

Oh no you don't-

"Shakespeare was probably from a Victorian-ish era, you know? Those times when ladies wore metal frills on their skirts to make them more poofy and shit." You hurry to say. "His mama might have stabbed one of the metal frill shit into his ear if he said he was gay. Maybe he was in a polyamorous relationship, maybe he was the one who invented the idea-"

"Oh my fuck, shut the hell up." Taehyung hisses, standing up and stomping away. You blink at him as he takes the trolley of books, quickly making his way to the shelves and starting to put the books away.

Talk about being narrow-minded.

>

"So, your brother is Namjoon, right?" Taehyung asks the next day, slipping by your seat during lunch.

The cafeteria is excessively crowded, the jet line filled with students seeking a second helping of the ice-cream sandwiches they're handing out for free. According to Jimin, it's on occasion of Ice-cream Day, which you think is the stupidest invention that ever exists.

"Yes, but," you warn between gritted teeth, "Stop talking about it. I'd rather most people don't know. I'm not gonna be that one sister that the girls suck up to so that I'd help them get brownie points with Joon, like back in high school."

"You have a good point... It must have been hard for you, right?"

This makes you soften up a little, nodding back at the male who frowns sadly at you. So, even if Taehyung enjoys annoying you, he can be nice if he wants to.

"Oh, there's Jungkookie! Yah, Kook-ah, come here and sit with your Noona!" Taehyung yells from beside you, and the said brown-haired male's eyes widen as he pauses in his tracks, blinking at you two in surprise and his face going very pink.

You can't blame him, you must be at least two shades redder than he is.

You take it back, Taehyung is not nice at all.

"Over here, Kookie!" Jimin greets, patting the seat beside him. Yoongi lets out a small grunt beside you, and you sigh, giving your best smile to the freshman and motioning for him to join you lot.

Jungkook looks hesitant, quietly nodding and taking a seat right in front of you. Taehyung is paying for this later. Wait till you hide his library card. He's gonna suffer. And you're gonna be the one ugly giggling inside.

"So, Kookie, we were talking about how we can help Joon-hyung and Jin-hyung get together. Do you have any ideas?"

"Ah, so they do like each other. I always thought that too." Jungkook blinks in surprise.

"Even the kid knows. Why is it that those two little shits are the only ones who don't know how they feel about each other?" Yoongi lets out an exasperated sigh. "If they got together, Namjoon might stop writing depressing songs and start working on more brighter songs."

"Maybe they can go to a carnival. Seokjin-hyung has a thing for alpacas, right?" Jimin asks.

"That's a weird animal to have a kink for, but I'm not judging-"

"Shut up." You hiss, elbowing Taehyung, and the male doubles over, laughing and being proud enough to have elicited out a reaction from you. Jungkook watches the exchange in silence, and when you meet eyes with him, he looks away, turning to Jimin instantly and saying 'So? What about alpacas?'

Weird.

"Well, they can go to a carnival, Namjoon-hyung can play one of those dart games, or those ball-throwing games. He wins an alpaca plushie, and he gives it to Seokjin-hyung and tells him how he feels."

"That's like an unarmed battle with a bunch of sirens. Joon can't win no matter what he tries, he's not the most athletic nut in the world." You state.

"Si... Sirens?" Taehyung chokes, an eyebrow raises in confusion.

"Yeah? You know, those pretty fucked-looking female sea creatures that try to seduce idiots like you to get you into the sea and st-"

"I know what a siren is, you dolt," Taehyung sighs, "I took five weeks of Greek Mythology in my freshman year. I remember writing 'Sirens' in Google search and having nightmares."

"Then, why are you looking at me with that face?"

"... What face?"

"It looks like a fuck face minus the innuendo-inducing expression that you use. It's that face you make when you're confused to the level where you don't even know what speaking is, and you look like you accidentally ate ruined kimchi from a ripoff Korean-wannabe shop."

"I do not. And that's really specific, has that ever happened to you?"

"Down at Lindsay's Korean Meals stand a few blocks from the library. I had food poisoning for days."

"That's kinda sad. Was it recent?"

"Nah. I missed like four classes of Advanced Psychology classes near the start of the semester, remember?"

"Oh, then?"

"Yeah. Food poisoning is sad."

"Yeah. Please take care when you eat out, okay, [Name]?" Taehyung smiles at you, and the gesture is so soft that it makes you smile back like an idiot until you hear the sound of throat clearing.

And that's when you remember that Jungkook is staring at you two, and his expression is hard to read, eyebrows furrowed and lips pursed a little as if... as if...

Wow, you really shouldn't be a language major after all, if you can't describe something as basic as an expression.

Another, more defensive side of you pipes in, claiming that it's fine, reading expressions are the tasks of psychology majors, which you clearly aren't.

It's while you have this debate, that Taehyung - who seems to have noticed the way Jungkook is playing around with the bowl of grapes in his tray - coos 'Kookieeeee, what's wrong?' in a sing-song voice.

Jungkook does not respond, eyes hard and now looking at you, and both the angel and devil on your shoulder that's having the language vs psychology war together stops, making you gulp.

"The heck is this tension here? Let me do some mood-making here with my funny humour that no one can get enough of." A loud voice has to say, and all three of you look up and see Seokjin holding his tray proudly, a smiling Namjoon beside him.

"No thanks, Hyung." Yoongi speaks, picking up his almost-empty tray of food and standing up. Jimin, seeing this action, scarfs down the rest of his kimchi and rice, following the older male a couple steps behind after saying a hard-to-decipher 'bye guys!'

"Well, it's okay. Jimin might get offended if he was here to witness this amazing question that I have for all you earthlings."

"But Hyung, you're an earthling too. Or, are you an alien?" Taehyung has to butt in, and you hush him, glancing at Seokjin so that he would say whatever he has to say and get it over with. Namjoon takes the now-free seat beside you, and all eyes are on Seokjin who plops his tray beside Jungkook's, hands on his hips and puffs his chest out with a big smile.

"If Jiminie eats a mochi, does that count as cannibalism?"

"Oh my god, please stop, Hyung." Taehyung mumbles, while, beside you, Namjoon is cracking up like the loser that he is.

You think you hear Hani and Hyojin giggling, while Jungkook just stares at Seokjin as if he couldn't believe what the male had said.

"This story won't be fun without my jokes-"

"YOU CAN'T JUST SAY THAT OUT LOUD."

>

You're in charge of putting away the books for today, and the trolly is lugged to the side while you look up barcode numbers and do your job in peace.

But there's a being that taps your shoulder, and no one should really blame you for being scared and starting to scream. The light above the philosophy aisle is dimmer than the other isles, so it makes you wary of beings other than human.

But there's a hand that covers your mouth, muffling your scream. God. What a sucky way to die. It's kinda kinky if you think about it, but why is a stranger making you die at the philosophy aisle, at least let you move over to the language aisle, it's literally only three rows away for crying out loud-

"Noona, it's only me." The voice says, and you turn around, seeing Jungkook smiling at you with a fond expression, looking highly amused when you hide your face in embarrassment.

"Kookie, what are you doing?!" You hiss, punching his arm and taking a couple steps back - the kid was standing way too close for comfort.

"I wanted to say hello." He shrugs, watching as you pick up a book and place it back on the shelf. "Extra-credit, right?"

You give him a nod, waving the cardholder you have around your neck. The picture of yours had come out good, you had every right to show it off to the hot freshman, okay?

Jungkook takes hold of the card, smiling down at your beaming picture, and - wait a second, his finger just touched your left boob, rip virginity - he comes so close to you that it makes you slightly intimidated as you nervously look up at the male.

And wow, this must be what interactions with angels feel like; you can see the scar on his left cheek, his pretty doe eyes, and the slightly chapped lips of his from this close, and he-

"Noona, do you want to go out with me sometime?"

"Sure, I- Wait..."

"To see a movie and eat and stuff. You're majoring in language, right? I'm sure we can have a lot of discussions about the movie after it's over."

Wait wait wait pause rewind-

Hey, now that you think about it, dissecting a movie and over-analysing it sounds like fun...

"I mean, well, of course I wouldn't mind going with you, Kookie, but do you mean..."

A platonic going out, or-

"Definitely not a platonic going out."

Shit, did you say that out loud?

"Yes you did, Noona."

"Oh."

"This is probably selfish of me to ask, but, remember that really boxy white shirt you wore once with that blue skinny jeans? Do you think you can wear it for our first date? I really liked it, but for some reason, you didn't wear it after that one day."

Yes, because Namjoon accidentally splashed ketchup all over it when you both had gone to KFC for chicken and fries later that day.

But you aren't going to tell Jungkook that, of course.

"Um. Sure, okay, I'm good to go." You tell him, and you can feel your cheeks flushing in embarrassment while you aggressively take a stack of books and stuff them back on the shelf.

"I'll message you, then?"

You give him a thumbs up, too flustered to look at his face, and Jungkook responds with a small laugh, hands clutching on the hanging straps of his backpack before he quickly runs away. And only after he does so, are you able to let out a huge breath you weren't aware you were holding.

Dragging the now empty trolly, you make your way to the reception desk. Taehyung's laptop's lid is closed now, and he has his chin rested on his hand as he watches you make your way back to the desk and take a seat.

Wordlessly, he reaches a hand out and presses his hand on your cheek. You are about to protest, when he moves his hand back and raises an eyebrow at you.

"You're quite obvious, Ms. Kim."

"Shut up. I just accidentally bumped into Kookie when I was putting the books away, that's all."

"I know."

You expect him to tease you, but he doesn't. Even when you finish up work and Namjoon is waiting to pick you both up and drive you home, he says nothing to your brother.

"Hey, Joonie?"

"Yes, my dearest little sister to whom I will share half my food, half my world, half my milky way, and half of everything I have to offer?"

"You're buying me the same exact white shirt you poured ketchup over. I have a date and I need it."

"Oooh, did the freshman kid finally make a move on you?"

"Shut up. We're driving to the mall and spending half of your allowance. You'll do that for your dearest little sister for whom you said you would give half of everything to offer, right?"

Namjoon has nothing to say while he digs in to see how much cash he has on himself.

Serves him right.

And you find it oddly uncharacteristic, the way Taehyung wordlessly waves goodbye to the two of you and leaves, when Namjoon stops by the younger male's apartment.

read next: ch 4

[raccoonfootproductions]

Editorial: Why Does Nickelodeon Give Up On New Animated Shows So Quickly?

(The following post is long. Very long. And I did my best to word it properly even though I’m not the best with words. Still, I’d very much appreciate it if you took the time to read it because it’s about something that really matters to me. I know stuff about Nickelodeon isn’t very popular unless it’s 100% negative, but please, if you have the time, give this a look)

Nickelodeon. Once beloved by everyone, now infamous for two things: Either ending animated shows too early (El Tigre, Harvey Beaks) or treating them terribly (The Legend of Korra). They’ve been like this since 2006 and have only slightly improved since then. Even now, Bunsen is a Beast and Welcome to the Wayne, which only just premiered this year, seem to already be on their way out, either cancelled or ready to be moved off the main network for their next season.

Why has this happened? Why has Nickelodeon lost faith in its own animated output? I believe there are two groups of people to blame:

Nickelodeon’s current management

The general viewing public on the internet

That’s right, WE are just as much to blame for Nick’s downfall as they are. Yes, really. There are several factors that led to the state the network is in now and we had a hand in quite a few of them...

1. The Change in Management (The Dark Ages)

Let’s rewind to early 2006. Nickelodeon had just gotten a new president -- Cyma Zarghami. Needless to say, it didn’t take long for her to become the most hated president in the history of the network.

What was her first move? Cancelling almost every current animated show. Danny Phantom, Jimmy Neutron, My Life as a Teenage Robot... The only ones that remained were Avatar: The Last Airbender (for a while) and SpongeBob SquarePants. This was obviously received as a terrible move and fans were outraged. So much so that protests were held outside the network offices in New York (by fans of Danny Phantom).

Did Cyma respond to criticism and stop there? Nope! Many shows after that were cancelled quickly, several only getting one season (El Tigre, Tak and the Power of Juju, Making Fiends). Even pilots that had potential to live longer than that (Adventure Time, The Modifiers) were rejected before even getting their own series. To make matters worse, many shows that did live beyond a single season were terribly received by critics (Back at the Barnyard, Fanboy and Chum Chum, Sanjay and Craig, Breadwinners).

Only a small handful of shows since then have lived for at least two seasons and received critical praise, thanks in part to two seasons becoming the minimum for most new shows, but even most of those were treated terribly by the network at some point. However, at this point, it wasn’t entirely the network’s fault, which leads me to the next factor...

2. Our Refusal to Give New Nickelodeon Shows a Chance

I’ve seen it far too many times. So many people on the internet either not knowing about a new Nicktoon (more on why that is later) or outright refusing to watch it. The latter is a problem that stems from our inability to trust Nickelodeon anymore, thinking the new show will either be dumb or the network will just cancel it early.

Hear me right now and hear me well: THAT ATTITUDE IS EXACTLY WHY THEY CANCEL SHOWS EARLY.

You boycotting shows just because you think the network will mistreat it or because you just don’t like the network only makes things worse. It greatly affects the rating and online buzz, the very things shows need to survive. The network won’t think you’re refusing to watch because of how bad they’re run; They’ll think you just don’t like the show and axe it quicker. If you want to make a real impression, boycott the shows that you think are bad and support the ones you like by watching them or merely talking about them online.

Sometimes, it’s not even the mere fact it’s on Nick that makes people too judgy about new shows. It can be the way the show looks. If we think the art style isn’t good enough or the premise is a ripoff of something else, we’ll pass on it, even if the show is actually pretty good. There were people who thought Harvey Beaks was a ripoff of The Amazing World of Gumball because of how it looked and decided not to watch it. There were people who thought Welcome to the Wayne was a ripoff of Gravity Falls just because of its premise and decided not to watch it. There’s already people planning not to watch Pinky Malinky because they don’t like its art style. These shows (not counting Pinky because we don’t know yet) were all good, but got very little attention because many judged them at first glance rather than actually watching them. This was a major factor that led to their early demises. Not enough people gave them a chance right out of the gate, so the network gave up on them.

The Loud House is the only recent Nicktoon that managed to become popular right away and avoid cancellation, but that’s mostly due to early online buzz and people actually giving it a shot because they actually liked how it looked. It ended up rivaling SpongeBob in ratings, which Nick is always looking for in a new show. If we can’t help it get close to SpongeBob numbers, there’s a chance the network won’t support it for long.

I know what you’re thinking. “C’mon, new shows can’t become popular that quick! It takes time to build up popularity! Nick just has unrealistic goals!” Well, as a rebuttal to that, I present the next factor...

3. Cartoon Network (and Disney XD)

Cartoon Network... That network... I have a lot of problems with that network...

My main problem with it is simple: It’s an attention hog.

Ever since 2010, with the introduction of Adventure Time and Regular Show, all I ever heard online was how great those two shows were. Day in and day out, no one would shut up about these two shows. Cartoon Network had apparently entered a new golden age, while Nickelodeon was still seen as a rotting corpse. I’m definitely not saying these two shows were bad; I was just annoyed by how much people were talking about them, especially since I wasn’t as into them as everyone else.

Then came The Amazing World of Gumball. Then Steven Universe. Then Clarence. Then We Bare Bears. Then, most recently, OK K.O.: Let’s Be Heroes. So many shows came out in the last few years that appealed to pretty much everything the internet wanted. Because of that (and I suppose a lot of promoting on CN’s part), most of them became famous almost instantly. Their ratings compared to other networks’ shows didn’t matter; They had online fame. A lot of it. Much more than anything Nickelodeon could produce.

Don’t believe me? Just look at these Google trend charts, the blue lines representing Nicktoons and the red lines representing Cartoon Network Originals:

Breadwinners vs Clarence (admittedly not a fair comparison already)

Harvey Beaks vs We Bare Bears

And most recently, Welcome to the Wayne vs OK K.O.: Let’s Be Heroes

As you can see, the CN Originals had enormous spikes of popularity around their premieres, while all the Nicktoons could barely reach their level at any point. The internet’s focus has always been directed toward CN more, as if Nick doesn’t even exist anymore because we’ve become that biased. New CN shows barely have to do anything other than exist and repeat the formula of the last hit show to get immediate online fame. Even unpopular shows like Teen Titans Go! have achieved fame simply by being controversial, something that not even Nick’s worst shows have achieved.

That's my problem with Cartoon Network. It achieves so much by doing so little, while almost all other animated shows get next-to-zilch.

Of course, Cartoon Network isn’t the only attention hog. There’s also Disney XD. While its ratings are the lowest out of all kids’ networks, its shows can easily become as popular as CN’s. Gravity Falls and Star vs The Forces of Evil are two prime examples.

All that being said, these networks are just as guilty as Nick of sweeping shows under the rug early if they think they’re under-preforming. Let’s not forget how Disney treated Wander Over Yonder or how CN treated Young Justice and all other action shows. So this isn’t just a Nick thing; Nick’s just the most notorious for doing it. This is probably because of the next factor...

4. Poor Promotion and Business Practices

Now this one is entirely Nickelodeon’s fault. There’s really no way I can pin any of the blame for this on the public.

When was the last time you saw a commercial on Nick for something other than SpongeBob, The Loud House, or a live-action show? Almost never, right? Unless there’s new episodes or it’s a big event like Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie, most animation gets shoved to the side or completely off the schedule. Obviously, this is a terrible way for a show to gain any attention. It can’t gain any traction if it’s never advertised or airing. It also doesn’t help if the schedule’s constantly changed. Just ask The Legend of Korra.

Sadly, when it comes to new shows, if it’s not live-action, Nick doesn’t care. This raises the question, why does Nick like live-action show so much, even when the shows are so poorly made and received?

The answer is simple: They’re cheaper to make.

Animating a single episode of an animated show can take over half a year and many resources to produce. A live-action show can be churned out in much less time for much less money. All those recent Dan Schneider shows that just lump together at this point were likely greenlit because it barely costs the network anything compared to an average Legend of Korra episode. Even imported animated shows like the current Alvin and the Chipmunks series were brought onto the network because of their cheapness (Cyma Zarghami doesn’t even like Alvin that much).

That said, a show being cheap doesn’t automatically make it bad. A good example might be The Loud House. Its Flash animation can’t be all that expensive, but it still manages to be good because its staff cares about their craft. In the end, caring enough about what you’re making is what counts, not the price of it. Sadly, not enough live-action shows have a caring-enough crew to make them any good. The kid actors and kid viewers just play along because they really don’t know any better.

All I really want here is for Nickelodeon’s scheduling and promoting to be more balanced. They can keep the SpongeBob reruns and live-action shows, just as long as other animated shows get just as much airtime and advertisements. They need to even the playing field and then, only after more than a few weeks or months, judge a new show’s popularity before pulling it. Also, checking the amount of views a show gets on their website and other legal streaming sites is a good idea for them too. We live in an age where online viewership matters a lot more than television viewership.

5. Our Inability to Let Go of the Past

How many times have you heard this? “Nickelodeon was better in the 90′s!” Yeah, we’ve all heard something like it. Everything was apparently better back in an earlier decade. That’s part of the reason companies rely on nostalgia so much these days -- It’s stuff that people already like. Therefore, it’s easy to sell and they don’t have to take risks with new stuff.

This is a driving factor behind a lot of Nickelodeon’s decisions these days. Think about all the movie reboots of old properties they have lined up: Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie, Rocko’s Modern Life: Static Cling, an Invader ZIM special, theatrical movies of Dora the Explorer and Are You Afraid of the Dark?... And that’s just what they’ve announced so far. There’s also the merchandise based on old shows, which is also growing more and more abundant. Even the 2012 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series managed to stay alive for a long while thanks to it being a familiar brand, with yet another series on the way. You could also say it’s why SpongeBob and The Fairly OddParents have lasted so long.

Why all the nostalgia? Like I said, it’s easy to sell, but also because... NO ONE GIVES THE NEW STUFF A CHANCE.

Why waste money on a show someone’s bound to dismiss as a poorly-drawn ripoff of another show when they can easily grab attention and cash by bringing back an old property that everyone already loves? Yep, you ignoring new shows just because you think they don’t look good was partly what led to this.

Don’t get me wrong, these nostalgia-fueled revivals of old franchises aren’t inherently bad. In fact, Nick probably does it better than anyone else. They actually bother bringing back the original creators and as much of the cast and crew as they can. There’s actual love and care put into these reboots, which is more than I can say for some other cash-grab reboots (looking at you, new Powerpuff Girls).

The problem is that these shouldn’t be the only thing from Nick you support. Next time a new show comes out, try watching a few episodes when they first premiere and see if you like it. If you do, keep watching it on the air and from legal online providers. Talk about it online and get other people interested. Do what you can to show support. If you don’t support it, I certainly don’t want to here you complain when it’s cancelled.

So is there still hope for Nickelodeon to improve?

At the moment, I definitely think so. It already has a bit, in some ways. However, it still has a long way to go before it’s learned from its mistakes. Cyma Zarghami is still in charge and she’s not much smarter than she was in the beginning.

That’s why we should help them get better.

I know in this day and age, it’s easy for us to not care about something like Nickelodeon. It’s past its prime and we’re beyond its demographic now, so why bother, right? Apathy can be dangerously powerful like that. Still, it’d be nice if we could all help somehow. I already named a lot of ways we can and many problems we should tell them to fix.

I’m sure a lot of you reading this grew up with them, possibly during their heyday, and if you did, who better to tell them what they should do than you? Who knows? They just might listen if you actually bother to speak up.

After all, wasn’t it fan demand that helped Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie finally get made?

[the-desolated-quill]

Cold War - Doctor Who blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Here we go again with another Mark Gatiss episode and it always pains me whenever I have to slag him off. I’m a big League of Gentlemen fan and Gatiss has done sterling work with them over the years, but the sad fact of the matter is the stuff he does outside of the League just isn’t very good. His first Doctor Who episode, The Unquiet Dead, was decent but flawed, The Idiot’s Lantern was a ripoff of Little Shop Of Horrors except with none of the charm, Victory of The Daleks was utter crap, and Night Terrors just bored the pants off me. Now here we are with Cold War, and I wish I could say this was the episode where Gatiss finally pulls out all the stops to give us the magnificent Doctor Who story we’ve all been waiting for, but sadly it’s yet another dud I’m afraid.

By far the biggest problem with Cold War is its total lack of originality. An Ice Warrior gets loose aboard a Russian submarine and it’s a fight for survival as the Doctor tries to reason with the alien and save the crew. Yep, this is yet another base under siege story, and it goes through all the cliches. The Doctor meekly trying to persuade the villain to show mercy, the crew splitting up to search for a solution, the monster picking them off one by one, and so on. I’ve seen this kind of story done so many times in Doctor Who now that I was practically nodding off halfway through it. 

Cold War also borrows liberally from other sci-fi stories, the most obvious being Alien, but there’s also elements from other Doctor Who stories too, such as the multiple Silurian stories where the Doctor tries to persuade two sides to play nice, and Dalek where the last surviving member of a warrior race threatens to destroy all of humanity out of desperation and rage. The problem is the reason Dalek worked so well was because of the Doctor’s long history with the Daleks. A relationship he simply doesn’t have with the Ice Warriors. Plus Cold War shares the same problem as The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood where neither side are given any sort of nuance or depth, and therefore it’s hard to empathise with anyone.

Of course Cold War is significant in that it features the long awaited return of classic series monsters the Ice Warriors. Having heard all of my rants about the Cybermen, the Sontarans and the Silurians, you’re no doubt wondering what I, a veteran Whovian, thought about the Ice Warriors during their heyday.

Yeah, I’ve never really been a fan. Not that they’re bad villains, mind. They’ve had some decent stories in their time. I’ve just never found them to be particularly interesting. The only time I felt the Ice Warriors really came into their own was in the Jon Pertwee era story The Curse Of Peladon. It was a sort of murder mystery plot where an alliance between the Galactic Federation and Peladon was in peril due to someone killing off the delegates. Naturally the Doctor and his companion Jo suspected the Ice Warriors due to their reputation, but then the story pulls the rug out from under us by revealing the true culprit to be the High Priest Hepesh and the realisation that the Ice Warriors really had changed their ways after all. It was a genuinely good twist and opened up a lot of creative possibilities for the Ice Warriors. We’d seen heartless zealots like the Daleks, altruistic foes like the Cybermen and one note pantomime villains like the Master, but we had never seen a monster in Doctor Who that starts out as evil only to realise over the course of the show that what they were doing was wrong and try to make amends. This put the Ice Warriors in an incredibly unique position I feel. One that sadly was never fully capitalised on because in their next and last story, The Monster Of Peladon, the Ice Warriors reverted back to being baddies again.

So what direction does Gatiss take the new, revived Ice Warriors? Are they a morally complex race of warriors trying to make up for past mistakes or boring alien invaders hellbent on world domination?

...

Boring alien invaders hellbent on world domination.

Great! Yeah! God forbid we should do anything interesting with them!

To the episode’s credit, the new Ice Warriors look really cool. Much more high tech and imposing than the classic series ones. And Gatiss does try to address a few discrepancies in Ice Warrior lore, for example how did a race of cold blooded reptiles survive on a cold planet like Mars? But it’s the characterisation that severely lets this episode down. The Ice Warrior just isn’t a very interesting character. They try to make you feel an emotional connection to him by wheeling out the cliched dead daughter, but the character is just too extreme for us to empathise with. One human zaps him with a cattle prod and suddenly he wants to destroy the world, and the only explanation we’re given as to what justifies such an overreaction is some bollocks about Martian code of ethics. Also, didn’t he attack them first? And I had to let out a hollow laugh when the Doctor said the Ice Warrior would have left them alone if they didn’t zap him. Bit naive, wouldn’t you say? The Ice Warriors are many things, but merciful is not one of them.

And it just gets worse when they then commit the cardinal sin of getting the Ice Warrior to come out of its shell. So instead of the tall, imposing Ice Warrior we were promised, we instead get a pair of green rubber gloves gripping people’s faces and the worst CGI face I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s hard to imagine an Ice Warrior being that fast and nimble out of the suit, (not to mention that spindly looking), not just because I’m so used to the Ice Warriors being slow, sluggish brutes, but also because Earth’s gravity is much stronger than Mars’. Shouldn’t the Ice Warrior be a quivering puddle of slime on the floor? And what was the point of the Ice Warrior ‘disassembling’ people to learn human weaknesses. It never comes into play at any point in the episode. Everything about the naked Ice Warrior just feels utterly divorced from anything I’d associate with them to the point where I question why Mark Gatiss would even call it an Ice Warrior. Why not come up with your own alien? Why bring back the Ice Warriors? And I’d prefer a better reason other than ‘it’s the 50th anniversary.’

The human characters are just as bad. Whenever I’ve seen Cold War related stories, it’s usually from the perspective of the Americans. Hardly ever from the Russians. This is an opportunity for Doctor Who to cover new ground here, but they don’t really. The Russians aren’t actually characters. None of them are given any real development, arc or personality of their own. You have the captain who’s... well... the captain, some douchebag who is obsessed with war and gets promptly killed off, and then you’ve got David Warner’s character who we learn absolutely nothing about other than he’s obsessed with Duran Duran. The rest are just pointless redshirts that I don’t give a single shit about. If you’re going to give me a base under siege story, the least you can do is give me interesting characters that I actually care about, otherwise it’s going to be a bit hard to work up any kind of shock or sadness when they do kick the bucket. There’s no tension because I don’t care who lives or dies.

And speaking of tension, that’s another missed opportunity. It’s the Cold War. The world’s on a knife edge. Any spark or conflict could trigger nuclear armageddon. Combine that with the claustrophobic submarine setting and this episode should be brimming with paranoia and nervous tension. But you never get a sense of that, not only because I don’t give a shit about any of the characters, but also because at no point did I feel the weight or scale of what’s happening. Oh sure the Doctor keeps reminding us about the threat of a nuclear apocalypse, but it never feels imminent because none of the characters seem to take the prospect seriously. For one thing, the Russians are very quick to trust the Doctor and Clara despite them mysteriously appearing out of nowhere and could very well be working for the enemy for all they know, and whenever they do talk about the Cold War, it’s very quickly brushed to the side. Well if the characters are’t bothered by the prospect of a nuclear holocaust, why the fuck should I be? Even the finale with the Doctor praying that the Ice Warrior won’t launch the nukes is undermined by Clara randomly singing Hungry Like The Wolf. Strip all the tension out, why don’t you?

The Doctor is at his most ineffectual sadly, reduced to spouting his usual ‘show mercy’ claptrap and waving his sonic screwdriver around, but what annoys me even more is Clara. Not only is she back to her smug self, reducing the potential threat considerably because if she’s not taking it seriously, why should I, but also there’s an opportunity for a good character arc here that Gatiss botches spectacularly. At one point Clara wonders whether she could have handled her first encounter with the Ice Warrior better and at the end is able to use the memory of the Ice Warrior’s daughter to persuade him to leave. This could have been an effective moment had Clara been allowed to speak to the Ice Warrior freely the first time around instead of being reduced to a mouthpiece for the Doctor (why couldn’t the Doctor just talk to the Ice Warrior himself? They never properly explain that). Clara isn’t given any real agency of her own or licence to screw up, so rather than the ending feeling like a personal triumph for Clara as she grows and develops as a character, she’s instead just a convenient out for Gatiss.

And don’t get me started on all the stuff that just didn’t make sense. How can the Russians mistake a frozen humanoid for a mammoth? Why did that guy thaw the Ice Warrior out other than for the sake of plot convenience? Why would a submarine that was only sent on an Arctic expedition be carrying nuclear weapons? Why would the Russians have automatic weapons on a submarine? How is the Ice Warrior able to hide inside the walls of a submarine? How does the Ice Warrior expect to launch a successful nuclear attack from a submarine that’s stranded 700 meters down below sea level? Oh and the Doctor just happened to have been fiddling with the TARDIS off screen, which just happened to make it disappear to the South Pole, leaving them stranded in the submarine? That’s fucking convenient, isn’t it?

I suppose I don’t hate Cold War. It’s competently made and if you’re someone who can’t get enough base under siege stories in Doctor Who, I’m sure it’s possible to enjoy this one provided you switch your brain off beforehand. The only crime this episode commits is that it’s just really, really dull. The story is cliched, the characters are one dimensional, and the potential of the setting is completely wasted. The only noteworthy thing about Cold War is the Ice Warrior and they don’t even do that very well. Overall it’s a very bland and forgettable episode. Maybe one day the Ice Warriors will get an episode that finally realises their full potential, but it isn’t this one.

[tube-thoughts-blog]

tube thoughts vol. 2

zero stars - terrible, 1/2 a star - dull, 1 star - folly, 1 1/2 stars - lacking,   2 stars - fair, 2 1/2 stars - decent, 3 stars - terrific

zack snyder's 300: Rise of an Empire *Lady warrior commandeers the battle scenes and saves it from being a male meat fest like the first film.* 3 stars

rifftrax presents "Independence Day" *One way to make this movie more moronic would be if social media existed in its world at the time.* 3 stars with riffing 2 without

Cannon films "Ninja 3: The Domination" *Spunky shinobi, you must avenge me!* 3 stars

Septic Man *Municipal shit-storm* either zero stars for grossness or 3 stars for grossness and surrealness

"The Stuff" a Larry Cohen film starring Michael Moriarty *Ba-da-ba-ba-ba, I'm lovin' it.* 3 stars

Farscape premier episode *Awol from the ratcage.* 3 stars

Garth Marenghi's: Darkplace "The Creeping Moss from the Shores of Shoggoth" *Brocolli from space. I'd thought it had tasted odd.* 3 stars

Albert Pyun's "Omega Doom" starring Rutger Hauer *It's nice to know after we've killed ourselves off, through constant warfare, sentient robots will become gun nuts and start acting out cold war westerns.* 2 1/2 stars

Kenny vs. Spenny: "Who Can Sell More Bibles?" *The Devil is in the details.* 3 stars

Masters of Horror: Clive Barker's "Valerie on the Stairs" *Another bodice-ripper.* 2 stars

"I Spit On Your Grave" uncut 1978 either zero stars or 3 stars

"Beyond the Door" *Paranormal pregnancy with personality.* 3 stars

Twin Peaks: "The Condemned Woman" *Josie and the pine weasels* 2 1/2 stars

Lost and Found Video Night: Vol 7 -- 3 stars

Seinfeld: "The Frogger" *George's high score.* 3 stars

Kolchak, The Night Stalker: "Mr. R.I.N.G." *What's the difference between right and wrong? robot need to know.* 3 stars

Everything is Terrible "The Rise and Fall of God" *Homeschool is the answer.* 3 stars

Roger Corman presents Andrew Stevens' "Subliminal Seduction" featuring Sharknado's Ian Ziering and Critters' Dee Wallace Stone *CD-ROM Inception meets Tommy Wiseau's "The Room"  type inept erotic thriller.* 3 stars

David Cronenberg's "eXistenZ" *Jennifer Jason Leigh penetrates Jude Law's port hole in order to play an addictive and twisted version of The Sims.* 3 stars

rifftrax presents "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" *Butter scraped over too much bread.* 3 plus stars with riffing 3 stars without

"Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone" *Han Solo babysits a brat-pack ginger cutie, Ernie Hudson is Lando, and Michael Ironside is a Darth Humongous who believes that Earth Girls Are Easy.* 3 stars

"Riddick" *Robinson Crusoe machismo* 3 stars

Farscape: "I, E.T." *My name is Mud.* 3 stars

Dominion: pilot episode *Bright light city gonna set my soul on fire.* 2 1/2 stars

"Thor: Dark World" *Science lady Padme pines for Adam of Eternia so that she inadvertently stumbles into the evil fudge and awakens the 9th Doctor Keebler Who causes the realms to converge like ornaments on an imploding Christmas tree.* 3 stars

"Priest" *Paul Bettany's Obi-Wan character is disenchanted with his forced retirement  in a Catholic 1984 dystopia and his regret filled dreams lead to the wasteland where his  fallen knights of the old republic partner, a cowboy from hell Karl Urban, lurks about with his horde of bloodsucking bandits and xenomorph vampires. A decent cameo from Brad  Dourif as a snake oil salesman. This movie's biggest flaw is that it forgets  the classic genre work of Sergio Leone,  John Carpenter, and George Miller and instead mimmicks the cliche Matrix ripoff style hack work of Paul W.S. Anderson's Resident Evil flicks.* 2 stars

"Scanners 2: The New Order" *If you get inside me, go gently, and easy on the nosebleeds. This kind of telepathic power in the hands of a fascist P.D., no thankee.* 3 stars

Joe Bob's Christmas Special: Charles Band's "Pets" *Inhabits the same universe as other weird,  dumb kids' adventure comedies like 'Garbage Pail Kids', 'The Super Mario Bros Movie', 'Ernest Scared Stupid', and 'Problem Child 1 & 2'* 1 1/2 stars

Sami Rami & The Coen Bros present "Crimewave" aka "The XYZ Murders" *Reminiscent of the Three Stooges, classic Mel Brooks, 40s cartoons, humorous Tom Waits song tales, and the original SNL.* 3 stars

Udo Kier in "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss OSbourne'  --sexploitation-- *Show me where it hurts. Fill me with  hatred. My pleasure is seeing your dead body.* 3 stars

Masters of Horror: "Right to Die" *The crispy, vengeful ghost of Terry Shiavo.* 3 stars

William Lustig's "Vigilante" starring Robert Forster & Fred Williamson *Regular Joe nihilism* 3 stars

rifftrax presents Ridley Scott's "Alien" *H.R. Giger porn on the sattelite of love.* 3 plus stars with riffing 3 without

Josh Brolin is DC's "Jonah Hex" *Sometimes spooky, often dumb B-western that's sadly too gutless to show any blood n grit. Still it might fit into a marathon of 'The Quick and the Dead', 'Five Bloody Graves',  'Navajo Joe', and 'Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter.'*  2 stars

"Rhinestone Cowgirls" 1982 --xxx-- *Easy listenin' and screwin', plus plenty of other prickly  situations protruding in Cactus Corner.*  2 stars

Kolchak, The Night Stalker: "Primal Scream" *Unfrozen caveman mauler.* 3 stars

"Shogun Assassin" *Daddy day samurai* 3 stars

Monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs: Dino De Laurentiis presents "Orca" *starring Richard Harris as a salty sea-dog, Charlotte Rampling as a sensitive marine biologist, Bo Derek as a sexy shipmate and Shamu snack, plus the indian fella from 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' lending his wisdom by saying things like,  "The old ways no longer work. Now, even our gods dance to a new tune."*  2 1/2 stars

"Baron Blood" *Decent dubbing, giallo lite, moody nightscapes, cursed castle, creepy stalking.*  2 1/2 stars

Garth Marenghi's Darkplace: "Illuminatum & Illuminata" *Interviewer: Do you believe in the Horned One?  the actor Todd Rivers: You mean the Hoofed One? Interviewer: Yeah.*  3 stars

Beavis & Butthead: "Time Machine" *Butthead: 1832, that's like not now.  Beavis: Yeah, aren't we more than that?* 2 1/2 stars

Twin Peaks: "Wounds and Scars" *"A country habit. We are so very trusting."* 3 stars

Monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs:  Wes Craven's "The People Under the Stairs" *A ghetto version of Twin Peaks' "Black Lodge" where "Hills Have Eyes" type inbred freaks are trapped in the cellar and "Sometimes further in is the only way out." in a twisted Tom & Jerry style game of cat & mouse.* 3 stars

Masters of Horror: "We All Scream for Ice Cream" starring Lee Tergesen, William Forsythe, and the kid from Bad Santa and Eastbound & Down *The Good Humor Man returns from the land of the popsicles to scoop out and dish some cold and sticky revenge.* 3 stars

Gun Fu John Woo and Risky Bidness Tom Cruise present: "Mission Impossible 2" *We've got the cure, we made the disease. Dianetics incorporated.* 3 stars

Tim & Eric present: Bedtime Stories "Hole" *Spitting surreal absurdism sometimes sidetracks the sinister suburban satire.* 2 1/2 stars

MST3K presents: Charles Band's "Laserblast" *Moppy-haired stoner with a muscle-van gets to rain down the fire of the lizard alien gods on his stereotypical 70s burnout and redneck cop enemies in his one horse desert hometown.* 3 stars with riffing 2 without

Farscape: "Exodus from Genesis" *A hot time in the roach maternity ward in the outer reaches of the universe, tonight.* 3 stars

"Saga, Curse of the Shadow" aka "The Shadow Cabal" *Somewhere between Peter Jackson's LOTR and LARPers that run around yelling, "Lightning bolt, lightnight bolt, lightning bolt!"  2 1/2 stars

"Night of the Loving Dangerously" --xxx-- *With the allure of his ever-wanton ex-wife, Traci Lords, private dick, Peter North, is pulled into a web of blackmail involving his ex's new fiance- a perverted CEO  with everything to lose, Jamie Gillis,  his naughty daddy's girl daughter, and gay son's snooping photographer boyfriend.*  2 1/2 stars

Monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs: "Poltergeist" *Joe Bob maligns Spielberg's involvement with a Tobe Hooper horor flick, Heather O'Rourke gives me the sads, an 80s kids bedroom is full of nostalgic shit, the mom looks sexy even with a streak of grey hair, there's some kind of message about the sinister nature of suburban sprawl,  a sassy medium with a drawl steals the show, and Joe Bob ponders the difference between "Go into the light" & "Stay away from the light."* 3 stars

Lost & Found Video Night Vol. 5 *Hot diggity tallyho* 3 stars

"Purely Physical" 1982 --xxx-- *Schmaltzy motel fornicating where the lovers' lips refuse to move when the pillow talk gets filthy.*  2 1/2 stars

Kolchak, The Night Stalker: "The Trevi Collection" *Fashion victims. Some hilariously bad acting from a witch.* 3 stars

"Gallowwalkers" starring Wesley Snipes *Spaghetti vampire western. The kind of movie Blade 3 should have been.* 3 stars

Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back & Return of the Jedi ---despecialized editions--- *Impressive. Most impressive* 3 stars

Monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs: 1954's U.S. version of "Godzilla"  & "Godzilla vs. Mothra" *Tokyo stompin' in a Texas trailer park.* 3 stars

"Manborg" 2011 *Will Ferrell's 'Westworld', Scott Pilgrim vs. Mega City 1, Napoleon Dynamite 2: Judgment Day, Tom Green's 'Total Recall', Jim Carrey's "Battlefield Earth', Sam Raimi's 'Mortal Kombat: Annihilation', Paul Verhoeven's 'Army of Darkness', Patrick Swazy, Jacki Chan, Jake Busey, and Cynthia Rothrock  in 'Revenge of the Sith'.*  3 stars

Masters of Horror: Stuart Gordon presents Edgar Alan Poe's "The Black Cat" *Pluto, the little devil.* 2 1/2 stars

rifftrax presents: "The Last Slumber Party" *More potty-mouthed and homophobic than a Wayans Bros. "Horror" "Comedy" "Movie"* 2 1/2 stars with riffing 1 1/2 without

The Outer Limits: George R.R. Martin's "Sandkings" starring Beau & Lloyd Bridges *Red menace* 3 stars

rifftrax presents: "Battlefield Earth" *L. Ron Hubbard's  The Passion of the Prometheus as acted out by the rat-brained man-animal, John Travolta.*  2 stars with riffing 1 star without

Monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs: Mel Brooks "Spaceballs" 3 stars

rifftrax presents "Fantasic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" *Fate of world hangs in balance while obnoxious bantering, obnoxious celebrity  style wedding is overshadowing focus, obnoxious background extras actors mug for the camera and stare at the pop culture status heroes, obnoxious twirling mustache Dr. Doom villain moments, obnoxious studio thinking Galactus is a stupid concept and yet going through with having his threat to earth being the plot-- leaving us with a cloud of lame spacedust* 1 1/2 stars with riffing 1 star without

Troma presents: Lucio Fulci's "Rome 2072: The New Gladiators" *Televised brutality in a cyber-disco dystopia where the cities of the future are painfully obvious scale models covered in Christmas lights and dirtbikes along with karate chops are still considered pretty badass.* 2 1/2 stars

--- Game of Thrones: Season 3 episode 1

*The inept, pudgy comic relief gets to stumble around  in the snow avoiding ice zombies,

the dashing dwarf gets dissed by dear old dad,

the high class pimp positions himself near the daughter of the woman who always shunned his advances,

the would be future queen shows kindess to orphans and gets politely scolded for it,

a crow defects to the king beyond the wall,

a fiery zealot harshly deals with infidels,

a shiprecked war veteran brother puts himself back in harm's way to try to talk sense to his witch's pussy whipped brother,

the king of the north returns to his scorched hometown and imprisons his mum there,

a puppy eyed dragon mama sails with her seasick soldiers and goes shopping for baby slaughtering drone warriors while narrowly escaping creepy child with scorpion assassination attempt.*

3 stars

-------------------------------------------------------

rifftrax' Mike Nelson riffs "Predator" *"Speak mono-Slavic-ally and carry a big stick."* 3 plus stars with riffing 3 without

George Lucas & Ron Howard present: "Willow" *In order to save a red-headed bastard baby, Frodo Skywalker  fellowships a force of ragtags including a Han Solo in Pocahontas drag, an indian in the cupboard Kevin Pollack,  and a wizard lady trapped by spell in the body of a wombat.*  3 stars

rifftrax presents: "Twilight: New Moon" *A frigid, psycho chick gets dumped by her prissy,  older, unhealthy obsession. she then begins having night terrors ruining  the sleep of her closet gay lumberjack dad. next, she begins leading a lovesick  puppydog around on a leash while getting wreckless on a mopad, attempting suicide  for attention and all before going on a sisterhood of traveling pants adventure to a pretentious Anne Rice version of faggy Europe. 1980s teens were awesome. 2000s teens are awful.*  2 stars with riffing 1 star without

---- monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs:

"Slaughter High" aka "April Fool's Day"

*These jokers aint' f-f-f-foolin'. They like their drugs, they like their sex, they like their cruel pranks on nerds.

Unlucky for them,  their 10th year class reunion takes place at the now abandoned old high school in the middle of nowhere on a rainy night.

It's the perfect setting for an old dark house horror mixed with Agatha Christie style revenge picture.

This is one of the best episodes of monstervision.

It features a classic 1980s slasher flick, it has the original mail girl, Joe Bob skewers the logic of the TNT censors, and he reads an awkward letter from a male admirer named Rufus.*

3 stars

---------------------------------------------------------------

"A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors" *Freddy flew over the cuckoos' nest* 3 stars

The Outer Limits: "Valerie 23" *Do androids sleep mode with electric wet dreams? 2 be or R2D2? See, I could think of some existential questions to ask my prototype sexbot over a romantic dinner, especially if she were the first sentient being of her kind, and had Hulk strength for no apparently necessary reason.* 2 1/2 stars

Jamie Gillis in "Midnight Heat" 1983 --xxx-- *Rare grime. A gem of a different time. Seedy NYC.* 3 stars

Masters of Horror: "The Washingtonians" *Patriotic blue hairs set their wooden teeth on edge about the disclosure of that rich colonial tradition of chomping on cherry tastin' child flesh.* 2 stars

Farscape: "Throne for a Loss" *Rigel, the royal pain in the rear.*  3 stars

"Hellraiser 2: Hellbound" uncut *The stigmata of Sigmund Freud, from the makers of 'Scratch it, sniff it, squeeze it, suck it,' now available at finer novelty shops.* 3 stars

Twin Peaks: "On the Wings of Love" *Hangover cures, hidden secret half-sister, hallelujah for the hard of hearing, hometown beauty pageant queen hitlist, and hoot owl hieroglypics.* 2 1/2 stars

Monstervision with Joe Bob Briggs:  Randy Quaid in "Parents" *A Norman Rockwell painting hanging on the wall behind the desk at the Bates Motel.* 3 stars

The Outer Limits: "Blood Brothers" *Twelve immortal monkeys* 2 1/2 stars

"Kill List" 2011 -- *This feels like it could be a Garth Ennis story. It has old mates drinking together and shooting the shite about life. It has acts of extreme violence almost to the point  of dark comedy. It has a bleak poignancy. There's also the occult undertones like a Hellblazer comic.* 3 stars

William Hurt in Ken Russell's "Altered States" *Waiting, in a fish-bowl, for Godot.* 3 stars

Kolchak, The Night Stalker: "Chopper" *Stunt motorcycle riding, sword slashing specter with separation anxiety.* 3 stars

Farscape: "Back, and Back, and Back to the Future" *"Psychic Spanish-fly," alien lady combat, genetically structured spy seductress, quantum singularity also known as a blackhole used as a soul saving secret weapon of mass destruction that is seriously in jeopardy of being stolen or accidentally set off."* 3 stars

"The Wind" starring Meg Foster, Wings Hauser, & Steve Railsback *Swept up in stormy solitude and story.* 3 stars

The Outer Limits: "The Second Soul" *Lending our dead bodies, like they were used cars, to alien parasites, leads to some serious moral implications. Feels like a 50s style sci fi message about the dangers of multiculturalism given a more progressive twist at the end.* 2 1/2 stars

"Virgin Witch" --sexploitation-- *Prissy Galore throws a feisty spell when a group of dysfunctional devil worshippers decide they really, really fancy her.* 2 1/2 stars

Van Damme / Raul Julia "Streetfighter" *"Who wants to go home, and who wants to go with ME?!" Self aware dumb fun.*  2 1/2 stars

rifftrax' Mike Nelson riffs "xXx" starring Vin Diesel, Samuel L. Jackson, & Asia Argento *Double Ohhh Seven sez, "Do the DEW, dude."* 3 stars with riffing 2 stars without

[aardwolfpack]

Childhood O.C.s

Some characters I made up before age twelve, in no particular order...

Silverhawk: A Lego Castle minifigure who had many adventures.  He inherited half a kingdom and strong-armed his brother into giving him the other half.  He conquered other kingdoms and eventually the entire world.  His teammates were a mad scientist and an alien, and he later gained a second alien for a bodyguard and a pirate queen for a wife.  When I became more concerned with things making sense I decided the Lego Castle and Pirates settings were parts of an expansive technology-free zone in twenty third century Asia.  Silverhawk shifted from supervillain to benevolent ruler and his squad became the defenders of the Earth.  Later still he was a conventional politician in the United Alliance of Worlds.  He always wore the helmet, though.

Old Man Lead: A tough old rascal with lead instead of skin.  When he wasn't busy saving the world from mutants or aliens he was telling boring stories about the good old days.  His sidekick was a giant talking cat who peed acid.

Dimitri: A rad Dimetrodon with sunglasses.  He solved other prehistoric animals' problems.

Silhouette: A failed artist turned superhero.  He lived in the world of Marvel Comics.  Despite the name, he was not a silhouette.  He was host to a symbiont known only as "the Little Guy," who was a humanoid upper torso sticking out of his belly.  The Little Guy could attach to other superhero hosts, temporarily granting Silhouette their powers.  It sounds like I ripped off that one X-Files episode, but I created this character a year or two before it aired.  I actually ripped off Total Recall.

Scum a.k.a. Alien Crusader: A a mass of organs without skin or bones living in an oblong spheroidal tank with robotic arms and legs.  Despite the name, he was not an alien.  He led a team of hideous mutants who fought crime.  The bad guys were also hideous mutants, but they were mask-wearing conformists.  Later Scum had a space ship and lived on Mars in a community of mutants who looked like him, and the whole thing shifted to space opera.  Later it snapped back to superheroes, and Scum had a cloned Archaeopteryx for a sidekick.

Dr. Headsworth a.k.a. Dr. Conner: An alien who looked like a human head sliding around on a gastropod-style muscular foot.  Sometimes his "head" rested on a humanoid robotic body, but usually he could be found at the controls of a giant vehicle.  He was the Solar System's most skilled creator of androids, but he could never get the faces quite right.  They were, however, convincing enough to impersonate planetary leaders and start the biggest war in the history of the United Alliance of Worlds.

Joanna a.k.a. Mercury: The teenage future daughter of two present-day superheroes.  She went back in time to help the team prevent the bad future.  You might not know this but only gases and liquids can travel through time.  Mercury's superpower was being liquid.  She was born normal but liquefied at puberty.  In hindsight that's actually really awful.  She could mimic people and things and turn her arms into blades (Original idea!  Do not steal!).  Her standard form was a palette swap of her best friend.  That's also creepy in hindsight.  Sadly Mercury was my only memorable female O.C. who wasn't a generic stock character or a direct ripoff of a copyrighted character.

Skindroid: A killer android disguised with the skin of a slain human.  Only one metal finger gave him away.  I made this up before I saw The Terminator (though I'd possibly heard about it).

Rhubarb & Gooseberry: Two aliens who ended up in Mediæval Europe, which ended up being future Asia.  Their true names were unpronounceable.  Rhubarb was a skittish being who followed Silverhawk around after he saved his life.  I feel like there were important things about his character that I forgot.  Gooseberry was an ambitious knight who turned out to be a disguised alien from the same planet.  After Silverhawk bested him in battle he agreed to be his bodyguard.  Much later I decided Rhubarb and Gooseberry belonged to two related races of interstellar warriors.  Rhubarb went A.W.O.L. because he hated violence.  Gooseberry was a bounty hunter who tracked him down but had a change of heart.

Larry Octopus: A reclusive inventor who lived under the sea.  He just wanted to be left alone, but stuff kept happening that prompted him to summon his giant underwater vehicles and robots (which could be easily identified because they were marked "L.O.").  Despite the name, he was not an octopus.

Mega 2: In this universe there were three Mega Men (though Mega 3 faded out of the picture).  They were transformed from machines into humans, but confusingly still had robotic traits.  Dr. Light actually built Mega 2 around a gnat-sized robot he found one day.  The Mega Brothers lived in a base at the crossroads of dimensions and also had a mobile fortress (originally a treaded vehicle, but later a mechanical bull).  They fought Dr. Wily's robots and other evildoers (some from video games, some we made up).  Each time Mega 2 hit his head he shifted to an evil form with knight's armor and ground-shaking fists.  He reverted to normal when someone said his name backwards three times.  When Mega 1 disappeared Mega 2 got an upgrade.  He went mad with power and had to be taken down.  The Mega Brothers were later remade, and searched for the answers to their existence.  A planned storyline cast the original Mega 2 as the villain.

Dr. Giff Monquake: Pronounced "JIF mon-QUAY-kee."  He changed his name to that because he hated his birth name, Christopher Hurlbutz.  He was an eccentric scientist with no moral compass.  He was equally happy using his inventions for evil as for good.  He was only unhappy if they didn't work.  For a while Dr. Monquake wore "the Magic Fleece," a powerful alien artifact that looked like a white sheet with two holes cut in it.  It disappeared when I couldn't think of anything more to do with it.  So did his giant frog friend.

Larry & Grinder: A two-headed dragon.  Larry had a crest on his head and was friendly.  Grinder had a horn on his head and was ferocious, but he was a nice dragon deep down.  This pair had no fixed canon, but showed up in various action figure and Lego games.

Big Metal Ton: A robot henchman who sang while he worked.

[thesrr]

My Review on the WWE Royal Rumble

Decided to give my thoughts on the WWE Royal Rumble since this is the first day fully back from Ponycon. So if you haven’t seen it yet, I recommend you do before reading. Or if you’re like me and don’t care for spoilers, go ahead.

NXT TakeOver: San Antonio

To me, the big 4 PPVs don’t start an hour earlier. They start a day earlier with NXT TakeOver. These are like PPVs themselves and sometimes even better than the Big 4. So I’m going to review them alongside the Royal Rumble and treat them all as one big event. Because they are.

Eric Young Vs Tye Dillinger

Been a fan of Eric Young even in TNA. While him winning the world Championship was definitely copying Daniel Bryan, he did deserve it. Nice to see him not do a joke gimmick in the WWE so people new to him can treat him seriously from the start. As for Tye, he has grown on me. To think, only Stonecold and DB were capable of getting one word over and he joins them with “10″.

Nice to see Eric give him one more chance to join. Made it seem he really did want him to join Sanity. But seeing how Tye rejected it was really smart. You can’t disqualify someone for giving back their jacket. If Tye does indeed move to the Main Roster, this is a great completion of his time in NXT. I’m not a fan of heels with minions but I could when done right. And Sanity I felt is done right.

They’re big an intimidating, but they’re not the sole reason Eric Young wins matches. Eric Young is capable of winning his own battles (through underhanded tactics but still on his own). They’re not someone who shows up in the final moments of the match and makes it easy for the heel to win. Overall, an excellent opening to the rest of TakeOver and the Royal Rumble in general.

Samoa Joe in the Audience

If I saw this live, I would have thought “if he’s there, that means he MUST be appearing at the Rumble.” Sadly, I would be wrong.

Roderick Strong Vs Andrade Almas

While I heard of Roderick Strong, I sadly never seen him wrestle outside the WWE. Seeing him has been impressive so far. Andrade Almas I felt was smart to go heel. As a face, he didn’t provide much impact. Especially when he got overshadowed by others coming into NXT. He has been working better as a heel than a face.

The two work really well together. Almas was a fun cocky heel while Strong at times lived up to his name and more by being also pretty agile and quick. Awesome match overall. Both of them would be awesome to see on Raw or Smackdown. 

The Authors of Pain Vs DIY

Outside having Paul Ellering as a manager, I don’t see them being a Road Warriors ripoff. I see this more of Paul wanting to be known more than that guy who managed the Road Warriors. He want to be the guy known for managing champions. And unlike the Disciples of Apocalypse, these two definitely have the look of being Tag Team Champions. I just didn’t like how they won the later rounds of the Dusty Rhodes Tournament. Makes them look weak when they really aren’t.

DIY are frikkin impressive alone and together. They were the Match of Round 1 and possibly even the Entire Tournament of the Cruiserweight Classic. And seeing them take on The Revival all those times proved they have what it takes as single competitors or a team. 206, Raw, Smackdown, these two definitely deserve a call up.

The match told a good story. When DIY were in control, they had a strong intensity and excitement. When AoP were in control, they told the story of big men Vs smaller men very well in both having the advantage and losing it. Seeing Tommaso German Suplex both of them one after another was awesome! That double submission being broken was also an awesome spot! 

This is how the AoP should have won the Dusty Classic: by just being dominate. Definitely beatable, but still showing they could dominate. I hope these two teams collide again in the future. So far, the current match were superior to the previous. I wonder if this can keep up.

Seth Rollins invades NXT

More evidence that TakeOver is part of the Big 4 Events. While this could have been done in the Royal Rumble, seeing it part of NXT really shows how close NXT is to the Main Stage. Would love to see more of this sometimes. Maybe a special event where some NXT stars take on WWE Main Stage ones. The Revival Vs America Alpha would show why both teams are a must see. Joe Vs Styles in the WWE. Sanity Vs Wyatts. A lot of fun possibilities without the need to call them up.

Asuka Vs Nikki Cross Vs Billie Kay Vs Peyton Royce

Asuka is fun: nuff said. Can’t tell if she is a heel or a face but I love the fact that when she asked for a match that she demanded all of them. I don’t remember much of Nikki prior to being in Sanity, but talk about making a nice change. This new gimmick is very fun.

Billy and Peyton, on the other hand, I’m not a fan of. As I said before, I prefer heels who can do things on their own. Either by being completely dominate like the AoP did or being sneaky on their own like Eric Young or the Miz. These two do it in a way I dislike: unable to do anything themselves unless they have numbers. Take away the numbers and they are not a threat and honestly not worthy of a title shot.

And the opening proved it as the two acted more like scared children than wrestlers. They also ruin Asuka and Nikki face each other. When those two collide, its frikkin fun! Intensity Vs Insanity. But when Billie and Peyton join, it slows it down and they  continue to work as a team. Its like you have two high speed cars in a race but they have to stop to allow two kids on a tandem bike to catch up.

I will say the Double Suplex off the Announce Table was a cool spot. And in another positive, unlike Jericho and Owens, the two actually didn’t care who got the pin. As long as they have the belt in their possession. But if they didn’t care who won, why not allow one to pin the other? Most likely because neither one wanted to be the one pinned, so pinning the champion would prove their dominance.

But I am glad Asuka defeated the pair while Nikki was taken out via Double Suplex off Announcer Table to Table. It made sure those two are out of the title hunt because they both failed to defeat her and Nikki can get an actual one on one match in the future.

Bobby Roode Vs Shinsuke Nakamura

All I’ve seen on Shinsuke was what he has shown in the WWE. And the first moment he arrived, I believed he was made to be on the Main Stage of the WWE. It was like Japan wanted to design their version of a WWE Superstar and Shinsuke Nakamura is that final product. He is probably going to have the greatest Wrestlemania Entrance ever in the future.

Bobby Roode I saw a lot in TNA. My first real taste of him turning heel was after the first ever TNA event where the winner of a grueling tournament would face the champion. Bobby Roode won that, only to lose the match at the PPV. That was bad in itself, but it got even worse when James Storm, his partner at the time, WON THE TITLE on TV after that. After that, Roode turned heel and won the title. It would have been so much smarter to just have Roode win it all and then turn heel.

But I blame TNA for that and not Bobby Roode. As part of Beer Money I felt the two had a license to print money. As a heel he was great. And now as NXT, he definitely lives up to his new theme song and is Glorious. Though of his three entrances, this one was weaker than his other two TakeOver entrances. Eight ladies kind of pale in comparison with having an actual choir sing your theme song or descending from above to enter the ring.

It was a fun match until the ending. I do hope it was planned and not a real injury. Would hate to see this take Nakamura out of action. But either way, I am glad to see Bobby Roode as Champion in the WWE. If Shinsuke isn’t injured and this is storyline, I do hope we get to see these two again in the future.

Pre-Show

Now the Day of the PPV. NXT was awesome! But can the WWE Royal Rumble itself live up to that hype? Let’s see with the matches that weren’t officially on the card.

Becky Lynch, Nikki Bella, and Naomi Vs Alexa Bliss, Mickie James, and Natalya

There is a lot of people here. Becky is fun. Nikki has been proving herself. And Naomi’s entrance, I hate to say, is more exciting than her. I like Alexa Bliss. She makes a unique heel. Mickie back in the WWE is fun to see. Thanks to her time on the Independent Circuit and TNA, she still has the chops. So weird that Natalya is a heel. As coach, she had a great face gimmick. Sure, it was humorous but it would have gotten over. Considering Tamina is back to full health, I would have had her be the one to attack Nikki.

First, Mickie definitely needs a new theme song. So use to hearing her theme song being more country thanks to her time in TNA. Second, all these story lines in one match? Maybe just have one of them being the pre-show and the others handled in the next PPV. Third, I wish they had an all women Royal Rumble. With the talk of the Woman’s Revolution, it would be cool to see a Full Rumble dedicated to the Wrestlers themselves. 

As for the match itself, that Triple Suplex was a fun spot. Other then that, it was an alright match. Definitely a downgrade after seeing all the TakeOver matches minutes ago. Luckily it wasn’t Mickie or Natalya who were pinned or Becky and Nikki getting the pin. This give Naomi the idea of a singles match at the Elimination Chamber PPV that they have been building up. If Mickie were pinned by Becky or Natalya was pinned by Nikki here, it would have watered down their feuds.

Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson Vs Cesaro and Sheamus

I did enjoy Gallows in the WWE prior to his return. While being Kane was terrible (mostly because of the wig), his time with CM Punk was great. Festus was alright for a gimmick but seeing his real self was much better for him. In TNA, he was in Aces and Eights which I felt was a terrible fraction. Like I said with Billy and Peyton, I hate heels that relies on numbers. And I felt he had the same belief as he left TNA.

Now with Karl Anderson, they became part of the Bullet Club. While I haven’t seen much outside bits in ROH, even I heard of them. And they have been a good team but sadly haven’t gotten the chance to shine until recently. They definitely need a Team Name though. The Club is when they were with AJ Styles (as an allusion to the Bullet Club). 

Speaking of teams who could use a Team Name: Cesaro and Sheamus. I frikkin enjoy Cesaro, especially in recent time. He makes a great singles competitor and has a lot of fun matches. And even in this situation, he still provides fun. Sheamus I have no real problem with. As a face or a heel, he does his job the best he can. I just am tired to see these two together, be it a team or against each other. I feel they both need to move on to something different.

I like the idea of two referees out there. It would make annoying finishes harder to pull off legitimately since we get a ref not distracted by a wrestler. Downside is we don’t get to see the teamwork of heels due to the fact they can’t attack the wrestler while their partner in the ring is being pushed away by the ref.

As for the match itself, I barely notice the second referee except a few times. This could have been a regular tag team match. Besides that, it was a better match than the 3 on 3 but still down from AoP Vs DIY. But I am glad to see Gallows and Anderson finally win the Tag Team Titles.

Nia Jax Vs Sasha Banks

Sasha is definitely fun. Shame she never got the chance to shine as Women’s Champion. Instead, we see her continually choke on the PPVs. As for Nia, I always liked powerful women. I was hoping to see Awesome Kong (Kharma) be successful but sadly things were out of everyone’s hands. Nia did a great job during NXT and I hope she gets that treatment I was hoping to see in WWE.

As for the match itself, it felt like a TV match than a PPV match. Makes sense since this is not the PPV. Technically a stomp for Nia to prove her dominance. So if she were to ever actually go for the Women’s Title, she would have steam behind her.

The Royal Rumble PPV

So far, NXT TakeOver was Superior to the Pre-Show. But then again, the Pre-Show is not the PPV itself. So can its four single matches match or surpass the ones on NXT?

Charlotte Flair Vs Bayley

Charlotte is a mix bag for me. When she’s alone, I feel she is a great heel. But when she was with someone (be it her father or Dana Brooke), I feel she is a terrible one. Like I said, I like my heels who can win on their own: be it dominance or using tricks. Those two directly interfere in the finish making it worse for me. Bayley I hoped would win the title here. Her character is fun and her last set of matches on TakeOver were great! I am hoping she would get the same kind of success on the Main Roster as she did in NXT.

For the match itself, it was pretty good. A little botchy in the beginning but some great moves from both of them (like the Back Slide Reversal from Charlotte). Definitely better than the NXT Women’s Match because they didn’t have to drag two others with them. And Charlotte goes for a dominance victory with a Natural Selection to the apron. Shame Bayley lost cleanly, but she was defeated by a strong attack like that and that at least doesn’t lower her rankings in my book.

Kevin Owens Vs Roman Reigns

I haven’t seen Kevin Steen prior to the WWE, but he has been a fun heel in NXT and his feud with John Cena. Sadly, as Universal Champion he has been hampered with being a bad heel due to needing the assistance. Kevin definitely can be a dominate heel and he has in the past. But honestly he has to stop being Besties with Jericho and be the show.

I don’t really have a problem with Roman. I believe he has been pushed too soon. And I can see why people dislike Roman due to all the “shoving him down our throats”. Hopefully he can develop into his own in the future and actually be a face people can get behind.

Why is the Shark Cage above the Ring? If I was Foley and I saw NXT’s attempt, I would have kept it away from the ring to prevent any shenanigans like throwing down brass knuckles like they did. But in this case, it didn’t matter because it was also No-DQ. That kind of makes the entire “Keep Jericho Out of the Match” pointless. Because being above the ring and ready to drop a weapon pretty much means he was still there in the match.

The match itself, being a No-DQ match, was fun to see. Lots of fun spots with the biggest being KO Frog Splash Roman through a Table on the Outside. But one of the spots had me worried and that was Kevin Owens falling down onto the Tower of Chairs. I really hate spots like these because I fear it would seriously injure them or worse. I only recently got over them breaking Ladders after someone revealed those are specifically made of wood.

The biggest downer was Braun Strowman. At the end, he showed up and attacked Roman Reigns. Once again, despite having the opportunity to show his dominance the writers decide to make him win because of others. And even ignoring that, why Strowman? Was he still upset with the Double Spear or the Spear in that Three on Three? If the first, why not attack Goldberg when he came out? This wouldn’t be the last time I question the Storytelling. 

Neville Vs Rich Swann

I enjoyed Neville as a face. But now that he is a heel, he has definitely improved character wise. His look and his moves definitely makes the Heel turn legit. Rich Swann is fun and exciting in the ring. I was really hoping he would retain the title. But unlike other matches, I wouldn’t have mind if Neville won. This was a match where either outcome would be a positive for me.

The match was exciting and excellent. Neville is definitely the big star of 205 Live. And to see him win by submission showed that he doesn’t need the Red Arrow or to go off the top. He just wants to to inflict more damage. 

John Cena Vs AJ Styles

I have no real problem with Cena. He does a lot for the WWE so he deserves to be their poster boy. AJ Styles definitely lives up to being phenomenal. In TNA, he was the reason you had to watch it. Even after being Mini-Flair, he was still great in the ring. TNA made a grave mistake to letting him go. Seeing him in the WWE so soon had me worried. But eventually in the end he became World Champion, something I never expected. 

I am still surprised how well the two work together. I will say that sometimes Cena does heelish tactics. Would this lead to an actual heel turn or is he trying to add some edge? Overall, best singles match of the PPV alone.

The Royal Rumble Event

Possibly the most stacked card ever. And the potential of surprise entrants are numerous. How did it do? Let’s go over it by elimination.

Jack Gallagher - Entry #5

I was hoping to see this guy be one of the competitors. Outside the Neville story line, he was the highlight of 205 Live. Sadly, his time was too short and he was the first one eliminated when #6 entered the match. But for the brief time he was there, he was a joy to watch.

Mojo Rawley - Entry #4

Mojo is a fun guy in a Tag Team and most likely fun at parties. But as a singles competitor he could use work. Honestly, despite winning the Battle Royal to get in, I was hoping he would be the first one gone. But he lasted longer than Jack and that makes me sad.

Big Cass - Entry #1

He’s pretty good for a big guy, but I like him better with Enzo than a solo act. Sadly, we didn’t get to see the two together because he was eliminated right after Mojo.

Kalisto - Entry #3

I was rooting for him to win the Crusierweight for Smackdown. Sadly, his lost means Raw is also after Smackdown. He’s fun but really needs to be with others his own weight class. But man, that is a lot of height for his elimination.

Mark Henry - Entry #6

Like the three before, Mark was also eliminated by Strowman. I grew up watching Henry from his blue tights being an Olympic hero to being a member of the Nation to Sexual Chocolate and everything between. He definitely deserves a Hall of Fame shot in my book.

The Big Show - Entry #9

Big Show looked good. I believe them when they say this is the most fit he has been in some time. But surprisingly he was there pretty short. Another victim of the Strowman Push.

James Ellsworth - Entry #11

I knew he is a joke entry. I have them a bunch of times in my own Rumble. His spot was funny and that was an impressive bump he took when being eliminated. But I think I am done with the joke Ellsworth. How is the real Ellsworth?

Tye Dillinger - Entry #10

Another guy I wanted to see and even in the exact spot I was hoping for. I was hoping he would last a little longer but sadly he was soon eliminated. 

Braun Strowman - Entry #7

As I type this, I am watching Raw. It was there that they explained, with a clip I totally forgot, that Kevin Owens promised him a title shot after beating Reigns. And Strowman took that as legit. Amazing how one promo can change the results of a match. As for his elimination, I’ll talk about that more when I get to the person he was eliminated by.

The New Day - Kofi #14, Big E #17, Woods #20

Even though they have been around for a long time, I still enjoy their work. Even Woods with his Up Up Down Down channel on Youtube. But for an event that says “Friend Vs Friend”, there is very little friends going on. In fact, these two practically went out at the exact same time.

Cesaro & Sheamus - Entry #19 and #16

Speaking of which, so did they. That is until the final moments. A funny bit was Cesaro getting dizzy hitting everyone with the Big Swing and almost getting Sheamus. But those final moments saw them going against each other and lead to both of them being gone.

Apollo Crews - Entry #22

I feel sorry for Crews. He is definitely good but he was brought up from NXT way too soon. And his time in the Rumble makes that same suggestion. He should probably go back to NXT and wait before WWE actually have a plan with him.

Dean Ambrose - Entry #12

I don’t mind the comedy bits of Dean. I still enjoy him. I just like the Miz better as IC Champion. 

Dolph Ziggler - Entry #24

Ziggler’s chase for the IC title bored me. Besides one time, the Miz always had the upper hand. It is because Miz has a clever use of his wife while Ziggler hits a Glass Ceiling that is invisible. I am glad he turned heel, but in this Rumble you don’t see it. 

Enzo Amore - Entry #27

Talk about a quick time. Like Big Cass, I prefer him with Cass than alone. And his time was quick thanks to Lesnar.

Brock Lesnar - Entry #26

I knew Lesnar wasn’t going to win, but I expected him to at least be the one to Eliminate Goldberg to set up that Wrestlemania Final Match. Instead, Goldberg came in and quickly eliminated him. That shocked me. 

Rusev - Entry #18

Poor Rusev. He has a lot going for him but things just don’t turn out well for him. At least he lasted longer than others.

Baron Corbin - Entry #13

I wasn’t a fan of him before, even when he turned heel. But he has been growing on me. One thing I wanted to see at Survivor Series 2016 was Strowman Vs Corbin. Of the two, I prefer Corbin. My wish failed because of Shane McMahon. But in this rumble, I finally got to see Baron take on Strowman. And with a little help, Corbin was the one to eliminate him. He lasted pretty long too. Maybe in the future he’ll be a World Champion.

Luke Harper - Entry #25

I am honestly surprised that Luke was the one to betray the Wyatt Family. I swear it was going to be Orton and Harper would prove his loyalty. But if he does decide to go solo, here’s hoping he doesn’t return again to the Wyatt Family.

Goldberg - Entry #28

Goldberg did more in this Rumble than his match against Lesnar. But despite what they set up and planned, I am looking forward to seeing Goldberg Vs The Undertaker than either of those other two matches.

The Miz - Entry #15

I was hoping the Miz would win. He is my current favorite wrestler. In that match, practically everyone who entered hit the Miz with one of their best moves. Speared, F5ed, Chokeslammed... While Jericho lasted longer overall, the Miz was in that ring much longer.

Sami Zayn - Entry #8

Zayn is a fun guy and I’ve seen matches of him outside WWE. I am glad he lasted as long as I did but I was hoping to see him at least in the Final Four. Oh well.

The Undertaker - Entry #29

With Goldberg, Lesnar and the Undertaker entering when they did, I was wondering who would be #30. They wouldn’t have done that unless the surprise of the 30th Entrant was worth it. But honestly, it wasn’t. Especially because that person eliminated the Undertaker to set up a Wrestlemania match.

Chris Jericho - Entry #2

I am a big fan of Jericho. He was the first heel I ever cheered for. And in this Rumble, he surpassed Triple H by lasting almost 5 hours in total. Sadly, he didn’t do much as he spent a good number of time outside. 

Bray Wyatt - Entry #21

I enjoy Wyatt. Love his gimmick and his group. While I question the entry of Orton into the fray, it does seem to be working for him. And Final 3 is a great spot to be in.

Roman Reigns - Entry #30

I was upset that Reigns was #30. While the possibility that Joe or Finn would be in the Rumble stung, the real issue was one thing: HOW?!? In story, McMahon hates Reigns. And she was definitely in charge of who enters the Rumble. So how on Earth did she okayed Reigns to enter? So far he hasn’t appeared on Raw so unless he becomes a heel working with the Authority, I don’t like the fact he did enter the Rumble.

Winner: Randy Orton - Entry #23

And our winner is the 7th Two Time Winner. Orton has his ups and down but he seems to be doing well in the Wyatt Family. But now that he won the title, what is gonna happen? Well, we’ll find out when Smackdown is on Tomorrow. I honestly expected him to be the betrayer in this PPV. Looks like I was wrong

Overall

Overall, it was a fun Weekend for Wrestling Fans. TakeOver was awesome and the Rumble was still fun. Now I am looking forward to do my own.