#what is it with liberals thinking that they specifically are the protagonists of a fucking tom clancy novel
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iamnottoph · 6 months ago
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ah yes, those dastardly ruskies, poisoning the minds of our american youth through the incredibly influential cultural touchstone of *checks notes* tumblr dot com
Just a thought for the night, but remember in 2016 there were all these accounts that seemed really really telling you all the ways Hillary Clinton was some kind of demon woman, just the worst, and really Trump wouldn't be worse and maybe he'd even be better?
and then it turned out they got banned for being literally Russian agents and never came back because spoiler they were?
does it feel like that all over again? just a thought.
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moongothic · 8 months ago
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I do kind of wonder if One Piece might end with two "Pirate Kings"...
Like Luffy is 100% going to become Pirate King, without a doubt. You don't just build up the protagonist's adventure to reach their goal for 20+ years and then Not Deliver on it. Luffy's gonna be King, no doubt about it.
But as we already know, to Luffy being "Pirate King" simply means "being the most free person in the world". When Rayleigh asked Luffy if he thinks he can become the ruler of the seas (New World specifically), Luffy explicitly told Rayleigh he's NOT going to "rule over anything".
So Luffy could and will become the most free person in the world and gain the title of Pirate King, but he's not going to become The Ruler of the Seas.
Which leaves me wondering... could someone else ALSO become "Pirate King", some kind of a (Luffy-approved) benevolent ruler of the seas while Luffy goes off on more adventures to enjoy his life?
And if so... who? Who would be suited for that position, who might accept that role (in Luffy's stead)? And mind you, I do mean specifically a King for Pirates; even if/when the WG gets overthrown and replaced by whatever system the Revs may be preparing, it doesn't mean all the pirates of the seas are going to bend to the New Government's will.
Right now, of all known characters I feel like Shanks might be the most suited for it technically speaking, but I'm not sure he's up for it. Shanks is a man of many a mystery as are his goals, but yeah IDK if he'd want to take the throne, it remains to be seen.
Hilariously. Buggy's also a fucking option. Not only has he very recently claimed he'd like to be Pirate King mayhaps, but also during Summit War he did make his funny little predictions about becoming Shichibukai, Yonkou and finally Pirate King himself. And we know two of those predictions have already come true. So between making his final predicition also come true and keeping Buggy's trend of Falling Upwards going, it would be funny as fuck if Buggy did become The Ruler of the Seas. Thing is, between Buggy arguably not being genuinely suited for the job (though being easy to dethrone could be a perk), we need to ask if Buggy does TRULY want to become Pirate King himself. Like yes, he may have dreamed of claiming One Piece one day, but also, his entire BEEF with Shanks has to do with how Buggy wanted to follow Shanks and watch HIM become the King after Roger. Buggy says he wants to be the King, but does he truly? Or would he rather just let Shanks have the throne instead?
But that might be a bit of an issue that just runs in a circle; if neither Shanks or Buggy wants the throne then who the hell would take it then?
And like... No matter how I think about it, the only other option I come to is like... god damn fucking Crocodile. Because (say it with me now) if Crocodad Real, it could make sense thematically. Depending on whatever character arc the bastard might go through first. If he was put into that role then you'd think (and hope) he'd find himself surrounded by people who trust him and he can trust back (Pirate King's crew and all) (oh hey what's this Cross Guild thing?). Not to mention if Luffy wanted to give up the job of actually ruling the seas to someone else, the only way he'd ever willingly give that fucking job to Crocodile of all people, would be if their father-son relationship improved first (you know how I feel about that) and Croc actually like proved himself to be (trust)worthy. Not to mention, Crocodile would get to reclaim the dream he had abandoned so long ago. But also, he'd get to reclaim it while his sweet baby boy's dream also came true; they'd both get to be King together. That would be so fucking adorable and sweet. And don't let me get started on the Sobek-Ra symbolism (Sobek = protector god (a crocodile), Ra = sun god (=Nika=liberation=Luffy); Sobek-Ra = fusion of the two) (Also let's be real, Crocodile would be weirdly suited for the job. Like he's stronk enough but also he can run operations and boss people around etc)
Like I feel so delulu even suggesting that but also it would make sense. It makes so much sense it makes me a little bit mad lmao
But in the end, what other options would we even have? Of the known characters I don't think there's many who would fit into the role AND want the role, and I feel like we're a bit late into the series to introduce any completely new characters for this purpose in particular.
I just. I dunno the thought just haunts me
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fae-morrigan · 3 months ago
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This morning I wrote a whole breakdown of why I think Jay Nakamura's design is so fucking cool and such a great display of more complex design-as-story principles. But that was like, six a.m, I was at work and had just been staring at swim teams for like an hour, I ended up leaving out a LOT.
So let me elaborate a bit: I opened my essay on this design on the idea that good character design isnt actually about making an 'appealing' design (i.e someone the audience wants to fuck) but rather about conveying character as part of storytelling. And part of what I think people miss with Jay's character design is like, Tom Taylor has literally no interest in making YOU, the audience, feels what Jon does for Jay, which I think is a bold choice. He could've easily been like, well, Jays effortlessly hot and cool, of COURSE jon likes him, which is OFTEN the move a lot of gay romance comics take (rather lazily, i may add). Instead, he presents a fully fleshed out character that you may or may not like, and reveals through the story exactly why Jon admires, trusts, and loves him.
I've made the point before that SOKE isn't a romance, its an action coming of age with a romance sideplot, and I think this is part of that. Jay, like I've said many times, is the secondary protagonist. He's not there to be eyecandy. He's there to DO STUFF. And the stuff he does is WHY jon likes him.
As @ultfreakme pointed out to me, people generally assume that 'love interests' need to be appealing to the audience, as that's part of their role in the narrative, to sell you on a love story and help the audience put themselves in the shoes of the character falling for someone else. But Jay isn't a love interest. He's the secondary protagonist. "Love interest" encapsulates a specific set of narrative expectations that Jay Nakamura ain't got time for, he's got a country to liberate.
It also makes Jay's sort of glow up at the hands of Jon giving him the Gossamer costume feel almost like you, the audience, are being given a glimpse of what Jon has seen the entire time. The summary for this issue literally says: "Jay Nakamura must embrace his powers and become the hero Jon knows he can be." Its design as story!
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Surprising absolutely no one, I have strong feelings about Grease, and the ditch I am most prepared to die in is that the Millennial Commentary Industrial Complex is fundamentally wrong about the end of the movie and it's mostly Disney's fault.
Oh, no, it's a bad message! It tells girls that they're responsible for changing themselves to suit a boyfriend! Danny should have told Sandy that it was okay to be herself, he should have loved her for who she was! Respectfully, this is the opinion of a fool. I love you, but it's fool talk.
I know that the Inspiring Message of every single piece of media for children made from like 1985 on was "you should be yourself." And that's fine! In some ways it's good. And I don't want to get too deep into whether or not it's good for teenagers to cling to a specific sense of Self and worry a lot about their personal style and mannerisms adequately showing the world their True Selves lest they betray Who They Are -- I think that's worth interrogating, but I also think a range of positions on that question are possible and probably even valuable.
But Grease is not a show about everyone finding and actualizing their Truest Most Distinctive Self. If it were, the main characters probably wouldn't all wear matching jackets the whole way through. Grease is a movie about how being cool is rad. The clue is in the title! Grease is the word -- the protagonists ("greasers") inhabit a subculture that's specifically contrasted to the nerdy earnestness of the poodle-skirted 50s mainstream. They are bad kids, they are burnouts, they regard "trying things" and "caring a lot" as nerd shit. They are also fucking fun. They look cool and they get laid and the show (produced in 1972) is not making the argument that it's acceptable to be a greaser if your soul so compels you, it's arguing that it's desirable.
Everybody gets an arc in Grease. Sandy falls in with these Bad Kids and discovers that she likes them, that they are good friends and that she has fun when she's with them. She interrogates the person she has been up until now and decides she doesn't really like that person, who is nervous and naive and acclimated to the uptight and judgmental parts of her society. The reason she quits dressing like Patty and starts dressing like Rizzo is that Rizzo is a better person to be like than Patty is. Grease is positing a vision of the 50s where conformity to the mainstream is a weakness, and Sandy discovering that the Bad Kids are objectively better -- braver, more honest, loving and loyal and fun -- is how she is liberated. She doesn't become a Pink Lady to please Danny, she evolves far enough that she's worthy of being a Pink Lady.
There is a character whose arc is to realize that he has to be his own individual, and it's Danny's. Danny steps out of the self-imposed box of the Alpha Greaser to actually try hard at something and admit he cares about someone. The movie gives him a kind of a Third Road, saying that he can absorb some of the better qualities of the jocks he disparages -- some of the earnestness, some of the achievement -- without having to stop being cool. Sandy already had those qualities, and she adds being cool to them once she gets over her fears.
In either case, you have to take it as a point of worldbuilding within the story that it is cool to be a greaser, not just for some people, but objectively cool. Particularly in the movie's directing choices, it does find some fondness for characters like Eugene and Patty, who are doubtless being themselves, but it's never going to argue that it's equally good to be Kenickie and Eugene, or Frenchie and Patty. Grease as a text definitely assumes that some of these people are more aspirational figures than the others.
I just feel strongly that if you come at it with the lens of "don't change for anyone else, be yourself," you are missing what is actually happening in the story. Danny does already love Sandy even when she's a hopeless dork, that's the starting point of the show. His story is about not being too afraid of what other people will think to admit that. Her story is about not being too afraid to let herself have the freedom her friends have. The narrative sense of the whole thing depends on both of them wanting a goal we want them to have -- not dating each other, that's a plot goal, but the story is in Danny letting love make him more vulnerable so he's a good enough partner for her, and Sandy stepping out of her shell to experience the freedom and joy that she's so attracted to in the people around her. No part of it is about getting Danny to like Sandy more; he doesn't like her more after her transformation, he already liked her the maximum amount before that.
It's about Sandy becoming better, and to grok the ending you have to understand that the show isn't defining better as "more like the Platonic Ideal of Sandy," it's outright saying that "Sandy but a Pink Lady" is better. As the audience you can agree or disagree about that, but the show stakes out that position and holds it consistently.
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chaos0pikachu · 2 years ago
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#ok I don't necessarily want to be mean about this book but#house in the cerulean sea#it's very sweet and well written and like I do think 'a soft warm gay blanket' describes it very well and idk that's good i do like that#but it's very much exactly what they describe? like the protagonist is a 40 year old man who has worked for an abusive agency his entire#life. without. fucking. questioning. the. work he does. every. single. fucking. day.#I think. that book could have been vastly improved by being from Arthur's pov and having mr. Baker™ be a lot more threatening and#questionable? like. he IS#but yeah idk that would be if you wanted a more complicated book. but it's a simple one and that's fine. idk (via @two-captains) 
It’s funny you mention this b/c Rite Gud did another episode and talk about House in the Cerulean Sea. 
The hosts specifically bring up the fact that the author of HotCS (a white American queer man), was “inspired” by real history of Indigenous children being separated from their families (Canada, America, and Australia) and placed in these “correctional homes”. And yet, the book pushes the concept of “found family” over reuniting these children with their families and decenters their trauma in favor of the protagonist. The author said one of the main themes of the book was “kindness” when in reality, nothing about such an historical abusive system is kind and kindness never resolved those systems. An oppressor will always continue to oppress as long as they have the means too, kindness will not change them because it’s not about compassion it’s about power, control, and hatred. 
I dislike squeecore stories b/c they’re often times presenting a thin narrative about oppression. It’s a privileged idea of oppression, where it’s not a complicated system from top to bottom along but something easily solvable. Something ruled by emotion, or the power is held in the hands of people who are just emotionally motivated ignorance rather than emotionally motivated illogical hatred rooted in a desire to horde power, privilege and status. It falls into a respectability politics, and non-disruptive acts of protest. 
Squeecore is neo-liberalism lol it’s moments of pointing out systemic issues, but only in a lukewarm way, or only to suggest it’s just these specific people running things, these specific authority figures that are the real problems. The rebellion isn’t a rebellion or revolution against The Systems of Oppression but just like, those specific bad people. Everyone is Voldemort; interchangeable evil fascists' with flimsy ideologies, watered down versions of oppression, that once taken down ~all is well~ again even tho fundamentally what created Voldemort, what caused their rise to power, what enabled them, is never examined nor have things changed in any meaningful way afterwards. Everyone watch this video essay about Harry Potter lol
anyway no one is saying you can’t like escapist genre fiction but I’d rather have hopepunk b/c in true hopepunk stories the characters seek to disrupt and tear down the system, rather than just pay respect to it 
I read a podcast transcript about commodified sff/the kind of rot in fandomgenic media you sometimes talk about. These authors call it ‘squeecore’ — you might enjoy it https://kittysneezes.com/squeecore-transcript/
[“And there’s almost a weird, like, YA-ish, young-adult fiction tone to it, even when it’s supposed to be “for adults”. Someone on our Discord, Kurt(?), pointed this out – characters feel weirdly young: they always think and act and feel like they’re in their late teens or early twenties; they’re kind of inexperienced, naive, still very full of wonder, and you get the sense they haven’t really lived a life before the story began?
JR: You could probably attribute a lot of that to, of course, to the YA thing that blew up in the last twenty years since Harry Potter; but there’s also a lot of influence from films, and a lot of influence from mainstream commercial narratives – the MCU, the She-Ras [sic], and the “save the cat”-style 3-act-structure screenplays that have really become the blueprint for a lot of storytelling.
RSB: Right, they almost feel like… maybe bad RPG protagonists; those silent protagonists that were very popular in the 90s who don’t really have personalities? Because you’re the player character, you put yourself in there. And I’ve been trying to figure out why, because for me, characters who are a little older, who have lived their life, maybe they have a haunted past and terrible secrets and regrets, and there’s something driving them toward this need to redeem themselves, but it never really tells you what it is, like – I love that shit. That shit’s – that’s the good shit.
JR [crosstalk]: Yeah, I think so –
RSB: Characters who have seen too much, and are kind of haunted, but you don’t know what it is? Like, aww, hell yeah, that’s right… [laughs]
JR: Yeah, and the older I get, the more I gravitate toward older protagonists as well; because I have nothing to learn from a teenager, right? Or a 57-year-old HR manager who writes like a teenager, and to teenagers.
RSB: Yeah, and it’s such a strange thing; I’m wondering if it’s because we have this need to eliminate or fill negative space. We need to explain everyone’s motivations; we can’t just let a character be the way they are; we have to have some kind of detailed flashback to The Traumatic Experience that made them this way. And that takes up a lot of space, so in order to evade– avoid having to do that, we just have these kind of flat, like, “JRPG from the ‘90s” protagonists that feel –
JR [crosstalk]: Yeah, like –
RSB: “Oh, they’re on the cusp of their life’s journey, and they haven’t lived.”]
[“JR: But I think that’s broadly – it’s sort of a tendency in the writers themselves, because as less people start out with the ability to make a living income with writing, it sort of becomes a hobby; but at the same time, the people with all the free time are the sort of white-collar professionals who have the the ability and the money to network, and to have the leisure time to write, and to pay attention to the submission grinder, and do all of these things that maybe a working-class person doesn’t have time to do, especially now.
RSB: Right. Someone working multiple jobs, and working blue-collar jobs where you don’t have downtime at work. In most white-collar jobs, you can usually squeeze out an hour a day to write. You can usually, if you work really efficiently, you can squeeze out a little bit of time to write. If you’re waiting tables, you really can’t do that; you rest your feet for two seconds, and your boss barks at you: “if you’ve got time to lean, you’ve got time to clean.” That’s it.
JR: Yeah, and of course, there’s a lot of wonderful working-class writers, but they’re not really being published because they’re out of the zone, they’re out of the clique.
RSB: Connections unfortunately do play a huge role in what gets published. You see pretty frequently in SFF magazines… Whenever I see a story that looks kind of mediocre, and I’m like “how did that get published?”, I look down and I always find out that, according to the writer’s bio, the writer is an alumna of one of the same workshops that the editors are an alumna of. It’s like, “oh. Okay, you’re in the same club.”
JR [crosstalk]: Yes, it’s very much social networking.
RSB: And it’s this club giving each other – publishing each other’s works, and giving each other awards. This is what it is. And the club costs five thousand dollars.
JR: Yup.
RSB: So, if you don’t have that, you can’t get in. And… maybe you can sneak in, if you’re – fucking – an amazing writer, but it’s definitely an uphill battle for you in a way that it isn’t for other people. And chances are you might have a different sensibility than other people will have. There’s very much a certain type of, I don’t know, socializing that’s acceptable, where it’s like that very WASPy, passive-aggressive condescension is okay; but being direct and straightforward in a way that a sort-of working-class person might be, that a person from a non-WASPy culture might be, gets you branded as “unsafe” and “abusive”. “]
cackling
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itsclydebitches · 2 years ago
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Upon realizing, I find it very funny and weird how the WF chose to wear the masks of Grimm because humanity saw them as these mindless monsters. Meanwhile we have not one, not two, but THREE entities in the series who exploit the Grimm to serve them; Salem, Schnees and the Dark God. It's like, wow... truly the symbol of your liberation. 1/2
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You know, I don't actually mind the grimm masks as a symbol because the faunus have no idea they're so closely tied to those three entities... for the simple reason that they don't know the entities exist. Or, in the Schnees' case, that their particular brand of sins extends to grimm exploitation. Salem is literally the show's biggest secret that only a handful of people in all of Remnant know about, with her experiments in particular only revealed to our protagonists in the midst of the last Volume. The God of Darkness left Remnant before this version of humanity even existed and his brief stint as co-ruler is known only to one hero, one villain, and a handful of young adults who managed to weasel the information out of a lady in a lamp. Meanwhile, sure, the world knows that the Schnees are horrifically exploiting their faunus workers -- or at least, many in the world are willing to acknowledge that -- but they have no idea what goes on behind the manor's closed doors. Like, say, the head of the family binding a grimm to a giant knight to face off against his youngest daughter in deadly battle.
We can literally count up all the people who know about one of these connections between grimm and powerful people exploiting them -- Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Yang, Jaune, Nora, Ren, Oscar, Ozpin, Qrow, Maria, Willow, Whitley, Winter, maybe Ironwood pre-death -- and notably only one of those characters is a faunus herself, someone who only found about all this Salem/God/Schnee stuff long after Adam started wearing a grimm mask, thereby inspiring others to take it up as a large-scale symbol. So how would they know it's a complicated association? They presumably wouldn't. It's like if I chose a lion to represent strength and then, years later, someone went, "Okay, but in this culture halfway across the world they tell secret stories about how the lion is actually the weakest of the animals, so idk why you'd choose that :/ " Beyond the fact that symbols mean different things for different groups, this is a situation where the characters simply aren't privy to what a core group of individuals + the audience is. If anything, it acts as a dark irony for the viewer. Given how badly the White Fang movement has gone in the show (and, frankly, been written) there's something appropriate to me in them passionately taking up a symbol that we know is fraught with problems, but they are ignorantly unaware of, forever charging forward with the expectation that these doomed passions are going to pay off.
Honestly though, even with that acknowledgement, I don't think the complications are that much of a problem. I still maintain that the primary issue is that the White Fang possesses none of, or very little of this knowledge: Adam never met back up with Cinder post-grimm arm (at least, I don't think he did), he definitely doesn't know about Salem's experimentation, it's heavily implied that Raven knows that Salem is immortal, but has expressed no specific knowledge of her activities. The one exception here is Cinder being very aware of her own arm + Salem's experiments, but the story has made it explicitly clear via flashbacks that she knows she's in a fucked-up situation, one that heavily parallels her time with the Madame. "Oh fuck, that's me." That's the nature of abusive relationships though. Just because you recognize the problem ("Omg Salem is experimenting with grimm and she gave me a grimm arm") doesn't mean you're in a position to anything about it (yet). Especially when you're Cinder and you're perpetually convincing yourself that every threat and horrific downside you encounter is ultimately necessary in your Quest For Ultimate Power. Cinder can't fully acknowledge Salem's manipulation if only because that requires humbling herself enough to acknowledge that she's capable of being manipulated.
But regardless, even if these characters were in a position to pick up on how strongly the symbol is associated with enslavement and control... that's kind of the point? Adam chose the mask because humanity saw them as mindless monsters. Expanding on that just a bit, humanity treats them as disposable, something to rid Remnant of -- violently, if necessary. If he were to learn that three of the most powerful players on the board were taking away the agency of grimm and using them for their own purposes, that would just hammer home the point he's making. Those in control -- a billionaire equivalent, a witch, a literal god -- treat those around them like pawns to move around said board. Whether we're talking about a literal monster or a perceived monster, the end result is the same, strengthening the connection Adam was trying to make. "You think we're no better than the mindless, soulless beasts that ravage your villages? Fine. We'll embrace that." That grimm inhabiting the knight was locked up in the Schnee manor for who knows how long, under Jacques' control. Meanwhile, Adam has the SDC's initials branded into his face. He feels a stronger connection to the monsters of their world than the humans who have ignored his plight, especially when those humans claim he's inanimately monstrous himself.
Though RWBY in no way did this intentionally, the fact that Salem's most successful grimm experiment is not just a SEW, but a faunus SEW really highlights the point here.
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anniestvramblings · 2 years ago
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Okay I know what I just said but. I got to thinking about how Irma Vep is tackling the archetypes of masculinity and femininity.
Edmond is very obsessed with his character appearing to be strong & capable, in a typical masculine hero-esque role. To the point that anything subverting that traditional “masculinity” is deemed “patronizing” in his eyes.
The character he plays, Philippe, has all the archetypes of a typical male protagonist in many respects; and yet he lives with his Mother - something you wouldn’t traditionally see in such a casual way. And of course, Edmond immediately wants to snuff out this uniqueness, for fear it will make him appear weak.
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He has similar doubts over his character giving up information during the scene where Moreno hangs him, because he feels that even with the threat of death, his character should remain steadfast in not revealing anything. A typically masculine, heroic concept. He only acquiesces when Rene manages to pitch it to him in a way that emphasizes how Philippe is “manipulating” Moreno.
The actor playing Moreno, Gottfried, has a similar complex. He outright states as much when answering an interviewer as to why he even wants to act in Irma Vep in the first place.
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“Because it’s the fucking best character.”
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“I mean, Juan de Moreno is a fucking criminal genius. He screws all those vampire losers.”
And this is right after his right-wing rant on how all gays are communists. Granted, Gottfried is not a traditionally masculine archetype himself - he even admits to having been gay “back then”. But he also goes on tirades about not wanting to look like a “gigolo” and scorns the “liberal media elite”. Verrry intentional.
He also describes Moreno as “evil, genuine evil” in his adoration for him. A possible parallel to Irma Vep being the “embodiment of evil”. Put a pin in that.
It makes the scene where Gottfried and Edmond are filming the hanging scene so funny in retrospect. Here you have two men, both enthusiastically enraptured in their roles, because they both believe they’re screwing over the other character and asserting their masculine power.
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Opposed to that are characters like Laurie and Mira. Specifically I’m going to touch on Mira.
Mira is a woman who’s tired of playing the “girlfriend”, or the cliche “femme fatale” - because they don’t actually make her feel empowered as their marketing suggests. No matter how many people try to convince her that Nausicaa was a feminist archetype, or how playing “The Silver Surfer” would be a huge leap for her career - she can’t feel it. It’s all very hollow.
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“This is exactly what people want right now. High-concept, feminist, lady-led superhero movie. Alright? They are gonna go nuts over this.”
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“Are you serious? You want me to play The Silver Surfer?”
Even Irma Vep is a character she doesn’t get at first. Asking whether she’s a moll, or what - but, as she works with Rene (likely the main reason she was doing the Les Vampires reboot at all considering she really was a fan of his), she does start to see the appeal.
That’s not to say Rene teaches her. He does give her some direction to finding out the character, but she only seems to feel the character in moments of isolation - when she’s allowed to embody her in a purely instinctual manner. Examples of this include the first time she puts on the suit and opts to steal a credit card, or the dancing scene wherein she finally starts getting the moves down by opting to add her own “spin” on it using her fingers.
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“Wow! We’ve got it. Where did that come from?”
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“I don’t know” (laughs)
Rene, in fact, has a bit of a lapse when it comes to understanding Irma Vep outside of the role she plays. In both popular culture and in regards to his sexual fascination with her. Take this conversation.
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“The actress, Musidora - not her real name - was a fetish for a whole generation. The surrealists worshipped her.”
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“She was a much more complex figure.”
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“What do you mean?”
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“She was an artist. In her own right. One of the first female directors.”
Now, Rene does acquiesce that this is true, going on to list the iconic French female directors of her time - but I think his pre-occupation with Musidora as an icon prevents him from seeing her as a person. Because, as he says multiple times, Rene hates people. He’s bad with them. He has a hard time separating art from the artist, because he’s more pre-occupied with art than people.
He expresses a similar sentiment in clarifying his respect for Diana Rigg, the actress, versus his fetishization of Emma Peel, the character she played (a character who, i might add, was literally created as a pun of “M. Appeal” (male appeal), so another aspect as to why they chose her specifically).
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And take his arguments with Edmond over whether the character of Philippe needed a clear scene establishing the love he has for his wife in order to justify his motivation to find justice for her death. He was against it, simply because that was not how the original film did it - and he believes merely telling the audience that was the case is enough.
Mira, on the other hand, wants to connect to Irma Vep as a person. Thus she needs to insert herself into the role, as many actors do, and be able to live through her.
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“We have to establish Irma Vep as a murderess. That’s what she’s all about.”
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“I hope there’s more to her.”
Even though she says she’s joking (leading to Rene to backpedal and try to keep his most famous actor happy, as he has been doing through the whole production,) she still rationalizes Rene’s notes as this;
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“I get it. She can be wild.”
She can be wild. Versus that wildness being what she’s all about.
Like Edmond and Gottfried, we see that starts to give her a sort of freedom - she absorbs herself into the role of Irma Vep, but sees her as more than murderess - what specifically, she sees her as, is unclear. As unclear as what exactly Mira sees herself as. All she knows is that she “feels” it.
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“But acting is like choreography. It has to feel right, it can’t be forced.”
Considering we know Mira is someone who had a tendency to control her relationship with Laurie, this ability to not “force” anything is valuable to her. And it leads her to unexpected places - such as her playing the submissive role with Laurie for a change. She embraces some of her vulnerability in that moment.
That separates her from Edmond and Gottfried, who reject such vulnerability any time it appears.
But will it last?
I’m thinking...maybe not, actually.
We already see that it’s not as simple as Laurie completely giving up control. In the scene where she’s very suggestively being paraded around for the camera (more on that here) she plays with the camera a bit, exercising some of her authority over it. That doesn’t jeopardize her surrendering control - if anything it’s far healthier than simply letting some guy behind a camera treat her as a muse.
But we may be seeing signs that she’s actually swinging right back in the opposite direction of her newfound vulnerability. That we may be seeing the controlling Mira that once was described by Laurie as “scary” in Episode 1.
Just recently, Mira was told by Gottfried that Laurie was using her from Day 1 - something she both believes, and takes to heart. She believes she was used. And I believe that feeling is something that could lead her to try and grasp for control again.
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“Laurie doesn’t have a submissive bone in her body.”
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“And if you believed otherwise, you were so naive.”
Fitting that Gottfried is the one to make her believe this, hm? Let’s take out that pin from earlier; “He also describes Moreno as “evil, genuine evil” in his adoration for him. A parallel to Irma Vep being the “embodiment of evil””.
This is potentially indicative that Laurie’s going to use Irma Vep as a force for her desired control. Become more Gottfried/Moreno-esque.
But she’s not playing Gottfried - she’s playing Irma Vep. One of the original villainesses, who in many ways characterizes archetypes of feminine power. This comes from her taking on positions where she knows she’ll be underestimated - going undercover to work in a law firm, performing as a one-woman-cabaret, etc., only to undermine those around her. This was the birth of the “femme fatale” archetype. And perhaps using her newfound ability to pull at her own “vulnerability” in portraying Irma Vep, Mira will begin to use it in a similar way to that character - as an asset. After all, Zoe said this of the character;
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“She seems vulnerable. And that makes her all the more dangerous.”
Lmk what y’all thought of this one, I’m worried I’ll come across as enforcing gender roles or playing into misogynistic stereotypes - let it be known I acknowledge this stuff is all outdated cultural cliche to be taken as self-aware. Mira certainly does not fit a traditionally “feminine” mold in the ways the “Perils of Pauline” or “Irma Vep” herself would have been back in the day, and thus I think her adapting these aspects of old cinema is not to justify that tunnelvisioned interpretation of womanhood, but see how it can be reclaimed.
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nerves-nebula · 2 years ago
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UGH I’ve never been so viscerally conflicted by the protagonist (who is a good person) succeeding before. 
We’re 2 hours form the end of the audiobook and Thom has managed  to trick the monkey king into putting the circlet on, which makes me SO FUCKIN CURIOUS what those next 2 hours are gonna be.
My hopes are that the next 2 hours more fully address the themes of the heavens being a fundamentally unjust and unequal society, specifically in their treatment of demons. 
But I hate to see the monkey king enslaved it’s justttt ITS SOOO BADDDD 
Like maybe this is cuz im kind of insane (prolly not neurotypical) but I was literally shaking when it described Thom putting the circlet on his head cuz like. I REALLY DONT KNOW HOW TO FEEL. IM happy she tricked him! I am!! But ALSO I REALLY REALLY HATE THE CIRCLET I HATE how much PAIN it’s gonna cause him I hate his inevitable breakdown once he realizes he’s FUCKEd.
I hate that he’s still being nice to her. Like I paused the audiobook to rant in this post but he’s still offering her his hand and being like “Come on Thom-Thom lets make the heavens a liberated kingdom TOGETHER!! Living peacefully together with equal rights and liberties and as many peaches as we want to eat :D” AND I JUST
im soOOO weak for the monkey king. If I was in this story I would have just helped him take over heaven I swear XD
i mean it is admittedly fucked up that he wants to send ALL the immortals to hell for a while, but I still don’t think he’s in the wrong for thinking it would make them realize how awful they’ve been!!
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rametarin · 4 months ago
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I gotta add something here.
Videogames were always the place of liberal progressivism. That meant that games would feature female characters and nobody would bat an eye about it. Most fighting games featured girls. Most were pretty or bosomy (and it only got really excessive towards the mid-late 90s) but that just contrasted MORE with 4'8 cute mousey girls using throws on fucking ZANGIEF.
You could have games where the female character operated under complete gender neutrality rules, or you could have a few games where they made the stats and characteristics gender dimorphic, but most of them were gender neutral. And nobody got upset or cared negatively that wasn't a biased moron that wasn't welcome at the videogame time entertainment center, anyway.
Because when Tyris Flare went all Red Sonja, people enjoyed her. When Alita of The Guardian Legend is Legend of Zelda'ing it up half the time and Bullet Helling it the other, people adored that.
Female videogame characters have a unique characteristic that male ones do not: The fact that femininity is a part of their lives. And whether one is a hardline observer of socially constructed gender identity and demands that all notions of female gender be relegated purely to the social sphere and demand we disavow the idea it is inherently tied to sex, likes it or not, being female is its own special thing with inherent femininity that can express culturally, naturally from the biolgical state, or its emphasis be utterly muted, depending on what the woman in question wants.
Want a very girly girl that conforms to a cultural concept of femininity? We have a lady for you. Want a girl that may not necessarily try to punkishly refuse or invert of subvert cultural femininity expectations? We have a lady for you. Want a girl that's just, you know, happens to be a woman but also participates and is counted equally among everybody else, men or otherwise? We have women for you! It's all good, there are no rules, there's women for your tastes in exploring femininity! For every Princess Peach, there's a Samus. For every Roll, there's a Bridget. It's all good, everything goes, there's room at the table and under the tent for all kinds of women, and all kinds of female, for that matter.
That was the liberal, modernist bubble that "gamerbros" older than 30 and even ones younger than 20 lived under. That was our expectation. You may have some utter loser in a game dev team that was old fashioned and go, "Ehhh. I dunnooooo! Do you think our bro teams would tolerate a woman in their ranks?" but they'd be laughed out of the room, because videogames and design teams have always done whatever they wanted. It's only when companies demand consultation teams (LIKE SWEET BABY INC) to dictate game design by committee, do they make more ideological decisions to try and avoid pissing off demographics.
What these people want is NOT the liberal, everything goes, all possibilities open kind of featuring women in games. They want their specific kinds of women featured in games. They want narratives where their girls are the plucky protagonists oppressed by men and worlds of men, the FIRSTS to dramatically stand up to this false image and idol they have of masculinity and "the status quo" that oppresses women. They want heroic struggle stories that just so happen to be married to their narrative about women throwing off chains of oppression and rubbing it in some cigar smoking Andrew Tate types' face like it's the first time in history that happens, and tell a bunch of young girls, "you're the first generation to have this opportunity! Hate boys and their old fashioned male chauvinism!" which.. isn't really a thing in videogaming.
They want to selectively interpret history, gender politics and gender dynamics, speak authoritatively about how things were and are up to now, and try to instruct people in this false history and false dynamics to make them believe things that aren't true, and drive them towards values and beliefs and outcomes rooted in these lies. They aren't liberal.
They want to pretend as if every female character was an afterthought or purely there just to behave as background rewards or support characters for males while just glossing over how deep and how involved women have always been in the industry from a creative standpoint as well as business one, and act like it was always just an industry made of woman-hating traditionalist suit wearing toxically masculine, cigar smoking patriarchs and that, "needs to change."
Of course, their proposed "change" just so happens to be labeling themselves as the new thing, different from the old, and flattering themselves by thinking they are everything that what came before isn't. They don't ACTUALLY care about women, black people, Asian people, Indigenous American people or Polynesians; they care about demography driven identitarian representative groups like something out of Trotskyist guild politics and think there should be some governmental board governing not just women as a population, but one that manages and oversees and has power over the very abstract cultural concept of a woman, where you have to pay it a tax just to invoke their "imagery" in culture and follow their rules in order to feature women in your art, at all.
And how do they start that insidious conversation?
They start by stupid bullshit like this. "Did you know video game culture before you were born just HATED women and didn't think they should be protagonists!? Wow, things sure were different back then! Good thing those heroic intersectionalists challenged gender norms!" And pat themselves on the back for what was already there, and they just appropriated while spinning a tale about how they had to fight for it existing at all, rather than just fighting to seize power over it.
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Ironic that quantum-dragon is supposedly against "unreasonable" bigotry, but apparently a) blocked everyone who replied, and b) pre-blocked me.
Doesn't seem very reasonable.
The supportive notes are still there, of course.
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dabistits · 2 years ago
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rereading this article and thinking back to the time i posted it, i’m vindicated and gratified that time has only proven it to be more correct, considering the number of people who expressly argued against the article’s thesis the first time around. the claim was that, simply by portraying any societal injustice at all and by humanizing the villains, bnha could be nothing if not a nuanced story that wanted the villains’ grievances to be validated and bnha’s society to be rearranged. maybe this still sounded plausible two years ago, but the unpleasant whiff of copaganda was too strong for me even back then, not to mention that copaganda and sympathetic villains certainly can coexist.
by now, i hope it’s really fucking obvious that giving villains sympathetic backstories and legitimate grievances don’t actually result in justice within the narrative; what actually happens is usually that the villains will be put down through a combination of arrest or death, and maybe some protagonist deigns them tragic enough to kickstart some liberal reformist effort that serves to protect, rather than upend, the status quo.
what happens outside the narrative is even more insidious. if people were willing to expand their analytical horizons to consider the text as a cultural product—about why someone would create a story specifically like this one—they would have to question why bnha falls into the same well-trodden path of marvel movies and “progressive” cop shows. the marginalized people who demand that their needs be met by society are portrayed as extremist and ultraviolent, contrasted with the rational benevolent order (and “restrained” violence) of the state. it encourages the reader to perform justifications for law enforcement and “both sides”ism on behalf of the characters—justifications which are the same ones given for state violence irl.
if anything, sympathetic villains and benevolent heroes don’t make for a more nuanced story—it just makes the copaganda more effective. after all, sympathetic causes can now be safely demonized for their militancy; leave it to the benevolent state actors to put down the radical, extremist terrorists, and then rationally determine what rights the individual might deserve. not only does this just plain suck from an ethical standpoint, it’s also nowhere near an innovative lesson that must be taught. who does it benefit to have the 900th run of “maybe these activists terrorists are too radical”?
maybe y’all can consider that instead of trying to thermian argument your way out of this shitty series.
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humans4vampires · 3 years ago
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I caught some of your meta on your posts and I peeped around and saw a little Hardin Scott commentary. I saw you unpack this a bit in a chat but I want to hear more so I’ll ask again: If we sub out Jacob for Hardin, who would Bella pick? Edward or Hardin?
Wow, okay. Let's unpack!
I'd say it really depends on the situation; whether or not we're merging plot lines from both series or if we're just hard-swapping Hardin for Jacob in the Twilight Saga. I have so much to say about the two universes colliding, which I would dare say would have a different outcome and a much more compelling storyline, but since you asked this question specifically, I'll just cover what I think would happen if we swapped Jacob Black for Hardin Scott, cold-turkey, without any other peripheral character changes or introductions.
Edward Cullen versus Hardin Black (neé Scott)
Hardin Black is angsty, a little aggressive, and very popular amongst his friends and peers. He's charming, enough so that he's charmed the pants off of most of the girls his age, so he's quite sexually experienced by the time he meets his childhood friend, Bella Swan when she returns to Forks to live with her father.
Charlie Swan knows Hardin well enough to know he doesn't want him hanging around his teenage daughter, but his dear friend, Billy Black hopes that Bella might be a good influence on his gruff son. Charlie keeps a close watch on them when they're together, though he quickly assures himself that Hardin won't be pulling any tricks on his daughter.
Bella and Hardin were a volatile pair together, and both had no issue telling the other what they thought of them. Hardin found Bella to be a boring, plain-Jane, goody-goody, which only was made more apparent in her choice of a boyfriend; the incredibly tame and aggravatingly perfect, Edward Cullen. Over a fish-fry dinner with Billy and Hardin, Bella made a passing comment about Edward to Charlie, to which Hardin's response was, "Even worse than the Newton kid."
Bella saw Hardin as a fuck-boy, to be entirely honest. To her, he was rude and crass, spent too much of his time looking for destructive things to do. And once Edward came into the picture, she saw all of Hardin's flaws in direct comparison to her perfect gentleman in Edward.
Things changed, though, when Edward left Bella in the time during New Moon. Bella spent months essentially catatonic before discovering her new-found passion for adrenaline charging adventurism. Who better to create chaos with than Hardin?
Now, here's where some things take a turn. Hardin isn't interested in wholesome 'fun' like our sweetie pie, Jacob Black. Hardin drinks and parties and stirs up trouble. Bella falls in with Hardin, but does a good job of leveling him out a bit. They bond over their shared love of classic literature and spend their days recovering from their wild teenage nights by reading passages to each other on an old quilt on the beach in La Push.
Eventually, the two build a strong and trusting relationship, full of witty teasing and more balanced joy. They spend less and less of their time with friends at parties and more and more time alone. Bella proves to be a good equalizer for Hardin and Hardin a good measure of happiness for Bella. The two do end up having sex and continue to have a sexual relationship leading up to the time Hardin transforms into a werewolf.
Both Bella and Hardin manage to help each other with a lot of their varying emotional baggage, and in many ways, they are able to supplement each other well. Hardin's fear of abandonment is well cared for in Bella's over-attentiveness and need to be the "parent," while this quality in Bella is better balanced by Hardin's more carefree and narcissistic tendencies. In this, I mean to say that Hardin encourages Bella to let loose and think of herself first - which becomes even more liberating for Bella when the two begin their sexual relationship.
I'll pause here to unpack this more: I'm not just putting in this saucy tad-bit for your reading pleasure. You cannot have Hardin as a character without the sexual chemistry with the female protagonist. At his core, he's still an adaptation of Christian Grey and Harry Styles. This is not a comment on Harry Styles' sexual prowess, just to be clear - but Christian Grey is sex personified, and thus, is Hardin Scott (or Black, in this case). Which is so interesting to think about, considering Christian Grey is just an adaptation of Edward Cullen, thus, Hardin has enough at his core to be a strong contender for Bella. And, Bella Swan, at her core, is very in-tune with her sexuality. Stephenie Meyer may not be overly colorful with Bella's lustfulness, but it's obvious and apparent throughout the series. Bella and Hardin would have sex eventually and this would complicated things for the both of them, especially when Edward returns.
Now, as the whole werewolf thing unfolds and Bella is forced, by Hardin, to separate from him, the gravity of their relationship and their sexual encounters pushes Bella to another breaking point. She feels rejected and isolated with Hardin distancing himself and the feeling that she loses Edward the more she let's Hardin in hits her harder in Hardin's absence. Not to mention, her relationship with Hardin isn't exactly as easy-breezy beautiful, Cover Girl, like her relationship with the subbed-out Jacob was. Jacob, remember, is very go-with-the-flow, sunshine with a candy-coating sweet - and Hardin is very much not. All of those character flaws that make Hardin who he is are still there. Their relationship is tumultuous, which makes Bella question herself and exacerbates her insecurities.
There's not much time between the two reuniting after the werewolf is out of the bag -Get it? like the 'cat out of the bag?'- and when Bella leaves for Italy to save Edward. This moment triggers Hardin's abandonment issues big time and this is the moment Bella spends the next three books trying to overcome with Hardin. She does come back with Edward and she does continue her relationship as she did in Eclipse and Breaking Dawn, but with the added layer of sexual history and intense chemistry with Hardin throughout the rest of the saga, Bella struggles much more with her feelings for both men. Sex complicates things in a big way and definitely proved her feelings for Hardin very early on in the saga.
This also adds so much more complexity to her relationship with Edward, who very much knows what happened while he was away and very much blames himself for how Bella and Hardin's relationship developed - as he did with Bella and Jacob.
Ultimately, do I think that Bella would choose Hardin over Edward in the end? No. But Hardin does present a compelling swap that I'd say could keep you truly wondering if she was going to change her mind at any point.
I would like to assert here that Renesmee should never have happened like that and I will not even discuss the repercussions.
In the end, Bella would choose Edward for all the things that Hardin is not and cannot be; a perfect God-like creature that shifted her entire perspective of what life was and what life could be. Hardin, or Jacob, could never compete with that.
But the saga would have been so much more dynamic with the tension and the complexity that sex brings to a love story. Imagine Bella tossing and turning at night, Edward agonizing over hearing Hardin's name on her lips. Imagine Edward being tormented by Hardin's mental replays of his nights with Bella every time he looks at her. Imagine how much more conflicted Edward would be about his sexual relationship with Bella! The added complexity of his feelings of her being with Hardin and being nervous!! Oh, I can't even go into that right now...
It would make so much more sense for him to want to commit to her in marriage too! He'd want to solidify their love in a new and different way than she had with Hardin. And it would probably be the reason Bella would agree to it.
Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.
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akimojo · 7 months ago
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oh absolutely, if we're talking about who's more revolutionary as a female protagonist of a male-dominated game franchise, lightning is 100% the one we should be looking at! she challenged male players so much that even to this day, they're still throwing tantrums whenever someone so much as mentions her lmao
i just think it's a shame that even women feel the need to base part of our opinion of a female protagonist on "well what do the men think of her?", even if it's for the sake of challenging them
men definitely found serah's character easier to digest because she's more "male-friendly", soft and feminine, but i don't want my own perception of her to be affected by what they think, and it hasn't! her arc was a lovely deconstruction of the damsel in distress trope, her unwillingness to act on her own and her heavy dependence on lightning and snow was rightfully treated as an obstacle she had to overcome so she could find her own strength and agency, and many (cough, pretty much all of them) women in the franchise don't get that same kind of liberation. in that sense, serah's arc is very much a part of the revolutionary feminist-driven narrative we love in ffxiii, but a very overlooked one on the basis that she's feminine. i've seen takes that she's just a "girly version of lightning", which completely misconstrues both characters
unfortunately her development gets swept to the side by men, maybe even more so than lightning's development since, to them, an overly dependent female character isn't seen as a character flaw, and that sucks ass. they still see her as a damsel, despite how her arc was specifically about her growing into her own person, so to see women (no one in particular in mind, just takes i've seen here and there) ignore her development too, again because she's softer and panders to the male gaze more than lightning (putting aside the fact that lightning's design most definitely panders to men as well), is frustrating to me. the growth she went through and the depth behind her character gets downplayed because of something on the surface that, if we lived a perfect world where the topic of femininity wasn't poisoned by misogynistic men, shouldn't matter
my gripe with people comparing lightning and serah is that i personally don't feel like they're meant to be compared, at least not on a question like "but who's BETTER" (especially not when that dicussion is led by men, holy shit does that get predictable). they complement each other a lot, what one lacks at first, the other might have in excess (bad or not), when one is missing, the other yearns to see her again, one is feminine, and the other is more masculine. but more than that, our opinion on who is the stronger protagonist shouldn't have to be affected by what men like. i know that's something we have to take into account when we look at their differences from a feminist perspective, which frankly fucking sucks because in doing so it almost feels like we demonize femininity, and i know that's not actually the case, but it's hard to shake off that feeling as one of those people who grew up hating pink or the idea of learning to cook for example for fear of not being taken seriously by fellow women
i want to base my understanding of lightning and serah and how they differ from each other from the perspective of their personal growth and the roles they have in the story of each game, not what roles they have among the kind of people that hated lightning for breaking out of the female ff character archetype. those people can keep shitting puking crying over it for all i care. at the same time, i'm aware that it's men that were behind both characters and that their biases bled into both of them, serah in particular. going from having lightning as a protagonist to serah can feel like a step down from progression, and in a way it was! that's beyond frustrating, but i would've personally hoped that in our own little non-male-dominated fandom space, we could look past men's perception (unless feminism is at the center of the discussion, of course) so we could actually appreciate both serah and lightning based on who they are on their own
Every time I stumble across someone trying to argue on whether lightning or serah is the better protagonist I wanna bang my head against the wall
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thenixkat · 3 years ago
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Hi! Sorry for opening old wounds, but I found your blog by scrolling through the animorphs tag (specifically David ones)
I 100% agree on the David take, the David trilogy was actually my introduction to the animorphs series, and I was pretty young when I first read it, like I think, mm like 9 or 10, but I remember feeling off about it, kind of uncomfortable, but was never able to fully process of what’s happening, until I was 17 and decided to re-read the trilogy again and was like oh NO
Weirdly enough, when I read the animorphs (which I have never full access to, only reading 10 books out of 50+ books, so I never read or learned how bad the books can get, protrayal wise until I read your other animorphs post deep diving it) David was my favourite character, and would get miffed if someone tried to change my opinion
I don’t think people understand the circumstances David was going through?? Like the kid just saw his family got kidnapped because he found a blue box and decided “hey I need cash” and tried to sell it, suddenly five kids his age bust in, tell him there’s nothing they can do to help his family, threatened him, made a vote right in front of him (I think in front of him) being like “should’ve part of us, or should we allow him to be enslaved with his parents :/“ which is,,,, and then kidnapping him, and force to sleep in a barn. if I went through that, I sure as hell wouldn’t even try to be nice like David, I would’ve full stop fought them on the spot. And their 13?? What 13 year old aren’t asshole, I was an absolute menace when I was 13, so it’s weird to see people be like “David was such an asshole, I hate him :/“ yeah, the boy is in that asshole age
No old wounds reopened, no old wounds in the first place, the books are bad and the fandom's willfully stupid (among other things). I've simply just been reading better books after forcing myself to reread those books.
David is a really interesting character. And before the writers decided to hit him with the 'evil for the sake of being evil' stick at the end of that trilogy he was really smart and self sufficient and COMPETENT. Like, the Animorphs have technically so much more experience but my dude just rolled up like 'Nah' and took out half the team.
And like, the biggest thing that the probably solidified the 'these bitches need to die' to David was likely the fact that the Animorphs demonstrated that they absolutely could track down and capture his parents but they do this explicitly as a fucking threat. They go out of their way to prove to David that:
a) The Animorphs don't give a shit about rescuing any of the people that the yeerks are enslaving (they liberate all of one woman in like the first book. And its not Karen, the Yeerk Peace Movement liberated Karen. If nothing else these tree books really just solidified the fact that Jake was never actually going to rescue Tom, he didn't really care about his brother.) so they never were gonna help him free his parents.
b) That they probably will kill his parents at some point either b/c they don't give a shit about the lives of the captives or to keep him in line/keep him working for them whether he wants to or not (which, is definitely extortion and possibly also slavery)
and
c) Its either them or his family. And the first book in this trilogy very much proves how much David loves his family and would do whatever he needed to to protect them. For the same reason he rushed into a room full of fighting aliens and wild animals to save his pets, he's gonna murder the fuck out of these kids to save his parents.
And good for him.
The reason that David is 'an asshole' to the fandom is b/c he tried to murder the protagonists that they're rooting for. Even when those protagonists themselves are largely slavery apologizing (Cassie), racist, ableist, low key to high key genocidal (Jake, Tobias, Aximili) assholes who frequently murder and maim innocent people being held against their will with no regards to bystanders.
I still feel like having the story from David's perspective instead of from 2 people who didn't like him at all and fucking Cassie would have been a great opportunity to have an outside perspective on the Animorphs.
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kaizokuou-ni-naru · 4 years ago
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Could you do a meta on the theme of freedom and what it means to different characters? (Sorry if this seems like a basic thing, but I'd love to hear your thoughts!)
hell yeah hell yeah. (this wound up being more an examination of luffy specifically, because the theme of freedom in one piece is very tied up with luffy as a character.)
first of all: freedom and its importance is the central theme of one piece. i’d go so far as to say the main dichotomy in one piece isn’t so much good vs bad as it is freedom vs order/oppression. the most obvious way this is expressed is through luffy- as the series protagonist, obviously the way he thinks and what he holds important is going to be very important in how the series presents itself and its themes. and, simply put, luffy prizes his freedom and that of his friends above all else.
one of my very favorite reveals in one piece is that luffy’s dream isn’t actually, necessarily, to be the pirate king. or at least, not the way everyone else perceives the title- as the conqueror and undisputed ruler of the seas and the pirates that sail them. luffy just wants to be permanently, unquestionably free, and he sees becoming pirate king as the way to do that.
it’s a very straightforward dream. if you ask me, i’d say it’s the dream of someone who, as a little kid, had a person he loved very much get killed for seeking the freedom that had been stolen from him.
many of the worst crimes of the series’ most despicable villains involve taking away the freedom of people and enslaving them (the world government, doflamingo, and arlong all come to mind). the celestial dragons enslave people on a whim. doflamingo literally turns people into puppets when he’s bored. and this is also what brings luffy into conflict with them. all of his direct attacks on the world government come because the freedom of someone he cares about is threatened- robin at enies lobby, camie and hachi at sabaody, ace at impel down and marineford.
all of the strawhats have something either metaphorical or literal holding them down when they’re first introduced, be it zoro imprisoned in the marine base at shells town or sanji held back by his debt to zeff or nami enslaved by arlong or brook trapped in eternal darkness in the florian triangle or even jinbe, who meets luffy through a literal prison break. and every time, it’s luffy who sets them free to pursue their dreams.
luffy is always setting people free, be it one person or a town or a prison or a whole fucking country. it’s how he winds up a hero time and time again despite proclaiming himself not to be one, and it’s also how he winds up with just so many devoted allies and admirers, starting right at the very start of his journey when he facilitates coby’s escape from alvida and continuing straight up to the most recent arc with the liberation of udon.
additionally, the primary opposing force against the world government and probably the closest thing to an overarching big good the series has is the revolutionary army, a group that singularly revolves around liberating oppressed people. outwardly luffy doesn’t have much in common with his dad besides a general penchant for raising hell, but they do both prize freedom above all else, which is the exact trait makes them both massive thorns in the world government’s side, since the world government’s oppressive nature is inherently antithetical to true freedom. you could even call them natural enemies (wink wink).
struggled for like fifteen minutes on how to end this, but for now i’ll just settle for saying that one piece as a series is all about freedom, and the wonder of being able to live and dream however you want, and the evil of taking that away. freedom and the drive to seek it out and defend it is the most fundamental aspect of luffy’s character, and the freedom he’s given his crew and thousands of others in turn is why they’ll be loyal to him to the end of the world. 
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lowkeyorloki · 4 years ago
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random question: if i were to write a monologue as Loki, what are some things you think i should include/keep in mind?
Hi anon! Thanks for coming to me with your question, that’s very nice of you! Please remember that these are all my personal opinions, and at the end of the day you’re entitled to your own writing/character opinions and style. These are just how I view Loki!
I have answered a somewhat similar ask before, it was someone asking for general tips on writing Loki. Here is the link to that ask, as it seems applicable :)
I also currently have a multichapter on ao3 that is like... literally all Loki monologue. If you don’t mind smut, that link is here (it actually updates tomorrow, and the second chapter is even more monologue-y than the first)! The whole fic is meant to be an insight into Loki’s inner monologue and general thoughts, so it may help inspire ya.
But otherwise, here is some general guidelines/rules/tropes I like to think about when I write Loki:
~Try to avoid contractions. Words like I’m are fine, but if you pay close attention to how Loki, Thor, and other Asgardians talk, that’s about the only contraction they’ll use. Try not to say you’ll, say you will. Isn’t becomes is not, haven’t becomes have not, etc. etc. A lot of Loki’s characterization comes down to the way he speaks because he does talk like someone who was raised in a royal setting. Loki is also highly intelligent, and while saying contractions DO NOT mean you are dumb or uneducated, when we catch all these little details about Loki and reflect them in our writing, he seems more in character and he plays into our stereotypes about what makes someone “smart” and what makes someone not.
~Don’t let your colloquial become Loki’s. I’ve said this before, but Loki was raised thinking he was a god. Therefore, he is not going to say “oh my god” in any situation, that wouldn’t make sense. I would also caution you from using cuss words liberally. Loki is the type to use words like fuck for emphasis, to assert dominance, to express unbridled anger. I think a lot of fans view Loki as someone who chooses his words very carefully, so if you reserve words that are seen as bad for specific situations, you’ll be able to draw more attention to the emotions Loki is feeling in that moment.
~Last point on language, I promise! I always try to incorporate fancy language into my (Loki) writing. Words that I find make him sound very posh or just otherwise like himself include: quite, wholly, pitiful, siege, relinquish, enchanted, believe, etc. etc.
~Don’t be afraid to over-explain! I’m not saying go Tolkien on your readers, but walk them through why Loki feels what he’s feeling or does what he’s doing. For example:
Furious, Loki scowled as you walked away.
There’s nothing wrong with this line. However, you could make it about essentially anyone. If you’re writing a monologue, internal or not, you’re able to characterize your protagonists. If you want to give more insight into Loki, you could do something like this:
Loki’s lip curled as you walked away. It made him furious to watch you, head held high in the air as your hips swayed. A mortal like you had no business being so confident - especially not while Loki was standing right there.
See the difference? Now, even though Loki isn’t narrating in the first person, the readers are fully aware of why he’s upset and how his own mind views seemingly neutral situations. Mind you, Loki doesn’t always have to be negative. I just like being dramatic, and I’m sure you know by now my speciality is angst. You can just as easily make this something happy.
~If you’re going to do the above, careful that you balance Loki’s internal emotional responses with external ones. The commonly accepted version of Loki is seen as a very cold and stoic man, one who doesn’t often let his emotions show through (I don’t see this supported by much source material, but that is the version of Loki fans like to see). That means you may want to sporadically add lines that convey the way Loki looks on the outside, if that makes sense. So if we take my previous point, we have:
Loki’s lip curled as you walked away. It made him furious to watch you, head held high in the air as your hips swayed. A mortal like you had no business being so confident - especially not while Loki was standing right there.
Now, if we want to offset that and let the readers know what, say, Thor or any other character sees while Loki is thinking that, you can just tack on an extra sentence or two:
Loki’s lip curled as you walked away. It made him furious to watch you, head held high in the air as your hips swayed. A mortal like you had no business being so confident - especially not while Loki was standing right there. Despite his anger, Loki contained himself, clenching the weapon he was holding in place of letting loose his tongue. Thor shot him a questioning look, trying to figure out what had just happened between you and his brother with little success. 
Now we’re observing Loki’s actions through both his lens and someone else’s, making him overall a more three dimensional character and treading that line between Loki being a very emotional person, but not one who is outwardly so. 
~Be dramatic! Thor and Loki and anyone else coming from Asgard are drama queens. They wear fancy clothes, they talk in Shakespearian-esque ways, and they all have a little bit of a superiority complex despite being very insecure (and that’s that on layered characters). So much of Loki monologues is about immersing your audience in the moment, and being dramatic really helps with that. Make things more high stakes than they need to be, throw in details like clenched jaws or sharp glares. Try to pull the readers out of this world and into your own, because Loki is that grand a character and warrants full attention. Even in just fic writing, he kinda demands it. 
~Get into Loki’s headspace!!! This is the best advice I can give you for writing pieces from his POV. I’ve started to do something my beta introduced me to, and that’s creating Pinterest boards for your fics. It allows you to understand the vibe you’re going for, the setting your characters are in, and it just helps with organization and visualization. It’s also fun to direct your readers to! The other thing, and this is kinda weird, is that I act out the scenes I write. I think (no, I know) it has to do with being a former theatre kid. When you act out your scenes, particularly your dialogue, it can help clue you in on details you wouldn’t have noticed before. This includes the way your face contorts or your body’s physical reactions to thing (sweating, shaking, what have you). I find this also helps with the realism of your writing, because while you’re putting the characters in fictional settings, you’re giving them authentic human reactions. 
I hope this helped a bit! Please let me know if it did. Also, I would love to read your completed piece. Send me a link when you publish it ;)
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sarahjtv · 4 years ago
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BNHA Chapter 311 Quick Spoiler Analysis: Searching For Answers
The new chapter is out after waiting 2 weeks!  I hope Horikoshi and every other mangaka had a good Golden Week!  Anyway, there was a lot of dialogue in this chapter and it was primarily focused on the Top 3 Heroes: Endeavor, Hawks, and Best Jeanist.  The last few pages had All Might and Deku in it and 2 surprise guests!  I don’t think I have too much to comment on, so this might be a short one:
The chapter starts off with Endeavor taking out a couple of villains who broke out of prison with Detnarat support items on them.  Endeavor quickly takes them out with a new Super Move called Ignited Arrow.  Well, I say new, but I think we’ve seen this move before back in the Stain Arc.  It was that fire spear that Endeavor threw at the winged Nomu.  I think that it was only in the anime and it didn’t have a name then.  Well, it does now.
Anyway, the Top 3 are trying to capture as many villains as they can in hopes they can trace back to Muscular and ultimately Shigaraki and AFO.  No luck so far though.  It’s not like finding AFO is going to be THAT easy, c’mon...     
But, of course, there are people who have lost their faith in Heroes and are now actively protesting against them picket signs and all.  The Top 3 tried to convince them that they’re still Heroes during their big press conference, but it’s clear that wasn’t enough for some people so they just leave in the Jeanistmobile.  The ironic thing is that none of these 3 are “False Heroes”  Even Endeavor, while he was still a shitty dad, was a great Hero in his own right.  Right now, the Top 3 are the last people who should be getting yelled at by the public.  
It’s a short detail, but Hawks makes sure that Edgeshot is still looking into the Liberation Front.  I’m glad to know that it’s confirmed that Edgeshot is still doing Hero work by gaining intel from the enemy.  I don’t think we knew about Edgeshot’s status before.
Another small detail: During this long talk, Hawks calls Izuku “Midoriya” and Endeavor calls him “Deku”.  They’re both treating Deku like the kid he is, but it’s interesting that they address him differently.  I think that Endeavor is trying to see him as a hero just as much as a child.  He did mentor him after all.    
The Top 3 have agreed that they should still keep their distance from Deku since they don’t want Deku to be caught with the mass media.  Endeavor comments that Deku shouldn’t be burdened anymore than he already is.  Even if all this is his idea, Deku shouldn’t have to do this in the first place.  I remember reading a comment somewhere that basically said that it was refreshing to see adult characters remind us and our Shonen protagonist that, at the end of the day, they’re just kids.  Characters like Reigan from Mob Psycho 100 and Nanami from Jujutsu Kaisen are good example of this.  I’m kind of glad to put Endeavor into this category now too.  Big improvement from the beginning when he straight up tried to intimate Deku during the Sports Fest.
As Endeavor’s talking, there’s this one panel that shows Deku presumedly when he told his idea to the Top 3.  Ngl, this panel makes me sad.  Deku just looks so serious and detached in a way.  The light in his eyes is still gone.  Someone here on Tumblr pointed out that the light in Deku’s eyes have basically been gone since he went off on his own.  I quickly went back to the last 5-6 chapters and yeah...  That light is just gone.  I honestly can’t even tell if that light was there when he woke up back in Chapter 309.  Deku’s been through too fucking much.  I don’t know if my heart can take it anymore 💔😢
*sniffle* Anyway, the Top 3 are taking about their plan in all this, the status of Shigaraki and AFO, and why they’re after OFA.  It’s basically things we already know, including why AFO needs Shigaraki, how much power Shigaraki actually needs and why (they call it “Hatred”), and how they can lure AFO and Shigaraki out.  These 3 are just putting all the pieces together into this one massive puzzle that we’ve all been trying to figure out.  There’s an interesting focus on Endeavor at one point when he figures out that Shigaraki has a “Lack of Heart” which is probably what’s fueling that Hatred to begin with.
We transition back to All Might who’s keeping track of Deku’s GPS in his own car.  All Might comments that Deku’s not getting a lot a of sleep lately.  He thinks of what Sir Nighteye said to him back in the day, that All Might should get some rest.  For one, Deku needs to get some rest.  Sleepless nights aren’t going to help this kid at all.  Second, I’m worried that Deku’s going down the same path that All Might went.  Being broken down, but still hanging on to that heroic spirit enough to keep fighting even when he probably shouldn’t.  Third, I wonder why All Might was thinking of Sir Nighteye specifically here.  I feel like All Might still has some regrets about how he didn’t listen to Sir Nighteye before he died.  I do wonder why now though?
Suddenly, Deku’s GPS signal is gone and All Might is ambushed with an explosive!  Horikoshi please don’t let this be how All Might dies!  I highly doubt he’s dead, but god I’d be mad if this is how All Might goes out.  He deserves a more ceremonial goodbye when that happens.  I’m hoping the car he’s driving his has some sort of extra shield on it like Nick Fury’s did in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Finally, we go back to Deku who’s nearly shot at by a mysterious assassin.  That assassin being the mysterious women in Tartarus who freed Overhaul!  She has a sniper rifle oozing out of her elbow and she has new gear on.  It’s also stated that she was sent by AFO himself, so Deku’s plan is actually working so far.  I wonder if her Quirk is similar to Momo’s Creation but with only weapons as opposed to almost everything under the sun.  We all thought she had an electric-type Quirk earlier, but maybe she made a taser of some sort.  IDK, I’m spitballing here.
Speaking of Overhaul, HE’S RIGHT NEXT TO HER TOO!  I wasn’t sure with the early leaks because I could only see his head and hair, but the cleaner leaks are out and that’s definitely him.  He’s sitting on the roof flappy sleeves and all.  I can’t tell if he’s conscious or not, but it’s interesting that the Assassin woman brought him with her.  I wonder what his role is going to be?  He’s not doing anything at the moment.  The Ultra Analysis book said that Overhaul’s Quirk developed somehow without his arms, so I wonder how he uses his Quirk now?  With his feet maybe?  Also, how’s Deku going to react to this?  Will he kick Overhaul’s ass again?  Will he try to turn Overhaul to a better path away from the Yakuza and villainy?  He wasn’t able to do it last time, so this might be Overhaul’s second chance.  Though I’m not sure given that he’s probably one of the biggest pieces of scum in the series.  I mean, what he did to Eri especially is straight up unforgivable.  I don’t know how Deku’s going to try to redeem Overhaul if he tries.  But, I wouldn’t put it past him if he doesn’t.        
Yeah, that’s the chapter!  It’s good to be back!  No sign of Bakugo or Shoto though😭.  I want my kids, Horikoshi!  But, I’m glad to see that we’ll get to know who this mysterious Tartarus women is.  It’s time to simp again, my dudes.  I need to know if All Might is ok and I need to know what Overhaul is going to do too.  I need to know what Deku’s going to do now too.  Things have gotten a lot more interesting now that it seems like Deku’s definitely going to encounter former Villains from the past.  
Me rooting for our Heroes and admiring our new villain 💙:  
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