scam2003

[reverseflashes]

an upgrade from this post

[epickiya722]

As a fan of both bnha & jjk, can I ask you somethings?

-which majority of characters will survive if their universe is swithed (jjk charas in bnha verse or bnha charas in jjk verse)

-people in jjk verse have stronger mental than in bnha verse because the death rate is higher in jjk than bnha (do you agree?)

- from plot and art, which do you think is better (jjk or bnha)?

-dynamics between bakudeku or satosugu, which is written better as a duo? why?

I asked this because in twitter I found a jjk fan and bnha fan have a heated discussion to prove which is better, and that's why I want to know your opinion, thanks.....

Okay, I will warn you. This may not be the answer you're looking for but I'll tell you something as someone who does like both BNHA & JJK.

In summary, to all these questions, I like them both because of variety. Even if both stories tackle the same themes, it's like two different flavors that I happen to like. So why not have both? Hell, both of the MCs of the series are at my #1 spots for favorite characters from their respective series.

Now! To answer the questions!

**

Hm... ooh, it kinds of depends. I say both sets of characters can survive in the opposing universes if let's say the characters are going through life, just living it. Now let's say putting them in different situations, that's where things get crazy.

Training Camp Arc from JJK, put the Tokyo Students there instead and that arc would last at least an episode and a half. Hell, the villains involved for that situation would already be in the ground, not escaping or leaving in handcuffs.

Now, for this next one, I'm not saying this because Miruko is my #1 (I have another), I'm saying this next part because she's Miruko. Miruko is a character that reminds me of how Todo is when it comes to fighting. She is not going easy for anybody. She would be came out alive after Shibuya. Okay, she is like the Yuki Tsukumo of BNHA for me.

For the war arcs going on with both stories... I honestly feel like it would still be the same as they are with their canon characters. Suffering, lots of suffering still.

**

Ooh, that is a good statement right there, that is something to think about. I agree, but I also don't agree. Again, both stories touch on that topic but in different styles. JJK characters would have a strong mentality because they deal with death a lot. But same goes for the BNHA characters. But for certain characters. Rewinding a bit to part A and adding to that, characters like Rock Lock that would definitely survive a world like JJK because he thinks like Nanami. Both characters are aware of how hectic their jobs can get. They're aware of the risks people like them (sorcerers and heroes) take. And they actually think about the children put in those situations. People want to say Rock Lock was "mean", but I say he's reasonable because why would children be there fighting a dangerous group of people?

Let's that think to that first question again, but remix it! "Would the majority of JJK characters survive in BNHA or BNHA characters in JJK?"

JJK characters would definitely have that mentality to deal with the situations in BNHA. They're built for that. I can't think of one character in JJK that wouldn't. Now how about the reverse? It's going to be a selection of characters I feel like would be able to handle fighting curses and death.

Miruko and Rock Lock are definitely in that selection. Other characters would definitely be Aizawa and Present Mic. Yes, Present Mic. He's already dealt with death himself. He lost the same friend Aizawa and Midnight did.

Endeavor? Yeah, a character like him, Best Jeanist, Hawks, Mt. Lady... no. I'm sorry, but no. Before things took a left turn in the story, characters like them were more into fame, keeping face and their egos. Hawks... look... he's cool and all. He's smart, he gets the job done or whatever, but I feel like his wish to be more free and belief of "popular approval" could clash with a duty of being a jujutsu sorcerer.

Jujutsu sorcerers DO NOT DO POPULARITY CONTESTS.

**

Comparing plot and art, again, I won't say that "this one is better" because I like having variety. I like that the art styles and plots are different.

Never is better, or worse for me.

I'm just not someone to say "this art style is better". If I was, I wouldn't be following a lot of the artists on Tumblr that I do. I love seeing so many art styles. Each artist has their own distinct aesthetic that is different from the next but they all share one thing in common. They all get the "this art style is so cool" from me.

Again, why choose one flavor if I like them all?

I find both JJK and BNHA entertaining. I have been into BNHA longer, yeah. And right now, JJK has my attention.

The way each mangaka designs their manga vibes well with the story they're telling. Horikoshi's style gives "action comic book". It's perfect because that's what BNHA is. It's a story about good and evil, heroes and villains. I feel like a kid again sometimes on a Saturday morning when I would wake up to watch my hero cartoons. For Akutami, the art style is more... angular, more sharp and sketchy. The way the manga is drawn, for me, captures the tone of the story. JJK is a clean cut story of anguish. Sometimes, it's like "is there even a hope spot in this story". The style... ooh. JJK's style is like "if the movie MirrorMask could be drawn in a manga style, it would be this one", if that makes sense. Vibes are kinda similar...

I freaking love that movie!

**

Hm... I can't choose. I know, I know. But hear me out!

For SatoSugu, it's written perfect for JJK. That pair is for that story. Satoru and Suguru were a vital part for each other's lives. (My autocorrect wanted to make that "loves".) They play a part of the other's development.

Same for BakuDeku. They're a big part of the other's life and development. Their dynamic is perfect for BNHA.

SatoSugu is a pair that begins a common ground. Yeah, Satoru and Suguru would get on each other's nerves, but they would meet in the middle. They're the "strongest duo" until their relationship went sour. And even when it went sour, they still had some attachment to each other. I wouldn't be surprised if during those ten years of them being on opposing sides, they met up here and there just to check up on each other.

BakuDeku is a pair that grew up with each other. From the start, they're a constant to each other. Their relationship started good, then turned sour and now it's good but also kinda in limbo (?). The thing with BakuDeku is neither character is "evil". Bakugou is mean, yeah, but he's on the side of heroes. Their relationship, in shipping, is "rivals and/or to lovers" to me. Not "enemies and/to lovers" as I seen some people label them as.

That would be Gojo and Geto.

With Bakugou and Midoriya, they had a falling out, but with what we seen so far in the story, do each of them actually have opposing ideas? Both want to be a hero, want to win and save.

Enemies - opposing ideas, sometimes even entirely different goals

Rivals - usually on the same side, but would compete with each other, especially when sharing the same goal

That's what "enemies" and "rivals" are to me.

However, in terms of which dynamic is written better? I don't have a clear answer for two reasons.

I like both dynamics, so yeah, that again. And both stories are unfinished. So I don't have a definite answer.

Now, one would argue that SatoSugu's story is "finished", but with Gege Akutami and surprises that keep getting thrown here and there, you never know.

With BakuDeku, there's still some things that need to be wrapped up as well as covered.

**

That was long! But I enjoyed answering those questions! Sorry though, Anon, if it's too wordy!

[whatsaudreythinkingabout]

Idk if u d0 r0mantic headcanons but… Dating Matthew Patel headcanons

I haven’t done romantic headcanons before (at least in terms of “x reader” stuff) but I’ll give it my best shot!

Quick disclaimer: I am a lesbian who is very much not attracted to men, so I’m approaching this from a purely objective standpoint just to get a better idea of how I interpret his personality & overall approach to relationships (& it’ll also help me flesh out my MattLee headcanons so I can get a clearer idea of their dynamic in my head)

So anyway:

Dating Matthew Patel

As I mentioned in my previous post about Matt (which you can find in the tags), after what happened with Ramona he became hesitant to pursue another romantic relationship because he figured it would only end badly, so he started to play up the whole “mysterious brooding loner” schtick so people would leave him alone. Unfortunately, this only attracted him more attention because 1. he was trying way too hard so it just made him come off as overdramatic and 2. there was a select group of girls in his grade who thought he was secretly a vampire and took him rebuffing their advances as “playing hard to get” (yeah this all technically takes place before Twilight [and by extension the vampire craze] comes out but it’s my headcanon & I’m allowed to have a little fun).

If he did catch feelings for someone, he’d probably start out repressing them pretty heavily like the angsty little bitch he is. He talks a pretty big game for someone who claims they’re so slick, but when the time comes to actually tell someone how he feels he shuts down & it would probably take him a while to work up the nerve to confess.

Either that, or he’d come in overconfident with some kind of ridiculous pick-up line, then cringe at himself on the inside whenever he inevitably crashes and burns.

However, once he does finally feel comfortable enough with a partner, he would be completely and utterly OBSESSED. This man is first and foremost a theatre kid, so he is dramatic as fuck and not afraid to show it. Expect a lot of big, flashy, over-the-top romantic gestures; gifts, food (I do HC him to be a good cook), nice dates, fully-choreographed musical numbers—you name it.

It’s been said that the difference between being in love with a hero vs. a villain is that a hero would sacrifice you to save the world, but a villain would sacrifice the world to save you. Matt might be more of an edgelord than a true villain (no matter how much he claims he’s totally evil, yeah sure you are), but regardless he would burn the entire world down if it meant the person he loved would be warm.

It’s also been demonstrated that for all his big talk he has a pretty fragile ego, so he’d fall apart at the slightest indication that you were mad at him. Just totally pathetic (/affectionate) malewife guyfailure energy

Overall he acts all doom & gloom on the outside but when he does love someone, he’d both die and kill for them

honestly that’s about all i got for right now. i might come up with more later but it’s a lot easier for me to do these types of things for female characters bc women

[azreactstowormtheserial]

Overboard [8.1-11.8]

SORRY IN ADVANCE FOR THE SCROLL WHEN YOU HIT KEEP READING

--Yeah... Sorry for not keeping to that 'one arc at a time' promise. But whilst I'm in medical-recovery mode I have nothing better to do than Worm [The Serial] my afternoons away.

And look at that! I'm 1/3 through all of the main story. At least, by Arc-No. ? My friend said come the end of Arc 8, I'd graduated from 'Early Worm'. Should I be scared or happy to be gradually approaching 'Late Worm'?

Speaking of.

ARC 8 -- EXTERMINATION

Title Accurate.

ARC 9 -- SE

Okay, okay. I'll talk about Arc 8. It's a little weird to talk about as a whole. Way easier in the moment, reacting to things as they happen.

"1 in 4 of you (at least) will die."

Tattletale "down".

Aegis, Gallant, Iron Falcon, Mr. G,

Taylor -breaking her spine -- she could have died!

And I thought I couldn't handle the stress of the inter-group dynamic potentially crumbling at the end of Arc 7. Don't worry, we'll get to that.

The endbringers are a terrifying concept. Like, what do you do? Wear it down, hundreds dying to prevent hundreds of thousands from dying, only for it to recover for a few years, months, who knows-- before it attacks somewhere else, almost unprompted?

Almost. I have no idea what it was doing, edging slowly towards Coil's base like a fucking NGE Angel. That's almost as scary.

It just, picked people off. Indiscriminantly.

Kaiser. A powerful, influential-- horrible excuse for a human being, but still, a major player-- he's just dead! Just like that!

I'd started to like a few of The Wards towards the the end of Arc 6, I think. At first it was easy to group them into a 'haha these kids don't know any better, they're really snot-nosed about being heroes'-- which feels a lot nicer a label than what's actually happening.

They're just kids! 15, 16, Vista is 13. 13! Kids that've had a traumatic past, in one way or another. Up against, and dying to, an existential threat. Sentinel really helped put this into perspective.

I'd love to talk about individual moments that I thought were cool; Tattletale's analysis of Leviathan, The truce between heroes and villains, Clockblocker absolutely stepping the fuck up and pretty much clutching the entire fight. But I need to talk about Armsmaster.

(These few lines saved me.)

ARMSMASTER. You horrific excuse for a human being. Jeopardizing CHILDREN'S LIVES, YOUR COMRADES LIVES, PEOPLE'S LIVES-- AND FOR WHAT!?!?!?!?

WAIT NO STOP NO

I absolutely hate this fucking guy. How do you ruin everything in the middle of a natural(?) disaster killing thousands.

(Did I mention Shadow Stalker is Sophia. Huh. That's interesting! I'm sure it won't come up again.)

The arc ends really bittersweet.

I'm really sorry, Bitch. Showing up and saving Taylor was an amazing moment, but that's over half of your closest family, just gone.

But, I totally called it.

I know I wanted to take a break after all that, but I couldn't just leave it at "I told her my answer." -- I had to find out what it was!! So, after a few hours of psyching myself up, I got straight into the Interlude.

ARC 8 -- INTERLUDE [COIL]

How do you beat Coil? What -happened- to Coil to give him this power? Applied perfectly, his power makes him practically invulnerable. One of his only weak points being the immediacy after closing his second universe.

I still don't know how to feel about Coil. He's said in vague terms that his plan for Brockton Bay was to improve. Taylor, I think, took this to mean that people's livelihoods would be better. People would have food, shelter, water. But it's so difficult to tell, even with a direct view into his mind like this interlude gave. All I know is that this is a plan he's put a considerable amount of time and his life towards-- it has to mean a lot to him and he has to be strong in his ideals. I only hope that he isn't utterly insane.

Because if he is? If his motives are 'evil', unjust-- if you can even say they have the potential to be just, with how he operates-- I don't know if anyone can beat him.

...

Shit.

ARC 9 -- SENTINEL

This arc was nice. The breather I needed, and was worried I wouldn't get, after Arc 8's Interlude.

I mentioned that I'd started to like The Wards a little earlier in the story, so the emotional beats really worked here for me. And even if I didn't, this arc'd easily have been a turning point.

\=====

[Az.Interlude: Obligatory Wards (And Co.) Tier List]

Bold means #1 in each thing if there's more than 1.

S [Super :)] - Flechette, Glory Girl, ****Shadow Stalker****, Vista

A [A cool character] - *Clockblocker, Gallant, Kid Win, Panacea, ****Weld***

B [Baegis Tier] - Aegis

C [Cant Remember] - Browbeat

(Sorry Browbeat, who apparently died offscreen in Arc 8.)

\====

I say it's nice, but really we're just seeing a few kids grieve the deaths of their friends. Is that what 'nice' is, in Worm?

Sophia/Shadow Stalker is growing into a more and more interesting character. Though everyone got their fair share of attention, I found her scenes, like the one with Flechette in 9.2, quite interesting.

I* think something really awful happened to Shadow Stalker. *

A lot of my thoughts on Arc 9 I think are just snippets at characters I like. I really liked Weld, and felt 'kinda bad for him. He's trying his best! He's just walking into all this mess.

Vista's chapter made me cry. She's so strong for standing up to Shadow Stalker like that! And the story's tackling on trying to 'fill in' somebody's role after they've passed really hit me like a freight train.

\====

[Az.Interlude 2: Now Obligatory Protectorate (and Dragon) Tier List]

S [This is actually based off of the arc 10 interlude, wait for that.] - Dragon

A [Assault- Oh] - Miss Militia

B [Battery] - Battery

C [Cool? I think?] - Assault, Triumph, Velocity

D ['Dunno] - [Anyone who I haven't remembered. I don't know that many...]

F [Fucking Armsmaster] - Guess who

\====

9.3 was a nifty chapter, too. It's probably the only instance of a 'character are bored in an exposition-lecture' that I've actually thought was pretty well done?

Also, it's nice to get some Clockblocker characterisation. He gets a pass for his flaws because of his context. I do hope his dad ends up getting healed-- but the scenario as a whole really makes me feel for Amy/Panacea. There's so much suffering in the world, and it's -technically- preventable. Just through her. How much of a weight on her shoulders is that?

\====

[Az.Interlude 3: Favorite Arcs]

S - [Super Good Arc] [4. Shell] [8. Extermination] [9. Sentinel] [10. Parasite.]

A [A really good Arc] - [11. Infestation] [6. Tangle] [7. Buzz]

B [Breally good] - [1. Gestation] [2. Insinuation] [3. Agitation]

\====

(See what I'm doing there, by the way? Interlude Arc? Load of Interlude Tier lists? Whatever.) KID WIN ADHD TINKER REP!!!!

I think that's my cue to hop on over to

ARC 10 -- PARASITE

Okay, sure, sure-- Taylor's back, but on uneasy terms, swallowing her pride, sure--

ALEC. ALEC! I THOUGHT YOU JUST MADE PEOPLE TRIP! And I thought even how -that- power was utilized was a little horrifying. This is just... I mean. I'll talk about it some more in the interlude.

Hi Imp! It's nice to meet you! Where'd you come from? Or maybe she was here the whole time, and that's her power--

Imp's neat. I like her power, and I'm hoping we see more of her! She doesn't quite live up to the rest of the gang just yet, but, I mean-- they've been around 9 more arcs. I was wondering if The Undersiders were going to recruit some more members...

This Arc's short but sweet. An infiltration à la the bank robbery, some fights with some superheroes-- and, Dragon!!! Dragon is so cool!!! I love Dragon!!!! We'll get there!!!!

I expected Bitch and Taylor to have a proper confrontation about everything, but... She really just sabotaged her mid-mission? Taylor's beatdown of her was unfortunately deserved-- like, c'mon. You're hurt. More than any of the others, really. But you didn't even 'eye for an eye' her, you went ahead and 'eye for a head' or whatever the relevant saying'd be. I

*really

* hope she takes her up on that offer.

Everything was going alright, even if Dragon'd appeared and made the escape a little tricky. And, oh. A meeting with Coil. Maybe Taylor can hash things out, and come up with a deal that reflects her--

So. That's one way to make an impression of a new overarching villain group. What the actual fuck, Jack. The absolute balls of this reveal-- I have no idea what to make of it, and already Jack just in how he's been described in passing, and-- this-- already made me clock him as a huge threat. I can't wait to see how this goes. I'm sure it'll go great. I'm sure.

ARC 10 -- INTERLUDE [ALEC]

Alec, alecalecalec-- What the actual fuck. I really should have thought twice when Lisa clocked you as a sociopath on first sight. This chapter was scary. Even Sophia doesn't deserve that. The "breach of privacy" -- if you can even -call- it that, with how far it went, made me sick to my stomach.

It's 'kinda crazy that this is just something that continued word-for-word from an earlier chapter. What else has happened directly after Taylor's POV left a scene? What has she missed?

I'm sure this won't come back to bite Taylor in the ass.

Or that.

I think something really awful happened to Shadow Stalker. [2]

Even after all that. I still like Alec. I think. In his own, fucked up, twisted way, he's getting payback for Taylor. He just has no limit. And, I mean-- he is still a kid. That had a horrendous, abuse-ridden upbringing. I don't know. I'm allowed to have complicated feelings about the main cast!

ARC 10 -- INTERLUDE [DRAGON]

Dragon, on the other hand, is objectively fucking cool. She's not even human! What?! It's 2011! Or something like that. I'm a bit of a dork for the 'kinda stuff that the opening third of this chapter was. That it was layered with limitations, purposeful, intended ones that dig under Dragon's skin at all times-- that she's keeping this a secret from even her closest co-workers-- only made me root for her character even more. I'm hoping she's, uh. 'One of the good ones'? Is that how you'd put it? Weird considering she's a hero, but--

*Armsmaster. *Come on.

Oh, look. It came back to bite Taylor in the ass.

Taylor in Arc 11 ruminates on how she'd face losing her civillian identity. But I don't think she quite understands the ramification of it just yet. This is the beginning of the end, in that regard-- Dragon found her.

I'll try not to gush about an interlude too much just to get to Arc 11 and wrap up this post before the day's over, so I'll just leave it at:

*The conversation between Lung and Marquis was very interesting. ****I hope Amy is okay.***

Arc 11 -- INFESTATION (I haven't read the interludes yet! I thought the final base-11 was a good place to stop.)

The Merchants are pretty fucked up, huh? 'Might makes Right' as an actual group philosphy never works. And I don't think the leader's are -that- stupid. I wonder what their deal is?

And, yeah. I'll finally bring it up, Worm. You've got me. *I'm interested in whatever the fuck Case 53 is. *And so is Faultine, apparently. Let's hope they stay in touch with Lisa.

Skitter taking over her territory was rad. She'll make a great monarch! (Queen bee? Is there an insect joke you can make here?)

Whatever my views about how things should be handled, Taylor's helping people in the here and now, and keeping groups like The Merchants out. Helping families. I think what she's doing is right.

And, for once, it all works out! Not without a hitch. Or an underlying dread. Taylor being the arbiter of one of the more straight up 'bad' Merchant's fate is a little telling that her moral's have shifted, somewhat. She's more comfortable leaving someone to die than insisting they have the right to a fair trial, etc-- even if the situtation did totally call for it.

Faultline's crew showing up was neat. I don't think I've mentioned Labyrinth, actually. Her and Newter are my favorite of Faultline's crew. I might go back and re-read Gregor's interlude, just for another look at how Faultline runs things.

And, my god. Brian finally picked up some slack, after some nudging via Lisa. Good on her. The dynamic needs some work from the both of them to build up the trust they once had. But they'll be friends in no time. I hope. Everything's working out.

...

*Oh my god, No, Taylor you can't ****say it!***

Everything is going to go to shit, isn't it?

I don't want to read on anymore. Can't it stop right here? Taylor won, got her friends back? Please?

See you all on the other side. Promise it won't take as long.

[seriousbrat]

hi this may be long so sorry in advance but

i always loved hp and when i got into the marauders i started caring about sirius, remus, and james more (peter hater till i die unfortunately i can’t get behind him) and like every marauders stan i despised despised severus, i thought that since he was in a known death eaters friend group and called muggle borns mudblood he was unredeemable. but then i saw more and more pro snape content and it made me feel bad for him, james bullied him (which i’m still not even sure if it was classified as bullying because james didnt have any power over him and it wasn’t even 1 vs 4 it was 1 vs 2 so i’d like to know your opinion on that as well) and he had an abusive parent, but then i saw snily shippers (i am a major jily shipper fyi) saying how james basically manipulated lily into marrying him by not telling her he still bullied snape, how the prank was the best thing to happen to james because their “fights” wouldn’t be seen as bullying but as a teen rivalry, how james was the rich boy who got everything he wanted and he got the poor girl as well, how it was him constantly asking lily out and her always saying no etcc, so ik this may sound stupid but i love ur takes like ur always sooooo fucking real so if u want to share your opinions on these like if u think any of these things are wrong 🙈 id be glad bc i dont know how to feel about severus and idk how to feel about jily either which is just making my small world inside of my head crumble bc i used to love them so much

Of course and thank you! First of all as I've been saying I don't think it's necessary or even really a good idea for us to base our preferences or interests in fiction with our moral beliefs. so we can accept that snape or james did bad things and still like them. Fiction gives us that freedom to delve into aspects of humanity that in real life we might try to avoid. So I don't think you should feel bad for liking james or severus or jily or whatever. Ok, that being said let's get into it:

First it's normal to feel sympathy for Severus, he's a sympathetic character in many respects! That's what makes a good anti-hero (or even villain. we're even supposed to feel sympathy for voldemort and barty crouch jr at certain points)

what james and the marauders did was definitely bullying. there's no way around that. you say james didn't have any power over him but he did; social power. You touched on economic class, which is a big factor, but James was a popular student and Sev was deeply unpopular. whether it was 1v4 or 1v2 or 1v1 doesn't really matter in terms of whether it was bullying, though tbh it was really 1vthe whole school because the spectators also participated in Sev's humiliation.

However, in my mind there's almost no way that Snape wasn't instigating just as much, possibly more, in seventh year. Like you think he was just going to sit around and accept that his worst enemy was dating Lily? lol. I tend to believe Sirius when he says that Sev "never lost an opportunity to curse James" like good for him get his ass. But I think it was definitely a different dynamic in 7th year than in 5th. there's this tendency to portray Sev as being a meek little helpless victim his whole life but personally I feel that's a disservice to his character-- this is the guy who invented sectumsempra 'for enemies' like three guesses who 'enemies' was.

re: jily, I really doubt that James manipulated Lily into anything, I think that's such an overdramatic reading lol. We don't know much about the way they got together-- although many fic writers have taken it upon themselves to fill in the gaps-- but everything points to them having been happy and in love, that clearly was the intention by the author. If James didn't tell her about duelling Snape that isn't great, but there are a lot of things that can be imperfect in a relationship without jumping to manipulation and abuse which require a specific pattern of behaviour that we have no evidence for. We also only have the external perspective of Sirius and Remus, which is likely incomplete.

(also James 'always asking Lily out' is fanon, we see him ask her out ONCE albeit spectacularly badly. it seems more likely to me that lily 'you make me SICK' evans simply saw james grow into someone she rly liked rather than gave in and gave in so fully that she married him bcause he was pressuring her. idk she didn't read like a pushover to me.)

So no need for world crumblage! It doesn't sound stupid at all, but I think it's important to keep in mind that we can enjoy fictional characters/relationships that aren't perfect, in fact those are the ones that I find more enjoyable. It's totally possible to be a fan of snape and james and jily and snily all at the same time, fandom tends to create conflicts or 'shipping wars' or whatever lol but idk if that's necessary. I don't see it as a moral debate or an either/or, I just find all the characters and the dynamics between them interesting.

For instance, you mentioned the class differences between Lily and James, and I always thought that was probably a point of contention in the relationship; but to me it's one that makes it more compelling to explore. Relationships irl are rarely perfect and evenly-matched from the start, they take work. Similarly people are never perfect- they learn and change and grow. James did, Snape definitely did. otherwise they would be boring and unrealistic as characters.

[aconstantstateofbladerunner]

I would love to see more of The Buddy System thing, where bakugou thinks he has to basically babysit izuku; meanwhile, all he's doing is just talking over him and taking credit for everything.

Previous post: https://aconstantstateofbladerunner.tumblr.com/post/710108569392054272/if-youre-still-doing-the-ask-game-an-au-where#notes

My mind naturally drifted to a very Cain-like scenario so forgive me.

Izuku’s pre-ua training ends up very similar to Cain, with Katsuki tagging along and cleaning the beach alongside him. Difference is that he spends most of his time ‘babysitting’ Izuku, trying to cut him off when he tries to move something he doesn’t think he can handle, or generally trying to talk him out of the whole operation. He also has no idea that the weird skeleton man overseeing them is All Might so Katsuki isn’t trying to prove anything other than that Izuku is wasting his time. A quirkless person can’t be a hero, no matter how hard they train.

Katsuki does also try to separate izuku and all might via Inko, telling her some weirdo is making her son pick up trash. Yagi’s cover story is that he’s an old quirkless personal trainer that believes in Izuku’s ambition, but Bakugou assumes he’s a creep trying to take advantage of weak, gullible Izuku. She assumed Katsuki was Izuku’s only friend and that his quiet demeanor was a result of everyone else bullying him for being quirkless, Katsuki’s words of course. Words Izuku never refuted. However, Katsuki’s constant trying to insert himself into Midoriya business as if he has authority over him, not to mention how much more Izuku perks up when it’s just Yagi there, gets some gears turning in Inko’s head about what’s really been going on all these years.

Katsuki almost makes a scene at the entrance exams. He finds Aizawa looking over orientation and warns him that weakling Izuku will die if they let him try out. Katsuki also strong-armed Izuku into applying for gen-ed so he could still keep an eye on him at UA. He makes a scene for real when he doesn’t find Izuku waiting for him outside the front gates like he told him to after. He goes straight to the Midoriya apartment and demands to be let in, ranting at Inko about how stupid Deku ditched him and could have gotten attacked by a villain again without Katsuki to protect him. But Izuku isn’t there. He stayed at UA a little longer to get treatment for his injuries. Inko calmly but firmly asks him to leave, telling him that she plans to call him mother to make sure he goes home.

That doesn’t stop him from chewing a numb Izuku out when they go back to school. Double so when they get their acceptance letters. Katsuki runs the gambit of emotions, from rage that Izuku has been faking being quirkless all this time just to waste his time, to betrayal that he did the exam behind his back when Katsuki told him not to. Izuku finally asks for one good reason he should do what he says. Katsuki tries to argue that Izuku doesn’t know what’s good for him, to which Izuku counters that quirklessness isn’t tied to intelligence. But what about everything Katsuki has done for him? Like isolate him? Manipulate him? Call him worthless every day of the week like he’s doing him a favor? Izuku declares that he has someone who believes in him for real now, and that he doesn’t need Katsuki anymore. Not that he ever did. And Katsuki uses his quirk on Izuku for the first time since they were children, blasting him in the side of the head. Then he runs away.

In an unprecedented power move, Izuku, sporting a new haircut to get rid of the singed ends, pretends not to know Katsuki on the first day of class. It’s not a particularly convincing act, but it’s enough to set everyone else on edge about Katsuki’s attempts to reestablish their dynamic. When the other kids try and step in, he accuses him of replacing him. That shifts to yelling about how he could have gotten in to UA without a quirk. Everyone else that was in Izuku’s exam group act like Katsuki is that much crazier. When he finally sees Izuku’s new quirk for himself, he again shouts about being lied to for ten years. Izuku whispers that maybe he did.

[automeris-io-moth]

What do you want to see/read more with heroes and villains?

I’ve seen this question answered a lot across the hero x villain blogs, and I really like that I can make my contribution too :D.

I had to take a moment to put it into words. I think I have a clear understanding of what I like to consume in media in that sense but not necessarily know how to express it lol.

I really enjoy dynamics where things are not handled like a clear dichotomy between the goodness of the hero and the evilness of the villain. I really enjoy blurred lines where both can have an understanding of the other, I think it works really well with either a romance built between them (because those make more sense when something, however minimal, is shared between the sides), or to construct something else like an existential crisis for the Hero. Grey areas are such a fun thing to explore. 

I do, however, also enjoy immovable values and immovable goals and views of the world by the villains, constructed by their personal experience of everything surrounding them, that they are not willing to give up for a friendship, a partnership or the love of the hero, they perceive theirs as the truth and know the hero wrong. I also love it when they are right. 

Another thing that I don’t see done a lot but I think is a very interesting concept to explore are platonic relationships between either heroes and villains, or heroes and heroes, or villains and villains. I really really enjoy mentor-mentee situations, and like the admiration and respect it often entails, and how it can easily fluctuate to an almost parental kind of care. Which takes me to: 

Betrayal. This might be controversial but I love well established betrayals, where there’s a deep sense of trust between the parts (which works very well when there’s also admiration involved in a case of a mentor-mentee relationship, for example, between a villain and a hero). I really enjoy the angst involved in betrayals, either to fulfil one side’s purpose or to protect the other against their will. It also works very well within members of the same side. 

Monsters and terrors and otherworldly things. I think it may be the liking of a clear advantage of one side over the other, the imbalance of power along with the potential of plot points given the appearance of something akin to an eldritch terror. Perhaps it involves a debt to a higher power which keeps the hero or the villain tied to one side. Perhaps it’s the unwilling transformation, perhaps it’s the discrimination against a certain group of beings that has shaped the way one of the sides views the word. 

And lastly, I love a good unreliable narrator, where you can’t really tell which side is which, or a purposely misguided, I feel like it adds depth.

That’s all! Thank you for asking. 

[mhacentral]

14 Days of MHA - Day 14 (August 5th): Anything you want

So my thoughts on MHA..... yeah this series had its good points, but there was also a lot of garbage and the rushed ending really hit this into the ground. Honestly from the get go of this series, I was worried how Horikoshi would meld a Hero Story and a School Story together.... it COULD have worked, but Horikoshi is not a good writers, sorry but he isn't. I kept reading cause I was hopeful it could work but also because I fell in love with a few characters..... sadly everything ended in disappointment. Honestly I did this 14 days thing like a month ago EXCEPT for this one post, had I waited until now, I wouldn't have wasted my time.

Problems

ALL THREE major villains die and the three heroes trying to saved them failed.... wtf kind of ending is that. I don't care if you are someone like positivity nanny.... THIS IS BAD STORYTELLING TO HAVE YOUR MAIN HEROES FAIL. And one of them made NO FUCKING SENSE even in anime logic.... Bakugo lives after being struck in the heart, but Toga dies from Blood Loss

See the last chapter with Aizawa and Deku's talk about strictness with students, along with the kid Dai... The "NEW" ranking system is still shit as before, as Popularity and Strength are still all people are focused on, which of course isn't going to cause future problems...............

Shoji getting an award for being a good Heteromorph - this plotline got like maybe 2 chapters worth in the entire series.....

Deku gets a support item to help be a hero, but it takes 8 years..... like drama for nothing at the end

Then over the course of the series there were some MAJOR downfalls

Lack of planning - this is a major downfall of many shonen series due to the insane work schedule and forcing authors to write certain things in certain ways so its super popular, such as shortening the training camp arc, cause Japanese fans didn't want to see more villains, thus screwing up the traitor plotline

Introspection - the series did START off with this and it was well done, but then Horikoshi just stopped doing this and it really made character development take a huge hit

Character Dynamics - this goes in both good and bad, cause it did START OFF really well done, but after Kamino….. many interactions just felt short or didn't happen. One major interaction we didn't get in the main series was a scene with Shoto and Rei….. like how did we not ever get a scene with these two in the main series (there is one in the light novel)

Students were stuck in school and were only allowed out for the war, this caused a major issue, with not being able to explore a lot of themes

The middle of the story was meh and there were TOO MANY characters for Horikoshi too handle. We didn't didn't need three villain groups either

The Overhaul Arc - yep gets a special mention. This arc pulled focus away from the main cast, instead focusing on more new students and a new villain group. Even Oda mentioned in an interview about him having too many characters lol. Then to top this off, the arc was very rushed towards the end. Also the theme of the Yakuza felt old school and didnt fit with MHA, would have loved the MLA to be here at this time instead

Meta Liberation Army - Cmon don't tell me there wasn't supposed to be a MAJOR storyline after the Endeavor internship arc with focus on the MLA, cause 110% something was supposed to happen but got cut and War #1 happened and the MLA may as well never have existed just like the Yakuza... oh yeah next points:

Lets end with some of the good:

Characters and characterization- all very unique in personality and design and made you want to follow them

Character Dynamics - like relationships between characters. Absue, bullying, friendship, romance.... though this could have been done better with some more introspection and interactions between characters

The beginning arcs

Quirks and power system - each power is very unique and really compliments the character well

Superheroes and Villain society - we've had stories with these, but this is in present time where almost everyone has a power, so powers really arent as "special" as in another series and creates a new dynamic of sorts

[lookbluesoup]

My Take on Fourchenault (complicated)

Making this my own (very long) post and want to say right out the gate that even though seeing several other posts about him inspired me to write my own thoughts out, I'm not here to tell anyone else they're wrong! This is fandom! You're valid! While I don't expect a lot of people to read this and mostly just need to get it out of my head, if I get a bunch of notes on this bashing other fans or parroting hate for specific characters, I will turn reblogs off, and will block people if they try to make this into Drama. Whether you like Levidad or not, be nice.

I also think characters and their actions can mean different things to different people, that's partly the beauty of fiction. Especially in FFXIV, there's a big cinematic element. There's a lot of characters, and background information, that is either left vague or only implied, because they're not relevant to the Main Plot. There's also a lot of subtlety to the FF story, a lot of showing rather than telling, and a lot of different people writing the dialogue, translating it, and building off it. And that leaves gaps that every player will have to fill in for themselves, based on their own reference points. What stands out to one player might be insignificant to another. We are all playing a different game, at the end of the day. I'm not here to tell you, reader, or Fandom at large, what to think. I'm just invested enough in this character to want to share my own thoughts about him!

Overall:

I think he's complicated. I believe he loves his children a helluva lot, but I also think he abusive (partly out of ignorance.) I don't think he's a villain, but I do think he makes some very harmful mistakes and that some of his behavior is very selfish. Which makes him interesting. And I'm very curious what role he'll play as MSQ continues in years to come, what else we might learn about him.

Because this is SO LONG I'm putting my expanded thoughts under a cut!

On Needing Control / Criteria for Abuse

So mostly what I'm going to talk about to start is... warning signs. I'll acknowledge my own bias here in that I'm a psych student who's had to do lots of research, research papers, reviewed case studies, etc. with a particular focus in trauma and abuse. I've spent years IN therapy, coming out of an emotionally abusive home as a neurodivergent and physically disabled person with several (clinically diagnosed) narcissists in my family, and yeah, the issue of parents who are... Overly controlling. Stubborn. Self-certain. And applauded by the outside community, seen as Respectable people in their insular social groups... Hits close to home. So what Fourchenault means to me is absolutely influenced by this background.

A parent can be affectionate a lot of the time, can love their children, be very devoted to family, and still absolutely be abusive. Especially in emotional areas. And, also important - the abusers usually do not see themselves as abusers. They are Protectors. Lovers. Family. Leaders. Victims. Heroes in their narrative. They can believe this so much and so loudly that they convince the people they are abusing, too.

Additionally, doing abusive things does NOT automatically make someone irredeemable, evil, or a villain. It is a flaw, a behavior that can be unlearned, and can be performed out of ignorance and without deliberately trying to hurt someone. I do not think Levidad (Look don't ask me to write out Fourchenault every time this is a long enough essay already) is trying to hurt his family, or that he wants to. And I do think he recognizes some of his mistakes by Endwalker's finale and is on a path to improvement.

But in emotionally abusive homes, you often see dynamics at play where affection becomes a tool for control. Children are given moments of unfailing devotion and love and care as long as they do what's expected of them, but when they misbehave (according to that parent) the affection is withdrawn, or threats are made, even or especially threats the parent doesn't mean, because it's really only about having the child obey. I've seen and experienced this in real life, where parents would threaten to kick their kids out for even minor infractions, just as a scare tactic to keep control, despite having no intention of actually kicking the kid out.

And fear? Is an HUGE motivator for this kind of abuse. Parents can do absolutely wicked things to their children because of a 'greater good' mentality, because they're trying to prevent what they see as greater harm.

People who need control, who are stubborn, who have a temper, might be prone to these tactics. All things Levidad is shown to possess in spades. (I'll expand on some of this further below)

And this dynamic often teaches kids and spouses to desire the affection they know is there, and want, while also being afraid to lose that affection by displeasing their loved one. It may sometimes cause them to become argumentative and self-righteous in their own way (cough, ARR Alphinaud, cough). It can make them belligerent, or insecure and uncertain of themselves, or their worthiness to be loved (Alisaie.) It teaches them to keep secrets, and go behind a loved one's back (Ameliance.)

Some other important aspects of this kind of dysfunctional dynamic is that... the people being abused can be very protective of their abuser. Make excuses. Focus on the good things and minimize the bad. They want to have that relationship, they do genuinely care about the person mistreating them. That doesn't make them incompetent, nor is it meant to infantilize them. It's just a thing that happens to people because of how our brains work and how much most people are wired to need other people and have loyal social bonds. It's a trait to be aware of. It means that just because Fourchenault's family is permissive of his vices, doesn't mean they aren't vices.

AND, to add even more nuance to that, abuse isn't a 24/7 thing. It can be inconsistent. It can vary with the state of mind people are in, other experiences they had that day, and so on. Just because there are a few good days or good choices does not negate all the other bad ones.

A few things that have been stated in canon, which are worth considering to me

He does not read the letters the twins send home, only Ameliance does. While this could mean a lot of things, it can't be argued that he has little to no idea of what is actually going on in his children's lives despite having the opportunity to find out (Ameliance specifically says how she's seen them grow up through their letters!) But in his mind they're still inexperienced children, and he chooses to keep it that way.

Ameliance has been financing the twins and Scions behind Levidad's back. There is no reason to keep this activity a secret from him in a healthy relationship with good boundaries. That could speak poorly of Ameliance instead of Fourchenault, but it's hard to argue for a case where he would have been supportive of her spending. Given his opinions on staying out of other city-state's affairs, and given her behavior compared to his in-game, I'd argue this was more her trying to avoid his ire. Especially because:

I personally find it impossible to justify taking this out on the servants. Are the servants expected to treat his wife as subservient to him rather than an equal, and bar her guests entry? Is he unable to discuss or plan with his wife and trust her (implying a lot of disfunction in the home?) Is taking it out on the servants a roundabout way to punish her? And/or is he going to punish an "acceptable target", the servants, rather than express his anger at his wife or at you, who actually did the thing he's upset about? The servants? Really? People who can't rightly argue back or defend themselves because he is their employer and they are servants? This kind of abuse of power is not the behavior of a benevolent, well-adjusted man. Honestly, for me this line of dialogue alone is a massive warning sign that Fourchenault's need for control can manifest in extremely harmful ways. I'll avoid speculating on just how much that could affect with his family but in this line of dialogue alone there is a lot to unpack.

Alphinaud liked to argue with his dad. Their rows would cause scenes in the house. Alphy is a little shit before Heavensward but assuming he doesn't have some kind of Oppositional Defiant Disorder or Narcissism (he doesn't), I suspect that behavior most likely comes from emotional neglect or abuse. Either seeking attention even if it's negative, or modelling after his dad in argumentative/self-assured approach for approval, or attempting to claim some kind of independence because his home life has been so controlling.

Levidad claims he will do anything to protect his kids, and that he would have forced them onto the Ark even against their will, even if they hated him for it. While that could be read in a touching way, for me it was just another sign that he would do anything to have control. Because to protect his children, he needs to be able to control them. He can love them and use that love to justify infantilizing his children and trying to take their agency away.

While Levidad does let the kids leave Sharlayan (though as they are considered adults, I'm not convinced he actually could have stopped them), it could have been under the assumption they'd come running back soon enough. Since he doesn't read their letters, he may be entirely oblivious to the actual amount of danger they found themselves in. He let them spend time with their grandad, which is good, too. I don't think Levidad demanded total 100% uniformity of belief from his kids, it wouldn't fit with their culture. But at the end of the day I think he still wanted to be assured he was in control.

As far as disowning them. Yeah, I think it was a control tactic, too. I think the only thing he new how to do was Escalate in his disagreement with them, because that's what he did when they were children and they fought. I think the significant moment when Levidad slams them with that excommunication is the fact that Alphinaud does not argue with him. He lets his dad go. And even tells Alisaie not to try, either. Alphinaud has grown. He doesn't need to prove himself to his father anymore, not really. And that means Levidad can't control Alphy anymore, either.

I think if their dad had disowned them as a way to get them a message and pique their curiosity, he would have explained so when the vow of silence was lifted, and apologized for that, explicitly. I don't think he would have been so opposed in the Forum to having the Scions help with the Ark and get involved, because at that point, why continue fostering ill will with the children you love, or potentially risking turning the forum against them?

I could see him being so callous to misdirect the Eorzean Alliance because he does not trust them or want their interference as the Ark will only be able to carry so many people, he doesn't need an army beating down Sharlayan's door, and is baffled/frustrated by his children's opposition in front of everyone, because again, he doesn't know how much they've changed and matured. But disowning them was still about control, in my mind.

Lost in Translation?

It's entirely conceivable to me that Japanese Levidad could be very different from English Levidad. The cultural expectations around behavior, good or bad, are different. And we know, from stuff like how differently Haurchefant's lines were in English vs Japanese at first, that sometimes stuff does change in translation to make it carry better for different audiences. Or because the translator interprets something a specific way. English and Japanese are really different languages and how ideas are communicated or assumptions are made are different, too. Let's also not forget Nael van Darnus's whoopsie gender swap. So if there's parts of Levidad's behavior that seem inconsistent, it could, quite literally, be lost in translation.

I think this makes who he is and why he does things very open for interpretation, so I will reiterate that everyone is free to read him however you like. Your story is yours, and mine in mine, and that's a good thing!

Not a Villain.

Levidad loves his kids. He acknowledges that they've grown in the finale. He relinquishes some of his control. If he hadn't, his kids would have been able to move on without his support. I think he has the capacity to learn to treat them better and that ultimately his love for his kids and desire to have a relationship with them will win out over his need to have control, and I am very curious to see where the story takes them all.

[systemadministratorclu]

Ask fandom game for Atlantis!

The first character I first fell in love with:

Milo James Thatch. How could I not? Look at him, he's adorable!

 (Also, whenever 6yo me and friends played pretend with the characters of this movie, I was always Milo. And I wore glasses at the time, and he was the first movie hero I'd seen that wore glasses, so it was kind of a 'ooh, someone like me!' thing)

The character I never expected to love as much as I do now: 

Commander Lyle Tiberius Rourke. I actually think Disney kinda dropped the ball a little bit with this one. He could've been a much more dynamic character, especially with the background they give him on the collector's edition dvd (his struggles in school gives me 'undiagnosed learning disability' vibes and he definitely has some form of PTSD from his time in the military. As much combat as he saw and as many times as he was wounded, there's no way he doesn't). A friend and I were even saying he could've been a sympathetic antagonist who wanted to try and end World War 1 (which literally begins July 1914, a few months before the movie takes place) making him kind of a 'Justified Asshole' for you AITA readers (basically, it'd be like "on one hand, yeah, what he did sucks, but also, we Get It. He had a good reason, and there really was no good option here') Instead, the motive they give him (make a fuckton of money) is kinda stupid because it was hinted earlier on that everyone's already going to make a fuckton of money just for going on this expedition.

Basically, the more I looked into him and asked questions and looked beyond just what we see onscreen (because there IS more there. He's a human, and humans are nowhere NEAR as simple as just what we see onscreen), the harder it was to hate him.......Also, I wrote some fanfics with a canon-divergent version of him that I now adore. More on that in a moment.

The character everyone else loves that I don’t:

Helga Katrina Sinclair. She creeped me out from the get-go, from the first time I saw this movie (in theaters, which was AWESOME). Like, the instant I saw her, the 'EVIL!' alarms in my brain went off. If I'd been asked to guess who was the main antagonist of the movie before seeing the end, I definitely would've said her. She still gives me the creeps, and I find it incredibly easy to write her as a main villainess in my fanfics (especially Heart of Hell, where she goes full-on evil queen Disney villain on steroids, doing shit even Disney's most evil don't do)

That said, I have read some AU versions of her (that make her not so evil) that I do like.

The character I love that everyone else hates: 

Gotta go with Rourke again. Poor guy is pretty universally hated by the fandom (undeserved, I think, but I'm not going to start another Rourke rant here. I'll spare you this time, but he seriously does not deserve the amount of hate he gets.)

The character I used to love but don’t any longer:

Probably Kida. Don't get me wrong, I still like her a lot (badass warrior princess/queen FTW!!) Just not the way I used to, mainly because I no longer ship her with Milo. (No offense to him, but she really doesn't need a man. Let her be the epic queen she is on her own.)

The character I would totally smooch: 

Milo, because the look on his face would be priceless and hella cute. And Rourke, just to see the look on his face as he realizes THAT'S why I needed the stepstool (he's 6'4", I'm 5'2")

The character I’d want to be like: 

Milo again! (I kinda am in that I'm a frickin' nerd. However, I am not a genius with near superhuman intelligence)

Also Audrey. She don't take shit from anybody, but she's really sweet to her friends and even if she's really snarky with them, you can tell she really cares about them.

The character I’d slap: 

Gaetan "Mole" Moliere, and affectionately unless he says whatever he said to Kida. Slapping him seems to be a thing in this group.

A pairing that I love:

Scholmander (Milo/Rourke). This should NOT be a surprise to anyone here who knows me. This became a thing for me because I at first thought "no way could it ever work without being toxic/abusive", then I saw a part of an edit someone did, then wrote a fanfic, then went "holy shit, it works without being toxic/abusive!", wrote three more fics, and now I've written a bunch more, I have more planned, I RP it on here, and it's canon to me now. I love them so much.

A pairing that I despise: 

Rourke/Helga. Well, anyone with Helga, really, but especially this. I honestly think if he didn't have her so close to him all the time, he might not have acted as 'evil' as he did in the movie. I think she has a lot more influence than anyone, even Rourke, thinks. The best thing I can compare it to is that she's like Grima Wormtongue in LOTR. Except she's not serving another power, just herself. (And yes, I have read stuff/looked at art for this, and it just felt wrong, gave me those Wormtongue vibes)

Also don't like her with Milo. That just SCREAMS 'toxic/abusive' with all the emotional/psychological manipulation and gaslighting that would likely occur because he's got such a gentle heart and is a little naive at times, thus easily taken advantage of.

[moiloru]

🦸 My Hero Academia (Seasons One Through Five) Review! 🏫

Well, here's a big one! Welcome to a new anime review, everyone! In this one, I'll tackle My Hero Academia, the one and only!

Needless to say, this one doesn't require any introduction, but hey, I'll do it anyway. My Hero Academia is a shonen anime that started airing in 2016. It currently has five completed seasons and three movies, for a total of over 100 episodes.

MHA has established itself as one of the most well-known names in the industry - for both fanboys/fangirls and haters. In this review, I'll only be talking about the stuff that has already aired, so the ongoing sixth season will be for later.

My Hero Academia is fascinating because it's a very... normal anime, in a way. There's no real quirk to it (see what I did there?), just superpowers. But it still works, even if some people would tell you it sucks ass.

The plot's simple: to become the strongest hero in the world and defeat the Big Bad. After that, it's fight after fight, training session after training session - sometimes incredible, sometimes dull. Some arcs are great, others not so much.

S1 felt a bit slow to me, but the show truly peaked in S2, which was excellent. S3 was still very good, and half of S4 was great, but S5 was long and only sometimes entertaining. Still, every season has its good moments.

The first and third movies were quite remarkable, and while the second one looks marvelous visually, the ending sucks and is fanservice at its worst. Their canon-compliance is unclear is annoying since you can't tell precisely when they happen or if they're even important.

Still, the overarching plot is pretty interesting to follow, even if I wish some of the most boring arcs - and villains - were skipped more quickly.

One great strength: the main characters. They might not be the best-written characters ever, but they're an endearing cast I grew fond of. Their dynamics are amusing, and their group development is excellent. Required for a school anime!

The villains are meh, though. A few are memorable, but some are not interesting and make their arcs forgettable - if not outright bad. However, the Big Bad has a decent backstory, so that's something. Hope they make good of it in the future.

One thing MHA excels at is music. The OST is a banger, and some of the action themes sent shivers down my spine, sometimes making up for the plot being silly. That's a fantastic asset for a shonen to have!

I personally loved openings ODD FUTURE and Merry-Go-Round, even if others are good, too. Overall, the OPs and EDs are pleasant to listen to; some get you pumped up!

Visually, this anime has improved tremendously over the years, becoming beautiful to the eyes in the latest seasons. It's colorful, well-animated, and highlights some critical scenes in the anime - and even more so in the movies.

Overall, for all the criticism it got, MHA is still a good anime. Of course, it could be much better, but I mostly enjoyed watching these first five seasons. I just wish they skipped the boring parts!

In seven years, it has earned the status of legendary anime, so I'd be a fool to tell you not to watch it. It has flaws, but you can't not watch an anime such as My Hero Academia. Go make yourself your own opinion and decide if it deserves the critics!

Down below are the tierlists for the characters and the narrative arcs! No spoilers, so no worries!

[oddygaul]

Children Who Chase Lost Voices

This movie is like, the poster child for why I started keeping this media journal. I’ve seen Children Who Chase Lost Voices two times before this watch, and did not remember a god damn thing about it other than vaguely liking it… it really bothers me, not being able to summon up at least a surface level reaction or feeling about a piece of art I spent time with. At last, there will be a record!

Anyway, it was aight. Children definitely feels like Makoto Shinkai’s take on a Ghibli movie; it’s a solid attempt, but it’s missing a bit of that secret sauce.

They’re not subtle about it, either - see, for example, the Legally Distinct Fox Squirrel from Nausicaä

Visually speaking, it was interesting seeing one of Shinkai’s earlier works again after the phenomenon Your Name became; it very much feels like an aesthetic in a transitory state. At this point, CoMix Wave is beginning the pivot to an Hiroyuki Okiura-style realism* for its character animation, which would later set Your Name apart -  but they can’t quite manage it yet here, leaving a lot of cuts feeling stiff and weightless. It’s stuck in a weird middle ground where, were I not aware of their progress in later works, I’d almost wonder if they would’ve been better off sticking to more stylized movement like the classics it’s based on.

*I found out after writing this that Okiura actually did key animation for Your Name, neat.

The backgrounds, always a focus of Shinkai’s work, are gorgeous. All of the scenes in Asuna’s town are my favorite - it feels lush, vibrant, and is possessed of such a sense of place.

I did find that the landscapes became a bit bland once the characters found their way into Agartha, though. If I remember correctly, location scouting and on-site compositional photography are a big part of CoMix Wave’s production process on Shinkai’s films. I can tell that was the case for Asuna’s town - it’s rendered lovingly, looks lived in, and consistently features striking angles and framing. In stark contrast, a lot of the underground scenes, while painted well from a technical standpoint, often feel flat and empty.

My partner was floored by actually seeing a cicada on-screen for once, after hearing them in literally every anime ever

The strongest element of Children Who Chase Lost Voices to me was the nuance of its characters. While it is very much a Miyazaki-style grand adventure fable, there’s not really a traditional bad guy or antagonist. We have some monsters our heroes have to get away from, and some soldiers that get in their way here and there, but there’s no mustache-twirling villain trying to harness the power of Laputa for their own evil ends or whatever - just a group of people whose paths are intersecting, and only occasionally fully parallel*.

Instead, the person who most seems closest to occupying that role, Morisaki, is just a wife guy, start to finish. Sure, he makes some fucked up choices throughout the movie  (his behavior during the climax being the worst of it), but at the end of the day, he has a single motivation, a plan he’s following through with, and outside of that he’s not going to get in anyone’s way unnecessarily. He’s not out for revenge, he’s not holding grudges, he doesn’t try and force anyone to see things his way, he’s just desperate with grief and driven to accomplish his goal.

It all results in a pretty unique dynamic - turns out having your ‘antagonist’ spend the whole movie on the road with your lead gives you a lot of time to flesh them out and make them feel genuine.

*Not that Miyazaki movies never do this - Spirited Away comes to mind - but the movies Children feels most inspired by (Nausicaä, Castle in the Sky) definitely just have some villain-ass villains.

[zorilleerrant]

I really feel like Knight Terrors: Robin didn't work because like. why put Jason and Tim together? I mean there are thematic elements you could use to tie their stories together, but they... didn't. so it's two separate stories that don't seem to have a lot to do with each other? which is a shame because time looping Jason's death is something he's been through before so it's ripe for a nightmare story. and then instead of knowing right away, they could be talking to each other through each loop and slowly come to a joint conclusion. or like. you could play on the whole "my best friend died I couldn't save him" thing they both have going on, which didn't even come up. and the enemy designs could be based on Roy and Kon (or Steph).

but I really think it would've made more sense to stick Jason with Steph and Cass, and they could all three have joint nightmares about their villain dads, and even have to fight them together. Steph and Cass would realize there was a lot they weren't saying to each other, and they and Jason would realize they have a lot more in common than they realized. you put Damian in with them if you want evil!Talia or evil!Ra's, or you could have Damian in with Babs and he could fight Heretic and she could fight JJ and they could not really know what to do with each other because they don't hang out much and aren't good at talking out trauma. easy to make the parents much larger than the heroes for both childhood physics and emotional magnitude reasons. the sibling thing you'd probably have to go with mirror, mirror style eerie similarity what with the clone bit, but Babs seeing herself in her brother wouldn't go amiss.

meanwhile Tim should be in with Dick as they watch their parents die together and Duke watches his parents get infected, and then you can keep the nightmare versions of the villains. or you have Tim with Dick and Damian as they relive Batman's disappearance and have no idea whether it's real even though they're in a dream world, but now with different interpersonal dynamics. and the nightmare is shaped like an obvious fake Batman (probably Jason's version but more exaggerated). or you have Tim and Babs with the identity change thing, and Tim's not sure whether he can even have a standalone identity and doesn't know what to do with his life, while Babs is reliving being forced into the role of Oracle because she wanted to help and her choices were cut off (not that I necessarily trust the writers to handle that gracefully). and they could talk each other through feelings of guilt and inadequacy. and the villains are an idealized version of their first appearances. or even have Tim and Kate dealing with homophobia together.

I mean, you could group them by who's died and use their death trauma, but that would still leave Jason and Steph and Cass and Damian fighting through the horrors of hell and unable to tell if they're really dead again or whatever. and meanwhile Dick and Tim are stuck where they know they aren't dead but everyone else thinks they're dead, and then you could use the isolation from each other to underscore that. and then I think Babs and Duke would have some kind of survivor's guilt storyline or like the looming terror of the inevitable or something but that's probably too abstract for the current crop of writers to handle.

this whole thing feels like it needs to be driven by an emotional arc and coming to terms with that kind of thing but all the writers are bored by the emotional implications and want to get to the plot. except the plot is very boring and relying so much on being mysterious about it just makes the stakes seem irrelevant. so far Poison Ivy is literally the only one that gave me what I wanted out of a nightmare villain arc putting them in bad dreams. a) dreams thematically relevant to the story being told, b) actually used a fear Pam would have and that hasn't been explored a lot, c) presented the fear in a way that's genuinely unsettling, and d) self-contained story that followed the emotional arc of the character.

[mediacinemtographyartetc]

Archetypes in media/stories

Okay, so in media or even as a writing narrative archetypes [not sterotypes, sterotypes were written either to harm or be a caricature of a group of people while an archetype can describe anyone and can be anything being a leader is a archetype that any one can be while being a bad driver is a sterotype]

So here's the ones that drive me crazy ^^;

Protagonist see's the villain do something evil like steals the declaration of independence or blows up peoples heads because their 'problematic' But the protagonist by being decides that even if they can tell local authorities decides to do the right thing.

By 'stealing' the declaration of indepence [national treasure] Or blowing peoples heads of [Kingpin when eggsy and Merlin blow up the heads of the 1% of people in their safe house bunkers when the whole world almost got killed]

Its okay when the HERO does it I guess *shrugs* The popular concept of "Doing the wrong thing for the right reasons. 'Trope'

Then my next favourite 'archetype'

The two 'best friends' who are living vicariously through the main character or the 'choosen one' [weird it'd happen twice but alas I have two nickels]

So we have the choosen one whose life sucks, they have a lot on their plate but because of their friends they're able to remain a pure hearted hero.

But what happens when that friend wants to walk away? Just 'stop' and be a kid for once? And not carry the world on their shoulders anymore and the friends have issues because how dare they do that and be so 'selfish'

Its like an abuse parent system the girl 'friend' is an overbearing mother who isn't speical but wants to be the quricky girl who thinks her life is sucks [but its actually great and kinda privaleged] then the boy 'friend' who is lazy neglectful but always has an opinion.

Buffy the vampire slayer with Willow and Xander. Danny Phantom with Sam and Tucker.

Tucker asked danny what if he could control a girl for five mintues, both friends using his powers for 'their' benefit. When Sam talks about Dannys issues she suddenly makes it about her and her overbearing parents. When Danny turned himself human both friends got annoyed because he wasn't 'speical' anymore [Altho the villain was being sus, its unfair that DANNY who is fourteen has to deal with it like he's responsible when its unfair.] Same as willow, she walked one mile in buffys shoes then whined that she had to nighthunt vampires for the summer when Buffy was awol [Her boyfriend DIED willow god] yet Buffy had to nighthunt when she was younger, by herself deal with her parents divorce and DIED but sure willow lets make it ALL about YOU and YOUR problems.

Then the guys don't take anything seriously and are just the goofy comic relief but when they have just a 'tiny' bit of life not being fair they act all grouchy and judgmental.

Heck Both Ron and Hermione do the same to Harry with the 'parent' dynamic because it makes sense. Both are sucked in by the 'choosen ones' orbit. Its whimsy and adventurious to save the world. The tone changes when it turns serious. When their families are in danger when they realise they could 'die' then it looses its lustre.

Ron used to be self sacrificing when he was in his first year, because children dont realise the danger yet when he got older and realised wanted to leave but was in too deep to walk away. Which is a valid fear, but when compared to the 'choosen one' who physically cannot walk away sounds like their whinning and need to suck it up.

Also more annoying when the choosen one starts to flag with burnout and wants to end it, thats when the 'mom' type just 'nags' the main character like yeah they already feel like shit just add to it I guess. Jeez.

Not throwing around anything since I'm not a therapist etc- but it does kinda come across like narcisistic friends who kinda gaslight their friend to get something from them and when they do something they percieve as 'wrong' they make them feel like crap because of it.

...

Next is some fun archetypes which by youtubes channel [Cracked]

The four humours. aka the four temperaments;

The leader, The rival, The intellect, the heart. Or usually the comic relief.

Usually a group of four OR Five. Like Avengers, Voltron, TMNT, etc and it goes on. Going back to the group of threes would be, Katniss peter, kale. Then Percy annabeth and rover, then Harry Hermione and Ron, Then Bella Edward and jacob.

Groups of threes then you go for Groups of four > Fantastic four . Girls trip, sex and the city [again tmnt] The A- team. other comedies. Then leads to groups of fives which are prevelant in superhero movies/series like teen titans etc.

Love triangles which are prevelant with the GROUP OF THREE. But honestly? If only Character b-c like character A? Thats not a triangle thats an arrow. Personally I feel like triangle would be A likes B and B likes C and C likes A. Are ALL abcs like abcs and realising who like who and which should be endgame instead of the popular archetype of;

[Dull bland your/name brunette girl here] who has to choose between [hot boy next door who is just the sweetest and non problematic guy who is her personal simp and would let her get away with murder] OR the OTHER HOT dark edgy cool mysterious "I can fix him!" Toxic bully of a guy. Which everyone chooses dark edgy shadow the hedgehog because at least the toxicity has some SPICE to his character as the boy next door is just as bland has white bread.

Also another thing I hate about these archetypes [that turn INTO a steroytype because it harms ME personally]

Is choosen one VS Society, and do the choosen ones actually fight 'against' the issues with society? Actually dismantle the structures in place? Harry conforms and becomes an auror and doesn't fix anything [anyone can polyjuice potion as someone and infiltrate the goverment escpeicially children harry and his own son did it and yet nothing in place? huh?]

Shadow hunters, clary becomes part of it AS DOES SIMON and yet do nothing to help downworlders [even tho simon WAS an ex-downworlder] and just became shadowhunters and conform to their [very elitist] society and dont change it.

The only people who ACTUALLY tried to change anything was Katniss she literally abolished the hunger games [and even the SECOND coming of 'capital' hunger games] And Percy jackson making it where the parents actually acknolodged their kids changing and avoiding a ton of resentment after the fall of Luke?

[greysfall]

My 4444-word review of NEO TWEWY (with personal illustration + heavy spoilers)

My overall critical score for the game is 7.5/10, while my personal enjoyment score is 8.5/10. This review is posted as I have 80% completed the game, got the secret ending and achieved the Angel psychic rank. I’ll first start with the main pros and cons as follows.

PROS:

-        Enjoyable as a whole, still upholding the first game’s spirit in world building and sharing the same backbone - which was mostly revealed in the Secret Reports, it’s impossible to grasp the story without reading them.

-        The new cast and new game is charming in their own way

-        The old cast’s return is one of the biggest highlights for sure, it was fun and impactful. Everyone stays true to themselves and also had their own stories wrapped up nicely.

-        Boss designs are cool, new pins are fun to use and collect

-        The connection between the old and new cast is well written and executed, including but are not limited to the tension between the old and new protagonist, the weird but fun interaction between the 2 Composers, the new friendships revealed and formed

-        Sho being in the main cast is something so uniquely TWEWY and uniquely Sho

-        Still good music

-        Still many fun side quests, some of them really uphold the same quirky spirit of the old game and some are surprisingly touching

-        Many new nice stores and yummy looking foods to explore

-        The map is really easy to memorize for me, it’s fun to travel around the “current” Shibuya to see all the differences compared to the past

-        The social network is crazy and interesting to read through

-        Has an anti-frustration system to help 100% complete the game more easily and earn money faster, so post-game is relatively managable.

-        Overall, I really feel the efforts the team poured into making this as their passion project, not just during the development process but for all the last 14 years. They showed the vision of what they wanted to make, at the same time giving something to both the old as well as new fans.

CONS:

-        The biggest problem with the game is scenario writing. The story is so heavily back-loaded. The director himself thought it would be better to balance out the tension flow by adding more at the beginning but gave in to the scenario writer in the end, probably due to time pressure. This results in an underwhelming execution of characterization and lots of wasted potentials for the first half of the game.  

-        I struggle to view it as a stand-alone game, since the backstory and the old cast both play such an important role in the core of the game. If someone plays this game without having played the OG, they can only enjoy it on surface value at best.

-        The new cast is nice but most of them aren’t quite as intriguing as the old cast, maybe it’s cuz they’re all too nice deep down that they lack a little bit of an edge, of that batshit craziness that everyone in the OG used to have? I think some characters (Fret, Nagi) ended up weaker in terms of characterization because the writer is too afraid of making them unlikeable – which kind of backlashed cuz they only became likable in the most expectable way to cater for a specific group of fans. I would have wished for the other team leaders to be more crazy too, had they not suffered 30+ loops of the Game…

-        The CAMERAWORK IS HELL.

-        Gameplay does get tedious at certain points with all the time travels.

-        Shiba is so badly written as a villain, some Shinjuku characters should be given more screentime cutting into Shiba’s– like Hishima or Kaie or even, Hazuki (though his limited presence also solidified his importance).

-        Some of the main character designs, for example Beat’s hairstyle and his food reactions are hilariously bad. What’s the point of covering up most of his unique facial features?

-        Some of the minor/side characters’ design are too cool for them to have such a small role (eg: Ayano, Eiru). Ryoji did get much screentime but is nowhere as fun as Makoto was.

-        Overall the scope of this game is made a little too big for the team to handle as perfectly as the last game that was very compact, it felt somewhat rushed in development too so the missing pieces are clearly there in the final picture

The entry fee versus paying for it all in the end

An important difference between the Neo game and the original Shibuya game was that the Shibuya rule asked for an entry fee that is the Player’s most important asset, stated as a chance the Composer gives them to reexamine themselves. Meanwhile, the Shinjuku rule neither encourages nor allows personal growth and ultimately aims to erase as many Players as possible. It’s a pity we were never introduced to the full Shinjuku rulebook, as it seems like the system there focuses more on building up power and a grand government to compare with the individuality-driven system of Shibuya.

When you have to compare the new game and the original game (OG), this is an important factor to consider. Also, the OG has a serious storyline running through and through, locked with a different partner/GM creating unique atmosphere for each week and you don’t get to see your old partners again until the end. NEO’s team system does not allow such deep insight and communication between the Players. All of your teammates are always there throughout, the dynamic does change with each new addition but it is not as prominent as a partner change.

Another important factor is how the OG was built from scratch for a new platform as “something no one has ever seen before”, while Neo recycled a lot of old unused ideas from the previous development (check out this interview for more details). The development team for NEO lacks 2 key members and had a change of writer so the final product is not as strongly bound together as the last game.

The new cast is definitely inspired by today’s teenagers (from the view of creators), compared to the old cast they’re more sociable and always seem to take whatever works for them despite feeling unstable inside. They are all innocent and genuinely nice kids, avoiding to hurt each other to a degree that they end up keeping some sort of distance. They’re also unable to communicate at deeper levels, always stagnant at this half-baked stage of equilibrium without any motivation to get to the core of things. That is the cost of entering the game without an entry fee, without even dying or having a reason to be there/to fight seriously. These kids were stolen from the RG into a Game that was decidedly the worst environment for them to change or develop, just wandering around cluelessly to find a way “out” until tragedies started to unfold one by one and they ended up being charged the total sum of the price for their actions – ultimately losing everything in the end.

That is, I believe, a story arc which can resonate more to the youth of today rather than of my generation. If the message of the old game was to “listen”, enjoy life to the fullest and accept to trust others, the message of the new game is to “speak up” from the inside, trying to understand yourself and take actions instead of just going with the flow and finally, to take responsibility for such actions.

If Neku was handpicked by the Composer for being the special one with an all-dense soul to ensure victory of the game then Rindo was just a normal kid chosen out of random by Kubo to be his back-up plan, who just happened to have a high enough imagination to awaken the incredible power from his pin. Rindo was then officially chosen by the Composer as Josh picked up and handed the pin to him again, this time not as Josh’s personal Proxy – but as the Proxy to represent the normal people of Shibuya and via whom he could gamble if humans can fight for their own fate.

The underworld heroine and the hero with little of his own

Shoka is for me a refreshing and layered heroine. She’s the kind of character that took at least 3 trials of creators to form as a complete individual – that included Nomura who gave her the base design and Reaper background, Gen who gave a more cunning touch and the writers who made her English dialogues more punchy. Dishonesty equals “tsundere” is such a cliché, so the English writers tried really hard to avoid that trope in my opinion, while still letting her good intention come through.

She serves as the character who is informed of everything the players should have known, and there was almost nothing she could do about it. Almost. Until she met Rindo.

They were drawn to each other by sharing a state of “not having anything of their own”. They both started out with not being able to truly know themselves, Shoka even hated her RG life but also managed to mature from that stage before Rindo. She must have vibed with Shiki’s love and passion in the Gatto Nero threads, initiating her connection with Shibuya and understanding herself more. With Shoka as Swallow, they were able to open up to each other and offer mental support… but was still not getting to the centre of their problems because for all this time, Shoka could not tell Rindo the most important things about herself.

How did Shoka feel when she met Rindo at the UG? She probably didn’t want to hope that he would live the day until she witnessed the Twisters’ potentials. From the very beginning, they were both incredibly conscious of each other and also constantly frustrated that the person they happened to “notice” was such a condescending bitch/a clueless loser. The Shinjuku Reapers are overall quite drunk in power and uncompassionate to Players, Shoka included. She is also a master of dissociation, which results in her constant boredom, tone swings, haughtiness and subconsciously distancing herself from the friend – the boy she cares about – from false hope, as she judged from facts that it was a hopeless situation where nothing could ever be. Maybe she is naturally a bit of a chameleon just like her name suggests (Shoka 紫陽花 = hydrangea, the color-changing flower), so putting on an act and always dissociating herself from what’s important was easy, while hiding her contradiction was impossible. It was the ex-Reaper Beat who broke it out to her, that she should decide whether she really cared and wanted to do something for a change. He knew how it felt like to cross that line, and knew she wanted to too.  

Shoka is endeared by many of the Shinjuku Reapers and has shown independent acts of kindness (the Shinjuku ghost), proving that her kind and truthful side is as real as her harsh and dishonest side – which makes her a nice mirror to the previous heroine Shiki, who also embraced a dichotomy of self-complex and self-love within her character. In the end, she was the first of the new cast to ultimately accept all that is important to her and independently made the decision to help save Shibuya despite all costs.

She was jealous at Rindo’s interaction with Tsugumi and Kanon but remained silent cuz she wasn’t at a place to have any say about it. She also didn’t reveal about Swallow because that would only add an awkward irrelevance to their current situation, as she was too ready to face erasure at the end of the Game. She only wished to “play a game” with him, be it FanGo or the Reapers’ Game. The tension that the team could only feel at the end, she’s felt it the entire time. The song “DIVIDE” is applicable to not just one bond in the game, but it always makes me think of theirs. There is always a “divide” between her and Rindo throughout the course of their journey, as the living and the dead, as a Player and Reaper, as someone who has a place to return to and someone who doesn’t, someone who knows little but wields too much power and someone who knows a lot despite not being able to do much.

“If only I had the chance to connect with you on the other side

But time goes on, and without us realizing it

The battle is getting heated

Time goes on, and without us realiazing it

Divided again”

To be honest, maybe I didn’t grow any affection for the new main cast from Rindo’s perspective but from Shoka’s. Since I started to sympathize with Shoka, I started to see the boy in a more “real” way. The real Rindo, behind his peaceful façade with others, would lash out on Shoka for her unfairly harsh attitude while none of the others cared. He could also subtly feel that mantle of unspoken secrets from her, her own contradictions, the unresolved chemistry between themselves – and not knowing what to do with it rather than to feel angry with all the unfairness he could not process. (As a Libra too, he’s triggered the most by unfairness!)

It is actually a positive development as he’s at least “reacting” to something strongly now rather than to keep evading his problems. During my replay, I clearly saw the difficult situation Shoka was in, her remaining harshness after the Motoi incident was due to her internal struggle with a mission to save her own life, versus a chance to really be with the team. Her decision was to do both at the risk of losing favour from both sides. Rindo started to accept her layer by layer, as the person who resonated the most to her contradicting nature from the start and knew that via learning her resolve, he has learnt his too.

Later into the game, she even got too much of his attention. Maybe even without knowing she’s Swallow, he’s familiar with her thinking direction and Swallow had always been closer to him than any other friend. It was only after she had to betray her important ones twice that she could start being truly honest. The scene when she died a 2nd time left a strong impression in me, the little reveal let Rindo know that he is also losing Swallow as he’s losing Shoka – and that only death could drive the last secret out of her. Her final “Later, loser” echoed through Rindo as it was the final truth, with only him remaining to hear it: they had actually, already lost everything.

Rindo was the boy who never dared to face all that matters to him until he lost it all, fighting an unfair battle in the faith that they would somehow still win. Shoka was the girl who always knew what was dear to her, but never dared to think she could be together with them ever after and still threw her all into a battle she knew was losing. I think they stir each other on naturally to fill out their gaps, similar to what the Shibuya game partner systerm would have aimed for. The end reward was a little divine intervention to help close up the divide between them once and for all.  

During the game there was not enough space to process anything personal so at the ending when they officially became “friends”, it was an important affirmation of their bond. Some people complained it was friendzoning but it’s not, they just have arrived at the perfect place to start something more. “From now on, we will truly be together” – I read it as that kind of message.  

The heroine from a lost battle, with her story taken away

After reading the secret reports and playing the game to be surprised of how small a role Tsugumi had in the main game despite being the “Hype-chan” thought to be a major character of the next TWEWY installment, many fans would feel sad at a missed opportunity to see the Shinjuku arc in full depiction.

It was shown clearly that, a Shinjuku arc was very carefully planned out and is a vital part of the whole story, yet it could not be made due to various circumstances behind the development scene. I would assume, that the team were not able to make a TWEWY game that ended on a despairing note, but it already happened in their mind, thus becoming a mental burden that forced them to break away from it and started the game anew with NEO. A significant part of NEO became the healing arc for the Shinjuku characters, especially for Tsugumi though I really wished more emphasis should have been placed on her rather than Shiba. We didn’t even get to see her brother – Shinjuku’s Conductor who had a vital role and instead was given the clueless Shiba, who had absolutely no idea what’s going on all the way until the last day in NEO. It’s as if Tsugumi has had her story stolen away from her, because her own battle ended with a saddening loss.

I think every time the game creators look at Tsugumi, they would feel that sadness too. Maybe to them, she is a bigger character than what is seen by the fans, as despite their failed effort to depict her story, she’s lived in their mind for all these years through periods of destruction, healing and rebuild.  Though it is a pity we could not get to experience the full scope of the Shinjuku story, the creators was clear about the place they wished for it to arrive at.    

Individuality, connection and the social network

The team system adapted from Shinjuku rulebook does not allow much room for personal development, as the team dynamic is closer to a work relationship forced to bear results, than a spiritual bond to max out all corners of understanding as found in the partnership system. The old Shibuya system allowed only 1 winner and 1 week limit per game, while the new rule declares for a 1 winning team and only the team at last place will be erased – the other teams will enter another loop. Furthermore, whichever team to challenge the unwinnable Ruinbringers will face the risk of ending up dead last followed by erasure. As a result, the longest-standing teams are most likely not the strongest ever recorded, but the ones who have figured out a strategy to simply survive until something changes, enjoying their newly found social constructs while they are at it. Basically, it is a system to hypnotise players into the illusion that they are still “living”.

Therefore, we as players would not get to the core of each Player individually as fast and directly as we did in the last game. The Twisters were able to stand out not because they’re powerful, they only started to have a real chance after growing enough to each form a meaningful and personal connection to another teammate. It did not come as a team, nor did it intiate from the existing friendship between Rindo and Fret. In fact, I did not find much solidity or anything truly note-worthy about the main team and new characters within themselves until they started clashing with other team members, Reapers and new recruits from week 2 onwards. Rindo found his personal development with Shoka (via a clash with Motoi and pretty much a mini dating sim between them), then via the confrontation of his role with Neku; Fret found his with Kanon then Nagi, the team learned about the real Neku via Beat, Neku entered the UG via Coco’s wish to save Tsugumi… it was not the team but their personal links that empowered them to fight and solve each of their problems.

The other team leaders may have failed because they did not form such personal links, after 30+ hopeless loops Fuya’s team all fell apart to pursue their own interest even at the cost of erasure, Motoi quit his KOL façade to work like a dog for the Reapers (probably to save just his own ass not his team), while Kanon dropped her tricks to find changes via honest cooperation in acceptance of a fair loss. The despairing note in that is huge without making much of a scene because their failure didn’t happen at their best effort to “win”, but in their last attempt to find a way “out”. Even Shiba got his way “out” in the end thanked to his personal friendship with Hishima and Tsugumi.

Something has shifted in the mindset of the game creators in the last 14 years, as both games are about “connection vs individuality” but the last game focuses more on connection between just individuals and this one on the overall network that is formed out of those individual connections.

The introduction of Beat into the main cast was truly the bridge between old and new, they helped each other out in several turns before officially recruiting him. Beat is a character whom a lot of fans including myself have felt somewhat concerned about after Neku disappeared from the RG, so when the new kids welcomed Beat with warm and organic interaction and Beat seemed happy, I started to feel like I wanted to help them out too! I think the overall team chemistry is enjoyable enough for new players, but I could warm up to the new kids more from the pov of a returning character – whom I’m glad to be Beat, as the older brother figure who is genuinely kind, fun, serious and upbeat at the same time; who is needed and needs the kids in return.

The social network is a fun and refreshing feature. You can read all of the crazy tidbits about Shibuya and the links each character have formed with the town people, it’s also fun to visualize how the characters act off screen. Characters’ profiles provide extra insight into their background too, like how it reveals Tsugumi has been friend with Coco during her time in the RG. During the game when not all characters have showed up, you can sometimes guess which empty spot will belong to whom. For example there is a 1 character linking to Neky that is not linked to anyone else, so I could guess that was Joshua, and that another character linking only to Joshua was probably Hazuki, hinting that the 2 Composers are related before either of them even showed up.

Hazuki only showed up for 5 minutes, but his presence is so vital and true to the game that I think he is the most memorable out of the new cast. The two Composers have such an intriguing bond, with their yin/yang or phoenix/dragon themes, opposite color design, the sempai/kouhai tone and the way they keep some sort of distance/work relationship as if it’s mandatory between Higher beings, yet at the same time they can talk so casually because they are truly equal – and different from one another. I have written a separate meta on them here.

Some people pointed out, that all Shinjuku characters’ names and themes are based off Hanafuda cards and the Phoenix in Hanafuda belongs to the Paulownia suit – which is Joshua’s name flower. This is so interesting because it feels like the creators somehow saw it as a sign to interweave the Shibuya and Shinjuku storylines together. Though it doesn’t come out much on the surface, it’s fascinating nonetheless considering both Josh and Haz had at some point interfered with the other town’s affairs.

“Shibuya tour with Haz” was such a special scene, as it happened between 2 characters who do not/no longer have a reason to care about Shibuya, on the subject of what is worth saving about Shibuya. Hazuki carried out the purification of Shinjuku and stepped in to restore Shibuya just as part of his job and unlike Hanekoma or Joshua who both possess profound understanding of humanity, he really didn’t know humans at all. Rindo’s irrational wish invoked in him a sense of curiosity, to try gambling on something irrationally and learning a bit of what his senior have experienced. With all the pieces put together, it provides an overview on Higher beings as a whole, and that Joshua and Hanekoma are really the odd ones out with Hazuki being somewhere in between them and the rest.        

The old friends

It’s easy to have returning characters overshadow the new cast as they have already matured out of their personal story arc and stayed in our hearts for all this time. In the end, I have managed to enjoy both the old and new cast separately and altogether, and they will both find their own place in our memory of this game for the long term.

Sho is truly as crazy as ever, the game wouldn’t be the same if Sho is any less of what he is. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like Neky or Beat is younger than Nagi at all, with moments when it seems like Neky has aged 14 years instead of 3 years. His friendship with Coco surprised me pleasantly, and their interaction together with Beat was fun to watch. Rhyme’s found a new dream and her friendship with Kaie is precious too, especially considering that she can still talk to him online after the game ended. Josh and Neku’s interaction suggested that they have resolved the past and are on equal terms now, they even parted ways in good spirit and I don’t feel any worry about them like I did before.

Neku and Shiki’s reunion scene was beautiful, theirs is such a special bond that it has grown and supported them even without being able to see each other. I am so happy to see them all again and that they stay true to who they are, albeit looking more grown up, cooler and happier than ever before.  

Overall, NEO can’t become a classic on par with the OG, but is definitely a good sequel and a good game in its own rights. I’m happy with whether or not there will be a 3rd game to complete the 3 monkeys theme, but if there will be – I hope the creators can really find the time to learn from the last 2 games and start over with a fresh mindset and strong core.  

[qqueenofhades]

Hi. I’m curious. What did you mean by “women who read fiction might get Bad Ideas!!!” has just reached its latest and stupidest form via tumblr purity culture.? I haven’t seen any of this but I’m new to tumblr.

Oh man. You really want to get me into trouble on, like, my first day back, don’t you?

Pretty much all of this has been explained elsewhere by people much smarter than me, so this isn’t necessarily going to say anything new, but I’ll do my best to synthesize and summarize it. As ever, it comes with the caveat that it is my personal interpretation, and is not intended as the be-all, end-all. You’ll definitely run across it if you spend any time on Tumblr (or social media in general, including Twitter, and any other fandom-related spaces). This will get long.

In short: in the nineteenth century, when Gothic/romantic literature became popular and women were increasingly able to read these kinds of novels for fun, there was an attendant moral panic over whether they, with their weak female brains, would be able to distinguish fiction from reality, and that they might start making immoral or inappropriate choices in their real life as a result. Obviously, there was a huge sexist and misogynistic component to this, and it would be nice to write it off entirely as just hysterical Victorian pearl-clutching, but that feeds into the “lol people in the past were all much stupider than we are today” kind of historical fallacy that I often and vigorously shut down. (Honestly, I’m not sure how anyone can ever write the “omg medieval people believed such weird things about medicine!” nonsense again after what we’ve gone through with COVID, but that is a whole other rant.) The thinking ran that women shouldn’t read novels for fear of corrupting their impressionable brains, or if they had to read novels at all, they should only be the Right Ones: i.e., those that came with a side of heavy-handed and explicit moralizing so that they wouldn’t be tempted to transgress. Of course, books trying to hammer their readers over the head with their Moral Point aren’t often much fun to read, and that’s not the point of fiction anyway. Or at least, it shouldn’t be.

Fast-forward to today, and the entire generation of young, otherwise well-meaning people who have come to believe that being a moral person involves only consuming the “right” kind of fictional content, and being outrageously mean to strangers on the internet who do not agree with that choice. There are a lot of factors contributing to this. First, the advent of social media and being subject to the judgment of people across the world at all times has made it imperative that you demonstrate the “right” opinions to fit in with your peer-group, and on fandom websites, that often falls into a twisted, hyper-critical, so-called “progressivism” that diligently knows all the social justice buzzwords, but has trouble applying them in nuance, context, and complicated real life. To some extent, this obviously is not a bad thing. People need to be critical of the media they engage with, to know what narratives the creator(s) are promoting, the tropes they are using, the conclusions that they are supporting, and to be able to recognize and push back against genuinely harmful content when it is produced – and this distinction is critical – by professional mainstream creators. Amateur, individual fan content is another kettle of fish. There is a difference between critiquing a professional creator (though social media has also made it incredibly easy to atrociously abuse them) and attacking your fellow fan and peer, who is on the exact same footing as you as a consumer of that content.

Obviously, again, this doesn’t mean that you can’t call out people who are engaging in actually toxic or abusive behavior, fans or otherwise. But certain segments of Tumblr culture have drained both those words (along with “gaslighting”) of almost all critical meaning, until they’re applied indiscriminately to “any fictional content that I don’t like, don’t agree with, or which doesn’t seem to model healthy behavior in real life” and “anyone who likes or engages with this content.” Somewhere along the line, a reactionary mindset has been formed in which the only fictional narratives or relationships are those which would be “acceptable” in real life, to which I say…. what? If I only wanted real life, I would watch the news and only read non-fiction. Once again, the underlying fear, even if it’s framed in different terms, is that the people (often women) enjoying this content can’t be trusted to tell the difference between fiction and reality, and if they like “problematic” fictional content, they will proceed to seek it out in their real life and personal relationships. And this is just… not true.

As I said above, critical media studies and thoughtful consumption of entertainment are both great things! There have been some great metas written on, say, the Marvel Cinematic Universe and how it is increasingly relying on villains who have outwardly admirable motives (see: the Flag Smashers in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) who are then stigmatized by their anti-social, violent behavior and attacks on innocent people, which is bad even as the heroes also rely on violence to achieve their ends. This is a clever way to acknowledge social anxieties – to say that people who identify with the Flag Smashers are right, to an extent, but then the instant they cross the line into violence, they’re upsetting the status quo and need to be put down by the heroes. I watched TFATWS and obviously enjoyed it. I have gone on a Marvel re-watching binge recently as well. I like the MCU! I like the characters and the madcap sci-fi adventures! But I can also recognize it as a flawed piece of media that I don’t have to accept whole-cloth, and to be able to criticize some of the ancillary messages that come with it. It doesn’t have to be black and white.

When it comes to shipping, moreover, the toxic culture of “my ship is better than your ship because it’s Better in Real Life” ™ is both well-known and in my opinion, exhausting and pointless. As also noted, the whole point of fiction is that it allows us to create and experience realities that we don’t always want in real life. I certainly enjoy plenty of things in fiction that I would definitely not want in reality: apocalyptic space operas, violent adventures, and yes, garbage men. A large number of my ships over the years have been labeled “unhealthy” for one reason or another, presumably because they don’t adhere to the stereotype of the coffee-shop AU where there’s no tension and nobody ever makes mistakes or is allowed to have serious flaws. And I’m not even bagging on coffee-shop AUs! Some people want to remove characters from a violent situation and give them that fluff and release from the nonstop trauma that TV writers merrily inflict on them without ever thinking about the consequences. Fanfiction often focuses on the psychology and healing of characters who have been through too much, and since that’s something we can all relate to right now, it’s a very powerful exercise. As a transformative and interpretive tool, fanfic is pretty awesome.

The problem, again, comes when people think that fic/fandom can only be used in this way, and that going the other direction, and exploring darker or complicated or messy dynamics and relationships, is morally bad. As has been said before: shipping is not activism. You don’t get brownie points for only having “healthy” ships (and just my personal opinion as a queer person, these often tend to be heterosexual white ships engaging in notably heteronormative behavior) and only supporting behavior in fiction that you think is acceptable in real life. As we’ve said, there is a systematic problem in identifying what that is. Ironically, for people worried about Women Getting Ideas by confusing fiction and reality, they’re doing the same thing, and treating fiction like reality. Fiction is fiction. Nobody actually dies. Nobody actually gets hurt. These people are not real. We need to normalize the idea of characters as figments of a creator’s imagination, not actual people with their own agency. They exist as they are written, and by the choice of people whose motives can be scrutinized and questioned, but they themselves are not real. Nor do characters reflect the author’s personal views. Period.

This feeds into the fact that the internet, and fandom culture, is not intended as a “safe space” in the sense that no questionable or triggering content can ever be posted. Archive of Our Own, with its reams of scrupulous tagging and requests for you to explicitly click and confirm that you are of age to see M or E-rated content, is a constant target of the purity cultists for hosting fictional material that they see as “immoral.” But it repeatedly, unmistakably, directly asks you for your consent to see this material, and if you then act unfairly victimized, well… that’s on you. You agreed to look at this, and there are very few cases where you didn’t know what it entailed. Fandom involves adults creating contents for adults, and while teenagers and younger people can and do participate, they need to understand this fact, rather than expecting everything to be a PG Disney movie.

When I do write my “dark” ships with garbage men, moreover, they always involve a lot of the man being an idiot, being bluntly called out for an idiot, and learning healthier patterns of behavior, which is one of the fundamental patterns of romance novels. But they also involve an element of the woman realizing that societal standards are, in fact, bullshit, and she can go feral every so often, as a treat. But even if I wrote them another way, that would still be okay! There are plenty of ships and dynamics that I don’t care for and don’t express in my fic and fandom writing, but that doesn’t mean I seek out the people who do like them and reprimand them for it. I know plenty of people who use fiction, including dark fiction, in a cathartic way to process real-life trauma, and that’s exactly the role – one of them, at least – that fiction needs to be able to fulfill. It would be terribly boring and limited if we were only ever allowed to write about Real Life and nothing else. It needs to be complicated, dark, escapist, unreal, twisted, and whatever else. This means absolutely zilch about what the consumers of this fiction believe, act, or do in their real lives.

Once more, I do note the misogyny underlying this. Nobody, after all, seems to care what kind of books or fictional narratives men read, and there’s no reflection on whether this is teaching them unhealthy patterns of behavior, or whether it predicts how they’ll act in real life. (There was some of that with the “do video games cause mass shootings?”, but it was a straw man to distract from the actual issues of toxic masculinity and gun culture.) Certain kinds of fiction, especially historical fiction, romance novels, and fanfic, are intensely gendered and viewed as being “women’s fiction” and therefore hyper-criticized, while nobody’s asking if all the macho-man potboiler military-intrigue tough-guy stereotypical “men’s fiction” is teaching them bad things. So the panic about whether your average woman on the internet is reading dark fanfic with an Unhealthy Ship (zomgz) is, in my opinion, misguided at best, and actively destructive at worst.