#why does it have to be a retelling of the original show that was already good? i dont get it

[friendlyneighborhoodghostpal]

i’m just gonna say it i love how kaos handled orpheus and eurydice. i really did, im a huge greek mythology nerd and that story has always been about the refusal to give someone up even when you should, its not a love story its a story about grief. and i just- ah they did something really cool there didn’t they? i’m gonna rewatch the season and like properly form my opinions but i really like it.

[toytulini]

no but for real not to beat a dead horse that i havent seen and dont plan to but they keep trying to do live action atla and i just Do Not Get It? its already been done? quite well? the original cartoon is very good and it doesn't feel like its actually really lacking in a way that a remake would improve upon, and it doesnt seem like either remake has improved upon it, and it doesnt feel like they ever get the tone right either? and why are they only ever trying to adapt atla? why not the comics? or korra ? the adventures of fire lord zuko. i mean fuck i dont even like that they turned toph into a cop but they could do a Toph crime drama procedural. probably shouldnt i dont think that would be good but at least it would be like. a new idea. fucking, adapt the kyoshi novels maybe. i wont forgive you if you fuck them up of course, but im already not forgiving the live action ATLAs so like idk. why not try something new. something a little more original.

[demilypyro]

So I've seen a few too many people on twitter talking about The Kiss Scene from the new Scott Pilgrim anime. People saying it's fetishistic and indulgent, people calling it male gazey, etc. And while the kiss itself is certainly a bit exaggerated, I felt like writing a bit about why I disagree, and why context is important, like it always is. But it basically turned into an extended analysis on the metatextual treatment of Roxie Richter. So bear with me. It's a long post.

What really matters about this scene is not the kiss itself, but what precedes it. Not even just the fight scene just before it, but what precedes the whole anime series, really. And that's the Scott Pilgrim comic book, and the live action movie. Because in both, Roxie is a punchline.

She's a joke. Her character starts and ends with "one of the exes is actually a girl, I bet you didn't expect that." Jokes are made about Ramona's latent bisexuality, the movie especially treating it as funny and absurd, and her validity as a romantic interest is entirely written off by Ramona as being "just a phase." There's a fight scene, she's defeated by a man giving her an orgasm which implicitly calls her sexuality into question (come on), and the movie just moves on. It sucks. It really, really sucks.

The comic fares a little better. It never veers into outright homophobia like the movie does, and while the line about Ramona having gone through a phase remains, Roxie actually gets one over on Scott when Ramona briefly gets back with Roxie. But Roxie is still only barely a character. Like all the other evil exes, she's just a stepping stone towards the male protagonist's development. She barely even gets any screentime before she's defeated by Scott's "power of love." But Roxie stands out, since she's the only villain who is queer, or at least had been confirmed queer at that point (hi Todd). In a series that champions multiple gay men in the supporting cast, the single undeniable lesbian in the story is a villain. She's labeled as evil, made fun of, pushed aside in favor of the men, and then discarded. Her screentime was never about her, or her feelings for Ramona. It was about the straight, male protagonist needing to overcome her. And that was Roxie Richter. An unfortunate victim of the 2010s.

Fast forward to current year, and the new anime series is announced. Everybody sits down to watch the new series expecting another retelling of the same story, and.... hang on, that straight male protagonist I mentioned just died in the first episode. And now it's humanizing the villains from the original story. And there's Roxie, introduced alongside the other evil exes in the second episode, and she's being played entirely straight, without a punchline in sight. No jokes are made about her gender, no questions are made of her validity as one of Ramona's romantic interests. The narrative considers her important. In one episode, she already gets more respect than she did in either of the previous iterations of Scott Pilgrim. And this isn't even her focus episode yet... which happens to be the very next one.

The anime series goes to great lengths to flesh out the original story's villains and to have Ramona reconcile with them. And I don't think it's a coincidence that Roxie gets to go first. While Matthew Patel gets his development in episode 2, Roxie is the first to directly confront Ramona, now our main protagonist. This is notable too because it's the only time the exes are encountered out of order. Roxie is supposed to be number 4, but she's first in line, and later on you realize that she's the only one who's out of sequence. She's the one who sets the precedent for the villains being redeemed. She's the most important character for Ramona to reconcile with.

What follows is probably the most extensive, elaborate 1 on 1 fight scene in the whole show. Roxie fights like a wounded animal, her motions are desperate and pained. Ramona can only barely fight back against her onslaught. Different set-pieces fly by at breakneck speed as Roxie relentlessly lays her feelings at Ramona's feet through her attacks and her distraught shouts. And unlike the comic or the movie, Ramona acknowledges them, and sincerely apologizes. And the two end up just laying there, exhausted, reminiscing about when they were together.

Only after this, after all of this, does the kiss scene happen. Roxie has been vindicated, she has reconciled with the person who hurt her, the narrative has deemed that her anger is justified and has redeemed her character. And she gets her victory lap by making the nearest other hot girl question her heterosexuality, sharing a sloppy kiss with her as the music triumphantly crescendos.

It's... a little self-congratulatory, honestly. But it's good. It's redemption for a character who had been mistreated for over a decade. And she punctuates the moment by being very, very gay where everyone can see it, no men anywhere in sight. Because this is her moment. And then she leaves the plot, on her own accord this time, while humming the hampster dance. What a legend. How could anything be wrong with this.

[magneticflower]

It irks me the way that the fight scene in Per Haskell's bar makes little sense in the show because they decided to for some reason forgo Per Haskell and Kaz's real relationship even though his assent through the ranks of the Dregs and the blood, sweat, and tears he put in into making the Dregs into an actually reputable gang is a big part of his journey into who he is today. He put everything into that gang because he had always intended to get to the point where he could come and collect on his hard work when the time came for him to stake his claim as the real leader of the Dregs that they are today because Per Haskell was not that by a long shot. Why they decided to omit that I'll never understand.

[sunfyrisms]

i think it’s important to ask why the show deviates so heavily from the book. no, seriously, it’s important to ask why the showrunners have so elaborately deviated from the original source material. every change, every alteration, it happens for a reason.

some people, including the very writers of this show, cling onto the justification that fire and blood is a book of propaganda, and even more strangely, fans love to say house of the dragon is a true retelling of the history. which, inherently, is not correct and one of the most dumb things you can say.

the showrunners do not understand that fire and blood is a very nuanced, intricately crafted piece of work. this is a piece of fictional history that highlights that house targaryen was destined to be its own destruction. its power, its unrivaled strength, would be its downfall. part of the mystery of the book it that it is so unreliable. every narrator is saying something different. it is up to the reader to come up with their own interpretation. the dance, as i have said before, was a pointless family war that destroyed the family, the dragons, and the realm.

i understand changes will be made regardless, i do! but you have to ask why. why are these changes made? what purpose does it serve thematically? narratively?

why is alicent made rhaenyra’s age? why is she made a child bride, and humiliated at every turn? why is she so weirdly in love with rhaenyra, after everything that has happened between them? why does she sell out her children, her father, literally every single person she has ever held dear?

why is rhaenyra this stale woman? what was even the point of the last scene of the season one finale? where is her anger and her conviction? why did the showrunners choose a thin actress to play her when she, naturally, gained weight after giving birth to literally six children?

i can give a million other examples, but these ones are already jarring enough to me. where is alicent and rhaenyra’s ambition? their rage? what are the showrunners, unintentionally or intentionally, saying when they make these changes? i think it’s important that we ask ourselves these questions, is all!

[lemotmo]

I'm nervous to send anything but certain topics aren't being posted or answered anymore so this feels safe! But feel free to tell me NO! ❤️

Q. Have you seen the Tik Tok Ryan watched about how if Eddie isn't gay then they've just made him the biggest jerk possible when it comes to dating? 😂 I mean she wasn't wrong. Having hope makes me nervous!

A. Haha, yes, I saw the Tik Tok and it does make him look particularly bad in the context of dating. But it just continues to prove what a very hard corner they've written themselves into where Eddie is concerned. He is not a bad guy. He's not. He's a good man with a very deep sense of duty, responsibility, obligation and expectation. And in that context the women he has chosen to date, post Shannon, make sense. His relationship with Anna was always the obvious head scratcher because on paper she was absolutely the perfect person for him, but the relationship always felt off. Once we got the spoiler from the insider saying she was supposed to be the relationship that led to Eddie's sexuality discovery it made the Anna relationship make much more sense. I know there are some who don't want to believe the insider information, but given Tim's history I think he would have repudiated the claim if it had been false. We have already seen Tim correct false information this off season, so I see no reason why he wouldn't have corrected that one as well if it were untrue. It was everywhere. He knows it was leaked information. Everything Eddie experienced in that relationship further seems to support the idea that the original plan was a sexuality awakening. The panic attacks he was having fit perfectly into this theory as well because Eddie is not a commitment phobe. They never felt like a couple. She felt like Christopher's babysitter. They even had Eddie flat out admit that Christopher loved her so he thought he could force himself to love her too. It's the classic sexuality arc relationship.

Marisol is another mess entirely. You could tell she wasn't meant to be back last season, and they didn't even bother trying to pretend otherwise. I think the Kim nonsense was Tim's way of maybe trying to demonstrate that Eddie just doesn't feel like he can find a connection with anyone else, romantically speaking, and he was reaching out so hard for doppelganger Shannon because he thought she could tell him why. There is absolutely no other plausible reason for that storyline. Eddie specifically told Buck that it wasn't about sex and he didn't want to sleep with her. He wanted to talk to her, and once he was able to, what he talked about was how broken he feels. That is where we are with Eddie. That very much feels like trying to recreate where he was mentally in season 4 without retelling the same storyline. So it feels very much like they're headed in the sexuality direction. I understand people are hesitant to allow themselves to be excited about the possibility. And they are correct when they say we have no proof that's where they're going. But what I will say is that it's okay to say that things feel genuinely different this time around. It feels very different than it ever has before. And we're allowed to acknowledge that. Oliver and Ryan are behaving in ways they never have before. And we're allowed to also acknowledge that. Ryan has very much followed Oliver's pattern from last off season. He has followed the same interview patterns, right down to switching to gender neutral pronouns. And he is following the same fandom behavior from Oliver last season. He is being very openly pro Buddie. Acknowledging the corner the show has written themselves into, and acknowledging the patterns that Oliver and Ryan are following and repeating is not giving false hope or unfairly raising expectations. It's acknowledging the clear change. That's all anyone is doing. If it makes certain people feel better to be adamant that it's not happening, fine. That's their fandom right. But it's other people's fandom right to be excited about and to acknowledge the possibility of the storyline. A storyline that feels very much within reach. Let people be excited.

Hey Nonny! I'm firmly saying YES to be honest. I know that Ali also isn't posting about certain subjects and topics anymore. So please, don't be afraid to drop something in my inbox. As long as it's not about fandom messes, it's fine. Thanks again for doing this. I do appreciate it.

If we all focus a bit more on fandom positivity, we can hopefully counter some of the negativity.

As for Ali's answer? Yes, yes and yes. The playing field has been set and all the pawns are exactly where they should be to get Eddie out of that closet and into Buck's arms (after some extra loopholes, no doubt).

I agree so hard on the fact that it's okay to be excited and hopeful. Let yourself hope. Why not? What have we got to lose at this stage? Besides our sanity that is. 😉

And yes, the people out there who are being cautious about Buddie? They have ever right to be. I mean, nothing is set in stone at this point. So, it's more than fine to want to hold back on the excitement for a while.

We can all coexist just fine, if we respect each others opinions and POVs, because after all:

We all have the same end-goal in mind. 😋

IMPORTANT! Please don't repost this ask and/or a link that leads straight to my Tumblr account on Twitter or any other social media. Thank you!

Heads up! For anyone who is giving me the shifty eyes for reposting Ali's updates instead of reblogging. Read this.

Remember, no hate in comments, reblogs or inboxes. Let's keep it civil and respectful. Thank you.

If you are interested in more of Ali’s posts, you can find all of her posts so far under the tag: anonymous blog I love.

[katerinaaqu]

It's hard talking about the disrespect to Greek mythology and religion when every argument people brings to the table is "look at this original novel that is adapted into a movie that is turned into a tv show that didn't follow the original plot" as if the Greek culture is on par with fictional story instead of a tradition and heritage of real life people.

A media that is broadcast to the public and make accessible to everyone that erased the values and lesson of a cultural story still can do harm when it feeds misunderstanding and misinterpretion of the culture it originated from.

Greek people has the right to be upset when their culture keeps getting misrepresented, doesn't matter the good intentions behind it, why must it be at the expense of Greek culture?

You can create arts that is so beautiful and so praises by many, and years from now you could look back and see what an amazing experience and community you have created out of it. But at the same time you also continue feeding the distorted ideas and flawed understanding about a culture as a whole.

All because you took from a culture and want to tell your own story.

Retelling is telling back the story. Any addition or new ideas you bring is when there's part in the original story that is vague or open for interpretations. Even then, when you elaborate, you follows the already presented ideas that the original story already established.

If it so beloved to you and so meaningful to you, why couldn't you be faithful when adapting and retelling with the talents you have?

Shouldn't it be better if you created an original story inspired by it? If you feels that the values and standards are not to your taste, but you so loved the stories and could related to it, isn't it better to create original characters and settings with your own voice and narrative with the story inspiration as the backdrop?

At this point, what is greek mythology and lore to you? That makes you so passionate so inspired, that spark your imagination that encourage you to be creative but it is at the ruin of old age history that is meaningful for the Greek identity. Do you really appreciate the values and moral that you gained from the stories, or did you forget yourself along the way?

I couldn't have said it better! I agree to all that because that is exactly my sentiment as well! On one hand of course I am proud that Greek mythology contnues to inspire and people want to create stuff on them or that even now there are people who think the values of Greek Mythology are universal and they are!

But as you said it pains me to no limits when stories that were literally created from people based on their culture and religion to pass on messages are not only distorted beyond recognition but also to a degree where nowadays most people of Greek mythology liking spectrum know only how terrible villains some men are (in actual mythology they are complicated personas) and how weak women are (there are literlly figures in Greek mythology that are so strong personas that honestly I am shocked. See Helen for example how she is the most projected persona as a pretty face that does nothing when Helen literally taks back to Aphrodite, she is the only one who sees through Odysseus's disguise, she has knowledge of medicine and so much more for once) Mythology loses all its meaning, all its allegory and all its cultural spectrum because as you said people do not use it to retell the story, they use the word "retelling" as their excuse to just tell a story that fits them by using the popularity of greek mythology and yes as you said why cannot they say their original stories while using inspiration from Greek mythology?

Honestly I have nothing to add! You said it all dear Anon!

[genericpuff]

The Mishandling of LO’s S3 Mi(n)season Hiatus - Part 3 2/2

ALRIGHT. THIS IS THE LAST PART. I MEAN IT THIS TIME.

I had completely forgotten how long the mi(n)season finale for S3 was, but I suppose it makes sense considering it was operating as the true cliffhanger before the 4 month break.

If you haven't read the first 3 parts of this episodic breakdown, please go check these ones out first:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3 1/2

Alright, let's get this show on the road!

CAUTION: THIS IS PART 2 OF THE THIRD PART OF A 3 + 1 PART SERIES IN WHICH I WILL BE SPOILING MUCH OF EPISODES 251-253. THIS EPISODE CONTAINS TOPICS SURROUNDING SEXUAL ASSAULT. THIS WILL BE A LONG POST. BRACE YOURSELF.

We've gotten delusional Leuce. We've gotten erasure of the SA. We've gotten a complete bastardization of the original myths that this story got its claim to fame on. The dread has set in, and all I want to do is get off Mr Bones' Wild Ride. But we have one more stretch of mind-numbing track to go, because the reveal of Persephone starting winter was not the end, oh no. The true cliffhanger of this episode - upon which the fans and critics alike have sat on for 4 months - proves that when we think Rachel has gotten crazy enough in this circus she calls a "retelling", she manages to prove that yes, she can make things even crazier, and no, you will not have a good time.

Ironically, despite that opening, I actually have a lot less to say about this last part of Episode 253 than I did about the first part. Obviously there's no feasible way to top "Persephone causes winter", but this episode does come rather close in its absurdity. Ultimately, if these essays have proven anything, it's just how much Rachel retcons things, to such an extent now that she seems to be retconning or outright forgetting information that she established just a handful of episodes prior. You'll see what I mean here as we go along in this.

As soon as it's hinted at that Persephone has started winter, we cut away to Apollo. Because, as per LO tradition, we can't spend longer than 10-15 panels on a single scene.

Already this seems like... really odd framing.

This is Apollo. A character who has been a villain since basically the beginning of the comic, when he sexually assaulted Persephone. This is not something that's up for debate. This is not something that can be refuted, as much as the comic may try to erase it or twist it into something else.

And yet, the vibe I get from this is, "Misled but good-deep-down character being taken advantage of by a sinister being." This isn't the type of framing we should be seeing around a character like Apollo.

I mentioned it ages ago in my post about the SA erasure that it really feels like Rachel is slyly trying to make Apollo empathetic, from giving us an entire episode in his perspective to adding extra panels into the books to making Persephone weirdly reminiscent of feelings for Apollo that she never had.

One thing I also touch on in that post is how Apollo is framed against Zeus. Zeus is also a villain character for much of the series, and even after he's "redeemed", the fanbase still considers him largely to be an antagonistic force. So to have Apollo be trying to take down Zeus comes across as very "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" and I really don't like seeing that framing when it's regarding a rapist.

And this scene largely feels the same. It feels like Rachel's trying to sway the audience into believing Apollo is like Draco Malfoy - a misled boy who "didn't know any better" and was being manipulated by a greater evil. If you haven't guessed by now, that "greater evil" is Ouranos.

Why is it Ouranos? In my opinion (so take this with grains of salt) this is because they need to somehow "one up" Kronos and give Persephone and Hades a tangible force to fight against, to draw a clean line in the sand between "good" and "evil" so that we, the audience, will be forced to categorize Persephone and Hades as "good" and someone else as "evil".

But really, why Ouranos? We're told that he manipulated Gaia to use her powers in an attempt to create "hierarchy" (whatever the FUCK that means, I don't think Rachel really understands how societal hierarchies are created) but there's NOTHING to imply that he was tyrannical or "evil" in the same way that Kronos has been depicted. Rachel's basically submitting this whole plotline to "well it's in the prophecy" but there was NOTHING dictating that she had to try and write a "prophecy" storyline to begin with. So as a result, it feels very tacked on and it's hard to tell what the point is, it really just seems like Rachel watched too much Marvel one week and decided that Lore Olympus - a fantasy romance - needed a big bad.

And by extension it feels like Apollo is being used as a pawn in this dynamic. By making him subservient to an "evil" force, it means he can labelled as definitively "evil", and thus it gives Rachel a vehicle to have Apollo taken down - or even perhaps empathized with much like in the Draco Malfoy sense - without having to touch the SA plot that she set up and never resolved.

He was evil before, but he wasn't the kind of evil that Rachel could write around. Because she doesn't know how to write SA or give her female characters any sense of retribution or agency. We've seen that already with her robbing Demeter of winter and Persephone of her feelings regarding the SA. There was never going to be a chance in hell she was going to be able to write herself out of a plotline she's been procrastinating for 4+ years.

That said, this is just a vibe I get, so I'm not gonna speak on it much more. This is one of those "we're really not gonna know until the comic returns" situations.

Once again, Rachel's trying to make Apollo seem like a "master manipulator", but she's also trying to make him seem like he's the one being manipulated, but she's ALSO trying to write him as a big dumb idiot who literally can't grasp consent. Apollo has to be one of the most inconsistently written characters in the entire comic, and yes, that includes Persephone. Again, it just goes to show she hasn't been able to fully commit to the SA plotline because Apollo's motivations and intelligence levels change with each passing episode. Sometimes he's being nefarious and plotting to overthrow the King, other times he's literally asking a nymph if she'd be willing to cut her hair to look like Persephone. The comic can't choose and so we, the audience, can't tell why Apollo is even still here.

Again, this is SUCH bizarre framing. If we're to believe that Persephone has been "cursed" by no longer being able to create Spring, only Winter, then does that make Ouranos and Apollo the heroes here? Because Ouranos is right, if Persephone is causing winter, that's going to kill the mortals, which is the complete OPPOSITE of what she's trying to do. So what are we left with? A plotline where Apollo and Ouranos might actually have a point about how she rushed into a marriage with the King of the Underworld and sacrificed everything that gave her agency and power - both metaphorically and literally - in the process?

Again, this is why Rachel fundamentally misunderstands the original purpose of The Hymn to Demeter and how she's, by and large, made her retelling worse in an attempt to be "subversive". It puts the plot and character motivations in a place where it's hard to tell what the story is trying to say, I can understand if maybe Rachel's trying to write a conflict where Apollo uses this information to manipulate her, but it doesn't help that knowing EVERYTHING we know about the H x P relationship within the context of this comic, Ouranos has a point that Persephone's union with the King of the Dead is problematic. It might not be the same "problematic" that we're all thinking of, but it really just reinforces the criticisms of this relationship. Is the comic really asking us to say "fuck the human race, they're in love" ??? Because that's NOT what the point of the original myth was in the slightest and it's just a really weird place to put your audience in.

It's 4:45 AM right now as I'm typing this so my thoughts are a little scattered, but all this really feels like is an attempt on Rachel's part to create a new "big bad" for her to use as a distraction from the SA plot and to give Persephone a "flaw", but that "flaw" really only takes away the strength of another character.

Oh, and by the way? This whole "you need the fertility goddess" thing? THE COMIC HAS ALREADY TOLD US THIS WON'T WORK BECAUSE SHE HAS TO BE IN LOVE WITH APOLLO FOR HIM TO BE ABLE TO USE HER POWERS. SO RACHEL'S ALREADY WRITTEN HERSELF INTO A CORNER THAT SHE'LL EITHER HAVE TO SOLVE OR RETCON ENTIRELY. DO YOU SEE WHY THIS IS SO ABSURD???

This line is kind of jarring because we had the Kassandra prophecy at the beginning that talked about the herb, but the prophecy Ouranos is talking about is the one about the sons of kings overthrowing their fathers. I definitely forgot about that one for a hot second reading this, I didn't get how this sequence related to the poisonous plant thing because they're framed as completely separate prophecies. It's not like Kassandra said in her initial prophecy that this plant would be used to overthrow a King again, she just said that the plant still existed and Psyche figured it out on her own that Apollo was gonna use it on Zeus. IDK that's just something that bugged me (also again, why are they believing her prophecies when we literally just had it established an episode ago that no one believes her prophecies LMAO)

Because if it wasn't enough for LO to have one Evil Robot Jeff Bridges villain, it had to throw in another one for good measure. It's just a line of dads and grandpas going back centuries waiting for their turn in the ring with Persephone.

lmao I love this 'hint' at Apollo being the one to write the note from Hebe and leave the cupcake for Zeus. Like... duh? We already put that together as SOON as Psyche said gasp "Zeus!" and then it showed Zeus eating the cupcake while Psyche called him on the phone telling him Apollo was gonna try and harm him. This sequence of 'revealing what really happened' doesn't work here because we've already been told what happened.

Except we know he won't. There's no tension to this whatsoever.

That's Hebe by the way.

It's odd that Apollo is embracing this prophecy when he has a kid himself. He literally has a fully grown son in this comic. I guess Apollo forgot about that, just like Rachel.

And that's it. That's the midseason finale. Ouranos is the new twist villain and Apollo is... whatever the fuck Rachel plans on doing with him.

Now, this leads me to my original motivation to create this series of reviews. It spawned from a conversation we were having in the Discord, discussing what it must be like to be a free reader who hasn't paid for the FP episodes that are still behind a paywall. This is not standard for LO, it hasn't kept FP episodes behind paywalls in the past during long hiatuses like this. I can even prove this with screenshots from the Wayback Machine, during the last midseason hiatus:

(whoof, that rating has dropped. I know it doesn't seem like much but for a series with millions of readers, by law of averages it takes a LOT of poor ratings to pull that number down compared to a series that only has a few readers)

Point is, this is the first time Rachel/WT have done this. Now, I will make this perfectly clear, I don't think this was a decision that was purely on Rachel. WT controls much of the backend like paywall costs, release dates, etc. so I'm not gonna go pinning this on her.

However, I do think this is a completely bungled attempt at trying to get people to pay up. LO has been dropping in views steadily but surely since the midseason break for S2. It's not pulling in the peak numbers that it used to, while it does still pull in a lot more views and money than other series on the platform, it's nowhere near the juggernaut that it once was in terms of record-breaking numbers, and I think WT knows that. So this really comes across as a stunt to get readers to FP, assuming that people will HAVE to pay if they're left waiting for 4 months.

But here's the flaw in that logic - people are still going to have to wait 4 months anyways. Reading those 3 locked episodes, especially all at once, will still leave you in the same place as you were beforehand.

And it shows in the numbers that people aren't falling for the bait.

Again, 17k likes still isn't anything to sneeze at for a FP episode, but it's still just barely above the new average that LO has gained over the past two years. I remember a time when those like counts would be 30k+. And now, despite being on break 4 months with these episodes still locked behind a wall, it's barely able to scrap by its new average of roughly 14-15k, and that average is when episodes are actually updating.

Obviously like counts = / = viewcounts but when they fluctuate, we know that the views have to be as well by extension, at least to some extent, and that's still engagement that's dropped of in and of itself. And we can also see a rough look at how the views have dropped off through the comic's landing page. Now, it's hard to compare data because there was a time when WT actually didn't give follower/view counts on the landing page (this was also when the like count capped at 99k) but we can still see a downslide in growth very visibly in the view count, sub count, and most of all, the rating, which has been steadily dropping for years now.

August 2020:

May 2021:

November 2021:

March 2022 (don't get confused by the 995 million, this is where view count comes in):

September 2022:

March 2023:

Today (October 24th, 2023):

Again, there's no way to get a true clear picture of LO's stats beyond this surface level data, but it does show that LO is just not getting the rapid growth it used to. People are moving on from it. And while its view and sub count are steadily increasing (albeit slowly for a webtoon that gets as much marketing as it does) the average rating is going down. It's clear that the majority of LO's growth happened between 2018 and 2020, which would make sense as the series was still relatively new compared to how it's become old news today, and Webtoons experienced a boom in 2020 due to the COVID-19 lockdowns - a boom that they think still applies in the year 2023, judging by their attempts to import as many series onto the platform as possible and capitalize on an audience that just isn't there anymore.

All of this leads me to wonder - what's in it for free readers after all this? Because if you recall from where we started, the cliffhanger they started on was Hades - possessed by Kronos - attempting to strangle Persephone, a cliffhanger that was resolved within seconds for FastPass readers. If they don't FastPass after that, they'll be met with numerous reveals that don't even make sense for the plot as a whole (such as Leuce making up the text messages).

Again, I don't want to claim that this was a decision on Rachel's part, but it really seems like either she didn't plan this hiatus, or her inability to write naturally without the need for addictive-style formatting as a crutch made it so that the free readers would be given the worst midseason premiere ever.

And what are we, the FastPass readers, going to return to? There are still so many plot threads that have been left unresolved, multiple villains being setup, and as far as Webtoons and Rachel have revealed during NYCC, LO is supposed to end by the spring. That's 20-30 weeks TOPS, which isn't exactly a whole lot of wiggle room for a writer like Rachel who's chronically bad at pacing and getting to the point of the plots she's established.

I know there are so many readers right now anticipating the return of this comic, some of whom genuinely believe this comic is "better than ever" and others who are critical of it but hope that the comic will come back in a better state after the hiatus. But right now there's so much evidence to support the contrary - that LO is about to come back in as bad, if not worse, condition than it was in when it left.

And through all this, for a comic that's finally ending after 5 years, I have to ask - where is the hype? Why are Webtoons and Rachel keeping the finale of this comic behind closed doors? Where's the promotional art, the hinting at what's to come, the attempts to generate any semblance of excitement for the readers who are still left after clinging onto this ride for 5 years? Why were the fans themselves barred out of their own communities during the majority of the hiatus?

And that just leads me to an even more discouraging thought. This is not meant to accuse Rachel or make assumptions. It's simply a thought that I had while thinking about what the series could possibly pull upon its return, so please, take this with MOUNTAINS of salt. It's one thing I hadn't considered with the knowledge that LO will be returning with 3 episodes still behind a paywall, a 'buffer' in and of itself for Rachel to work off of.

Rachel only technically needs one episode ready for the release. Not three as she normally would if the episodes had been unlocked like in previous hiatuses. That's not including whatever buffer episodes she would need beyond the upload schedule, but she's proven to be chronically bad at maintaining a buffer as well since day one.

We haven't seen any promotional art. No hinting. No hyping beyond what's been seen for her "Rachel Smythe Presents" series.

With all that in mind, I have one question to leave this on:

Has Rachel even started working on Episode 254 yet?

[writing-for-life]

Michael Zulli: Death, Dream and Hob

Now, I know fandom bends over backwards to make this about Dreamling and often slots its meaning in during/after The Wake (or at least hinting at it because of the meeting with Death), but I honestly can’t see it?

I personally believe we need to step back a bit here and consider that this was painted long before the TV show, and Dreamling wasn’t really a thing (at least not in these epic proportions, plus it was always fanon, not canon), hence we can’t really do art analysis through that lens.

If you just put the 1689 meeting (also drawn by Zulli) right next to it, it becomes, at least to me, so blatantly obvious that it is set in the same timeframe. Hob wears nearly identical clothes, so does Dream (also, some of the original comics have been recoloured).

The woman at the table next to them holding the mask? Hm, there’s a famous artwork by Colleen Doran in which Death holds a mask, and she definitely seems to be listening in here. Which she might, considering the conversation Dream and Hob had in 1689. Could obviously also just be a random person covering up smallpox scars 🤣

In the grand scheme of things, I don’t think it matters so much whether Hob already met Death or not and would recognise her, it’s the symbolism of talking to her at this point more than anything.

So would it be totally outlandish to think the missing glass is also for Eleanor? Hence the red roses as well, because Zulli hardly ever uses red roses for Dream apart from one exception (he does so for Daniel though)—they tend to be blue and always hold connotations to grief, I wrote about this before. Or better: Symbolic for all those who aren’t at the table with him? And that’s why Death is there? Both for those she has taken, but also because this is very obviously the point where Hob is at his lowest and might rethink. 

I think we really have to think about where Hob is in his life here and not erase Eleanor and his kids again. “To absent friends AND lost loves”, right?

And I can’t look at that angel holding the table and not get references to pregnancy/childbirth (Eleanor and the second baby died during childbirth).

As for the raven looking away/pointing away from the table: Foreboding? Because apart from being Dream’s ravens, ravens were also associated with Apollo, who was also the god of prophecy and an oracle himself. That’s why Apollo himself eventually released Orpheus from his existence as one—long story (plus, Aristeas, who was also Dream’s raven, was Apollo’s raven in Greek mythology. Plus Apollo was also Orpheus’ father in some retellings. It’s all interwoven, but I feel the foreboding is a significant thing here for exactly that reason).

And foreboding-foreboding, of course Death and Hob meet again, and by that time, Morpheus will be gone, and the missing glass is also for himself.

I wrote about Zulli and his symbolism a few times, it’s all linked in my pinned post, but the ruins are one of the less subtle references:

[merp-blerp]

EVEN MORE Things about Cinderella's Castle I'm excited about already as a big Cinderella fan

Part One, Part Two (This), Part Three

I did this once, guess I'm excited enough to do it again!

The songs sound wonderful! Can't wait to hear what they sound like with the cast and I can't wait to see what Lauren does with the choreo! NPMD blew me away and I can't wait to see how this show will kill me. "Cursed Crazy", "Step On Your Grave", "Ash To Ash", and "Ever After" are my favorite demos so far.

I think it's so cool that "Step On Your Grave" is such an angry song. I know it takes place while Ella's cooking her step-family dinner, but it would be really interesting if a reprise took place after Ella learns she can't go to the ball (that is if the story works the same way as usual). Normally, if Cinderella gets a song during this moment, it's very mournful, like say "In My Own Little Corner (Reprise)" from 1997 Cinderella. And that's great! But giving Ella a song like that, but with a "No Good Deed" from Wicked vibe would be so original and new as far as I'm aware! Cinderella has every right to be sad at her abusive situation, but also every right to be angry! Imagine she wants to follow them to the ball not to have a good night like usual but to kill her step-family on the way or at the ball somehow. Whether a rendition of "Step On Your Grave" is at a moment like this in the show or not, Ella deserves a song like that I think and I'm glad she's got one.

"Step On Your Grave" has a lot of allusions to Ella once being a princess in the making before the step-family or something came along, and Ella mentions her father having a sword, so I wonder if the Ashmores are fallen royalty or had royal tie-ins of some kind. Like maybe Ella was arranged to wed a prince or something.

"Ever After" has some elements of grief and that's so special I think. Cinderella often loses someone or something under her step-family, like her family or her former life, but the grief aspect isn't brought up too much very often in adaptations, the most significant time I can think of it being brought up is in 1997 Cinderella. It'd be nice to include that element in this show. I can't help but wonder if Ella's father's death was accidental in this show. "Ever After" kind of reminds me a bit of "Cool As I Think I Am" from NPMD sound-wise; some smart musical person should mash them up once "Ever After" is released. Ella also might be kinda regicidal in this song too, so... POOR GIRL'S JUST SO CONTEMPLATIVE!

I genuinely doubt "Trappings of Starlight" has much to do with the Starlight Theather from Hatchetfield, but to add to that craziness, the "Uh-oh-oh-oh," reminds me of the vocalizing from "Axe Man" from NT2. And "Should we shun her?" in "Castle On A Hill" reminds me of "Should we kill him?" in "The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals". I don't think it means anything though. It seems pretty clear that The Lands That Are and Hatchetfield aren't going to have much overlap.

"Ash To Ash" seemingly referencing Ella's mom! I get this feeling that Ella's mom was a witch or enchantress of some kind and that's why she was burned. And it sounds like the Fairy Queen and Ella are maybe plotting revenge on someone or a system, maybe? And I wonder what QF means by saying Ella is "Terrible as I". Maybe she means terrible as in great or fearsome, like, say, "Oz the great and terrible" or something. And the lyric, "I shall wrap thee in these cinders, Ell" makes me wonder if her dress will be made with starlight + the cinders on her body—what a wicked idea! I love how far the Langs took the whole cinders and ash thing. With Ella's surname being Ashmore and this being a duet with the Fairy Queen, I'm very curious about the title and if there's a double meaning; are Ella and the Fairy Queen related in some way? This retelling will be so good!

In the subtitles for "Ash To Ash" in the 4/13 livestream, I assumed "Q+C" was supposed to be "Queen (Fairy) + Cinderella", but listening to the song a second time, it sounds like C's lines overlap Ella's very slightly, which would make it hard for one person (Bryce) to sing alone. So C is likely not Ella in that song. Maybe it's Crumb? Some in the chat said it probably just meant chorus, so we'll see eventually.

All the little motifs that exist already! Like "Will it Ever After Happily?" in "Castle On A Hill" and "Ever After". Or the talk of Ella painting in both "Ever After" and "Last For Ever". "Ever After" has so many! AAAHHH!

The Lyrics in "Castle On A Hill" being "A queen and her vanity, a beast and his agony" have me Thinking™. Are the prince's parents Beauty and the Beast? Is the prince a beast? And there's also the Excalibur callback??? Since Nick said there would be no other fairytales involved in this story, it might just be more of a reference than literal, but it's still cool.

The lyrics to "Cursed Crazy" make me wonder if the citizens blame Ella for the Ashmore family's demise for some reason. The idea of Cinderella not even being able to find potential solace in the townsfolk is so sad! There's so much to think about!

Dying to know what "'Cause my love will be fierce, and your love will be missed," in "Trappings Of Starlight" will mean. It's such an intriguing line. As well as who is the character singing the song. We seemingly don't know who they are yet.

Seraphim Fairy Queen is such a cool idea, especially with all the talk of God(s) or a god in "Ash To Ash"! No pressure on the Langs, but it'd be so cool for them to be able to go through with that design concept, even if it's through minimal tactics. I can't wait to see who this Fairy Queen is. Is she the prince's mom??? A Sleeping Beauty-type character we could follow in a future show??? Ella's mom??? Ella's girlfriend??? This will be so cool!

There are more characters that we haven't been introduced to yet! We can still get Ella a girlfriend guys! Genuinely excited to see who they are!

The fact that the trolls eat rodents and other smaller creatures has me a bit worried about Sir Hop and Crumb. Maybe Ella was going to cook them for her step-family, but became friends with them instead, protecting them from getting eaten.

Not to get too Crazy, but what if the characters singing with Ella in "Last For Ever" are her parents, resurrected, or never actually dead or something. Probably not, but what if???

I have a feeling I'll be making more lists as we learn more about the show, so if I have any more thoughts I'll try.

[moony-2001]

Lore Olympus ch. 253 critique

I think this time I'll start out with the major critiques and then move to the minor ones.

The Cause of Winter

So. Persephone is the cause of winter.

Can't wait to see where Rachel tries to take this one /s.

But for real though, I can't possibly imagine how this is going to work in this "modern feminist" retelling. In the original Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Demeter causes an eternal-like winter/famine in order to get her daughter back from Hades since he refused to return her, and since Zeus' solution to the situation was basically "tough tits". It was this huge feminist act to show that Demeter not only loved her daughter but was willing to burn the world to the ground in order to see her return.

And that's what galls me about Lore Olympus. The Homeric Hymn to Demeter was already considered to be pretty feminist for the time it was written. Demeter was able to subvert the traditional idea that once a daughter was married, she could never return home. She challenged this idea, challenged Zeus, something others wouldn't have gotten away with unpunished. This was something mothers in Ancient Greece could not achieve since they had no power or say in their daughter's marriage. Even though Demeter did not fully win in the end, with Persephone being bound to Hades for 6 months out of the year, etc., it gave ancient women hope that they, too, could one day see their daughters again.

In my opinion, there is no way that the action of Persephone causing winter can be more feminist than what Demeter did in the original story.

The Payphone

This one is a tiny one. Pretty much insignificant. But it just annoyed the shit out of me.

Really? A payphone? In the mortal realm? In a time where the modern technology we have today does not exist?

Additionally, there is no way Eros and Psyche could've gotten back to Olympus that fast because if they had, they might as well have warned Zeus in person. Why couldn't they have contacted Zeus through Iris? She is a messenger of the gods after all. Besides the very stupid plot that Apollo, of all people, would want to try and overthrow Zeus, this whole arc feels super rushed so much in fact that they have a frickin payphone where it should not exist.

Welp. See y'all in my next post. Hope everyone had a happy turkey day

[nalyra-dreaming]

"Worried about the Nicki/TVL content" here for clarification. I apologize, that came off like I didn't want to see TVL/Nicki. I'm excited to see Louis' journey through Europe and very excited for the theatre des vampires. I'm also very excited to see Lestat's backstory, including Nicki's part in it. What I meant is I'm worried that the showrunner might have been worried they weren't getting a season 3 so they packed in TVL and Nicki into season 2 so audiences got the backstory for Louis, Armand, and the theatre and how that ties to Lestat because they didn't want to leave questions because they may not get a season 3.

I want them to take their time with each major plot point and i wondered if cramming so much in was a hint that there was not going to be a renewal. But your response to my first ask was reassuring. I just really need to see the entire story play out before they end the show and I panicked so much advertisement of TVL in season 2 was an indication that this would be the only time we see it. Does that make sense?

Also, what plot points or storylines do you think we will see in season 3 in addition to TVL because the show always has more than one book or storyline going?

Ah ok :) It does make sense, but I honestly wouldn't worry too much.

For example Rolin talked about Lestat and Gabrielle at the SDCC '22 panel and so far there is no hint of Gabrielle - which makes sense, because Armand does not particularly like her... he probably omits her in his retelling of what happened.

But I don't think Rolin is going to omit her :) ... pass on the possibility to ... dip into that mess, too^^

And Rolin has already talked about Lestat's turning (and it being the literal worst of all the vampires' turnings) in the podcast back then, too. TVL is why Rolin wanted to do the show.

So. I wouldn't worry too much. AMC is financially out of the woods, the modus operandi seems to be the same as last season, and they are ramping up promotion, they are still developing the other shows, too. They said they are in for the long run, and there was once talk of 10 seasons... now I am not optimistic enough to hope for that much *laughs*, but... I'd love it :)) Definitely. Supposedly Sam was signed for 5 seasons though (off the bat). We'll see.

As per story lines... well, I mean, they will need to keep Dubai fresh, so that will develop further, and then, of course, in Lestat's past there is a lot they can hook into as well.

Magnus shows up as a ghost in the later books, too, so who knows, they might explore that aspect already (and there maybe the origins of the Talamasca???) in some kind of fashion. It would serve to introduce Benedict and Rhoshamandes here, too, given the later arcs. Marius' arc, of course, though if the rumor re Justin Kirk holds then they are going towards Marius' story and TWMBK (and possibly QotD) in s4 and s5. Gabrielle could be introduced in Dubai, and maybe bring in Sevraine, I mean Fareed is already there, the ancient vampires are there already, somewhere, out of sight, but there is a lot of possibility :)

And, of course, if they actually bring in Fareed again (which might be needed, given Daniel's health status), then Seth cannot be that far, and through Seth we could get an introduction to Gregory and Mekare, and Maharet, and Khayman, and... whoever else.

The Dubai TL is mixed up already, and I for one love it, because it allows for so much.

For example the piano music in the show... I would have loved it if that had been a live stream, of Sybille playing (for example). You know? Little things.

Sam said that there would be (more/other) cameo's coming in s2, so... I fully expect there to be more vampires, probably only apparent to those who know^^. (Just like last time^^)

Also: by now I do think we will get yet another revisit of episode 5 in s3. From Lestat's POV.

Because there is something there that I have touched on, that @cbrownjc has touched on... namely that we will now get to that the fight was more an actual "fight" downstairs, but even more interestingly, we will in all likelihood see why the fight rekindled upstairs. And... here comes something Lestat says in episode 6 into play, namely: "I don't know what possessed me that night."

Now, anyone who has read the last books (which Rolin as stated takes from) knows that Amel's awakening is bloody, drawn to violence, and that he takes over sometimes. He also likes to be in Lestat.

If the basic structure of the fight stays as it is there has to be a reason why that fight rekindled upstairs, and why it continued then with such a drastic power-imbalance, and why Lestat went on about his "nature", something which I have always found weird.

However, if they are already setting up Amel... I have theorized before that they might combine Akasha and Amel, since the actual threats (the burnings) are quite similar and it would be too repetitive for the show.

IF they are, indeed, already setting up Amel, then we will see the "reason" why it all went shit in Louis' POV next season, and then get the personal account of what happened there in s3. Louis won't be able to make much sense of it yet, neither will Armand, nor Daniel, and not even Marius (in all likelihood). But as these lines have not been come into play yet (and this show does not waste lines) I fully expect them to come back.

And then, if Lestat recounts the possession that story line can segue into s4 and s5 of Akasha/Amel rising, they'll probably skip the "core" going to Mekare first, I think Lestat will take it directly, maybe with the threat of Rhoshamandes thrown in or after, depending.

As I said before, I think they know how they want to do the first 5 or so seasons, and this... this is how I think it might come together :))

Obviously this is the "rough cut" - the details will be the most interesting thing.

What did Louis say in the trailer?

"We should get every detail right."

Indeed.

[seeingteacupsindragons]

Perhaps some of you remember that time I wrote up an entire essay for the TVTropes forums to get William cemented as a Magnificent Bastard because you literally have to get fictional characters vetted by people who care an absurd amount about this to add them to the trope page.

I am now back on my bullshit, and just got Albert confirmed (Louis is in the works, but the voting looks good for him so far). I did his write up today and it should be up later this week? I enjoy the short version as well.

And now:

The Work

Moriarty the Patriot is a (very loose) retelling of the Sherlock Holmes stories combined with James Bond set in the late 1800s, focused on Professor James Moriarty and exploring his motivations.

The Character

This post is to open a discussion specifically on Albert James Moriarty, older brother of Professor Moriarty (who we already confirmed) and one the Professor's Co-Dragons. Albert is the original "Moriarty" family member biologically who took the other two in as children, and is the leader of MI6 for most of the series.

Why Is He a Bastard

I mean, he kills his own younger biological brother and his mother by hand and then arranged for the entire rest of his family and servants to die in their sleep in a fire. So like. Is that enough?

He also took two orphan kids in, then basically said, "Hey, in exchange for getting your little brother heart surgery he needed to live, help me murder like so many people. Kthx."

He tends to come off colder than either of his brothers, which is sort of impressive since they're all murderers.

I like Albert, but he's certainly a bastard.

But Not That Bad?

Much like his brothers, Albert is trying in a very fucked up way to improve society by murdering people he thinks are making society worse. He is...trying to help in a Pay Evil unto Evil sort of way.

Honestly, Albert is the Moriarty brother who gets the least amount of sympathy from fans, although this shifted a fair amount after it was revealed he has severely untreated OCD, which is a massive contributing factor to his need to eliminate the hypocrisies of all these abusive nobles who keep going to Christian churches. But it's not like most people with OCD are murderers, so there's a limit to how far this Freudian Excuse is going to take him.

Is He Charming/Magnificent

Albert is, according to an official Japanese fan poll, the second most popular character in the series (second to the protagonist of the series, who won by a landslide). This seems to track from the interactions I've had with people. So people are charmed by him.

Albert is also in the series pretty much assigned to "socialization" on behalf of everyone else. He doesn't seem to really like it very much, but he gets along with people rather well. According to his official character profile, he's still getting asked out and courted even after losing his title and going to prison for the murders, so apparently people are really into him.

He also has a similar flair for the dramatic to his younger brother. This is absolutely a man who is going to revel in elaborate schemes and acting a part. While he often asks his brother to arrange details and plans, he always shows up to convince people that he's just so worried about his kidnapped brother, please help him, and oh, gasp, people have died, how tragic.

But Is He Brilliant?

This, I think, is a key factor in Albert's case here: Most of William's subordinates are very subordinate to him. It's made clear that William expects all of his crew to be able to think and plan for themselves and make their own decisions, but the series doesn't always take time to show that off for everyone. Albert does get that time.

Albert often sees opportunities before he engages William for a plan to make it work. Manipulating Mycroft Holmes into getting MI6 created so he could lead it was Albert's idea, and he executed the plan (and he leads MI6 when it's not doing Lord of Crime business), even if William came up with many of the details to help him out. Albert is the one who sees the potential in Adam Whitley and brings the topic up to William.

Also, Albert was the first person to bring William's dreams of killing nobles and creating a brighter world into fruition and set it into a tangible, real path. He and William are frequently tagged as the only two who originated the entire plan.

Albert is a brilliant opportunist and an excellent man to have making sure everything goes off without a hitch, even if the details of getting things done aren't really his forte.

He's brilliant.

What About His Competition?

Most of the nemeses in the series are focused on William, and Albert is his subordinate. Basically none of Sherlock or Milverton's attention ever splashes Albert's way. The person he really engages with in a competitive dance with is...Mycroft Holmes. And while Albert doesn't exactly win, neither does he lose to Mycroft. They come to a couple of agreements and passes to work together and watch to make sure the other isn't getting in their way.

Verdict:

Yes.

[stealerofthe2ndbraincell]

I think the funniest thing to me about The Understudy is why the misdirection involved (to me at least) works so well.

It makes such a show of the story it's "retelling" that you really don't notice how different it is until the very end.

(this is a long, tired ramble btw. Underrated episode <3)

A major aspect of Macbeth is how, despite the obvious involvement and influence of the Witches and Lady Macbeth, he is ultimately the one who makes the decision to kill Duncan and continue to act and kill afterwards. He made the active choice to murder.

The Understudy originally presents itself as a "retelling" (?) of the Shakespearean Macbeth story through through a theatre group performing that very play. Jim, as the understudy to Tony's Macbeth, is meant to embody the Macbeth to Tony's King Duncan. Jim even appears to have similar visions/hallucinations throughout (I don't know what to really call those). His fiancée and fellow understudy Laura takes the role of Lady Macbeth (both literally and figuratively).

However, our Jim, unlike Macbeth, never makes that act. He remains pretty passive throughout the whole story.

Everything by the end of Act II seems to suggest that things are going to play out the way of Macbeth. Laura and Jim's situation is established, (their financial position, the upcoming wedding and their desire to take that main lead) and the seed of violence has been planted by Laura, similar to Lady Macbeth herself.

Even Act III seems to follow that narrative, with the "King Duncan" character of Tony (ironically playing Macbeth) being taken down from his role of authority - with Tony having his juice spiked with vodka and unable to perform.

Laura offers Jim the dagger, now being seen as bloody by Jim....

....And he doesn't take it. He doesn't do anything and eventually Tony takes it back

Jim soon gets another opportunity to take the lead and make Tony rest, as encouraged by Laura. Once again, Jim panics, refuses to act, which lets Tony go back on stage (although that does lead to Tony's ultimate downfall).

This rejection of the spotlight, despite wanting it, is an active diversion from the original Macbeth story. Although his lack of action does mean Tony is put out of commission, he never actually makes the conscious decision to harm him unlike Macbeth.

This consistent passivity of his also keeps that point of conflict between him and Laura's own ambition, which includes possibly my favourite interaction in the episode.

"I'm there if they want me"

"What!? Stuck in the corner of the room, like a television on standby?"

"Yes."

Jim is essentially the anti-Macbeth. Whereas Macbeth seems to want more than what he already has, Jim is not only seen as much lower in that social area than Macbeth ever was, but he is content that way. He wants the lead role Tony has, but also has zero want to push for it, especially not as much as Laura would want from him.

Then the scene cuts and Tony, too injured to perform, is replaced by Jim. His understudy gets the lead. Macbeth takes the crown from Duncan. And he never did anything to get it.

The closest Jim ever does to making an active choice is rejecting dinner with Laura (admittedly in a pretty prick-ish way but still), before thanking her for getting him the role in the first place implying he thought she caused Tony's accident, which is an opinion he openly states near the end.

In his version of the story, Lady Macbeth is the one that killed Duncan. Or at least that's what Jim believes.

Up to the final act, whilst there have been these cracks here and there, the episode still seemingly follows the Macbeth narrative structure.

Then Kirstie gets involved at the very end and any pretense is dropped entirely.

(side note: this whole final scene is such an underrated unnerving bit. Rosie Cavaliero is insanely good)

Arguably, although the notion of it being a direct Macbeth retelling is destroyed by now, Jim learning about Laura's suicide seems to parallel the scene where Macbeth is informed of his wife's suicide also (even though Laura and Jim were no longer together, which may parallel the emotional distance between Lady Macbeth and Macbeth at that point in the play). However, once again, our Macbeth doesn't act. Kirstie says her piece, reveals she stole Laura's ring, kisses him, leaves and all Jim really does is go back on stage.

I should note that, although this scene is Kirstie casually confessing to her involvement throughout the timeline of this episode, she isn't a fully reliable source of information.

A way this can be seen is through how she seems to speak for both Laura after her death and for Jim.

"Looking after Tony is the price I pay for what I did. Just as Laura's death is the price you pay".

"That was nothing to do with me"

"I know it wasn't. Your career had to come first. You told her that"

Jim never did that. That whole previous scene was pretty douche-y of him but by the end he clearly shows the appreciation for what he thought Laura did for him - getting him this role.

Whilst we can't be sure that Kirstie is referring to the scene just beforehand (as they seem to have broken up between scenes), judging by the content of that scene and the lack of immediate animosity from Jim in regards to Laura throughout that scene and how unaware he was of her fate, I doubt what Kirstie says is true.

Kirstie not only assumes Laura's motivations and speaks for her but she places the responsibility on him for his inaction on the same level as own active choice to harm Tony.

Essentially, Jim's lack of action being unlike the point of Macbeth as an underrated bit of foreshadowing for how The Understudy diverts from and completely flips the Macbeth play on it's head, but the obvious parallels in character and story beat act as a good misdirection from this.

(One question I do have is what is up Jim? His visions, which only occur when he seems to picture himself in the role of Macbeth, don't amount to a conclusion besides that misdirection and expanding on his own anxieties about taking up the lead role. But, in the context of the episode itself, what was up with that?)

[nanjokei]

same anon here, incredibly interested in the history from someone who lived through it

ok!

here's my own rundown on why the vocaloid bubble burst in the mid 2010s!

almost irreversibly! (don't worry— this story has a happy ending)

if anyone is wondering, yes, you can reblog this! i only say this because this took a lot of work to write so if anyone feels compelled, yes, stroke my ego a bit, i allow such a thing. now, i might get snippy here and there, but i'm not serious at all. my sense of humor is pretty tsukkomi-ish and it shows up in how i describe things. <-disclaimer for if this post breaks containment because i know fandom types don't like my sense of humor if they're not given the context that i LOVE what i'm talking about and rib on it out of utmost adoration

as a disclaimer, i do lightly look things up to check on stuff timeline wise and its validity, but this is from my own point of view and memory and a personal retelling, so if you have a different take on it then i'm sure our viewpoints can co-exist. also, i speak about utaite from the point of view of someone who respects their existence but does not participate. so if a few facts are off... i am speaking only from the aspect of what relates to what i'm talking about. also if there are any typos i stopped being thorough with my checking and editing like 4k words in since i am not being paid to write this, it is just for fun. anyways~

so where we wanna start here is before the big bubble era. i think most people would agree that it was in full swing around mid 2012, but i'll set the date at september 23, 2011. the posting of the song kagerou daze (by the way, as a testament to how much of a boomer i am, despite being an kagepro fan from the start i find myself still using the "kagerou days" romanization by accident every time). by the way, senbonzakura, one of the biggest vocaloid songs ever for the longest time, was posted only a few days earlier. just to paint a picture. but that's not the only thing... i think what we want to look at especially is the end of the vocaloid2 era and what was going on during and before. the final vocaloid2 product, vy2, was released on april 25th, 2011. in this timeline, there are a few angles i wanna focus on. the state of the culture, its spread, utaite and producers. by the way, if i had to date when i met vocaloid, it was around 2008. right before gakupo came out, maybe.

around this time, the culture of vocaloid-ke (vocaloid family) type secondary works were falling out of fashion. 2010 and before, i feel that vocaloid had a strong image of nico nico douga especially— not that it didn't during the bubble era. but i mean the people participating. when miku came out, people viewed her as a novelty while still thinking to themselves they had stumbled across something special. there was no subculture like that before, and the closest counterpart to this was idolmaster. now, many know this is the origin of the -P suffix came from. it's a tossed around factoid now but people should know that it was certainly a phenomena back then. and a LOT of early miku adopters (like 80% were either already in the doujin music scene, the DTM (desktop music) scene, trained musicians or even some industry pros. and a lot of these people were nerdy and geeky and loved anime and games and manga so of course their first point of reference for building vocaloid's identity was idolmaster. touhou, idolmaster's next door neighbor, also had a lot of influence given many of the music people in its scene dabbled in vocaloid early on. so naturally the fans that were attracted to vocaloid were also nerds. at first there were only cryptonloids, but gakupo quickly followed (and continuing in the trend of heavy nnd association— kentaro miura (RIP), a big fan of nnd and especially idolmaster— designed and drew his art 100% pro bono out of love for the site and its culture). luka came out... i think gumi was the first shift. gumi just felt, different. i personally owe it to her being modeled after ranka lee, the iconic role of her voice provider, megumi nakajima— ranka lee was the underdog character in her source macross frontier's love triangle. so i feel like that image somewhat imprinted itself on gumi. gumi was not popular at first at all. her release came and went with not much fanfare. ironically the aspect of rivalry would come back under stuff like the miku vs gumi debate. this is probably the first real demonstration of "it doesn't matter how good the voice is, it matters who uses it and how that propagates the voice".

and so i arrive at the producers of the time, maybe late 2008 early to mid 2009, the newcomers. the ones that weren't necessarily otaku through and through, but more on the "teenagers who like vocaloid and/or don't have a singer to sing for them, and want to make music". i will be specific and say it is people like wowaka (RIP), deco*27 and hachi/kenshi yonezu specifically. wowaka for example had a very fresh take— his pvs deemphasized the vocaloid, but it also inspired many fan pvs because of it. i will not go into how it became ironic that he quit due to the attribution to the voice. but his moody lyrics captured a lot of hearts and his style carried a youth to it. hachi did a lot of his own artsy pvs. deco*27 was very unpolished and amateur but his music was VERY of the times. the synths, the guitar, very youthful. aside from wowaka, whose comeup immediately led to him getting signed quickly (and the guy himself just walked and i don't blame him) i think what made these guys (deco and hachi) stand out from the rest in the end is one thing: they picked up gumi. and this set them apart from the old and dusted otaku who didn't pick gumi up, or those who picked her up thinking of her only as ranka lee. mozaik role (still deco's most viewed song on nnd btw, with no sign of stopping. and he is clearly PISSED about it). matryoshka. all that kibs of noise. by the way, matryoshka's stint in the vocaloid rankings went unchallenged until it was finally killed by senbonzakura. that's a good two years of dominance!! a lot of the breakout stars or people who got more popular during 2010 used gumi, i'm talking your 40mPs, your sasakure.UKs, your buzzGs. incidentally, a lot of these people got signed... most for their vocaloid stuff. 40mP, sasakure, deco, kous and others were signed under label split-offs like U/M/A/A. wowaka and hachi... were signed for themselves. specifically, wowaka and his band hitorie, and hachi as himself kenshi yonezu.

but producers were not the only ones being signed. utaite, who had been a thing before even vocaloid was a thing, found themselves growing rapidly due to them increasingly participating in the culture as both fans and beneficiaries. personally, i split off utaites eras as "before piko and akiakane" and "after piko and akiakane". the before era included people who either started very early on when vocaloid became a thing on nnd, or started before it (participating in chorus medleys or posting utattemita videos of anison for example, like gero). it was all amateur and everyone was doing it for fun... but the record companies doth lurk around the vocaloid scene at this rate. akiakane and piko i pick specifically because they were the first utaite who were very publically signed. piko was signed under sony's ki/oon records! akiakane had two or three big albums under the subsidary of VAP, toy's factory (if you wanna have fun take a look at the list of talent they rep). piko is especially important— as he had a vocaloid made of him. this marked first big interest of corporations and large record companies to actually enter the vocaloid space— in the most direct way possible. btw, the reason piko the vocaloid is dead is because piko the person is no longer signed under sony. it's not outright confirmed, but piko the guy stopped tweeting about utatane piko the second he transferred labels. he is stuck in a weird catch 22 he probably will never be free of, though yamaha is doing some insane moves lately, i wonder if they'd ever try to buy the character out and revive him as a stunt. (they are doing many funny stunts lately. but a subject for another time.)

finally, my last point in this preamble is the interest in telling stories through vocaloid had only continued to grow. i think the two biggest early examples were the prisoner series by shujinP and the ever so infamous evillious chronicles by mothy. their explosive popularity is wholeheartedly owed to rin and len— ok this is a tangent but this is the genius of the rin and len package, that to this day was never replicated, they come together as you know and since they are male and female with no set setting, they are an easy buy and you can make a story because you can do two points of view across several songs... like literally. its paperplane vs prisoner. daughter of evil vs servant of evil. and their fans were and continue to be super passionate. it's great, we would be missing a huge chunk of what makes vocaloid subculture what it is without them. of course, shujinP's series (plural because they had several) is less known these days but it was probably the first series to get plays and novels and all that. quickly followed by EC. later came series like sasakure's doomsday series, stuck in a limbo between old and new era (most of the songs released in the old era but the novelization and such came out during the new), and a few "outsider" series like numtack05/putinP's series (the reasons this never got popular is because it was absurdist and shitpost-y and involved too much political imagery, not only that but also because putinP used a lot of copyright samples (most famously ronald mcdonald and sazae-san clips)— the freely distributed album vers omit these samples entirely and i can confirm the songs are worse for it)

so to give a summary of the above section

the tastes of fans were maturing

there was a shift in how vocaloid was perceived

the growing influence of utaite

the growing interest of big corpos in the scene

the growing interest in storytelling using vocaloid as a medium

anyway, here comes the real deal. and... it's gonna be a mess. just like the era itself was. i hope you're ready, at least.

even the very first echo of vocaloid3 felt kinda corpo-y. it wasn't, but.. looking back. it kind of felt like it. the first time we ever found out about v3 was through a leak of seeU's demo— but it was a work in progress leak, so it had the voice of her provider dahee kim singing along. people had no idea so they assumed this was the capability of the software. it was exciting! kpop was just starting to get popular, and we were getting a new vocaloid software, with korean capability!!!

anyway. we're not talking about the can of worms that was seeU.

not just because of dahee kim. but because it's not related beyond this. also the fact that korean fans were heavily and horribly mistreated by the majority japanese fandom for obvious reasons. i do not have the depths to speak on that stuff, but it says a lot that the software's first big swing ended up like that.

but i wanted to illustrate the mood of the fans going into this era. it was full of hopes and dreams. now, i don't want any wannabe know-it-alls wagging their fingers at me and checking the wikia going "b-but cullen, mew also came out!! at the same time!!" the seeU leak came out first. i remember there were fights over whether or not that demo was real. it was a cultural shift like no other. who the fuck cares about mew? literally her only legacy is one really amazing ezfg song. i will not debate anyone on this btw. i try to be objective but i'm allowed to inject a bit of my own opinion here too. you know who were also full of hopes and dreams? the companies. not your internetcos and your ahsofts, no, i'm talking publicly traded shits and record companies. look... i'm coming off harsh. i actually don't hold that much animosity, but you're gonna see why this was the first huge misstep of the era.

nice picture, right? this was the kind of optimism we started off this era on. but, i'll break down the picture for you in a way that helps illustrate a point somewhat:

your girlies from V2 like gumi (who was this era's it girl), lily, galaco (even if her shitty V2 version is contest only)

your earnest newcomers mew (look, even yamaha girlies count), cul, aoki lapis, seeU (one could argue.), IA (one could argue...)

tone rion of dear stage (who represented dempagumi inc., the group her voice provider came from, though this was a myth for years until it was proven... also it was clear they wanted to make the rest of dempagumi into vocaloids but rion flopped at the time. there was even a picture of her friends floating around. astoundingly embarrassing confidence. one billion dead vocaloids.)

akikoloid-chan of lawsons (yes, the convenience store! she is a vocaloidification of their mascot and i would argue the poster child of the modern brand private vocaloid. she was retired in uh.. 2019 i wanna say? though she was dormant for a long time anyway)

ring suzune, the aborted failure of minna no vocalo keikaku (everyone's vocalo-project)... this one involves a lot of otona no jijou AKA adult circumstances (japanese corpo's favorite excuse. you will now notice this phrase every time you hear it oooo). just unfortunate all around

yuzuki yukari of vocalomakets, i put her in a separate category because she really is a girlie of her own. a vocal born from producers being dissatisfied that their wants weren't being answered and no company was taking them up, they just went "fuck it" and produced yukari on their own. a huge outlier in this era of vanity projects and companies using the scene for their own crap.

not pictured, but i have to mention her due to her complicated position in this era, but mayu of exit tunes. exit tunes is a record label that heavily supported vocaloid and utaite during this era, signing both producers and utaite, and making compilation cds of popular vocaloid hits. and probably saw to it that due to their dominance in the area of compilation cds (and they still dominate, even if their releases are sparse these days their cds still top oricon without effort), them sneaking mayu into the tracklists would work... my thoughts on this? my position has softened a lot over the years. and i've always thought "they gave up right before she organically caught on, they should have kept pushing. so what a shame".

now you may notice i bolded a few of these and made special mention of the companies behind them. you probably already figured it out, but this era had heavy investment from parties who had only to gain from a rapidly growing niche subculture. see, unlike the other two of nnd's big three idolmaster and touhou, who are IPs where you need some kind of cooperation to officially get in on, vocaloid... is incredibly free, so laissez faire in comparison. you buy a 9,000 dollar dev kit and get to work making your mascot. it was... so easy. so free. so sweet. but real life is not so easy, or free, or sweet. you actually had to be accepted by the fans, and like i said before... the voice does not matter. what matters is who uses it, and how that propagate the voice. this is true time and time again. it is the ultimate "how many times do i have to teach you this lesson, old man?!" of the scene from a commercial standpoint. no matter how many years pass. ergo, one billion dead vocaloids. corpo vocaloids were releasing and they flopped immediately. earnest products from newcomers were dropping and struggling, though def doing better than the corpo ones (like lapis, lapis did ok). existing "in crowd" companies were vomiting out new vocals and not even promoting them. it was a disgusting era of excess and death and bile and plague and war and and and. it's astounding that it is hard carried by the art that came out of it. because if you only look at the commercial side of things, it is fucking disgusting.

now, onto the fan aspect. remember when i said this era truly kicked off when kagerou daze came out? yup. here it comes. so, anyone lived through this era remembers the cambrian explosion of original projects that did not make use of vocaloid mascots— arguably the final death knell of vocaloid-ke secondary works being the mainstream.

now, i'm planting my flag in the ground here very firmly— i do not ride the bandwagon of the people who erroneously attribute the near death of the scene to kagepro. it's just not true. personally i have a very complicated (bordering on near sort of but not quite negative, depending on how nostalgic i feel that day) relationship with the series, but to blame it is incredibly narrowminded and ignorant of the actual reasons the bubble burst, and not to mention unfair. if you find it annoying, fine. but just say you don't like the series and move on. and really, for better or for worse, mekakucity days and mekakucity records are unironically god tier vocaloid albums that will be remembered for years to come. i just have to say this because i see a lot of people blame jin for very flimsy reasons... SHUT UP!!! anyway.

i think one of the issues with the whole project culture that flourished during this era was simply the fact that since they were multimedia projects (whether by accident like kagepro or intentionally from the get), fans were coming from all angles, and even those who got into it through vocaloid eventually became super mega invested in them as separate IPs. which is... unfortunately an issue. so when these properties eventually spun off into manga, light novels, covers with real seiyuu, merch and ultimately some even netting anime projects... once those projects either abruptly ended (lol, lmao, this will come back later) or reached their natural conclusion, inevitably a lot of those fans either leave with it or found themselves burned out on vocaloid itself, or perhaps even think they've outgrown it.

next, utaite. now i mentioned a bit earlier about how the first batch of utaite were amateurs who didn't expect anything out of it and did it just cause, and how exit tunes signed a lot of them in this era. now, comes the time i speak about utaite "after piko and akiakane". i believe due to a generational gap and subconsciously perhaps due to the signing of a few utaite from the old guard at this point, the nu utaite of the 2010s had a sort of individuality to them... this isn't an insult, and a large part of their popularity actually came from them always collaborating and a lot of them ending up befriending each other. again, i'm an outsider, but i understand this much. but this era for utaite was the beginning of the idea that an utaite can become a superstar. in the end, very few of them did become superstars.

a lot of them naturally returned to a normal level of popularity after the bubble. there aren't a lot of your AtRs or your amatsukis and such. the smart ones became vtubers before being a vtuber was cool. to give an example: un:c and hashiyan who are arguably oldheads more than nu era became anjo and kosaka of monsterz mate. this isn't a doxx btw, this is publically available information, and un:c often credits himself as a mixer under projects he does as anjo. also, a certain duo of female utaite whose names i will not mention went on to form the super popular vtuber duo himehima. there are other early adopters like kano and god knows who else that i don't feel like mentioning. anyway, if your utaite did it after 2018 and under their own identity it is a desperate plea for attention. sorry but it's just the objective truth. tangent over... did you think i wasn't gonna shoehorn vtubers into this somehow?! anyway.

even sutopuri who got mega popular, only really formed after the vocaloid bubble burst, perhaps even as a result of it. utaite had a positive effect on the vocaloid scene and still do. but at the time, i think it was at its strongest. utaite NEEDED vocaloid, and vocaloid benefitted greatly from their continued patronage and love for it. i for one will not be caught slandering utaite and their relationship with vocaloid even if i will always prefer the vocaloid versions. the issue here comes from the fact that way too many were signed without much star factor (i'm not disparaging them, i'm just saying they did not hold their audience across the mediums), and even at that their fans splintered off into many tribes and many weren't really into vocaloid in the first place and were more into the livestreams and twitter banter. that's just how things shook out. you even have your reols and such, as reol was the face but in a sense her, gigaP and okiku were a set and gigaP left the scene to focus on commercial work with those two. too many of them got signed and splintered off into their own little fandoms before THOSE fandoms kind of died out. so this is another part where fans disappear and lose interest. you're starting to see the pattern here, right?

there's so much stuff i thought i would touch on, like how gumi was the undisputed it girl of the scene at this time, and how kagepro rose IA to prominence (all because jin wanted to buy gumi but didn't find her in the store) and how IA's people 1st place locked certain producers in their basement (like jin, yasuhiro, ishifuro etc) and... now this is a conspiracy on my part but prevented them from working on anything else, so that drew more talent away from the scene... but i realized it's tangential and belongs to other parts in this conversation. i want to reiterate here though before we go on to the biggest elephant in the room of all which would be the point of no return... there is more to the vocaloid bubble era of 2012-2015 than projects, than corpo and record company bullshit, than utaite fans. and there is more to the era before that than the top brass producers i mentioned earlier. i really... really lament how so much of early vocaloid reuploads are gone from youtube. there's a whole world just gone. so, anyway, are you ready?

the final block in this weird jenga of a story.

the producer, suzumu, and his unfortunate associates.

i will cut to the chase because it's easier to explain who was involved once i say what happened. to put it shortly... suzumu "stole" his songs. this is weird and vague and i always hated the way people used polite euphemisms to explain it because it made the situation way more confusing than it had to be— he used his producer friends as ghostwriters to compose songs for him, basically. and was very not nice about it according to one of the people involved. now i will probably adopt a somewhat sympathetic angle that people who have previously heard of this case may have not encountered before. not because i feel bad for that fuck, but because it seems like at least one of the people impacted has forgiven him, and others have moved on in less obvious ways. he's also professionally making music in the industry now. as much as i want to keep up the act of disliking him, i don't care anymore. i still dislike what he did immensely because it impacts producers i love to this day. but the man came forth about it himself and those involved forgave him. it's been almost a decade now... man!

suzumu, before getting into posting songs (who knows how many were actually his and which were ghostwritten), was a prolific lyric writer who worked with some of the trendiest vocaloid producers around. i'll cross gigaP out, since he was not involved in the incident, but almost every single person involved in this had worked with him in a lyric or story writing capacity (for 150P and komine specifically). here are the involved parties as i recall, bolded are people who he "stole" from

mafumafu, the person who spoke the most about it post suzumu's confession and the most vocal, and likely the person who was used as a ghostwriter the most (i don't recall if he actually alludes to this or not but people commonly think this). mafumafu had a series of vocaloid songs that told a story, but stopped using vocaloid after the incident for a while and songs that were going to get pvs from his first vocaloid album were not posted. he contributed a song called machigai sagashi for the vocaloid flavored moba #compass in 2015, but it seems like that song was probably in the works since before the incident for reasons i will highlight in a moment. suzumu wrote the lyrics for only one of the songs. iirc, mafumafu's song berserk is about suzumu. don't remember if this is confirmed or not. btw, the album of those songs, meikyou shisui, is really underrated and you should check it out. im not a mafu guy but that album is great

kemu, the person who is arguably closest to suzumu and the one who most publicly supported suzumu (albeit wordlessly) in later years by working with him professionally. when i mention someone forgiving suzumu, i mean him. suzumu wrote the lyrics for most of his kemu voxx songs, a famous multimedia project kemu was on the helm of along with hatsuko as the main illustrator. since kemu no longer had a lyricist, the project stalled for years until he posted a song suddenly in 2017 (with self written lyrics). it seems like the series is continuing still, but with a different direction

150P, who worked with suzumu heavily for his shuuen no shiori (bookmark of demise) project, a project that was conceived from the start to be a story. this part makes me really mad, guys!! i'll try to keep calm about it. 150P wrote over 50 songs (idk if this is an actual number but he wrote a lot. at least 40.) for the series, with suzumu writing the story and lyrics. the character designs were done by saine (who dodged a bullet all things considered.) and the art was done by komine. 150P was already doing crazy things before shuuenpro, his most popular song is still his insane 12-len classical metal chorus song lost destination. now shuuenpro caught on slower than its peers and was an underdog. i LOVE shuuenpro to this day. you know what? right when it was finally getting its first W, when the album that had seiyuu covers at come out on oricon in third place, suzumu dropped his confession. what a slap to the fucking face!! the manga of the series hastily wrapped up after that. 150P and komine disappeared and no longer did stuff ever. 150P recently appeared for a mafumafu anniversary thing so i'm glad he's still alive. but, komine...

komine, the only non-producer, an artist with the worst luck. she was slowly rising to prominence doing pv art for a lot of popular producers, and was the main artist of shuuenpro most prominently. during the initial release of the first few shuuenpro songs, she was accused of tracing, and the art of the pv of sarumane isutori game had to be done by someone else. komine stopped using social media at that point, but continued to make art for the project quietly and quite prolifically. so she was already on some kind of fraught standing even though the tracing allegations were disproven. fast forward to the suzumu blowup, komine packed up her bags and disappeared forever. if she had become disillusioned, i do not blame her. her final public contribution was the design of jeanne d'arc from #compass, the character who was paired with the mafumafu song. all subsequent artworks of jeanne were done by different artists. i suspect the reason the vocaloid version of machigai sagashi did not have a proper pv was due to komine quitting. i can only imagine what that pv looked like! if you're wondering why i mention a pv, it's cuz compass fans got mad at mafu for having a fancy pv for his self cover but not for the original. but otona no jijou, you know? and where is that energy for eve who still hasn't released a pv for mistletoe publicly and only put it on his kuso app and with 0 compass association? who let that wishy washy fuck do an anniversary song? ...im not gonna go on a compass tangent. anyway.

so... why does this matter?

it matters because people became disillusioned due to this drama. it matters because suzumu took out some very popular and prolific people from the scene during what one could argue was a transitional phase. the fans of all those people, including suzumu's... gone. if you weren't there, you may not understand the cult of personality suzumu had. he had his name on everything and was friends with all the right people. when i heard about this incident... i just closed my eyes and sighed lol. it hurt and it hit when the scene was at its weakest. and was the final blow, almost. and it impacted the way people saw and talked about vocaloid for years. miku became "owakon" for a time. people thought kizuna ai was gonna replace her as a cultural touchstone (lol, lmao, it is proven time and time again that the big three cannot die). kenshi yonezu, in all his detached glory, came down from his jeweled encrusted throne to compose a song for miku's 10th birthday that he smugly thought was the death knell of nico nico douga.... which even at the time of its release was contested by even people who were on the same miku anniversary project and, whether you wanna acknowledge it or not, is still mocked to this day by several producers. magical mirai's theme this year even does it. there is no respect for sand planet or anything kenshi yonezu stood for in that song. what an asshole move no matter how you see it. argue with the wall if you don't agree, i don't want to hear it. the scene survived because there were producers and artists and fans who still loved it. not because of some sardonic fuckoff song by a guy so detached he'd write a funeral march for a birthday.

these days, i feel like the community is incredibly conscious of what happened. there are wanton community led events that encourage not only the creation of songs, covers, art and secondary creations but also the discovery of new producers— the biggest of which being vocaloid collection, which happens three times a year and has many categories, but most importantly the top ranking (producers active for 3+ years) and the rookie ranking. i once read a japanese article that said proseka brought new fans hungry for something beyond the music presented in the game, and vocacolle and other community led events and song posting festivals supplied the works. the average age of the new vocaloid producer is— and this is my own estimate based on how many heart attacks i've been given the past 3 or 4 years— 17~19 years old. they say things like "i know of kagepro but i wasn't there"!! should i get my cane out!! who's driving me to the retirement home?!

even companies involved in the product end are more savvy these days.... (holding my tongue about a certain company of a popular synth software and its ceo because i have nothing nice to say). i think they realized that you can't clap with one hand and that appealing to the end user and fans is a necessity. honestly, i can only be excited for what comes next. we're never going back to that dark age, i can say this with utmost confidence. do i miss the past of the times before the bubble, back when vocaloid was a smidge more geeky? sure. but we can only really move forward, so why not enjoy it

[goodluckclove]

A Very Very Muppet Christmas Movie Deserves All the Hate it Gets, and Maybe More Actually

Okay so someone said I can talk about this so I'm going to talk about it. Spoilers I guess? For a shitty Muppets movie?

This got long. Fuck.

I have seen, at this point, every Muppets movie aside from Muppets Oz. I couldn't really rate them in order of best to worst like other online sites do. I like The Muppets. Even the movies that didn't touch my heart like Muppets Treasure Island I still found fun and enjoyable. My favorite will always be the original movie from 1979, but I found all of them to be comforting and enjoyable.

Until this one. This one is bad. A Very Very Muppets Christmas Movie was so immediately bad on every level. It is the first movie I've seen in some time that actually made me angry.

A little context for those who haven't seen the movies. Muppets movies fall into two categories that I'll call Muppets Lore and Muppets Theatre. In Muppets Theatre you get a loose retelling of some classic story where the cast is primarily Weird Felt Perverts - think Christmas Carol, Treasure Island, Wizard of Oz. The Great Muppets Caper isn't technically based on source material but I'd put it in this category since they're playing characters.

On the other hand, the Muppets Lore movies focus on the origins/misadventures of the Muppets as an ensemble. Think the original movie, as well as Muppets Take Manhattan, Muppets in Space, and the two reboot films.

Muppets Haunted Mansion is technically both a Muppets Lore and Muppets Theatre film. It's also. I wouldn't say bad, but it - it's weird to talk about. It does canonize that Gonzo's worst fear is dying alone - which, like, yeah. That tracks.

Anyways, A Very Muppet Christmas (I refuse to keep using the full title), though it does heavily draw from It's a Wonderful Life (but badly), is primarily a Muppets Lore movie. The basic plot is that the Muppets, who by now are well-known for producing shows out of their own Muppet Theater, lose their venue. This devastates Kermit, driving him to believe that the lives of his friends would be better if he was never born. He gets to see this alternate reality, realizes it's apparently way worse, and begs to go back. He does, the theater is saved through randomly being declared a historical site, and everyone's happy forever.

I don't know where to start with this. Let me break it up.

They Had The Same Message For a Like 30 Years At This Point How Did You Fuck it Up This Badly

So a majority of the Muppets Lore movie focuses on the central theme of chasing your dreams. The main cast are all performers (barring Scooter, who seems to be the entirety of their tech crew. Kermit also directs and writes. I think Doctor Honeydew is a war criminal but no one talks about that.) with aspirations of making a living doing what they love. They make mentions of fame but are pretty loose with what that means. Miss Piggy is the only cast member who explicitly wants mass amounts of stardom.

The rest appear content with being career artists. Rowlf is chill wherever there's a piano. The Electric Mayhem prefer their jam rock but seem fine playing any gig with an audience and also probably a plug for hard drugs. In a lot of Gonzo origin appearances he's actually working a separate day job and just shoots himself out of cannon as a hobby. The major draw in the original depiction of their dreams (for me at least) is that it really does paint them all as people who would be doing their art anyway regardless of whether or not they Hit it Big. They push for fame, they try again and again to find an audience that appreciates them even when most of them don't, and it works out in the end. They get rewarded for the effort their dreams push them commit to - what Real Life, Non-Muppet Artist wouldn't at least acknowledge how that's cool to see?

I think this is why a Lore Muppet movie doesn't really work when it depicts The Muppets already being successful. The reboot worked for me because it took place when they were all major celebrity figures past their prime and mostly forgotten (except for Rowlf who I think was on so much Oxy that he didn't realize they were famous). When the movie focuses on their career the fame is a better goal than a starting point.

It really does make A Muppet Christmas fall apart immediately. They run the risk of losing their theater if they don't make the money to pay rent? They're famous. They're on talk shows. There's a statue dedicated to the joy Kermit brings to the world. I do not accept this to be a universe where they can't get another venue immediately. I wouldn't be able to accept this as a universe where they're both successful performers who sell out every show and also almost broke, if not for the fact that I can think of like four Muppets off the top of my head who probably generate a new court case against them every year. Legal fees.

They had one scene where Kermit calls a bunch of mid 2000s celebrities and none of them want to guest for the Christmas show. That works in the reboot where Kermit does the same thing only to find that most of his old contacts are either retired or dead. In this one? It's nonsense.

No, Really, You Fucked it So Bad

In every Muppet movie that focuses on following your dreams, that message is paired with maddening levels of determination. The Muppets, mainly Kermit, do not give up. All his friends ditch him while he's trying to get their musical produced on stage? He's gonna work a minimum wage job and keep looking for producers so he can get that venue and perform with his friends. His career is kind of over but he runs the risk of losing the studio that served as a landmark for the legacy he made with the people he loves? Fuck it, cross-country road trip to get the band back together.

He's trying to make a name for himself but there's a entrepreneur who runs a frog legs restaurant and, after being unable to hire him as a spokesperson, sends a paid assassin to kill him? That's less important than making the Big Audition in Hollywood!

So when being faced with losing the Muppet Theater in A Muppet Christmas, Kermit stays true to his character by giving up immediately and abandoning his friends to die alone in the snow.

Like I get it, you're doing the It's A Wonderful Life thing but you can't make Kermit do an explicit suicide attempt. But the film establishes he is fully frozen and unresponsive when his Religiously Unspecified Celestial Guardian finds him, and that is WAY more disturbing than having him jump off a bridge in my mind. It's just so bleak holy fuck. And this happens immediately. First fifteen minutes of a movie that inexplicably starts in the middle and Kermit slinks off to die.

It's not earned at all. He didn't fuck up to the extent for this to make sense. We find out later that the money was lost because he gave it to Fozzie to give to the bank and Fozzie loses it. Kermit then becomes convinced that he ruined all of his friends lives because of this.

Like it's a common thread to depict Kermit being the lynchpin that moves the ensemble forward. He's the guy with the plan, so it makes sense story wise to take that character and get him to a point where he's out of ideas. Only we never see him really try anything? He makes no attempts that fail before he falls into despair. He sits on the sideline and when things don't go well he's like "I fucked it" and loses his will to live. When people say Kermit is a boring buzz kill this is the Kermit they must be imagining.

All the Characters are Bad Here

The major crux of the film is seeing how the ensemble would live without Kermit, who inexplicably thinks he ruined their lives in a way I still don't understand (Did he take out a bunch of loans in their name? What happened???). The intention is to show that their lives are better for having him in them. This, for some reason, looks like the following:

Gonzo: talented street singer/musician, maybe implied to be homeless?

Fozzie: pickpocket, apparently. Why? Bullshit

The Electric Mayhem: Irish step dancers I guess

Scooter: go go dancer. Living his best life.

Sam the Eagle: nightclub enthusiast. Seems fine.

Statler and Waldorf: I could be wrong but it did really look like they were depicted as a gay couple

Rizzo: I - actual rat? Rat actor? Non-sentient rat? I don't really understand what was happening there.

Miss Piggy: I thought they were going the path of having her give up on acting and become a crazy cat lady (not good but fits the era) but apparently she's a phone psychic who uses a Jamaican accent and wig. I guess Kermit is the only person keeping her from race baiting - which I can believe.

So my issue with this is that it's fully inconsistent to all of their characters. If you wanted to show how their lives would be worse without Kermit, it's very easy to do so using the aspects of their personality depicted in like 40 years of media. I think the issue comes in the fact that the obvious downfalls aren't really fitting for a kids movie, which is probably why Jim Henson didn't go there. But I will right now! Here is my take:

Fozzie: super bigoted comedian. He doesn't realize his audience are racists and he doesn't really get the jokes but he's happy people are finally laughing

Gonzo: drug mule

Miss Piggy: probably got famous but not though acting and she's trying to pretend like that's just as good

Rizzo: pays Gonzo be his drug mule

The Electric Mayhem: long dead. Either OD or murder-suicide. Maybe Animal lived but he's absolutely in prison.

Statler and Waldorf: divorced because they never got to bond over their mutual hatred of live theater

Scooter: still in technical theater but he gets treated like shit and probably has a drinking problem

Sam the Eagle: full-on Nazi. Obviously.

There's a plot there in showing what the muppet ensemble would be like without their director and biggest cheerleader. It's just that the depiction in the movie we got was so far removed from what they were like in the present reality that it didn't - like, without Kermit, Gonzo would've learned how to play the guitar? Huh? The only thing that's keeping Fozzie Bear from doing petty crime is making vaudeville theater? Fucking how? Based on what?

It doesn't work as a Muppets story and it doesn't work as a Wonderful Life reference because there's really not anything real that proves that Kermit is the thing that kept this from happening. Except for Piggy doing phone blackface. I can see him having to have that conversation with her a lot.

Anyways, it sucks. The framing is bad, the guest stars are weird (Joe Rogan and Matthew Lillard?), and the one song for the film is awful. Kermit's emotional arc is nonsense and the film fails to see that the point of the ensemble is that they're better and happier together, not that they're all useless and miserable without their leader.

Brian Henson did an important thing taking over for The Muppets after his dad died. He did a lot for the way the movies he wasn't involved in production wise - he worked on the rig that allowed Muppets to appear to ride bikes. This is his life and his dads legacy and it's clear - at least at one point - he valued continuing it.

But yeah this movie was awful. Near incoherent. It's like fanfic from someone who's only research was doing a Google image search of The Muppets. Christ.