#with their chemistry and the foreshadowing and just the cuteness and ahhhhh

[theorynexus]

114:  Beyond Adoption

That last line is very interesting, in particular. It paints Karkat as alllmost a little speciesist, himself, though I am not sure it quite qualifies, since the assumption that a troll child would be treated differently (likely poorly) is indeed a legitimate concern, and could certainly change the parental calculus of a completely objective individual, I should think.

This is most humorous. X3

Aww. This is surprisingly cute, and does show that the three of them do have some degree of romantic chemistry together, rather than just as individual pairs. While it still doesn’t prove things might work out well (especially in the light of the conversations between Dave+Terezi/Karkat+Terezi that the Teal Troll told John about), it does at least give one a glimmer of hope for them.    Of course, there is a good chance that this hope is intended specifically to lighten the spirits of the audience before Hussie yanks the rug out from under them (as is often his stylistic tendency), but it certainly is good to know a bit more of the conditions of their romantic potential regardless.

Tut tut tut. Explaining the joke takes away from the magnitude and potential of its humor, Dave. I know you know better than that.

***snerk***   (Obliviously plowing forward does add a bit back in, though.)

Oh geeze. That wasn’t entirely a joke. That was also self-doubt driven by depressing comparison between himself and his Bro.   >:

Ahhhhh!!!   And he’s comparing himself to Jake in the Jane/Jake/Gamzee situation!  (Or really, more Gamzee, probably, but it depends on how one constructs/destructs the metaphor.)    D: (The empirical evidence line is interesting, by the way. They clearly haven’t had enough cases to draw proper conclusions, yet, which he should know, considering Jade’s expertise in science and his own at least passing interest in its various fields, long before starting the romance with her~)

Sadly, I am not well-versed enough to make actual claims about the developmental consequences of such a life on the kid.   I am not sure there are enough studies on the effects of children being raised in households with additional parents to actually create a well-founded hypothesis, though.   (Also, one should, if one is being serious, also include some measure of the fact that there will likely be a significant religious disagreement between parents as the child is growing up, which may effect their development, as well.)

***struggling not to laugh***    Why is schadenfreude so fricking powerful?! XD

***shudders***     Not only does it feel disturbingly possible that Jane has done that (and YES, it is both possible for a woman to rape a man, and for rape to happen in marriage--- don’t even get me started), this is horrible foreshadowing. Not... the rape part I’d think, mind you, though that is also conceivable, considering how much Dave and Karkat were resisting things in the Meat side of the coin, but the leaving a bad relationship part.   These are not a pleasant prospect to have brought up, now.

Ahhhgh, frack, he’s starting it up already.   It almost sucks worse, because I’m sure their look is not just filled with selfish desperation, but a genuine concern for Jade and a desire for her to be happy, which can be hallmarks of bad relationships, too.     >~~~<

THE HECK?!?!?!!!

This is very interesting, though, seeing their limited but still potent ability to react to things, here. It certainly seems better than what happened in the other version of things, with the very awkward Dave/Jake situation at the trailing end of the campaign.

My first reaction was to wonder if this would be a Terminator reference. My second is to remember the hyper-epilogue segment at the end of the Meat Epilogue.   This shouldn’t be the version of her from the fight with Lord English... right?

Huh. Yeah, it seems like that could actually be the case?!   Darn, I don’t---   didn’t... that version of her definitely went through the black hole, meaning that, considering she IS the version that appeared in the Meat Epilogue epilogue, a whole lot should have happened beyond the point where Davebot appeared in order for this to actually be logically her?     Man, that does indeed make it feel more like a Terminator reference, somehow. Aaaannnd I have to stop right when the action begins to shift from internal and social struggles to actual existential/mortal threats.   It figures.

[emelkae]

The Rise of Skywalker takeaways

Do not click open if you haven’t seen TROS/don’t want to read TROS spoilers! I'm on mobile so hopefully this has the Keep Reading thingy. This is from the perspective of someone who liked TFA and disliked TLJ.

The Good: I did like it, generally, for nostalgia reasons. I would say I was satisfied with it as an ending to the sequel trilogy, and some of the things that critics ripped apart felt like no big deal to me.

One critic said watching the trio quip and banter with each other was boring and that it seemed like their scenes were supposed to be interesting merely because they were together. They lamented the lack of earth-shattering dialogue between them and said it felt more fanfiction-y than dialogue should be coming from a professional franchise, but honestly, seeing the three together doing literally anything was something I wanted to see more of, and I loved every second of them sharing the screen. And why should dialogue between friends always be earth-shattering? They were just hangin’ out and it was wonderful. There was so much hugging and shoulder pats.

It was visually the best-looking thing to come out of this franchise. You could take any shot from this movie and stick it on a poster and it would fit. It did sometimes come off as them cramming every piece of concept art into the movie, but it was so beautiful I didn’t even care.

Carrie’s Leia scenes were not as clunky as the critics said they were. I think going into it knowing they were deleted scenes made them seem slightly more “off,” but if I didn’t know that I wouldn’t have found anything wrong with them.

The parallels to the original trilogy were numerous and were obvious fan pandering, but I ate it up. I 100% expected that from J.J. Abrams. Same with the cameos. I got all emotional at the last “be with me” scene, I’ll admit that unabashedly, and I liked the scene at the end with Force Ghost Luke and Leia.

Kylo Ren became basically a Vader clone and I was here for it. I was like “you go you absolute edgelord meme I hate that I love this terrible character so much”

Lando gets to fly the Falcon again ahhhhh he’s reunited with L3 :)

The Palpatine stuff was weird, but I thought it was super cool anyway. Probably it was the visuals that got me, but Star Wars has been weirder, so no complaints from me there.

THE SCENE WITH HAN AND BEN OOOOOOOOOOO BEECH I WAS SO HAPPY. And Luke lifting the X-Wing and smiling directly at the camera like a little shit god damn you you are really just like Obi-Wan in your ghost life ain’t cha?

I didn’t see what all the praise was about with Adam Driver’s acting as Kylo Ren until his transformation into Ben Solo. His whole face smoothed out and it seemed like his eyes got bigger and softer? Catch me being thirsty but I did actually want to see more of him as Ben. His fighting mannerisms were just like Anakin’s, too. And he was just so gentle ghjkjhg

The Bad: Okay…Although I liked it, I do have complaints. Some minor, some major.

It was too long and too much was going on at once. Because there was so much packed in there, the pacing was weird and the scene transitions were very awkward and jerky. They could have cut like a quarter of all that and it would have been fine.

Finn never tells Rey that he’s Force sensitive, and I only knew from context clues and actor interviews that that was what he was going to say to her, so of course they never explore Finn’s relationship to the Force or even mention it any point.

There are soooo many parallels to Leia and Han with Finn and Poe (not to mention the chemistry), but of course they don’t end up together. They introduce some random new female characters who, while badass, are completely flat and are obviously only there as love interests and new action figures to sell. Idk, maybe I’m just salty because my ship isn’t canon. Speaking of new toys, the new droid they introduced was another thing they obviously just wanted to stock shelves with. It was cute though.

Most of the major plot points were out of completely nowhere and were not foreshadowed at all. Rey being a Palpatine and Hux being a spy for the Resistance come to mind. Also, there could have been some really interesting character development with Hux being a spy, like Kallus in Rebels, but then he is just unceremoniously killed by a superfluous random character. Leia’s lightsaber and her whole “oh actually she’s been trained in the Force this whole time” was a cool concept that also came out of nowhere.

The scene with Rey and Kylo fighting above the ocean was just awful. It was twice as long as it needed to be, the fighting was clumsy (a critic said it was like they were swinging baseball bats at each other and it absolutely was), and some parts of it were so needlessly dramatic that I was laughing at what was supposed to be a serious scene.

I wish they would've left Threepio's memory wiped. They made the wipe such a huge emotional deal and then were like "nvm Artoo can just stick a thing in his head and it's all good" and I was like "...oh so all that was for no reason then I guess"

The Ugly: I. Do not. Ship. Reylo. I don’t ship it and have never shipped it. I don’t get aggressive toward people who do (ship and let ship, y’know?), but it personally makes me uncomfortable and just feels creepy. So as pretty as I find Ben and as gentle as he was with Rey, I kinda imploded at the kiss and was so upset that I said “Nope nope nope fuck no” out loud in the theater and closed my eyes. Especially since I think the comics established that Palpatine is Anakin’s dad, and he’s also Rey’s grandfather, which I think makes Ben and Rey like…first cousins once removed or something. That was the only thing that made me genuinely really pissed off about the movie, that Reylo is…I guess canon? Even though Ben died right after? It was very very weird and I hated it. And it made NO SENSE. I liked watching Driver as Ben, but I didn't think Kylo deserved a redemption and certainly didn't want it to be that sudden and short. Him dying was also done weirdly.

Overall: Most of my complaints are just me nitpicking, with the exception of the last one. I am actually glad I went to go see it. The good does outweigh the bad for me. While I can definitively say I liked TFA and hated TLJ, I can only say this one made me feel mostly good when I left the theater. It was bad as a movie, but good to just romp nostalgically through the Star Wars universe with.

[masha-allah]

My Top 20 Bollywood Songs ↳ 2.) Bairi Piya - Devdas This entire soundtrack is gold, but this song features the best vocals ever to come from Shreya’s angelic mouth. Her light and innocent voice perfectly mirrors Paro’s naivete and playfulness. How can anyone’s heart not swell with happiness when they hear this song?