#yeah I’m rewatching prime empire

[dropletsofraine]

they’d be best friends I think

[fabuloustrash05]

What is your honest opinion on the TMNT 2012 girls? In my opinion I don't understand a lot of the hate they get and they weren't even horrible or that badly writen. Yeah there were flaws in their writing but so did the other male characters have it as well.

I love all the girls! Some more than others. They all have their good qualities and I will admit even my favorites have flaws, but I blame the writer's more than the characters themselves.

This took awhile to put together and get my honest thoughts through, but here it is! Here’s my opinion of the TMNT 2012 Girls: April, Karai, Irma, Renet, Mona Lisa, Shinigami and Alopex!

April O'Neil

My opinion of April has changed throughout the years. As a kid first watching the series I felt indifferent towards her (I didn’t hate her but I also didn’t like her), then when the series was over I grew salty and began to hate her on rewatch. I became a toxic person because of my hatred for 2012 April, but lately I’ve grown to like her and appreciate her for the good things she’s done. I’m proud of her for how far she’s come in her ninja training. I think most of that change came from how ridiculously hated she is in the fandom when honestly she doesn’t deserve that hate. She's not the best or the perfect character, but some people make it their religion to hate on her and it's pathetic. I realized how toxic 2012 April haters are and I wanted to distance myself from that and I began to chat with 2012 April fans and things got better for me and my opinion of her change to something more positive.

My biggest problem with April still to this day is her relationship with Donnie and how it was handled. I disagree when people say she was manipulative towards Donnie and Casey cause honestly I can understand that she feels uncomfortable and awkward in this situation these boys put her in and is conflicted on how she should handle it, because in the end she is only a 16 year old girl and both Donnie and Casey are still her friends that she cares about. Now her kissing Donnie at the farmhouse, I was mad at her for, but that was a dumb decision on the writer's end. That choice made it come off that April is leading him on, but honestly Donnie is not perfect either and he is just as bad when is comes to this relationship, but this post isn't about Apritello, it’s about April. If you wanna know how I would've handle Donnie and April's romance, you can check it out HERE.

I fully blame the writer's on this one, but I feel April's plot with her family's connection to the Kraang, her mom missing, and her being a half Kraang herself was totally wasted and forgotten by the 3rd season. They were doing good build up to it but then I feel they completely dropped it and forgot about it by season 4 and onward. My guess is the writer's didn't know where to go on from there so they just ignored it for the rest of the series hoping we wouldn't notice. Her have psychic powers is cool but feels totally random and out of place at times. Yeah, Kraang Prime has psychic powers too but most of April's Kraang heritage plot often leaves more questions than answers. Another thing is I wish she was given more Kraang features as the series progressed. I see a lot of fans today draw her with Kraang like eyes or tentacles coming out of her head and neck and it looks really cool! Let my girl embrace her alien side!!

Karai

She used to be my all time favorite character in the series, her intro episode is what got me into fully watching the rest of the series. So I thank Karai for being the reason I really got into TMNT. I loved her, but after rewatching the show a few times, I would see her choices and just wonder “what the hell was she thinking?” She does so many dumb decisions as the series goes on and it begins frustrate me. She had two opportunities to go back to her real father and be a family with him and her turtle brothers, but instead she is blinded by her vendetta against Shredder and wants to overthrow his empire. Now that is a cool concept, Karai taking over the Foot, but when she returned in season 4 it just feels out of no where and I feel I skip a whole arc or season. I wish they gave her more time to grow and we see her come to this decision instead of it just happening. Side note, but I love how even before the reveal, Karai acts like a teasing older sister towards the Turtles. Her dynamic with Donnie, Raph and Mikey is rare to see but you can see that they care about her and she cares about them too and I love it.

Her snake form was very cool and had a creative design, though that whole arc of trying to find her and then her being brainwashed was pointless filler, such a waste of time. How she out of no where mastered her turning from human to snake at will was so random. The whole brainwashed Karai arc in general didn't need to happened!

I feel I'm obligated to talk about it, but Karai's biggest flaw, as well as it being TMNT 2012's worst quality, was her relationship with Leo. What were they thinking with that shit?! If they wanted Leo to have a crush on the enemy that's fine! That can be good drama, but why then throw in the twist that his crush is also his sister and continue to push a romance between them in the same episode when they are acknowledged as being family?!! Such wasted potential for them to just be enemies who respect one another that grows into a friendly rivalry that becomes two siblings looking out for one another, but still like to get on each other's nerves. Beside that mess, her and Leo do have a fun and good dynamic, when it isn't being ruined with forced uncomfortable romance. I also wanna add I like her dynamic with April and parallels between the two girls. Overall, I like Karai, but she could've been better.

Irma/Rook

I'm adding "Irma" to the list cause she counted as a character for a short while before the twist and she did technically come back in season 4. I liked Irma, she was funny, quirky, and her dynamic with April and Casey was fun to watch. I liked her banter with Casey, it always made me laugh. I'm honestly still disappointed that it was revealed Irma was not even Irma but was just a robot controlled by Kraang Sub Prime. All that hope to see Irma befriend the Turtles was destroy for me.

I am glad they were able to find a way to bring back Irma in the form of the Utrom Rook in season 4. She had little screen time but she always stuck out to me for some reason. Also, wasted potential of not having April meet Rook and for her to have a heart to heart with her about the friend lost because Rook looks like her old best friend.

I actually did a whole rewrite of how I would've handle the Irma is robot twist and still keep her as a character: LINK.

Renet Tilley

I love her so much! She's funny, entertaining and a total sweetheart. I love how she's a very bubbly and overall kind person but isn't afraid to punch someone right in the face. I like how she's perceived as dumb and naïve but is actually very smart and is usually the one saving the Turtle's from certain doom. I also love the little detail of her having a gap in her teeth. Really brings out the childish nature to her character. My favorite part about Renet is how much of a fangirl she is, literally representing the entire TMNT fandom. From first meeting them Renet has so much faith and trust in the Turtles because of what she's read about them in her history books. They are her heroes, she believes in them and knows in the end they'll save the day. The very concept of the Turtles befriend a time traveler from the future was another thing that was underused and could've open the door to so many cool new stories and adventures, but like many characters, she was underused and only came back when need, like for a Halloween special of all things. I'm really surprised Mikey or any of the Turtles didn’t mentioned her after the Earth was destroyed by the Black Hole Generation, remembering what she told them about how they've saved the world so many times.

I know some people find controversy with her romantic relationship with Mikey nowadays because of them both being from different time periods, but I still find their dynamic very sweet and entertaining to watch. As best friends or as romantic partners, you got to admit that they are fun to see together. She understands Mikey and never judges him for his weird antics/ideas and Mikey finds her quirkiness adoring and always makes sure she is safe.

A little nitpick I have is with her character design, mainly when we see her without her helmet. Her hair model design doesn't look good, like it looks like she's wearing a wig that they just slapped on her at the last minute. Which sucks cause in her concept sketches her hair looks very good, with having a more proper hair line, but since the braid crown is playing as her hairline in the 3D model it doesn't look good.

Also, technically Renet is the most powerful ally the Turtles have because of her weapon alone. Why does no one talk about that?? The Turtles are lucky that Renet is on their side.

Mona Lisa/Y'gythgba

SHE IS MY QUEEN AND I LOVE HER SO MUCH!! <3

Next to April, Mona Lisa also gets a lot of unnecessary hate, but I know why she gets hate. It those toxic whiney Raphael fangirls who can't accept the fact that he's fictional and is happy with an actual girlfriend so now they can't have him or ship him with their self insert Mary Sue OCs. A true Raphael fangirl, like myself, would be happy for Raph that he found someone who loves and respects him for who he is.

It's already obvious that Mona was another underused character in this series. I absolutely LOVE the space arc in season 4, but the concept of the Salamandrians, though cool, were very underused despite the Turtles fighting a Salamandiran before (Newtrailzer). If you ask me, Mona and Sal should've been more present during the space arc and they should've been there helping the Turtles when they were fighting the Triceratons on Earth at the end of the arc. This choice could've given the writer's the opening for Mona to start living on Earth sooner and join the Mighty Mutanimals during mid season 4 instead of saying she joined the Mutanimals in season 5 but never see her with them! (I'm still so mad that they got our hopes up that we'd see Mona interact/become friends with the Mutanimals only to find out that we will never see her again after When Worlds Collide) I have actually wrote a whole post on how I would've included Mona in more episodes, give her more time in the spotlight and her joining the Mutanimals sooner: LINK.

Mona being a lieutenant for the Salamandiran army already says a lot about who she is and what she has been through. You cannot tell me that this woman as killed people and has war trauma! Mona is an interesting character and her personality clashes well with Raph's, even before they became a couple, them butting heads shows what kind of person Mona is. She can be short tempered and stubborn like him and would often jump to conclusions, a fight first ask question later kind of gal. She loves to fight and is a very strong and skilled warrior. She is loyal to those she looks up to and respects like her commander and is a rule follower, but sometimes she loses control of herself and steps out of line, to which her commander has to hold her back. She cares deeply about the ones she's close to and especially shows how much she loves and cares for Raph. Most fans result her to just being a love interest, but she's still her own character and grows as a person from being with Raph. Honestly the push up scene was one of her highlights, not only for being hilarious and showing how in love she is with Raph, but also showing that she's more than a strict serious lieutenant. That scene reminds us that she's still a teenager and is acting her age, even she can't help but break her serious military persona once in a while.

I absolutely adore her and I'm so happy more fans today are growing to love her as much as I do! She's such a great character and its ashamed that we didn't get to see more of her in the show, but I'm happy with what I got.

Shinigami

My only criticism I have of her is that she is underused (I know I say that a lot) and I really dislike that she was forced shipped with Mikey. It was the most pointless decision they did for her character. You can just tell the writer's didn't know what to do with her so the made her a love interest as well thinking that would make her more interesting. That was a dumb decision. Her and Mikey are not a good match for many reasons I won't get into, but here's what they should've done:

Not ship her with anyone cause we already had enough love interests by the time she entered the show.

Ship her with Leo instead of making him crush on his freaking sister. They already wanted him to have a crush on a female ninja from the Foot Clan who's a bad girl, why couldn't they hold it off until he met Shini instead of Karai?

Ship her with Casey as a way to give Casey a happy ending after that whole love triangle drama.

Ship her with Karai cause they were obviously already dating in the show! Shinirai forever!!

Regardless of that poor decision, I love Shini, her design is very gorgeous and creative, and her concept of being a witch brings something new to the series with magic and illusions. I feel there has been wasted potential with her not being involved during the Kavaxas arc, cause come on, she's a witch who specializes in dark magic. Why didn't they have her be attached to the Kavaxas cult in some way? Or have her know about Kavaxas and help the team stop him? Honestly I was convinced at one point that Shini was going to be a surprise villain and she was secretly loyal to Shredder not Karai and betray her during the finale. I made a whole post about it actually LINK.

Overall, I love Shinigami! Next to Mona Lisa she is one of my favorite female characters. I love seeing her teasing April and the others, especially towards her enemies, treating a battle like its nothing more than a game to her. Her loyalty and romance friendship with Karai I adore. She is such a fun character and underrated too if you ask me.

Alopex

She stole the show and she was only in one episode! Once again, another underused female character. Alopex is technically (not counting April) the first female mutant on the show (not counting Karai cause she's able to turn back), and we only get one episode with her. That should be consider a crime, but the episode she was in, she made a damn good impression. We learn of her and Tiger Claw's tragic backstory and you grow to understand why she is so hatful towards her brother for the life he put her through and him supposedly killing their parents. She establishes herself as a badass and continues to prove she is a badass throughout the episode. The way she cut off her brother's tail and later is arm without a second thought and then leaves shows shows how ruthless she is, but her sparring him also shows her compassion and her hope that one day her and Tiger Claw can be a family again.

Her line "Just remember, I could have taken your life" sent chills down my spine when I first heard it.

My biggest complaint is WHY didn't they bring Alopex back during the Kavaxas arc in season 5?! How cool would it have been if the Turtles recruited and teamed up with Alopex to take down her brother!

[brvtvsfrvitvs]

I got my gf to watch Lego Ninjago and I asked her to rate each season she’s seen so far.

Her notes on 1 and 2 are that they’re basic, good episodes for the start of a good nostalgic show. It gets it all goin, but they’re just a lil aged. Nothing too bad tho.

Rebooted was chill, and at the time she said it would be a 9 or something, but now that she’s gone on and seen the quality grow, it’s at a 7 now.

Seasons 4 and 5 are real hype! But . . . Skybound left a bad taste. The highs were really high, and the lows were loooooooow . . . (👈 her words)

Hands of time ended kinda anticlimactically to her.

Seasons 9 and 8 . . . PEAK!! I’m so happy I had a chance to rewatch, cause back in the day, I was very neutral on them. Now?? Hell yeah. Baby wu was so funny bro, like what were they thinking, I love this timeline. March of oni was too short to leave any impact. I had to remind her when/what that was.

11 is in 2 parts because the first half was roughhhhh, with the whole “WE HAVE TO GO ON A QUEST!!” But after they entered the never realm, it got better.

Prime empire was solid. She said something really cool and interesting, that it’s intriguing how in every Jay season, he doesn’t win by fighting the big bad in some crazy takedown fight. Instead, he just talks. Like he talked to Unagami to get him to consider other options. And he doesn’t even try to fight nadakhan, he just kinda grieves. . . And in doing so happens to fall on the right thing to say.

Teheh, my gf so smart and cool 🥰

[nerdyenby]

My top ten favorite season of ninjago (don’t hate me)

[Note that I’m not ranking DRs2 yet, as we’ve only seen the first half, but I fully expect it to make this list]

Dragons Rising season one: Energy

Prime Empire (fight me)

Master of the Mountain

March of the Oni

Tournament of Elements

Secrets of Forbidden Spinjitzu

Rise of the Snakes

Skybound

Posession

Crystallized

Obligatory reminder that that’s just my opinion

And for those of you who like confusing numbers, here’s the same information but listed objectively worse:

16

12

13

10

4

11

1

6

5

15

Now, I’m not going to try to justify my placements because we’d be here all week, so instead I’ll explain why the seasons that didn’t make the cut just don’t really do it for me

Legacy of the Green Ninja: the first half of this season is back to back bangers, but I just entirely lose interest when it comes to the actual dark island stuff. Idk why it just cannot hold my attention.

Rebooted: a fine season. It set us up beautifully for s4 and gave us a lot of incredible characters (Sensei Garmadon, Borg, Pixal), but it just messes with my sense of this universe so badly. That’s only kind of a complaint — because I actually find it super interesting to try to explain away — but it is majorly distracting for me personally and kinda just seems like poor planning. While this season did a great job with Pythor and managed to get me to kind of care about the Overlord, the nindroid army is woefully underdeveloped. Zane defends Pixal, saying she was just doing as she was programmed, but the same is true for literally all of them and we never even stop to entertain the notion that these nindroids also have the capacity to be, you know, people. That’s all pretty nitpicky tho, my real issue with this season is the stupid love triangle. Not to mention how forced Pixal’s existence is and how bland she is at first. I absolutely adore her as a character, but rebooted was just like “here’s a woman. she’s hot btw,” and I don’t really vibe with that.

Hands of Time: over hated imo, I feel like if the animation wasn’t noticeable worse than every other season we would all appreciate it a lot more. I think it actually did some really cool things, but you kinda lose me with the vermillion. Literally why are they there? The bad guys need lackeys, yeah, but why snake hivemind warriors? Idk, felt random and out of place. I feel like they could have also done more with the conflict between the Time Twins. Like they fundamentalists disagreed about what an ideal world looks like and they argue about it all the time, but they still work together like nothing happened? Anyway, all my complaints are fairly minor for this season, it’s just not much of a stand-out.

Sons of Garmadon: ninjago didn’t know what to do with itself after the movie came out and you can tell. They went more serious with the plot but the humor feels way more childish. It still hits most of the time, but it just feels off. I’ve come to like Harumi and her arc, but I feel like this season really suffers for it’s focus on her and Lloyd. It just lacks a lot of the team chemistry that makes ninjago ninjago imo. It’s all about Lloyd and the others are just kinda there, something that ninjago has impressively managed to never fall into before. What makes this series special to me is how it handles its characters and their dynamics, they all feel real and important, both to each other and to the story, but you could just say “yeah everyone’s dead” and the plot could more or less function as is. I do love what they did with Pixal tho.

Hunted: idk, it feels like they started to correct the whole issue I just talked about where none of the characters other than Lloyd matter, but the disconnect just doesn’t really do it for me. I’m fairly into the resistance plotline, and I’m kinda here for the First Realm shenanigans, but it’s just not really a stand out. S9 is always where I lose interest in my rewatch and I’ve never been able to figure out why. It does wonders for Lloyd and Nya’s relationship, and I am always here for lore, but otherwise I just kinda don’t care that much.

Seabound: she’s solid, it just doesn’t really stand out to me. Obviously having a Nya season is huge, but otherwise it’s just ninjago. That’s a good thing, but it also means it doesn’t stand out. I don’t really like Maya’s arc, and I’m really not a fan of how they just shoo Kai and Cole off to do a whole lotta not much. It felt so forced and unnecessary when s13 did a fucking superb job of keeping the rest of the cast busy and having it be entertaining, however I do recognize the real-world reasons at play so I don’t hold it against them. It does detract from my experience tho, and the rest of the season isn’t memorable enough to recover from that for me personally. Also it’s super shitty that they kill Nya off as soon as she gets to be the main character, they hate women so much and for what.

[mcytbdamofficial]

A strange question. If the official DSMP lore of (a) character/s ever heavily changes from what you wrote it as (in example, if c!Velvet turns out to be long dead or the velvetisegg theory is true, or any of the major characters- that their canon lore starts being majorily different), how do you come up with things that would make them "fit in" again? I am just genuiely curious about that

usually a good way to go around things like that is to fall back on what i've already established and try to spin it in the right way. a good thing to use is the nether lore as well as everything with the memories - things like that are unpredictable and pretty much anything can come to light at any point.

(this answer went on for a while longer than i expected so i’ll put it under the cut in case there’s someone scrollin who doesn’t want this whole thing clogging up their dash)

a good example would be the sbi family canon - when phil first shouted the words "you're my son!" a lot of people instantly thought that techno, wilbur and tommy being his sons had been basically canonized (obviously this got debunked later with only wilbur being his son, but at the time that was the canon i went with and had to somehow push in). until a part of the story i wasn't planning to make the sbi family canon, so i had to think of something fast. so i considered how phil, for whatever reason, supported techno's reign during the antarctic empire days. why did he just outright follow him when his acts were universally regarded as evil? initial ideas were he, himself, was rather bloodthirsty, but this new issue came around and i used this blank in the story as a way to explain it - of COURSE phil would support techno unconditionally, he's his son, after all. later on, i managed to strike a balance in the story between phil supporting techno because of them being family, as well as him, himself, having his own agenda in the empire itself (bringing along the bloodthirsty nature of techno, which in turn i later explained with the voices, once those were canonized. that solution to a new canon was practically handed to me, with how i wrote the bloodlust as a voice beforehand. i just had to change it to “voices”).

for your example, i have one idea that could work! if velvet turns out long dead, i could quickly explain it in a simple way. ant WAS getting letters from velvet, but at one point they stopped and he received news velvet had died. ant has been lying about getting letters after some point because he didn't want other people who knew him to get hurt, and maybe he's even in a certain level of denial.

if velvet IS the egg, that could be more complicated, but still doable. tie it all into the source/nether lore, make him some sort of god or symbol of chaos, just play around with the rules of my own world until things fall into place. usually, somehow, i will find a way out just by stepping back and analysing what i already have prepared and thinking of how it can help me insert a new idea into the story without disturbing what's already there. 

this is basically how wilbur being a source came into fruition! initial ideas were him and schlatt decided themselves to not enter the bunker and escape the flood on their own, but how would that make sense? oh yeah, what if one of them IS the flood? then i rewatch the video, and who other than wilbur is putting the commands in to make the water rise! it was too perfect not to somehow include it, yknow? and then boom, i have this cool lore about sources. why not use it? and yes, initially sources were JUST gonna be a passing mention in the captain’s journal. they weren’t ever planned to go this far. and before you know it we have wilbur, kristin, foolish, hannah...

so yeah. what i’m saying is. when in doubt, use nether lore. and that’s how i’ll go around whatever comes of the egg, in the end.

a lot of it also comes down to very careful storytelling and knowing what to change and what to leave alone. when the story started there was a set amount of people that i knew were involved in the roleplay and others i knew would NEVER get involved (keep in mind the story started being written before even the festival happened live, HELL, even villbur wasn't a thing back then), and separated them into small groups based on what i could and what i couldn't play around with. for example;

i could easily change callahan, alyssa, etc around... they're people who barely appear who aren't involved in the storyline. i gave them small appearances to show they're there and mostly kept them to the back.

people who i KNOW will never join the smp can be mentioned, referenced or even included! minx is probably the prime example of this. and if she ever DOES join the smp, by some magical chance? there can always be some magical book in the library that can reverse her from a dreamon to a human. so nothing to worry about there.

future major characters like dream, quackity, niki, etc didn't have much at the start but needed something to push them into their future arcs. in these characters i changed their start but made sure it left space to be moulded into anything they become later - i made niki kind but i also showed her early critisism of wilbur, already sensing she may have a villian arc coming in the future. when season 2 came around, i was proved right so i went in on those small hints more and more.

for characters who have an established arc, start to finish, who it's hard to change in any way, i change nothing - but i look at their past. the obvious people for this are schlatt and wilbur. on the smp they were characters start to finish, their arcs started and ended in the story and had nothing else. so i focused on the past, instead. and boom, suddenly we have 35 smplive chapters of completely original content.

with every character i live small hints of SOMETHING coming in the future. i leave small holes to be eventually filled by canon, and if canon gives me nothing, i fill them myself with something minor. another good thing is to trust fanon - with a fandom like this, where the creators listen to their fans and canonize a lot of popular fanon, it's good to go in on small fanon knowing it will eventually be canon, or even knowing it will make readers happy and will never impact the story, no matter how much it changes (think tubbo having horns, puffy being a pirate/sea captain of some sort, stuff like that)

there are, of course, times when i can’t avoid changing things from canon. phil not knowing who schlatt is, wilbur not knowing schlatt, etc... but i think in those places, those changes serve to improve the story in some way, and i think it’s a welcome change in the end. this story is definitely leaning more into AU than RETELLING, but i don’t think it’s such a bad thing. while faithfully retelling every major plot point, it adds its own elements and creates a somewhat new and exciting story people can enjoy anew. i think that’s what i strive to do the most in this fic - not retell the story word for word. you’ve already seen the videos. you don’t need that. what i DO want to do is create an engaging read for both avid fans who have seen every stream and casual fans who want the lore to make a little bit more sense to them. and that’s that.

god that went on a while didn’t it haha...

okay so to summarise - whenever something major changes in the canon lore, i have various ways of going about it. usually for some characters i would have left behind hints of SOMETHING and will just try to fit them into whatever change has showed up, or try to at the very least explain them with the new development so it doesn’t seem out of nowhere.

if that is not possible, i look back on all i established and think how i can use it to my advantage. could someone have been forgotten in an old world? is there some sort of nether anomaly that could have caused this? is this character a reliable narrator and have we gotten the full truth? there are a lot of ways to change things around with it being completely out of the blue but seeming fitting for the audience - you just have to really think it through, plan it, and make sure you know exactly what you want to do before going into it.

and finally, if there truly is no way to change a thing, shift canon completely and make sure it doesn’t change the base story. allow me to use the sbi as an example again, since i think they’re a good tool for this;

techno will take tommy in and help him recover from exile, same as canon, because he is his brother, as bdam canon states. at first he’ll just do it because phil wanted him to, but soon it will become a matter of family. when tommy betrays techno, it will hurt him more deeply BECAUSE they’re brothers. when he comes back to phil and tells him what happened, even phil himself will become enraged. the two themselves have been shown to have a history of resorting to violence and aggression in the story (look back at the antarctic empire), so doomsday wouldn’t seem out of  character, or, at the very least, out of the question, when two men like them are pushed to their very limits by a betrayal like this. still, it would be unfair on tommy, but on both sides there would be something justified and something they did wrong - and that’s how you balance a good conflict in any story.

so yeah. i hope this long ass essay made sense. a lot of work goes into making sure this story flows naturally, so i’m glad someone finally asked something like this where i could reveal just how much work goes into it!!!

[vaguely-concerned]

The Mandalorian Chapter 11; the rewatch edition

I have found a bit more enthusiasm for this one on the rewatch, so here goes!

- din snapping ‘I’m trying my best here!’ in a vaguely annoyed tone as his entire ship is going up in flames around him because he mostly doesn’t get angry as much as sulky... the height of cinema 

- I love frog husband’s clothes, because they’re in a very similar style and colour scheme to frog lady’s but also incorporate the knitwear we see on the people of trask, so it both underlines his belonging with her and implies that he’s been on this moon for quite a while, they may have been apart for some time  

especially his scarf is a darling detail and there’s a bit of contrast in texture to it next to his wife’s, it’s nice. he’s wearing a similar kind of vest to what we see on the fishermen later, too 

- I think my favourite part of this entire episode (well second after din cradling the baby against him after nearly drowning) is just the design and Vibe of the planet and especially this harbour

for one I LOVE that it’s shown that even in the middle of the day it’s dark enough that the electric lights are still on when it’s overcast (it reminds me a bit of norway during the winter, actually, when dawn just never quite breaks and then slinks off in embarrassment before it’s even noon). and there’s also the... sails? nets? hanging around looking almost like flags, which are very Aesthetic but god knows what they’re for. maybe for drying fish on in the summer? 

I think the building in the distance behind frog husband’s back here is a lighthouse? or it could be one of those towers for loading you see when they scout out the empire ship too, I suppose!

and one for my strange obsession with Texture on this show: these fabric-covered crates!!! they look exactly as dingy and moldy as you’d expect them to be in this climate, I wonder what they’re for (& I vaguely want to touch them) 

- from the sound of it din’s vibroknife is uh ‘on’ when he pokes the squid thing, and he also goes for the tentacle the furthest away from the baby <3

proof the calamari flan have been scratched up a bit during all that time in din’s pockets! (the attention to detail in this show sometimes istg) 

- this is 100% me reading too much into things again, call the overthinking police I’ll do my time meekly lol, but the boat looks a little bit like the mudhorn signet from this angle: 

again din keeps his hand on or sooo close to his blaster in this entire scene, he knows this is sketch as all hell 

a) once again I want to praise the effects team for how GOOD the aliens look in this episode holy shit and b) the hell is this dude wearing on the straps of his overalls tho 

- the dude mando (axe woves) uses his little... wrist launcher thing to shoot with to finish two off the fishermen, so my theory that they can be loaded with other things than the whistling birds for slightly less effective use (maybe without the level of honing we’ve seen din’s be able to do?) is looking good!

- din actually has quite good form when diving into the water, I’m guessing he can swim at least tolerably when not in full armour, being stabbed at from all directions, having just had his son eaten by a sea monster and also being trapped in with said sea monster (I’m a strong swimmer and I can tell you that there’s a reason they make you swim with clothes on from time to time to see how hard it is, it sucks. with metal plates strapped all over you as well? yeah good luck) people don’t tend to hit the water that gracefully without some kind of training in my experience lol. might be some of the training with the jet pack has carried over too, considering he throws himself off that cliff in chapter 12 with similar confidence?

it’s interesting that they’re once again showing us a threat where the armour doesn’t help and even hinders him. we’re so used to the ways it can make him near-invincible, but it can also drag him down (literally, in this case. aha ha ha. well if I’m not here for my own entertainment then what am I here for honestly)

- din’s voice sounding like he’s just on the verge of crying as he cradles the baby (and the sound he makes as he realizes the baby’s alive) is my kryptonite, turns out. fucking breaks my heart into tiny pieces every time, I would die for this man and he wouldn’t let me

- in support of din’s paranoia: so far this season we haven’t been able to go five minutes without someone talking about peeling the precious beskar off a mandalorian corpse, I can see why his mind was primed to move in one particular way there

- I think the fabric of din’s cape has been treated with something that makes it waterproof; the water seems to pearl on top of it rather than soak in! can you imagine how heavy it would get if it did absorb water tho christ

(a bit hard to see at this size but that’s what it looked like to me close up anyway! could also be that it’s wool and that’s why it looks that way but I prefer an elaborate sci-fi explanation here, because it doesn’t look particularly weighed down afterwards) might also explain why he doesn’t seem worried about it catching on fire when he uses the jetpack haha, maybe this is something the mandos do with fabric they’re going to use for a long time 

I also enjoy part of the gambeson/undersuit thing poking up from under the shoulder pauldron and cape; I think this is about as disheveled as we’ve seen him since immediately post-mudhorn 

- the sound mixing in this scene, where din’s breathing is layered a bit over everything else so you almost feel like you’re in the helmet with him listening to what the others are saying........ oh my GOD, it embeds you so deeply in his POV but so subtly 

- not to be biased or anything... but din and the armorer’s armour design is so vastly superior to these guys it shouldn’t even be a competition lol 

din looks like an honest to god knight in shining armour except also sci-fi western and the armorer looks like a fucking war goddess from a time beyond memory; the clone wars mandos look like high end cosplayers (eh maybe it’s just my dislike for the boobplates that has me so 😒 lol. also a lot of dudes were very shitty about that whole thing and I don’t say anything but the ‘vaguely-concerned will remember this’ telltale message pops up in the corner every time) 

moment of saltiness over: I do like the differentiation between their individual character designs 

the differences in body type and helmet design is nice! they look like a unified team, but with individuality. I suspect the ladies have those belts and their armour plates on the hips instead of the front of the thighs to emphasize the ‘female’ silhouette, which. okay fine whatever

- bo katan looks very pointedly down at the baby after saying ‘a group of religious zealots who want to return to the ancient ways’ which makes me VERY nervous for reasons I can’t quite articulate

- the mournful guitar version of the mando theme as din watches the sunset...... hmmmmngh (this might be some Symbolism happening to us folks strap in for the identity crisis he still hasn’t processed) 

- I Cannot get over din being so unimpressed by and uninterested in bo katan’s ‘retake mandalore’ sales pitch from literally the first moment dfhasdkjfhsad sorry lady kryze this man just does not do main quest shit, he’s all side quests all the time and that’s why I love him  

- as someone who after chapter 8 wrote a whole-ass fic that was wholly & exclusively about din telling the baby he’ll always come back for him... some of the shit he’s been saying this season does feel like it’s been written to mercilessly victimize me, personally and specifically 

- guessing this structure in the background is the traffic control tower! doesn’t really matter, I just thought it was neat

- this part of the soundtrack is called ‘ship o hoj, mandalorians!’, which I found incredibly charming haha (it’s ‘ship ahoy’ except how you write it in swedish, good one herr göranson)  

- bo katan is vague about who exactly the new mand’alor would be if they took back mandalore to begin with, she doesn’t specify she is planning to be the ruler until she’s already got din on the ship and in no position to refuse to help. gotta respect the grift at least lol  

I do love her voice, though, it reminds me a bit of jennifer hale as shepard

- “I need to get back to my ship, with the foundling” your honor I uh love him so fucking much 

- frog lady stroking the baby’s back a bit as she holds her hand behind him to make sure he doesn’t fall backwards while playing with the tadpole ;___________;

and also frog husband and frog lady reaching out to hold hands and frog smooching as din and yodito leave ;____________________________________________;

- when din says the exasperated “mon calamari. unbelievable” line, the baby makes that little blowing a raspberry sound he does as if to agree ‘uh-huh unbelu -- unbelly -- unbelievable dad smh’ and it is very very adorable 

- there’s quite a bit of Stuff in the concept art that didn’t make it in this time around; I wonder if maybe they cut some stuff for pacing or whatever and that’s why this episode is so short? water leaking into the cockpit of the razor crest, something that looked a bit like whaling going on on the docks and more spaceships taking off (maybe there were originally meant to be some smaller ships defending the big empire one?), there’s quite a bit here  

[flowercrownjay]

i rank ninjago seasons because i said so: 

SONS OF GARMADON (s8) I think this is probably my favorite season because it’s so much darker than the rest of them? Also, it’s the first really Lloyd centric season since s2 (I know Possession was kind of his season but it was Morro in his body so it wasn’t really him?). I absolutely love the vibe of this one as well and the angst is amazing too. Also it kind of starts a storyline that continues through to the next few seasons which is what I love about it. 

POSSESSION (s5) I’m sure I’m not the only person who thinks this but I love this season so. freaking. much. I was never a fan of Nya before this season just because I felt like she was always reduced to this basic stereotype of “girl wants to fight but guys won’t let her but she’s actually a genius” and it kind of bothered me. But her being the Water Ninja was definitely a step up and I really started to like her after this season (although I’m still salty because I was the Water Ninja long before s5 came out but whatever). Also, another reason I love this season is because of the implications and the extra character building you can do behind the scenes, especially for Lloyd since he himself isn’t in the season as much.

LEGACY OF THE GREEN NINJA (s2) I don’t think it should surprise you that my top seasons are all Lloyd-centric but I’m biased towards him, obviously. I’m big on nostalgia so this season kind of just hits different for me (listen, hearing “way of the ninja” makes me cry so this is nothing). I know in terms of plot this season kind of sidelined the rest of the characters but I just... the final battle absolutely makes up for all of that. Also! Darreth. And the Garmadon + Lloyd relationship that I absolutely live for.

MASTER OF THE MOUNTAIN (s13) COLE CENTRIC SEASON COLE CENTRIC SEASON- other than this one being the first season Cole really got to himself it was just a beautiful season overall. It flowed really nicely plotwise and the ninjas, even though they were split up for a lot of the season the way they came together in the end was *chef’s kiss*. Anyway Cole Brookston-

TOURNAMENT OF ELEMENTS (s4) I love the vibe of this one. It’s such a light hearted season for the most part, unlike its successor, Possession. Also, Skylor and the rest of the Elemental Masters were amazing as well. And I kinda vibe with the whole “only one can remain” tournament thing. There are only I few times I actually cried in the whole series and the Corridor of Elders was one of those points (of course, when I rewatch I cry over every little thing). 

HUNTED (s9) Hunted was a very good story plot-wise and continuation-wise, my only complaint was that the ninja were split up during most of it. But this season definitely let some of the background characters like Dareth and Skylor shine on the Ninjago side while introducing some more history on the Oni and the Dragon side. And young Wu! I love him. A lot. And the whole revolution-vibe was very well done.

RISE OF THE SNAKES (s1) I honestly can’t remember what this one was called but I think that was it. This one is only this high-up for nostalgia’s sake. I felt like it was a pretty decent season but it definitely wasn’t the best. The standout moments were definitely episodes 7-10 where they were unlocking their true potentials. (Those shaped my childhood LMAO). 

PRIME EMPIRE (s12) I’m honestly not sure what the later seasons are called because Netflix doesn’t have the same names most of the time but I really vibe with this one. Also the idea of being in Prime Empire sounds appealing as fuck but whatever lol. I think this was a Jay-heavy season, as far as I can tell and it was pretty good. There could have been more Zane but that’s alright. Also bringing Harumi back was a solid 10/10 move. 

SKYBOUND (s6) I know a lot of people like this season but I just cannot. It was probably the absence of the rest of the ninja for a lot of the season and having it be really Jay-centric, which of course I don’t mind at all, but still. The whole Nadakhan-sky-pirates thing I just did not like. But other than that it wasn’t the absolute WORST season. I did like the first three-ish episodes and the last one but I hated the ones where the ninja were disappearing I NEED THE GANG BACK TOGETHER.

MARCH OF THE ONI (s10) THIS SEASON HAD SO MUCH POTENTIAL AND THE ONLY REASON IT’S DOWN HERE IS BECAUSE OF THE LENGTH. They only used four episodes to cover that huge plotline and I hated that. I did not cry when Cole fell because I watched it over the summer when I knew he got a season later on. (Yeah, when I stopped I had only watched till s7). Jay and Nya were pretty cute and so were Cole and Kai. Garmadon supremacy as usual. 

REBOOTED (s3) I spent an hour arguing with my little brother last night on why this was one of the worst seasons and he just. Would not listen. There are so many problems with this season, the least of them being the digital Overlord bullshit they wrote in. (This is no hate to the writers as I understand they were pressed for time writing this one since the show was renewed). My main complaint is the JayxColexNya crap they wrote in and it completely ruined all three of their characters. Cole had never been remotely interested in Nya until this season and Jay was just. Upset? Over what a machine said? I’m 100% convinced the Overlord did that on purpose to divide their team. OH AND NYA WAS *LITERALLY* REDUCED TO AN OBJECT. BASICALLY. I didn’t even watch this season all the way through because it was so BAD. The only redeeming factor was the Titanium Ninja where Zane dies because I sobbed like a little bitch during it. 

HANDS OF TIME (s7) There are so many things wrong with this season. I cannot think of single good episode. Honestly. They completely wrecked Lloyd’s character by making him sound like a whiny baby (I know he’s a kid but STILL). The ninja were just RUDE through the entire thing and maybe the only decent episode was Out of the Fire, Into the Boiling Sea. MAYBE. Lloyd not knowing how to make an energy dragon in midair? I thought he conquered his fear?? Yeah I just hate this season for so many reasons.

SECRETS OF THE FORBIDDEN SPINJITZU(?) (s11) I’m not sure what this season is called and I really don’t care enough to find out so we’re calling it this for now. I hated the Fire Chapter of this season with a *burning* passion (get it lol). Kai lost his powers, which is fine, but he was such a bitch about it. I hated it. Hated. It. In the past Kai has been known to be irrational but this was a whole different level? He wasn’t being irrational, he was just being straight up rude. Especially to Wu, who I know deserved it but it doesn’t sound like a very Kai think to do? And then the Never-Realm part was OKAY at BEST. The only good episodes were the first few, I don’t make the rules. (Also, LloydxAkita bothers me for many reasons. Akita’s probably like way older than him. And she just... reminds me of a furry. I don’t hate Akita I just don’t like them together.)

Okay yeah so that’s my ranking, it changes a lot but this is it for the most part. I don’t think anyone read all the way here but if you did thanks. 

[foureoreos]

oh please do delve deeper into why you think nya is not suited for romance (or at least the way she is written). I do think that jaya sometimes have cute scenes BUT Jay's desperateness ruined them for me. plus I feel like nya is not stupid. if she genuinely liked Jay she wouldn't have let a machine decide she is not compatible with him anymore which honestly makes me believe she just stopped liking him after s2.

Aight, let’s start this, shall we?

I’m really trying here not to turn this into a “why I don’t like ja/ya” answer, but it’s going to be a wee bit difficult to do if I don’t pull examples from that relationship. I’m also going to try really hard not to throw bias in here since I love bruiseshipping, but I will need it at some points to compare and contrast my different points and thoughts to make things clearer/better.

First, I want to start by saying that I’ve run into many people who tell me and mutuals things like “Wow, seriously? You’re still thinking about that? That was in the past, you gotta move on!” or “Look at Skybound again”. This is when I talk about both why ja/ya has been dragged on for so long and why Nya just doesn’t fit right into the whole romance subplot.

Well, buddy, call it what you want, but you can’t just base something off one point in time. Events like these carry over. That’s also what helps build relationships and gives them a stronger foundation.

i.e. How Jay and Cole, after making up during the Tournament of Elements, still continue to progress and develop their relationship. It actually got to the point where the character’s chemistry feels natural and very casual, almost to the point where the characters could write themselves.

For instance, we all remember that love triangle, right? I know people use the excuse “Nya is a teenager, she’s just acting like one” whenever she’s a b**ch or acts out very impulsively around Jay, but frankly, I think otherwise. Her character is really inconsistent throughout the series. There’s some moments when she’s likable and you can get behind her, but other times when she’s just straight up obnoxious.

She’s only nice to Jay whenever the plot calls for her relationship with him. Aka, ja/ya. When the plot doesn’t, she can be really mean and it feels like a complete one-sided relationship, because she acts like she just doesn’t care. And Jay loves and supports her like 24/7. (Also, ja/ya is really only developed one Jay’s end of the relationship? Very rarely or EVER Nya’s. What’s with that?)

Here’s where I point out how she contradicts herself in S3 and S6. Season 3, Rebooted, Nya lets a “match-maker machine” decide for her who her perfect match is. And while she was already dating Jay at that time, she still went ahead anyways to give Cole a shot, just because a machine told her he was the one. Okay. Can I add that she never apologized to Jay for what she did? Like, never explicitly told him that she started the whole mess? That she was the one who cheated on him?

Also, remember in Season 4 when she was telling Wu, “Jay’s funny and all but Cole, Cole’s not Jay…” (thanks to @afrenchfrypassingby for pointing this out to me)? So, what is Jay then? Or do you just have a very poor way with words?

Anyways, so, Season 6. I can’t remember the last time I ever watched this season. Must have been like years ago, because I always skip it in my Ninjago rewatches. Still, I remember a lot of things from that season. Especially when Nya told Jay that “Hey, when I first met you, I knew we were meant to be together”.

Well, hmm. Ah? Okay?

Can we rewind Season 6 a bit more?

I actually liked her at the beginning of Season 6. Only the beginning.

She wanted to be more than just “the girl ninja”, “Kai’s sister”, and “Jay’s girlfriend”. She wanted to find her own identity. And girl, I can 100% get behind that. Plus, she was basically forced to give up her Samurai X identity to become a water ninja. But then I don’t know what the hell happened that made her decide at the end, “I’m Jay’s girlfriend again”. And before anyone says anything about the lighthouse scene, etc. what she did in the end completely defeats everything she clearly wanted at the beginning of the season.

Follow up that Jay was a complete creep in that season. I know it gave him more development to his character and helped him to be more confident and have that “If I want it, I’ll take it” attitude, but the girl said “No” at the beginning and he was?? just?? so desperate to win her back and get the two of them back together? Ugh, that’s not how you write relationships, folks. When someone says “no”, that doesn’t mean “try again”.

Haha, my mind just did a flashback to that one line from Prime Empire when she told Jay she and him had chemistry. That was a lie. If anything, Nya and Ronin actually have more chemistry. And Jay and Cole have more chemistry.

I truly believe that from the beginning of this show, Nya was meant to be written as the “strong, independent, female character that could take care of herself”. But the writer’s try way too hard when they write her character.

If I’m being honest, Pixal actually shows that better. Not to mention Pixal can also be very feminine and still be a cool girl.

Strong female characters don’t have to be buff, they don’t have to want to be irritated by relationships or feeling like it pulls them down (not @ how Jay has said to Nya “I love you” over a thousand times and never once has Nya said it back because she doesn’t like showing affection because it distorts her image. When Zane and Pixal have said it to each other and show a very mutual, loving relationship), they don’t have to dislike “girly” things, and whatnot.

Strong female characters can be compassionate and kind. They can be badass and still care for other people. They can be in a relationship and still be powerful. They can show weakness and affection and emotion.

From the very beginning the writers pulled out the compulsive heterosexuality card and decided “Okay, we have one boy, one girl, let’s just put them together because yeah”. And then they started doing that with everyone else. Kai and Skylor, Pixal and Zane (though, not going to lie, is the only well developed canonical Ninjago romance). What a shame, honestly, because Lloyd and Harumi actually could have been really well developed if it weren’t for the whole “I want to kill you and bring back your dead father” abusive relationship. And, I don’t want to shame you for shipping Lloyd and Akita because I don’t care if you do, but they really had to make her go and kiss Lloyd at the end of the season huh? I personally feel like it was more a “thank you” kiss after some thought, but hah, you just can’t leave a girl alone for one second, can you, writers? And oh my gosh that subtle look between Lloyd and Racer 7 at the end of Season 12?? I got so scared. WOW.

I went OFF. And I don’t want to go any further because it will be so bitter and salty and I will rip her and everything about Ninjago canonical romances APART. But yeah!! This is all I will leave for you :)

Thanks for that ask!

[gotgifsandmusings]

Now that the Skywalker Saga is over (until Disney dicides to introduce us another Death Star) can you come up with a ranking yet? I know Solo is the worst for you (which is quite a feat since you really hate the prequels) and I think you've said before Empire is your favorite. I have to say, I prefer the prequels over the sequels. I won't ignore the prequels's issues but I felt more invested in their overarching story. They had purpose, something the sequels failed to, imo. TLJ is a gem, though.

I have a tough time engaging with the prequels at all to be completely honest. They’re joyless slogs other than Attack of the Clones, which is just purely hilarious in all the ways it wasn’t supposed to be. I get where people come from with it, because it had a single story that it tried to tell, and it just told it badly. But even that story itself was colored by Lucas’s weird sexism (a woman is canonically what tempted Anakin to the dark side), and a complete lack of imagination about how to actually expand in this universe (all jedi have to be trained by wearing a blast-shield down and blocking attacks from a pokey ball as example prime). Plus people didn’t talk like people, and we were gifted racist caricature aliens.

Even the “it depicted the rise of fascism so it’s good and relevant” argument falls 100% flat for me, since it’s not like it armed us in any particular way to recognized signs or to fight. Evil space wizard was evil, and the lethargic “peacekeepers” all took their stupid pills to allow the plot to advance.

Very light TROS spoilers ahead so I’ll put a “read more” here.

I really, really liked what the sequels set up and deconstructed, and the destabilization that TLJ introduced that also made the franchise feel relevant. TFA was a safe soft reboot in a lot of ways, but one I’ll never begrudge because of the new cast, and because a palate cleanser totally was needed after the prequels. Then TLJ tapped into all the potential that was there, in imperfect ways, yes, but in a way where I’ll always defend its core.

With TROS…this wasn’t what the movie could have or should have been at all. I knew that from the second Disney told us they’d never ever recast Carrie Fischer, even more when the title was unveiled, possibly the most when they brought out Ian McDiarmid, and the early reviews that bemoaned Rose getting shoved to the site, and made it clear this was a movie to give people their Star Wars back.

That said, sitting in the theater already armed with every spoiler, I actually enjoyed the experience of watching it far more than I thought I could. But it was a momentary thing. I can’t imagine seeking it out to rewatch, and the implications of this being the note they chose to end it on is just…it’s rotten and cowardly. It’s like I’m mad it at way more in this philosophical way than how I felt sitting there, if that makes sense.

But my god I hate how fucking dynastical it became.

So it’s very hard for me to directly compare the Sequel Trilogy and the Prequel Trilogy as wholes against each other, because I still have this feeling about TROS that it’s disconnected. I don’t think it cheapens TLJ, but it frustrates. It’s also still a better movie than any of the prequels, and I’ll happily argue that. But I think the fact that it could frustrate and let me down is more of a mark of my engagement with the ST, than say…Revenge of the Sith, where I went in just happy it was finally ending.

So yeah, here’s my hot-take ranking, and yes…every single movie in this franchise has unfortunate implications in places, plot holes, silly contrivances, and issues. 

The Last Jedi

Empire Strikes Back

A New Hope

The Force Awakens

Return of the Jedi

Rise of Skywalker

Rogue One

Attack of the Clones

Revenge of the Sith

Phantom Menace

Solo

[originaljediinjeans]

MCU Rewatch: “Guardians of the Galaxy” (2014)

kid Peter Quill getting beaten up because he tried to save a little frog from the other kids picking on it grows up to be Star-Lord who is not going to stand by while a nutcase terrorist tries to wipe out billions of people

Meredith was kind of played by Ego, or at least deceived into thinking he was a better person than he actually was

Peter Quill is actually a great space pilot and the film shows it

the opening credits scene is perfect, you have no idea how perfect

Drax isn’t the brightest bulb in the set but don’t mess with him when he’s angry. just don’t.

The Avengers have their quarrels but they can get along, especially when they’re slightly inebriated. The Guardians….attack each other when they’re drunk. We only have one instance of either party being drunk in the same room but that’s what I’m seeing.

The Broker is underrated. He’s a little bit of a snob but he’s kind of high-strung. Love him. Did the Broker realize later that Ronan had an Infinity Stone that had actually been in the Orb that Peter had tried to sell him? That was a close one.

Ronan is a drama queen seriously.

Peter Quill thinks at the start of the film that he has street cred. He doesn’t.

Quill’s day out on Xandar was…not his best day

GOTG is not only Marvel’s first real “space” movie, but it’s also the first movie where the main characters end up together on accident. They only sort of came together because Gamora wanted to sell the orb and split the profit when they got out of prison, and Drax wanted their help killing Ronan. After that they were only working together to stop Ronan. They had no plan for afterward, much less for if they survived.

AKA what might have been in Rogue One if they had…yeah

Nebula and Gamora have been working for Ronan for a while. And they’ve done a lot of killing with him and for him.

Day’s face when he saw that Quill was calling him XD JOHN C. RILEY WAS THE PERFECT CHOICE FOR THIS FILM

I hope we see at least Danerian Day in a future MCU film. GOTG 3 or a Captain Marvel sequel.

I love PQ’s long coat that he has in the opening. The shorter leather jacket just isn’t the same.

I love Nova Prime. She’s got great hair.

Seriously the NovaCorp’s military uniforms are on fleek

You’d think the NovaCorp would have the time and resources to reform their criminal justice system…

I think Ronan’s beef with Xandarians is that the Xandar-based Nova Empire have a pan-commercial mass-media culture kind of like the USA that is influencing the rest of the galaxy with its ways and Ronan and a lot of Kree just don’t like it

Never noticed this before, but Xandar’s capital is built shaped like the Nova Star. You see it on Nova Prime’s interactive map in the board room

If prison was a popularity contest, Gamora lost bigtime

The Guardians are really lucky they left the Kyln when they did

It’s also really fortunate that the Milano was impounded at the Kyln

It’s really a good thing for the whole universe that Yondu decided to not give Peter to his dad

Adult Groot is as much of an idiot as the rest of the Guardians, and he doesn’t really have the best morals either, but he is a saint

Carina’s death is really intense

Peter Quill has moved on from his life on earth, yeah–sounds like his childhood wasn’t really that great. But even if it leads to a new life as a space pirate, getting abducted is still traumatic

The well of Nebula’s hatred, anger, and spite vastly deep. It’s probably bottomless.

Gamora deciding to quit working for Ronan and Thanos probably influenced Nebula to make the same decision.

Rocket compulsively builds things

Ronan may be a “drama queen,” but when things are going his way he’s very patient and calm. Overall he’s not super active/jumpy. He’s really slow and deliberate.

Chris Pratt was the perfect man to play Star-lord. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I think PQ has been going through a phase where he’s decided to rebel from Yondu and go on his own

The brother that I watched this with says the side characters are entertaining and he’s absolutely right

Yondu w/ that arrow is so hardcore I can’t even

I also love how he collects little trinkets

Groot: *attacks all the soldiers with giant branch* Brother: “That would be the time to say something in the vein of, ‘Why was she up there the whole time?’”

You know what the MCU needs? More Kraglin.

Yondu was probably listening to the Guardians “planning” meeting

My brother also thinks that Quill’s face cracking when he’s holding the Power Stone is related to his Celestial origins

Gamora’s dress at the end is cute. But does she only wear black because she’s emo or do only dark colors go with their hair/complexion?

Why does no one talk about the fact that Quill literally “trolled” Yondu?

[dumbbelle]

robber!Minghao

In the end, Chan’s the one who says it best: “So… What you’re telling me is that you broke into Y/N’s house to steal a painting, and walked out having stolen their heart instead?”

Seokmin raises his hand for a high five. “Smooth man, smooth.”

Minghao Robin Hoods the frick outta his life, and quite literally bumps into you in the process. 

✄ Word Count: 3402 ✄ T/W: Swearing, attempted robbery, cute shit ✄ A/N: Heyo it’s Belle, I’m back with something that nobody asked for but I thought was necessary.

Masterlist

Contrary to what his best friend and roommate says, Xu Minghao insists that he’s a decent person.

(“And Mingyu can go fuck himself with his morals, the asshole’s the most notorious bootlegger you’ll find on campus”)

But honest, Minghao is a simple college boy.

He came to Pledis University when he was 18 as an international student, double majoring in Visual Arts, and Korean Language and Culture.

He’s there mostly on scholarship but he also has financial support from his parents, so he’s never really had to worry about his economic status.

He’s not the most social of kids but he’s also not the most introverted, so he always has just enough friends and just enough parties to attend as to not get bored.

But he gets bored anyway, because he’s always been an active child itching to do more.

So really, this whole mess started when he decides that he should pick up his old hobby:

Breakdancing

It’s mostly just a passing thought that comes to him when he comes back home for holiday and rewatches a VHR tape of an old b-boying competition.

But it lingers and every once in awhile he considers the possibility of him just quitting school and becoming a b-boy star like he once dreamed of.

After all, he was pretty damn good.

(He accidentally thinks this out loud during dinner and his mother throws her chopsticks at him)

Anyway, he returns to college for the new year and he’s almost completely forgotten about his old dreams.

Luckily enough (or maybe unluckily enough, depending on the perspective), there is a campus b-boy squad that he happens to stumble upon during his second-year clubs fair (as in, they barrelled into him with a flier and bombarded him with questions).

To be truthful, it seems pretty lame and Minghao’s sure that if he went underground, he could probably find a cooler scene,,,

But also, they said that there would be snacks at the interest meeting,,,

And so he makes the considerate decision to attend.

The interest meeting is where he meets Seokmin of all people.

The acting major makes a scene when he announces that he’s not there as Lee Seokmin but as Kang Hajoon, a lower-class high school drop out who finds his way through the power of breakdance.

(“Nobody knew who you were in the first place, dipshit–“

“–I said to call me Hajoon–“

“–Just sit down.”)

And people are snickering at Seokmin because they find his method acting lame.

But Minghao finds that lame so he proceeds to sit down right beside the boy and stare daggers at any jerk who directs a snide comment their way.

He hangs around just long enough so that he can decimate the rest in a b-boy demonstration, pretty much showing them all what they’re going to miss out on.

And then he gets up and leaves the meeting, Seokmin following behind him.

They grab some chips on their way out and properly introduce themselves.

“Hey sorry about all of that in there, Seo- uh, Hajoon. B-boyers usually aren’t assholes… Just them. Don’t let that bleed into your portrayal, you feel? I’m Minghao, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

“Don’t worry, I’m over it. Thanks for what you did back there... It’s nice to meet you too. And you can call me Seokmin now, I’m done with Hajoon for the day.”

Which starts an odd, but well-oiled friendship.

Seokmin introduces Minghao to all of his friends, and that’s how Minghao ends up with an incredibly,, diverse,, friend group.

And by diverse, he means that he’s positive his friendship with them will likely result with him going to jail.

He should’ve realized it when the de facto leader Seungcheol introduced himself as “S.Coups” and made him sign a waiver of liability before joining the group.

It was scribbled on to the back of a receipt but yeah, it should’ve been a little concerning

But Minghao just kinda rolls with it.

And this is how he finds himself inducted into their so-called “League of Good Doers Doing Not So Good Doer Things”.

It’s a working title; LoGDDNSGDT for short.

(“What do you do, Seokmin?”

“I’m a recruiter!”

“… That’s fair.”)

It takes him a few months to solidify his role in the group (he’s the last to join), but in that time he manages to become especially good friends with Mingyu, so much so that he becomes his roommate.

Mingyu’s known for using his technical abilities to bootleg high quality concert footage, videos, textbooks, and whatever else you need.

(“We’re all just a bunch of broke college students with a bunch of broke college student needs. We’re just making those needs realities.”)

Also alcohol, he sells a lot of alcohol.

And though Minghao initially scoffs at this, it also makes him check his privilege a little

He’s always been fortunate enough to grow up with money and be smart, free to do whatever he wants when he wants.

Growing up, he’s had a lot of interests and a lot of phases, all of which he more than excelled in.

Gosh, there was even that one ninja phase…

THE NINJA PHASE

He’s eating a brownie that’s probably been laced with weed one Friday night as he watches tv with Mingyu and Seokmin when he remembers the ninja phase.

He remembers how stealthy he is and just how good he is at picking locks.

And so he decides to Robin Hood the frick outta his life, robbing the expensive belongings from the richer students and pawning their items off so he can donate to the poor.

He excels at this too, much to Mingyu’s chagrin (“the kid’s just fuckin’ good at everything!”)

It definitely alleviates him of his boredom, and he’s so subtle and precise with it that most of the time, people don’t even notice when things are missing.

He’s become some kind of town legend, and so many people idolize this mysterious robber that the authorities aren’t even too concerned.

He’s also somehow acquired this odd nickname?? The8?? They say it’s because you never know how his crimes begin or how they’ll end.

Like the only thing anybody knows about his victims is that they’ll be wealthy (but gosh, Pledis U has too many of those roaming the place),,,, but then next thing you know the underfunded art department will suddenly get a donation of a few thousand, or the Culture Club food drive will find a gazillion non-perishable cans when they come back the next morning.

Minghao likes to think he's spontaneous.

Now this is where you come in (“finally,” I can hear you sigh from behind your screens)

Unlike everyone else around you, you do not have the biggest crush on this mysterious figure.

(“Just for the record, ‘The8’ is literally the dumbest robber alias I have ever heard.”

“How many have you heard before?”

“Not. The. Point.”)

All he does is go around and undermine people’s hard work, invading their personal space and infringing on their privacy.

All so that he can make a quick buck.

And sure, maybe he’s not spending all that money on himself, but to make students feel unsafe and unprotected in their own freaking homes and dorms?

And to have nobody do anything about it?

Absurd.

It becomes such a constant source of ire for you that you rant about this almost daily.

But it’s like you’re the only one who understands the gravity of the situation.

Your closest friends are all about this guy, singing his praises and commending his selflessness.

Your junior, Chan, is particularly adamant about the quality of his character (you have no idea about his involvement with the LoGDDNSGDT, of course; after all, he also had to sign the receipt contract).

So you’re a party of 1 in the Anti-The-8 Movement.

He’s three months into it when he makes a rather stupid mistake:

He decides to rob you.

Minghao will later complain that anybody could’ve gotten the wrong idea.

He sees you for the first time in his Korean History class.

He doesn’t exactly know how he missed you before.

First of all, you’re fucking gorgeous

First of all, there is a certain air that you carry yourself with–

It’s poised and self-assured and kind of breathtaking.

You raise your hand to read a passage and even the way you speak is levelled and controlled.

You remind him of royalty some of the other wealthy kids on campus.

Probably trained to uphold a certain degree of eloquence so that you can one day take over your parents’ company and maintain good business relationships. 

And socialize at those hoity-toity parties with the little hors d'oeuvres.

His thoughts are confirmed after class when he overhears you talk with your friends.

You’re asking your friend to take notes in place for you when you go off to vacation with your family next week.

“Heading off to the island?” Your one friend chirps.

“Yeah, dad just finished a successful case and we’re celebrating.”

And wait, an island? These guys must be fucking loaded.

Your friend lets your name slip and it’s all starting to make a lot more sense.

Now he’s heard of your name around campus.

Your parents are lawyers who built an empire, opening up law firms around the country.

They’re known for being ruthless and never sharing their wealth.

In short, they’re prime targets!!

Minghao feels like it’s Christmas– this will be his biggest catch since that one kid who was the heir to the electric toothbrush company.

He trails you and your friends for a few minutes just to confirm the details and then he’s off to plan.

Fast forward a week later to when you should be going off to vacation.

But instead you come down with the stomach flu, and not a pretty one either.

You experience the full range of systems:

Vomit, fever, dizziness, fatigue,,, There’s no way your parents are letting you tag along on the trip.

And you’re too busy vomiting to argue.

So they ditch your ass and head off to vacation by themselves, once you assure them that you’ll be fine on your own.

After all, you are a certified GDI who can take care of yourself.

… Who just so happens to be dressed up in a onesie, cuddling a large teddy bear as you watch Netflix from your nest of pillows on the couch.

You’ve scrolling through your recommended feed when you hear it:

The door opening

And you have to wonder if the vacation ended early because who else… Would…

You gasp when you realize what’s going on, rushing to turn off the television as to eliminate all sources of sound.

All your nightmares are coming true, and you haven’t even fully developed a game plan to approach this awful situation.

Now you’re not dumb, you’re not gonna run headfirst into a situation where you don’t have the upper hand.

Instead, you’ll hide and discreetly notify the authorities when you activate the alarm system.

And so no, you’re not dumb,, 

But you are clumsy.

You’re trying to navigate your way to your bedroom, remote in hand as a backup weapon, checking over your shoulder at every possible moment.

Perhaps you’re checking over your shoulder a little too much, because next thing you know you’ve crashed into a wall.

Except the wall moves and you know that it’s definitely not a wall.

The wall makes a sound, a little grunt and you snap your head back around so quickly, you think you hear the whip of the wind.

The man in front of you is tall and skinny, and seems oddly familiar even with his ski mask on.

You don’t have too much time to contemplate this however , as you’re too busy trying to whack the heck outta him with your remote.

“GET OUT OF MY HOUSE YOU ASSBUCKET.”

It's all just too much, and you're surprised you haven't shat your pants because of how scared you are.

But,,,, The8 is kinda just taking it??? He's trying to block you of course (and mostly succeeding to, the jerk) but he's not trying to fight back. What kind of shitty robber…?

You're c o n f u s e d, which is why you stop to look up at him expectantly.

“You done?” His voice incites a whole new wave of panic to wash over you, and you raise your remote to start hitting him again but The8 quickly raises his hands in surrender. “Hey, hey now, I'm not here to hurt you.”

You're skeptical, of course you are. But you think back to all the gossip you’ve heard about The8, and realize that you can’t recall any accounts of violence.

This doesn't change the fact that this asshole is robbing you, so you use the remote to gesture towards his ski mask.

“Take it off.”

And he sighs, as if it's inevitable, but holds up a finger and starts to negotiate,,,, as if he has any right to in this current situation,,, and gosh, how is he so damn calm right now??

“Okay, but if I do, promise you won’t call the cops immediately.”

You don't know why you agree to his terms– you're sure it won't make a difference.

He’ll get the cops called on him sooner or later.

But if it gets him to cooperate… You agree with a swift dip of your head.

The tension in the room is palpable, and you have to remind yourself to breathe as he starts to take off his mask.

And oh fuck you know who it is you know who it is you know who it is.

You recognize him immediately as the cute guy in your Korean History class, the one you've had a crush on since forever and a half ago.

The one that's always hanging out with that group of loud kids…Chan's Precious Seniors

And somewhere in your subconscious, you're freaking out about the possibility of Chan being involved in a crime syndicate.

And further freaking out about how you’ve confided in Chan about your crush in Xu Minghao, who just so happens to be The8 and holy fuck you can’t believe it’s him.

You really don’t have much time to dwell, because the shock and overexertion of the situation starts gets to you, and you’re starting to feel dizzy. It’s like the fever finally catches up to you–

And then you’re falling, fainting–

The last thing you hear before you pass out is the startled cry of your name.

…

You wake up to the smell of broth, and the feeling of a damp cloth pressed to the top of your forehead.

Your headache is devastating, but you’re otherwise positioned comfortably

It takes you a minute to process that you’re back on your living room couch, low hum of the television sounding from somewhere to your right

You try to locate the smell of broth, which is when you meet eye-to-eye with a very timid looking Minghao

He’s more tense than earlier, as if he’s scared you’ll jump up right then and there to attack him

And you would, honest, but the broth,,, smells,,, so,,, good,,,

You motion for him to give it to you and he relaxes before quickly complying, letting you sit up before gently placing the bowl in your hands.

He settles into a stool beside you– one that definitely wasn’t there before, but it’s whatever.

You sit there in silence for a good couple of minutes, Minghao watching the drama playing on TV as you drink your broth.

It’s kinda nice

Minghao’s the first one to speak.

“Please don’t exert yourself like that if you’re sick. You could’ve had a heart attack or something.”

He sounds so small that you just manage to resist throwing the rest of the hot soup at him in the sudden bubble of anger that erupts from you in the form of a hiss.

“Um, my memory might be wrong here but wasn’t it you who broke into my house in the first place, assbucket?”

He chuckles at that, and you’re slowly losing that sliver of self-restraint.

“Assbucket, that’s a new one.” You notice that his accent is more prominent when he’s amused.

“You deserve worse, you assbucket.”

At that he really laughs, and you have to look away to distract yourself from how attractive the sound is.

“You’re cute, you know that?”

You’re not sure what to say to that, and Minghao can tell. He quickly changes tact.

“Listen, I get why you’re mad.” Oh, now wouldn’t that be the understatement of the year.

“But I promise I’m not here to hurt you. I-I won’t even steal anything from here anymore. But please, please don’t make yourself more sick because of me.”

And man, fuck Minghao for making it damn near impossible to call the police on his ass. You don’t say anything more until you finish up your broth.

“Why… Why do you do it?”

Minghao shrugs. “Just because.”

“Just because? You’re violating my home, Minghao. This is my private space, and you’re infringing upon it without my consent.”

Minghao furrows his eyebrows, as if he’s never considered it before. And God, why did it have to be him?

Minghao finally hums. “Would you miss it?”

W-wha… “Huh?”

Minghao nods towards an abstract modernist piece that hangs high up on your wall. “Would you miss it?”

Your silence is more than enough to answer his question.

“But I’m sorry, you know. I truly wouldn’t have come around if I was aware you’d be home. Aren’t you supposed to be on vacation?”

“. . . Minghao, that’s creepy. Don’t do that. Besides, how do you know my name?”

“How do you know mine?”

The fucker. You blush, shrugging and dropping the subject completely. You’re avoiding his eyes so much that you miss the fond smile on his lips. He’s about to say something when a phone sounds. You realize it’s coming from Minghao’s pocket and watch as he takes it out, curious.

Minghao checks his phone and immediately scowls, closing his eyes in what seems like exasperation.

“I… I have to go, so sorry. My roommate just did something unbelievably stupid because he’s unbelievably stupid.”

You refrain from asking; you really don’t wanna know.

“Will you be alright by yourself? I’m worried… I’ll try to stay longer if you don’t think you will… I mean, if you want. Or I can call someone to come or–”

Where was this bashful kid an hour ago? For the first time that evening, you let out a small smile. He sees it and is stunned, momentarily blinded by your beauty.

“I’ll be fine Minghao, go help your roommate.”

He nods, getting up to leave, but not before taking your phone from the coffee table. He holds it out so that you can unlock it, and you do, though the question hangs in your eyes.

“I-I’m not taking it, just wanted to give you my phone number. In case you start to feel worse. Call me or don’t... It’s whatever.”

And so you do.

...

Bonus:

Three months later, you’re recounting the tale to the rest of the boys during one of their weekly movie nights. (You don’t dare touch the brownies, Minghao tells you they’re fucked.)

In the end, Chan’s the one who says it best: “So… What you’re telling me is that you broke into Y/N’s house to steal a painting, and walked out having stolen their heart instead?”

Seokmin raises his hand for a high five. “Smooth man, smooth.”

Your boyfriend ignores it, though Seokmin stubbornly keeps his hand up and waits for anyone to complete the exchange. You tap your palm against his in pity.

“Actually,” Minghao starts, nuzzling his nose into your hair, “I would say Y/N is the one who stole my heart instead. Just had to fall straight into my arms like that… A true master of seduction.”

You giggle, turning your head to peck his lips. The boys groan, losing interest in your story and turning back towards the movie.

From somewhere in the corner, you hear Mingyu fake a gag.

(Perhaps it’s the brownies, you can’t really tell.)

Masterlist 

[logh-icebergs]

Episode 30: Lost Things

March 18, 798/489. In the Empire, Reinhard’s fleet prepares to warp Geiersburg Fortress into the Iserlohn Corridor. On Iserlohn, Yang prepares to submit to a dubiously lawful inquiry by the hostile—but democratically elected!—Alliance government. Hilda convinces Mecklinger to pay a visit to her sick cousin, who teaches us all about the importance of having hobbies. And Geiersburg’s test warp, thanks to Kempf and Mueller’s adept leadership, goes off without a hitch. Meanwhile, Reinhard sinks deeper into depression, Julian blows off steam at the shooting range, and Reuental and Mittermeyer (you guessed it!) go on a date.

Reinhard Alone

Reinhard may be dead inside, but he still looks amazing. Episode 30, in particular, has some of my favorite animation in the series, so please enjoy all the ridiculously beautiful heartbreak as much as you possibly can through your tears.

We haven’t spent much time with Reinhard since the traumatic season 1 finale, so we’re long overdue for a check in with our fast-rising Empire-side hero. How’s he been doing?

Not great! (From episode 28.)

Once you're immersed in how LoGH tells stories, it’s tempting to say that Reinhard’s newly sour affect “should come as no surprise,” given what he’s been through. And though that is true on an in-universe level—nobody who suffered the tragic loss of a long-time romantic partner only months ago should be expected to have recovered already—it would be disingenuous of me to suggest that surprise at the way LoGH treats Reinhard’s grief is unwarranted.

In my episode 26 post, I talked about how my past experiences as a queer consumer of media had primed me for LoGH to handle Kircheis’s death poorly, and what a surprise it was when my expectations were subverted. In that light, Reinhard’s grief—the way it changes him, the way it has a tangible presence, the way other characters tiptoe around and discuss it—is a surprise. It’s a constant reminder not just of how important Kircheis was (and still is) to Reinhard, but also of how committed LoGH is to treating its queer characters and their relationships with respect.

LoGH can be a difficult show to watch. Not only does it have over a hundred incredibly dense episodes to get through—some of which are basically impossible to parse unless you watch them more than once—but it’s also deeply, sometimes overwhelmingly sad. Depending on the context, though, that can be good, or at least validating. And Reinhard’s grief, upsetting though it may be, is fundamentally important to a queer reading of LoGH.

Like I said during episode 26, Kircheis’s death is a turning point for the slow dissolution of LoGH’s heteronormative surface reading. And the unflinching portrayal of Reinhard’s grief from here on out is evidence of an ongoing decision on the part of LoGH’s creative team to allow what was formerly confined to subtext to remain above the surface.

The Locket

The way Reinhard’s voice softens when he talks to “Kircheis” via his locket is dramatic and says a lot more on its own than is possible to express in a mere text caption. If you missed it the first time, definitely go rewatch this scene in episode 28 (the timestamp is 3:45) to get the full effect.

The most obvious manifestation of Reinhard’s grief is, of course, his locket, in which he keeps a family photo and a lock of Kircheis’s hair. Some of Reinhard’s colleagues, as I’ll get to in a minute, worry about him because of how much he’s changed since Kircheis’s death. But I would argue that a lot of what’s so disturbing about Reinhard’s transition into Life Without Kircheis is the lack of change, at least in one respect: He still relies on Kircheis for emotional support, as is evident in the gifs above, and for strategic advice, which we see a bit of in episode 30 (below), and will see more of in the future.

Hilda is particularly attuned to Reinhard’s new habit of playing with his locket whenever—were Kircheis still alive—he might have looked to him for input, approval, pushback, or whatever.

There’s nothing inherently unusual about accessing one’s memories of a departed loved one for guidance, but Kircheis was Reinhard’s only intimate relationship before he died, and now that he’s gone, Reinhard still shows no interest whatsoever in diversifying his support network. As a result, his only intimate relationship is now with an inanimate object—or, to put it another way, he has nobody.

Of course, Reinhard’s isolation isn’t entirely self-imposed. Annerose was also a source of strength and comfort before she voluntarily withdrew from his life. If things had gone differently and Annerose had stayed, Reinhard might not feel so lonely—but would that have been healthier, for either of them? I’m not sure. My guess is: not significantly.

Other People

I’m not sure Reinhard realizes how obvious it is to everyone around him the extent to which he’s been utterly destroyed by Kircheis’s death. The fact that he wouldn’t care even if he did realize is, well, not unrelated.

From the relatively trivial to the life-altering, rumors and hearsay play a substantial role in our understanding of LoGH’s world and characters. Reuental and Mittermeyer, who have already spent a good deal of time gossiping about Reinhard and will continue to do so far into the future, are responsible for a good portion of the Empire-side gossip that we see—probably as a factor of their daily standing date. In episode 30, Reinhard’s two highest ranking admirals discuss the depths of his grief in vague terms:

It’s worth mentioning (as always) that Reuental and Mittermeyer’s bodies during this scene are beautifully aligned, without being symmetrical. The line of Mittermeyer’s torso is precisely parallel with Reuental’s left arm! Look at it! In case you hadn’t noticed, I am in awe of the animation team’s treatment of these two.

Reuental and Mittermeyer’s discussion of Reinhard and Kircheis is, of course, about more than just Reinhard and Kircheis—this is Reuental we’re talking about, after all, and he is pathologically incapable of saying one thing without also meaning at least five other things. For the time being, though, this scene mainly adds another, third-person dimension to Reinhard’s grief: We already know how it is affecting him personally; now we also know that it is affecting the people around him, that they’re aware of it, and that these are important enough facts to merit scenes of this length devoted to conveying them.

Hilda, on the other hand, is a lot less prone to gossip than Reuental and Mittermeyer—or maybe she just hasn’t found the right gossip partner?—so her feelings about Reinhard’s situation are communicated to us differently, mainly via looks (above) and internal monologue:

Worry not, dear reader: I’ll be spending tons more time on Hilda and her well-articulated emotional intelligence in the very near future. For now, feel free to repeat “Hilda knows everything” to yourself whenever you see her on your screen, because that basically sums it up.

I also love this little exchange, after Reinhard shuts himself away (again) in the room on Geiersburg where Kircheis died:

Kempf and Mueller’s quick look of mutual understanding here is so simple, but goes a long way towards expressing that the topic of Reinhard’s grief is never far from anyone’s lips among the admiralty.

These are all—even the lengthy conversation between Reuental and Mittermeyer—comparatively small moments in the overall landscape of LoGH. But taken together, they convey that Reinhard’s grief is not small; not for him, not for the people around him, and not for the galaxy.

Reinhard’s Oberstein Eyes

On a subtler character note, remember a few episodes back when Rebecca likened Reinhard’s eyes to Oberstein’s? Well, you may have thought she was being facetious, but she extremely was not. Allow me to demonstrate:

Here are Oberstein’s eyes as they appeared in episode 4. Their most noticeable trait is, obviously, the fact that they’re flashing red. But another distinctive characteristic of Oberstein’s eyes is that they don’t have any highlights or other details beyond the pupil and flat, uniformly blue iris.

In contrast, this eye-heavy moment from episode 28 is a good example of how eyes are typically animated throughout LoGH—with the remarkably consistent exception of Oberstein’s which are, of course, artificial. Mittermeyer and Reuental’s eyes here both have distinct highlights, and seem to move naturally.

Here’s an example, from episode 9, of how Reinhard’s eyes in particular have been depicted before now: Note the visible highlights that change and move with his expression. Reinhard’s eyes do a lot of characterization work for him, and obviously got a corresponding amount of attention from the animation team.

Compare that to Reinhard’s eyes here, in this moment from episode 27. Like Oberstein’s eyes, Reinhard’s irises are now flat and lifeless. They don’t move with the rest of his face and have none of the energy we’re used to seeing from him.

But unlike Oberstein’s, Reinhard’s eyes aren’t synthetic. So when he lets his guard down—which he can only do when he’s alone with his memories of Kircheis—we see unbridled pain and anguish flood back into them. Poor Reinhard.

Stray Tidbits

Can someone please explain to me exactly what is going on here? Why does Yang’s desk only go up to Schenkopp and Cazellnu’s knees? Why is Yang proportional to his weirdly tiny desk? Why is his entire head smaller than Schenkopp’s crotch? This single screenshot keeps me up at night with questions.

Maybe the furniture store that sold either Mittermeyer a tiny chair or Reuental a huge chair also has a location in the Alliance.

Try to imagine something more suspicious than not having a pet. How about liking books more than pets? Yeah, that’s what I thought.

Time for some fun facts: Other than Da Vinci, the three historical figures that Hilda’s cousin mentions are Cao Cao, Lazare Carnot, and Tughril Beg. Biographical info on Cao Cao and Lazare Carnot makes it pretty clear they were both, like Mecklinger, Renaissance men who had a wide variety of cultural accomplishments in addition to their political/military careers; it’s harder to find information on Tughril Beg but my guess is that he falls into the same category.

[ohmytheon]

Okay I read your tags about the Star Wars AU and am shook but how does Roy's ambitions factor into it, considering the Resistance is already on the side of good? And what are your thoughts about Al? (Bc Ed's motivations in the beginning are entirely to get Al's body back, which- as far as I know, at least- doesn't completely translate into Star Wars/ Luke's original motivations). But ahh thinking about this is gonna keep me up all night! I love it and would read the heck out of it oh man...

I haven't really come up with ALL of the mechanics of this Star Wars AU yet, but it's slowly but surely there. So don't mind me: I'm just gonna ramble and write as I come up with things.

I'm thinking that Al and Ed were separated when they were really little (not birth like Luke and Leia), so Ed gets thrown on Tatooine (can you IMAGINE the level of saltiness he would have) and Al is sent to Aldaraan. Ed has really vague memories of Alphonse because they were separated so young, but sometimes thinks they aren't real because Granny Pinako can't tell him the truth for his own safety.

Then, somehow or another, Ed finds out the truth. Al is his brother and was captured by the Empire while on route to send a message that would help the Rebellion. Like C3-PO and R2-D2 show up and Winry is all excited because she works on droids and these are some pretty prime droids. But then R2 plays Al's secret message and Pinako explains to him some things and he's like, YO I GOTTA SAVE HIS ASS. HE'S MY BROTHER." idek i'm flying by the seat of my pants here so bear with me.

Roy and Riza end up on Tatooine upon following the droids or something after Al's ship is blown up and he's captured. (I can't remember A New Hope with perfect clarity, so I need to rewatch it.) Of course Stormtroopers are looking for the droids as well so they've gotta be sneaky. Roy would be the Han Solo character, but already in the Rebellion. His motivations are fairly simple: DESTROY THE EMPIRE. I mean, he's living on limited time. If anyone finds out just how force sensitive and powerful he is, it would be dangerous as hell. As far as everyone is concerned, all Jedis and anyone that Force sensitive is dead and gone. (But if he could just get his hands on a lightsaber...) His mother was a Jedi. Yeah yeah they're not supposed to have kids, but his mother was very headstrong and lived by her own rules. She was killed when Order 66 came about and his father died while guarding Roy's hiding place, so he was raised by his paternal aunt, who raised him as her own and taught him to keep his Force abilities a secret. Aunt Christmas also, of course, has ties to the Rebellion and taught Roy everything she knows about espionage, so he made his way up the ranks as an Intelligence Officer very easily.

Back on Tatooine, Roy and Riza bump into Ed, who is not only trying to find a way off this sand-forsaken planet but also has the droids they're looking for following him around like lost puppies. (DON'T THINK OF NINA OMG) Of course Roy doesn't want to pick up some overly energetic, aggressive kid, but he doesn't have much of a choice because ED IS ON A MISSION and R2 is down with that. So they take Ed, Pinako, Winry, and the droids on their ship and are like, "PEACE WE OUT." Pinako tells Ed the story of how his father was one of the greatest jedi that ever lived but was killed by Darth Vader and how Ed is just as strong in the Force as his father and she gives him his dad's lightsaber. (Roy is jealous tbh.) Ed is a maniac though and is like, "WE HAVE TO SAVE MY BROTHER," and Roy is like, "WE NEED TO GET THE DROIDS TO A SECURE REBEL BASE," and Father/Darth Vader is like, "LOLS jokes on you fools because ya'll are being occupied and forced onto our Star Destroyer ship." (Who is Emperor Palpatine if Father is Vader? IDK i'm trying but I need Father to pretend to be Ed's actual father, who is being held captive or whatnot.)

Winry and Pinako hide on the ship while Ed, Riza, and Roy infiltrate the Star Destroyer, Roy and Riza acting as Stormtroopers guiding their prisoner Ed. Little punk caused a lot of shit for the Empire. They find Al, and Ed is super excited because his little brother is REAL. His memories of Al weren't dreams or fake. But, of course, Al doesn't know him or remember him at all and while they look very alike, he's kinda skeptical. But Ed wants to help him and they've got the droids and they NEED to get off this ship and back to the Rebel base. Shit gets real and they gotta blast their way out. At one point, when they get pinned, Roy uses the Force to get them out and Ed is like, "wait what???" and Darth Vader/Father is like, "exCUSE ME but WHO ARE YOU?" but they can't escape on their ship -- until Granny Pinako sacrifices herself to distract Darth Father and they blow out of town.

Ed is devastated, but even more so when Al explains that Aldaraan, where they were going to deliver the Death Star plans has been destroyed. Like where is the HOPE he thought he felt? Strong in the Force as he is, he doesn't know how to use it well enough and he couldn't save Pinako. Guess who has to awkwardly teach him to use the Force at first even though he's tried to keep his tamped down for years. (OH MY GOD. This means Izumi gets to be Yoda. CAN YOU IMAGINE? Just drop kicking Ed into the swamp when he's a lil shit. "Could've blocked that with the Force.")

Um but yeah Ed joins the Rebellion alongside Roy and Riza and they all go to destroy the Death Star. Shit seems really hopeless at first and people are dying. Ed has never seen anything like this before. But he's got surprisingly mad pilot skills and right when Darth Father almost gets him Roy swings in once more and saves his ass. "You'd think he wouldn't even be able to hit you since you're such a small target, Fullmetal Five." (Fullmetal is his call sign bc PLS.) And then Ed thinks about his father and his brother and the family that he never knew he had and the Force and he SWEARS he can hear his father's voice guiding him, who left so long ago, and he uses the Force TO DESTROY THE DEATH STAR.

my god this was a fucking train wreck. did anyone understand this?

[macguires]

I'm so late but I sure hope you're still doing that ask meme because if you are I'm giving you Hannibal and Star Wars. Because I know you too well and I know you'd be waiting ;D - tattlecrimc

YESSSSSSS EDEN BLESS U (i’m assuming you mean this one bc that’s the only one i’ve reblogged recently)

i will ramble horribly on the hannibal one and i’m very sorry about it so i’ll leave that for last so i can put it under a read more

i should probably warn u that the only movie fresh in my memory is the force awakens so all of this is gonna be answered through a v tfa-heavy lens but ok

star wars

three favourite male characters: poe dameron, kylo ren & general hux (DON’T KILL ME i know kylo & hux are awful, the fandom paired w/ my pre-existing love for domhnall gleeson did this to me and i am v ashamed). finn, han solo, bodhi rook, cassian andor, chirrut imwe & luke skywalker are also v dear to me. listen i just have a lot of love to givethree favourite female characters: jessika pava (i’d better see So Much of her in ep8), phasma & padme amidala. & also rey! ‘Needs More Girls’ is my opinion on most franchises but especially star warsfavourite pairing(s): finn/poe, kylo/hux, rey/jessika & han/luke! i also like obi-wan/anakin in the sense that i don’t actively go looking for stuff abt it but when i do see it on my dash my heart does a lil “!!”notp(s): r*ylo is like one of the only ships on my blacklist so that probably tells u something. i’m also p Ew about rey with any of the villains, so that also rules out rey/hux & rey/kylo/hux which i see way too often all over the place. also you wouldn’t think snoke/kylo would be a thing but i’ve seen fics & i’ve seen art and i’ve like cried every single time, experiencing that was my tragic backstory and now i’m a jaded & cynical anti-hero who’s seen Too Much™least favourite character: snoke who’s like me: i’ll hesitantly say padme amidala? i saw the prequels when i was too young to be properly interested in them and i haven’t rewatched them yet so 99% of my knowledge is secondhand, but from what i’ve seen she’s the most relatable most attractive: jessika pava tbh, yet another reason behind me hoping she’s around a lot in the next movie, i am Absolutely in love alreadyfavourite moment/scene: THAT’S MY JACKET(also lowkey the whole starkiller/hosnian system scene, that was shot so impressively w/ the whole ~greatcoat blowing dramatically in wind~ and the brief reaction shot of the people on hosnian prime and the lights shooting across the sky and damn)favourite quote(s): LOTS

“so this is how liberty dies. with thunderous applause.” - padme

“if you live long enough, you see the same eyes in different people.” - maz

“mm. lost a planet, master obi-wan has. how embarrassing.” - yoda

“are you kidding me? i’m blind!” - chirrut 

“there’s a problem on the horizon. …there is no horizon.” - k2-so

“so you’re with the resistance?”“obviously. yes, i am. i am with the resistance, yeah. i’m with the resistance.”“i’ve never met a resistance fighter before.”“well, this is what we look like. some of us. others look different.” - rey & finn

“lieutenant, get back to your station!”“just look! we won’t survive. even hux is gone!” - rodinon

“through the ages, i’ve seen evil take many forms: the sith. the empire. today, it is the first order.” - maz

“where is my boyfriend? […] i like that wookiee.” - maz

ok right. now for my favourite thing in the world. the show i don’t shut up about. the universe to which my heart belongs

hannibal

three favourite male characters: will graham, hannibal lecter & anthony dimmondthree favourite female characters: chiyoh, molly graham & reba mcclane (also beverly katz. and freddie lounds. and abigail hobbs. and literally every other girl)favourite pairing(s): hannibal/will, margot/alana, reba/molly, abigail/marissa & jimmy/brian are the ones i pay most attention to, but i’m honestly also down for literally any other f/f ship u can imagine from this shownotp(s): there isn’t anything i would specifically call a notp, but i’m not a huge fan of will/alana or hannibal/alana i guess? just bc as much as i love will & hannibal, alana deserves 1000x better and i lovelovelove her with margot. i also dislike mason with literally anyone for what i would hope are obvious reasons. i also tend to be kinda cringey about abigail with will or hannibal in a romantic/sexual sense bc it’s made very clear that their relationship with her is parent/child and that she’s a teenager so it feels v creepy to meleast favourite character: i like them enough as characters but i’ll say francis dolarhyde & mason verger. bc everything mason does ever makes me feel vaguely ill and my first impression of francis dolarhyde was him stretching and grunting @ his mirror in briefs w/ Glistening Muscles and i was done with That and ready to move on in under 0.00002 seconds but it just….. kept happeningwho’s most like me: peter bernardone, abigail hobbs & s1!will graham most attractive: chiyoh! i was literally Gone from the second we saw her through will’s goddamn binoculars favourite moment/scene: literally every second of dark!will i am so here for that. every moment from when he attacked freddie in the barn and then. u know. ate randall tier with hannibal, the whole ~i’ve given up good & evil for behaviourism~ conversation and the knife exchange in the kitchen. also him bringing randall’s body to hannibal in the middle of the night like some dog looking for approval wtf. and obviously him & hannibal double-teaming & killing francis in the season finale and running the fuck away together and then coming back to eat bedelia like I JUST REALLY LOVE DARK!WILLfavourite quote(s): i have SO MANY. some of them i just think are gorgeous and thought-provoking, some i like for shippy reasons or bc they were super chilling or Ominous on a rewatch/paired with later context, and some i just find straight-up hilarious

hannibal: “i’ve always found the idea of death comforting. the thought that my life could end at any moment frees me to fully appreciate the beauty and art and horror of everything this world has to offer.”

hannibal: “the essence of the worst in the human spirit is not found in the crazy sons-of-bitches. ugliness is found in the faces of the crowd.”  

jack: “you remember when you decided to call hannibal?”will: “i wasn’t decided when i called him. i just called him. i deliberated while the phone rang… i decided when i heard his voice.”jack: “you told him we knew.” will: “i told him to leave, because i wanted him to run.”jack: “why?”will: “because… because he was my friend. and because i wanted to run away with him.” 

hannibal: “you cannot control with respect to whom you fall in love.” 

will: “i’ve never known myself as well as i know myself… when i’m with him.” 

hannibal: “when the fox hears the rabbit scream, he comes a-running. but not to help. when you hear jack scream, why will you come running?”

chiyoh: “you have a taste for it now.”will: “for what?”chiyoh: “harm.”will: “do you?”chiyoh: “i was violent when it was the right thing to do. but i think you like it. […] if you don’t kill him, you’re afraid you’re going to become him.”will: “yes.”

freddie: “i’ve interviewed enough serial killers to know one when i see one. […] a very specific brand of hostility. i see it every time i look at will graham.” 

gray: “there is no god.”hannibal: “well, not with that attitude.” 

hannibal: “hello! i love your work.” (YOU NEED CONTEXT FOR THIS ONE BUT I LOVE IT)

guest: “it smells divine!”hannibal: “it is! i say that without ego. i don’t require conventional reinforcement.” 

hannibal: “that may have been impulsive.”

hannibal: “a paradox.”alana: “freddie lounds thinks the two of you are a paradox. she sees something no one else sees.”will: “and what’s that?”alana: “that neither of you is the killer she’s writing about… but together you might be.” 

will: “i’d pack my bags if i were you, bedelia. meat’s back on the menu. […] ready or not, here he comes.” 

freddie: “what will understands is that if you can’t beat hannibal lecter… join him.” 

hannibal: “what’s the meat? veal? pork?”will: “she was a slim and delicate pig.”hannibal: “i’ll make you lomo soltado. we’ll make it together. …you slice the ginger.” […]hannibal: “this meat is not pork.”will: “it’s long pig.” (RIDICULOUS. now they’re both making puns while eating people)

will: “is hannibal in love with me?”bedelia: “could he daily feel a stab of hunger for you and find nourishment at the very sight of you? yes. but do you ache for him?”