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awed-frog · 5 years ago

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When you say romance should be 18 and over do you mean the brand of romance we know today (aka toxic) or romance as a whole? If we wrote healthy romance aimed at younger crowds or presented unhealthy behaviour as unhealthy behaviour in regular romance (for older crowds) would that be a good solution?

Well - I see three questions here, all of them incredibly complex and beyond interesting: should art be political and is censorship ever a good idea and also is the romance genre okay? The answer to all of them, in my opinion, is ‘no but’.

1) Should art be political?

The stupid thing is, art is inherently political, whether you want it to or not, but art that’s deliberately political tends to be awful, and that’s a universal truth both for left-wing stuff and for right-wing stuff. When you willingly create political stuff, what you’re crafting is propaganda, and proganda is generally sad and bad. I guess there is propaganda that’s also good art - Victor Hugo’s The Man Who Laughs comes to mind - but the problem is, not all of us are Victor Hugo.

That said, since whatever we create is political (because man is a social animal) and will have some kind of moral message, yes - ideally we want more art with an ethically ‘good’ moral message than we want garbage, because art (and here I include everything: books, movies and so on) is perhaps the most effective and impactful mind-shaper ever. That’s why Disney is doing its very best to be a monopoly, after all. But: I don’t have a good solution for how to ensure art is nice. I think art is nice when artists are nice, and artists are nice when they grow up in good, healthy societies. So the more a society rots from the inside out, the more likely it is you’ll find art that’s also rotten. I mean, while romance as a genre was always a bit dodgy (see below), what that article was talking about - the rise of the possessive, violent boyfriend and domestic abuse as the great love story - is sort of a recent phenomenon, and goes hand in hand with the deterioration of women’s rights in (Western) society.

(As an aside, I’m not sure I agree (young) women are necessarily misogynistic for reading crap like Fiftfy Shades: I think (young) women are exhausted. Fifty Shades is, more than anything, an ode to undeserved capitalism - the only kind that seems open as an option today. After all, we know trickle-down capitalism doesn’t work and most of us will toil and toil for very little; Christian Grey is the antidote to that, the guy who shows up, basically kidnaps you, and smothers you in a life of riches for which the only thing you must do in return is give up. Having someone else decide on your job, your car, your possessions and clothes, where you’ll live, what you’ll eat and when, whether you’ll take birth control (lol: obviously not), when you’ll see your friends and family plus when and how you’ll orgasm - what women tried to escape for generations is suddenly the dream for many of us - not because of any new political ideology, but because we’re beyond tired. Women, like men, are now crushed in a neverending cycle of bs, underpaid jobs, and are apparently fed up enough in taking responsibility for anything that not only romance and ‘superhuman’ characters are booming, but a very specific kind of subset of that: essentially, slave fics.

Just give up your agency, and you’ll be taken care of and cherished - forever.

I understand a kink is not the same as your actual political opinion, but still - I’m not enthusiastic about this trend, and I’m even less enthusiastic when it gobbles up young women who haven’t had time to experience real life relationships.)

No, I think that in the end, the answer is - if you reverse the rotting of society, automatically - statistically - you’ll get healthier artists and a healthier audience. So, really, the fight is always the same: better paid jobs, better (and free) schools, more opportunities for continued education of any kind, more democracy and transparency, more green spaces and better living conditions.

2) Is censorship ever a good idea?

Sadly, no. You’d think the logical conclusion of what I just said would be, ‘In the meantime, let’s ban the most dangerous stuff’ or something, and while part of me is tempted to support that, censorship has a way of ending very badly no matter how good and noble your intentions are.

(Self-censorship should be more of a thing, though: not everything that goes through our minds deserves to be seen and shared.)

What sucks at the moment is that on the one hand, capitalism is operating its own censorship; and on the other, its desperate search for new markets has led to a disastrous disintegration of actual human interactions.

So, problem one is that we only publish and market what makes a lot of money, and while that’s normal, to an extent, the result today is that everything is ‘almost the same’ as the previous thing (think sequels, prequels, remakes, obnoxious book covers for books that are basically all the same). So if ‘asshole boyfriend who beats you up’ suddenly makes money, it becomes very hard to escape the trope, because what will be offered to you everywhere is exactly that. This was less of a thing back when our main sources of entertainment were shared (movie theaters, the one family TV, school libraries and so on); now, it’s an epidemic, and as we see with Youtube algorithms, a dangerous one, because this obsession with watching and rewatching ‘almost the same’ inevitably leads to more and more extreme stuff.

Meanwhile, problem two is that the more tailor-made our entertainment is, the less we connect to real people. I know I sound about 90 here, but when all family members are glued to a different screen - mom watching the 50th remake of Eat, Pray, Love, dad down the rabbithole of lizard conspiracy theories, big brother now exploring some milk&peanut butter weirdness on Youporn and younger sister 30 fics deep into Stucky high school AUs - what do they have in common? What do they talk about? What can they even learn from each other? Until recently, and for aeons, fiction was shared, and its primary goal was to form a connection between group members. Now, that’s gone. We destroyed it, without even realizing what we were doing, in the space of twenty years. And yeah - I know you can create new communities, but a) these communities are virtual (which means, for the most part: not real) and b) they tend to connect like with like, which is comforting, perhaps, but not very useful. The whole point here is that we need to learn how to feel empathy and trust for those who’re different, and build a community with them - instead, what the internet is doing is isolating us inside our little bubbles, so much so that any minor disagreement is now seen as good reason to break off contact.

Censorship, however, doesn’t solve any of this. For starters, we need more regulation on how big corporations can get, what social media companies can and can’t do and who can access what kind of material. And it’d be great if we could all unplug a little, but uh - fat chance of that.

3) Is the romance genre okay?

Again, just my opinion, but personally, I mistrust it. There are no romance books for men? Instead, books for men feature a Main Character doing stuff and improving himself while accidentally meeting a Sexy Lamp he can go home to at the end of the story. And, well, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but isn’t this a healthier way to look at life? While good relationships are very meaningful (or even the most meaningful) part of any human life, if your goal is to get them, they won’t grow right. You shouldn’t be hyperfocused on finding love; I think it’s much better to be like Main Character: you work on your drawing skills, try a new sport, read poetry, defeat evil Russians, thus developing inner happiness and self-confidence, thus leading you towards towards a partner who’ll fall in love with who you are - not a partner who was looking for some empty shell to fill with their own expectations and preferences.

And I know - romance books and movies are full of exciting non-romantic events and stuff - but still, the fact they’re classified and intended as romance does imply that finding a romantic partner is the ultimate goal. Which, I don’t know, I don’t think it’s healthy, and is a particularly inappropriate message for young women. After all, why is it okay that young men are encouraged to go on ghost hunts, study dinosaurs and save the world while young women are taught to wait around for a broken (possibly violent, but it’s not his fault) bad boy only they can fix? It’s messed up, is what it is, and I may be extreme here, but even the tamest, sweetest romance revolves around the same message: that you’re not complete on your own, and that you should focus on relationships as a way to become a better, happier human being.

Now, as much as I love this quote -

“It is what you read when you don't have to that determines what you will be when you can't help it.” — Oscar Wilde

- obviously there’s no direct cause-and-effect here - you don’t read one book and become a mindless Stepford wife - so I’m not saying, ‘no one should read romance ever’. It’s just - as I said in that other post, we should all enjoy diverse stuff. Read your romance novels, but also read the classics, read some philosophy, a random poem, a badly-written thriller - read Stephen King, read how the OED was written, or a Wikipedia article on the French resistance - anything and everything. Because of capitalism, because of this push towards personalized entertainment, we’re being forced and pigeonholing ourselves in smaller and smaller cages, and the worst thing is - we’re comfortable inside them, because this is the awful truth: cages are comfortable, and that’s why we need to get out before we forget what cages are for.

[As a final point: you say ‘if we wrote’, does it mean you’re an aspiring writer? If so, you shouldn’t worry about any of this. You write what you want, you write the stories you want to read. Just remember to get out of your cage as well - experience, discover, grow, read, dare - and then put all that into your books. I’m sure they’ll be great, whatever your favourite genre.]

#ask #books #romance #entertainment #capitalism #ya #fifty shades of grey #narrative tropes #old woman yells at cloud #the end is nigh #i miss the 90s #potentially unpopular opinion

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fyrapartnersearch · 7 years ago

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seeking long-term partner for anime/manga 1x1

You can call be Quaz! Read on for the good stuff;

a bit about me:

my thoughts on:

© Effort: Let’s shoot for equal effort please. I am not at all interested in partners looking only to play out their own halves without effort going into mine. No Bueno, friendos. Quickest way to get me to drop a roleplay.

© Age: looking for someone 18+!! I enjoy mature themes, but generally okay with fading to black if you prefer. There will most likely be mentions/implied sex though either way, so if you aren’t cool with that I am not the partner for you. Similarly, I’d like all characters engaged in romantic plots to be at least 16 for similarly aged charas, 17+ for any (student/intern/whatever x teach/boss/whatev) plots, thanks.

© Universes: I am mostly looking for fandom OC X CANON roleplays at this time, which will be mentioned below. Some originals can be workable though. Usually willing to split roleplays between fandoms for your cravings too!

© Misc: DOUBLING IS A MUST FOR FANDOM ROLEPLAYS. I am okay with stacked single-emails, or two separate threads, or whatever! Just must double!! Also, I can’t write m/m but m/f and f/f is fine. All of my fandom pairings will be m/f.

absolute nos:

© Terrible sues. Long lost sister twin to Sasuke/Naruto with the rinnegan in one eye, the byakugan in yje other, and summons dragons are not allowed in my sandbox. SELF INSERT OCS ARE FINE! Just not sues please!

absolute yes!!

Green: fluffy, flowery language; no explicit mention of parts

Yellow: euphemisms for parts and actions, moderate description

Red: explicit words and description

just fyi: I’m fine with green or above but tend to default yellow if you don’t tell me otherwise. I’m also super okay with red, just want to be considerate of your level of comfort. :)

Cool beans, onto the really good stuff:

cravings:

Canon verse, alt timeline**

mafia plot involved

Wammy Academy***

Wammy’s House

Arranged Marriage**

Canon verse, canon timeline

Canon verse, alt timeline**

arranged marriage plot involved

Modern AU?

Mafia/gang

Business/corporate

University

Academy Setting

Canon verse, alt timeline**

Modern AU

Mafia/gang

Business/Corporate

High School***

University

Ninja Academy (?)

Marriage (arranged or not)*

Summer camp AU!!***

Canon verse, alt timeline**

Alternate Universe

other fandoms I can play for you:

Attack on Titan

Inuyasha

GANGSTA!

Hunter x Hunter

Tokyo Ghoul

Ouran High School Host Club

Full Metal Alchemist

Resident Evil [games]

Dynasty/Samurai Warriors (Orochi)

Sailor Moon

Cowboy Bebop

Yu-Gi-Oh!

Basilisk

Kingdom Hearts/Disney

note: these fandoms I haven’t played before/in a while but am familiar with. I am always okay with taking suggestions to brush up/watch other things you might be interested in doing! Just let me know! Also feel free to ask about things not on this list!!

contact me:

Thanks for reading so far! If you think you might be interested in roleplaying with me, please drop me a line at: [email protected] . I would love to hear from you! Please include the following items in your email!:

Your name/nickname/penname (whatever you want me to call you)

Your age/age range (18+, 20+, 21+ w/e)

Your timezone/rough availability just so I have an idea

What you’re interested in playing & love interest

Your deal breakers! Things you are absolutely inflexible on so we know if we’ll be compatible.

*cough* your smut color *cough*

If your feeling generous, your fav song or show or movie! I love finding some new tunes. 😊

Whatever else you’d like to include, it’s your world man

I hope to hear from you soon! <3

#multiple paragraph #para #semipara #long term #email #submission

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musicmeisterfanatic · 7 years ago

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What the Gender-Fuck? (Disney Princesses Modern AU fanfic) Pt. 1

Contains: Disney characters, gender-bending

“What’s a seance?”

Moana asked Tiana, curious about what they were doing and why everyone is in a circle at a table in a dimly lit room.

Tiana shrugged. “Well, I found an article about seances in a newspaper. Sounded interesting, so I figured we’d do it on our Girl’s night.”

Merida sighed. “Tiana, seances are magic summonings of ghosts to interact with them. If we summon one and it gets aggressive, we could be cursed or in big trouble!”

Belle rolled her eyes. “Oh please, ghosts aren’t real. If you educated yourself, then you’d figure that out.”

Pocahontas crossed her arms. “Belle, spirits exist. Me and my people know that. But I don’t think a seance is the best way to interact with them. The spirits might be angered.”

Jasmine just shook her head. “I think it could be worth a try. I’m not afraid of some ghost.”

Cinderella and Elsa gave each other skeptical looks. Anna just sighed. Aurora shrugged. Mulan bit her lip. And Rapunzel played with her hair.

Tiana looked at all of them. “So are we doing this, or not, ladies?” She put her hand on the table.

Moana put her hand on the table. “I’m in. I’ve dealt with a giant fire demon, although that was different, but still. This will be much easier than that.”

Merida put her hand in. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Pocahontas put her hand in. “As Merida said, you have been warned.”

Jasmine put her hand in. “It can’t be worse than an evil genie.” She chuckled.

Cinderella put her hand in and then Elsa. Elsa looked at her other hand. “I hope ghosts can be frozen, because we might have a problem.”

Anna put her hand in and ate a piece of chocolate.

Aurora put her hand in, although she was a little shaky.

Mulan put her hand in. “I have a dragon, pretty sure dragons can fight ghosts.”

Rapunzel laughed and put her hand in. “I love trying new things! This is new, so I gotta do it! And, Mulan, I may not be a ghost expert but I’m pretty sure ghosts can only be touched by other ghosts.”

Everyone looked at Bell. She didn’t put her hand in. “What? It won’t work. And yeah, Mulan, I don’t think ghosts can be touched by anything that’s fully corporeal. Although, there is a theory that ghosts can be affected by iron, but I don’t think so. Even if that was true, ghosts aren’t real in the first place, so it wouldn’t be helpful.”

Merida hit Bell with her bow, her accent coming out a little. “Ah, don’t be such a downer! Put yer hand in the circle on the table! Unless yer scared!”

Belle rolled her eyes and put her hand in. “Okay, but if it doesn’t work, you owe me!”

They set everything up and linked their hands around the round table. Everyone began the chant. Then they waited. There was no response.

Belle smirked. “Ha, I told-” the room shook and a giant voice boomed.

“Who summoned me?!”

Everyone was silent. Merida responded and gave the spirit their names.

“Why did you summon me?! What do you need?!”

Tiana answered shakily. “W-we just wanted to try it out! We don’t need anything!”

The voice was angry. “So this was just for fun?! Just a game to you?! How dare you?! YOU WILL PAY!”

The voice disappeared and so did the shaking.

Merida slammed her fist on the table. “Tiana, this is all yer fault! If we didn’t do this, we wouldn’t be in trouble! Now something’s going to happen! We’ll probably all be cursed!”

Pocahontas gulped. “Or dead. Spirits can kill those they deem unworthy of living any longer.”

They were all visibly shaken They decided to all sleep in Belle’s giant house tonight. They all got into beds and sleeping bags and slowly fell asleep, questioning what was going to happen to them.

“I’m a boy!”

Everyone was woken up by shrill screaming. Anna wasn’t in her bed. She/he came running around the house, waking everyone up.

Belle looked down at her/himself. “So am I!”

Everyone else screamed and looked at themselves, noticing that they all became boys.

Elsa received a call from Hans, who used to be a jerk, but had learned to be nicer after spending a year in prison and they were friends now. But the voice on the other end was higher than usual. “Elsa, what’s going on?! I’ve become a girl!”

Elsa just slowly took the phone away from her/his ear. “I think the boys have swapped genders with us....”

Everyone just looked at each other in shock. No one knew how this was going to end.

But they didn’t have to worry for now, it was just the beginning...

I hope you liked this fic! It’s only the part one though. They change their names up in the next part, so I figured I’ll give you the girls who became boys, the boys who became girls, and their new names.

Girls to guys:

Moana: Mano

Tiana: Theodore, Theo for short (it’s a name that’s apparently popular in New Orleans)

Merida: Mairtin, Mair for short (Gaelic equivalent of Martin)

Belle: Bennet, Ben for short

Pocahontas: Patamon, Pat for short (yes, it’s a Native American name)

Jasmine: Jesse, Jess for short(inspired by Jesse from full house, don’t judge me)

Cinderella: Cid

Elsa: Elliot, El for short

Anna: Anakin, An for short(no, it’s not because of Star Wars)

Aurora: Austin

Mulan: Mun-wa, Mun for short

Rapunzel: Raphael, Raph for short. (no, it’s not because of TMNT)

Guys to girls:

Maui: Macy(no, not the store)

Naveen: Nathalie, Nat for short

Harris, Hubert, Hamish(Merida’s brothers, now sisters): Erica, Euna, Ealasaid, Eala for short(Gaelic form of Elizabeth)

The Beast/Adam: Adalie, Ada for short

John Smith: Joy

Aladdin: Alaina

Prince Charming/Otto(that’s his name in the wiki I looked at): Othelia

Hans: Hannah

Kristopher: Krystal

Prince Phillip: Phoebe

Li Shang: Li Ming

Flynn: Flita

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the-river-dream-shore · 7 years ago

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@burtonesquevincent tagged me, thanks! :)

Rules: answer all the questions, add one of your own and tag as many people as there are questions i mean you can tag other people then :)

1. coke or pepsi?

lemon pepsi? idk

2. disney or dreamworks?

Dreamworks!

3. coffee or tea?

herbal/fruit/light green tea. I don’t like bitter taste.

4. books or movies?

both

5. windows or mac?

Windows? I used to want Mac, but today it just seems like an overpriced product that prefers design over functionality. Once game developers start including Linux I’ll switch to Linux.

6. dc or marvel?

I feel like it’s more about the writers, as I just don’t like big corporations much. I really liked Young Avengers and Journey into Mystery. And Agent of Asgard, but it broke my heart so idk if I can recommend it (yes I can), I’ve also read some Robin stuff (mostly Nightwing and Red Robin), where the quality differed as it was written by numerous authors. I want to read Ms Marvel. I started to read Wicked and Divine (Image comics) but there was too much pop-culture references that said nothing to me (not sure, if i’m too eastern Europe, too young, or too abstinent for it. but I might revisit it later because the plot was interesting)

7. xbox or playstation?

PC. Only game console I like is a good ol’ gameboy. (read as: i’m broke and i’ve never owned either)

8. dragon age or mass effect?

Dragon Age, the plots seem more interesting and I love fantasy more than military sci-fi. I don’t like the design of either. I would say I’m picky, when it comes to 3D games, but then... I like WoW, Minecraft, Don’t Starve, Pokémon, Undertale, point ‘n’ click text-heavy adventures and Subnautica and not much more. So idk :D I prefer isometrics and 2D, exploring landscapes, gathering resources, getting to know characters, uncovering mysteries. Romance, timed missions and teambuilding? Nah. 1st person shooters? EVIL.

9. night owl or early riser?

hoo hoo, it’s currently after 1AM and since I don’t have work tommorow, I’m not getting out of bed before the lunch :D

10. cards or chess?

cards. chess are too depressive (idk why, it just makes me sad even if I don’t lose)

11. chocolate or vanilla?

vanilla. I rarely eat chocolate and I used to like the white one the best before I started eating vegan. i got used to the chocolate flavour and sometimes actually crave it a lot, but i still mostly prefer vanilla flavour.

12.vans or converse?

never had any of them, but I would really like to have converse style shoes that go mid-calf length.

13. fluff or angst?

hurt comfort with happy, even unrealisticaly sweet ending. shut up.

14. beach or forest?

calm beach near a calm forrest where there are no dangerous or annoying insects (my skin is delicate and insects tend to be inconsiderate :D)

15. dogs or cats?

generally? cats, i just too often can’t share the dog enthusiasm and being a good team player exhausts me. but animals have different personalities that doesn’t have to match the stereotypes, so I keep an open mind.

16. clear skies or rain?

both is nice, as long as it changes in few days

17. cooking or eating out?

Eating out, probably. I’m not a terrific cook and I hate doing the dishes.

18. spicy food or mild food?

Spicy!

19. halloween/samhain or solstice/yule/christmas?

Halloween. But I like both :)

20. would you rather forever be a little too cold or a little too hot?

eh, probably the first one, but both sounds shit

21. if you could have a superpower, what would it be?

Telekinesis and flying. Aka I wouldn’t have to get up for snacks and I could avoid all obstacles and people when running late somewhere. Also discovering abandoned roofs and towers :3 Oh, and it would be nice if I actually could remember stuff and stay motivated :D

22. animation or live action?

unfair! but if I had to choose, 2D animation.

23. baths or showers?

baths aren’t an option mostly, not enough hot water or bad bath tub. I love baths, but only when it’s perfect temperature and a nice bath tub. otherwise, showers.

24. team cap or team ironman?

MCU? Steve. Comics? Idk, neither.

25. fantasy or sci-fi?

my favourite setting is when it mixes

26. do you have three or four favourite quotes, if so, what are they?

All that is gold does not glitter/Not all those who wander are lost (LotR)

Everybody want’s to change the world but no one wants to die (MCR)

27. youtube or netflix?

youtube

28. harry potter or percy jackson?

Harry Potter. I didn’t read PJ.

29. when do you feel accomplished?

when I can make the brave decision.

30. star wars or star trek?

really?? both, ofc.

31. paperback or hardback books?

hardback, except for the Terry Pratchett books.

32. horror or rom-com?

Hm. How about a horror setting, but it’s funny in an un-american way?

33. tv shows or movies?

eeeeeh, probably movies, i don’t have much time lately so it’s more accesible medium for me

34. favourite animal?

cats, water turtles, parrots, elephants, monkeys...

35. favourite genre of music?

rock, country, rock ‘n’ roll... I like quick beat and catchy melody. I don’t like recitals/hip hop/rap, baladas and whiny pop.

36. least favourite book?

I tend not to remember books I dislike. Serves them good.

37. favourite season?

Late spring, not too hot summer days and early autumn. Temperature is everything.

38. song that’s currently stuck in your head?

Nothing in particular. But I’m always in mood to sing good ol’ MCR at shower :D

39. what kind of pyjamas do you wear?

sweatpants/shorts and a tank top/shirt. zero shoes.

40. how many existential crises do you have on an average day?

Lately, not that much? It’s like twice a week usually, but nothing devastating.

41. if you can only choose one song to be played at your funeral, what would it be?

i don’t think I’ve actually thought about my funeral before? I wouldn’t choose anything with words, just some calm but uplifting melody. Maybe Undertale (from Undertale :).

42. favourite theme song to a TV show?

dun dun dun... go go naruto! :D idek, I don’t even atch TV shows that much...

43. harry potter movies or books?

I liked the books more, but I can’t remember when I read them the last time. The movies are cool too though :)

44. you can make your OTP become canon but you’ll forget that tumblr exists. will you do it?

I’m not giving up this site up! It has it’s problems and bugs, but most of the time it encourages me and puts nice pictures on my dash, so I feel better.

45. do you play an instrument and if so, what is it?

I play the piano badly and I have a basic knowledge how most of the instruments work, does it count? :D

46. what is the worst way to die?

hopeless

47. if you could be entirely invisible for a day, what would you do?

I would use it to make a political statement or action - I would try to find dirt on openly bigoted and hateful famous people and politicians, and maybe sabbotage some neonazis.

48. If you could have personally witnessed anything in history what would it be?

I’d be fascined to find out what was there before the Big Bang. I don’t think I’d be able to comprehend it by just human senses alone though...

49. If you could understand animals but you could never understand humans again, would you?

No. I worked hard to understand at least a little about humans. And I don’t think understanding animals (at least to some extent) is impossible for humans.

50. What is your most favourite album currently?

I don’t do albums.

51. What is your favourite word/phrase/colloquiallism? Name one (or more) per language you speak c:

We’ll burn that bridge when we get there. (eng)

Wanderlust (de) - longing to travel and explore (ok, saying i speak german would be a bit of an overstatement, but i like this word and i vagely understand german, so...)

Kdo si hraje, nezlobí (cz) - [playing prevents mischief] used in situations where the playing leads directly to mischief

52. What mythical creature would you like to be able to transform into?

And now, the tags! I tag everybody who:

- likes doing long tag games

- is willing to tag me in ther post so i can read your answers

( @kaimaciel? @kitikara? @gentianablue? :)

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rantsaboutponies · 6 years ago

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Season 8 Retrospective

This... Okay, Season 8’s final W-L-T score was 0-11-15, which means that, quantitatively, it should have been the worst season yet. But...I dunno, this season just kind of...came and went. It might partially have to do with the fact that this is the eighth season of a show that should have ended with Season 3, but I think there’s a bigger factor at play here. Yes, it’s that most baffling of poor decisions, the School of Friendship!

I still cannot figure out why they thought this was such a good idea to build the entire season around. Maybe the voice actors for the Mane 6 are trying to move on from the show and are minimizing their future commitments? If it’s just trying to sell toys of the New Mane 6, they wouldn’t need to focus on them so heavily (people will buy figurines of background characters, for god’s sake), but phasing out the original Mane 6′s toyline also seems like a dumb idea. I think it’s just that corporations still haven’t gotten over the collective concept that they all seemed to have in the 1980s that kids love school and will watch anything set at a school. You know which cartoons I watched the least (or just flat out never watched) as a kid? Recess! Teacher’s Pet! Braceface! You know, the ones that spent a large chunk of time at school! School is by far the least interesting part of any child’s life! If the characters were school-age, you maybe showed a scene or two an episode just to establish that, but that’s it! A good example is Kim Possible; sure, she went to school every episode, but the majority of each episode was all the spy shit. Because no duh! (For the record, as a kid, I was also incredibly bored by any show that was just about kids doing normal shit all the time, school-related or otherwise: Doug, Rocket Power, The Weekenders, Hey Arnold!, Pepper Ann, As Told by Ginger, every single live-action laugh-track Disney sitcom...come to think of it, is that all that late-’90s to early-2000s Disney Channel and Nickelodeon shows were? Jesus Christ, I miss when Cartoon Network was fun.)

Anyway, I don’t know what kids watch these days. Maybe they don’t even watch this show; I have no idea. I haven’t kept up. Why am I even still talking about this? On with the list!

#1. “Road to Friendship”: Like I said, this one was the closest to “good” we got this season. Starlight and Trixie tend to have good dialogue together, and this was no exception. Did anyone notice that Starlight was barely in this season at all, though? They really need to deal with their constant problem of adding characters to the main cast and then not knowing what to do with them in future episodes.

#2. “Sounds of Silence”: If not for Autumn Blaze being so goddamn annoying (and the moral being fairly lame), this episode might have been better. At least I now know why I’ve been seeing kirin fanart for a few months now.

#3. “What Lies Beneath”: This was probably the only halfway decent episode involving the New Mane 6 because it actually gave us a bit of insight into their characters besides “like the Mane 6, but children”. The Tree of Harmony’s way of thinking is still super fucked-up, though.

#4. “Molt Down”: Puberty episode? Sure, why not. Still better than Big Mouth.

#5. “Father Knows Beast”: This one goes right next to the other Spike one because, like all Spike episodes, it really left little to no impact. The fact that Spike is still being written to be dumb enough to fall for some random dragon showing up and saying that he’s his father is pretty grating, though.

#6. “The Break Up Break Down”: Miscommunication storylines annoy the shit out of me, especially since Modern Family became 90% “I heard a thing and I’m going to assume the worst instead of just confirming it with the person I heard it from” episodes. At least Discord finally got a couple funny lines again.

#7. “Non-Compete Clause”: I don’t know why Applejack and Rainbow Dash thought a rehash of “Fall Weather Friends” would be a good idea if they mixed in a bit of child endangerment. Thank god the kids turned out to be smarter than them.

#8. “A Rockhoof and a Hard Place”: Still hard to believe they couldn’t find Rockhoof any digging or demolition jobs anywhere in Equestria. I do like that the ending basically acknowledged that they still don’t know exactly what the point of making Twilight a princess was or what she even does anymore.

#9 & #10. “School Daze”: I was technically right. Neighsay did return to be a villain in the season finale; he just wasn’t the real villain. The fact that they could have arrived at the solution at any time and just chose not to was really annoying. Remember, kids love storylines about legal loopholes and technicalities!

#11 & #12. “School Raze”: Yet another episode that required everyone involved to be as stupid as possible to get the plot going. Nothing like going with your first assumptions and ignoring all evidence to the contrary, eh, Twilight?

#13: “Marks for Effort”: This was just dumb. Twilight wouldn’t let the CMC into the school because they already knew enough about friendship? Yeah, sure. If anything, the episode proved just the opposite. Cozy Glow intentionally failed the test because she thought it would get them in? Uh-huh. Given her secret ultimate evil goal was to make everyone friends with her, I can only assume that she did in fact think that that plan would work, since getting them kicked out definitely wouldn’t endear her to them.

#14. “The End in Friend”: I don’t think this episode accomplished what it was attempting to. No, Rarity and Rainbow Dash don’t have anything in common. No, they don’t have to hang out together if they don’t have any activities they both enjoy. No, that doesn’t make them enemies, nor does it mean they can’t still hang out with their other friends. Sheesh.

#15. “The Washouts”: More child endangerment! Why a dangerous stunt team was able to hire Scootaloo I still don’t know, but apparently no one in the audience had a problem with that. If the lesson was to teach children not to be so fickle about picking their role models, that’s probably a good idea.

I’m not sure there’s all that much difference between these two parts of the list, but whatever.

#16. “Fake It ‘Til You Make It”: Seriously, though, Fluttershy’s only mistake was not telling those raccoons ahead of time that she was going to be using different personae. It was working!

#17. “Grannies Gone Wild”: This episode beat out Book Club by a whole month for its message of, “Old people are people too!” The Wonderbolts are assholes, Applejack is an asshole, and everypony loses! Hooray!

#18. “The Mean 6”: At least Chrysalis was still kind of intimidating in “To Where and Back Again”. This episode just made her look like a joke who had no clue what she was doing (more than “A Canterlot Wedding” already did, I mean).

#19. “The Parent Map”: Remember “Parental Glideance”? That was last year’s, “God, my parents are so embarrassing!” episode. This is this year’s. Joy.

#20. “Friendship University”: Someone was confused that I complained about Twilight apparently hating competition, even though she was trying to shut down the Friendship University because she clearly knew that Flim and Flam were untrustworthy. This person apparently missed the fact that Twilight was upset that somepony was opening a competing friendship school BEFORE she found out it was Flim and Flam who were running it, and she in fact went to the Friendship University specifically to find something wrong with it. That’s the part I was objecting to: the fact that Twilight is still so neurotic that she can’t handle not being in control of everything. In fact, that raises an interesting point. Has there ever been an episode where Twilight has had to learn the lesson of, “Other people are capable of things, too. Not everything has to be run by you first”? It certainly wasn’t this one.

#21. “Surf and/or Turf”: Hey, another episode where the conflict made no sense! And, as an added bonus, another one where just talking to the other people involved would have resolved it instantly! Huzzah! Old El Paso managed to make “Why not both?” the lesson of a 30-second commercial. I don’t know why this took so much longer.

#22. “Horse Play”: COM-MU-NI-CA-TION. “You’re a bad actress. You can have a surprise cameo at the end of our play to make the crowd happy, but that’s it.” Jesus.

#23. “The Hearth’s Warming Club”: What exactly was the message of this episode? “Don’t lie”? No, because they never told Twilight the truth; she just happened to be standing behind them when Gallus told the other kids. “Don’t wreck shit”? No, because Gallus never faced any consequences for that. Honestly, the lesson should have been directed at teachers, and it should have been, “Don’t try this shit. It never works; it just pisses everyone off, including you.”

#24. “The Maud Couple”: Worst new character of the season. Hands down. I hope we never see him again, especially if the only way we get more Maud is if he comes along for the ride. What a prick.

#25. “A Matter of Principals”: Speaking of episodes that teach the lesson to the wrong person... Remind me again why Discord wasn’t the one who learned the lesson here? Because he’s unteachable? Because he’s “reformed” and therefore has already learned all the lessons he needs to? Also, this is a rare episode where the characters do actually communicate properly (Starlight does tell Discord to knock his shit off), and they try to pretend they didn’t! Twilight gets mad at Starlight for not talking to Discord, even though she did! You can’t do this, writers! You just can’t!

#26. “Yakity-Sax”: Talk about not knowing what fucking lesson they were trying to teach. You know what? I bet this actually happened. I bet Michael P. and/or Wil Fox were practicing their electric guitar or drums or bagpipes or whatever for days on end at all hours of the night, and all their neighbors called the cops on them. This was their way of sticking it to everyone. “No! You should let me do whatever the hell I want! It doesn’t matter if it disturbs you! Fuck the system! It’s my passion! You can’t stop me from living my dream!”

There’s a holiday special next week, and near as I can figure, it hasn’t been aired in another country ahead of time! We’ll actually get to watch this one together! Yay!

#my little pony: friendship is magic #my little pony friendship is magic #my little pony #friendship is magic #mlp fim #mlp #fim #my little pony spoilers #mlp spoilers #spoilers #season 8 retrospective #retrospective

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