#I'll probably expand on the hero concepts later

[howlingguardian]

I think I'm going to do some worldbuilding on my superhero idea.

In a fairly typical superpower setting- costumed heroes and villains, the occasional giant monster, etc, plumber and single father Frank Bennett comes home from work one day to see a costumed woman standing in his apartment.

Naturally, he freaks- until said spandex-clad stranger transforms back into his 12 year old daughter Tammy, who excitedly holds up a drawing of the superhero she was a second ago. She'd discovered that she has the power to create drawings that can transform you into the subject of the drawing, complete with powers, for a limited time.

The next step is obvious- she's young, powerful, and driven by an innocent desire to do good like the heroes on the news. She's going to be a superhero.

Absolutely not, says Frank.

They argue massively, before Frank sends her to her room to try and think. Left to himself, he realises that she's too determined to be persuaded easily, and he can't keep her away from paper and pencils for the rest of her life. But he also doesn't want his baby girl running around doing some daring do, even if she signs up with a superhero team- and he's not eager for that, because there are stories about child superheros having the same problems as other child celebrities. So what's the solution?

Frank knocks on Tammy's door, and offers her a deal- no superheroics for herself until she's 18 and ready to make her own decisions. In exchange, he'll take her drawings and do the hero stuff himself.

Tammy likes the idea- what kid doesn't secretly imagine their parent as a hero at some point- and eagerly shows him her drawings and her ideas for various superheroes.

The thing is, most of the heroes in this setting are pretty grounded; less capes and more body armour. Whereas Tammy's ideas are more like something out of cartoons, or the stuff an excitable 12 year old would come up with.

Thus, over the next 6 years, the inhabitants of the city of Steelhaven are absolutely baffled by multicoloured goofballs with powers even odder than usual showing up out of nowhere for a day to help with whatever problem's going on- guys like Caffeinator the coffee-fuelled speedster, or Demo Dino the cyborg pachycephalosaurus construction worker, or Kanga-Fu the martial arts master from Down Under.

And then there's Yo-Yo Master. Nobody is forgetting Yo-Yo Master.

Over the years, Tammy's art skills improve, and her various teenage phases and personal life crises influence her art- her emo phase results in a rash of gloomy heroes with way too much eyeliner, while her love of fantasy books give rise to friendly ogres and benevolent minotaurs.

And Frank has to buck up and slip into the body and powers of all of them. Nobody ever said it was easy parenting a teenage superhero!

[epickiya722]

You know what the moment it was revealed Izuku was left with the embers back in 424, I knew he was going to become Horikoshi's previous protagonist from 2008... Jack Midoriya.

I'm sure almost everyone has heard of Jack Midoriya, right?

Well, guess what, you are today!

Let me just point out something that I noticed when it comes to Horikoshi and his concepts and characters. Some of the characters are characters from his previous works and maybe he has used a certain concept before. Izuku Midoriya and his story is no different. It's been told before but in a different flavor.

(I kid you not that every time I think I'm done finding every character and concept Horikoshi has used before, I'm not done. I'll probably make a post of a list!)

For those who don't know, Horikoshi had an one-shot manga published back in 2008, which is 16 years ago, called My Hero. Already seems familiar, doesn't it?

Well, it should be. My Hero Academia is like a more revamped version of that story, just expanded with more added themes and characters and a different setting.

In summary of My Hero, Jack Midoriya is a salesman who wants to be a hero, but due to being anemic and failing his Hero License exam (yes, that exists), he can't become one officially. However, it doesn't stop him from trying! Throughout the story, Jack does still try to be a hero, using the gadgets the company he works for makes. Spoiler alert, by the end of the story, he is recognized as a hero. Especially, by the one person he has looked up, Snipe aka the real Positive, the mantle Jack used during his vigilante run.

Now, how does this may relate to Izuku Midoriya?

Throughout the story, it seemed that a quirk, a good one, is what was needed for someone to be a Hero. Izuku was born Quirkless and his dreams of being a Hero seemed fruitless, nearly shut down when his role model, All Might tells him so. (Which Snipe does to Jack.) However, after trying to save Katsuki, All Might sees that Izuku does have the ambition to be a Hero and Izuku inherits the One For All Quirk from him.

Now I know some of you said that was pointless for him to have a Quirk and then lose if he was going to become a Hero anyways using gadgets.

But, folks, that was it. There is a point. And the point is... it was pointless.

Here's what I'm getting...

One theme I think is often looked over is "be your unapologetic self" and another could be "work with what you have".

Izuku never needed a Quirk to be the best Hero he could be because he already had Heroic qualities, but he did need a Quirk to see that.

One For All was a Quirk that needed to be gone. It was a curse disguised as a blessing. It worked so to challenge Izuku into becoming the Hero he always meant to be. Just as Jack Midoriya did in his story.

Now that Izuku is Quirkless, he now can become that Hero. He still has room to grow and learn from what he did fail at in the past to be better in the future.

It wasn't something he was going to learn overnight just as society isn't going to change overnight.

While MHA has some fantasy elements, just like many other stories before and after, it is a reflection of the real world sometimes. One reality is that it takes a long time to finally understand something.

In real life, it takes people years to understand "Hey, that's not right" or "maybe I should change this about me".

The characters of MHA are no different.

"Society hasn't changed, there's still discrimination, there's still rankings and---"

Well, yeah. Again reflection of the real world.

And just because the changes aren't seen, doesn't mean that they can't happen or that they didn't happen.

The last chapter gave us glimpses of what transpires over the eight years. What if those events have changed? Even not then, what about later?

"What about the talk between Katsuki and Izuku?" Just because we didn't see it, didn't mean it didn't happen. It was revealed Katsuki put in a lot of money for Izuku's Hero equipment, so that's a sign for me that they did talk some more because knowing Katsuki, he wouldn't have just done that unless he knew Izuku would be okay with it somehow.

Hell, they still had two years of high school left together. You're telling me it's impossible that they didn't have a talk?!

Sometimes I feel like some of you decide "this sucks" is because you just don't have the patience to try to decipher the message yourself. You want it handed out to you.

Not me, I want a writer to challenge my imagination because that gets my mind working and really engaged with the story. I might not understand it, but it's not that big of a deal for me. I'll still try to understand and if I never get it, I'll just move on.

Really my overall take from "Izuku being Quirkless again but still a Hero" among other things is that yeah, work with what you have. Just because you receive something that may be a blessing, it will also curse you in some way. The things and changes you want won't happen overnight, it takes time. Izuku was already a Hero, or at least one in the making.

And honestly, Izuku wearing a suit (because he's a teacher) and still being a Hero with gadgets just visually is like a reminder of "I'm not forgetting where I started" from Horikoshi.

It's wholesome in a way that he went back to an earlier work and still used his intended concept for Izuku (he wanted to make him an adult but had to change it to Izuku being a high schooler) of his last chapter. Full circle! My Hero may not be Horikoshi's first work (yes, folks, it's not), but it's familiar.

And I know some of you may not care for my opinion because I'm sure this post made you feel some kind of way (not my intention, but damn it, I'm tired of not expressing how I feel), but I know some of you might.

My overall thought of the finale? It is not as bad as some of you make it out to be. I'm sure there are worse endings out there and it's not like Izuku didn't become a Hero. It's not like Izuku didn't have people by his side because he did.

"But he was lonely." Well, you would, too if you couldn't hang out with your friends. But they're adults now and busy. Izuku is busy, too, he's a teacher.

"But Izuku's feelings!" Cut it because this is the same fandom where some of you don't care how he feels. He cries, it was annoying to you. Oh, but when he was neglecting himself y'all sure was like "yeah so badass".

I see myself in Izuku with how he treats his emotions. He's expressive, but he also tends to keep in his feelings. He even keeps them from us, the audience.

"Eight years it took him to be a Hero again!" Back to my original point. Izuku was always a Hero. You don't have to go out there and fight to be one. You don't need a Quirk to be one.

Overall, I don't hate the ending at all. It have easily been worse.

Sure I would have loved more Miruko, but I'm glad she's alive and some other Heroes didn't get the spotlight like that anyways. She is still a minor character, so I'm not actually upset. 😆

[nezushisreunion]

Book 6 spoilers

Some Shroud thoughts

Someone I find very interesting in book 6 has to be Ortho, phantom Ortho to be more specific. Original Ortho and his relationship with our Ortho

Basically the ramblings of a crazy person about Shroud brothers

In the jp server, there is a line that ORTHO says "I wonder what else Ortho would do for nii-san." Which was changed in eng, "Ortho" was replaced with "I". It implies that ORTHO looks towards Ortho for advice, never receiving any as the dead cannot talk. ORTHO wants to be Ortho Shroud, or at least the best Ortho Shroud he could be so Idia wouldn't be sad anymore. Which makes his choice to end the world make sense, he wants to do it because Ortho Shroud would do it and also to make Idia happy again.

When Ortho and ORTHO meet, the original line was "pleasure to make your acquaintance, me" the kanji was "me" while the voice over said "Ortho" which I think is a pretty cool detail. Ortho accepts ORTHO as himself, and does not seem to resent him for taking his spot as Ortho Shroud.

Idia originally was against the idea of ending the world, it was until ORTHO calls him "nii-chan" instead of his usual "nii-san", desperate to get his brother back, Idia runs down to Tartaros. It is shown that Idia will do anything for Ortho in the attempts to make him happy, in his flashback, he hacks the security system so Ortho could have an adventure with his big brother, and once again he is doing something FOR Ortho to make him happy. Idia doesn't see the point in doing anything because nothing will change, he'll always be a Shroud, but if Ortho asked him, he'd run down several flights of stairs to grant his wish. Because whatever Ortho wants, Ortho gets.

My interpretation of that is because Idia understands his fate, he will have no freedom, ever. But his little brother didn't (I'll expand on that later), so in his attempts to keep his innocence, he will grant Ortho whatever he wants. If Ortho wants to go on an adventure, fine. If Ortho wants to reset the world, fine. Whatever made him happy.

I think Idia would've done the exact same for ORTHO, it was just because of his shock that he had acted like that to ORTHO, the situation of a cyber attack on the security system brought back unwanted memories, causing him to accidentally lash out at ORTHO. I believe Idia holds no real resentment to Ortho.

Now back to Ortho, in Idia's flashback, he said "why's that? I want us both to be!" In response to Idia saying he cannot be a hero but Ortho probably could. It implies that Ortho lacks the understanding that he's a Shroud and will never have freedom. He's still ignorant, a trait that Idia does not have. Which leads me to believe that Ortho doesn't fully understand the concept of phantoms, he doesn't understand that being his brother's phantom, he is hurting him. He doesn't understand that by being his brother's phantom, he is slowly killing his brother. Which just makes their dynamic so much more depressing

Now to the scene where Ortho and Idia talk, Ortho telling Idia to live for him. I have two interpretations of this scene, one is the popular one which is Ortho just wanting Idia to be happy. My second interpretation is just, Ortho pretending to be mature so his brother wouldn't be sad anymore. He knows that his brother was willing to die just for him, and he doesn't want that because his brother shouldn't suffer. I believe that because well, ghosts don't age, and Ortho still acts pretty childlike, he acts like he's 8 but also a mixture of the age he should've been, 16. I feel as if it's because he doesn't wish for Idia to worry anymore

But hey that's just a theory

[justatalkingface]

The Failure of Corruption in Heroes

So, here's the thing with MHA: when it first started, it made a lot of promises to the readership; there's Izuku becoming a hero, of course, but I'm talking more about the unstated promises, about the themes that were presented to us, which are as much the reason I got as into the story as I did as the characters were. A lot of these themes, over time, have fallen to the wayside, and today I'm talking about one I mention again and again: corruption in heroics.

I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that early on this was one of the biggest themes we were shown, and one that presented as early as the first chapter, no less.

From Mt. Lady kill stealing for glory, to Stain getting a cult following for killing the "corrupt" (more on my contempt for Stain later), heroic corruption was referred all over early on, and even now, in the grim post war era it still clings to life.

Here's the problem: where are the corrupt heroes?

I can count, on one hand, all of them: there's three who are on screen for more than five minutes, Endeavour, Hawks, and Lady Nagant. There's aso that mole for the MLF that get picks up before the raid who is there for about a minute.

And... that's it.

I mean, that's three and a half examples; that seems pretty good, right? The thing is that this problem isn't supposed to be an aberration, it's supposed to be systemic. Stain murders people, and one speech seems to give him a cult following, to the point where he has merch. This is something that almost every major villain talks about; this is supposed to be a lot more prevalent than Endeavour and the Hero Commissions barely expanded on black ops squad.

Where's the heroes taking bribes, or working with small time villains? Where the abuse of power? Where are all the other abusive spouses? Where is all the typical things you'd expect of a corrupt law enforcing institution?

On top of that, there was a focus early on about what heroes meant, but after awhile that petered out as well.

One of the big things of MHA, you see, is that hero is a multifaceted word in setting; it refers to people who save people, yeah. It's also a job, though, one with massive influence, merchandising, public accolades and presumably income.

Izuku, early one, seemed like he'd be the one to... redeem heroics, take them back to their more vigilante roots of just helping people rather than having it as some big popularity contest... which it honestly is? We don't really know what metrics go into ranking heroes, which honestly is probably a damaging concept in itself, but it seems to be heavily involved with the public perception of said heroes, if not completely coming from it.

We had a nice contrast to Izuku, to show this grey area, with Bakugou, who wanted to be rich and famous, Ochako, who wanted money for her family, and just the way UA itself operates at times, with things like the Sports Festival being as much about branding as anything else, and the heroes in the first chapter just standing around instead of trying to save the child dying in front of them.

And the thing is, all of that is a good setup for Izuku, as an audience proxy, to start getting past his blind hero worship and start questioning the system he wants to be a part of; not just how it fails the regular people, but also how it preys on heroes themselves, but it just never happens. That grey area starts fading away over time.

I think it was supposed to be sparked by Stain, at some point into something more, and in story, that's apparently what happened. In reality...

Yeah... about Stain. He has a point, in theory. He's a crazy serial killer, but he's not completely wrong. In practice though? He's supposed to hunt the corrupt. We... we don't see that. Almost all the heroes he's attack have been, at best, names, and then there's Tensei, who I'll get to in a second. If these are corrupt heroes, shouldn't we... hear about that? That they were threatening people, maybe, or taking bribes, or... something, to spark these attacks? And that's not even getting into Tensei, who, from everything we've seen in the spin off, was honestly the ideal kind of hero, kind, helpful, inspirational.

So, it's weird that Stain is attacking him, right?

Actually, not really. Stain has this idealized view of heroes, where if they aren't All Might, society's vision of the ideal hero and someone he almost literally worships, they aren't worth living, and that's why he falls flat as this big symbol of societies darkness or whatever; attacking heroes for failing to be heroic, for doing bad shit, is one thing, something that makes his takes more valid. What he's actually doing is attacking everyone that doesn't meet his personal vision of perfection, which pretty much invalidates whatever is left of his point once you got past all the murdering.

And then, as if to lampshade how much he doesn't work, Hori gets rid of him right after, and after maybe ten chapters he almost never comes up again.

So why is it like this? This is something I brought up when I talked about the League, if approached from the other direction: Hori is afraid of his heroes being wrong, and while he makes the villains always seem wrong to discredit them, he also makes his heroes always seem right so they seem infallible. At this point, I'm not sure if he chickened out part way through his writing, or editors or the industry stopped him, or he just never meant to go in depth into all of this, but so much of the story revolves around the idea that heroes are imperfect.

But we don't see that.

Can you imagine how much harder all the Stain stuff would have hit, for example, if every time he attacked someone he leaked an exposé on who he attacked and why? If every 'victim' he attacked turned out to be a criminal in their own right? And, I feel like I'm doing Tensei dirty by saying this, but imagine the development for Iida if he finds out his brother, his beloved brother he looked up to, was bad? Did bad things? Maybe even, dare i say deserved to be attacked? How his internal debate over taking up the name Ingenium would have looked?

Or when Momo is apprenticed to a hero who spends all her time on fashion shows and commercials, if she said, 'No, I became a hero to save people, not to sell out', and took a stand against a woman who seemed to be almost using her to make a quick buck .

Or... anything, really.

Because for this big, systemic issue, all we really have is Endeavour, who Hori started engaging in Initial D worthy U-Turns to try and salvage the perception of his character almost immediately after he was introduced. Less than a year of in story after it started, no non-villain ever says an unkind word about him any more because he's apparently changed that much. We also have Hawks and the Commission pulling his strings, but since they were killed off off screen that's just... better now, apparently, and we should never talk about them ever again even if the organization itself is still there, and Lady Nagant who, as a character introduced Post War, by default barely even exists.

Oh, and you know, Post War itself. Let me sum up how Post War talked about heroic corruption in the press conference shortly after it begins:

Hawks: Ah, yes, cold-bloodedly executing Twice really tore me up. Deep inside.

*pats chest*

Right here.

Reporter: ...Your heart is on the other side of your body. That's so far to the side... there's nothing important even there.

Hawks: And?

Reporter: Endeavour! Endeavour! What do you say to critics who cite... *checks notes* ...Your entire existence?

Endeavour: Watch me.

Reporter: What? What does that have to do with-

Endeavour, louder: Watch me!

Reporter: But what abou-

Endeavour, screaming now as he burns down the podium: WATCH ME!!!!

Hawks, under orders, joined a bunch of villains for months, apparently killed someone to get entry, blended enough that only a perpetually paranoid shell of a human being saw through his act, and killed a man on national television.

Endeavour was so desperate for success that he married a woman to breed her like she was cattle, and discarded every child she bore like a particularly jaded gatcha player until he got the proxy he desired for his ambitions.

I know I hammed up the responses a lot, but their answers to these problems answered nothing, solved nothing, and barely acknowledged anything, yet it was presented to us as, well, important, like it helped show how sorry they are, and how much they really mean that they'll do better this time, honest.

And this is the pinnacle of the supposed corruption in the later parts of the story, since stuff was theoretically happening off screen, while Lady Nagant showed up and repented in a matter of minutes.

The thing is, for this big, corrupt system, one that is failing so badly that it's collapsing, we never really see the corruption. It's only there, conveniently, so it can provide backstories to motivate the villains, and then vanishes. Meanwhile, all the heroes are, to a man, woman, and apprentice, blindingly Good, willing to sacrifice themselves for the cause (or for Hori's fan favorite), or at worst willing to quit when they don't think they can do it anymore, and that doesn't seem particularly corrupt, now does it?

You can tell us until you're blue in the face about how the heroic industry is flawed, Hori, but until you actually show us these flaws, it'll only fall flat.

[astraeus-moon]

@melchinafan Sorry for the late ish response I feel kinda sick so it took me a while longer to organize my thoughts. Also here we fucking go apologies for no read more sins I am on mobile

And no I haven't seen those ign articles! More canon info to add to my hordes! And Jacob :( sad baby girl. I'll probably post those (The screenshots of the new info)  later for easy access for others

Your point on all 4 of heros being effected makes me wonder if Grave lock girls magic has sort of an area of effect or if the alpha vampires magic is a double edged sword in positively affecting the heros

And ooooo I didn't know there were other blood remnants that came in dif forms makes me wonder if they are somewhat similar to the alpha vamp remnants bc I think i remember it being mentioned somewhere the vial also had psychic residue?? Could not be I'm just losing it but eh. And the psychic residue perhaps being in the blood/body? And that's why it alters you?

And yeah I agree! I think that we don't carry them into the fight just to crack open the door and sort of wave a red flag at a bull sort of way

And then when the alpha vampire dies we get the remnant imbued with a bit of that vamps specific magic

And yeah perhaps using the skulls almost a psychic lockpick if those chosen had been imbued with some of the alphas powers (referring to the trickle down effect you noticed, Vampire mlm is a concept that will be lodged in my brain now)

The biggest one for Bellwether not giving a shit I believe was a piece of dialog that said like "once we get out of here do you think they'll drop a nuke on this place" which made me laugh bc I audibly went just like resident evil grqt2h3 which despite some of the negative reviews comparisons to other games the lack of resident evil with vampires is making me laugh (I mean it in a positive way I'm very attached to RE)

Plus I don't think a privately funded not so small military/mercanary group is gonna lose sleep over a "few" civilian casualties (especially not when you can write em off as vampire deaths when it comes down to it)

Yeah I agree! One of my main grievances was I wish that side quest/mini bosses got more diversity and watchers idk if those are miniboss types as I think they go down p easy (but like I said can't/haven't played the game so I could be wrong) they seem closer to the mutated cultists than "true" vampires

And totally get you on lore one of my other favorite games is destiny 2 and holy shit the amount of environmental storytelling/lore is so strong they have a fan run website to compile it all so I totally get you.

And ooo I'm always looking for new games to watch/obsess over so I'll have to check it out

And yeah unfortunately the people I watched wernt too into grave lock collecting and the only 100 locations video I've found doesn't play em in full

And yeah with Addison I won't spoil it but holy shit he was the worst one too me I wrote out/expanded on the house of Echos mission so I was rewatching and it ended up being 4k words but also it was woof. I almost wish they swapped the order of the map start out in the second way with the other 2 then work into the 1st area for the hollow man

Yeah my sort of interpretation (both in how I'm writing and general fun) is that his Ravens outlines + his guns lock on are from that eye but a fun thing I had was giving them all like the way things are highlighted blue for you to grab some of the psychic residue as most of the psychic energy we see (barring layla) tend to be a pale blue - teal(?) Ish color and it was just funny to me that the highlights for important objects were similar

I agree with vampires probably having night vision as they are supposed to be a sort of apex predator so night vision fits with the whole can't go in the sun.  It does make me wonder if Jacob would run into issues in direct sunlight with that eye time to invest in sunglasses my guy

And yeah I hadn't considered the psychic spaces as like stronger spaces where the trance is louder, bc in my thoughts I think the trance is a seperate but adjacent magic thing to what turned them into vampires

It definitely seems like the magic sort of got them all or bolstered abilities in some way and come on we both know that devs def smart enough to crack teleportation lmaooo necessity is the mother of invention and all that. But I do think that magic and science go hand in hand (destiny 2 is so great for that reason aswell because so much of what looks like magic can be kinda turned into science)

I think Remis ult is pure video game but healing it would make sense if it gave out a sort of opposite end of the spectrum vampire healing and helped you regenerate by like tapping into that magic that's settled in you or the vials/remnants

yeah we don't know how the healing actually works as you don't regen health unless you find medpacks which leads me to believe you do have to needle and thread it up instead of magic video game heal as explained in dishonored or prey

And yeah I'm assuming vamp regen at best at worst, you should uhhhh probably got get that looked at bud and yeah blood as fuel is a good idea even if it was connected or disconnected

And yeah the tissues, I'd imagine a wash cloth would be slightly more useful than tissues but eh and yeah sort of a gunk goop dripping thing (ie Eris Morn from destiny with her hive eyes)

And yeah! I think to be a bloodbag/sin eater it also I think is slightly voluntary(?) As the sin eaters are like that. And the blood bags seem pretty eager so maybe the most devoted cultists get turned into em

And yeah I'm uncertain bc I remember for one of the missions Jacob has a line like "but slitting the throat of your neighbor to get in." Or smth like that it's been awhile

And yeah vampire mlm, and yeah definitely maybe the more sacrifices brought in = higher chance of getting turned

I think it's a bit of both as we see with the alphas they were all real shitty people beforehand and yknow being willing to kill others to further your own gain definitely fits under "bloodsucker" (derogatory) in my mind lmao

And I think that's why Jason got away was bc hes not a bad person and was rather selfless hence but still also perhaps shaped by the intent of the person giving you magic (jacobs raven, laylas telekinesis which is something other higher up vampires can do as weve seen with the sea) But also made to shape you're own natural abilities remis healing, devs gadgets :) especially in those latter two cases where they wernt forced really to have the powers

The slow boil is soooo intresting to me bc like where were they? Like in the nests psychic spaces and just coming out to feed plus with the size of the alphas I think that'd kick up a fuss

I think probably a but of both, as drug trials/medical research like aevum was doing was bound to test on mice at least and upon observing the effects may have worked there way up to humans but huge fucking claw marks are probably vampires especially from what we've seen they are extraordinarily wasteful with animals perhaps both as food and ensuring surviving humans can't get it

And birds + animals disappearing evokes a similar feeling of when animals tend to dip before natural disasters because there senses and instincts are so much stronger than ours but also vampires killing them because they couldn't go after people yet

also lmao yeah like idk where tf they were going with that like was the plan to eventually move out of redfall or use it like a home base or smth bc you kill the animals and the people you're gonna have to start eating each other

And yeah I have to imagine at least one cultist was wincing and didn't voice it but was very much like aw come on guys

And yeah! Idk if it's ever explained if vampires exclusively have to eat blood/meat or can eat other things aswell

And oh my God don't get me started on the impacts of introducing a fuck ton of apex predators into your ecosystem and food chain not to mention if other animals mutated and are breeding. Like just removing Wolves from Yellowstone was enough to fuck over the ecosystem I can imagine something on this scale plus the probably intense growth from the decomp rates of bodies.. anyone in an environmental science field would be tearing their hair out (specifically my own redfall oc whose a park ranger is not having a great time with that)

You would have to build ground up essentially as trying a top down approach would fuck up the few remaining secondary and primary consumers (obligatory environmental science rant over)

They all def do the trance def is giving hive mind vibes aswell as a removal of emotional/rational thinking makes me wonder if the blood trance heightens base instincts/hunting drive or aggression like with animals being aggressive and shit being fucked

And oh def, bc each of the bosses has there own space but the nests aswell which makes me wonder if vampires have their own allegiances or a nest is like a pack

And yeah hindsights 20/20 and yeah fears a hell of a motivator and cults pray on scared lonely people with no other options and yeah in too deep

I haven't! Unfortunately I haven't watched a dev playthrough and there's not too many multiplaythroughs on YouTube but I'll inform you if I come across any! And as for rough speculation on mothman physique(?) I think leathery makes sense from someone as logical as dev since it glides so it being similar to a bat or moth it almost makes me think of point pleasants.. intresting... statue of the mothman to say the least...

And yeah woof the scientists sure as hell are doing some malpractice although I'd admire arkanes commitment to fuck the rich with them being consistent enemies.  And yeah sorry this got Hella long

[your-brilliant-lady-m]

Part 5 - Basic Concepts of Miraculous Ladybug: Guardians

Helloooo! Did you think I was done? No!

My PhD thesis chapters were approved last week, so have some celebratory meta. I haven't seen the latest Season 4 episodes, so do forgive me for not being up to date.

Welcome to the next part of my analysis of the basic concepts of Miraculous Ladybug. Today we are talking about Master Fu, Order of the Guardians and how little everything here makes sense. I highly recommend reading previous parts to fully understand this one, but I'll try to quote most parts of earlier posts.

Order of the Guardians

Order is an international and ancient organisation (New York Special showed us the guardian from North America and he was dressed like Su Han). Presumably, Miraculous jewels were created by these people. Guardians are responsible for the preservation of jewels and knowledge about them. They also distribute Miraculouses to worthy people around the world to combat mostly magical threats, but sometimes jewels are used against normal threats too. It's implied that Master Fu used Miraculouses during WW2 when he was in Paris. Perhaps he performed some spywork with Marianne, but the magical nature of his interferences was discovered and he was forced to flee, before returning to France many decades later.

Why does the Order need so many people to take care of a 3 Miracle Boxes? If its only purpose is to preserve knowledge, keep magical secrets and distribute Miraculous jewels then wouldn't it be more logical to have Master-Apprentice system? It's much easier to keep magic knowledge a secret and train a few people in martial arts than doing the same in the self-sufficient temple full of people, keeping in mind that a good part of them are teenagers and children, who are bad at keeping secrets. Also a single person can travel around the world much easier to give out Miraculouses. Imagine that we have a few active guardians traveling the world with Boxes. What do other people at the temple do in the meantime? They teach the next generation about the powers of each Miraculous and Mirakung Fu, but besides that?

Master-Apprentice system gives us more personal conflict between Fu and his mentor and makes his relationship with Marinette and Adrien more nuanced. In this scenario Fu accidentally caused the death of his Master at 14 because he wasn't careful. It makes sense for him to take on only 1 or 2 students if this is how things were done with Miraculous Guardians. This Wang Fu is very cautious and protective, he spent the majority of his life afraid of hurting someone else and never took an apprentice as a result. But now he is ready to try again, since he is not getting any younger and he likes these 2 kids. He wants them to succeed. Maybe Master Fu, becomes the father figure for Adrien in this situation and a guide for Marinette. Just think about it. This way writers avoid the need to develop all these extra characters (Su Han) and traditions related to the Order. All inconsistencies I mentioned before and later in this post are gone now! Hell, even memory loss and the changing of the Miracle Box shape could make more sense. We also raise the stakes post-amnesia, if it happens of course (the whole Season 3 finale didn't make sense, so stay tuned for my next meta). Marinette and Adrien are on their own now, there's no one who can give them answers. It's very fun scenario, which has potential to be brilliant. Any thoughts on that?

The existence of Order of the Guardians is not quite a secret, at least it wasn't in XIX century China. Master Fu in "Feast" says that guardianship was considered "a great honor". It implies that people who lived close to the temple of the Order knew about Miraculouses and what exactly guardians did for the greater good.

The existence of other Miracle Boxes around the world makes sense from a real-life perspective. Writers have the ability to create many stories set in the same universe and use them for merchandise and an almost unlimited amount of content. Judging by the unholy amount of specials in production, this is exactly what the creators are going to do. It probably won't go down well, but who knows?

However, it doesn't work in our main story. The main conflict is Paris-centred. Gabriel's motivations revolve around Emilie's resurrection and Season 4 gives us more reasons to suspect that Adrien's mom wasn't as wonderful as everyone says. Hawkmoth still remains the main villain of the show and most likely it's going to stay that way. There's no point in moving the main story to different places for the sake of introducing more Miracle Boxes from around the world. Ladybug and Chat Noir aren't needed to fight something halfway across the world unless Hawkmoth also changes locations.

LB and CN are centrepieces of this franchise. They brought success and money to ZAG. Creators constantly need to remind the audience that this new piece of media with new characters who will never be mentioned again is connected to Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Chat Noir. Writers have to come up with reasons to include our heroic duo into the story even if makes no sense.

New York Special had to introduce American Heroes whose names rarely come up in the fandom because people stopped caring about them or their stories shortly after the release of the Special. I barely saw any content dedicated to them. In order to bring LB and CN into the story, you have to include Hawkmoth too. Gabriel suddenly needs to get his hands on the Eagle Miraculous and goes to USA. Marinette and Adrien suddenly have a class trip to New York. Unfortunately, their presence in this story is required only to expand the world of Miraculous and attract fans of the show, so that they could keep an eye on new content related to newly introduced characters.

In the end, it's not their story. Events of the special don't affect main story of the show and the development of the love square is merely an illusion, because Adrien and Marinette are no closer than before. In season 4 LB and CN are growing apart and their test of trust in NY Special doesn't matter. Perhaps, some people don't see it that way and it's their right, but I find it hard to see NYS as a valid contribution to canon. I mean, even people in large portion of the fandom state in the tags on AO3 that "specials are not canon", "specials didn't happen" or "ignores both specials". It speaks volumes about continuity and preferences of your fandom.

Shanghai Special didn't give us more information about the Order, which is located in China, history of Miraculous jewels. We still don't know much about how Gabriel and Emilie found Peacock and Butterfly. Maybe, Marinette's family had connections to Miraculous jewels. Maybe, Adrien does some snooping and discovers research his parents made while Gabriel is away. All of these are relevant to the main story. However, we got something much different in the end.

Marinette chases Adrien across the globe and they make new friends. Fey becomes Ladydragon and now has a direct contact with Marinette through her uncle. Gabriel's desire to get his hands on the Prodigious comes out of nowhere. Apparently, he had been planning this trip for years, presumably even before Adrien was born. It probably happened at the same time as Agrestes found 2 Miraculouses. He bought bracelet-key (which is also a Miraculous apparently, but its Kwami is a Guardian of the Prodigious and they existed separately for a very long time - and let us not dwell on this mess) from some shady mafia boss, who can easily find out just who Gabriel really is (fashion designer billionaire) and use this information to blackmail him. This Special didn't answer important questions, but it gave us a new superhero character.

The real question is whether Miraculous as a project will survive long enough for writers to create content for every minor character they introduced in all specials. This is only a beginning after all.

Miraculous is not a global show and it can't be globalised in a way that makes sense, at least with Ladybug and Chat Noir in the centre of action. Case closed.

Mirakung Fu

I liked the idea of Mirakung Fu introduced in "Furious Fu". It makes sense and things rarely do in this show. Miraculous grants its holder superhuman strength, stamina, endurance and ability to fight. This means that essentially transformed heroes are guided by magic in combat. There's nothing personal in the way Miraculous holders fight. You can predict their moves and learn how to fight this magic guidance, which is what Su Han does.

However, if the holder has any special training, skills or knows any martial art in their civilian life then they become more dangerous opponents during transformation because now their fighting is a mix of magical moves and their personal knowledge, tricks and style. Therefore, Adrien and Kagami as skilful fencers have more chances of winning against someone who knows Mirakung Fu than Marinette, for example.

Memory loss

At the end of season 3, we find out several things:

apparently, now Miracle Box can change appearance to suit its guardian;

when Guardian passes down the Miracle Box to someone else, they lose memories not only about everything related to Miraculous, but also about pretty much everything in their life (Fu doesn't recognise Marianne, instead he experiences the love at first sight)

Master Fu trains Marinette to be the proper holder and next Guardian off-screen. He says that her training as the holder is complete in "Feast" and wants her to become the next Guardian. Fu told her lots of things, and yet, he never mentioned the fact that he would lose his memory after relinquishing the box, nor the fact that Marinette would lose her memory afterwards. She finds out about this from Wayzz after the battle with Miracle Queen and the letter that Master Fu gave her. That's not proper training! How on Earth do you forget to mention this memory loss? How?

Master Fu's amnesia is a convenient plot device that removes him from the narrative almost completely. That's mostly all there is to it. Why? Because it doesn't make sense.

Fu was around 7 or 8 when he started his training. The disaster at the temple happened when he was 14. He stated that his training was never complete, which means that he never passed any magical ritual, never swore an oath or was bound by some kind of spell that made him subjected to the rule of memory loss.

Miracle Boxes belonged to the order, not Fu. Their design reflected their country of origin because these Miraculous were made and kept in China. They were just standing there on the shelves not magically bound to anyone in particular. When Feast attacked, monks just tossed Wang Fu the miracle box and grimoire. No one at the temple lost their memory after Fu took the box with him (Su Han is the proof). Su Han not only remembers Fu and his mistake but everything that happened that fateful day as well. In "Furious Fu" Marinette explains Su Han that Master Fu lost his memory in the very first conversation they have. However, after Ladybug and Chat Noir fight Su Han on the roof and escape with the Miracle Box, the latter searches for Fu and attempts to take his staff from him. In this scene, Su Han acts like Fu knows very well what is going on and who he is.

Su Han should be aware of the memory loss rule as the Celestial Guardian. He remarks on the different shape of the Mother Miracle Box and calls her "incorrect", which means that Su Han should have been able to easily tell that previous Guardian lost his memory and the Miracle Box is now bound to someone else. But he doesn't say anything. Moreover, since Su Han is supposed to know about amnesia, he seemed awfully chill about forcing this 14-year-old girl in front of him to give up the box and her memories. Hell, Chat Noir wasn't on board with this. But we get zero reaction from Su Han.

During the first conversation between Marinette and Su Han, he doesn't ignore what she is trying to say, instead he actively comments on every word. Even if Su Han didn't listen when Marinette told him about Fu's memory loss, than he still should be able to understand that Fu doesn't recognise him, because of common sense and the "incorrect" shape of the box. But nothing of the sort happens. Because writers apparently forgot that "memory loss" is supposed to be known to everyone in the Order. On-screen it looks like Su Han is not aware of the "amnesia rule".

"Furious Fu" makes the concept of memory loss a plothole no matter how you look at it. Just like "Timetagger" and "Chat Blanc", as well as "Kwamibuster" this episode is not consistent within itself. It does not surprise me, however.

Grimoire and Guardian Staffs

Let's talk about the Miraculous Grimoire. Good things first.

There are no illustrations of Miraculouses in camouflage. Kwami can't read its contents, only guardians can. Certain elements are written in riddles as an additional precaution. The book contains only the information people have learned so far, which means that Miraculouses have more unexplored potential ("Mr. Pigeon 72"). It describes powers of each Miraculous, provides information about weapons, has instructions for potions that don't make sense (see previous parts).

Unfortunately, everything is about to go downhill from here.

Guardians are taught how to read the writing in this book. They can read it just like people learn to read texts in a different language. This means that one can read Grimoire like any other book (you don't need to consult some guide to decode each letter or word). Master Fu proclaimed Marinette an almost fully trained Guardian. He should have taught her how to read the Grimoire then (he doesn't know the code very well, but he knew enough to understand the general meaning and content of the book according to "Collector"). He didn't. We don't know why. He shows her powers of every Miraculous but doesn't teach her the code.

Master Fu knows that Grimoire now belongs to Gabriel Agreste. He knows that it's dangerous for someone else to have it. If they knew how to read the Grimoire, they could discover all secrets of Miraculouses and harm Ladybug, Chat Noir and other heroes. It's very important to keep the information about the code top secret because Fu is not the only one with the source material.

What does he do then? Master Fu proceeds to write a French translation of Grimoire for Marinette, a translation that he doesn't even need. He carries it with him at all times on a tablet (without any precautions) just like the Miracle box after "Feast". Naturally, it means that in "Miracle Queen", Gabriel and Nathalie easily managed to get their hands on the tablet and Miracle Box. It allows the plot to happen, sure. But it doesn't make any sense.

"Furious Fu" created another curious plot hole. It will probably be ignored, of course. Su Han has a staff with a magical compass that allows him to find any Miracle box, but not the Miraculous jewels for some reason. How does the staff work? Can it locate the box without the Miraculous? If yes, then it seems useless. What's the point in the ability to locate an empty box? If it can locate the box only with the Miraculous jewels inside, it implies that the staff can track the location of every Miraculous too. So, Su Han could just locate the Butterfly and Peacock without any problem. But he talks about reassigning Ladybug and Black Cat to adults and defeating Hawkmoth like locating the Butterfly is not possible. This situation makes the Guardian Staff a simple plot device that creates plot holes and its only purpose is to explain how Su Han found Marinette.

Also, I have a few more words to say about this. Master Fu had a Guardian Staff that was never mentioned before. I wonder why? That's because the staff didn't exist before "Furious Fu" was written. Writers just went: "Do you know what would be cool? If Fu's cane was really a secret Guardian Staff with a compass all along that he decided to keep even after he lost his memory? It would make people wonder whether Master Fu is faking amnesia, and everyone will definitely call him an awful mentor after this even though we kind of tried to make him a good and responsible person."

Fu didn't give it to Marinette and didn't mention it to her. Why? When he gave up his memory, he should have written about this in his letter at least. Why did he decide to keep it? He can't use it anyway now.

Please note how in the flashbacks Fu didn't take any staff with him when he escaped the temple. Su Han seemed to know how Fu's staff looked like. It means that Master Fu didn't make this staff himself, because it belonged to the Order.

Su Han wasn't even surprised that Marinette didn't have the staff as the current Guardian. Was she not supposed to have it? He never questioned the fact that the former Guardian without memories has the staff. Su Han actually returns this staff to Fu after he is deakumatized and Fu acts like they have never met before. Why did Su Han gave the staff back when he knows what it is and to whom it should belong (to him or to Marinette as the current Guardian)? The staff is useless in the hands of the civilian. Does Marianne know about its secret? We'll probably never find out, unfortunately.

Guardian Staff of Master Fu has a compass too and therefore this also makes it a plot device, just like Su Han's staff.

[problemswithbooks]

your character of choice for the meme

This is tough, there's a lot of characters I love so choosing is hard. I think I'll do Tensei though because he's such a minor character he rarely gets any love.

favorite thing about them

Tensei is such a contrast to his little bro, Tenya. Even though he didn't show up much in the official manga, from the get go you can tell he's a really happy-go-luck, laid back dude. He wants to save people and is really passionate about Hero work, but he's also able to take time to hang out and watch his little brother, or in Vagilities to go jogging with Koichi. He's obviously very good at leading a team and he's more then willing to give them the credit they deserve for helping him.

least favorite thing about them

He doesn't get a little more screen time in the official manga 🙁. I wish we'd gotten a bit more on why Stain targeted him too. I think it was good the anime put in a scene that showed that he wasn't specifically targeted and only came across Stain and lost the fight, but still Stain seemed to find something bad about him and it would have been nice to know what it was. Maybe we'll get a little bit on him at some point, especially if Tenya fights or saves Stain when he shows up again. Also I'm not really a fan of wear his engines are--like I saw the spin-off's concept art of him and they messed up and put them on his triceps instead and that felt better. Like your elbow is a joint--how it move if there's an engine pipe through it?

favorite line

This one from the official manga is good. Sums up his character. It's expanded on more in the spin-off about how he values speed because when people are in trouble what they want is for someone to save them fast. All around just wholesome stuff.

brOTP

I like him being friends with Aizawa and his group, but I will say that idk where people got that he went to UA, because I don't think it's ever said that. So I see them becoming friends later on, after Oboro died. You could actually make it kind of angsty because Tensei acts similar to Oboro--the happy go lucky, optimist, and Aizawa would be reminded of him when they hang out. Also him and Tenya having brother brother hang out time!

OTP

Aizawa, Yamada, OT3 is cute. And as I said in my Stain thing, you could do some interesting, angsty stuff with him. Seen him shipped with Fuyumi a few times and it was nice.

nOTP

Midnight probably. Not because I think you couldn't make it work, but more that they're generally thrown together in the background of Aizawa/Yamada fics and it feels forced. Like they had to pair everyone up and Tensei and Midnight were the only ones left. I think it could be done okay, but I just don't like it as an after thought.

random headcanon

He loves parties and huge get togethers at his fancy apartment above Idaten. As a sports lover he will invite the entire staff over to his place to watch the big games of the season. He will invite people he barely knows. There will be sixty or more people over at his place. They will get drunk and trash the place. Everyone loves it and thinks he's the best boss. Tenya is not invited to those parties.

unpopular opinion

I'm not against fics that have him not be fully paralyzed. Like yeah he said he couldn't feel his legs right after the injury but that doesn't mean that he couldn't later get some feeling back. He'd never be a Hero again because he'd still have weak legs and need a chair to get around most of the time, but on good days he could use a cane. Just, because we didn't get full confirmation that he's 100% paralyzed, I think it's cool to have multiple interpretations of his injury and struggles. Not all people who use wheelchairs are 100% confined to them and that's usually the only representation you see. So, letting people write some different variations of mobility struggles with him would be nice.

song i associate with them

Lisztomania by Phoenix, just for the sound--the lyrics don't really make sense.

favorite picture of them

This one from the spin-off. Tensei's smiling like 99% of the time and is just such a happy guy. Like he can get serious but he's just so nice and charming. I totally get after reading some of his parts in Vigilantes why Tenya loved him so much and was so effected by seeing him so beat up and hurt in the hospital. Stain's my fav character but I would give him a smack on the head for hurting this precious, precious man.

He's also just really attractive.

[scriptstructure]

Hi ! Im sorry, my question is going to be very vague and I'll understand if you do not want to answer it. Here it is : I always have beginnings, or very basic concepts, but I never know how the story will go between the beginning and the end (when I have one...). Like, I've been writing for nearly ten years and I came up with hundred of idea but I only found what happens in the middle only two times. Can something help me ? Sorry again for this vague question but I'm like... Desesperate.

I think that this is probably a pretty common problem, and one that I deal with myself a lot of the time. It’s easy to start off with a great idea, it’s harder to persevere through the middle of it and get it done, right?

To me, it seems like there are a few different factors that can make it really difficult to get through the middle part of a story (aside from the difficulty in itself of just sitting down and writing the whole thing, of course), so I’ll go through a few of the main sticking points in writing that I’ve come up against.

I have a beginning, but then what?

Figuring out how to continue a story once you’ve gotten past the ‘brainwave’ section of the idea can be really hard. If the first part of the story came to you so naturally and easily, shouldn’t the rest of it just fall into place?

Well, not really. At this point you’ve probably got to look at what you have so far, look at where you want to get to in the end (if you know that) and figure out the most satisfying path to take to get there. The middle part of a story is often the hardest part, you have to expand on all the great little concepts that you’ve thrown together and you’ve got to figure out how to make them all make sense.

Sometimes brainstorming ideas will help get through this, just to figure out what could possibly happen:

What is the protagonist trying to achieve?

What is the antagonist trying to achieve?

What would be the simplest solution for these things?

What is the biggest mistake the protagonist could make?

What happens if the antagonist succeeds?

What outside forces does the protagonist have to contend with in addition to the events of the main plot?

What could tempt or force the protagonist away from achieving their goals?

Figure out the simplest path from start to end, and then throw a big old roadblock in your protagonist’s path. Make them question their own motives, their own goals, make them question whether they’re the hero that’s really needed here.

Essentially, lay out all the possible things that could happen, and then pick the ones that make the best story/ the highest drama.

Too many great possibilities?

While having too many ideas is often more of a ‘good’ problem to have, it can also wind up getting you stuck just as badly as not having ideas, because when you get right in there in the middle of the story and you realise that of the two or three or five GREAT concepts that you’ve got on your hands, only one or two of them can possibly fit in and have the story make sense, it can be heartbreaking to have to pick and choose.

If you’ve got too many ideas on hand, don’t stress. Pick the one or two that are the MOST exciting/ dramatic/ fun/ heartbreaking and go with them. Don’t throw away the other ideas -- put them in a ‘for later’ folder and use them in the sequel, or in another story altogether.

It doesn’t feel ‘natural’, or I want the rest of the story to flow like the start did:

Sadly, most of the time there are going to be sections of every story that are difficult to just sit down and write. It’s going to feel like pulling teeth, but the only way is to figure out what you need to happen, and how you’re going to do it, and then sit there and type until it’s on the page. Maybe it won’t be pretty, it won’t be as fun as the start of the story was, but once it’s done it can be edited until it shines.

You can’t edit a blank page, and you can’t finish a story with only a beautiful opening.

Can’t think of what might happen next?

It happens, doesn’t it, you write out a fantastic starter and you’re just as excited as anyone to see where it goes and then it just ... doesn’t. You’ve stalled out in your own story and it’s horrible.

Go back and look at your characters, at your world building, look at the direction that it was all going in before you stalled and work on fleshing things out -- a lot of the time in this situation you’ve gotten ahead of yourself and the reason that you don’t know what happens next is that you’ve dived in headfirst without really getting familiar with what you’re creating. That’s okay, it just means you have to go back and do the work that you skipped in the beginning.

Other tips:

If you’re attempting to jump right into longform stories, like novels or full length scripts or comic scripts etc, and finding that you just can’t get through the whole thing, why not scale it back?

Try writing short stories, ten minute films, single page comics, to hone your craft and exercise yourself in being able to go through the beginning/ middle/ end stages of your form.

As well as that, the feeling of finishing something, even if it isn’t a ‘full’ length work, is very rewarding, and as well as the practice, it can give you the motivation to get back into the slog of working on a longer piece.

I hope that this helps, and please feel free to ask if you have a more specific question.

Some other posts that might help you are:

Post about plotting [HERE]

Post about speed plotting [HERE]

Post about three act structure [HERE]