#but then the episode just happens to have the exact niche character and plot to make me keep pausing and crying and ranting to myself

[victoriously-wicked]

Finished 21x06... nope, I refuse. Are they seriously taking the piss right now???

____________________________________________

You are seriously gonna look me in the eyes right now and tell me that they brought this character that I've loved since the moment i met him in season 8 back just to kill him off and HURT MY SOUL?? Motherfuckers... 😭

That was Liv's ONLY FAMILY.

That was her RIDE-OR-DIE.

That was the man who NAMED HIS DAUGHTER AFTER HER.

That was HER LITTLE BROTHER.

If you were there when I was posting season 8-14 reactions, you'll remember how much I ADORED Simon. AND THEY FINALLY BRING HIM BACK JUST TO DO THIS??

I swear to God, these writers better watch out-

(also, its 1am and this is a really shitty place for me mentally for me to be in right now. Especially since I'm gonna be walking into a chemistry exam in less than 8 hours... oops)

[popculturebuffet]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1990 Review: Still Possesses Turtle Power After All These Years

Cowabunga all you happy people! I freaking love the Teenage Ninja Turtles. I grew up with it from Turtles in Time, which was my first video game, to the 2003 cartoon, which I covered the first three episodes of last month, and on to present day as I re-read the idw comics after finally reading the original eastman and laird run of mirage, and impatiently waiting for Shredder’s Revenge to come out after a LONG drout of no good TMNT games. I”m a fan of these heroes four, their dynamic as a family, the endless possiblities that come from it’s long history and ablitlity to go anywhere in any genre, and the wonderful goofy shit that happens when you have a franchise about mutant turtles learning ninjitsu from a rat and fighting a dude covered in knife covered samurai armor. 

So with me finally covering the guys after almost a year last month and with a new movie set to debut at some point this year, I had the bright idea to revisit the FIRST TMNT movie after way too many years of not watching it. This movie is anear and dear to my heart: When I first started getting into the boys big as a kid with the 2003 cartoon, I badly wanted more turtles. But back then it wasn’t nearly as easy to glom onto some more of the sewer shock pizza kings: Streaming sites with all the cartoons on them weren’t all that accesable, dvd’s were expensive for the 87 cartoon, Mirage wasn’t reprinting the comics in any meaningful way and my local comic shop didn’t have any at all and I could only play the SNES when my brother had it set up on occasion like at our Grandma’s farm. 

As you probably guessed though there was one exception: the original 1990 movie, which I got at Walmart for 5 bucks and haven’t let go of since. It was one of my first dvds and is still one of my most precious. Said film hit the spot just right as like my beloved 2003 series, it was a mildly goofy but still fucking cool adaptation that stuck closer to the mirage comics, even more than the 2003 series would, while taking a few queues from the 87 series. This film is as precious to me as the 2003 series and a with a brand new movie coming up, I figured it was the exact right time to dig into this classic: what makes it still good to this day, what’s fun to point and laugh at, and how the heck Jim Henson got involved in this. So join me under the cut as I take a look at my boys first theatrical outing and why I still love watching a turtle. 

No One Wanted To Make This: Before we get into the film itself some background. As usual I struggled a bit, but thankfully found some help in the form of this Hollywood Reporter article.  It’s a fascinating read worth your time, providing an oral history of the film from the people who worked on it. 

The film was the baby of Gary Propper, a surfer dude and road manager for the prop comic Gallagher, aka that guy who used to smash watermelons but now has instead opted to smash what little’s left of his career by being a homophobic douchenozzle. He found an ally in Showtime producer Kim Dawson who’d produced Gallagher’s special. I don’t think there will be more of an 80′s sentence than “Gallagher’s surfer dude agent wanted to make a teenage mutant ninja turtles movie”. Propper was a huge fan of the comics, and with Dawson’s help convinced Laird and Eastman to let them option it to studios. 

It may come as a shock to you but the road agent for a homophobic watermelon man and a producer at a niche cable channel wanting to make a movie based on an underground comic book about masked turtles at a time when the two most recent comic book movies were Superman IV: The Quest for Peace and Howard the Duck, did not go well. Every door in Hollywood got slammed in their face, even Fox> Even the eventual backer of the film, Golden Harvest, a hong kong action film studio, took months to convince to actually back the film. 

Things did not get easier from there: The films writer Bobby Herbeck had trouble getting a story agreed on because Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s working relationship had deteroiated horribly from the stress so naturally the two could not agree on a damn thing and argued with each other. Peter Laird  made a tense siutation even worse by constnatly sniping at Herbeck and feeling he was a “Hollywood outsider infringing on his vision and characters”

Granted the script was apparently not great... but Pete still comes off as a pretnetious ass who views his weird indie comic as THE HIGHEST OF HIGH CALLINGS HOW DARE YOU SOIL IT. And continued to be kind of a prick like this throughout the rest of his time with the property. 

Thankfully the film found i’ts voice, vision and director in Steve Barron. Barron was a music video guy who knew the producers and while reluctant, eventually dove into the project rightfully thinking the film would need to be a mix of the mirage comics and 87 cartoon, keeping aprils’ reporter job, the turtles lvoe of pizza and their iconic color coding from the cartoon but adapting several stories from the comics as the backbone of the film. The guys liked barron MUCH better and things ran smoother. 

Barron also brought in one of the film’s biggest selling points and it’s most valuable asset: it’s triumphantly awesome Jim Henson costumes. Barron had worked with good old Jim on the music videos for Labyrinth, and while it took some convincing since the comics were violent as hell and that wasn’t Jim’s style, Barron eventually got him on board. This naturally doubled the budget, but given Henson’s costumes STILL hold up today and look better than the cgi used in the platinum dunes films... it was a good call. And this was brand new tech for jim, having to invent tons of new ideas and mechanisms just to make the things work, and said things still were absolute hell on the actors. Jim later ended up not liking the film for being too violent... which I find hilarious given how many muppets got eaten or blowed up real good on his show but regardless, I thank this legendary and wonderful man as without him this film WOULD NOT have worked. The costumes here look great, feel realistic, and you can’t tell the actors were dubbed much less horribly suffering in those suits. Much like Disney Land. 

The film would get picked up for distribution by New Line, and despite i’ts weird as hell origins and the long shot it had.. the film was a MASSIVE hit at the box office, owing to a combination of Batman 89 the previous year having proved comic book movies can work for audiences, the cartoon’s runaway sucess, and a massive marketing campaign. The film made it’s mark. So now we know how we got here let’s get into the film itself. 

What’s the Story Morning Glory?:

So the story for this one is largely cobbled together from some of the more notable arcs Eastman and Laird did before handing off the book to others full time as the stress of the company and the mounting tension with each other made it near impossible to work together on the book itself. 

To Save time i’m just going through what hte movie takes from the comics plot wise now to save me the trouble later:The movie takes elements from the first issue (The Turtles, Splinter and Shredder’s backstories, Shredder being fully human and the main antagonist, Shredder’s design and the final rooftop showdown that results in Shredder’s death), second and third, (April’s apartment over her dad’s old store and the turtles moving in when their home is ransacked and splinter has gone missing), the rapheal micro series (A tounge in cheek way of cashing in on the Mini-Series craze of the 80s, a one shot by modern standards and something that’s tragically been underused as an idea as only TMNT and MLP have used the idea at IDW, Raph meeting casey and their fight with one another), the return of shredder arc (One of the turtles being ambushed and mobbed by the foot and then thrown though a sky light (Leo in the comic and Raph here), the turtles being horribly outnumbered by them, Casey coming ot the rescue and metting the non-raph turtles for the first time, and them being forced to escape when the place goes up in flames), their exile to northampton (April writing in a journal, casey working on a car with one of the guys and one of hte guys looking over hteir injured brother), and finally, their triumphant return which was very loosely adapted as there are no deformed shredder clones and shredder not being dead yet in this version was not brought back by a colony of super science worms. 

So as for how this all comes together: Our story takes place in New York: A crimewave is high with muggings mysterious. There are a ton of phantom thefts going around and at most people have been seeing teens responsibile. And the police.. are at about this level of useful:

The only person doing something is April O’Neil, played by Judith Hoag. Hoag is easily the standout of the film, giving us a strong, confident woman with a wonderful sense of humor. She honestly might be my faviorite April O Neil, and given we’ve had some great ones with 2003, 2012 and Rise, that’s not something I say lightly. I honestly wish I’d recognized her in more stuff as she was both on Nashville and the mom in the Halloween Town films, and most recently was on the ScFy show the magicians. She’s a talented lady and i’m glad she’s still goin. 

April is a reporter for Channel 3 like the cartoon, though for some weird reason her boss from the cartoon is replaced by Charles Pennigton, played by Jay Patterson, whose currently dealing with his troubled son Danny, played by Micheal Turney. Pennington is horribly useless at both jobs: At work he tries to ease April off calling out Chief Sterns, who refuses to listen to April’s evidence gathered from japanese immigrants that the crimes resemble similar ones in japan in favor of trying to get charles to shut her up. Danny meanwhile is a member of the foot becase his dad thinks shouting out him and talking about him like he’s not there and generally being a dipstick will actually do anything to help him. 

I love the concept for the foot here. In addition to being a Ninja Violence Gang as always, they now recruit new members by finding kids without families or with troubled family lives and giving them a sense of family with the foot, and sweeting the bargin with a giant cave filled with arcade machines, a skate ramp and general late 80′s early 90′s kids goodies. Is it rediculous? Yes. Is it also clever as it gives Shredder an easy army of plausably deniable theives that he can pick the best out of to put in his elite that will be tirelessly loyal to him and him alone? Also yes. 

So April being public about this stuff gets her attacked, which naturally leads to our heroes coming in, first in the shadows and later directly when April wont’ give up on the case and Shredder sends some ninjas to go shut her up.. which he does weirdly as the guy jsut slaps her and tells her to cut it out like he’s on a domestically abusive episode of Full House. Raph saves her, and we get the turtles origin.. though weirdly they cut it in half. We get the ooze portion but Splinter’s past with Saki, Saki’s murder of his master and his master’s partern Tang Shen is left for later in the film and the fact Shredder’s saki is treated as a big twist despite the fact the biggest audience for the film would be kids... and kids would’ve been familiar with the cartoon where the giant brain monster routinely screeches out saki at the shredder. Maybe Barron just thought he was an alcoholic I don’t know. It just would’ve made more sense to have it all at once and let the audeince put it together. 

April becomes good friends with the turtles over a night of frozen pizza and camradrie, but the Splinters return home to find it ransacked, Splinter kidnapped by the foot, and are forced to Stay with april. Charles meanwhile tries to get April to backoff because he made a deal with the police to clear Danny’s record, without TELLING her any of this mind you, but I will save my rage on that little plot point for in a bit as Danny who he drug along sees the turtles and tells the Shredder. 

So we get the return of the shredder arc as Raph goes through a window, our heroes fight valiantly, and Raph’s friend Casey who he met earlier shows up, the two having bonded as all true friends do.. by beating the shit out of each other ending with raph shouting DAMNNNNNNN really big and dramatically into the sky for some reason. The Turtles and friends escape with an injured raph from April’s burning second hand store. She had a second hand store it was poorly established and only there because she had it in the comics. 

Our heroes retreat to a farm April’s grandma owned in Northampton, Massachutes, where Mirage was located at the time the original comics where they were exiled to the place were written and a location that has been a staple of the turtles ever since. The turtles slowly recover, lick their wounds, talk about who hooked up with who on gilligans island etc, before Leo connects with Splinter via meditation, who tells them to come back. Splinter also starts to connect with Danny and convinces him to swtich sides.. or at the very least squat in the boys old home. 

The boys return home, find danny, and prepare, Danny goes back and ends up giving away the Turtles are home.. but the turtles are ready and in an awesome sequence kick the fuck out of the foot squad sent for them with some well prepared steam vents. Casey goes to get splinter since Danny told them and with Danny’s help, finds him, since Danny found out they were gonna kill him. Casey beats up Tatsu, shredder’s right hand man, and they get him out. 

We get our final fight which is awesome up until the climax.. which is splinter casually tripping shredder with nunchucks and thier bloody history being kind of rushed and unsatsifying. Casey crushes shredder with a garbage truck, April gets her job back, more on that in a moment, she and casey hook up, and we end with the fucking awesome song T-U-R-T-L-E Power by partners in cryme. Seriously check it out it’s fucking triumphant. 

The song is just good.. cheesy? Sure but that’s half the fun. It’s the gold standard for movie theme songs for them and stacks up handily with the various animated series themes.. all of which slap. Okay... ALMOST all of which slap. Fast Forwards is aggressively medicore, which is doubly suprising to me since 4kids was REALLY damn good with theme songs. It was one of the three things they were best at along with finding VERY talented voice actors and setting japan based works in america because merica dammit.  

The plot is very solid: It skilfully packed half of eastman and laird’s run on TMNT into 90 mintues while adding things like April’s job at channel 9, the way the foot recurited kids etc. The plot flows well for hte most part and apart from one annoying subplot we’ll get to never has a moment that feel unecessary or dosen’t pay off later. And the stellar plot and fun pacing of it helps boilster the characters that do work... and help paper over the ones that are so thin the’yd fall down a grate...

Our Heroes, Villains and Annoying Middle Aged Guys:

Yeahhhh character is hit and miss here. Some are rather strong, others are the bare basics for the character their adapting and most are just to serve the plot but some work some don’t,  So let’s talk about it starting with our boys:

Raph is the most fleshed out of the turtles, being the main focus of the first 2/3 of the film, and having his anger be part of what SHOULD be a character arc, learning to temper it. And while granted MOST TMNT properties do this, to the point that Rise Raph is so loveable in part because his boisterous bruiser big bro attitude is a refreshing break from the usual grumpus we get. But at the time this hadn’t been done in every version but the 87 cartoon, so exploring it was valid.. but despite saying this should be a thing htey just forget about it and the most plot relevance he gets is going thorugh a window. He dosen’t really get a resolution.. his arc just kind of stops dead for the final half and it’s one of the film’s weaker points, one I only just now noticed on this rewatch. He’s still the most entertaining. 

Leo is the weakest of the turtles. He really lacks a personality here mostly just being leader and while his spirtual side is touched on, it’s  mostly a plot device. He’s just kinda the leader because he was in the comics to the point Partners in Cryme called Raph the leader. His role in getting taken out by the foot was taken by Raph, so he just has.. nothing to do for most of the film other than gripe at raph ocasionally and say orders. He’s probably the worst Leo i’ve seen outside of Next Mutation. I prefice that because after watching Phelous’ review it’s VERY clear those four are the worst versions of the characters, and no personality is still better than either having your team do nothing or yelling at them as your personality. I chalk this up to the Mirage Leo, and the mirage turtles to a poit being kind of bland. Not TERRIBLE characters, especially for the time, but not nearly as fleshed out or individualized as they woudl be in other adpatations, and with most traits LEo DID have, like his badassery flat out gone, he’s just.. nothing here. 

Mikey and Donnie are a double act here with both sharing a brain. Interestingly instead of his normal genius character, Donnie is Mikey’s best friend and the two simply trade jokes and schtick together. The two are interchangable.. but easily the best part of the film and a lot of the most memorable gags and lines, from Ninja Kick the Damn Rabbit! to “Do you like Penicllin on your pizza”, are from them. Thier there almost entirely as comic relief but it works, with both clealry being more modled ont he 87 cartoon turtles, a move that helps lighten the mood in darker moments. Their just genuinely charming and it’s intresting to see such a diffrent version of Donnie, and other incarnations, specifically the 2003 and Rise versions, would retain the sarcastic edge. 

Splinter is splinter. That’s about it, he’s peformed well and the puppet is amazing but he gets kidnapped a half an hour in and outside of influcencing Denny, more on that in a moment, and finishing Shredder he dosen’t do much but spout exposition. He’s not bad or anything, but he’s essentially a rodent shaped plot device. He was also puppeted by Kevin CLash, aka the guy who does Elmo. So there you go. 

April on the other hand.. is truly excellent. This might be my faviorite April. Judith’s april nicely blends the cartoon and mirage versions: She has the cartoons energy and job, but the comics sheer will and casual nature. Judith just oozes personality and her April is just a joy to watch, from her breezy chemistry filled interactions with the guys to her confrntation with Chief Sterns, knowing she’ll get thrown out by the asshole. She’s confident, and even when afraid dosen’t back down to her attackers and even helps out during the sewer ambush. I mean it’s a pot on the head but still it’s neat. She’s easily the best part of the flim and the most fleshed out of the cast. The worst I can say is they kinda shove her store from the comics, Second Time Around, in there for no other reason than it was in the comics: It dosen’t come up until it’s needed for the foot’s assault on her place. But overall.. she’s just fantastic to watch. 

Speaking of fantastic to watch, Elias Koteas is fantastic as Casey. Seriously he’s only second to the 2003 version in my eyes, getting the concept of a testorone filled average guy who decided to just go out and hit people with sports equipment after watching too much A-Team.. I mean that part of it’s not in this version but it’s implied, just right. Like judith, Elias is just really funny to watch and his big scenes, showing up just in time during the foot assault on april’s place and his fight with Tatsu are some of the best parts of the film, the former taken directly from the comics. This version isn’t without problems: His friendship with Raph, his most endearing aspect and one that has been carried throughout eveyr version Casey’s important, with the only exception so far being rise and we have a movie to fix that, is absent here. HE does save the guy, but they don’t really bond or anything. In fact he disappears for about half an hour after his big fight with Raph. But... again he’s just so damn entertaining, down to his JOSEEEEEEEEEEE Conseco bats (There was a two for one sale!).

Shredder is just a LITTLE better than splinter, if only because his actor projects a true aura of menace and I feel this version had some influence on the pants crappingly terrifying 2003 version. And the idea of the foot recurting teenagers like I said is a good one: He gives them home and a cause, they give him plausably deniable backup. And his fight with the boys in the climax is really awesome... the conclusion sucks but otherwise h’es okay. Not the deepest villian, but he has enough presence to be enjoyable.

His right hand man Tatsu, whose been adapted ocasionally since this and reimaigned as Natsu in the IDW comics, a female version, is also fine. He’s your standard grimacing goon but has enough presence to work. 

So that brings us to the penningtons. Charles, april’s boss at the station and his son Danny who’s joined the foot as he feels his dad dosen’t love him. Charles..is about as interesting and likeable as a dog turd and is the worst aspect of the film. No debate there, he just sucks. He sucks so hard he’s classified as a black hole.  The film wants you to see him as a put upon wokring dad whose frustrated with his son’s increased moodiness, skipping school and crminal undertakings and just wants to help him and loves him deep down. The problem is his actor’s delivery instead of concerned.. is just pissed. He just seems pissy and upset about the whole thing and comes off like he’s only mad about Danny doing this because he’s embarassing him and not because you know, it’s bad. When confronting Danny about stealing, he dosen’t consider MAYBE he’s part of a gang or needs help, but just wonders “Why are you stealing when I give you stuff”. Because, Dipshit, sometimes kids do crimes not because they need the stuff but because they WANT to, and because they want to act the fuck out. 

The most he does for the kid is agree to try and get April to back off the police when Cheif Sterns offers to let Danny go and not put him on record in exchange for it. The problem.. is this makes him even MORE unsympathetic. While I do get wanting to help your child, I do and it’s a sucky position... he again should be sympathetic.. but he handles the thing so badly it sucks. He just tells april to ease off, with no reason given, then fires her when she SHOCKINGLY dosen’t give up taking the guy whose refusing to take her hard work seriously or actually solve the crime wave problem to task for his shitty behavior as ANY person facing a shitty, corrput cop would. She just wants to hold him acountable and get him to actually do something. He clearly knows her on a personal level too as he talks about his issues with his son freely with her, something you don’t do with an employee unless their also a friend on some level. 

He could have TOLD april what was going on. She’d be furious at Stern’s naked corrpution and prioritizing shutting her up over actually solving crimes.. and thus put at least some of that energy into shutting him down or finding a way around it, going to the papers or something like that. Even in 1990 pre-internet, there were ways to get around Sterns blackmail and expose him so someone who’d actually do the job could get the job. Instead he just comes off as a selfish coward who rather than try and fight the guy blatantly abusing his power and using Charles own son as  barganing chip, goes along with it because it’s the easier option to simply bow to him instead of TRY and stop this. And it’s not like he’s even going after a beloved public figure or someone who could hide behind his rep: Sterns was blatantly failing a crime wave, April had called him out on his failrues and coverups multiple times. The public was against sterns.. finding out he tried to blackmail the media into shutting up about him would PROBABLY end him... I only say probably not because the public wouldn’t skewer him, but because police tend to escape consequences for blatantly murdering someone on a daily basis and Andrew Cumo is STILl mayor over in new york, the same city this movie takes place, 31 years later, depsite EVERYONE asking him to resign over a long history of sexual harassment and a more recent but still horrible history of hiding death numbers. I don’t doubt people being stupid enough to ignore this or the bilaws with cops being stacked enough for him to get away with it, but just because someone gets away with a crime dosen’t mean you shoudln’t try and go after them in the first place. Fuck. Charles. Pennington. 

Danny on the other hand is FAR more interesting and I think gets way too much flack when it comes to this subplot. Unlike his dad, whose dead weight, Danny is intresting: He provides a POV character for the foot’s MO in the film of taking in wayward teens, and his character arc is pretty engaging, slowly realizing the foot dosen’t care and that hte turtles are the good guys. HIs actor does a great job and while not the biggest presence, he’s not a bad addition to clan hamaoto and I wish other adaptations would find a way to use him. The pull between doing the right thing and his found family is a good struggle. My only real issue with his plot is the moviies flawed aseop about family. It tries to contrast shredder and his using the kids blatnatly with Splinter and Charles really loving their sons. And it works with Splinter and the kids because despite being a tad strict, Splinter clearly loves his sons and works with them to help them. The problem is ENTIRELY with Charles and Danny. As I said Charles love comes off as transasctional: He either thinks he can buy it or just expects it because he shot a bunch of goop into Danny’s mom after two minutes of disapointment. It dosen’t work with them because neither option is good for Danny. His father is neglectful, chooses throwing his jounralistic integrity out the window over talking to his son or his best friend about another way, and abrasive. Danny is no saint, he does do crimes, but it’s clearly a result of a shitty upbringing and the shredder and co actually offeirng him the love he desperatly craves. Danny goes to the foot because his dad is bad at his job but the film never adresses that and just expects Danny to go back to his dad because the plot says so. Danny would HONESTLY be better off with Splinter. No really. Sure he’d have to live in the sewers.. but he did so for a few weeks in the course of the movie. He’s fine down there. Splitner actually cares about him and took an intrest to him and knows how to raise a child. Let him become the fifth turtle. An aseop about family is not a bad thing: Loaded subject that it can be given how many outright abusive families exist, i’m one of the lucky ones who dosen’t have that issue, family is an important thing and can be a source of comfort and support. But this film tells you you should love and respect someone who does not love, respect or value you because he spent a minute in your mom’s vagina and that’s not how family should work and is outright dangerous to kids in an abusive situation. Love the film otherwise but fuck this aseop skyhigh. 

Final thoughts:

Overall though.. the film is bodacious. It’s funny, well paced, has an awesome cast, and outside of a certain bald asswipe... it’s a really good superhero film. Is it the best i’ve seen? Nope. Not even close and character wise most of them are as thin as a wet paper bag covered in ranch dressing. But it’s still a fun as hell with awesome corepgraphy, a killer soundtrack, seriously the soundtrack is damn excellent and only didn’t get it’s own section because I didn’t have enough to say and some of the best effects work i’ve seen in a film in the turtle suits. If you haven’t seen it I urge you to check it out: it’s a breezy 90 minutes, it’s on hbo max and it’s a shell of a time. Will I do the next film? 

We’ll see how this one does like wise and such, but I will be doing the rise film whenever it comes out this year. So look for that and keep possesing turtle power my dudes. If you liked this review subscirbe for more, join my patreon to keep this blog a chugging, comission a review if you have more turtle stuff you want me to cover, and comment on this. What do you think of the movie, what are your thoughts on the review, what can I do better, what other turtle stuff would you like me to cover/ Let me know and i’ll see you at hte next rainbow. 

[intergalactic-zoo]

I was almost ready to comment on how this series is using single-word episode titles, just like "Smallville" did, but now we've got this mouthful playing on a book that was roughly contemporary with that show. It's pretty clunky, but whatever. 

It's nice that this episode gave us a break from the Luthor story, choosing instead to focus on Lois's investigation and some good character moments for the Kents and Lana's family. The mantra that "life is simpler in Smallville" gets an explicit repudiation, some fences are mended, and some new mysterious antagonists are introduced.

Spoilers ahoy! 

If not for the enormous amount of COVID-imposed lead time this series had, and the amount of time it takes to write and record and add special effects to a live-action TV show, this episode would feel like a course correction for a lot of the problems I've had with the last couple of installments. 

I'm writing this a little longer after watching the episode than I typically have, so I'm going to go plot-by-plot rather than chronologically through the episode. 

Painting the House: a cute scene, and a good way to remind us that, even with all the drama and the teen angst, the Kents are a loving family. 

Jonathan & Jordan: Jordan joining the football team is a neat plot point that goes in unexpected directions, given how that kind of thing has typically played out in Superman stories. I like the way that it sets up conflict with Jonathan in the beginning, but eventually he realizes that Jordan's not trying to take away the thing that makes him feel special. Jonathan being the one to convince Clark to let Jordan play—and making the case that Jordan's abilities just even the playing field with respect to his size—is a good moment of solidarity and understanding for him. 

And Jordan, for his part, really does seem like he's found what he needed. Being able to take out some aggression on the football field—and having Clark's support—ends up being the key to getting a handle on his anger and being able to solve some problems with kindness rather than sulking and violence. I also appreciate that at least one of our initial antagonists—Sean—has moved out of that role, at least for now.

Coach Clark: There have been lots of attempts over the years to saddle Superman with various character flaws, but I think the one that fits best is being overprotective. On the macro scale, you get "Must There Be a Superman" and "King of the World," and on a micro scale you get stuff like this, being a bit of a helicopter parent and nearly losing Lois early in their relationship by eavesdropping. It rings true in a way that other attempted flaws—being dull-witted or indecisive—haven't. So it's nice here to see him realize it and acknowledge his mistakes, and to realize that he doesn't have to make the same choices his father did in order to keep his kids safe. After all, Jonathan Kent I didn't have superpowers. It'll also be nice for Clark to have a place to be earnest, mild-mannered Clark Kent, since he's outside the Daily Planet environment.

Lana and Sarah: Somewhere in my drafts I have a post about poor Lana Lang, a character made to fill a niche—the Lois Lane analogue for Superboy—and has never had much of a life outside of that niche. Every time Lana is introduced into adult Clark's life, she has a different deal. She's a TV reporter with a British accent, she's married to Pete Ross, she's a successful engineer, but she's almost always the girl whose life fell to pieces in one way or another after Clark Kent left. It's not fair to either character—Clark's presence in a person's life should elevate them, not devastate them—and while I understand the reason for giving her a failing marriage and conflicts with her children, I do want to see Lana have a happy ending in some adaptation or incarnation. 

Anyway, I like Sarah as a character, and it's interesting to see how her story parallel's Jordan's, with her mother's overbearing overprotectiveness leading to conflict. It creates a contrast between how Clark and Lana are handling their respective teenage offspring, and gives them a nice bonding moment. It's easy to see how these bonding moments could turn into Lana trying to rekindle the old flame with Clark, and I really hope that doesn't happen, but platonic male-female friendships are rare enough on TV that I can imagine it's hard to set one up without everyone seeing a ship setting sail. 

Speaking of ships, I know that Jordan and Sarah are an obvious pairing, but I hope Jordan is smart enough not to try to be her rebound relationship (and ruin his reconciliation with Sean). But honestly, I kind of hope Jordan is gay or bi, giving a way to tie his feelings of being different and search for identity to the struggles queer kids commonly face in an explicit way rather than an allegorical one. 

Seriously though, let Clark and Lois have a strong marriage that doesn't need to be threatened by the Other Woman for unnecessary drama. Let the drama build out of normal family conflicts, not tropes that were sexist and outdated when they were common in the Silver Age. 

Lois's Story: "The news comes to Lois Lane" seems to be an ongoing theme, as the next lead in her story just walks through the door of the Smallville Gazette. Unsurprisingly for a story involving Lois Lane, this leads to a conspiracy involving disappearing workers and super-powered enforcers. Lois explicitly makes the point I said earlier, that the stories in small towns do matter, and too often get overlooked because there aren't enough reporters covering them. 

The action scene where Lois is attacked by someone with Kryptonian-level abilities is pretty good. I always like when Superman enters a confrontation by trying to de-escalate before fighting, and I always like when Lois enters a confrontation by trying to fight before calling in the big guns. The fight between Superman and the assailant (who I think is credited as Subjekt 11, but I assumed that character was going to carry forward and, uh, doesn't look like he is) showcases both a nice escalation as Superman learns what the guy's strength is, and some nice uses of powers. The CW effects teams have gotten pretty creative over the years. The one issue I have is that Superman slams the guy through a cinderblock wall right at the start of the fight, before he's tested those abilities, and I feel like that would have done some real damage if he'd guessed wrong and the guy was a baseline human. The No-Prize Answer would be that either he scanned the guy before hitting him and knew, at baseline, that he was a meta, or that he knew Lois wouldn't call him unless she was dealing with a metahuman threat. Still, it bugs me. 

I do hope we learn more about what Subjekt-11 was. Metahuman? Kryptonian? Some kind of experiment? I'm frankly more interested in the Morgan Edge stuff than alt-universe Luthor. 

The woman who takes out Subjekt-11—who I guess was also with Edge at the meeting last episode—seems to be named Leslie Larr, no doubt a reference to Lesla-Lar, the Silver Age Kandorian villain who happened to be an exact double for Supergirl, because every major character had a double living in Kandor. Whether that means she's Kryptonian or some other swerve is something, I guess, we'll learn later.

Other: I noticed an Easter Egg that I haven't seen reported anywhere else: The Whitty Banter Show! For those who don't remember, Whitty Banter was the host of a Metropolis talk show in the 80s and 90s; there's ads for it all over the Death of Superman Newstime issue. In trying to remind myself what Easter Egg I remembered catching, I also learned that Kryptonsite still exists! What a blast from the past. There was a time, many moons ago, where that was a daily visit for me, along with the Superman Homepage. 

And Blogger.com, for that matter. But those days are clearly far behind us.

[unordinary-analysis]

Episode 166

Honorable mentions:

I always love seeing a student with John’s old ‘loser’/helmet hair lmao it makes me happy

For the first time ever, when I say ‘Remi, pop off queen’ you know I actually mean it lol

Tldr: the high-tiers (can’t really call them “royals” anymore can we) establish themselves and prove their worths as paragons (perfect examples) of what royals should be and i applaud them for it

The amount of joker masks that the superhero posse brought in has to be representation of their power. Isen, the lowest-ranking of the superhero posse brought 1, Remi brought 3, and Blyke brought 3. You might be thinking ‘hey remi is more powerful than blyke’ but we know that he’s been working hard recently and because he only has one more mask than Remi, i think this idea is plausible. so let me believe that blyke is more powerful than remi please.

Nothing to really say about Isen except that he needs a hug

Going to ignore that remi listed cecile as someone she wanted to recruit help from because i would just get my hopes up

Only occured to me now that i could pull off a John and Rei comparison especially after reflecting over episode 150

Arlo and seraphina give off such close vibes and it’s obviously because they got close (or at least intensely familiar) when they were the king and queen and i just- i absolutely love when plots or characters go full circle and reflect (revisit?) the start of the story even though that sounds anti-development, it’s not im just bad at explanations.

WHAT I WOULD GIVE FOR CECILE TO BACKSTAB JOHN not that i don’t like john because i absolutely aDORE him because of his impact on the story, but i just want to see Cecile backstab someone and john is convient

just me talking for a bit, scroll if you want to skip to the actual content i understand ;( :

Okay: so.

I’ve figured out that instead of putting little talkative comments in the honorable mentions like I’ve been doing lately, I can put them here and not feel like total trash and that I’m downgrading the post so that’s fun.

Anyway, sorry if the massive ton of parentheses(?spelling) i'm using is confusing or hard to read. I mean, I won’t fix it, but I hope it’s not too bad ya know

Again: sorry for talking like im texting someone in 2017 it’s an issue, im aware. No one ever says anything, but yeah?? Im sorry???

Im panic-writing this an hour before the new episode drops so hopefully this is up before then, there’s no real hope though it takes me 10 minutes just to transfer this from my google doc to tumblr because i have to manually re-add all of the bold and italics and bullet points. Still not removing this bit tho even if (lmao “if”) it’s late ;)

Talking too much, but whenever you see (?”spelling/grammar/word choice/etc”), that just means that I messed up in that way, but I’m too distracted to fix it. Figured i should say that eventually seeing as i literally do that every post

Next post will not be written in first person at all because i think it makes these feel way too familiar and makes new readers uncomfortable which is stupid but is how i would feel so we’re experimenting. If you’ve never read one of my posts, i just act very informal with everything i do and i just want to say, i'm not in this tightly knit niche group that reads these and that ive been friends with for years. i just. Talk like this. So don’t feel like you’re eavesdropping by reading one of these. I really hope im not an outlier in feeling this way when reading other peoples post because if nobody actually feels this way, im bout to be real embarrased oops.

Im getting the talking out of my system because no talking next post.

Yeah this post is late. But: i stopped for pizza in the middle and my webtoon isn’t loading so im like sitting around waiting for it to

Remi:

    Now, in this episode particularly, it has occurred to me that I need to give Remi credit where credit is due. I made a post (AN: multiple posts but we’ll ignore that) over a year ago talking about her abilities as queen and- I did her pretty dirty. Not unfairly, but dirty. I basically dissed her a lot and said that she wasn’t a good queen in any sense. And I’ve done this multiple times (AN: ignore last AN) because I can remember at least 2 other times when I just berated Remi over and over for being shit queen.

    I’m not going to disagree with myself in this post (because I didn’t lie), but I want to give her some credit because I do believe she has changed recently and it has affected how I view her as a position of royalty. And, yes, while it is unclear if she is currently technically still a royal, what with John having somehow destroyed the entire concept of Wellston having royals (?), she has been taking the actions and responsibilities that a royal would. So-

    What made me want to write this out was in this episode, episode 166, I really realized/noticed her attitude and actions dealing with and revolving around this whole joker situation (currently more about the fake jokers) was?? Actually productive?? To explain: In this episode, we see Remi approaching a group of low-tiers who are worriedly talking about the joker situation and 1. Analyzes the conversation in reference to the measures she, Blyke, and Isen are taking to prevent the situation, 2. Reassures the low-tiers that qualified help (her, Blyke, and Isen [aka the superhero posse]) is doing the best they can, and 3. Asks if they have any suggestions or ideas that might help them attain their goal. Like?? Hello?? The Professionalism? And the way she didn’t let her disappointment that her previous efforts up until now affect her is a stark contrast from the Remi of the past. I’ve ripped her apart because of just how often her emotions would completely overwhelm any sense she had. So: that stood out. But, anyway, big picture again: This whole short little scene from her was so impressive?

    Honestly, the fact that Remi is going through all this effort to stop the fake jokers and make sure the low-tiers are safe is very different than what we would’ve seen from her in the past. One of the common reasons that I kept saying Remi was a bad queen was because she didn’t care about her responsibilities and didn’t take her authority seriously. There are even examples of Arlo, or others, telling her this (the example that came to my mind was when Remi was warning students about EMBER and Arlo stepped in [and the reason behind the events of this example helps to support my next point] {ALSO (sorry) afternote: I was reading through everything I’ve ever said about Remi’s leadership and I used this exact example in my post “Remi” from just over a year ago}). Another reason that I was against Remi as queen, which ties nicely with the previous reason (this sounds like repetition of like two seconds ago when I said that my last reason would support this point, but it’s not because words), was that she prioritized personal missions over things her school needed her to do. I remember being very pissed around episodes 110-120 because she ignored the big conflicts happening at Wellston in order to track down this separate crime organization (EMBER) and took Blyke and Isen with her (royals)(who were both against the idea). And I know that her reason for doing this is valid and I do respect her for attempting to avenge her brother, and I would have let this slide if she gave one thought or listened to Isen and Blyke at all about Wellston. I know this still sounds bad on my part, but it was many instances stacked on top of each other of Remi being, not just unconcerned, but unknowing, about Wellston’s current state as a school. At that time, Remi was the queen, she was one of the school’s royals, whose job was to maintain order and peace within the school. I couldn’t see any instances of Remi even attempting to do that. That was in the past though, because obviously, things are different now, like I said. Currently, Remi has gone out of her way to dedicate herself to the wellbeing of Wellston, that is obvious in the way she has been talking with low-tiers and unmasking fake Jokers. I only hope that her new motivation isn’t just a phase brought upon her due to her personal relationship/conflict with Joker, with John. I want to know if John ever happens to be dethroned or Remi somehow gets her technical authority back, will she still be dedicated to the school, or is her motive purely situational? I hope not? Because we’ve seen lots of change from her recently what with learning of the low-tiers mistreatment and all, so let’s cross our fingers.

    Regardless, there has been improvement in Remi. In her leadership and dedication. And that needs to be acknowledged. So I am doing it. Yeah. Here you go. Badge of honor for Remi.

    Obviously, most of what I’ve said also applies to Isen and Blyke, who are honestly going above and beyond (especially Blyke), just this section is a response to my previous statements of how Remi is not a good queen, not only for Wellston, just in general. And, again, while I still agree with my evaluation of Remi as a queen in reference to her past self and past episodes, This is a new development I felt obligated to talk about. :).

Blyke’s idea (?word choice confuses me):

Wowee this is a fun one. So: Blyke broke up a fake joker fight in a hallway this episode, and i just have to acknowledge this like I did for remi: props, but anyway, I was very intrigued by the way he handled the damage control like?? He refuses for the fake joker to be unmasked (?grammar) and gives the reason, “I’m not about to show his face so that you all can just gang up on him later!” And: applause. I think that this has occurred to me before, I just never dwelled on that idea, so I was taken off guard by this from Blyke. He was able to understand this and form a plan with how to deal with it? I don’t know about you, but that screams king behavior. Anyway, what Blyke does is take the fake joker to a separate room and unmasks him privately then talks with him as a way to both protect the fake joker’s safety and discourage him from any future stunts like the one he pulled a sec ago. And?? This is so great because, guys, this is liTERALLY the concept of like anger management and behavior therapy?? 

I especially liked how Blyke took the time to hear the low-tier out(something that the high-tiers are really starting to do [technically because of john because john became joker and caused all of this {and since john wanted to destroy the hierarchy because high-tiers didn’t give a shit about the low-tiers in a way he’s achieved his goal, albeit unknowingly}]). And, like i literally just said, by hearing him out, he’s creating yet another bubble of safety around the low-tier because immediately after (okay maybe not immediately, blyke did scold him a bit), Blyke says that whenever the low-tier is being picked on, he can come to Blyke. And NOT ONLY does this whole thing help with the fake jokers issue, but Blyke, along with Isen and Remi, are creating trust and respect between the low-tiers and high-tiers. This is them doing the hierarchy right! They are establishing themselves as leaders and as people that can be relied upon, which is exactly who the royals are supposed to be.

Just want to say: He also talked about how the guy who got attacked should also reflect on his actions, and yes, this deserves recognition, but this has been a common theme, so I didn’t think it was worth really discussing. Blyke got bonus points for this. Extra credit if you will.

    Remi’s idea:

    Back to Remi, but her idea about recruiting John to help get rid of the Jokers? Excuse me? The innovation, the growth, the potential. And, I know this was shut down pretty quickly by Blyke, but I still have to talk about it??? And this section is starting off horribly because there was absolutely no transition or introduction but hello?? 

    Anyway, obviously the fact that Remi would even suggest getting any help from John (Joker) is astonishing. 1. He literally beat up everyone present in the scene 2. Honestly from what john’s doing for all anyone knows, he likes that low-tiers are faking being joker (remi even points this out lmao) 3. Again, he beat everyone up? Not exactly looking good for any kind of compromise. And yet despite these obvious reasons, Remi still lists him as a possible ally. Why?

    Because when she met up with him before he completely dethroned the Wellston hierarchy, she noticed similarities in their goals and their beliefs. She says, and quotation marks mean quote, “When I spoke with him… I really thought both of us wanted the same thing… Just that our methods of approaching the situation were different.” !!!!!!! Remi knows that they really want the same thing: a safe environment for low-tiers. That was the one thing that John kept repeating over and over when they met up and talked (episode 150) (other than the fact that royals are shit but-): he wanted to create a school environment that was safe for the low-tiers. Whether or not that’s his goal now, or if he’s acting with that goal in mind, Remi obviously remembered this the most from their conversation because it seemed so similar to the way she was thinking. And Remi thinks that it would be possible that John would prioritize this over his dedication to his own personal project of destroying the school :).

    Anyway, this whole idea is scrapped by Isen and Blyke who give valid arguments as to why trying to ally with John is a really bad idea, but oh my god the way my heart stopped.

    This section is basically a summary and very quick, but this scene in the comic was riveting because of this. I just don’t know what else to say.

[ultraclops]

Semi-live Blogging: Return of the Mao Mao Episodes

Before we start, is it just me or is the animation like 10x smoother than it usually is? Also like I said with Nakey, there’s a lot more good expressions too!

Lucky Ducky Mug

Adorabat drinks from sippy cup like baby

"What, Mao Mao's ridiculous mug?" says Badgerclops, holding a cheap plastic big gulp cup he probably got from the grocery store.

How did Adorabat not notice the Lucky Ducky sticker on the Aerocycle

"Don't touch it" (Badgerclops proceeds to slam the table to move it) Ah Badgerclops, ever the contrarian

I'M SORRY DID MAO MAO BLOW THE ROOF OFF OF HQ BY SCREAMING

I love the way Mao says "PROFESSIONAAAL SILENCEEE"

Badgerclops trying to make his mouth disappear and failing made me scream with laughter

Are they seriously reducing Ratarang to 'the funny lil Italian guy'? C’mon guys you’re better than this

Wait why do they think Kevin is Adorabat?? They've seen Adorabat multiple times?? "But they're both blue!" You FOOL Kevin is TEAL there's a difference

Everybody gangsta til Mao Mao's ears start speaking morse code

They're doing surprisingly good silent but it's probably not gonna be that way very long.

Thank you, Lucky Ducky Mug, for catering to my niche interest in characters with neon outlines on black backgrounds.

Mao Mao thinking: Normal thoughts

Badgerclops thinking: Musical-esque singing

Adorabat thinking: Literally just heavy metal

The Sweetypies seriously think they're just playing a really intense game of charades huh,,,

(Mao jabs BC in the stomach with the fire net) HAHA GET REKT

The scene with Badgerclops trying to give Mao Mao Penny's mug is the funniest shit in the world I couldn't stop laughing...or maybe I'm just sleep-deprived

So the Sky Pirates are so similar compared to the Sheriff's Dept. that they can think perfectly in sync? That's cool

SKY PIRATES SONG SKY PIRATES SONG

Why is Snugglemagne throwing a random tea party & why did he only invite the Sheriff's Dept.

Yep there goes the plan. Both of their plans.

Am I going crazy or did the skin on Mao Mao's mouth tear apart like it was sewn shut?! Also yay they're talking again

"It's not gonna stop charging, so I'm just gonna let it explooode..." Mood

"What about the mega laser tube made by mega Losers?" Fsfhkfh

Hey, everyone learned something new from this experience! Are the Sky Pirates gonna try that Hive Mind tactic from now on?

Awww, they fixed his mug with gold - GOD DAMN IT I KNEW THERE WAS A CATCH!!

Lonely Kid

(Sighs) ...I said (SIGHS)

"I literally can't relate to that problem at all." says Badgerclops, who joined a gang because he wanted people to like him.

Shin just dropped off Mao Mao at a summer camp and expected him to make friends? Why does this feel like the plot of Camp Camp

I'm sorry the Mao clan has a freaking PARTY AERO-BUS??

NOO GERALDINE

That BGM is DEFINITELY an extended version of "I Love You, Mao Mao" and I want the lyrics NOW

So Bao was literally just a stray that Mao took home?? Would make sense as to why he wasn't trained

I have a feeling the Flimborg is some sort of sacred being the townspeople worship for some reason

How in the hell did Mao tie that guy up and why didn't he bother to untie him

HOW'D HE SET THE ROCKS ON FIRE USING PAINT

"And then you become frien-" "BEES. IN THE EYES."

"Everyone knows bees are our friends!" "Uh, actually, they were wasps." "Friends to no-one!" Usually I'd agree with BC, but I read an article about someone befriending a wasp and her babies so.

So the Mao clan's just known as the "Golden Cat Family Up The Hill?" Huh. I thought they’d have more recognition, especially since Shin says he went to that same summer camp at the beginning.

Man those kids are jackasses

"Say hi to your mommy!" "I would if she was here..." Excuse me wHAT

Noo don't cry baby boi - tHEN BAO JUST TACKLES HIM ASFHDKDL

"Go away! I don't feel like laughing right now!"

Look. You can see the EXACT point Mao developed his adult personality

I know Mao Mao means well but that is gonna go terribly wrong.

"I AM A HERO! I WILL BE LOVED!!" Okay first of all OUCH, second of all THAT IS PAIN

This monster empty, YEET

Awww it was just a sweet little puppy-ish monster...and it was his BIRTHDAY

"Hi, Aunt Gloria!" (Pulls out pitchfork) BETRAYAL

He didn't feel bad about ruining the festival because he made a friend doing it I 💞💞💝💝💗💗

Thanks for that 'different times' comment cuz I don't want kids thinking being beat is normal.

"Just like you found me...and I'm your best friend!" Tbh I thought she was gonna say 'Me and Badgerclops' & that would make a lot more sense

Why are they fighting over who's his best friend they're obviously BOTH his best friends

I'm sorry did Badgerclops just call Adorabat a "little mutant"?? ARE THE SWEETYPIES MUTANTS??

Awww his friends love him sm...and he feels so loved too...💓💓💗💗💕💕

Try Hard

No one gives a shit about Pinky being kidnapped lol

"K for Copyright Infringement"

"You'll never be like me!" Oof a little harsh maybe?

"You've gotta learn to be your own kind of hero, in your own special way!" So THAT'S where it's from

"You just gotta...try hard." Hey, title drop!

Ngl the moment Mao Mao said "Badgerclops take the shot" I immediately thought of The Confession 3 by TomSka

"Up in a tree, little old me, about to do something...UGLY..." 7-year-old me sniping people on Halo 3 like

Why is he shooting them with gelatin tho? ...oh. Oh THAT'S why.

Tbh if I didn't have subtitles on I would've thought BC was saying "beep boop"

This badger and cat empty, YEET

Adorabat walking into the Skyship with only a walkie-talkie is giving me some sort of vibes...OH, Silent Hill! Or Tattletail

WHOOP HIS ASS SWEETIE

"Mao Mao would hide the body!" Very unsubtle there, wonder how it got past censors

"Ratarang, say something!" "Pasketti?" "THAT'S THE BRAT!"

Wait a sec, they can just use Badgerclops' arm to power the ship? Why didn't they try that in CapturedClops?

"Good thing my head is in here cuz I'm a-scared of heights!" Ramaraffe. Whose whole schtick is making herself taller. Is acrophobic?

"Because she's Sheriff's Department, that's how! >:3" "Also y'all tend to be pretty incompetent >X/"

Why does she keep trying to use the elevator when she can fly? Nvm she climbed up Badgerclops' arm

"Ooooh I'm also hereeee"

"JERK BUTT"

Why is the Omega Field just a bunch of broken glass? And why doesn't she just step around it?

"I can fly!" "She can fly!" "SHE FORGOT?!" Ooh that's why

"You're the best thing to ever happen to a bat like me." 💝💝💕💕💓💓

Wait she's talking through the walkie-talkie and her molts are there but she isn't there where is she?

Oh she was freeing the other two from the gelatin. No wonder Mao Mao almost threw up, it was bug flavored.

GET HIS ASS, HONEY!! ADORASLAP!!

I hope that 'Nah' means Adorabat's realized she needs to be herself instead of her just rejecting her individuality like I think it is.

Scared Of Puppets

Oh, so this takes place after Sleeper Sofa! Praying it's a fix-it episode...

"DISCARD ANYTHING THAT DOESN'T BRING YOU JOY!!" Fuckin Marie Kondo up in here

Oh no PTSD flashbacks. He's scared of them cuz one's head landed on his lap as a kid? Understandable have a nice day.

Who tf collapsed into a sobbing heap on the floor then leaps back up and insists they're fine? Mao Mao, apparently.

Hairless ape? Is that what they call humans or are they something different in general?

"TAKE ALL MY MONEY!!" What did BC want an antique puppet for if he had no idea Mao was scared of them...

Mr. Din Dandalib!

"I...(eye twitch) love him too..."

IM SORRY DID HE FUCKING THROW UP OUT OF FEAR...holy SHIT

If I scared my friend and they threw up I would simply never do that again. RIP to Badgerclops but I'm different

(Badgerclops makes concrete blocks around the pothole) "Why didn't you just fill in the pothole??" "I AM TRYING MY BEST!!"

"I SIGNED YOUR DUMB CAST, NOW LEAVE!!"

...Illegal house plants? ...like marijua-

That was literally just that one video where a guy knocked out another guy in a mask jumping out of a trash can...

So it's a CPR class...AND a hair-styling class? How

I stg the moment Badgerclops walked in the door I knew he was carrying Mr. Din Danalin I SWEAR

"You're 10." "BUT I'M 6??" JFC Shin doesn't know his own son's age AND is partially responsible for his pupaphobia. And I called it on Mao Mao being six in the flashbacks

OH WIG

Can someone take the footage of the Annex exploding and add the ReviewTechUSA intro over it please

"How many Adult Learning Annexes have to be destroyed before you admit you're scared of puppets?!" is extremely funny without context

(Mao punches the wall cuz hes mad at himself for being scared) Kinkinkinkinki

How does one forget to drink milk

Oh shit the scene from the promo...

Yay he's starting to feel less scared - wait NVM it JUST STARTED TALKING??

OG SGUTVKC FGCJ OG SHKR OF DJCN JKKKKK

Oh it was just a dream - er, nightmare. FIRST NIGHTMARE SEQUENCE OF THE SERIES!

"I just gotta get my socks on...wait, I wear socks, right?" Dud e you wear NOTHING BUT A BELT...

"I KNEW SELLING THOSE HAIRLESS APE DOLLS WOULD ATTRACT DARK FORCES"

"There’s a lot of pu-" "PUBLIC DANGER"

Those puppets are alive I stg

"I'M A BIG BOI..."

Awwww she said what he told her at the beginning of the episode!

"I'M AFRAID OF PUPPETS" TITLE DROP YET AGAIN

Adorabat takes after Badgerclops sometimes I swear

Oooh shit sequel hook - oh NVM it was Badgerclops voice acting - NVM Mao Mao passed out. Dang

The Perfect Couple

Watermelon time babyyy

TRANSFORMATION TIME BABYYYY

Ah so he wanted to perfectly cut a watermelon in half, that's why he got so many?

"I need (counts on fingers) 600 more watermelons!" glad to see I'm not the only one who counts on my fingers

Why would Penny and Benny need 600 watermelons for their wedding? Also I called it on Penny & Benny being the couple

Mao Mao has to officiate the wedding? I thought priests did that

Please don’t throw up again Mao Mao

"I WILL BUY YOU A BAG TO HOLD YOUR STUFF..."

"A nondescript sack!!" Dude he just taking out the trash...

Nvm its just laundry

"I WILL TURN THIS BUSH AROUND"

Oh so THAT'S what Ramaraffe thought Kevin was Adorabat

"Why don't you buy me cake and do my laundry?" Are you implying you wanna marry Mao Mao, Badgerclops 👀

I lov Mao Mao's faces in this scene he legit looks like a bishouen anime protagonist

Nvm no transformation it's just his wedding outfit

Why did they invite Orangusnake and Boss Hosstritch to the wedding tho? What about when they hid in their moving truck and used their electricity - wait Badgerclops technically did that last one, nvm

Wait THEY DIDN'T TALK TO EACH OTHER BEFORE THE WEDDING?? What a perfect couple huh

Is Mao Mao having hallucinations just gonna be a regular thing now....

IS PENNY SERIOUSLY GONNA MARRY ORANGUSNAKE OUT OF SPITE ASFSDGFUK

Why did Mao Mao say "melons" in a Spanish accent I'm scared

"They're both terrible, so what does it matter if they get hitched or not?" They're definitely gonna change their minds now

"She lied because she wanted to protect his feelings! And he lied because he couldn't bear to hurt her!" Isn't that just the plot of The Truth Stinks?

OH SHIT HE CUT ORANGUSNAKE IN HALF HOLY FUCK

He made Orangusnake officiate the wedding as punishment lol

Why are they,,,stepping on the watermelons?? Damn right Badgerclops I'd cry over that too

"What's, uh, your credit score like?" "850. Why, is that good?" "It's perfect..." HE WANTS TO MARRY MAO MAO NOW ASDFHKL

[woolishlygrim]

Winter Weebwatch #1

So, because it is Good when I get to have opinions about things, I figured I’d try out doing a bunch of mini-reviews for the current season of anime, doing a new batch of reviews with each episode and seeing how they evolve and change over time, whether some do better, or some fall behind, or if I end up dropping any of them (and by any of them, I mean Plunderer).

The winter anime season is kind of a dead zone: Since it starts in January when everybody’s starting to get busy again and Christmas has screwed over their sense of work-life balance, it’s the season with the lowest amount of viewers, and so it’s the season where the shows tend to be noticeably low effort and low budget. It’s telling that, despite having huge franchises with a lot of brand recognition, Sunrise and A-1 Pictures put Gundam Build Divers Re:Rise and Sword Art Online on hiatus for the entirety of the winter season, choosing to take the hit that comes from a three month hiatus instead of wasting twelve or thirteen episodes on the Death Season, The Season Where Shows Go To Die.

So by and large, what we’re reviewing here are either the shows distribution companies didn’t care about, or the shows distribution companies did care about but couldn’t get a channel to pick up in any other season. We’re also not reviewing all of them, because there’s like ninety and my store of time and opinions is finite, so we’re reviewing seven.

While the intention is to follow these seven shows through to the end, what will probably happen is I might drop a couple that aren’t keeping my interest, and pick up a couple that catch my eye. If I pick up new ones, then whatever I pick up will get some kind of bumper review covering several episodes.

Also, I really dragged my heels getting this done, so most of these shows have already aired their second episodes. I’ll be trying to put out the second episode reviews a lot quicker, so that I can be relatively current by the time the third episodes roll around.

Anyway! Week 1, first episodes.

Infinite Dendrogram.

★★★☆☆

Infinite Dendrogram has a terrible and ridiculous premise that crumbles into dust if you examine it for more than 0.2 seconds, and I kind of don’t mind that at all.

The show follows Ray Starling, a player in the titular Virtual Reality MMO, which promises infinite possibilities owing to its two unique selling points: The first, that all the NPCs are fully-fledged AIs, meaning the world ‘exists’ distinct from its players or any manned oversight, with quests emerging naturally from the NPCs’ wants and needs, and with NPCs able to permanently die; and the second, that each player character has an Embryo, a superpower generated using their personality as a model, with infinite possibilities.

This is an inconceivably dumb premise. Leaving aside the obvious game balance issues with the Embryos, it’s clarified early on that this AI technology is unique to the game, which means that some game company discovered the technology to create fully conscious, sapient life, and decided to use that technology to create a video game (and in doing so, directly led to the deaths of thousands of those sapient lives).

But I … kinda don’t care? Infinite Dendrogram’s episode was fun, lively, not terribly original but consistently engaging, and managed to introduce five characters who I actually kind of like while telling a self-contained episodic story with good stakes and nice pacing. It feels like Sword Art Online if Sword Art Online was written by a competent writer and also not just a delivery system for creepy, irritating fanservice, and that’s pretty nice.

Also, bonus points for actually making the in-universe game look fun? We’ll call that one another advantage it has over SAO.

ID: Invaded.

★★★★☆

ID: Invaded has indisputably the strongest first episode of this season of anime (really first two, as it aired both episodes one and two back to back), by a gigantic margin. A video called ‘Defending ID: Invaded’ floated by my youtube dash a few days back, so clearly some people don’t agree with me on that, but that’s fine. It’s okay for them to be wrong.

When ID: Invaded picks up, a young man awakens in an empty white void full of floating chunks of a city, with his own body in pieces and no memories. Pulling himself back together, he realises, upon seeing a dead body of a young woman, that his name is Sakaido, and he’s a detective here to solve the woman’s murder.

Sakaido, it quickly turns out, is exploring a cognitive world formed out of a telepathic link with the killer, with a team of investigators in the real world watching through his eyes and picking out evidence to find the murderer with. When the murderer, a serial killer called the Perforator, kidnaps a member of the investigation team, the race is on to find him before he can kill again.

So, ID: Invaded has kind of mastered the art of dripfeeding information in a way that gets a viewer hooked very quickly while steadily delivering a series of twists and turns, and recontextualising the story and the mystery (which, it rapidly emerges, is not the mystery of the Perforator, but rather the mystery of Sakaido himself). It’s gripping and inventive, with a strong if slightly convoluted premise and a lot of interesting material to set up going forward in the series.

In a nice touch, director Ei Aoki turns the mental worlds Sakaido visits (two in the first two episodes) into homages to other surrealist anime directors, mimicking both their compositions and their cinematography. The world of the Perforator draws marked influence from the works of Mamoru Hosoda, an apprentice of Hayao Miyazaki and one of the original creators of Digimon Adventure; while the second world visited pays homage to the works of Akiyuki Shinbo, best known for the unsettling surrealist landscapes and equally unsettling cinematography of Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Fate/Extra Last Encore.

Pet.

★☆☆☆☆

Pet looks like a cheap OVA from 2004. Let’s just get that out of the way, it looks bad, but in a really inoffensive way where it just kind of looks cheap and outdated.

It’s … fine. It’s okay. If you’ve ever had a Burger King bacon and cheese burger, you basically know what Pet is like. If you haven’t ever had a Burger King bacon and cheese burger, go and have a Burger King bacon and cheese burger, and then you’ll know what Pet is like.

The first episode doesn’t really give away anything about the premise of the series, save that it involves psychic criminals, but it tells a decent self-contained little story about a guy who learns something he shouldn’t and is then psychic-ly tormented before his memory is eventually wiped.

There’s also just not a lot to say about Pet, though. It fulfills its function as a work of storytelling, and it doesn’t really ever do much more than that, at least in its first episode. It finds its comfortable niche in just being very average and unremarkable, and sticks there, being average and unremarkable.

Of all the first episodes I’m reviewing, Pet seems the most passionless. It’s such a middle of the road piece of art that I struggle to imagine why it was even made. It doesn’t seem like it’s trying to sell merchandise, it doesn’t seem like a passion project, it doesn’t really seem like much of anything. It feels like someone asked a creative writing class to write a short story about psychic criminals, and then one of those stories was turned into an anime episode.

Plunderer.

☆☆☆☆☆

Plunderer offers a moderately interesting premise that literally nobody watching the first episode will even remember because oh good god, from the second scene onwards the entire episode is just non-stop sexual harassment and assault, first from the protagonist to the deuteragonist and then from the antagonist to the deuteragonist, and I hated it. I hated it so much.

In a bizarre turn, when the protagonist sexually harasses and attempts to sexually assault the deuteragonist, it’s played as wacky comedy, but when the antagonist does basically the exact same thing, it’s played with all the sense of horror that those actions warrant.

I just … don’t really get how I’m meant to ever sympathise with the protagonist after this. I don’t know how you rehabilitate a character in the audience’s minds when our very first introduction to him tells us that he’s a sex pest.

Also something something numbers something something die if your number reaches zero something something magical items who even cares what the premise is, my patience for this show ran dry thirty seconds into the second scene.

If I had a way of representing it, I would give this first episode a negative number of stars.

Sorcerous Stabber Orphen.

★★★☆☆

Let it just be noted that ‘Sorcerous Stabber Orphen’ is the most unintentionally hilarious anime title of the season, so there’s that.

A remake of a 1999 series of the same name, Sorcerous Stabber Orphen follows Orphen, a disgraced former sorcerer turned small-time crook and moneylender whose ill-advised attempt to commit marriage fraud is abruptly interrupted by the appearance of a dragon crashing through the roof of his potential bride/mark’s house. This isn’t just any dragon, however, but Orphen’s sister, Azalie, magically transformed after a spell gone wrong, leading Orphen on a quest to turn her back into a human before the sorcerers of the Tower of Fang can kill her.

Side note: While he names himself ‘Orphen’ because he is an orphan, I’m not misspelling the name, that’s how it’s spelled in-show. This is everybody’s fault except mine.

So, this first episode rather shows the age of its source material. It looks very much like a spruced up late 90s anime made with current day animation techniques, and that’s actually not a bad look for it. It’s also not really a good look -- Megalo Box this ain’t -- it’s just kind of a … look. Which is there. It exists in a state of Neutral Retro.

As first episodes go, though, this is probably one of the emptier and slower ones, somehow managing to cover less of its plot than even Plunderer (although it wins out on a massive margin the basis of that plot not being 90% sex crimes), because seemingly not only is its animation style cribbed from late 90s action anime, but so is its pacing.

What’s there, though, is pretty fun. None of it is dazzlingly original, it probably wasn’t that original even in the 90s, but we get introduced to a likeable cast of characters, we get a decent central conflict set up, and the worldbuilding is, while bare bones at present, at least interesting enough to hook a viewer who likes fantasy.

Also, it’s called ‘Sorcerous Stabber Orphen,’ so, you know. Extra star just for that, man.

In/Spectre.

★★☆☆☆

I’m not sure what In/Spectre is trying to be, and it doesn’t seem to be sure either.

The marketing set it up as an atmospheric, brooding supernatural mystery. The first third of the episode frames it as a romantic comedy with emphasis on the comedy. The second third of the episode switches back to atmospheric, brooding supernatural mystery, only for the third third of the episode to switch tracks yet again, this time to an action comedy with an emphasis on the action.

I don’t know whether I’m coming or going with this show. I get mood whiplash constantly, as it veers from genre to genre like a drunk driver on the freeway. By the time the last third of the episode hit, I felt completely unmoored not just from the plot, but from how I was even meant to interpret the characters.

It’s not bad at any of those genres, either. The romantic comedy section was actually pretty funny, the supernatural mystery section was suitably ominous, the action comedy section established stakes and followed through on them pretty well. None of it was blow-me-away-amazing, but it was all competent, it’s just that there’s no coherent sense of tone to any of it.

Darwin’s Game.

★☆☆☆☆

Full disclosure, I completely forgot I was watching Darwin’s Game. I finished these reviews, thought ‘haha, well done, I’ve reviewed all six shows I wanted to review’ and didn’t remember that there was a seventh on my list until I saw its name come up on a streaming website.

That’s a large part of why I’m scoring it so low. It’s better than In/Spectre, Pet, or Plunderer, it’s probably at least as good as Sorcerous Stabber Orphen, but at least those shows actually made some kind of impression on me. Darwin’s Game is good, but I can’t exactly justify giving two or three stars to a show that had such little impact that it vanished from my memory as soon as I stopped actively watching it with my eyes, like some kind of middling Doctor Who monster.

So, Darwin’s Game follows, um. It follows … a guy … with a name that I can’t recall … who is unwittingly dragged into a death game played in the streets of Tokyo. With each player given Sigils, seemingly magical abilities that they can use to gain advantages in the game, and with points exchangeable for vast sums of real money, the players of Darwin’s Game are set to the task of hunting down and murdering other players. Unable to back out of the game, Some Guy finds help with, er … with … a person … whose name I also don’t recall … and …

God, trying to recall the details of this show is like trying to recall what you had for dinner last week just after a severe head injury. You know, but the details just aren’t there.

I’m kind of at a loss as far as opinions go, because I don’t … know? If I think hard, I can remember the order of events that happened in the first episode, but I can’t remember what, if any, emotional response I had to them. All of my memories of this show are a blank, emotionless void, this is like asking me to review Solitaire. Like, I guess it was fine? I guess? 

I can’t remember the main character’s face or voice.

Note to self, write all Darwin’s Game reviews from now on immediately after watching the episode, otherwise all recollection of it will melt like ice cream in a heat wave.

I’m still giving it one star, though, because I refuse to put it on the same level as Plunderer. For a start, the main character doesn’t belong on some kind of registry.

[actuallylorelaigilmore]

I feel bad for not caring about Avery and Schneider on the show. I mean what do they even have in common besides being rich and hating it. Maybe it’s because they don’t show them as a couple or even her as a character much. Idk, they are just so boring to me. She does seem nice and she’s beautiful and I love that they are married in real life but as a couple on the show? I just can’t see it

Okay, this is totally you asking for an essay on Schneider and Avery, right? Whoops you’re getting one anyway because I have so many feelings about them and so many opinions I haven’t had much reason to dig into yet.

The genius of Schneider and Avery is that the actors playing them, real-life marrieds Todd & India, have the MOST ridiculous chemistry.

The problem with Schneider and Avery is…the exact same thing.

The Backstory

I knew long before S3 came out that Schneider was getting a love interest this season, and that she was going to be played by Todd’s wife, who I wasn’t familiar with at all besides his Instagram photos. I’m not even sure I knew she was an actress until they announced her guest starring role. Because they announced it early, I had a lot of time to build up anxiety over it.

I’m as deep into this fandom as I am because I ship Schneider with Penelope. I love the show exactly as it is, and if they never become canon I won’t love it any less, but that doesn’t change the fact that: 1) I watched the show; 2) I started shipping them; 3) I decided to write my first fic for a sitcom because of them; 4) through fic I made friends and developed headcanons and made more friends and managed to keep writing through some really rough life events; and 5) then from filming announcements and through the fandom, I found out Avery was coming and that the show was going to be including the weird Pen/Schneider sibling vibe in S3.

So before S3 premiered I was really, genuinely scared I might not enjoy S3 as much as I adored S2. What if I hated it? What if I hated Schneider’s new girlfriend??? I wanted to like her so much because I knew the actress was Todd’s wife, but I had no idea if I COULD because I had no idea how they were going to include her or who she would be. And I’ve never hated Penelope’s love interests just because I like her with Schneider, but I had also met several of those by the end of S2. Schneider getting a girlfriend was new.

1. Todd and India have more than their fair share of chemistry. Who do I speak to about that?

Then, in 3x03, we meet Schneider’s new love interest–and I was basically Schneider (as I often am). From the glasses that don’t succeed at all in dulling how gorgeous she is to her nerdy interests and apparent mild social anxiety (when she asked ”are you making fun of me?” so sincerely, my heart just went…oh. oh okay.) I thought she was adorable and funny and even more than that, I’m SO weak for devoted men, I can’t even tell you.

Well, I don’t have to tell you. If you’ve read anything I’ve ever written about Penelope and Schneider, you know. I love men who love women so much they would do anything for them, especially when they’re quietly selfless about it but so in love that it just radiates out of them.

That’s how Schneider has always acted with Penelope, a little bit, even when he wasn’t trying. That’s why I fell for the ship.

But that’s also how TODD acts, opposite India–to a ridiculous degree, in a way that isn’t acting at all. You can feel it hitting you through the television, how lucky he feels just to be with her, just to be NEAR her. It’s so sweet, I die. Schneider/Avery isn’t even my OTP and I’m gonna make them a gifset at some point, just because I cannot handle the fact that Todd looks at his wife that way, every time he focuses on her.

So because this is clearly going to be long, to sum up point 1: Todd Grinnell, who plays Schneider, and his offscreen wife India de Beaufort, who plays Avery? Absolutely fantastic couple. I’m totally rooting for them, these strangers I don’t actually know. Just because watching them act together is a beautiful thing.

Also because India is a sweet human who told me on Twitter that the little nose rub between them after they reunite in 3x13 was improvised by them, not scripted. And you better believe I could not love that more if I tried. THEY ARE CUTE. Conclusion one.

2: Schneider and Avery have too little screen time to make sense as a couple.

ODAAT as a show is so strong because it holds the Alvarez/Riera family at its core and builds everything around them. You’re supposed to fall in love with them first, and grow to love the supporting characters around them, as you slowly learn more about them.

Now, in some cases, it’s not a slow process. It didn’t take me long to love Carmen or Schneider–it only took me one scene to love Syd. But the show’s purpose isn’t those characters, at least not at first. It’s Penelope’s family. And the rewarding thing about ODAAT is that the definition of ‘family’ grows and envelopes more of the characters, as time goes on.

Because Schneider was still a (fabulous, lovable) supporting character before S3, he was on the outside a bit, along with Dr. B. I think you can look at the show like a set of circles, with Penelope and Lydia and Elena and Alex in the center circle, then with Schneider & Dr. B. and Syd one ring just outside of that, revolving around them. The support group, most of Penelope’s love interests, and Elena and Alex’s friends are a ring outside of that.

S3 widened the inner circle and pulled Schneider in. It was the first season to actually dig into his backstory, the family he comes from, his sobriety. And while it was amazing, it was still just a start. It was the beginning of showing him as a full family member. It put him in the center circle, and that meant giving him more focused scenes, more story.

But the show is still also about the whole family, and S3 has the same amount of episodes as the first two did. The show included more Schneider, but still only fit in so much. And one consequence of that is that his relationship with Avery exists almost entirely offscreen. They told us more about it than they  showed, and let Todd and India’s chemistry fill in the gaps, the unanswered questions.

3. What we actually saw onscreen when it comes to Schneider and Avery.

A meet-cute, which was pretty well-done. We learn she’s a geek along with him, that they’re compatible in at least that one way. We learn they like each other pretty instantly, which isn’t always believable, but the show’s got to move at a fast pace and I respect that. We learn he likes her enough to argue with Nikki, and she likes him enough to do the same. She’s no pushover, and she inspires him to be stronger. A good start.

Schneider spends some time with Penelope in the next episode and Avery doesn’t come up at all. When we see her again, Schneider’s about to have his first real date with her, as far as I can tell, on Valentine’s Day. (No pressure or anything.) It’s clear that Penelope and Avery have met by now, though we don’t know when or how. By the end of the episode we know that Schneider and Avery spent most of their first date lying to each other.

The big reveal, that they have even more in common than they thought, was super predictable to me but still funny, and my only problem with it is that once they land that plot twist, it becomes Avery’s entire personality. She’s no longer the quirky kindergarten teacher who gets along with Schneider the hobbyist because she loves to write poems and appreciates his niche interests.

Now, she’s his rich girlfriend. They get along because when he needs to fix his expensive hot tub, she can suggest they just pay someone to do it. The next time we see her, Avery’s entire existence is a few lines that show how well she gets along with his father because HAHAHA money. And then? We don’t see her at all until her surprise return in the finale.

5. What we didn’t see onscreen between Schneider and Avery.

Offscreen, as far as I can tell, they had other dates, they seem like they were serious enough to probably have had sex, she clearly was invited to some dinners etc with the family (though we don’t know if she went), before he started drinking again and they broke up and then she avoided him completely until Lydia convinced her to give him another chance.

We know Schneider completely blames himself for their breakup, but we have literally no idea what happened to send her running scared. Did he start drinking in secret and she caught him? Did he start drinking around her openly because he thought her reaction would be different from his family’s? Did she leave him because of the drinking or because of some specific thing that happened while Schneider was drunk or for some other reason entirely???

Based on their conversation in the finale, something happened, whatever it was. And Avery definitely knew he needed to be sober, otherwise why else would she be scared to try again?

Therefore the single biggest conundrum that S3 left me with, especially the more I rewatched, was this:

Avery knew Schneider well enough to know he wasn’t supposed to be drinking, or enough to tell there was a problem when his drinking came to her attention. SOMETHING happened that was bad enough for them to break up, and for her to ghost him after.

Avery also knew that Schneider’s family of choice was Penelope and her mom and her kids. She’d met them often enough to be able to talk to them politely, to know where they live.

Why didn’t she say ANYTHING to ANYONE in that apartment as soon as things with Schneider imploded????

How is it that she could be aware enough of Schneider’s life to know his family/best friends, aware enough to be worried about his sobriety, and worried enough to decide they had no future, but not tell his family what was going on when she was clearly aware of it long before they were??

Even if she was unhappy and uncomfortable and didn’t want to get into relationship details with Penelope, she could have just mentioned the drinking part and cut off all further communication! She could have left a note at their door!! She works at Elena and Alex’s school teaching the little kids, presumably she might sometimes run into them on school grounds…and she never said anything.

It drives me crazy because maybe there’s a reasonable explanation for that, for all of it, but I would have no idea what it is, because all of that happened offscreen and wasn’t explored.

6. Why it matters.

With the family at the show’s core, and Schneider only recently included in that center, Avery falls in the outer ring. But because S3 tried to give Schneider more without giving the rest of the family less, there just wasn’t room to flesh out Avery enough.

If you compare her to Max in S2, we saw him interact with the whole family on multiple occasions. Because of that, we got to know him as more than just ‘Penelope’s casual sex buddy who she was friends with years ago.’ He and Pen weren’t my OTP either, but I genuinely liked them together because we understood why they worked. We saw them survive conflicts, face problems, have real conversations.

With Avery, we saw her and Schneider meet and then we saw them present fake bios to each other before the truth came out, and then we saw her be the perfect rich-son girlfriend before disappearing. Their conflicts were left to our imagination. Their deeper moments were left to our imagination. When they get back together, we see Avery after she’s already decided to try again, and Schneider apologizing for whatever exactly happened that we may never know.

As viewers, we can interpret that as generously as we want, but it still leaves us with a relationship that we’re told matters…because we’re told it does. Though I love Schneider and I hate seeing him in pain, ‘he’s sad without her’ is not a detailed case for why he belongs with Avery. And ‘because Lydia vouched for him’ is absolutely not a good enough explanation for why Avery belongs with him.

Even looking at it as though what we learned about her in the beginning holds true, we’re left to assume that Avery loves him enough to support him through his recovery and rebuild trust, because…they’re both pretty nerds with similar feelings about their family money? And he loves her so much he was in hell without her…because to him she’s a ‘perfect angel woman’ (which is so painfully idealistic of him, it makes sense for him but is also begging for him to be crushed again when she falls off that pedestal).

There are as many red flags in the screen time we do see as there are reasons to root for them. She claims to be miserable with inherited money just like he is, but she’s way more comfortable relying on it, talking about it in ways that we just don’t see Schneider do. And the whole point when Schneider’s father visits is that Schneider is not who Lawrence wants him to be–but as far as we know, Avery isn’t putting on an act to get along with him, the way Schneider does. She just IS enough like him. She’s very at ease on his level.

And don’t even get me started on Avery stopping Schneider’s joy over being an Alvarez to make him focus back on her. It’s a joke, but it’s also not a good sign for their future, if any part of her isn’t 100% comfortable with how important to him the whole family is.

7. My grand unifying theory.

I’m convinced that her lack of dimensions, and their relationship lacking depth as much as it does, is because writing Avery in involved bringing India on. I’m not saying I wish they hadn’t!! Again, I adore her. But it’s a problem, and here’s why.

Every serious love interest we’ve seen Penelope have, from Victor to Mateo, is in her orbit mainly, but also interacts with the rest of her life. Max got to know everybody, counseling Alex, being pestered by Schneider, flirted with by Lydia, etc. Victor was central to her life for a long time, so we learn a lot about him through his many family scenes. Mateo has scenes with Penelope mainly, but he’s around the family enough that we learn about him based on that proximity–how he feels about Alex, how his background compares to her family’s.

Avery is Schneider’s first serious love interest, and we see her interact with…Schneider. No conversations between her and Lydia, only one exchange with Penelope when Avery tries to mistakenly console her over being single, then they never directly speak again. Avery doesn’t ever talk to the kids, though they’re super important to his life.

As a show, ODAAT never made me consider the Bechdel test until I was trying to include Avery in an edit about the female character interactions and I realized that that one moment with Pen is the only one. As a character, her entire point, and focus, and existence even, is about Schneider. It wouldn’t be so weird if she were just another Stick Girl, but we’ve seen her included in family events. We know she knows the people in his life. We just don’t see her ever talk to any of them, and I don’t think that was a choice they made to keep her character secluded so much as it was a natural result of adding a character to the outer ring whose only purpose in the story is to date Schneider.

So they created a girlfriend for Schneider, and they worked her into the story enough to give them a relationship, and to make their breakup and reunion important plot points for Schneider’s S3 arc.

And because the show was more focused on the family, Avery’s character was only included where she absolutely had to be, to hit those plot points.

And because the actors have chemistry enough to sell it, ODAAT called that good enough for their characters and that relationship and kept moving.

It’s clear from social media that the cast and crew of the show adore Todd and India, and adore their onscreen relationship just as much. Because of that, I’m not sure if maybe they’re a little blinded to what the whole thing is like for the rest of us, who don’t know them personally, who don’t see Schneider/Avery first as an adorable ship starring these two cute dorks that so clearly are meant to be because the actors are.

But whatever the reason, I think a lot of the people involved in the show ship it harder than the viewers do. I ship Schneider/Avery because she makes him happy and the actors are fun to watch, but I hope they’re not endgame for all the above reasons.

Schneider deserves love and a future with someone, and even if he doesn’t end up with my personal choice for his ideal match, I still want that someone to make sense. I want to be able to root for them for reasons that exist in canon. If the show gets more seasons and we see Schneider and Avery work on/through some issues, if we see him start to treat her like a flawed person he loves rather than like someone he doesn’t deserve at all…if we get to see how the other important people in his life relate to her…then I’ll be more on board.

But after S3, all I can say with certainty is that Todd and India make Schneider and Avery watchable…but they can’t carry the whole relationship based on their chemistry alone.

[elizabethrobertajones]

(part 1) this is random but something im curious about is do you think the next few years will see a radical shift in more lead lgbt couples in shows? i feel like when supernatural started it was all about subtext/queerbating between characters we would never see canon (maybe), the last few years have seen an update in more side lgbt characters/couples and while not a lot, more main lgbt characters then we had before. I don't know if tumblr/twitter fandom translates to general audience...

Yeah, I mean, the only way is up. I feel lucky that I managed to encounter a fair amount of queer content in my formative years, whether targeted programming on TV, or taking the route of not really differentiating the perceived cultural value of independent media like webcomics and webnovels etc from the mass media as I was young enough to naturally grow up on the internet as the internet itself was growing up and web 2.0 was pretty much taking off alongside my use of the internet. And that I had liberal parents who didn’t regulate our internet, and lived in a community where culturally I didn’t really fear being discovered casually accessing all this like in particularly this terrifying seeming evangelical christian community in America.

Which really makes me feel like A: everyone should feel that comfortable in themselves via the media as I did as a mass accessible thing or B: that the world at large should be soaked in as much representation and more that I encountered as a curious teen because at the very least it did me no harm and at best helped handhold me through an awful lot. 

And then brings us to the problem that the world isn’t actually like that and for a lot of people their media is restricted one way or another, from everything such as the era of social media weirdly making us much LESS broadly travelled on the internet as I was back in the day (SO many bookmarks - I had like 100 that I would check either daily or on their weekly update schedule, with enough habit that I had pretty much memorised it all without using an RSS feed or just following everyone’s twitter and waiting for update announcements, never mind the vast pit of things which I occasionally checked to see if their sporadic but very worth it updates had occurred somewhere in the last month/year) to the vastly overwhelming amount of media accessible to us. It seems almost to flood the market and creates this panic about watching the worthiest shows and campaigning for them and raising awareness and the FOMO and how things slip by and zomg you have to watch this that and the other, when even just making this list on Netflix now contains more hours of TV than a human lifetime and also one liable to disappear from the service at some point or another without warning. 

And then on top of that you have the absolute cultural monoliths that if you’re not going to have a cohesive culture - which now includes the entire population of the world because of our connectivity on the internet and mass-joining of services - based around smaller shows and stuff, then at the very least everyone is going to watch anything under the main Disney umbrella, other superhero flicks, animated things, and all the really big studio franchises and remakes, as well as a few TV monoliths which manage to get enough people talking to make it seem like “everyone” (again - these days it seems like that’s presumed to be the entire western world plus everywhere else these things air) are watching, like Game of Thrones or whatever… THESE properties are the inescapable ones and on that basis they’re the things we have to lean on the most for representation and then again barely get any, when it comes to gender and sexuality, due to them shooting for such worldwide markets that they can’t imply gay people exist to censors in places such as China. And it exposes the cultural awfulness inherent just in getting a white female character in the lead role of some things, or the absolute garbage fire lurking underneath that if you dare have a black stormtrooper or make one of your female ghostbusters black when you’re already ruining the childhoods of so many how dare… 

In those respects, having side characters who aren’t even major well-known superheroes or jedis or ghostbusters or whatever also be gay (because even well-known lesbian Kate McKinnon didn’t manage to get her ghostbuster to be canonically gay even if we All Knew) would be absolutely groundbreaking, even if it was, like, a role that could be snipped out for the Chinese market or something. And that’s probably exactly what would happen, and cue ensuing riot from whichever fandom, along with everyone rightly pointing out that even for us who got to watch it it was still a tiny side character… I mean Disney is still at the stage of what they did with Beauty and the Beast’s ~canonical gay character~ 

So yeah… that’s thrown back to TV and smaller movies to lead the way and because the generations showing most likely the real global percentages but actually just the young western world stats on queerness in any form (like… 25% instead of 1% or whatever and that’s STILL probably too low) are still teens to young adults. The previous gayest generation above them are still just arriving in power and settling in, and the excellent changes we already have from the generation before that is what we are seeing now... But given THEIR cultural context, even their best can still seem to younger eyes, moderate and not generally placing queer characters in lead roles except in niche or indie or otherwise “acceptable” places to take those risks. I think change is always coming and culturally each generation being more open and accepting that the last is really making changes and so on, hopefully things WILL change rapidly and what was the common state of affairs in the sort of indie media I consumed as a teen will be the mainstream soon because a lot of those creators 10 years later are kicking off… 

All that said, TV in the mainstream is still controlled by Mark Pedowitz types exercising their power over the Bobos who have their Wayward Sisters pitches with the clearly labelled main character for the main teen demographic being queer. The culture is very much that we’re now pretty open and can happily have queer characters, but the main characters are still largely held separate. A good example is Riverdale, which is on the CW, a newer show with writers such as Britta Lundin, who is young, queer, and wrote a novel blatantly based on being a Destiel shipper and fan interacting with the cast and crew in fandom spaces, and whose first solo episode of Riverdale featured a looooot of the gay stuff (yay). 

But while she’s a story editor and writer for the show and can use it as a platform for writing stories for its audience using a whole range of canonically queer characters, the show still keeps all 4 of its mains at a strict remove from this. Cheryl can come out as a lesbian in the second season after a lil ho yay in the first but no clearly marked storyline about her identity, but even though Betty and Veronica kissed in the first episode it was blatant fan service (for Cheryl in-story, lol) and mostly just set the tone that they are the sort of seemingly straight girls kissing for attention while having strong romantic or physical attraction to guys. In the second season the kiss comes up again in joking that Jughead and Archie are the only ones of the main 4 who haven’t kissed, Archie gets one planted on him by a dude as a “judas kiss” moment of betrayal in season 3 and he and Jug are teased that they were expected to get together because they were close but in the same sort of homophobic undercurrent tones as early Destiel snarking from side characters, seemingly less about their relationship and more to unsettle them with implications… I mean it was a complicated moment but in the long run it didn’t seem entirely pleasant to me, especially given the overall emotional state they were in and later plot etc etc. (My mum is 1000% invested in Riverdale now as a former Archie Comics reader as a kid so this is now my life too as I was in the room when my brother callously exposed her to it, hi :P) 

Anyway that’s just one case study but aside from SPN it’s probably the most mainstream teen demographic thing I watch… Other examples would be things like B99 which had Rosa come out as bi and that’s awesome, and made us all cry a lot, but Jake, the clear main character even in a very strong and well-treated ensemble, has a great deal of bi subtext, there’s no way given Andy Samberg’s apparent habit of ad-libbing MORE progressive jokes that he’d ever be intentionally harming people if that’s how his brain works (you know, like other people quick-fire offensive stuff from their mouth working faster than brain sense of humour :P). But at the same time for all Jake’s quipping about crushes and such and the fact the show clearly knows how to be sensitive to bisexuality with Stephanie Beatriz being a strong advocate, just because Jake’s the main character and adorably married to Amy. In NO WAY can that be threatened because they’re SO GOOD, so there’s STILL uncertainty that this will pay off in the same special episode “I love my wife but I am bi” kinda way that seems obvious that could just be said. We all carry on without it affecting anything because obviously Jake’s found his soulmate so we don’t mess with that but they should know it’s important to clarify it… Even with B99′s track record, I’m nervous solely because Jake’s the main character and main characters tend not to get self-exploratory arcs about latent queerness and ESPECIALLY not if they’re happily married. If ANY show was going to do it right and trailblaze in this exact era it would be them, but… gyah :P 

Anyway I guess the conclusion right now is that the more mainstream you are the more uncertain it feels, but we are right at that cliff edge, especially with shows putting in SOME of the work. If B99 doesn’t get us there (or the Good Place where they’ll happily confirm Eleanor is bi in interviews but I believe she hasn’t said it outright on the show despite clearly showing attraction to female characters, again, the denials we know so well in SPN fandom reflect a wider audience view of dismissing this stuff as jokes and not reflective of character feeling and identification without a Special Episode dedicated to confirming it >.>) then we’re very clearly on the cusp of SOME mainstream or massively well-known show doing it at least once in a meaningful way that has an Ellen-style cultural impact on TV writing. 

Let’s make it a goal for 2019 or 2020, and hope that a NEW show with a canonically queer main from the start is pitched and becomes a mainstream hit in the next 5… Still got a ways to go before Disney level mainstream but again there IS work going pushing the envelope, especially if we get a movie of a franchise such as idk Further Legends of Korra, or Steven Universe or something else that’s massively pushed the envelope with sexuality or gender for their main character on the small screen in the experimental petri dish they’ve had there for children’s TV. Something that would force Disney to blink about a lesbian princess or Star Wars to let Finn and Poe kiss or Marvel to let Steve and Bucky hold hands or something in order to remain relevant.

Once the Big Cultural Monoliths get in on it, I expect culture as a whole to first of all react quickly on the small screen, but honestly I’ve been waiting for them to snap pretty much my whole life since adolescence and they’re taking such wee tiny baby steps, and some factors are enormous geopolitical awfulness, that the story as a whole is unpredictable and we can only really hope that things don’t slow down. 

(Where this affects SPN is just impossible to say right now, given its almost unique position in this mess due to longevity vs fandom vs almost entirely new generation of writers’ room) 

[vmheadquarters]

Twelve years ago today, UPN (RIP!) premiered a cult-classic neo-noir about murder, class warfare, sexual assault, and forbidden love. It was quippy and campy and smart as hell—and it just happened to center on a pint-sized blonde who looked like a cheerleader but thought like Sherlock Holmes. The show was Veronica Mars, and even if the last decade has muddled its legacy with a much-hyped but ultimately disappointing fan-funded follow-up film and, of course, the extremely meh third season, the high school years remain an unparalleled success. Veronica Mars seasons one and two were better than anything that had come before, far surpassed its competition in quality, and set a high bar for future shows that has only barely been met by a few episodes of television here and there. So give my regards to Friday Night Lights (a family show, not a teen show) and Degrassi (please), but Veronica Mars is the best teen show of all time*. 

1. Nuanced Class Conflict

Gossip Girl and The OC did it well, but Veronica Mars did it better. Even though Neptune, CA, is technically fictional, it's as real a place as has ever been portrayed on television. Its particular problems and reputation informed everything from law enforcement (the question of whether or not to incorporate the town into a city and make the sheriff's office into a police department) to the biker gangs riding through on their way up and down the PCH. The levels of privilege/lack thereof were so nuanced and specific. Other shows divide people into the Haves and the Have Nots; on Veronica Mars, everyone has something a little different. At the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder is Weevil, whose background is not only impoverished but criminal; the only community he can "afford" is a gang (though his crew isn't all bad—you'll find nary a broad stroke or generalization in the world of Veronica Mars). In the center of things are Veronica and Keith, who lived comfortably when Keith was sheriff, but have buckled their belts since he became a private eye. On the one hand, they own a small business! On the other, they live in a pretty crap apartment complex and have nowhere near enough saved to send Veronica to college. Then there's the nouveau-riche Echolls', who have all the glamorous trappings of wealth (cars, booze, mansion) and pretty much none of the cultural capital. At the top of the heap are the Kanes; while the Echolls' have enough money to "get away" with murder, the Kanes have enough money to get away with it, cover it up, frame someone else for it, and get the sheriff fired for looking into it. Money problems are basically the least-juicy of TV plots, but by using wealth disparity as a way to develop the characters, essentially building it into the DNA of the show, Veronica Mars created a TV universe just as interesting and complicated as that of Friday Night Lights or Parks and Recreation.

2. Lianne Mars

A girl with a missing mom is a fairy tale trope as old as time, rooted in a deification-of-the-female version of misogyny that I don't have time to get into right now. Suffice it to say, a dead or absentee mother is usually a sign of lazy writing. It's a way to reduce the character count and set a heroine adrift while, not coincidentally, making it so the (usually male) writer doesn't have to think of what a grown woman would think or talk or act like. At first, this is the fate of Veronica's mother, Lianne Mars. She was just conveniently...gone, another casualty of the fallout from the Lilly Kane murder investigation. Her absence lets Veronica be angsty and ill-supervised even as Keith Mars entered the canon of Bestest TV Dads of All Time (which he is! Love Keith forever and ever). But then she came back, with baggage, and the trope was, if not redeemed, at least put to good use. Lianne is an alcoholic who couldn't deal with the disappointing turns life took, and she finally cracked when her husband ran directly into conflict with her lost love Jake Kane, for whom she still pined. Even when she decides she wants to be a mom again, she can't quit being an alcoholic. And as heartbreaking as it is to watch Veronica play the parent, it's also a moment of growth. Veronica realizes—or rather, decides—that she isn't doomed to repeat her mother's mistakes. She is a stronger, better person than Lianne. A person big enough to love her flawed mother, even strong enough to forgive her. In the third episode, Veronica says, "The hero is the one that stays, and the villain is the one that splits." By the end of the series, Veronica has learned what true villainy looks like, and it ain't her mom. Showrunners, take note: This is how you do a realistic redemption story.

3. The Guest Stars and Bit Players

The casting department at Veronica Mars did flawless work. Obviously, the core cast is great, but the semi-regulars and guests are also amazing. There's an entire season devoted to Steve fucking Guttenberg. Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin play the negaverse versions of themselves. Ryan Hansen and Ken Marino do their Ryan Hansen/Ken Marino Shtick, and why shouldn't they? Max Greenfield (a.k.a. Schmidt on New Girl) and Tessa Thompson (from Dear White People and Creed) both had recurring roles long before they were famous, and even Tina Majorino (Mac) and Michael Muhney (Lamb), who didn't really "break out" in a major way after the show, are perfect in their roles. The second (SECOND) IMDb credit for one Jessica Chastain is an episode of Veronica Mars, and of course, Leighton Meester appears in two episodes. Yes, there are other teen shows that feature young actors who went on to bigger, better things, but I maintain that Veronica Mars is notable for encouraging real actors to do real work.

4. The Mysteries Were Smart AF

The show trusted its audience to keep up and pay attention. Maybe even a little too much. In the era before binge-watching and old episodes being able on demand, Veronica Mars suffered from the same issue that plagues the first few seasons of The X Files: Viewers who weren't "caught up" on the season-long mystery arc found it difficult to get into. VM had low ratings throughout its run, and when it used the shift from high school to college to introduce shorter, quicker mysteries, well, we all know how season three went. But looking back, it's clear that the show was ahead of its time, telling smart, twist-y weekly stories while teasing out a longer mystery that deeply impacted the main characters' lives. (Can't you just imagine how they'd advertise the show now? Moody teaser trailers with the tag line "Who Killed Lilly Kane?" and fansites and podcasts devoted to all the clues and hints and easter eggs from every episode?) There are other teen mystery/crime-fighter shows, sure, but they tend to put their characters in immediate peril, which makes the audience ask, "What's going to happen?" Instead, Veronica Mars is an intellectual exercise, evidence and theory based, and the question becomes, "What has already happened, and what does it mean?" That's the kind of meaty writing that inspires, if not legions of fans, a loyal audience to sing its praises. Veronica Mars was so smart it was niche. I'm not making a case for VM as overlooked prestige television, but then again I totally am. WHY didn't it win any Emmys?

5. They Didn't Explain Every Little Thing

See: above "trusting the audience smartness" factor. They didn't explain why sleeping with a "consenting" teenager is still wrong, or why Logan and Veronica went from adversaries to lovers in the space of like, a week, or why money equals power. They got that the audience got it. So, the exact opposite of a show like, say, Secret Life of the American Teenager. There were episodes that touched on privilege and entitlement and infidelity and the abuse of power by law enforcement, but it was subtle and real instead of, you know...Degrassi.

6. The Humor

It wasn't dark and humorous, it was darkly humorous and humorously dark. (Think combining the creepy weirdness of Twin Peaks with the banter of Moonlighting.) Logan's poignant answering machine messages, Veronica's epic takedowns, even Lamb got to be withering and snarky while he systematically fucked over the whole town.The humor kept us invested even when stories dipped into sentimental, Dawson's Creek-esque territory and deflected the romance-y moments that might have turned it into a mystery-style Felicity. Veronica's and Logan's jokes, in particular, also serve a psychological purpose: mask their pain at any cost. Unlike in Gilmore Girls, where every character speaks like a hyper-intelligent stand-up comic and not at all like a teenager or real human being, Veronica and the residents of Neptune make comments that feel true to their characters and relevant to their circumstances. If you watched any episode of Scream Queens and thought, "I guess they're trying to imitate...Scream? Heathers? Clueless? With the smart/bitchy blondes and the snappy comebacks and the eye rolls?" I understand. But actually, they were trying (and failing. Hard.) to do Veronica Mars. Smart sassy cute mean heart of gold flirty clever repartee? Yeah, that's Veronica Mars, and Ryan Murphy, bless his soul, is not Rob Thomas.

7. The Rape Plot(s)

From the very first episode when, in a flashback, golden-haired, white dress-clad Veronica walks, almost in a stupor (have you ever seen a more "perfect" victim?) into the sheriff's office to tell Lamb that she was raped—because she is a good girl and good girls go to the authorities—only to have him, basically, shrug it off, rape and sexual assault were core themes of the show, central to its purpose and story engine. Creator Rob Thomas initially envisioned the story as a YA novel with a male protagonist, and changing the lead's gender to female is arguably the best and most important decision he ever made. Veronica's sexuality is everything. How she flirts her way out of scrapes, plays innocent when it can help her, distrusts it when she's attracted to the "wrong" person, is allowed to enjoy it with Logan and, of course, how her virginity was taken from her one night she can't quite remember. The show takes Veronica's rape seriously as not just a plot point or easy motivation, but as a defining part of her character. She cleans obsessively and looks over her shoulder. She's sensitive to the potential aggressors—and victims—at her school. She knows that her rapist was someone she knew, and she has to live with that mystery every day. But it's complicated. That night she can't remember might have been semi-consensual, but then we learn, no it wasn't. Yes, there's a story about a false rape accusation (against Adam Scott!), but the truth only makes the situation murkier. And in an unfortunately rare move, Veronica Mars also depicts the aftermath of the sexual abuse of boys, including an exploration of how the stigma against male assault survivors re-traumatizes them. (The third season is, in my opinion, a missed opportunity to tackle the campus rape epidemic. By blaming the rapes on a psychological experiment gone awry, the show unfortunately ignores the fact that toxic masculinity isn't a role-playing aberration but a pervasive national issue. But its heart is in the right place, if not its logic.)

8. Veronica

Choker-wearing, dog-owning, private-detectiving blonde badass Veronica Mars. She's most often compared to Buffy, that other crime-fighting cutie with a ragtag army of friends and a ne'er do well love interest, and the comparison is apt. Both possess skills their peers do not and use those skills to solve problems both thrust upon them and sought. But the difference is that in the space that Buffy uses to explore the supernatural, Veronica Mars plays with loyalty and ethics. Is it wrong to snitch on your friends? Is a rumor evidence? Can you break the law to serve a higher good? These are issues Buffy doesn't wrestle with; it's pretty much a given that evil vampires are worth defeating (yes, there are definitely instances when Buffy is tested because she's fallen for a vamp or one of her friends is possessed or whatever, but that's not like, the thing of the show). And while so many other "outsider/observer/new kid" teen show protagonists (Ryan, Dan, Dawson, Lindsay Weir) long to get "in," Veronica's been there. She's been popular, and (a little) wealthy. She's not exploring a new world, she's re-learning her old one. In that she has more in common with Angela Chase, but way less whiny. You watch My So-Called Life and think, I'm totally Angela. You watch VMand think, I wish I were Veronica. When people talk about the strong but vulnerable but smart but flawed but cool but real but beautiful but relatable but empowered but conflicted but modern but iconic but a good role model but not unattainable with a job not defined by that job "interesting" female characters on television, a few names tend to come up again and again: Carrie, Murphy, Ally, Roseanne, Olivia, Dana. To that (very white!) pantheon I humbly submit: Veronica.

*....except for Freaks and Geeks.

[dontdowhatisayandnobodygetshurt]

I’m obsessed with Titans S2 please help me I haven’t eaten or slept in days

I don’t know WHY I’m so fascinated by Titans S2 but I think it’s because it’s like a car crash?? like it’s horrible but you can’t look away??

But like horrible in a way that’s super predictable and entertaining??

Like there were so many good scenes but then the bad ones are just mingled in and it’s like a grab bag, you never know what you’re gonna get and boy is that FUN. The pacing was so absolutely and utterly GOD AWFUL and they established plot threads that were interesting but didn’t go anywhere and you’d spend the whole season waiting for that one plot thread to come back up but then you realize that it’s not going to until maybe the next season but by then it will probably be too late and it will only mess up the pacing more?????????

They mega over explain so many things but then when you actually find one thing you might want elaborated on they just??? breeze right over it??? 

Donna Troy’s death was actually so ridiculous and stupid and out of left field I legit starting fucking LAUGHING MY ASS OFF because OBVIOUSLY she’s not gonna stay dead but WHY would you kill her off like that and for what reason???? I’m so confused??? and it’s so funny I’m laughing just remembering it like??? WHY. GENUINELY THIS IS FUNNIER TO ME THAN ANY JOKE I’VE HEARD IN THE PAST MONTH I STARTED WHEEZING FROM LAUGHTER AT THIS POIGNANT MOMENT WTF. WHY NOT JUST HAVE LET CONNER KILL HER AND ADD WEIGHT TO IT. WHY DID YOU KILL HER ABRUPTLY WITH A BEAM RIGHT AFTER THE CONFLICT FOR NO REASON THE PACING IS SO BAD IT LEGIT WATCHED LIKE A GAG ASDFGHJKL X’D X’D

THAT WHOLE SET UP WITH GAR GOING THROUGH FUCKING HELL AND IT BEING SUPER DISTURBING WTF WHILE THE SHOW COMPLETELY IGNORED CONNER BUT THEN THE FINAL SCENE MAKES GAR COMPLETELY USELESS WHILE IT’S ALL FOCUSED ON CONNER??? LIKE I KNOW IT WAS ALWAYS ABOUT CONNER BUT THEN WHY DID THEY TOTALLY IGNORE HIM?????????????? THE PAYOFF WASN’T EVEN THAT STARTLING BC YOU KNEW IT WAS COMING ANYWAY???

but please don’t get me wrong Conner was one of the best parts of the whole series so far I love him with my WHOLE HEART and would die for him 11/10 what a sweetheart I hope he stays safe and happy

Like you can so. SO clearly see that they either bit off WAYYYY more than they could chew this season OR that the studio forced them to bite off way more than they could chew because oh my god. This show is so messy. Why did they introduce so many new characters and sub plots. Like the plots include every character and that is Way Too Many and this is coming from somebody with too many OCs which is why it’s so hard to write a good story with them all like:

Hank and Dawn (y’all KNOW I love these two but WHY ARE THEY SO IMPORTANT HERE??? THERE ARE OTHER WAY MORE IMPORTANT THREADS WHY DO THEY HAVE SO MUCH SCREENTIME?? RACHEL’S POWERS ARE GOING APESHIT AND GAR’S HAVING FCKIN BRAIN SURGERY DONE ON HIM I DON’T WANNA BE WATCHING YOU TWO HAVE PETTY RELATIONSHIP DRAMA W H Y)

Donna (with the gross inclusion of Aqualad ugh fuck that Danny Rand looking goldfish ass) DR LIGHT????? WHAT THE FUCK???? WHY WAS HE THERE AT ALL???? I KNOW TO DESTABILIZE THE TEAM OR WHATEVER BUT??? WHAT??? WHY BOTHER???

Dick 

Rachel

Gar (baby.......... I’m so sorry......)

Conner

Jericho (the pacing would have been much better if the whole show was about him, no other characters. just him. making all the friends he wants and deserves. listening to music. embarrassing jerks. being his funky self. I love this man so much y’all. I love him. help.)

Rose

Kory

Jason (rip I am so sorry they did you so dirty my dude wtf)

more nonsense that doesn’t matter?????? why is it here??

no, stop, that’s too many plots, you need to put some back, no stop picking up plots, all with the exact amount of screen time and importance on the SECOND. SEASON.

WHY WHERE JASON AND ROSE SO IMPORTANT AND THEN JUST NICKED OFF AND WEREN’T SEEN FOR FOR AGES??? AND THEN WHY DID THEY JUST FILL IN THE BLANKS LIKE NONE OF IT MATTERED?? WHY???? LIKE I GET THE REASON BUT DUDE THERE WERE A MILLION BETTER WAYS TO DO THAT WITHOUT JUST TELLING US THEY OFFICIALLY GOT TOGETHER OFF SCREEN HAHA YEAH THAT HAPPENED TOTALLY OH AND NOW THEY’VE BROKEN UP BC WE NEEDED THEM TOO. LIKE. AA???

THE BAD GUY THEY BUILT UP TO THROUGHOUT ALL OF SEASON ONE GOT TAKEN CARE OF WITHIN THE FIRST HALF OF THE FIRST EPISODE OF SEASON 2 I’AAKJBSKLHVSVSHS J????/>?< DID THEY RUN OUT OF EPISODE BRACKETS FOR THE LAST SEASON??? WHY DID THEY START WITH IT THIS SEASON?? WHY DIDN’T THEY END IT LAST SEASON WHERE IT WOULD HAVE ACTUALLY HAD WEIGHT AND NOT BE DISAPPOINTING??? IT ONLY WOULD HAVE TAKEN ONE MORE EPISODE AND IT STILL WOULDVE BEEN LONGER THAN THE FINALE WE GOT?? THEY COULD HAVE LET THE ULTIMATE GOOD BOI TEAM STINGER CARRYING IT SURELY??? OR DID THEY THINK THEY NEEDED MORE HOOK??? I’M PRETTY SURE ANYONE EVEN INTERESTED IN THE NICHE SHOW IN THE FIRST PLACE WOULD HAVE BEEN EXCITED AND KEPT WATCHING FOR KRYPTO AND HIS SIDEKICK SUPERBOY???

WHAT’S WITH THE OOC MOMENTS AND TONAL WHIPLASH BETWEEN QUIPS IN PLACES THEY SHOULDN’T BE AND FLASHING TO SUPER DARK MOMENTS???

THERE’S MORE BUT I LEGIT CAN’T THINK OF IT BC LITERALLY EVERY ASPECT AND SCENE OF THIS SHOW WAS WACK IN SOME WAY OR ANOTHER EVEN THE GOOD BITS WHICH I LOVE

Also please don’t take this the wrong way, all of this rage and exasperation is coming from a place of love, I love this absolute hilarious wack mess of a show with my whole heart, idk what they’re thinking but I am On Board. I hope there’s fifty more seasons and I hope each is more ridiculous than the last I’M STOKED FUCK YEAH BRO LET’S GO

and this is just me being Mega Salty that the whole show wasn’t just all Jericho I love him amen and hallelujah

[rp-sephiroth]

Is the FF7 remake now making the Compilation non-canon?? My friend gave me these news and I don't know if it's genuine information.

(continues:) My friend hates this possibility. She loves Crisis Core, and having that become non-canon brings several concerns.

Thank you for your question! 

A quick google search earned me no confirmation of this statement. But as a writer of FF7 fanfic writer/Sephiroth-roleplayer/Leiden university student of literature, I shall do my best to give you and educated and conclusive answer instead.

TL;DR: It’s unavoidable, and will have far-reaching implications for fandom community, but it will be OK and below’s why.

What is canon?This definition of canon from here is what I will be using in this post: 

Canon - a term borrowed from the Catholic Church, meaning ‘established truth’.  The definition of ‘canon’ is a bit vague, but is usually understood to mean the body of works upon which a fandom is based, and any information contained therein.  This is sometimes extended to include information in guidebooks, interviews, and other such sources.  Also used to refer to information from different versions of a story: for example, the school uniforms in Harry Potter ‘book-canon’ are different from those in ‘movie-canon’. 

It is a way for the creators to indicate “this is the set of in-game truths and rules we are working with.” It’s a way to keep the rules that govern the world consistent. In Final Fantasy VII, one can either regard just the OG (original game) as canon, or the entire compilation as canon.

What happens if canon is made invalid?   This happened to the StarWars fandom. Around the first 6 films were novels, lego, books, fanarts, and fanfictions. This franchise is incredibly interesting because it does not make canon top-down (from the creators to the plebs), but also accepts work from fans (bottom-up). 

An example:��anyone could write a StarWars book, as long as they stuck so guidelines set by the official creators and had it checked for approval. Anyone could be a stormtrooper, as long as you used the exact right plastic moulds and sent pictures of the finished product to the official people who approved it. (My first boyfriend did this for his cosplay.)

Anyway, the novels continued the storyline after film six (I believe all the main characters had children). But when LucasFilms and Disney embarked on making the 7th film, they decided to throw all that worldbuilding (universe-building) away. Why did they throw it away? Because for legal reasons authors cannot read fan-fictions and this post explains why (link).     In short: if the script writers of film 7 were to base film 7 on an any canon work, a fan could claim “I wrote a fanfic about exactly this” and face huge legal charges. Even/Especially a franchise that has a very agreeable bottom-up treatment of canon and fandom culture, has to watch out. Rey from film 7 is a completely new character, with her own timeline.

THUS THERE IS A BIG CHANCE THE CANON OF THE COMPILATION OF FINAL FANTASY 7 WILL BE DECLARED INVALID.

In the past, how has FF7 fandom dealt with canon vs new canon? A long time ago, the Original Game (OG) was the 'mothership’. Sephiroth was portrayed as evil. To give him any sign of niceness in fanfiction was considered out-of-character and greatly discouraged.Then FFVII Cisis Core came out, and certain fans rioted against the game’s portrayal of a kind, awkward Sephiroth.

For the Final Fantasy VII Remake to be identical to the Original Game with updated graphics would be impossible. Such a game would not sell. There will be changes in the game mechanics, dynamics, aesthetics, and narrative to make the game contemporary. I feel two ways about those changes: frightened and joyous.

How does it relate to online FF7 fandom communities?Now our 'canon’ 'mothership’ is the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII. Our current fandom community is built around what we have learnt of the compilation. Because FF7 is so big, it’s impossible to know everything about the story and characters and mechanics. People specialise, and draw on each other’s experience. 

My area of specialisation is Sephiroth, with in-depth knowledge of his scenes in Advent Children Complete, Crisis Core, Before Crisis, Kingdom Hearts, and Original Game. I’m still learning about his Dissidia, Ehrgeitz, and other versions. This knowledge of this character and interpretation of this character gives me social merit in roleplay communities. It’s said if you put 1000 hours of work into learning something, you are an expert. I’ve been writing Sephiroth on and off since I was 14. I’m 26 now. In my niche, I am an expert. Fans ask me questions about Sephiroth because they trust me to provide a plausible answer that conflicts least with canon.

But if/when the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII will be declared invalid, social status based on the no-longer-canon Compilation will be rendered useless. This means that when I make a statement on Remake-Sephiroth, all my arguments based on experience of (years!) of development of my Sephiroth will be useless. Scary.

This will upset the social structures of the communities. Experts are no longer expert. With the release of the first episode/chapter of the Remake, new fans and old fans start learning at the same time about the 'new’ canon. They will have the same chance to become expert. The one fan who will put in enough hours, will get most social status, will be crowned expert. 

Old groups of friends may stick together. New groups will form. New sub-communities rise. Some fans will riot against new information, as they did insisting that Crisis Core Sephiroth couldn’t be kind/awkward/friendly. More about attitudes and a ‘desired attitude’ later.

How can FF7 fans and roleplayers negotiate with old canon and new canon to find a position which they are comfortable with?The use of the word headcanon will go through a shift. 'Headcanon’ will no longer be a combination of traits/habits one puts on the character like a sticker (my trademark headcanon is that my Sephiroth puts his hair in a braid/my belief that Sephiroth follows the Jenova Omega Theory). Instead, the word 'headcanon’ will return to its old meaning: “In my head, this set of rules is canon.” The word 'headcanon’ will then refer to a set of metaphysical choices on how the FF7 world and characters function as a framework.

My friend @askcrv2 solved this question ingeniously. I’m taking a detour into the Vocaloid fandom: she writes a singing android robot. With robots, there are new versions every few years. The voice bank is updated. New songs. New merchandise… - and thus new canons. Nowadays version 4 is common. She writes version 2. She had her robot hide in a warehouse to avoid the garbage pile. This way, she can both stick to her old canons, but also in the new versions, her old version is still valid. Her robot complements new canon. Compliments to the writer!

The Compilation of Final Fantasy VII is fun, and I love it.It is not perfect. There are glaring inconsistencies. These plot holes could be changed in the Remake. But it’s not wrong to love the Final Fantasy VII from 1997 and style your preferences to that version.

IF/WHEN it’s made invalid… How do we as fans continue?When the Original Game and/or the Compilation as a whole be declared invalid, it will hurt. I will have to renegotiate my attitude towards Sephiroth as a character, and to the story as a whole, and find back my position in a new community. 

This game has kept me captivated for many years, so I have high hopes for the future product. I expect that the managers/teams/designers of the company have improved with 20 years more of experience. The Remake is being re-made from scratch. I have respect for the game team’s hard work and sacrifices. I imagine that every change in the  ’new canon’ will be a thoroughly-debated decision. The promotional video (link) of the Remake reveals the attitude the game-makers would like to see in the fans:

The reunion at hand may bring joy, it may bring fear, but let us embrace whatever it brings. For they are coming back. 

And that’s best of all. After 20 years, FF7 will be coming back. It’s not the fandom’s job anymore to re-create the world. The original creators will tell our favourite story back to us, and we can sit back… until we start making new fanworks!

Let’s embrace whatever it brings. 

Let’s make fantastic fanworks, and build warm communities.

The canon of the Compilation of Final Fantasy 7 will never be a forgotten memory. The Compilation will live on, inside us. I hope this post sufficiently answers your question. Tell your friend not to worry. <3

– rp-Sephiroth.

[kartiavelino]

Why Game of Thrones’ Final Season Was Always Destined to Disappoint

Endings are hard. Any writer will tell you that, but none will mean it more than the creator of a TV series when they are talking about their series finale, the culmination of their work that will largely dictate the entire show’s legacy. The Sopranos ended in 2007 and fans still argue over hits controversial ending. Lost caused online riots with its 2010 series finale. Dexter‘s ending is basically a punchline.  But no show’s ending has caused a stir quite like Game of Thrones, with the HBO fantasy hit bringing its epic saga to a controversial end on Sunday night, something its showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have long been preparing for. (Read our recap, but know this article is long and full of spoilers.) “We’ll be in an undisclosed location, turning off our phones and opening various bottles,” Weiss told Entertainment Weekly of the duo’s plans for the big night. “At some point, if and when it’s safe to come out again, somebody like [HBO’s Thrones publicist Mara Mikialian] will give us a breakdown of what was out there without us having to actually experience it.” It’s likely Benioff and Weiss, who brought George R.R. Martin‘s Game of Thrones: A Song of Ice and Fire to life in 2011, turning the epic book series into the world’s most popular TV show, have been keeping their phones off as of late, as the highly anticipated final season, which took two years to make before finally premiering in April, has been, to put it bluntly, a massive disappointment to a majority of the fanbase. So much so that some disgruntled viewers are petitioning for a remake of the eighth season “with competent writers,” according to a petition started on change.org. At the time this article was published, it had well over 1 million signatures (aka the viewership of a CW show, so small but still kind of mighty).  Game of Thrones‘ fall from grace has been swift and near-unprecedented, though it’s not unheard of for fans to not like how their favorite show ended; it’s the norm.  Still, the final six episodes of Game of Thrones just highlighted the obvious: the show was kind of screwed once it caught up to and surpassed the books, as Martin is still chugging away on those last books, despite telling Weiss and Benioff years ago he’d probably be finished by the time they were.  “I can give them the broad strokes of what I intend to write, but the details aren’t there yet,” he once told Vanity Fair. “I’m hopeful that I cannot let them catch up with me.” Oops.  There was definitely a shift once the TV series surpassed the books in season six. The dialogue sounded a little more modern, with the word “man-bun” even finding its way into the script. There were less intimate conversations, more battles and bloodshed. The pacing picked up, and we mean really picked up, going from zero to light-speed. Still, Game of Thrones was appointment television, possible the last vestige of it in the new world of streaming services dropping entire seasons of a show all at once. And it was still one of the best shows on television, with the jampacked trophy case to prove it.  But then the final season premiered, delivering disappointment after disappointment, leaving fans to cry “Where is my show?!” like Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) crying “Where are my dragons?!” in season two, a far simpler time. It’s not just the fans expressing their befuddlement over what the hell happened to the show that delivered defining and iconic moments like Ned Stark’s (leading man Sean Bean) death in season one and the Red Wedding, which has lived on as one of the best devastating scenes in TV history. Even the actors have become more vocal about their conflicted feelings about the direction the show had gone in in its final two seasons. (And that’s not including the Internet’s new trend of looking back on interview the cast did leading up to the final season and reexamining their now questionable answers and facial expressions.)  Conleth Hill, who played Varys, the always-plotting eunuch, spymaster and Master of Whispers that finally met his end when Dany learned of his treason, was still emotional about his exit on the show when talking to Entertainment Weekly, opening up about his frustrations with his character’s role on the show in the back-half of its run.  “That’s been my feeling the last couple seasons, that my character became more peripheral, that they concentrated on others more,” he said. “That’s fine. It’s the nature of a multi-character show. It was kind of frustrating. As a whole it’s been overwhelmingly positive and brilliant but I suppose the last couple seasons weren’t my favorite.” He then pointed to what he believed to be GOT‘s big shift, which of course was when the show caught up and surpassed Martin’s text.  “In a way, that was lost when we got past [the narrative in George R.R. Martin’s] books. That special niche interest in weirdos wasn’t as effective as it had been. Last season and this season there were great scenes and then I’d come in and kind of give a weather report at the end of them—’film at 11,'” Hill explained. “So I thought he was losing his knowledge. If he was such an intelligent man and he had such resources, how come he didn’t know about things? That added to my dismay. It’s now being rectified with getting a great and noble ending. But that was frustrating for a couple seasons.” Even the actors who have remained right in the middle of all the action have opened up about their struggle to adjust to the fast and furious pacing of seasons seven and eight in comparison to the slow and steady nature of the earlier seasons.  “We’re used to having a whole season to get to a point,” Nikolaj Coster-Waldau told Vanity Fair. “Now suddenly, a lot of things happen very quickly.” One of those things was his character Jaime Lannister’s Gossip Girl-reminiscent love triangle in episode four of the final season.  In one episode, Jaime, who had left Cersei to fight for the living and knighted Brienne, slept with Brienne, chose to stay in Winterfell, but then changed his mind and left to go back to Cersei in King’s Landing. This came after a seven-season redemption arc, featuring hard lessons of growth and countless moral struggles and the loss of his sword hand, which he longed to believe the very best thing about him and defined his own self-worth for so long. Like Jaime, we slowly discovered who the man was underneath the Kingslayer bravado.  We don’t see him struggle with this internal battle, continuing Jaime’s long-standing inner-conflict between the man he wants to be, the Kingslayer the realm has long believed he is and who he really is. Instead, we got a long, unnecessary and unrewarding final battle between him and Euron, the steampunk pirate bedding Cersei, before he finally reunited with his twin sister and true love, with the couple ultimately dying in am embrace as the world crumbles atop them, fulfilling the line Jaime told Bronn (Jeremy Flynn) about wanting to die in the arms of the woman he loves. Full-circle? Sure. Satisfying? Meh.  “Trying to connect the dots between the scenes was a little complicated because you invest so much time, so many years in these characters, so when suddenly you find out that Jaime comes back and his son has committed suicide,” Coster-Waldau said. “There’s so many things that obviously you can’t go through, on-screen, all of these moments, but you have to still walk through them in your mind, if you’re an actor, at least talk about them. There was a lot of those connecting the dots throughout.” The off-screen connecting of dots is a double-edged sword in the TV world: While viewers want to see character learn new revelations and react accordingly, there’s only so ways to share information the audience already knows without it starting to sound like a Wikipedia entry or an exposition dump that wastes precious minutes of what little time the show has left.  It’s a task writer and co-executive producer Bryan Cogman, who penned season eight’s second episode (the most celebrated of the final season episodes), “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” which featured a lot of characters reuniting after years apart and many highly anticipated moments fans had been looking forward to for quite some time.  “This was the most difficult script of the 11 I’ve written for Game of Thrones,” he told Entertainment Weekly of writing the episode, which he compared to penning a play. “The big challenge was not writing a Wikipedia page. In fact, my first draft was a Wikipedia page. The way it works is the showrunners return a Final Draft document with notes written in red in the margins. They returned my first script with a sea of red.” The hour proved to be a necessary respite from the breakneck pace and epic battle scenes that Game of Thrones seemed to have preferred since passing the books, and it was a welcome break for Cogman especially heading into the CGI-filled carnage that was to follow.  “There was such a breakneck pace to season seven that I was delighted when the [showrunners] proposed an episode of just spending time with characters in this space,” he said.  And yet, despite the character-driven episode, so many major moments—including one the entire story has centered on—have happened off-screen. How did Arya and Sansa react when they learned Jon’s true identity? Your guess is as good as ours. So Euron just knew where Missandei was going to be after his fleet destroyed their ships and that she happened to be one of Dany’s most trusted friends and advisers? Sure! Did you know that Arya had to strike that fatal blow to the Night King in that exact spot to truly kill him? You wouldn’t unless you watched Weiss and Benioff’s “Inside the Episode” featurette after your Xanax kicked in following the battle of Winterfell.  For a show that used to happily live in the delicious tension between characters attempting to read each other as information proved to be the ultimate weapon, Game of Thrones‘ new strategy of kill first, don’t even bother offering explanations or answers to anything has angered many viewers, none more so than the handling of the end of the Night King’s storyline and Daenerys ultimately becoming the Queen of Ashes. Let’s start with the Night King, who was a creation of the show and has been teased to be the ultimate big bad of the story since the very first scene of the show. His shadow has loomed over the political machinations of the characters for years, with most of the characters deciding to put their differences aside and unite to win the Great War, minus Cersei because…duh.   So expectations going into episode’s three massive battle were higher than the Wall the Night King brought down in the season seven finale. Winter wasn’t coming; it was here, and fans were poised to said goodbye to many beloved characters and possibly see the gang take a serious “L” as the Night King seemed to be unbeatable.  But by the end of the 82-minute episode, the Night King was taken out with a single blow. A. Single. Blow. While we have no issues with who wielded the dagger (Arya becoming the unlikely Kingslayer was an inspired and fitting narrative choice), we take issue with how it went down. All of this build up for…that? For the first time in pop culture history, we were hoping for that ridiculous moment where the villain holds off on killing the hero to give us their entire backstory and provide answers. We got nada. So eight seasons of build-up and mythology was dealt with, with the show ready to wash its hands of its fantasy elements completely, an especially maddening choice when we’ve been lead to believe that Bran was going to be an integral part of the story, not just a plot device to lure the Night King. (Also, remember when prophecies were supposed to matter?)   Another crucial misstep made by the showrunners was their pimping out of “The Long Night,” which they teased would feature the battle sequence to end all battle sequences. (OK, we’ll admit, the media played a large part in this, too, hyping episode three like our jobs depended on it. Which they sort of did, so forgive us our sins.)  When the PR blitz for the final season first began, the big focus was on how the battle sequence in episode three was going to be something that has never been done on television before, even bigger than the iconic 40-minute long sequence in Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, their inspiration and benchmark. GOT‘s version? Basically double that sequence, with 82-minutes of all-out war helmed by Miguel Sapochnik, the award-winning director responsible for “Battle of the Bastards” and “Hardhomme.”  750 people working on the episode. 55 consecutive nights. 11 weeks. Three locations.  “What we have asked the production team and crew to do this year truly has never been done in television or in a movie,” Cogman told EW. “This final face-off between the Army of the Dead and the army of the living is completely unprecedented and relentless and a mixture of genres even within the battle. There are sequences built within sequences built within sequences. It’s been exhausting but I think it will blow everybody away.” With this kind of hype and hyperbole, the pressure was on for GOT to deliver. And it did. Sort of.  The episode, the longest in GOT‘s history, was intense and high-pressure, never getting the audience a chance to settle in. That is if they could see what was happening on-screen.  As “The Long Night” was airing, many viewers complained on social media that they couldn’t see anything happening as it was just too dark. While some think it added to the horror and felt in-line with how the characters likely felt during the chaotic battle, others were just annoyed. Either way, it’s a valid and fair criticism, especially when HBO is subscription based. For cinematographer Fabian Wagner, the man responsible for lighting the episode, this was a non-issue. “I know it wasn’t too dark because I shot it,” he simple told TMZ.  OK then. “A lot of the problem is that a lot of people don’t know how to tune their TVs properly,” Wagner later told Wired in an interview. “A lot of people also unfortunately watch it on small iPads, which in no way can do justice to a show like that anyway.”  “Game of Thrones is a cinematic show and therefore you have to watch it like you’re at a cinema: in a darkened room,” he continued. “If you watch a night scene in a brightly-lit room then that won’t help you see the image properly.”  HBO And besides, it wasn’t about the deaths (mostly secondary characters) or destruction, even if we’d been lead to believe that it what this episode was supposed to be about.  “Personally I don’t have to always see what’s going on because it’s more about the emotional impact,” said Wagner.  Here’s the problem with that: they keep telling us that, but not really showing it. The final season seems to be almost all spectacle, intentionally so. Just look at what Benioff told EW of their initial pitch to HBO for Game of Thrones, how they sort of used the relationships as a Trojan Horse to sneak in their plans for the epic battles to come down the kingsroad.  “The lie we told is the show is contained and it’s about the characters,” he said. “The worlds get so big, the battles get so massive.” So massive that HBO would eventually increase their already staggering $5 million (per episode) budget to more than $15 million an episode for the final season. And they were willing to spend even more on Game of Thrones, one of their most commercially and critically successful series ever. (It averaged 30 million viewers per episode and has a record number of Emmy wins, not to mention the global merchandising market.)  “[HBO] said, ‘We’ll give you the resources to make this what it needs to be,'” Weiss told EW, Benioff added, “HBO would have been happy for the show to keep going, to have more episodes in the final season.” It was Benioff and Weiss’ decision to end the series, and to do so with two shortened final seasons, even with HBO offering them anything they wanted, which makes their choice to give themselves such a small amount of time to bring such a massive and epic story to a close in a way that respects the characters and its dedicated audience all the more frustrating. “We always believed it was about 73 hours, and it will be roughly that,” Benioff said of their decision. (They also once envisioned a two-hour wrap-up movie that would have a theatrical run, which in hindsight, was a very good call for HBO to nix.) Given how successful Game of Thrones is, possibly the most successful TV series of all-time, it makes sense Benioff and Weiss, who learned the broad strokes of Martin’s intended ending back in season four, would want to go out on a high note, not a whimper like so many once-beloved series before it.  “We want to stop where we—the people working on it, and the people watching it—both wish it went a little bit longer,” Benioff explained. “There’s the old adage of ‘Always leave them wanting more,’ But also things start to fall apart when you stop wanting to be there. You don’t want to f–k it up.” Of course, they did sort of f–ki it up, largely because of the limited amount of time to get their massive laundry-list of s–t done in a realistic way that doesn’t undo or ret-con eight seasons worth of their iconic characters’ journeys, decisions and motivations. (Remember when Tyrion was the savviest and smartest person in the game? Those were the days.) While there’s been many storytelling casualties in this truncated approach to the series’ end, there’s been no greater victim that Daenerys Targaryen, with the Mother of Dragons actively choosing to murder thousands of innocent people in “The Bells,” despite the fact that the city and its troops had surrendered. Like Usher, Dany and Drogon chose to let it burn, going on a complete rampage that devastated the city she once vowed to save (never mind that the only part of King’s Landing she chooses not to bring fire down upon is the Red Keep, where her ultimate target Cersei was hanging out, ripe for a long-awaited confrontation).  A lot of people, including those who’ve named pets and even children after Dany after her many badass moments over the series, were upset over this turn for their chosen queen.  The thing is the seeds for this eventual turn by Dany to embrace her House’s words “Fire and Blood” and succumb to the long-standing belief that all Targaryens have the potential to go mad with power (Shout out to her dad, King Aerys II Targaryen aka the Mad King) have been planted, so it wasn’t a total shock that she went the Mad Queen root. Again, like with the Night King, it’s not what they chose to do but how they chose to do it. After watching Dany fight tooth and nail for the weak and innocent throughout the series run (even showing off her affinity for somewhat alarming vengeance in just straight-up burning her enemies), her transition from the Mother of Dragon to the Queen of the Ashes happened so quick it felt like we had whiplash; it also didn’t feel earned, nor did the sudden distrust of Dany by her advisers and other characters after they championed her for seasons.  Yes, she’s made questionable and eyebrow raising decisions (murdering Lord Tarly and Dickon Tarly was not a good look), but she’s also saved their asses. Without Dany, her dragons and her loyal army made up of the Dothraki and Unsullied, the North would’ve been massacred by the Army of the Undead. No questions asked.  While it would make sense that the loss of two of her most beloved and trusted advisers, Jorah (Iain Glen) and Missandei, along with one of her dragons (RIP Rhaegal), combined with the betrayals of Jon, Tyrion and Varys would no doubt lead to Dany’s emotional stability being tested, the character we’ve watched evolve over eight seasons would not just murder thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands, of innocent people because she was having a bad day. She just wouldn’t. (The choice to not show a close-up of Dany at all once she decides to ignore the bells and give into her rage was a baffling choice as well, though Clarke did extremely compelling work in the short scene in which she chooses revenge over mercy.)  She went from complicated hero to cardboard cut-out villain in an instant, and she deserved better—so did the viewers. We wanted her descent into madness to feel earned, not rushed and cheap, actually lessing the impact of her death at the hand of her love, nephew and possible usurper, Jon Snow.  Imagine if we had an entire season of watching Daenerys actually rule, discovering that her dream of the Iron Throne may not have been all it was cracked up to be, slowly giving in to her paranoia and fury. The explanation offered by Benioff and Weiss for Dany’s decision during the “Inside the Episode” featurette following “The Bells” was frustrating, to say the least. (Never forget when they reasoned that Rhaegal died because Dany “kind of forgot” about Euron and the Iron Fleet!) “There is something chilling about the way Dany has responded to the death of her enemies,” Benioff said, citing her reaction to her brother Viserys’ death in season one.  Of the crucial moment Dany chooses violence, Weiss explained, “I don’t think she decided ahead of time that she was going to do what she did. And then she sees the Red Keep, which to her is the home that her family built when they first came over to this country 300 years ago. It’s in that moment…when she’s looking at that symbol of everything that was taken from her when she makes the decision to make this personal.”  And that is why Daeneyrs decided to ruin everything she had been working toward her entire life, because she saw the Red Keep, which again, she didn’t just attack to take out Cersei, instead of destroying the entire city. Instead, the show has now given the rest of the characters all the validation they needed to turn on her, making her downright evil and unworthy of being a ruler without the one redeeming quality a woman seemingly needs to still inspire some level of loyalty or shred of hope: being a mother, which brings us to Cersei. As portrayed by the extraordinary Headey, Cersei has always been one of the most complicated, complex and ruthlessly strategic characters on the show, willing to do whatever it takes to stay in power. This is a woman who literally blew up the Great Sept of Baelor, much to her delight as almost every member of House Tyrell died (Justice for Olenna and Margaery) along with many civilians.  If Dany is the Mother of Dragons, Cersei is the Mother of Monsters, well at least one, as she’s directly responsible for the human atrocity that was King Joffrey (Gone too late). She’s also threatened to kill basically everyone on the show—including her younger brother Tyrion, who has somehow become her greatest champion and defender?!—and Cersei is not a woman in the business of making idle threats. And yet throughout the final season, the common refrain has been Cersei still can be redeemed and/or trusted because she’s pregnant, and if there’s one thing to know about Cersei it’s that she loves her children.  Quick recap: All three of Cersei’s children are dead because of her: 1. Joffrey just sucked and she did nothing to tame him. 2. Her daughter Myrcella was murdered as an act of revenge against Cersei. 3. Tommen poor, sweet Tommen, committed suicide after her saw what his mother had done to the Sept.  Still, the show has replaced all of Cersei’s defining characteristics—ruthless convictions and cunning gameplay—with the fact that she’s a mother. They didn’t help matters by keeping her framed in a tower window all season, flanked by characters straight out of a late-in-the-episode Saturday Night Live sketch: a mute monster (The Mountain), a mad scientist (Qyburn) and the steampunk pirate paramour whose name must not be mentioned. When you look back, Cersei really didn’t do anything all season; making her a passive bystander in her own life. If “The Bells” taught us anything it’s just women are just too emotional to rule, even if they are making moves—controversial as they may be—that men in this cutthroat world have made for thousands of years.  Add in the fan outrage over Ser Brienne of Tarth being reduced to crying in a bathrobe after Jaime leaves her just after she was finally (and deservedly) knighted (not to mention that her final solo scene of the series was documenting Jaime’s merits!) and Missandei, the one woman of color on the show, ultimately serving as a device to move the plot forward, and it’s not surprising that many viewers feel that the female representation on the show is lacking.  But the biggest issue came in episode two, when Sansa’s rape, which caused possibly the show’s biggest controversy when it aired in 2015, was brought up again during her reunion with the Hound.  Jessica Chastain, Turner’s Dark Phoenix co-star, took to Twitter after the episode aired to slam the scene which Sansa inferred the horrors she has endured over the course of the series, including the Ramsay Bolton assault, had turned her into a stronger person.  “Rape is not a tool to make a character stronger. A woman doesn’t need to be victimized in order to become a butterfly,” Chastain tweeted. “The #littlebird was always a Phoenix. Her prevailing strength is solely because of her. And her alone.” Chastain was far from the only person to call out the show for this exchange, with fans and critics alike blasting the scene.  After the rape scene aired in season five, Weiss and Benioff defended their decision to include it in the show in an interview with Time.  “It’s still the same basic power dynamic between men and women in this medieval world,” Benioff said. “This is what we believed was going to happen.” It is a medieval world, but it’s also the biggest TV show in the world airing in 2019; you should know better. The criticism of the way the female characters storylines are playing out on screen could very well be because of the lack of female voices behind the scenes. Benioff and Weiss have written a majority of the series’ episodes, with the list of directors is equally as small and mostly male.  Just over five percent of GOT‘s 73 episodes were female-directed, and it was the same director, Breaking Bad‘s Michelle MacLaren, who directed two episodes in seasons three and four. Similarly, just a few women have written on the show, with celebrated writer Jane Espenson (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Once Upon a Time and Battlestar Galactica, to name a few) receiving a sole teleplay credit for a season one episode, and said in 2011 that she “loved loved loved” her experience working on the show She added she would do another episode “in an instant” if asked to return. For its final season, Weiss and Benioff’s assistant Gursimran Sandhu was promoted to staff writer, while Vanessa Taylor was the show’s sole female producer when she worked on the show in 2012-13, also writing a few episodes during that time. Maybe if Espenson or Taylor came back around they could’ve noted it’s not a good look to say that the two powerful women who actually want the Iron Throne are just too damn emotionally unstable to rule, and that a white man who didn’t want power truly deserved to be king, with another white dude who didn’t want the position ultimately becoming king in the end.  In an e-mail interview ahead of the series finale, Benioff and Weiss, who directed the series finale, admitted they avoid social media. “It’s gratifying to have people care enough about what you’re doing to feel like they need to comment on it in real time,” Weiss and Benioff, who are set to head over to the Star Wars franchise, told Rolling Stone. “Social media has been central to the way the show has been watched by many people. That said, we don’t engage with it all that much, mainly because of the time and energy required to do so. The show itself is a full-time job and then some. We’ll make the best show we know how to make, and we’ll hope that people like it. Knowing full well they won’t be shy about it if they don’t.” No, no they were not. But sometimes it’s worth it to read your feed.  Don’t miss E! News every weeknight at 7, only on E! https://www.eonline.com/news/1042391/why-game-of-thrones-final-season-was-always-destined-to-disappoint?cmpid=rss-000000-rssfeed-365-topstories&utm_source=eonline&utm_medium=rssfeeds&utm_campaign=rss_topstories The post Why Game of Thrones’ Final Season Was Always Destined to Disappoint appeared first on Top Of The World. https://kartiavelino.com/why-game-of-thrones-final-season-was-always-destined-to-disappoint/

[uniquecollectorplanet]

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[csolarstorm]

Review: The Defenders 1-4

What a useless first two episodes.  Who manages the pacing in the MCU Netflix universe?  I mean if you need two episodes to set up everyone's motives and all of the side character stuff, come up with some consequence, some solid content.  This was two episodes of nearly all exposition and setup, in a series that had four TV shows to set it up!

Anyway.

Review: The Defenders Episodes 3-4

THAT WAS AWESOME.  I had the house to myself, so I got to see these two episodes on the big TV in my family's living room, and the resulting epicness has got me pretty hyped still.

IT HAS BEEN SO LONG SINCE I WAS SURPRISED DURING A TENSE SCENE LIKE THAT - JESSICA JONES USED HER POWERS OF LITERAL DRUNK DRIVING.  SHE MOWED DOWN ELEKTRA WITH FREAKING DUI.  IT JUST GETS BETTER AS I DESCRIBE IT! *laughing*

What was the use of those first two episodes though?  Just push it together into one and release seven of them! But man, this was Marvel/Netflix nirvana, the use of colors, the relationship dynamics, they nailed it.  I didn't understand how they could portray Luke and Danny's relationship as something as powerful and long-lasting as in the comics, but once they meet, the simple fact is that they're the only ones left being the core of the Defenders when Jessica and Matt can't function as team members. Luke is Danny's only real sincere ally so far.  In fact Luke is pretty much the glue that keeps them together.  The scene where he's trying to convince Jessica to stay is beautifully reflected in their colors bathing over one another.  The colored lights in this series have never been as vivid, as striking as in The Defenders, when the team comes together. The neon lights of the Royal Dragon cleverly shine in front of Matt Murdoch while he's talking to Stick, and they're of course, red, green, and yellow, the three Defenders that are in the restaurant.  It's pop culture cinema-level symbolism and man, but man am I eating it up right now.

*breathes*

Also, the moment where they finally come together, their Avengers money-shot so to speak, was also awesome, and doing it AS an action scene was exactly the counterpart Marvel/Netflix needed to the very visual, character oriented Avengers shot, and the perfect portrayal of the Defenders to establish their team.  Story-wise, there meeting was not at all what I imagined it would be - but maybe I should know better considering where there's Daredevil, there needs to be a fight in a hallway.  I imagined they'd come together in a court case, a support group - I'd even buy that Stick assembled them at the Royal Dragon if I saw spoilers, but as a consequence of Danny Rand's proactive strike on the hand?  I did not see that coming.

Not trying to quote Age of Ultron there, but The Avengers series has been playing for the last couple of days…and I guess I was kind of slow to realize why.

Also, I get it, Alexandra is immortal.  I was rolling my eyes at the first two hints, but I have to admit they were decently subtle.  The real interesting part is, ARE THEY CREATING A PHILOSOPHER'S STONE?  I'm pretty damn nerdy about a FullMetal Alchemist plot.  I mean I just finished rewatching it right before there happened to be a solar eclipse happening (on the eve of my mother's birthday no less) I had no idea about until I after I finished it.  But is that blood a kind of Tang?  LCL?  It's most certainly the applied phlebotinum that The Hand uses, but the real question is, is it made of people?  People's chi? Is there a demon involved?  Do they feed the chi to the demon so the demon will grant them this phlebotium?  Or do they bleed the demon like Evangelion does with Lilith?  I'm really excited to see how they'll execute this - this - monoplot, this reoccuring tale that gets told over and over again - primarily in Eastern media, I guess, and I wonder if that's the point here?  Maybe they're drawing on that niche of Eastern media that gets inspiration from Western media, and that's what they're using in a meta sense as a substitute for the Asian sterotypes that probably went into the Hand orginally - or I dunno. I don't know enough to really describe what I'm talking about.

It's not perfect, even though I'm still coming down from the excitement of it.  Some of the writing choices are serviceable.  Luke tells Claire that "they guy had a glowing…hand" and honestly, they could have just written away from having to avoid using the word "fist".  The artistic transitions are cool, but they kind of cover up for the fact that there are entire scenes that are just there to tell you one thing.  Again, yeah okay, Alexandra's immortal.  Maybe this is effective on someone who hasn't seen any media trying to hint to you that someone is immortal.  These scenes simply could have been woven into the story better. And that's why the transitions, though cool, kind of tell the viewer when to be disappointed, because they cover for a story that is just too disjointed and has too many extraneous parts. But just the fact that I'm excited to know the logistics of the phelobotinum/LCL/Red Water/Tang that the Hand uses to maintain eternal life, and the exact process they need to do in order to obtain more shows that yeah, they have effectively set up the important questions.

Don't spoil it for me.

It looked like the Netflix rating was something like 2.5 out of 5 stars or something.  That's just a pity - but maybe it was people who have only watched the first two episodes so far.  That was obviously the problem for the first reviewers.