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guster-animations · 5 months ago

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Kamen Rider Zero-One Finale Commemoration Producers’ Symposium: Translated

i haven’t watched zero-one so i was asking someone who had what “raider” is and they genuinely had no idea what i was referring to

do NOT make jokes about a producer’s name. it’s not even pronounced the same way. i had to adhere to my own rules for romanization

this too is all for the henshindex wiki

TOKU TRANSLATION MASTERPOST HERE

The first of the “Reiwa era” of the Kamen Rider series, “Kamen Rider Zero-One”, has finally reached its final episode. While carrying the promise of creating a new generation of heroes, “Zero-One” is also the first in history to have had filming postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, all of the staff and cast members gave their all to the work, and thanks to them, they have reached the goal of completing the TV series. Thus, TTFC is releasing a special round-table discussion with the Toei producer team right after the end of the show.

We quickly looked back on the year and some more that “Zero-One” has taken up. Please take a moment to read it.

Participants

Takahito Omori (Chief Producer) He first joined the Heisei Kamen Rider series in 2005’s “Kamen Rider Hibiki” as an assistant producer. Has been a producer since “Kamen Rider Kiva” (2008). After that, he produced “Samurai Sentai Shinkenger” (2009) and “Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger” (2011), and then led as a Chief Producer for the first time with “Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger” (2013). After that, he handled “Kamen Rider Drive” (2014), “Kamen Rider Ex-Aid” (2016), and “Kamen Rider Build” (2017). In recent years he has also participated as a producer in the Toei Movie-Stage “Go Zen” (2019) as well as Fuji TV’s 60th anniversary special project “Ōoku: Final Chapter” (2019).

Chika Chikamatsu (Assistant Producer) Yosuke Minato (Assistant Producer) Applied to a “Tokusatsu Program Producer Recruitment” put out by Toei in 2018, and joined the company together in 2019. Their personal history prior to that will be expanded on in this book.

Ryosuke Momose (Assistant Producer) After being involved with all kinds of live events as a producer in Toei’s Enterprise Department, he transferred to the TV Planning Department in June of 2019. He took on a new role as the third assistant producer of “Kamen Rider Zero-One”.

Interviewer TTFC (Toei Tokusatsu Fan Book Editorial Department)

Act 1: What Happened Before the First Take

TTFC: In “Kamen Rider Zero-One”, the Toei producer team had a structure of the chief producer Omori and all 3 of the assistant producers. Because of how rare an occasion this is, I’d like for you all to talk to me for as long as you can. Chikamatsu and Minato were recruits from the “Tokusatsu Program Producer Recruitment”.

Chikamatsu: That’s right. I joined in April 2019.

Minato: I interviewed at the same time as her, but I was a little later and joined in May due to circumstances with my previous work.

Omori: Momose transferred in after that, right?

Momose: I did. I joined in June. At that point, we were already preparing to announce the work.

Omori: When you trace it back, “Zero-One’s” planning began around the summer that “Kamen Rider Build” was airing. In my experience before then, you don’t know how quickly the time will go by, no matter how quickly you are able to start it. So the main writer Yu (Yuya Takahashi) also started working on it from that point onwards, but we still didn’t have anyone for the assistant producers (Laughs).

TTFC: What’s this “Tokusatsu Program Producer Recruitment”…?

Omori: The way we put it at the time was that there were important aspects of inviting capable personnel to work as assistant producers in the shows following “Kamen Rider Zi-O”. I looked at written applications and participated in the first round of interviews.

Minato: That was around the end of the year before last.

TTFC: And then in April, May, and June of last year, in the period where the imperial era changed from Heisei to Reiwa, everyone joined in succession.

Omori: Auditions also began in April.

Chikamatsu: That’s right. I helped with the document screening as well, but when Minato joined in May, the auditions had already pretty much ended (Laughs).

Minato: Pretty much. I joined just about when you were deciding which members to go with.

Omori: What I remember most from that time is when we first went to the National Institute of Informatics. It was myself, Chikamatsu, and Yuya. I thought that they’d definitely just have three or four people there to meet us, no more, but more than ten professors wound up coming (Laughs). We were very surprised by that. For us, we were going to gather information about artificial intelligence, but as we spoke to them, even the professors that came in along the way had different opinions on the matter. As I listened to them, I thought, “I see— there are a lot of different viewpoints and potential outcomes”. If it’s that way, then we should depict themes surrounding AI in a wide variety of ways. After that, we also went to the “National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology”. Chikamatsu should talk about this.

Chikamatsu: Because I’d collected information in previous jobs, I went to ask to talk with them. While the NIST does actually make advanced robots, they also have advanced 3-D printer technology. I used the the 3-D printer I was shown while interviewing as a reference for the Tajimoto printer set that appears in “Zero-One”.

Omori: There was a lot of information about robotics that they couldn’t share with outside sources, so we had to go many places to gather information. We also went to Hachioji.

Minato: I also went there. It was to the Nippon Engineering College. There’s a robotics faculty department there. The campus is, to make it easy for TTFC members to understand, the Solbrain (Super Rescue Solbrain) headquarters (Laughs).

Omori: We were able to be shown aibo there, too. I would never have thought that we’d later show aibo in “Zero-One” (Laughs). That happened around April or May, right?

Chikamatsu: The script was being written at the same time…

Minato: If I’m not mistaken, the draft script for episodes 1 and 2 was finished on May first. The exact same time that I joined (Laughs).

Omori: After that, we really wanted to start filming at the beginning of June, but a lot of things happened and it was delayed until the middle of the month.

Chikamatsu: Omori was extremely busy when I joined in April as well. That was when the TTFC special “Drive Saga: Kamen Rider Brain” and the like happened, right?

TTFC: Definitely… It was filmed at the end of the Heisei era, and the plan was to release it on streaming from Heisei to Reiwa.

Chikamatsu: I had just joined, so naturally there wasn’t just work on “Zero-One”, but there were days when Omori couldn’t meet because he was busy. Other people told me that “Omori is a person that likes to do everything by himself, so you don’t ask him for anything, he won’t give you work,” so in order to not have that happen, I tried to let him know about it.

TTFC: I see… Come to think of it, not only “Brain” but “Zi-O” was very busy broadcasting. And the Build V-Cinexts and the Kyoto projects…

Omori: Well, we started early based on that, too. But I think we didn’t hold steady on that as much as we said we would. After you all arrived, I relied on you.

Momose: But I was already at Toei, so I was already somewhat familiar with the scope and quantity of an AP’s work. So it didn’t feel as hard as I expected when I actually started working as one. In that sense, you really did have important responsibilities, Omori.

Omori: No, I think it was really just important to have three people on the job. Because even in “Build”, it was just (Kazunari) Taninaka (Laughs).

Act 2: Each Producer’s History

TTFC: I’d love to hear about Chikamatsu and Minato’s previous jobs and why they applied to Toei, if it’s alright with you all.

Chikamatsu: I spent ten years as a director for NHK. The interview with AIST that I mentioned was also a result of that time. It wasn’t that I was unhappy with NHK (Laughs); I simply applied because I was a fan of Producer (Takaaki) Utsunomiya. “Samurai Sentai Shinkenger” (2009) was airing the year that I became a working adult, and watching “Shinkenger” each week that year motivated me to keep working. And the year where I applied was right during “Kaitou Sentai Lupinranger vs. Keisatsu Sentai Patranger” (2018). I went to the next available interview, and to my surprise, my role model Utsunomiya was the one conducting it. I remember that I couldn’t stop talking about my love for his work.

Omori: You’ve made your love for Utsunomiya very clear (Laughs).

Chimamatsu: Well, I like your works, too…

Omori: (Laughs). Well, I also had a hand in “Shinkenger” and “Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger”. So in a sense we’re “Utsunomiya Children”.

Chikamatsu: Of course, I’m aware of that (Laughs).

TTFC: Did you meet because of that love for him?

Chikamatsu: I don’t know about that, but I’d say I got lucky. I received a long email from Utsunomiya after the interview, and that really struck me. Also, I’ve been a TTFC member since the very beginning (Laughs). I’m still subscribed.

TTFC: Thank you very much! And now, how about you, Minato?

Minato: I watched “Super Rescue Solbrain” (1991) and “Chojin Sentai Jetman” (1991) when I was three years old, so I’ve been a tokusatsu fan for nearly thirty years. Because of this, I’d wanted to join Toei… After graduating college I went to grad school, and along the way I decided to take a year away and studied abroad in the United States for only half a year. So I was 25 when I was ready to start job hunting, but Toei’s requirements for graduate recruitment were limited to people 24 and under… I tried my best to do something about it, and even tried calling them, but I was told that they wouldn’t make exceptions. I was very frustrated. I chose to work on anime, and joined Madhouse. I was a production assistant for quite some time, and then moved to the production desk position. When I finally got more freedom at work, that’s when I was made aware that Toei was recruiting producers for tokusatsu programs (Laughs). I think it was around 2 o’clock in the middle of the night.

TTFC: Did you immediately think, “This is it!”?

Minato: No, I ruminated over it like I always do. Working on anime is also interesting. It was going well, and I was in the middle of some projects. But this was my only chance. I didn’t know if I would be accepted or not, and this was a once-in-a-lifetime chance, so I decided to apply (Laughs). I also told my boss about it when I had the interview, and gave excuses to my coworkers and juniors just in case. I said, “I happened to reunite with my dream girl from high school and I can go on a date with her for one day. I should go, right?” (Laughs).

TTFC: That’s a very convincing metaphor (Laughs).

Minato: So I went to the interview. I was with [Hideaki] Tsukada and Omori, and in the papers I filled out, I listed my favorite works as being “Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger” (2004) [which Tsukada was the chief producer of] and “Kamen Rider Ex-Aid” (2016) [which Omori was the chief producer of]. Similar to Chikamatsu, I remember that they felt my passion. I made it to the final interview, but everyone besides me had experience with live-action and there was no one else who’d specialized in anime. There were big differences in our areas of expertise, and I thought there was no way I’d make it, but I was recruited. I had a bit of difficulty afterwards, however. I was told by Toei that I’d join the company in April like Chikamatsu did, but we had to find someone to take over my role in the project I was working on, and it was pushed back until May. On top of that, my wedding was scheduled to be March, and my bride-to-be a senior at my company… (Laughs). In the end, the company’s president came as planned, as the guest of honor at my wife’s side. I spent many days apologizing to the president and then other people from my former company.

TTFC: How interesting. By the way, did you hope to become a producer, Momose?

Momose: Like I said earlier, I was transferred to a different department in the company, so there wasn’t as much drama as the other two had… (Laughs). I originally joined Toei wanting to help with video, so I had thoughts on which video department I wanted to go to. There was some contact with Kamen Rider and Super Sentai when I worked on their events, but I wasn’t as crazy about tokusatsu as the two over there (Laughs). But as time went on I started to like things with action scenes more and more, and I directly told the head of my department that I’d like to transfer. A short time later, I was told that I’d be transferred. As I was talking with Tsukada and the then-executive director (Hiroshi) Tezuka on my first day in the department, Omori then came in. He told me that he was going to be in charge of “Zero-One”, and that he was coming to ask me to work on the show.

Omori: It sounds like you were disappointed by that.

Momose: No, I wasn’t (Laughs). To add to that, when we’re creating Rider and Sentai events in the Enterprise Department, we naturally had opportunities to talk with the producers of each work. I was able to learn a lot from and come to respect Utsunomiya and Omori in particular as I talked with them. So I was grateful to be able to work under you for my first project, Omori.

Omori: That’s the first time I’ve heard that. Please say so more quickly (Laughs).

TTFC: How did you divide your work between yourselves?

Omori: There were responsibilities for small parts, and we switched this up along the way, but we had a rotation for casting the guest actors and researching “jobs” for the beginning and middle stages of the show.

Minato: That’s right. Specifically, Chikamatsu was in charge of (Director Shojiro) Nakazawa’s episodes 3 and 4, I did episodes 5 and 6 with (Director Takayuki) Shibasaki, Momose had 7 through 9 with (Director Kyohei) Yamaguchi, and 10 and 11 were Nakazawa and Chikamatsu again. In the “business competition” arc, Momose was in charge of flower arranging, judging, and firefighting.

Omori: Ultimately, when you decide to divide the work between yourselves, you will have tasks that you haven’t experienced before. That wouldn’t be a good learning experience for an AP, and I was also told, “Omori, you had three assistants, but what are you teaching them?” (Laughs). I thought about that, and decided on a rotation system. The original foundation of this show was wanting to deal with “work”, and if that’s the case, we couldn’t just ignore “work practice reform”. At that point, I thought that everyone would have more room to research things with a rotation system.

Act 3: This Person and That Person

Minato: We focused on manga artists and voice actors in episodes 5 and 6.

TTFC: It’s Mr. Choichiro Ishizumi’s big hit, “Perfuman Tsurugi”!

Minato: We made the script for that episode in around June, and originally the plan was to make it about anime. However, episodes 5 and 6 aired in late September and early October, and they were filmed in August, so we said, “We can’t have just two months to make an episode. If we’re going to do things like this, I want to have half a year to work on it.”

Omori: I was told, “We can’t just do that.”

[TN: Kamen Rider staff did eventually make this happen five years later, with the filming of Kamen Rider Gavv starting around 6 months before broadcast. The change was apparently made to get the show’s episodes past Chinese censorship screenings sooner. Although the initial change meant that the show was being filmed at the same time as the later episodes of Gotchard, meaning that they had a smaller director team and an entirely new set of staff, Gavv’s producers have said multiple times that the shift in schedule was much needed and should’ve happened sooner. This wasn’t really necessary to mention but I feel obligated to say it.]

Minato: Live-action and anime are very different in that regard.

Omori: When Minato joined, I thought, “he could do an episode about anime” (Laughs), but as I thought about it I realized that couldn’t be done, and I changed the premise slightly.

Minato: But even so, the images on the monitor in the scene where they record voice lines, for example, had to be made to look like the original, even if the pictures were not ready in time (Laughs). For things like this in regular anime, you’d use “storyboard footage”, which is like videos connecting to the storyboard, instead, but you also can’t use this “storyboard footage” with its storyboard and filming for more than a few seconds. So I asked the people who specialize in this stuff. Like with the poster that appeared in the show, I entrusted it to expert animators and our finishing effects crew. By no means did I think my old job would come in handy so soon (Laughs). Momose introduced me to the character designer Mr. (Masato) Hisa.

Momose: I knew Mr. Hisa as a character designer from the Super Sentai series, but his love for the projects was profound, and he’ll definitely come to Osaka on the last day of the Final Live Tour. I attended to Mr. Hisa every year in my Enterprise Department days, so knowing him, I’ll make sure to ask.

Minato: I created the concept of “Perfuman Tsurugi”. It was a long-running work, so I prepared to make it a 70-volume comic series. Where a stretch of volumes was “chapter __”.

Momose: Because it’s a story of a world where anthropomorphic animals live, the protagonist that Mr. Hisa drew, Tsurugi, feels a little similar to a Ga[REDACTED] from a certain other work (Laughs).

Minato: You’re right, it did look like [REDACTED]l.

[TN: if anyone knows the full name of this redacted character please let me know]

Then I faithfully recreated the workplace of a cartoonist, so I asked an acquaintance of mind who works as an assistant. The master that they assisted (Mr. Tetsuya Takahashi) liked the Kamen Rider series, and gladly helped me out. He also came on the days we filmed the episodes, and gave guidance on how to design a realistic desk for a cartoonist.

Omori: For that episode, Director Shibasaki verified everything related to “Perfuman Tsurugi” with Minato.

Minato: I also explained things like how Tsurugi ends his sentences to his voice actor Mariyo Ise (Laughs).

TTFC: From the beginning, “Zero-One” has always focused on the “jobs” shown in it, the Humagears made for those jobs, and the magnificent guest actors, all working in tandem.

Chikamatsu: In a sense, the last one of those was Shinya Owada (episodes 10-11).

Omori: I think we also talked about it in “Ura Kamen Rider”, but at the beginning the character wasn’t “Shinya Owada”. He had a different actor. Fundamentally, that episode being about “actors”, I think it’s better for the actors involved with Humagears to feel like “THE Actors”. So as I worried about casting, Producer (Chihiro) Inoue of TV Asahi said, “Owada would be good.” He suggested, “I think Owada can definitely do a lot of things.” Then I thought about what he could do…

Chikamatsu: You reached out and he said it sounded good.

Omori: In response to that, the scriptwriter (Masaya) Kakei rewrote the script for Owada.

Chikamatsu: The character’s age also was changed to fit him.

Momose: As for an episode that I was in charge of, the flower arranging episodes (17-18) were very memorable. I have a friend from college who’s an instructor at the Sogetsu School of Flower Arrangement along with his mother. Their family is wonderful. The two of them helped with movement guidance and creating flower arrangements. I wanted to try having the mother’s arrangement for the Humagear Sakuyo, and the son’s for Rentaro. I thought that the differences in the opponents’ work will show if we did it that way. What’s interesting is that the mother got hooked on “Zero-One”. She’s kept watching it, and on Mondays she always goes to LINE to ask for suggestions. During the time when we couldn’t air new episodes due to COVID, we made compilations. At that time, she said, “I’m glad you did that”; she hadn’t known what the story was before Sakuyo’s appearance. She also wrote that she “understood Metsuboujinrai’s members very well” (Laughs). In the lawyer episode, I called up another acquaintance to supervise everything from the contents of the script to behavior in the courtroom. And in the firefighter episodes (26-27), we received help from Tsukada of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications’ Fire and Disaster Management Agency, as well as the people at Shakujii Fire Station, which was also close to the filming site.

TTFC: The burning building in that episode was right next to the entrance to the filming site, at Toei TV Productions’ main building. Even though the staff members clearly have a long history with this building, it’s a huge spectacle…!

Momose: That was Director Kamihori’s (Kazuya Kamihoriuchi’s) special magic. The people from Shakujii Fire Station also came to the filming set, and they were incredibly helpful.

Omori: The people from all the “jobs” gladly helped us out. If these continued for a year, it might be different, but because they were basically all two-episode arcs, everyone was really enthusiastic to do it. A fundamental attitude of “Zero-One” is wanting to pay respect to these “jobs”, and the people who helped us out had nothing but respect. I’m grateful that we continued to meet good people throughout the work.

Act 4: Things That Didn’t Go as Planned

TTFC: There are lots more inside stories for “jobs” that I’d love to touch on, but I’d also like you to look back on the bigger topic, being how the last year has progressed… When the program first began, it felt like the public’s attention was obviously drawn to how the Reiwa era of “Kamen Rider” would change from the Heisei era, but Omori didn’t put that much emphasis on that point…

Omori: I think I probably said this at the time, too, but it starts right after the previous program ends even if the imperial era has changed, so those fundamental things wouldn’t be immediately changed (Laughs). However, we could still change the viewers’ feelings, and I myself became a chief producer and this was my fourth work, so I thought about how I wanted to expand the limits of the “Kamen Rider” shows a little more. Like, an un-“Kamen Rider”-like “Kamen Rider” work.

TTFC: I got that impression when I watched episode 1. I guess it’s extremely “easy to watch”… That might have also been impacted by the cast’s extravagance.

Omori: They truly were extravagant. However, I think it’s more from the accumulation of the Heisei era that all those people appeared.

TTFC: The people you cast as the characters surrounding Aruto affect the whole work. Even when you know how important they are, Akio Kaneda’s performance in episode 1 is still over-the-top… (Laughs).

Chikamatsu: I occasionally meet Kaneda at the filming studio, and he keeps telling me, “I want to appear again” (Laughs).

Omori: The most talked-about thing in this first episode with so much stuff going on was Taro’s abs shattering (Laughs). That was a miscalculation on my part. There are humans and Humagears, and the first big events are Humagears… We thought about beginning with Metsuboujinrai.net appearing evil because they’re trying to destroy humanity, and that idea eventually being reversed… but we noticed that people interpreted it more as Taro being pitiable rather than Metsuboujinrai being evil. I thought that after we tackled the theme of “AI”, we’d inevitably need to confront the topics of human “hearts” and essence, but when I saw the reaction to the first episode, I once again realized, “Oh, that’s what’s going to happen.” It was a profound theme after all.

TTFC: In the early stages, the series progressed while providing topics of discussion through various devices, but the growing popularity of Metsuboujinrai.net led to their temporary exit by the end of the year. Then, at the beginning of the year, the cour [TN: if you’re reading this droplet subs hi big fan and if that post was about me then i’m sorry but i’m gonna keep spelling it this way because french is stupid] for January to March was the “business competition” arc, expanding on the rivalry between Aruto and Gai.

Omori: The “business competition” arc was unpopular among fans~. We’re aware of that. However, I love the arc, and our numbers (television ratings) actually increased. Moreover, I think we had to make it this way in “Zero-One” because we couldn’t in any other series.

TTFC: It’s precisely one cour, but it’s also a fairly rare technique to call it a “competition” from the outset in recent years. (?)

Omori: In the very first plan, Hiden Intelligence was going to be taken over by Gai sooner, and Gai and Izu would be in the president’s office starting at the beginning of the year. But people said that would be a little early. Many of them said they wanted to see more of Aruto as the president of Hiden Intelligence, so we tried to have one cour be about Aruto and Gai clashing heads as fellow presidents. The “business competition” was born from that. I thought it was meaningful to do it while also aiming to delve more into the theme of “work”. However, it ended up becoming a drama that could’ve been done without being a Kamen Rider show. The “business competition” didn’t mesh well with the battles between Kamen Riders and the Magia and Raiders.

TTFC: I see. It’s like there are two “matches” that exist on different mornings…

Omori: Gai’s malice might have been a little too realistic because of that. The themes of power harassment at work were maybe a bit heavy for a Sunday morning program… It’s only there because work is a theme.

TTFC: Aruto’s seat as president was finally taken as a result of the “competition”.

Omori: But we made a premise where Aruto was required to be the president to transform into Zero-One, so a way for Aruto to continue being the president in some form was expected. So, now the “Hiden Factory” became Aruto and Izu’s new base of operations.

TTFC: That development was in episode 30. From here, Gai/Thouser becomes more worn down every episode.

Omori: It was a reaction to the “competition”, or some form of one.

TTFC: Metsuboujinrai.net was revived, there were big things happening with Isamu and Yua, and the story was going to soon reach its climax… and then filming was interrupted. It became something that would also stop new episodes from broadcasting.

Act 5: Who Wished to Destroy Humanity?

TTFC: Well, now for a point that many fans are curious about… I’m also sure that many people find it very hard to talk about and sort out their thoughts on, but because of the situation, the episode total was shortened by six episodes. I imagine that there are endgame developments that came because of that, but how did it feel when it actually happened?

Omori: We had an idea of how we wanted to proceed, and while we were generally able to follow that plan, there were some parts that we changed, and some parts that we were unable to depict. We didn’t know exactly how everything would turn out. We kept moving forward while not knowing how the episode count would change, what episodes would be shortened or removed, or how long we could continue filming. However, there were developments that happened specifically because the show became shorter. At least, the ending definitely changed because of the postponement caused by COVID.

TTFC: In that middle period, the members of Metsuboujinrai.net all gather. In a way, this was the perfect time to stop. And when we returned, Ark was revived and Ark-Zero debuted.

Omori: The script drafts were finished up to the aibo episodes after those, episodes 38 and 39. The state of emergency was declared then, and production on the scripts after that was halted. We didn’t know how long we wouldn’t be able to film for, or how much the number of episodes would change. While I say that, at first we decided that we could rest for two weeks at most and then restart broadcasting. We made the two “President Specials” from that assumption. We thought that, if we picked up the plot threads relating to Ikazuchi and the Ark well, we’d smoothly connect into the next episode.

Momose: The Ark’s (voice) actor Sho Hayami essentially debuted a little bit ahead of time in the latter part of “President Special”.

Omori: And then, as you all know, despite what we assumed, the state of emergency was extended by one month… This was difficult. Even though it was what it was and we couldn’t change the situation, there’s a big difference between cutting off two episodes and six.

TTFC: The remaining episodes went from fourteen to ten. However, the next four episodes already had finished screenplays, so in a sense it was only six episodes…

Omori: Furthermore, there was no guarantee that we’d be able to shoot the last ten episodes. Even though we were able to restart filming, we didn’t know where or why we might have to stop again. That meant that Nakazawa’s episodes 40 and 41 had a possibility to be the last ones in the show. Because of those circumstances, I was happy when we safely finished shooting the finale. I’m relieved to hear that the next show, “Kamen Rider Saber”, has also finished filming its first two episodes.

TTFC: Was there not an option to extend the broadcast period so that you wouldn’t have less episodes?

Omori: We ran many different simulations, at least. But first of all, that would also have an effect on the release of the summer movie and the second part of the Blu-ray Collection’s exclusive original drama “Project Thouser”, so we wanted to have the most beneficial plan.

TTFC: I see. Back to the episodes… After the aibo arc in episodes 38 and 39, there were episodes 40 and 41, where Aruto loses both the satellite Zea and the Zero-One Driver. Here, Kamen Rider Zero-Two is born in episode 40, and in episode 41 Aruto finally returns to being the president of Hiden Intelligence, and the previously shown Humagears were shown saving people from danger.

Omori: That was what I wanted to do the most. Originally, when we had meetings preparing for the movie which will release soon, I said at the start, “I want to have humanity be destroyed this time”. I wanted to do something where humanity is saved by the Humagears when they’re on the brink of complete extinction, because of what they’ve taught the Humagears. I thought, can’t we have humans and Humagears finally join hands there? We expected the movie to happen close to the final episode, so that was changed to be implemented as the great gathering of Humagears in episode 41, but nobody accepted the idea of “destroying humanity”. If anything, it felt like everyone pushed back against it (Laughs). By the way, I proposed this before the COVID pandemic happened.

Minato: The idea might show just a little on the movie’s poster and other visuals.

Omori: So personally, when we reached episode 41, I felt like I’d already used up all my strength. Director (Ryuta) Tasaki laughed at me when I said that much at the preparatory meeting for episodes 42 and 43.

TTFC: In episode 41, Aruto said the line, “the people in the current world are facing hardships they’ve never experienced before”. It felt like a story that could have only been written during the COVID pandemic.

Omori: I think that Yuya just wrote that part itself very well, rather than aiming for something. And more importantly, the destruction of mankind… Before now, most people thought, “destruction?!”, but I was rather thinking about a story of rebuilding from very near “destruction”.

TTFC: Just a short time ago, you said that “episode 41 could have possibly been the finale”, but episode 41 brought about the idea of Zero-Two and Kamen Rider Horobi destroying Ark together, and in a sense, this was only concluded at the very end of the last episode.

Momose: Sho Hayami’s Ark was extremely cool and well-knit. Hayami was always recording the voice-overs by himself, but I’m glad that he did it with the other cast members in just the last episode. But he said, “it (the time he spent in the show) went by quickly”, and he seemed disappointed about that.

TTFC: It really was no time at all.

Act 6: Where Did the Story Go?

Omori: Four episodes were left because of the situation. Some of the planned events remained, like the beginning of Kamen Rider Ark-One’s appearance, and Yotagaki Williamson coming from Zaia Enterprise management, but the rest would have to be remade from nothing. When we first cast (Seiji) Takaiwa as Kamen Rider Horobi’s suit actor, we’d decided that the final battle would be Zero-One vs. Horobi, but not how we’d get to that point. As I sort of said said a little earlier, I was thinking of a storyline where Horobi would start to look more like a righteous hero as we progressed towards the endgame. But what came up during the prep meetings was the idea of Aruto becoming Ark-One. Izu was lost because of Horobi, and because of that, malice is born within Aruto, Ark is resurrected, and Aruto becomes Ark-One (episode 42).

Chikamatsu: Meanwhile, on Horobi’s side, he loses Jin in a battle with Aruto/Ark-One (episode 43).

Omori: Horobi is now also grieving. On that cue, a total war breaks out between Humagears and humans.

Chikamatsu: The many things leading up to the final battle were set up in this incredibly short span of time. As for Azu, she wasn’t assumed to appear again and so she wasn’t given a name, but then that was changed.

TTFC: I was surprised that it’s mostly just Azu appearing in the last 3 episodes.

Omori: I felt a little bad about that…

TTFC: It’s also surprising that Aruto’s so-called “dark turn” wasn’t originally planned. I think there was an amount of foreshadowing leading up to that.

Minato: That was more of Yuya’s “witchcraft”.

TTFC: It was wonderful when episode 44 showed the surrounding characters thinking about Aruto and Horobi.

Omori: Looking back, having less episodes meant that many things were wasted, including the opportunities to delve into each character more. If we had the originally planned amount, we’d definitely have been able to do it with much more care. That was sad, and I think that all of the directors and the cast members themselves probably feel disappointed by that, too. On the other hand, the development of Izu being destroyed and Aruto becoming Ark-One… it can be said that the shock of that moment was only made because things were cut back, so that’s a really difficult point to decide.

TTFC: In episode 45, the finale, Aruto has returned to being “Zero-One” and fights Horobi, now Kamen Rider Ark-Horobi, and the two of them overcome “evil”.

Omori: I’d imagined something where Horobi is destroyed and brings Ark down with him, but it didn’t end up like that. It feels like a very “Zero-One”-esque landing.

Chikamatsu: The exchange between Aruto and Horobi also felt like a message to mankind as a whole. I was constantly on the set for (Teruaki) Sugihara’s group in episodes 44 and 45, and the Director’s fixation was incredible. He took a while to give the OK on scenes like the one where Horobi hits Aruto. He said, “You can do better than that!”

Omori: I was inspired by the director team’s passion again too. Of course, all of the staff members have also been putting in their best effort even more since the lockdown. And the most surprising thing was the cast’s growth. It seems like they all gave even better performances when filming restarted. I’m sure they all had many things to think about during quarantine. It’s unfortunate that we had less episodes to work with, but by experiencing unprecedented hardship, they underwent change with unique meaning, and took on the form of the art. There’s no doubt that it gave them some kind of power.

TTFC: Our time will be up soon, so I should ask you to talk for the remaining time we have about any little-known or new material, while also summarizing them as best as you can… Now, everyone on the AP team, please say your thoughts on “Zero-One”, or anything you’d like to tell TTFC members with this chance.

Momose: On the topic of TTFC, us at the AP team are currently producing “Zero-One’s” short anime. Omori-P “left this matter” to us (Laughs). Episode 1, with Aruto and Izu, and episode 2, with Isamu and Yua, have already been released, and we would be happy if you helped it do well.

TTFC: Voiceovers for episodes 3 and 4 were done the other day, and these also seem to contain interesting things…

Momose: I met the scriptwriter Tete Inoue when we worked together on items for G-Rosso. We had the prep meetings for episodes 1 and 2 during lockdown, so we would always work on it while talking on the phone, and I would tell Chikamatsu and Minato about what happened while continuing to work on it (Laughs). The concept of the short anime was that its story isn’t serious at all, and the prep meetings always had an atmosphere like a bar, so I had fun making it. Please look forward to the next episodes too. As for my thoughts on the year of “Zero-One”, it feels pretty different from the event work I’ve done in the past. When planning events, you of course make the events themselves from scratch, but the main part was figuring out how to make it fit with the already existing work that it’s for. It was very rewarding, but the difficulty of making things from scratch was something else. On reflection, there were things I could’ve done better, but I want to make the best of that in my future work.

Minato: As a tokusatsu fan, I’m extremely happy to have been a part of the Kamen Rider series that I’ve always watched. What I’m happiest about is that I made it through without feeling disappointed (Laughs). I worried about what would happen if this work that I’d wanted to be in for so long turned out to be different from what I imagined on the inside, but if anything I was surprised in the complete opposite way. I realized that everyone is truly interested in what they were doing, right down to the tiny details, and trying to make interesting art. I’m happy about that. “Zero-One” itself had a theme of “work”, but I myself think I made a good decision in changing my job. I feel like it’s work that I can be proud of, and with the way I feel now, I’ll continue to work hard in “Saber” too. Now, I want to extend my thanks to the cast of the show. When I worked on anime, I was mostly conversing with the staff members, so I hadn’t been able to see the younger actors shine more and more with every episode at such a close distance before. “Zero-One” was also interrupted by the lockdown, and I think that was emotionally tough for everyone, but we got through it well.

Chikamatsu: I’d also like to talk about the cast. Having been able to attend auditions, I’m especially attached to them. All of the regulars have devoted a long time, over one year, to “Zero-One”, and I’m thankful for even just that, but more than anything, I’m grateful that they came to love the show and bring their roles to life. The writing and direction was also amazing, but the actors took that and brought the quality to the next level. I can’t even put into words how much they’ve grown since their auditions. The lead role of Aruto was really tough to decide, and I worried about if there was someone who could play the role well, but when Fumiya Takahashi appeared, everyone said, “It has to be him”. As we’d hoped, he fit wonderfully with the role. When I saw his performance in the final episode, I thought, “I’m glad Fumiya is Aruto,” even more strongly this time. I think Isamu was a comparatively easy character to get the idea of, but (Ryutaro) Okada actively brought his own thoughts into it more and more, and it feels like no one else could have made this reckless character like he did. Izu was Noa Tsurushima’s first role, so having created such an amazing character shows just how much potential she herself has. Yua’s actor, (Hiroe) Igeta, struggled with a role that’s very different from how she herself is, but she brought out charm that only she could’ve shown. (Daisuke) Nakagawa as Jin also had anxiety about his lack of acting experience, but gradually took on his role with serious dedication, and became fascinating. Horobi’s actor (Shuya) Sunakawa had a role that didn’t show much emotion until the last part, but at the end of the end, he showed an incredible performance. I’ll look forward to how they all do in the future.

TTFC: Thank you, everyone. By the way, even though the TV series has finished, there’s more to come later. You have the “Final Stage & Program Cast Talk Show” in the fall, and the movie, which had its release delayed.

Momose: It’s unfortunate that the “Special Event” scheduled for spring (May) of this year was postponed, and that we couldn’t do any of the summer events or stage shows. We can’t do much about it given the circumstances. However, we’re currently preparing to put on the “Final Stage”, so I hope you look forward to that. The “Super Hero Festival” in January was done amazingly by my old department’s staff, so I think the events this fall will be great, too!

Omori: The second part of “Project Thouser” was also filmed the other day.

TTFC: The original drama made for the Blu-ray Collection Volume 2, which had its release delayed?

Omori: It was originally scheduled to release in August, but then the show couldn’t film and it was delayed. It will release in November now. Yotagaki Williamson was originally planned to appear in this second volume of “Thouser”. The shooting and release periods fell out of sync, but he still appears. I think it’s a story that will pull on the heartstrings of “Zero-One” fans quite a bit, so please look forward to this as well.

TTFC: That reminds me— in terms of filming order, the first appearance of Metsuboujinrai.net’s Naki was in the first part of “Project Thouser”.

Omori: They were actually a character created at that time.

Momose: When we were casting them, we’d decided that they’d appear in “Thouser”, and then appear in voice only in the show. However, in the latter half their position became pretty essential to have and they appeared in the show.

Chikamatsu: Originally they were just a joke. Like, “there’s Horobi and Jin in Metsuboujinrai— do Naki and Ikazuchi also exist?” (Laughs). And then we had “Naki”, so why not have Ikazuchi?

[TN: In case you didn’t know, the names of each MBJR member come from one of the four kanji in “metsuboujinrai” (滅亡迅雷— Horobi, Naki, Jin, Ikazuchi).]

Omori: Originally, Ikazuchi came from the form of Raiden Uchuyaro and transformed into a Kamen Rider (episode 14). Then I began to think, “could we possibly have four Metsuboujinrai members transform into Kamen Riders?” (Laughs).

Minato However, Ikazuchi’s return was also not yet specifically decided at the beginning, and the way we communicated it was similarly “there may be an opportunity for you to appear again”.

TTFC: The TV show ended with all four members of Metsuboujinrai.net surviving, and Izu reappearing as her alter ego… but there was a big surprise at the end, where “Es”, played by Hideaki Ito, transforms into “Kamen Rider Eden”. Should I assume that this is setting up for the plot of the movie?

Omori: You’re right about that. I can’t go into detail, but you’ll see what he does when it releases on (Friday) December 18th as we’ve announced. The release period has changed from the original plan, so the finished script has been drastically modified, but Hideaki Ito’s appearance has always been planned.

TTFC: I’ve read the script before it was revised. There were amazing plot points in the structure of the movie itself, and I thought there had never been a plan like this before. I was excited that you were going to try something like this. As for any other things…

Omori: We still can’t let too much be revealed, so that’s all for now (Laughs). I hope you enjoy the movie.

TTFC: One last thing… This might be impatient, but could I ask if there’s potential for any “spin-off” works? There are less episodes than there were supposed to, so there are probably many hopeful fans…

Omori: All I can say is that we have plans to do things. The world will be how it is right now regardless of what we say, so I don’t know how things will go. Still, many things about this show are already unusual, so it hasn’t been “finished” yet. Of course, “finishing” it in the same way as before won’t be possible for a while, but I would definitely like to “finish” it someday, in some form. It’s also because of that (Laughs) that I want to think about spin-offs going forward.

TTFC: Thank you for gathering today while you’re so busy!

#kamen rider zero-one #guster translates rider #tw covid #op #kamen rider #aruto hiden #isamu fuwa #yua yaiba #gai amatsu #takahito omori #yosuke minato #chika chikamatsu #ryosuke momose

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kizuike · 3 years ago

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Translating Ex-Aid cast interviews is fun and it's especially fun if they're talking about Iwanaga cause it's always like "We have no idea what his problem is but he's a good friend"

#original

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bananonbinary · 4 years ago

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Time for a Salty Meta Post about Martin!

people who’ve followed this blog for a bit know that spending six hours combing through text for some goddamn sources is my specialty, so i compiled every time jon ever talked about martin’s work in season 1. which for the record, he stopped complaining about all the way back in episode 26, where he was angry that martin of all people got hurt.

things jon gets mad at martin for:

not being able to find records that don’t exist

not being able to find someone based only on a first name

the Dog

not wearing trousers in his off-hours

being the one that got caught up in the jane prentiss thing

mag 004 and mag 012 both have jon taking potshots at martin over research that was proven accurate by outside sources

things jon has never once complained about:

martin not understanding the filing system and just putting stuff away at random

martin being clumsy, constantly ruining things, spilling tea everywhere everyday, etc

martin turning in incompetent, poorly-edited, or badly formatted reports

martin not understanding the terminology used, skills expected, etc., and generally being extremely new to the field

please for the love of god stop making martin the silly bumbling idiot who can’t do anything right just because he doesn’t have a formal education. there’s zero evidence for it in the text, and it’s really weird to act like a 4 year degree would outweigh the *10 years* of job experience he has, not just in academia, but in the institute itself by season one. my boy has worked there longer than ANY of the rest of the main cast. screw you guys.

tl;dr: martin is never once shown to be bad at his job, jon pretty much only ever gets mad at him for the really stupid first impression and also not finding stuff that no one else was able to find either. after martin got hurt, jon talks about his research basically the same way he talks about tim’s or sasha’s work.

fucking proof under the cut:

(i didnt include the s1 finale or martin’s statement bc that’s just...two entire episodes of them talking to each other, but there isn’t really any notable Martin Complaints in either of them imo)

I swear, if he’s brought another dog in here, I’m going to peel him.

[pre-launch trailer]

Well, technically three, but I don’t count Martin as he’s unlikely to contribute anything but delays.

[...] Alongside this Tim, Sasha and, yes, I suppose, Martin will be doing some supplementary investigation to see what details may be missing from what we have.

[MAG001 Anglerfish]

Martin couldn’t find any records of Ex Altiora as a title in existent catalogues of esoteric or similar literature, so I assigned Sasha to double-check. Still nothing.

[MAG004 Pageturner]

I had Martin conduct a follow-up interview with Mr. Woodward last week, but it was unenlightening. Apparently there have been no further bags at number 93 and in the intervening years he has largely discounted many of the stranger aspects of his experience. I wasn’t expecting much, as time generally makes people inclined to forget what they would rather not believe, but at least it got Martin out of the Institute for an afternoon, which is always a welcome relief.

[MAG005 Thrown Away]

Martin was unable to find the exact date the original house was built but the earliest records he could find list it as being bought by Walter Fielding in 1891.

[...]

We cannot prove any connection, but Martin unearthed a report on an Agnes Montague, who was found dead in her Sheffield flat on the evening of November 23rd 2006, the same day Mr. Lensik claims to have uprooted the tree.

[MAG008 Burned Out]

According to Martin, who was here when they took this statement, it was at this point in writing that Mr. Herbert announced he needed some sleep before continuing. He was shown to the break room where he went to sleep on the couch. He did not awaken; unfortunately succumbing to the lung cancer right there. Martin says the staff had been aware of how serious Mr. Herbert’s condition was, and had advised him to seek medical aid prior to giving his statement, but were told rather bluntly by the old man that he would not wait another second to state his case. I can’t decide whether this lends more or less credibility to his tale.

[MAG010 Vampire Killer]

“Veepalach” might also be a mishearing of the Polish word “wypalać”, according to Martin, which means to cauterize or brand. Admittedly, if Martin speaks Polish in the same way he “speaks Latin,” then he might be talking nonsense again, but I’ve looked it up and it appears to check out.

[MAG012 First Aid]

I sent Martin to look into this ‘Angela’ character - not that I want him to get chopped up, of course, but someone had to. Apparently, he spent three days looking into every woman named Angela in Bexley over the age of 50. He could not find anyone that matches the admittedly vague description given here, though he informs me that he had some very pleasant chats about jigsaws. Useless ass.

[MAG014 Piecemeal]

Martin declined to help with this investigation as he’s “a bit claustrophobic”

[MAG015 Lost John’s Cave]

There simply aren’t enough details given in this statement to actually investigate, short of Martin confirming that Mr. Vittery did indeed live at the addresses he provided.

[MAG016 Arachnophobia]

Oh, he’s off sick this week. Stomach problems, I think.

Blessed relief if you ask me.

[...]

I asked Martin to try and hunt down Mr. Adekoya himself for a follow-up, but have been informed that he passed away in 2006.

[MAG017 The Boneturner’s Tale]

MARTIN

Well, I need to tell someone what happened, and you can vouch for the soundness of my mind, can’t you?

ARCHIVIST

…

That is beside the point.

[MAG022 Colony]

Martin! Good lord man, if you’re going to be staying in the Archives, at least have the decency to put some trousers on!

[MAG023 Schwartzwald]

Martin found one other thing while combing through police reports for the Hither Green area. About a month after this statement was given, on May 15th, 2015, police were called out to once again investigate the chapel.

[MAG025 Growing Dark]

I know, but it would have to have been Martin, wouldn’t it? I mean, anything goes wrong around here, it always seems to happen to him. Anyway, we’re getting off topic. Why didn’t you report this?

[MAG026 A Distortion]

Martin made contact with the son, Marcus McKenzie, but he declined to talk to us, saying that he’d “already made his statement.”

[MAG027 A Sturdy Lock]

Tim and Martin had a bit more luck investigating Tom Haan, though only really enough to confirm that he seems to have completely vanished following his departure from Aver Meats on the 12th of July.

[MAG030 Killing Floor]

Martin’s research would seem to indicate the place employed a reasonable number of international staff they preferred to keep off the books

[...]

TIM

Ah well, that’s actually what he was asking, huh! Um, apparently Martin, uh, took delivery of a couple of items last week addressed to you. Did he not mention it?

ARCHIVIST

No, he… Oh, yes, actually. I completely forgot. He said he put it in my desk drawer, hold on.

[MAG036 Taken Ill]

#the magnus archives #LISTEN #i am once again asking people to remember that martin has MORE job experience at the institute than literally any other character #(except elias or i guess maybe rosie)#he's the goddamn veteran not the newbie #fan wank /

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tressasinterlude · 4 years ago

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𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐓 #𝟑: Female Public Figures Dating Men with Questionable Views That Contradict Their Image & Alleged Politics

𝗗𝗜𝗦𝗖𝗟𝗔𝗜𝗠𝗘𝗥: These rant blog posts are really just reflective of my thoughts at the time that I make them and are posted here because I need an outlet to release all of this shit I have going on my busy ass mind. That’s it and that’s all. Now let’s get into it..

This rant was greatly inspired by none other than Ms. Robyn Rihanna “Tell Your Faves To Pull Up [in regards to social injustices directly affecting black people]” Fenty and her openly colorist boyfriend, A$AP Rocky. Aside from the fact that Rihanna tends to slip under the radar and is never held accountable for her problematic ways due to her conventional beauty (i.e. Her heavy usage of anti-Asian slurs, particularly targeted towards Chris Brown’s ex gf, Karrueche), it’s very alarming that a woman who has an entire makeup brand with a campaign based around the inclusivity of ALL black women is publicly flaunting a beau who once said that DSBW do not look good with red lipstick.

And yes, I’m very much aware that Rakim said this tasteless comment over 8 years ago but from the looks of it, not much has really changed with him. Don’t @ me about it neither because I don’t care.

Also peep how he compares a hypothetical darkskinned woman to a man (Wesley Snipes) while trying to explain how his antiblackness isn’t wrong because he said something about white women as well. Gaslighting at its finest. Don’t you just love it! 😀

Furthermore, you would think that somebody of Rihanna’s level of stature would know not to associate themselves with someone as messy as A$AP Rocky but... Stupid is what stupid does, I guess! I can’t even begin to place the blame on him anymore because he’s revealed his true colors and we all have made the deliberate choice to either accept it or don’t and have discontinued all support for him. Unfortunately, misogynoir is never the dealbreaker for most people and the hatred for [dark-skinned] black women is so engrained in society that it’s frowned upon when we publicly speak out against it. Very ass backwards if you ask me but that’s society for you. Now, enough about that. Let’s focus back on Ms. Vita La Coco.

As a woman who claims to be a girl’s girl and is always presenting herself to be someone who is the epitome of a pro-black feminist bad ass, it just makes her alleged activism come off so disingenuous when she’s also laying down with the same man that actively attacks the demographic she’s supposed to be standing in solidarity with. It’s “Black Lives Matter” on the IG posts but your vagina is getting moist for a man who openly stated he doesn’t relate to what goes on in Ferguson because he lives in Soho & Beverly Hills. Ferguson being the exact place where a 17-year-old black boy’s lifeless corpse laid on the hot concrete for FOUR hours after he was murdered by a police officer. He couldn’t 'relate' to the fate of so many black men, women, and children who are murdered or seriously injured from state-sanctioned violence because they’re poor and he is not or so he thought.

But then again, what can I really expect from a woman who identified as being “biracial” until as recent as roughly 6 years ago? What can I really expect from a woman who called Rachel Dolezal a ‘hero’ for cosplaying as a black woman? I’d be lying if I said my expectations for her were high in this regard because sis has always shown us she was lacking in this department. And just for the record, this is not a personal attack on Rihanna at all for the die-hard Navy stans in the back. I admire her latest fashions and bop my head to her music just like the next person but she’s getting the side-eye from me on this one.

Trust and believe me though, she’s not the only woman who I can call out for being a hypocrite. Of course not! This stone can be cast at a few others. So without further ado, why don’t we bring Ms. Kehlani Parrish to the front of the congregation? Prior to Kehlani’s recent declaration of identifying as a lesbian, her last public relationship with a man was with YG. Yes, the same YG who felt it was necessary to say him & Nipsey had ‘pretty light-skinned’ daughters to raise in the middle of his deceased friend’s memorial. By the way, Nipsey’s daughter is not even light (or at least not in my book anyways.) She’s a very deep caramel tone just like her father which makes what he said even more moronic. Yes, the same YG who thought it was clever idea to use slavery as an aesthetic for a music video to a diss track about 6ix9ine. And yes, also the same YG who has derogatory lyrics targeted at bisexual women. Just to end up sweating the red carpets with one. I swear the jokes just continue to write themselves.

This raises the question once more; How high of a pedestal can I really put a multiracial woman who has a song titled ‘N*ggas’ and when received backlash for the song in question, she used the ultimate ‘I’m mixed’ copout while not having a visibly black parent in sight?

It’s also kind of suspicious to me that many were not privy to Kehlani’s secret romance with Victoria Monét (pictured bottom right) until Victoria did an interview with Gay Times revealing she fell in love with a girl but they subsequently broke up because Victoria had a boyfriend and that girl was pregnant in a polyamorous relationship. Fans began to speculate because both Victoria & Kehlani previously candidly spoke about their sexual orientations, Kehlani had just had Adeya and they both were seemingly close. Their short-lived fling would later be confirmed when Victoria released the song ‘Touch Me’ on her last project and Kehlani hopped on the remix. Meanwhile, Kehlani’s relationship with Shaina (pictured bottom left) was very overt and all over her Instagram feed from my recollection. And as you can see, Shaina looks absolutely nothing like Victoria. They look like the complete opposite of eachother in every aspect which is kind of alarming(?) to say the least because why is it that the women she proudly claims as her partners tend to have a very racially ambiguous look such as herself but her ‘sneaky links’ on the other hand are undoubtedly black women? Again, it could just be me jumping conclusions. You know, I’m kinda good for that however something tells me I’m not. Y’all be the judge of the material though.

Last but not least, I’d like to touch on Ms. Raven Tracy very briefly. I was very weary about even including in this segment and if I should just put her in a entirely separate blog post with other women who openly date abusers despite their checkered past (alongside Nicki Minaj & her r*pist murderer of a husband, India Love & Sheck Wes etc.) being this particular blog post was based around the theme of lightskinned/mixed women dating men with extremely problematic views about DSBW. Raven obviously isn’t lightskinned or mixed however I refused to ignore how contradictory her [former] relationship with an alleged (I used this word very loosely and mainly for legality purposes.) serial r*pist while promoting a brand that is all about feminism & body positivity. This also traces back to A$AP Rocky by default being that Ian Connor is his very close friend and he came to Connor’s defense when several women came forward detailing accounts of Connor allegedly s*xually assaulting them. (I wish I could place the actual video of what A$AP Rocky said verbatim but Tumblr only allows one video per blog post. 🙄)

Back in June of this year, Ian & Raven had a back & forth on Twitter after Ian tweeted about Raven “fucking everybody” behind his back. I can only assume that he was alluding to Tori Brixx posting a video of her ex, Rich the Kid & Raven kissing on her story. Disgusted is not even the word to describe my feeling when she admitted she stuck by Ian despite of his many allegations of s*xual abuse because she loved him and her being a empath causes her to want to help everybody. Imagine aiding and abetting a predator and even paying for his bail & legal fees just to turn around and expect sympathy because this same individual cheated on you and exploited you all over Twitter for the public to see. The same man that you would get back with not even a WEEK after the fact & turn off your IG comments because it isn’t our “business” after making it our business...

That being said, I just genuinely want to know: Why do these women completely go against what they stand for in regards to these men? Maybe it was never genuine from jump street and if that’s the case, why jump on the bandwagon of performative activism? Is it because it’s profitable right now? Is it because disrespecting black women is not an immediate death sentence to your careers and more often than not actually helps you advance even further? I guess that’s the billion dollar question that’ll never truly be answered. I just want the world to stop using black women as their stepping stool to get to where they need to go and then discarding of us when we’re no longer beneficial. Support us all the way or don’t support us at all. We deal with enough disrespect as is so we’d appreciate if y’all would stop straddling the fence and partake in your misogynoir out loud if that’s what you choose to do. We have no use for fake allyship and quite frankly, it’s doing more harm for us than good. Please and thank you!

Sincerely,

- 𝙼𝙸𝚂𝚂 𝙴𝙳𝙶𝙰𝚁 𝙰𝙻𝙻𝙴𝙽 𝙷𝙾𝙴. 💋

#i’m finally done after having this sitting in the drafts for about a good month... or two. 🥴🥴#abuse apologists #pro black #activism #feminism #body posititivity #colorism #raven tracy #kehlani #rihanna #yg #asap rocky #rant #my uploads.

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paraemu · 3 years ago

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Crosstalk 1 from Kamen Rider Genm VS Lazer

Iwanaga Tetsuya, who played Dan Kuroto/Kamen Rider Genm, and Nakata Yuji, who was Genm's suit actor in the second half of the main TV series and in this V-Cinema, have a talk for the first time. Iwanaga-san listed some of Genm's famous scenes that he is grateful for. Nakata-san said that he has many things to reflect on, but that he still enjoyed the process of creating a character together.

Keep reading ->

#kamen rider ex aid #ex aid cast interviews #dan kuroto #iwanaga tetsuya #kamen rider #kamen rider genm #tokusatsu #testing out my new site :)#kuroto dan

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thanksjro · 5 years ago

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More Than Meets the Eye #22- If You Don’t Love Thunderclash, Get Better Soon I Guess

One last issue before we reach Comic Event Hell.

Time to use a dead man to set up the rest of the nonsense that’s got to happen, because apparently 14 issues of setup, including six issues of literal prelude, wasn’t enough.

The first bit of information we’re presented with is the fact that Chromedome and Swerve are on the opposite sides of the camera-shy scale. I guess that’s bound to happen when your spouse has had his video-cam literally connected to his brain for at least several thousand years.

The art may look really gritty and hardcore here, but this is actually due to a filter Rewind has over all his footage that he’s neglected to take off, because it made all the wartime propaganda he would stuff into people’s heads all the more brutal-looking.

No, this is the style of our artist for this issue, James Raiz, who we’ll be seeing a fair bit of over the next several issues. Raiz has worked on the Transformers franchise over the course of multiple license-holders, as well as contributed to both Marvel and DC comics. He also works in special effects, including matte painting and VFX. That’s just neat.

Anyway, the reason Swerve’s completely frozen in place isn’t because Rewind switched out his head-mounted camera for a gun that goes off if it hears you make a self-deprecating joke, but rather because he’s conducting interviews with everyone in the main cast. We get all their introductions, Cyclonus makes a statement about his political stances, Drift sounds like he’s high as a kite, First Aid strikes a sassy pose while not being bitter in the slightest, and Ultra Magnus makes a move that would get him murdered on any given film set in the universe.

You do NOT use your bare fucking hand to clean a camera lens, mister. Go get a microfiber cloth and try the fuck again, you complete and utter duffel bag of a creature.

We get a quick cut of the speech Rodimus made back in issue #1, with an angle that implies that Rewind was in the front row of the front row, then cut over to Rodimus asking Rewind to document their Capital-Q Quest. This is where we establish that this film doesn’t only contain footage from Rewind’s personal camera, but also that of the Lost Light’s security system.

Which feels like the sort of access you maybe wouldn’t want to give some nosy little film buff, especially when you have a secret giant serial killing sadist living in your basement like a disappointing adult child.

See? He was given the job to record the adventures of the Lost Light not five minutes ago, and he’s already using his powers for evil. Eavesdropping evil. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, Rodimus, and you just handed it to the guy with a massive Dominus Ambus-shaped chip on his shoulder.

So Rewind’s got permission to film just about whatever he wants, and Rodimus figures it’ll be nonstop action from here to the finish line! Fights! Intrigue! Mild hijinks and peril! Explosions aplomb! Oh man, I can’t wait to see what kinds of crazy shit will happen on this absolute roller coaster of a Quest!

Smashcut to Swerve literally falling asleep in the middle of a conversation. Yeah, as it turns out, no quest, capital Q or not, is nonstop action. Which is good, honestly, because that kind of seems like it would be exhausting after the first week or so.

Swerve, Tailgate, and Rewind are discussing cool alt-modes, which seems like an odd topic, seeing as Tailgate and Swerve have basically the same situation going on there, leaving Rewind alone in the camp of “does not have wheels”.

I worry about you sometimes, Rewind. Internalized Functionism is a very real problem. Uh, well, in your universe anyway. Us humans have to deal with regular ol’ classism and racism.

Rung gets brought up, and it’s revealed that the wheel on his back is almost purely cosmetic; it doesn’t even actually attach to his body. The lads decide that they’ve got nothing better to do, and set up a gentlemen’s wager- first one to figure out Rung’s whole deal gets 100 space-dollars.

Throwing shit at people’s heads will be a major plot point in the climax of this comic series.

Swerve’s go at trying to win the bet involved tossing a grenade at Rung to hit him in the neural cluster, which is rumored to be able to force an involuntary mode change if done correctly. Obviously, it didn’t work this go around. Then our narrative focus switches over to the crew’s hobbies.

You were listening to Prince, weren’t you, Magnus? Not even deep space is safe from the Cease and Desist.

Skids’ hobby is meeting new people, because he suffers from the terrible curse of being so fucking good at everything he tries, he always ends up dropping whatever he picked up, because what’s the point? This acts as a segue into another flashback, to even MORE bullshit that the fellas got roped into on Hedonia.

These are the Stentarians. They’re like the Cybertronians, if they were better in every way.

And by “better”, I, of course, mean “more bloodthirsty, warmongering, and driven enough to make their civil war last about as long as the Jurassic Period”. Also, they’re all combiners by default, and Whirl seems a little TOO into their whole situation. So much so, in fact, that when the Imperial Guard of their race show up to kill them, he decides to do them a solid by single-handedly ending their entire war.

You know, in most cases you’re supposed to show and not tell for visual media. This is way funnier, though, so it can be excused.

We jump back into the interviews, and Rewind’s just asked everyone if they’re happy. This might seem like an odd question, until you remember that everyone on-board this ship has crippling depression and PTSD, and Rewind’s married to one of the saddest motherfuckers to ever exist, so he probably has this question loaded into the proverbial chamber at any given moment. We won’t cover all of the answers here, because they’ll be more poignant to reflect back on later in the comic run, but let’s take a gander at the characters who’ve completed the first leg of their character arcs this season.

Drift, is that perhaps… an honest expression of your inner thought processes happening right there? Has Rewind broken through your carefully crafted persona, if even for just a moment, with his question? Perish the thought!

Because Tailgate outed himself as being baby in issue #21, I have zero doubt he’s not exaggerating here. He was a janitor, then he fell in a hole and became Dirt-Nap Supreme for six million years; even the most boring day on the Lost Light’s got to be better than that.

And it’s nice to see Chromedome on a good day for once. Hopefully he reveled in it while he had the chance, because this interview takes place maybe a couple weeks before he fucks everything up big time and has to blow up his husband with a missile strike.

Getting back to the Mystery of the Rungian Alt-Mode plotline, we see Rung using his backpack as a wheelbarrow- no idea what he’s actually pushing in the damned thing- and wearing the most disgruntled face I’ve seen him pull in a hot minute. Someone yells for him to come down the eerily unlit and sinister-looking hallway, which he does. Rung would not do well in a horror film.

He winds up at Swerve’s, where Tailgate, Swerve, Brainstorm, and someone who is most likely Trailcutter, given the colors, are hanging out in their alt-modes. Tailgate’s ploy to find out Rung’s deal is to do what he does best- lie! They’re having an alt-mode party, and wouldn’t Rung like to join in? There are, of course, logistical issues with being a car in a bar, especially when your drink is on the table and your head is tucked up somewhere in your torso, but never mind all that! Let’s get crazy!

This doesn’t work either. Maybe we should cut out the middle man here and just get Rung drunk enough to agree to a wet alt-mode contest.

No, I don’t have any idea how that would work.

In our next vignette, Rodimus comes into the comms room, Rewind trailing behind him like a grim shadow of death, to see what the hell Blaster wants, other than just the hugest glass of water.

Raiz’s work is very detailed, and you really feel the weight of these giant metal space robots, but everyone looks like they’ve been put through a food dehydrator.

We get a lot of build up to the character who’s about to be introduced, with a common opinion being shared amongst everyone- even Tailgate, who hates successful people like his life depends on it.

Lovely readers, put your hands together for the ideal male partner for Autobots, Decepticons, and Neutrals alike:

A man with so much charisma and charm that only Rodimus could hate him, Thuderclash brings to IDW what everyone wishes Optimus Prime would, making our disappointing space dad even more mediocre by comparison. He fights for justice, and freedom, and the good of the universe- and he does it all while having a chronic medical condition that forces him to stay within a certain distance of his ship that is also a life-support machine, otherwise he will die. Despite his handicaps, Thunderclash seemingly brings to others what they need most, even if they don’t even realize that they needed it in the first place.

He also, in this one scene, appeals to Drift’s religious sensibilities, does a secret best-friend dance with Ratchet (who he helped to pass his medical exams- yes, Ratchet), and congratulates Rodimus on his questing so far.

Thunderclash is one of those characters that everyone in-universe is supposed to love, and I completely buy it- because he’s completely genuine and humble about all of this the entire time.

Compare this to the last time Roberts wrote Thunderclash, in Eugenesis.

Where he was an ex-Decepticon.

And kind of an abrasive asshole.

And then he died.

Y’know, now that I think of it, Eugenesis Thunderclash and MTMTE Ambulon being basically the same character makes a whole lot of sense, even without the horrors of Roberts’ Twitter getting involved.

Thunderclash reveals that he, too, is on a quest to find the Knights of Cybertron, much to Rodimus’ chagrin. But first he needs the Lost Light to break out the jumper cables, and then for his second in command to stop threatening his life.

Turns out, not everyone is as obvious as the Cybertronians with their naming conventions. Whirl assassinated the wrong folks; I’m sure the Galactic Council is utterly thrilled. Paddox wants to steal the quantum engine technology for the good of his people, so they can kick the ass of the up-and-coming Terradore leader.

Completely unaware of the situation unfolding here in the lab, Swerve is directing Rung towards the warm, loving aura of Thunderclash for another go at winning the gentlemen’s wager- through the power of lying about having friends, Swerve’s “agreed” to get Rung Thunderclash’s autograph, in exchange for getting to check that Rung’s transformation cog is still working. Then they bump into the nightmare currently unfolding. My, whoever will save us from this dreaded menace, who holds a gun to the head of the Autobots’ greatest warrior, confidant, friend, and perhaps even lover?

How about a bartender and a giant vape pen?

Okay, so Rung doesn’t actually turn into a vape. It turns out that the Mystery of the Rungian Alt-Mode is also a mystery to the man himself. Because Rung is old as shit, the Functionists got to see this bullshit for themselves, and ended up testing him over and over and over trying to figure it out, lest he prove to be a flaw in their fascist ideologies. Fun fact: fascists HATE it when people they’re trying to oppress don’t play to their expectations.

The Functionists were the ones who gave Rung his little wheelie backpack, to make him at least appear useful. This sort of treatment tends to warp one’s head a bit, which would explain why he’s bothered to keep it for so long- internalized functionism’s a real bitch.

At least he’s not giving teenagers nicotine addictions under the guise of being somewhat better than cigarettes.

Back with Rodimus and Cybertron’s Autobot of the Year for 40,000 consecutive years, we get the unfortunate news that jump-starting Thunderclash’s ship is going to make the Quest go a bit slower for the Lost Light, much to Rodimus’ horror, though he does his best to put on a brave face; after all, that’s what heroes do, isn’t it?

It’s at this point that it’s revealed that “Little Victories” was being screened to all the Circle of Light members who didn’t get murdered or turned into Legislators on Luna 1, and man are these guys pissy. What was meant to be a recruitment video turned out to do just the opposite, because none of these guys want anything to do with what the Lost Light’s got going on.

Too bad Rewind didn’t have time for a cleaner cut for showing. Maybe they could have at least snagged a couple of these guys to tag along.

As all of the Circle of Light leave the theatre to go call everyone’s favorite Autobot to see if he needs a more crew members, the film plays on behind Skids, back to the interviews, as everyone promises more adventures just waiting on the horizon.

You’re not even on this trip anymore, you dork.

Chromedome gives us the title drop for the movie and issue, and we cut to Rewind organizing a group photo of all the interviewees.

And then Rewind died horribly like a week later. Thus ends season one of More Than Meets the Eye!

While I’m here, I’d like to take the time to cover a little bit of cut content from this issue, a scene between Drift and Ratchet.

Drift, during his interview, recalls the time that Ratchet called him into his office for a very serious discussion about his/Pharma’s hands.

Yeah, turns out they’re haunted.

Well, no, not really, because this is a prank. But Drift doesn’t know that yet.

Ratchet demonstrates this hand-haunting by punching Drift in the face, as he screams damnation at Pharma’s ghost. Drift, because he is a spiritual man, knows exactly what to do to deal with this possession; he draws his sword and chops Ratchet’s hands off, then throws them out the airlock.

This, too, is a prank, not that Ratchet knows it right away, yelling at Drift that he’s crippled him.

Clearly, these two belong together.

This bit of cut script was lucky enough to have gotten drawn by the colorist for MTMTE Season 1, Josh Burcham. Burcham’s line art is iconic- you won’t mistake him for anyone else. It’s rough and angular, and honestly just very charming. I’m a sucker for this sort of style. If you want to see his adaptation of this chunk of script- and trust me, you do- the link’s right here:

https://dcjosh.tumblr.com/post/107665292031/its-done-the-mtmte-22-deleted-scene-in-all-its

#transformers #jro #mtmte #issue 22 #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #comic script writing

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rosesvioletshardy · 5 years ago

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interviews - ben hardy (lawki)

I told myself i was done with this series but i couldn’t help myself but write this.

also i recommend reading the series first so you have an understand of what is going when he’s talking so the masterlist will be linked to read it

masterlist

warnings: none

# of words: 1,453

---

there were times where ben didn’t enjoy talking about his private life especially after everything that has happened with Lennon, christian, and charlie. For the longest time, he was tired of people asking him how he was doing after the deaths of his best friends and whether or not he was going to be able to take care of a child while traveling and always working. They knew about how there was someone else to help but they always put the blame on him because he’s a “father” and fathers are also supposed to help look after the child. They all weren’t like that, some of the interviews he loved talking about being one and always gushed about how much he loved charlie if they asked him in a respectful way. Not only did he love talking about charlie but he also loved talking about y/n.

Throughout the press tours he was doing for bohemian rhapsody were some of his favorite ones as well as 6 underground. He loved the fact that whenever they brought it up, he would start gushing about his two favorite girls in the world. Half of his instagram feed were filled with pictures and videos of them whenever he had a day off and they went out for some fun. The guys also would start teasing him and tell the interviewer how he would never stop showing the cast and crew pictures of her doing pretty much anything from smashing strawberries trying to eat them and making a mess to watching y/n make dinner and trying to imitate her.

He never really thought he’d be a father that soon and before he even got married but he didn’t mind it anymore. Now he was in the green room for another interview at james corden waiting for his name to be announced and go through another interview. He was sitting on his phone talking to charlie and y/n even though the time difference meant that charlie was supposed to be going to bed soon but she insisted that he read her a story before he went on and hearing his name be called.

“Okay charlie girl, it’s time for you to go to sleep and for dada to work. I’ll be home in 2 more days.” he told her before talking to y/n as she left her room to back to theirs

“How are things over there? Is she coping well?” he asked her

“Yeah she’s fine, always sleeps with that yellow sweater you have because she still thinks “it’ll bring daddy home quicker.” in her words.” y/ n told him

“Well she’s not wrong. I feel like a bad parent for letting charlie stay up this late just so the both of you could talk but i didn’t want you to be tired the next day either” she finished

“hey, you’re not a bad parent. if anything I’m the one who should feel bad for her staying up, i’m in another time zone when i could be home with you two. How are you doing?” he finished

“I’m doing good, I miss you of course but I think I'm managing okay. Work is work. I can see where Charlie is getting at and wanting to sleep with something to be close to you. She didn’t want to take her nap today so hopefully she’ll take it tomorrow. You’re not a bad dad for wanting to talk. I think she enjoyed staying up but let’s not make it a habit” she told him looking down to avoid showing him how much she really misses him

“Ladies and gentlemen, we have ben hardy here tonight.” james corden announced

“Tomorrow is the last day of interviews here and then i’m home with the two you. And yeah, i agree, i’ll make sure she gets right back on track. Gotta go babe. Remember, i love you and charlie to the moon and back” he said

“We love you to the moon and back too. Have a good interview.” she told him before they hung up

----

“So Ben, how are you coping with dad life? Is it treating you well?” james had asked

“Well at first it was hard because it suddenly came onto me out of nowhere but now after a year and a half I'm enjoying it. Charlie is one of my favorite people in the world.” ben told him smiling

“So from what i’ve been told, you and your fiancée didn’t like each other at first and that you’ve actually dated before. Tell me about that.”

“You see, our friends, Charlie's real parents, before they died they tried to set us up. My mate christian was dating Y/N’s best friend Lennon and Y/N had broken up with her ex for a while and Lennon told Christian who told me about Y/N and we agreed to go on the date.” ben had said always regretting that day

“If i’m being honest, oh god she’s going to kill me, i didn’t want to go at first because I could find anyone but Christian told me about her and I gave in. I showed up, but I was about an hour and 45 minutes late. I wasn’t even dressed properly, I didn't make a reservation, I came with my motorcycle. We then decided to go to her other friend’s restaurant and I got a call from another girl which I played it off as a sick friend. Yeah, so after that, she hated me and i would constantly tease her but after christian and lennon’s death, we started to make up for everything just for theirs and charlie’s sake after we found out they wanted us to take care of her.” he finished remembering everything like it was yesterday

“Wow that was a wild start to finish, and now you’re both in love and engaged. How are they? Have you talked to them?” james asked

“Yeah i was just talking to them before I came out. I miss them, I really do but I talk to them almost every night before she goes to bed and I wouldn't give up anything for the world.”

“How does it feel for her knowing that her dad played Roger Taylor? Has she met Roger and Brian?”

“She has yeah. The first time they came to visit the set we started to film the Live Aid scene and in between one of the takes, she began to walk right in front of them while I was talking to Rog. Now they’re known as grandpa Rog and Grandpa Brian, well “Wog” and “Bwi” because she’s having trouble with her R’s at the moment. Even if she doesn’t know exactly who they are. they love her so much.”

“Wait until you get past the terrible twos, it just goes downhill from there, especially if she’s a daddy’s girl” Ryan joked

“Oh she is. She keeps taking my jumpers and according to Y/N when she tries to take it to wash it, she won’t give it up.” ben laughed

“Yeah we have the photo right here.” james showed the screenshot from ben’s instagram of the picture of charlie wearing the sweater while playing with Frankie as he captioned it

“I don’t think I’ll be getting that jumper back soon. 📸: @y/n.l/n”

“let’s talk about Y/N, how is she? I met her once when I went back to London and I really loved the cookies from her bakery.” he asked Ben

“she’s doing great and she’s been so supportive with everything and she’s a great mum to Charlie. I honestly can’t imagine doing everything she’s doing while also running two bakeries whenever i’m away. there were times where i was always doubting myself as a father, even now, and she still reassures me that i’m a great one.”

“oh she’s the best, i met her not to long ago I don’t know why he would ever act like that to her. Sorry ben. She does make the best cookies I swear, I felt like I died and went to heaven. I felt like Blake is going to leave me for her after we went out on a double date. she’s just that amazing” ryan joked and told the two brits as they laughed

“if i’m being honest i hate myself for that too and I can’t cook or bake for shit too. I tried to once but I feel like she honestly hated it when she said she loved it.”

They continued to talk about the upcoming projects and filming for 6 underground went, and how he was excited to go home for a bit soon, before playing Flinch to test if they would be able to keep a straight face while fruits are thrown at them.

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gvlin · 4 years ago

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/ * ( JACK GILINSKY , 24 , CISMALE & HE / HIM ) GALIN MORALIISKI has finished their interview process and is officially a cast member of the bali life ! let’s give a huge round of applause because this is their SECOND season with us . in their interview they stated they hope to be known as the UPCOMING CEO and are from NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK . they chose to stay at HOUSE A in room FOUR . let’s hope they see it out till the end !

okay so hiii ! my name is g and this is my baby boy ! if you wanted to hit me up on discord my thingy is 𝑔 ♡#6319 but , other than that i’ll be replying to ims <333 also this is gonna be fairly short because i put all my effort into the background link lolol .

FULL BACKGROUND LINK .

QUICK FACTS :

24 , has two siblings ( he’s the middle child ) , virgo baby , really smart which aids in his manipulative tendencies . his favorite color is purple , he speaks fluent english and bulgarian , drew all of his tattoos himself .

BACKGROUND SUMMARY :

ESSENTIALLY , he’s from bulgaria and lived there until he was in his 20s . his whole goal and life purpose is to take over his fathers business . he’s only on the show in order to distract people from the current scandal thats going on with his family in bulgaria . last season he was pretty much a wreck , causing chaos wherever he went and almost got kicked off mid - season for getting into a fight . he tends to be extremely closed off and hot and cold . you learn to not be able to depend on the things he says , his only real loyalty being to his family and maybe like one friend he has . but really , it doesn’t take much for him to just use people as a means to an end . coming from a household of abuse , he’s dependent on drugs and alcohol and tries his best to come off as sane as possible even though he’s slowly deteriorating . in all , if it has nothing to do with taking over his dads company he’s only putting in 5% .

WANTED PLOTS ;

the exs best friend plot in the background link , one of the only friends he trusts , someone he messed around with , someone he fought with , literally anything we can come up with yay !

#baliintro #like this and ill messageee you <3 #abuse tw #drugs tw

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blue-politics-reblogs · 4 years ago

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"A New York Times examination of the 77 democracy-bending days between election and inauguration shows how, with conspiratorial belief rife in a country ravaged by pandemic, a lie that [t]rump had been grooming for years finally overwhelmed the Republican Party and, as brake after brake fell away, was propelled forward by new and more radical lawyers, political organizers, financiers and the surround-sound right-wing media."

- "As [t]rump’s official election campaign wound down, a new, highly organized campaign stepped into the breach to turn his demagogic fury into a movement of its own, reminding key lawmakers at key times of the cost of denying the will of the president and his followers. Called Women for America First, it had ties to [t]rump and former White House aides then seeking presidential pardons, among them Stephen K. Bannon and Michael T. Flynn.

"As it crossed the country spreading the new gospel of a stolen election in [t]rump-red buses, the group helped build an acutely [t]rumpian coalition that included sitting and incoming members of Congress, rank-and-file voters and the 'de-platformed' extremists and conspiracy theorists promoted on its home page — including the white nationalist Jared Taylor, prominent QAnon proponents and the Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio.

"With each passing day the lie grew, finally managing to do what the political process and the courts would not: upend the peaceful transfer of power that for 224 years had been the bedrock of American democracy.

- "For every lawyer on [t]rump’s team who quietly pulled back, there was one ready to push forward with propagandistic suits that skated the lines of legal ethics and reason. That included not only Mr. Giuliani and lawyers like Sidney Powell and Lin Wood, but also the vast majority of Republican attorneys general, whose dead-on-arrival Supreme Court lawsuit seeking to discount 20 million votes was secretly drafted by lawyers close to the White House, The Times found.

- McConnell attempted one of his sly long games, "under a false impression that [trump] was only blustering, the officials said. Mr. McConnell had had multiple conversations with the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and the senator’s top political adviser, Josh Holmes, had spoken with Mr. Kushner, [trump’s] son-in-law and senior adviser. Both West Wing officials had conveyed the same message: They would pursue all potential avenues but recognized that they might come up short. [t]rump would eventually bow to reality and accept defeat.

"The [then] majority leader rendered his verdict on Nov. 9, during remarks at the first postelection Senate session. Even as he celebrated Republican victories in the Senate and the House — which in party talking points somehow escaped the pervasive fraud that cast Mr. Biden’s victory in doubt — Mr. McConnell said, '[t]rump is 100 percent within his rights to look into allegations of irregularities and weigh his legal options.' He added, 'A few legal inquiries from the president do not exactly spell the end of the republic.'

- "Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, then the Judiciary Committee chairman, went on Sean Hannity’s program to share an affidavit from a postal worker in Erie, Pa., who said he had overheard supervisors discussing illegally backdating postmarks on ballots that had arrived too late to be counted. He had forwarded it to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

"'They can all go to hell as far as I’m concerned — I’ve had it with these people. Let’s fight back,' Mr. Graham said. 'We lose elections because they cheat us.'

"Earlier that day, however, the postal worker had recanted his statement in an interview with federal investigators — even though he continued to push his story online afterward. His affidavit, it turned out, had been written with the assistance of the conservative media group Project Veritas, known for its deceptive tactics and ambush videos.

- "[W]ith the White House counsel, Pat A. Cipollone, backing him, Mr. Barr told [trump] that he could not manufacture evidence and that his department would have no role in challenging states’ results, said a former senior official with knowledge about the meeting, a version of which was first reported by Axios. The allegations about manipulated voting machines were ridiculously false, he added; the lawyers propagating them, led by Mr. Giuliani, were 'clowns.'

- "The [Paxton] lawsuit was audacious in its scope. It claimed that, without their legislatures’ approval, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin had made unconstitutional last-minute election-law changes, helping create the conditions for widespread fraud. Citing a litany of convoluted and speculative allegations — including one involving Dominion voting machines — it asked the court to shift the selection of their Electoral College delegates to their legislatures, effectively nullifying 20 million votes.

"Condemnation, some of it from conservative legal experts, rained down.

..."One lawyer knowledgeable about the planning, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said: 'There was no plausible chance the court will take this up. It was really disgraceful to put this in front of justices of the Supreme Court.'

"Even the Republican attorney general of Georgia, Chris Carr, said it was 'constitutionally, legally and factually wrong.'

"That prompted a call from [trump], who warned Mr. Carr not to interfere, an aide to the attorney general confirmed. The pressure campaign was on.

- "The next day, Dec. 9, Representative Mike Johnson of Louisiana sent an email to his colleagues with the subject line, 'Time-sensitive request from [t]rump.' The congressman was putting together an amicus brief in support of the Texas suit; [t]rump, he wrote, 'specifically asked me to contact all Republican Members of the House and Senate today and request that all join.' [trump], he noted, was keeping score: 'He said he will be anxiously awaiting the final list to review.'

- "Some 126 Republican House members, including the caucus leader, Mr. McCarthy, signed on to the brief, which was followed by a separate brief from [trump] himself. 'This is the big one. Our Country needs a victory!' [t]rump tweeted. Privately, he asked Senator Ted Cruz of Texas to argue the case.

- "On Dec. 11, the court declined to hear the case, ruling that Texas had no right to challenge other states’ votes.

"If the highest court in the land couldn’t do it, there had to be some other way.

- "And so they came the next day, by the thousands, to a long-planned rally in Washington, filling Freedom Plaza with red MAGA caps and [t]rump and QAnon flags, vowing to carry on. [trump’s] legal campaign to subvert the election might have been unraveling, but their most trusted sources of information were glossing over the cascading losses, portraying as irrefutable the evidence of rampant fraud.

"'The justice system has a purpose in our country, but the courts do not decide who the next president of the United States of America will be,' the freshly pardoned former national security adviser, Mr. Flynn, told the crowd. 'We the people decide.'

"There was encouragement from figures like Marjorie Taylor Greene, the conspiracy theorist just elected to Congress from Georgia, and Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, beamed in on a giant video screen.

"'Hey there, all of you happy warrior freedom fighters,' Ms. Blackburn said. 'We’re glad you’re there standing up for the Constitution, for liberty, for justice.'

- "The rally had been planned by Women for America First, which was quietly becoming the closest thing [t]rump had to a political organizing force, gathering his aggrieved supporters behind the lie of a stolen election.

"The group’s founder, Amy Kremer, had been one of the original Tea Party organizers, building the movement through cross-country bus tours. She had been among the earliest [t]rump supporters, forming a group called Women Vote Trump along with Ann Stone, ex-wife of the longtime [t]rump adviser Roger Stone.

- "'What we do now is we take note of the people who betrayed [t]rump in Congress and we get them out of Congress...We’re going to make the Tea Party look tiny in comparison.'"

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edgewoodrp · 5 years ago

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A recap of character experiences from October 1st, 2019 through July 31st, 2020.

Enjoy!

Caterina Singh

Following the events of the Wolf Moon, Cat tried to do some investigative work interviewing people in town to get a better picture of what happened - and ran into Heather during her investigation.

Caught up with Vice Principal Holloway during the speed meet.

After being followed by someone on a walk home, some friends stepped in to assist.

She threw a birthday party for her dear friends, Madison and Valerie, which turned into drunken shenanigans, with Heather sitting on her lap at one point, and a kiss with Charlotte at another.

Interviewed some townies on what Edgewood Pride meant to them.

Saw something strange during the firework show at Riverfest which resulted in her hospitalization and now there are some pieces that she’s trying to sort out.

Charlotte Kingsley

Confided in Beatrice her idea to host a small Halloween party at the Kingsley family house. It turned into a heart-to-heart, instead.

Braved the cold to help an acquaintance arrange the festivities at the bonfire on the Bluff.

While driving home on the night of the Wolf Moon, Charlotte (and her car) were attacked by one of the monsters terrorizing the town. It was only thanks to a mysterious barrier spell that Charlotte wasn’t mauled by the monster, and only thanks to Monty that she didn’t freeze to death on the road.

Charlotte recounted what she remembered of the accident to the witches SCC Representative, Rose-Marie Arceneaux the next morning at BHM. She also discovered Logan Cree had been attacked by a creature and admitted as well. Having seen the human face of the one that attacked him, Charlotte attempted to scry for them, but was unsuccessful in locating them.

To keep her mind distracted, Charlotte started helping Karen Pierce with some projects for the PTA.

While out one night, Charlotte met Juliet in the midst of househunting. She put the woman in contact with local real estate mogul and her former neighbor, James Hawthorne, to help speed up the search.

Volunteered to sell raffle tickets at the H.A.G.S. Carnival and sold so many tickets. Many were gifted back to her, so she wrote down other attendees names on the tickets before depositing them in the buckets.

Lost track of an ancient, bespelled tome downtown and performed a ‘lost and found’ spell with the help of Spencer Hawthorne. There were some... unforeseen consequences, but eventually they set things right.

Danced, drank, and played games with all who attended Madison and Valerie’s birthday, hosted by Caterina Singh. Later, per the decree of a Jenga block, Charlotte kissed Cat.

Ran into Monty, Demitri, and Madison at Riverfest in her quest for scented candles and general excitement.

Helped avert a bar fight from breaking out during Spencer’s birthday at Two Old Cows, but may have learned something sinister about the party crasher in the process. Further research has to be done.

Dominic Kingsley

Dominic has been helping his sisters. Charlotte lost her keys, and Bridgette… well, she just wanted some cheep booze.

He has been busy serving the citizens of Edgewood at the Underworld’s bar.

He caught the magic show at Edgewood’s Independence Day Riverfest and then spent the afternoon with his partners.

At his partner Spencer’s birthday party, Dominic took care of ordering refreshments and cheered on the intense game of darts.

Heather Payne

Heather and Xavier have developed a strong friendship after meeting at the grocery store then reconnecting at a speed dating event.

She did some investigating around the hospital after the strange attacks of the wolf moon. There she ran into Caterina doing some more legitimate digging of her own.

As far as investigations go, she finally figured out that Charlotte was the third Kingsley sibling. The two get along fairly well.

The witch has been meeting up with Spencer to discuss potion making.

Heather has been actually socializing, going to two birthday parties within a few months. At Val and Maddie’s birthday party, she partook in a game of truth-or-dare jenga. At Spencer’s birthday, she let out her competitiveness in a game of darts.

She met up with Maxine at the HAGS carnival as well as the aforementioned parties. The two teamed up for a game of darts at Spencer’s party.

Demetri has been steadily climbing up Heather’s shit list, and they almost came to blows at Spencer’s party. She is growing increasingly suspicious of his motives.

Juliet Hawthorne

Has grown more comfortable being in around Edgewood and has built up the courage to speak to Preston and Spencer (separately, of course) on different occasions.

Made friends with Charlotte Kingsley after she helped Juliet house-hunt and introduced her to realtor James Hawthorne, another possible descendant.

Moved out of the motel and into a home the Hawk’s Hollow neighborhood of Old Edgewood to be closer to her family.

Maxine Beauchamp

Sought advice on costume ideas for Halloween, and didn’t get quite the advice she needed

During a town event, where she was drinking in public, she found out about Charlotte’s car accident during the wolf moon

After seeing Maggie openly carrying an axe in public, Maxine offered to aid Maggie in creating an aesthetically pleasing case for it.

Was paired up with Maggie for the speed meet, and chaos ensued.

Subsequently, Maxine is now convinced she can help give Maggie learn the art of flirting.

Devised another plan with some residents to change the endlessly repeating playlist during the H.A.G.S festival (even if it was to something totally inappropriate, it was in a language no one there understood)

Reminisced the pros and cons to bartending with Xavier.

Attended Madi & Valerie’s birthday, and gave the birthday girl a kiss on the forehead.

After some planning with Spencer, she threw a party for her partner with Nic, which nearly resulted in a bar fight thanks to an uninvited guest arrival, whom she is now suspicious is less than human, given his immunities to her charmspeak.

Monica Rodriguez

Moved to Edgewood at the end of September, moving in with her long-term best friend Monty McAllister; she quickly began to establish friendships with people in town and settle into life in Edgewood

Around the holiday season, she and Monty welcomed a golden retriever puppy they named Roscoe into their home

During the Wolf Moon, she stumbled across tracks from one of the wolves, and later went out with several other weres to investigate; they handed off their investigation to the Callaghans once it led to the Olympus development

As things following the events of the Wolf Moon began to normalize, Monica brought home a stray cat

At the Speed Meet, her dislike of Logan Cree solidified beyond first impressions, and she befriended Phoenix Castillo

The Worm Moon saw her having an uncomfortable first introduction with Heather Payne following an earthquake

In the last few months or so, she has been reigniting one of her former relationships—with Gabriel Alvarez—albeit now long-distance

Has started reaching out to and interaction with some of Monty’s childhood friends, including Maggie and Trevor, to forge friendships of her own

At the Riverfest, she shopped and chatted over one of the magic shows. She found herself in the middle of unfolding chaos when something went awry with a firework display on the northern end of the Riverwalk; she assisted in getting people to safety

Monty McAllister

Struggles with his vision dreams drove him to the library, where he ran into Maggie See and he avoided directly addressing his own reasons for being there

Right around the holiday season, Monty and Monica added a puppy to their household

Leading up to the Wolf Moon, Monty experienced some intense visions, some of which detailed the wolves and some of their attacks. Close to 1 AM of the following day, he came across Charlotte Kingsley in the wake of one of the wolf attacks, and brought her to BHM for medical treatment

As things began to normalize towards the end of January, Monica returned home from a Run with a stray cat, which she declared part of their household with only minor protesting from Monty

The Speed Meet saw him further developing budding friendships

Encouraged a long-term friend and Monica’s ex to rekindle that romance

On the night of the Worm Moon, Monty found himself at work handling panic customers of the Lake House Bar and Grill as the haze rolled in

Continuing struggles with his dreams, as well as mounting family tensions over trust fund legalities, have led to a number of sleepless nights. And some sleepless nights have led him to coffeehouse encounters with friends both old and new alike

Monty spent some of the Riverfest exploring all it had to offer. He was at the northern end of the Riverwalk when the fireworks began exploding over the park, and assisted in getting people to safety

Phoenix Castillo

Phoenix is continuing to connect with Juliet and is starting to see her as another family member.

The girl is still frightened of vampire Logan, who barely resisted her blood and then used his to heal her.

She met Maggie at the Winter Solstice bonfire and the two have become friends.

She and her tour group had a scare on the Wolf Moon as something howled outside, trying to get in.

Phoenix and Beatrice initially bonded over their love of exploring the woods and are starting to see each other a bit more in civilization.

She is creating a bit of a reputation with her powers as she encountered other psychics Monty and Xavier who were not happy to have their minds read.

A child spilled their snow cone all over her at this year’s H.A.G.S. Carnival, making a huge mess. Luckily, plenty of Edgewood’s friendly faces were willing to help.

Spencer Hawthorne

Spencer agreed to an interview with Caterina Singh for a piece on Pride in Edgewood

In desperate attempts to find an old magical tome, Spencer and Charlotte decided to cast a lost and found spell… with yet unknown side effects oooooh

He met up with Heather to talk about magic, potions and ingredients

Spencer bumped into Juliet while visiting the Hawthorne estate garden thinking she was an associate of his father (he didn’t reveal that he is James’ son tho) and offered her a tour of the garden; they talked about plants and ended up doing a bit of gardening work in the herbs section; Spencer offered her some of the german chamomile to take with her; he found out she lost her kids

He bumped into Monty at a cafe and they shared what they’ve been up to since high school

Together with his partners they gathered a few people for Spencer’s birthday at the Two Old Crows, where an uninvited Demitri antagonized them almost & ending in a bar fight, but Juliet (working that night) threw him out before anything could escalate beyond some strong words; a round of darts was played, the teams being Spencer/Charlotte and Maxine/Heather with Dominic and Valerie as cheerleaders; Spencer and Charlotte won the darts game

The trio went to the Riverfest on the first day; they reminisced about previous years and talked about proposing new ideas for the next year; the second night they stayed in and went outside to watch the fireworks, strangely only a few could be seen even though they could still hear more going off…

#edgewoodrecap #caterina singh #charlotte kingsley #dominic kingsley #heather payne #maxine beauchamp #monica rodriguez #monty mcallister #phoenix castillo #spencer hawthorne #car accident mention #juliet hawthorne

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