#i DO have the rules set in my head. and they BASICALLY have consistent internal logic to them | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

derangedhyena-zoids · 10 months ago

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Oh I definitely agree re: anime dumbing them down. I think the closest we got with how Backdraft truly operated was the episode where they stole Liger and had Bit do a death match in the fiery arena, but even that was toned down. I’d love to see the exploration of corruption betwixt ZBC and BD, and within BD itself!

I bet they keep those records closely guarded, too?

Agreed, yhea. The show made what nods it could to the appropriate level of severity. But people should be somewhere between concerned by and terrified of Backdraft. These are literally folks whose hobbies include trying to steal all of your shit while murdering you for entertainment. ffs. (which should honestly be kept in mind as I pull out all the tiny violins for the various characters and their problems. they are all some stripe of responsible for peoples' deaths and suffering and have decided that's acceptable.) I would hand-wring and be all "imagine raising a child in such an environment and how they'd turn out" but, well Backdraft actually has remarkably little patience for internal matters becoming corrupt. The org is massively profitable, and huge amounts of money changes hands constantly. It goes back to 'please see: people getting treated decently within the org' - not being put at a disadvantage to begin with, and being given some baseline level of trust reduces the impetus to steal. Honor among thieves and all that. This doesn't mean there's 0% internal corruption - just anyone engaged in such matters knows they'd DAMN well keep it hidden or they're dead. Because crossing the org is generally dealt with both quickly and lethally. a meandering aside: part of the problem BD has developed is like... an ouroboros syndrome. Yes BD deals with a variety of external forces, both ally and enemy, but their most profitable clientele by far are the insanely rich fucks who not only pay to see, but bet on 0999 battles, with carnage and casualty being heavily incentivized. but... y'see, most of those clientele are the descendants of the families who started Backdraft... and some of the old guard is quite aware of this and sees the creeping drain of wealth from older families who've lost touch with the past. So the main schism lies between those two groups. as for broader corruption... There are "some" high-ranking ZBC/ZBGF people in the Committee of Seven - and likewise some high-ranking Backdraft people on the ZB* governmental Council (which I don't actually have an interesting name for, I've always just called it 'the Council' in my head.) Only a handful of folks are aware of this: what they do is balance a perpetual game of cat&mouse to sustain a healthy level of perceived tension between BD and ZB*/law enforcement This isn't to say there aren't people genuinely against either side, on both sides - there are. they have no idea that a lot of what goes on is illusory. the majority of everything is run by a handful of people. What this fundamentally means: 1) The ZBGF/ZBC is corrupt at its highest levels and has been for a while. So is Backdraft. Part of the degradation of Backdraft into bloodsport mafia happened because a number of old-money families moved into these highest positions of power... and there doesn't need to be a resistance when they've already "won." But weakening Backdraft at all could put its consistent, obscene income at risk. Nobody wants to do that. (This is why Sara is in so much trouble with basically everyone. She became aware of this, declared it bullshit, and basically tried to buck off the ZBGF/ZBC for good... while setting the stage for 'improvements' of her own. She didn't succeed, but rocked the boat nuked the boat, and people are pissed.) 2) The above set of people absolutely do things like tighten rules in sanctioned battles.... to make them more boring so the unsanctioned battles become even more appealing. 3) Both sides actually have the equivalent of secret arms races and are actually trying to gain some kind of advantage over the other, while acting like they're sticking to their side of the "deal." And yes, they absolutely keep those records guarded. The problem is they've lost their shine over the time they've been kept and people have lost knowledge of what could be/is recorded there. Only history nerds - like Alteil - would bother looking into them

#backdraft

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evelhak · 2 years ago

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In regards to your ‘writer research’ post - do you think it’s possible to overdo it? How do you personally know when to stop, and consider the topic familiar enough to write?

I sometimes struggle if the activity takes place irl and not fantasy. I need to know locations, travel options and times between them, their overall background, vibe, etc. And in the end it’s like I’m planning my own trip down there :D I did get a few nice feedback words like ‘how did you describe it so well if you never been there’ but it can be overwhelming, and I had a few times that stories ended in that research phase because the scope of knowledge I deemed necessary became paralyzing.

I don't know if I will be much help for you in this, because my approach seems somewhat different. I don't think I've ever experienced the problem you mention, because I stay the hell away from anything that would require me to follow exact details as you mention. Timetables, distances, locations and means of travel all frankly make me want to put my head through a wall. I couldn't care less what those kinds of "hard facts" about reality are like, I write around them at all costs because they are not important to my stories. (If it is too important to leave vague, I will not be writing that story, for the most part.)

My style has always been to bend reality, which is why I pretty much always gravitate towards speculative fiction in writing. Apart from one realistic fiction book that I mildly detested writing, my fics are the next most reality bound thing I have written, and it's not really reality bound, because the source material is fantastical enough to allow some reality bending: things that wouldn't work as absolutely and consistently in reality have that power in the story's world. And I write it in a way that actively ignores factual details: technically my story is set in 2009-2011 so far but that's just a loose point of reference as long as it works for me. If I for example want a character to read a book that hadn't come out at the time, I just decide that in this version of reality it came out earlier, because why not? It's not like the background fabric of the story will ever be so detailed that it would tear from a book changing release date. You're not supposed to see the whole world outside the story's focus in such detail that something like that would affect the story.

So, my research is not about factual details, it's about principles. I basically just need to understand how the abstract rules behind things work, to be able to produce something. I don't care about replicating how any individual place on earth looks, I just care that I have seen enough places to be able to abstract the principles of how they might look similar and how they might look different, how the internal logic of their formation works, to then be able to create a new place from that foundation. When it comes to places, a quite loose understanding is often enough for me because it's just the stage for me, and I will bend it to whatever the story needs, I don't actually care about the place for its own sake. If it becomes dear to me it's because a character looked from this balcony over that forest when they discovered something about themselves, or something like that.

The principle is the same when I create characters, it's just that I require a much deeper understanding of how people work, because that's what all my stories are focused on. I want psychological realism on a much higher level. I don't need to understand sewer systems to write a story and only a really huge drive to tell a story about a character who lives in the sewer system could persuade me to research them.

Anyway, I understand enough about human psychology to be able to combine traits creatively and in a way that feels like more than a sum of its parts because I understand the principles behind them in a flexible way.

So when I'm doing research into any topic I need in the story, that's what I'm primarily looking for: a theoretical understanding, a foundation from which I can then create anything I need because I understand the rules, how they can be combined and where they can be broken as well. And I usually do read some actual theory other people have written, but a lot of the times I focus on reading people's experiences, talking to people with relevant experiences, and just observing people from the outside too, and then I abstract the theory that I need from that "database" of experiences that I've collected.

So I might read an actual parenting book if my character was going to have kids, but I would still focus on my own observations and talks with people who do have kids. The more complex the topic the more likely I would want scientific theory to contrast my observations with. But I wouldn't want to write it in a way that is supposed to represent a particular experience, I would want to create a unique experience that is nobody's experience, just like any individual person is, just fictional. It wouldn't represent how I would parent my kids, and it wouldn't represent how someone I know parents their kids, and it wouldn't represent millennial experience of parenting, or anything like that. It might have seeds of those things, and some people might relate to it and feel like it represents them, but that would be a by-product.

I don't think I've ever felt like I'm overdoing research, because the process happens so naturally to me. I dive into a topic, I gather my data from different sources and once my brain has reached the overall understanding it requires to match the level of detail that I'm going to want to be writing in, it just begins to create on its own. It's very intuitive for me. I seek to understand the "essence" of things, and then my brain just starts generating stuff from that understanding.

(Personally I think it's important that both abstract and concrete, real and fictional information goes into a writer's brain... It's just the same as an artist. You can generally tell when someone has only practised drawing from other drawings and not real life, and the same goes for practicing writing from other stories versus real life, but, I digress.)

However, I absolutely think it is possible to overdo research because everything is possible to overdo. In general I think if you feel like you can't tell what level of detail of understanding is enough, then you should probably take a good break from that project, because it sounds like you're losing perspective.

Not that I never lose perspective... Of course I have looked at a story of mine and realized it needs more or less detail about a certain topic. I guess I just don't "feel" it when I'm writing, or before it, because the level of detail I need to know is determined by the point of understanding where my brain starts creating. Sometimes I do have to tell my brain to slow down, that we should go back to do some more research before we write this particular thing... Usually my brain listens, haha.

In the end it's about balance. I sort of see it like photography: sometimes the background can be really blurry when it's a portrait, sometimes you have macro pictures of a raindrop, and sometimes a general view of a town where you can still see a lot of details is what you need.

Maybe if the problem is that you're not sure what level of detail of knowledge you need because you're losing sight of what the story is about, it could help going back to your title and premise. Is the knowledge of which olive oil this particular village in Italy uses on their famous Carbonara, a necessary level of knowledge in this story about a young lawyer falling in love on his vacation? Maybe, if the olive oil turns out to be a detail he uses to win a case later? What about if it's not plot relevant, even if the person he falls in love with is a cook? Probably not necessary, unless the characterization is somehow built around the person's taste in olive oil. It really just depends on the combination of functionality and your artistic vision what level of detail is enough.

Then there's also the option that you're right, maybe the story actually does need more detailed knowledge to work than is possible to require without first hand experience. If that's the case, then it has to do with what angle your story is written from. You can write a story that is set in a village in Italy without going to Italy, if the setting isn't the focus of the story. If you want to write a story about what life is really like in a village in Italy then I'd say you would have to have first hand experience. That's just a rule of thumb, though. If you were inspired by watching movies and documentaries of a certain place and wanted to write about it despite of not having been there, I'd say do it regardless if you want to. It might still turn out great or it might not... Regardless of that, the value could be in the experience too.

That's a lot of rambling... Don't know if any of that was helpful or just missed the mark completely. It's such a complex topic. And if you happen to be the kind of writer whose inspiration is driven by a detailed factual knowledge or with a desire to replicate things from real life, for example to give the reader a feeling as if they can really go to Venice through your book, or feel like they are sky-diving, or to go back to their childhood because you recreated the decade so accurately... then I am not the right person to help, because I don't have that talent. (Mine is completely based on making shit up.)

#writing

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jeneelestrange · 2 years ago

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I see a lot of chronic illness people going to like, the scariest possible disgnoses without ruling shit out, which I GET BELIEVE ME because your body is screaming that it’s on fire and like two hundred years ago any of these things might have killed us but like……I’m more and more convinced a surprising amount of the time the answer boils down to a crack in the system from the fact that doctors have the least amount of training in nutrition and sussing out malabsorption/food allergies/intolerances, and even then, doing it is a BITCH and can’t be done in five minutes by throwing a pill at it, which insurance companies hate. Like, these have to be things we’re not testing or really looking into often or aren’t easy to look into.

Your heart’s fucking up? Ok, every doctor’s got a minimum of 100 hours on that. Nutrition issue? 25 hours. A lot of schools don’t even meet that and are suss on how they even count that. And don’t even get me started on nutrition RESEARCH which is the red headed stepchild and long story short there’s a long-winded reason why it feels like one year you’ll hear something like “Blueberries cause cancer!!!!” and “Blueberries cure cancer!!!!” the next and even a lot of the basics are built on pretty hnghhhhh suss shit but ANYWAY.

Think about it—if you are not absorbing a nutrient, you’re going to have symptoms that affect YOUR ENTIRE BODY. BELIEVE ME, I have confirmed four of them, and incredibly likely a fifth. Many of them cause anxiety, depression, fatigue, and believe me, it’s DEBILITATING(fyi if you look it up and have a LOT of anemia symptoms but your CBC is always normal, you may have too much folic acid for reasons I won’t get into for brevity and that hides it on the CBC—insist on a homocysteine blood test, if you have high cholesterol like just about every adult ever the doctor can use the ICD-10 code 78.00–certain countries like America also just have much lower standards for B12 for like, I don’t even know what reason even though the WHO has recommended the international standard be set to that of where Europe and Japan is at—ask me how I know all this hahaha 🙃). And if your doctor is shitty—depression, anxiety, and fatigue no matter how outrageous just gets you an SSRI consistently only.

And if you’re a fat woman and the deficiencies make you anxious and depressed? God help you. God. Help. You. They are looking for weight loss and even if they know micronutrients exist and would NOT cause that hmmmm or you could just have IBS and have depression and need to calm down, right? I could tell my GI doctor had only read the top sheet of my progress notes with the GI symptoms only and was probably like “abdominal pain lol” because unfortunately people in this office had a tendency to do that and then immediately stick their foot in their mouth. I told him I was concerned about malabsorption issues and he said, “But why? People with that are usually skin and bones.” I just paused aghast for a moment and said, “I have four vitamin deficiencies????? Three of them are different forms of anemia????? Might even have a fifth one but I’m not that interested in getting off magnesium for a month and getting full body cramps, migraines, and muscle twitches again for a blood test that isn’t very accurate.” I have never seen someone so quickly read a chart and say, “Well you’ve convinced me!!! Let’s schedule a colonoscopy!!!” and try to get out of the room.

You have to check off all the little weird shit your body is doing for the record so they can’t say they didn’t know, yes, the weird bruises that you don’t know where they come from, yes, the nosebleeds, everything. I used to be really butthurt about the diagnosis of fibromyalgia until I realized there’s very few ICD-10 codes that can be used to test for vitamin-D deficiency, so unfortunately some things are about getting us the best care in a broken system.

#chronic illness #chronic fatigue syndrome #chronic disability

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shhhhimwatchingthis · 10 days ago

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OK So I went ahead and did it cause I couldn't get it out of my head:

Presenting The Comedy Gameshow Alignment Chart:

Need to fill the last two spots please give me suggestions. Only rules:

I'm looking at Game shows not reality TV - no Bachelor's/Bachelorette's please!

I'm looking at shows starring/featuring comedians. Even other game shows with strong game elements (Survivor, The Circle, etc) Are not really what I'm looking for. This about the comedian vs host vs audience dynamic.

Image Description:

A DND style Alignment Chart. Black background, white text. On the Top Row in order it shows: Lawful Good: Whose Line Is It Anyway, Neutral Good: Mock The Week/8 of 10 Cats, Chaotic Good: Last One Laughing (LOL)

In the second row the Lawful Neutral and Chaotic Neutral spaces are empty, in the middle for True Neutral is Would I Lie To You?

On the Third Row in the position of Lawful Evil is Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont Spelling Bee. In the position of Neutral Evil is Taskmaster, in the position of Chaotic Evil is Game Changer. End of Image Description.

Propaganda about the shows/my reasons why I put them where I did below the cut.

Whose Line Is It Anyway: Comedians work together to create short improv scenes based on prompts. While they may occasionally be a prompt meant to annoy a contestant, or they try and annoy each other they generally are all on the same side. And besides, Everything is Made Up and The Points Don't Matter

Mock The Week/8 Of 10 Cats, other misc British Panel shows: Mock The Week is about british comedians riffing on that week's new, 8 of 10 cats is about those comedians riffing on statistics. There are ostensibly teams, and a host, all of whom are comedians. They may razz each other (esp if the host is Jimmy Carr). The format is consistent, if liable to occasionally go off the rails, depending on the panel. The game is light and low stakes, another show where the points don't really matter and the actual competitive game element is negligible.

Last One Laughing (LOL): There are many international versions of this show, I can't speak for any of them except the Canadian one. Basically a bunch of comedians get locked in a room together to play Graveyard (make each other break by laughing) last one to hold out wins. There's a host but they have little interaction with the game. The comedians are competing with each other and their methods to make each other break can be wild, but it's all mutual, and everyone has an equal chance of making anyone else laugh. There are clear rules, a clear winner, and the money goes to charity.

Would I Lie to You: One host and two Team Captains remain consistent. Each episode each team captain has two guests on their team (for two teams of three). Each player is given a card to read out loud. Some of the cards are true stories submitted by the players, some are lies made up by the production. Either way the goal of the player telling the story is to trick the other team into guessing wrongly about whether they are telling a truth or a lie. Comedian PvP, the rules are consistent every episode, but there's lots of potential for chaos in a 'bitch you really live like this?' way with some of the story reveals. A game where lying and betrayal is baked in, but it's also literally in the title.

Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont Spelling Bee: New Zealand Comedian Guy Montgomery makes comedians compete in a spelling bee. What? That's it? You're thinking, but you have no idea. With a psychedelics set, wacky mini games and a host whose goal was to make a game 'infuriating to take part in and entertaining to watch' this show is probably what hell looks like for over achievers whose parents made them compete in The Bee as kids. Lawful because while the game is designed to torture comedians, if you can spell the word right, you'll get your point.

Taskmaster: Comedians compete to do tasks. That both encapsulates the show and wildly undersells it. For the purposes of this post all you have to know is that many of the tasks are designed to be humiliating/frustrating, have hidden twists, tricks to solving them hidden in code - if only you looked under the table, it was right there! - and have a variety of possible outcomes. What one person nails in seconds, another competitor can spend a fruitless hour trying to attempt. Then its all watched back and scored by a man who is mostly fair, but absolutely swayable by his own lordly biases. Hosted by Greg Davies The titular Taskmaster who has what can only be described as an insanely homoerotic dynamic with assistant/show creator Alex Horne.

Game Changer: The rules by definition change every show. For players you might think you're in on the rules this time only for it to turn out, the joke was on you and the deception runs three layers deep. You might finish one episode and be handed an envelop instructing you take part in another, year long episode. You might think you're safe in the greenroom before the show starts only to get locked in and told it's an escape room and this is the game now. No one is safe, not even the audience, who may believe they are in on the joke, only for the last seconds of an episode to reveal even they aren't safe from being got. There is a high chance multiple contestants of this show have fantasized about killing host, creator and professional devil Sam Reich.

Need someone to make some sort of graph, alignment chart, visual whatever with Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont Spelling Bee, Taskmaster and Game Changer to visually depict gameshow's that have the premise 'psychological torture of comedians vs entertainment for the audience'

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braintapes · 2 years ago

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I think one reason I love dreams so much and find them so deeply fascinating is their utterly nonsensical yet very internally consistent logic. Everything makes sense in a dream, regardless of if it'd make sense in the waking world. For me, there's a very consistent set of rules and mechanics regarding place, people, etc. I understand in an intuitive almost muscle memory kind of way what's going to happen and what I can do to affect my surroundings.

It's stream of consciousness, of course, how things play out, but I can usually wake up and look back, analyze and understand why certain things cropped up or took the forms they took. It makes sense in a way many things in waking life don't. Is interesting in a different sort of way than the usual daily routine.

When I accepted that the shit floating around my subconscious as like, random Stuff from the pool of accumulated experiences, knowledge, memory, etc. that could be assembled and played with in infinite variety..That's when I really started to enjoy the nightly routine. I get to have an adventure every night! Anything could happen!! Ideas and concepts of basic things can be distorted and viewed through all kinds of fantastical lenses! An entire section of brain which is an eternal well of creative potential...Much of which needs conscious refinement to be anything of Good Substance of course. But the possibilities themselves are exciting to think about !!

Dreams also feel, in a very sensory but also memory kind of way, much more real to me. It's easier for me to remember a given dream than what I did in any given day of the past week. The absurdities help the memories stand out, but the chain of logic is consistent enough that it's easier to recall the progression of point a -> point b than, like, what I decided to eat for dinner on, idk, Tuesday. I don't even know how many days ago Tuesday was off the top of my head. But I still vividly remember random dreams I had from 2 years ago like I had em this morning.

#have been ruminating on this a lot 2day #i think often and a lot about what constitutes Real bc of this #is it real if it's physically felt? if i remember it as an Experience I Had?#there's no objective measure for defining How much something needs to Be in order to be Real #thus anything can be Real as determined by subjective judgment #but then you get into how worthwhile that is and that really depends on like #what Real means in context of a particular conversation #so then it all kind of turns into soup! existence is soup basically is what i'm chalking everything up to. communal soups and broths and w/#shit that is interesting to Only Me.

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kairyuuyaps · 3 years ago

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Disclaimer: I wrote this out way back when I was catching up with UnOrdinary (just never got around to proof-reading it). Iirc Season 1 had just concluded and all the hate Arlo got over the overwhelming majority of its runtime was still fresh in my head. Please bear that in mind when reading.

So. UnOrdinary. There's two people I want to really talk about, or rather, how incredibly toxic the social environment in this world is for everyone involved in it and the two characters that show this most blatantly: Arlo and John.

I never really understood all the hate Arlo got. I'm talking about back when the comments on the Webtoon chapters would consist of 90% "Asslo"-shaming. I feel like that happened because we, the audience, failed to understand what it was like being a royal. And not because Uru-chan didn't hint at it enough or explain it badly or something, no, we simply didn't want to admit that John's view of Arlo was skewed. Badly skewed.

The way this world is set up, you have basically three "types" of people, classified through the ranking system, and based on estimates of where you will end up in the system, kids are educated in very different ways:

High Tiers are taught one thing and one thing only: they're to lead, keep everyone else in check, make sure everyone behaves. Anyone who doesn't is their personal responsibility, fault and and direct consequence of their failure to do their duty. Also that ends always justify the means, no matter what. See Arlo, Remi, Sera before meeting John and rebelling.

Mid Tiers are directly or indirectly taught to feel inferior to High Tiers. To compensate for that, they are also explicitly taught to feel that Low Tiers are second-rate (or rather, third-rate) humans. Worthless. The story doesn't really feature focus characters from this group as of now, which might be why I can't think of a named character in this group off the top of my head. But these are the aggressive side characters that have Low Tiers do their homework, the kind that default to ranking battles whenever they feel questioned or that group that kidnapped Sera when it first got out that she had lost her ability.

Low Tiers grow up being taught they're the dregs of society. No matter what they accomplish in life, they will never measure up to High Tiers or even just Mid Tiers. Take the beating, keep your head low and move on. Keep yourself in the shadows, a life of being ignored is the best you can hope for. High Tiers rule and get whatever they want, by force or right of birth, Mid Tiers take the spoils, you live off the waste.

So when Arlo and John first clashed, it was destined to end badly.

What Arlo saw was a dude systematically rebelling against the order he had worked his fucking ass off on restoring for what he felt was everyone's safety and best interest. Arlo didn't see the institutional racism and bullying this was enabling. Why would he? All he's ever been taught to believe was that this order was the only thing keeping everyone from killing each other, and his experience with his role as King when Rei graduated and everything went off the rails only reinforced that belief. What he saw was a person risking to instigate what basically amounts to a school-internal civil war, and for no reason at all. Of course he'd look into it. Of course he'd try to stop it, by any means necessary. Remember, "the ends justify the means" and it's HIS responsibility to keep the status quo intact, HIS job as the King to keep everyone in their place, HIS fault if something goes wrong.

Meanwhile John was born as and lived a lot of his formative years at school as even less than a Low Tier. He was a cripple. Basically a punching bag ready for anyone to let their frustrations out on. All he saw was people with even the slightest sliver of power forcing their will on those below them. All he saw was authorities not only protecting this system, but enforcing it. All he saw was a a selfish world where everyone would use whatever power they had to get what they want. And then he became King. By this point, all he had ever known was force, so that's what he turned to. He was only in middle school, but his heart was bitter, angry and cold. He turned to what he knew and failed to see behind the curtains. He was (and still is) a child, how could we expect him to? So when he got expelled and forced to attend that "re-education class" he was in a very bad place. He was a kid that had only known hate and violence from the world, an angry kid incapable of seeing beyond his (for very little of his own fault) skewed world view, a lost kid in desperate help of help, guidance, and love; but what he got was even more hate and violence. And this time, it was very specific and targeted hate, violence with a purpose. No wonder the poor kid seems to have two separate personalities, they were literally BEATEN INTO HIM. Make no mistake, what he went through in that "re-education" class is torture, gaslighting and brainwashing. And I don't use these terms lightly. John is obviously showing an extreme trauma response and likely already had some form of PTSD (I am not a licensed professional, I am only going off of what little I read for my own interest) from being put into the position of King with no clue of how to actually fulfill the duties of what those duties even are (no wonder everything went to shit), and that asshole from the authorities used those cracks to completely break the kid.

Tl;dr: Season 1 John and Arlo are amazing antagonistic character foils to each other, John being the Lancer to Arlo's Leader if we're going by the 5-man-band dynamics, and the only reasons Arlo got as much hate as he did is the somewhat unusual choice of making the Lancer the sympathetic POV character and the Webtoon comment system being EXTREMELY polarising and detrimental as FUCK for any actual discussion for the chapter at hand. It's the Twitter of media discussion if we're being honest.

#unordinary #unordinary webtoon #unordinary arlo #unordinary john #unordinary season 1 #uru-chan #reviews by ニッキ #fuck webtoon comments

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ezool · 2 years ago

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hm im not too well-versed in the literary genre of dark academia but of what i do know,

"disneyfied" meaning: there is no death and things are lighthearted for general audiences.

here is my reasoning behind whether or not i consider it dark academia (under the read more) in this essay i will--

again, i haven't read much of any dark academia but from what i know, major components/common plot points and themes seem to be:

The school environment the cast of characters are in is a very dangerous one that has lead to lives being taken (most often offering a murder mystery element to the story)

If the students don't learn their shit and follow the rules and rise the ranks, while also keeping their head down, they could be next on the chopping block.

Often times this leads to alliances and sometimes unlikely friendships and they band together to make it through the school year.

They gotta use their intellect to play their cards right in order to survive, that or take down whatever force is there that's a threat to them. a Kill Or Be Killed kind of battle here.

The book is making a purposeful critique on the academic systems which enforce these dangerous traditions that endanger the students in the first place, all in the name of prestige, competition, class, and elitism/exclusivity.

(Often times the protagonist is a fish out of water as they somehow manage to make it into the prestigious university through a scholarship rather than old money family reputation)

with that breakdown laid out, here is where im drawing the comparisons to twisted wonderland (EN server as i am an EN player) (so basically books 1-6)

Canon game!Yuu, through isekai magic, finds themself at a prestigious mage school despite not being a magic user. A fish out of water like the last point made above.

There is a very competitive nature to the mindset of the student body of "the weak follow the strong" (paraphrased), as well as high ranking titles of housewarden and their vices that students can duel their upperclassmen for to prove their strength.

Among the student body are also many, many celebrities and royals and other such upper class 1%ers, and with the intern opportunities offered to 4th years, it is very evident that this is a very prestigious school. Really, the only reason there are folks like Ruggie (lower class upbringing) and Jamil (a literal indentured servant) are admitted into the school is because of a magic mirror that summoned them via the black carriage. dark mirror believes in equity.

Allyship is a major element to the story, as the friendships that Yuu makes with their peers are their greatest strength when facing adversity (given they have no magic). goes to show just how beneficial it is to network, folks!

Although school life seems peaceful on usual days, Yuu is consistently placed into dangerous, life-threatening scenarios (OB fights) that are made possible because of the worldbuilding element of overblotting. Yuu and company have to use their wits and what they learn over the course of the school year to survive these life-threatening situations that are, canonically, "very rare occurrences" and yet the school has done little to nothing to address this issue.

(essentially, with the student body's competitive mindset and the magic mirror choosing people who are a little fucked up from trauma, this place is a breeding ground for these overblots to happen!)

these are sort of where i end the comparisons, but a lot of this feels like more set dressing for interesting plot, rather than what dark academia is usually expected to address. which is to say the common theme being a critique on the system as mentioned in the first bullet point list.

i guess you could argue that a lot of the reason why the OG gang even make it out on the other end of those breakdowns is because of Yuu essentially critiquing/challenging the ideology of the boy who is OBing. and that part of the boys' redemption/recovery that follows after is them realizing the wrongdoings they committed and aiming to change, thanks to the influence of Yuu and co.

however

these are more of a 1v1, student v student critique, but not a critique on the system that is enforcing and/or encouraging these harmful ideologies in the first place.

Yuu has duked it out countless times against these OBing boys, but has never once questioned why it's happening so much. In fact, the ONLY person that's questioning the recurrence has been Idia in book 6 and that's only because his family business has historically been all about researching OB. and even then, he's not questioning NRC and the harmful rhetoric it cultivates in its student body i.e. "the weak follow the strong."

the only time anyone questions the Dark Mirror on why it summons who to the school is in regards to Yuu coming from a magicless world, and not "wait, what's the rubric the mirror looks at when considering what 15 year old will start their first year here?"

Even as Yuu finally realizes in the beginning book 5 that the dreams they have are based on the Great Seven, and seeing the discrepancy of the dreams and the revised historical accounts, they dont even actually stop to think "oh, maybe striving to be anything like these seven historical figures is a bad and harmful thing... why does this school go out of its way to encourage students to strive to be like these figures?" their only focus has only ever been finding a way to return home, and not actually exploring anything about NRC and its potential secrets.

and i think that's where it falls short of being a dark academia, even a disneyfied version because a big part of dark academia is the academia. while twisted wonderland focuses more on the relationships between the characters, dark academia would focus more on the characters' relationship to the school system itself and how it negatively effects them.

however (........2!)

i haven't read any translations for book 7, but from what i can tell it's still the same "an inter/intrapersonal thing happens to a housewarden and they snap" (obvi there's more to it in this one because it's THE Malleus Draconia we're talking about and it's nearing the end of the story/arc so it's got lots to cover and loose ends to tie) but so far it's still not addressing the School/Institution/Academia that these boys have been constantly overblotting in over the school year.

there's still plenty of time for the story to pivot it's direction to addressing the Seven's revised history in this world, and what the everloving fuck Crowley has really been up to behind the scenes all this time because you KNOW he's got something to do with Yuu's sudden arrival and everything that's followed there after.

so perhaps disney really will take this into a dark academia direction, or perhaps you consider it already to be included in the genre. i'd love to hear your thoughts!

#twisted wonderland #twst #disney twisted wonderland #dark academia #my first ever poll wow #tbh i didnt even know i had the feature lmao #thinking out loud #long post

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impossiblyatomictiger-blog · 1 year ago

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GURPS works for anything - as long as it's vaguely cinematic realist. It can't do vague or loose abilities or descriptions, as you might see in more mythic and comic-booky games. Combat is always movement by movement - which works for kung-fu movies, many action movies, and some horror, but do to it's high resolution doesn't do more loose combat well. And, due to how combat works, two high skilled characters fighting often last a while - which can be a slog or epic depending on context.

GURPS's specificity leads to an increased amount of mathematical consistancy - it doesn't do characters lifting significantly more than normal all to well, and powerful characters may rarely fail, but a gun is basically universally lethal - 6 to 12 dice of damage, often multiplied for a wound to the head or vitals - even powerful characters rarely have higher than 20 hit points.

GURPS is also very GM workload heavy - specifically in pre-campaign prep. What rules are you using - there are rules to make the game more realistically deadly with bleeding and disease, and rules to make it more cinematic with ways to spend xp and fp to reroll or improve rolls. Enemies have to be designed, and skill/advantage/template/equipment lists created. GURPS does suggest seperating the guy who controls the world and the guy who controls bad guys into the GM and the adversary, which does reduce GM enemy design workload, but many GURPS groups don't do this.

IMO, GURPS is my game because of the assumption of this internal realism and almost mathematical consistancy - why is x the case? why is x the case, but not y related thing? While i don't think other games lack this, this assumption of a detailed gm built world with layers of reasons why things are, which you see in GURPS's example settings - Roma Arcana, Inifinite Worlds - is the best.

I feel a lot of the "D&D can do anything" sentiment is actually borne out of a misplaced sentiment that the gameplay that D&D actually meaningfully supports (dungeon-crawling, combat, exploration, basically a series of challenges to be overcome in a hazardous environment) is seen as somehow pedestrian and unworthy of engaging with, and boy do I have good news for you all:

There are other games out there that support playstyles besides the dungeon-crawling challenge game! I would even happily recommend one to you but because there are so many RPGs out there that each cater to a different experience and playstyle that I can't just offer a single universal go-to system!

Dungeon-crawling challenge games actually kind of own if you're willing to engage with them on their own terms! There's a lot of potential for cool gameplay if you let go of silly reductive notions like "roleplaying" being just being when you play-act your character or social interaction!

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intothewickedwood · 4 years ago

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Once Upon A Time Rewatch: 6x15 A Wondrous Place

Just moved yesterday so bear with me. Lifted so many bags. If my arms aren’t like Emma’s after that I am suing! 

What episode do we have today?

A Wondrous Place. Okay, I don’t really remember that one. Do they go to Agrabah? Guess we’ll find out.

I wonder if Wonderland and Agrabah are right next to each other. It seemed to be the case in Ouat in Wonderland but maybe there’s a set portal between them or something. Either that or they’re in the same realm.

Agrabah is apparently across the desert from Eric’s Kingdom. So, in the same realm as the Enchanted Forest? 

Did you know, Snow’s nightmare prison realm in 7x22 was Agrabah? 

Let David be angry about what happened, dammit. I wish they would make it more about David’s feelings as opposed to being about trust in Emma and Hook’s relationship. What’s the point in adding this Storyline if there’s not going to be conflict between the people involved? 

Okay, I get that they wanted conflict in Emma and Hook’s relationship, but she’s not even upset about the actual murder. They could have made it about him not trusting her with the secret of him being a furry or something if that’s what they were going for. Basically, why write in the murder of David’s father if there is not going to be consequences for that or conflict about that specifically? Don’t get me wrong, I like the idea and potential of Hook killing David’s father. We get one scene of David pacing before making it all about CS trust issues and that’s it?? I just want David to be as upset as he was at George when he found out his dad was murdered. I want Emma to question her stance on forgiveness, even for a loved one, when those close to her are hurt irreparably right in front of her. Where is the internal and external conflict? I don’t want it to be about rehashed trust issues. I want it to be about how characters come to terms and move forward in an angst-ridden impossible situation.

Kraken’s blood allows you to travel between realms? Rumple is tearing out his hair right now. Oh! I guess that’s how it got shorter!

Chill, Killian. I’mma make you some camomile tea.

He’s so desperate to see his Kraken lover again. Get some of that tentacle, Hook! 

No one remembers Achmed. He f***ed a tiger!!

If you know that reference, you know xD.

Aladdin: “Jasmine, duck.” Jasmine (petrified): “Where?!” Jasmine has an intense phobia of ducks, confirmed. 

Don’t hit Kracky. He just wants his Killy.

Killian, how could you hurt your lover like that! The betrayal!

Hook, honey, I don’t know why you're so moody with everyone today but I'mma get you some cbd gummies. You’ll be fine. 

No one’s gonna help you if you talk to them like that, my dude. 

Jasmine “So forgive me for-” Me: “-doing what’s best for you! So forgive me for try-y-y-ying to make things easier.” Listen, I rewatched We Are the Tigers musical last week and I may suddenly be a little bit obsessed. Go watch/listen to it so we can geek out! 

Back to the rewatch.

Where’s Nemo and Liam? 

Jafar is quite handy at travelling between realms according to Killian. Maybe that’s how he went from Agrabah to Wonderland so easily in Ouatiw. But I’m sure we saw him use the white rabbit, so surely he can’t have another method. Unless... His magic carpet??

Emma is so blasé about Hook running off. She just seems like she wants to sleep. But she seems like she wants to sleep this whole damn season. Girl’s so done with everything. Completely checked out, bless her. Though it is sad to see a favourite character change so dramatically. Compare her to s1 or even s4 Emma and goodness gracious I just think s6 Emma might benefit from a heavy dose of sleeping curse or something. Let. Her. Sleep. Someone could just run Henry through in front of her and she’d take about 10 minutes to even realise and be like “Oh. Okay.” in slow motion when she finally notices and then she’d make out with Hook. Bonus points if Hook is the one to run Henry through.

Friends? That’s her mama. But hey, my mum’s my buddy too.

Lol. She stole a fork?

If you had to be a human hybrid, what would you be? Maybe I’d be a manticore or a womanticore.

Jasmine is being awfully nice to someone who just stole something. Some might say she has a thing for thieves. Wink. Wink.

Wow. This magical carpet ride is super gay. Love it.

Oh my God, she’s right. It is a rug!

Why is Hook being so rude today? 

Regina is just staring at Emma like “wtf happened to you?”

I just realised, Regina basically invited Emma on a date and invited her mother lol.

Snow lol.

Omg Emma needs a freaking lucozade. Someone get her a lucozade. Wake up Emma! *shakes her aggressively* Wake the hell up! Come back to us! 

Don’t the Jones brothers wanna hang out more?

That girl really loves her forks. 

Woah. She chased Eric all the way to Agrabah after one dance. 

Eric: “I have a great love for your people, especially poached with lemon and capers” lmao!!

“Son of a fish.”

What?! How’d he free himself?!

Ouat please explain. Are they suggesting the Well of Wonders Woman didn’t curse him to be a genie but just cursed him to stay in the bottle. They’ve gotta explain these things or they just look like inconsistencies.

Oh. Hang on. Ariel was supposed to have lost her voice. Okay but she had a necklace that allowed her to speak. I’m guessing Jafar destroyed it when he banished her to the sea.

Lol. He really hates being called bastard?

So, these events occur before present day events of Ouatiw. Agrabah was trapped in a ring all throughout Ouatiw? I feel like we saw it still standing in the present day in Ouatiw, no? I need to rewatch. 

Are the people of Agrabah still living their best lives inside that ring? Do they even know they’re trapped?

Ha! Turned into a staff. He freaking deserves that after doing exactly that to Amara. But then and again she probably deserved it. 

All they had to do was kiss to get Agrabah out of that ring. What?! Oh, and he’s free from the genie curse too. This is getting ridiculous. Can we please have some consistency with the limitations of magic? Genie curses cannot be flipping broken with true loves kiss. That would have saved Cyrus and Alice a hell of a lot of trouble!

“I’m an oyster head!” 

Emma, please, take a 10-hour nap. You’re making me tired. 

Ther will be no portals between Emma and Killian so long as Gideon has her tears. These rules make no sense!

It felt like ridiculous solutions were thrown into that episode. How do these tears of the saviour rules work? Could Cora have taken Emma’s tears to stop her taking a portal to Henry in 2a or does it just prevent her taking a portal to her romantic love and vice versa? What?!

#ouat 6x15 #6x15 a wondrous place #ouat #once upon a time #ouat rewatch #ouat rewatch 2019

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st-just · 4 years ago

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Semi-coherent Thoughts on the Poppy War Series

(Because I really need to start forcing myself to write semi-consistently again)

So I’ll say outright that I actually liked the series quite a bit, which does mean I actually got engaged and invested enough to start turning it over and picking it apart in my head after I finished it. So, like, this is probably going to come across as more negative overall than my actual opinions of the books.

Anyway, first off I really do adore Rin as a protagonist (I’d say ‘heroine’, but, well, no). Now partially this is because I always love even minimally sympathetic morally grey (..grey like coal soot, in this case) protagonists. But she’s just also such a complete garbage fire of a person, it’s kind of endearing. Well, that’s a bit callous – her entire personality is more or less a conflict between different kinds of unhealthy responses to powerlessness and trauma. Be she’s also just such a mess, and when she really starts leaning into delusions of grandeur you can’t help but root for her and hope things do actually turn out okay, regardless of how many fivers of blood she’s currently fantasizing about creating.

A big part of that is just how thoroughly awful the entire setting is, and how terrible everyone in it are, of course. Like, there are basically exactly three developed character in the entire trilogy who are unambiguously at least mostly good people (Chen, probably Venka, specifically the amnesiac and semi-delusional version of Jiang, but that’s being generous), and the fact that they stick around with Rin right to the end kind of puts that into doubt, honestly. Beyond that – almost every family has negligent or abusive parents, and literally every political figure is a bloody-handed tyrant ruling through violence and fear. The Hesperians are racist imperialists convinced they have a divine mandate to conquer the world, the Mugenese are every horror story from the IJA during WW2 translated to a pre-industrial fantasy setting, the ruling elite of Nikara are so many racist, scheming, power-hungry snakes with no concerns except their own position....

And, part and parcel with how terrible the setting is, Kuang does an incredible job of making all the worst things Rin does (until the final act, anyway) incredibly cathartic and badass and fun-in-a-fucked-up-way to read. There’s a terrible sort of awe while she turns the main islands of not!Japan into a pyroclastic hellscape. And whenever she gets a chance to enact any of her numerous revenges on some of the many people who abused and betrayed her it’s always poetic, in a Count-of-Monte-Cristo sort of way, and so kind of sickly compelling, even beyond it being some of the only times Rin’s really hopeful and happy. (Also, there are fun villainous monologues and quippy post-murder one-liners!)

Also, all forms of love are a terrible idea 100% of the time and is only going to end in at least one of the parties dead, abused, or (more or less literally) killing themselves in order to keep up with the other/earn their approval/try to keep them together. (I mean, Rin mostly had horrible taste in men, but Chen wasn’t able to stay mad at her for longer than a few months even after the whole ‘genocide’ thing, which he’s just about the only person to react to with any horror whatsoever. And look at how that ended up working out for him, so-)

I’m sure comparing grimdark fantasy to A Song of Ice And Fire is thoroughly out of fashion by now, but the overall perspective really did strike me as incredibly similar to Martin’s, a lot of the time. ‘Legitimate’ power and ‘lawful’ authority are ultimately nothing but polite fictions maintained by violence, terror and brutal oppression. War is a hell suffered most keenly by civilians with the misfortune to live and die in the middle of it, and least of all by the people with the power who actually start and end them. A flawed and unequal peace is very often preferable to dragging everything to hell with you as you die for the sake of freedom. And so on.

Now, to start the nitpicking – this is entirely personal and aesthetic, but it was kind of annoying how each of the first two books ended in moments of megalomaniac grandeur and terrifying empowerment, and then the next book started with a timeskip of things having gone to shit and her back under someone else’s thumb, and then a solid majority of the text is spent getting manipulated, betrayed, and finally crawling and clawing her way back out to the same point (both emotionally and in terms of independence/vision) that she had been at the previous book’s climax.

This isn’t anything even close to unique to TPW, of course – everything going to shit between the end of one story and the start of the sequel is kind of endemic to a lot of genres, really. And it is frankly incredibly in character for Rin to go through cycles flipping between resentment at being manipulated and used, and desperately craving authority figures to tell her what she should do and give her validation as valuable or useful. Still a bit annoying to read, though.

I’m sure it’s more me than the books – not like they didn’t put in the effort – but I could just never get really invested in the whole enemies-to-almost-lovers-to-enemies-again-to-? Thing with Nezha. Like, he’s interesting in that you can do a 180 perspective flip and he’d clearly be just as suitable a protagonist as Rin is, and his life’s very sad and everything. But, like, we get a front row seat to Rin’s internal monologue, and she gets thirsty for plenty of terrible men (and one awful woman), the only thing that makes Nezha special is that he’s not at least twice her age. So I never really got nearly as emotionally invested in them as the books seemed to expect me to. Which does kind of hurt the whole final act of book three.

Speaking of – okay, the ending isn’t awful or anything, but it is kind of disappointing in being exactly what you would expect it to be, as far as Rin’s character arc goes? Which might be just because I was already primed to compare this to ASOIF and she just literally pulls a Daenerys (fire-aligned vengeance/justice character with revolutionary impulses and an autocratic sensibility is willing to burn down the world in the process of freeing it, goes mad with power and paranoia, needs to be put down for the good of the country), but still. Her reading Venka throwing her to the ground to avoid an assassination attempt as a betrayal and burning her to death before she realized what was happening was just really heavy handed, you know? Same with turning on Kitay, who at this point is her actual literal soulmate. (Also sad in a broader sense, because those two are like literally two of the only characters in the entire series I’d actually peg as worthy of/capable of being trusted with political power.)

The specifics aside, I’m a miserable enough person to appreciate how unsatisfying the actual resolution at the end of the book is – imperialism wins! Literally no choice but to sign those unequal treaties and hope you’re eventually able to grow strong enough to force them out! Everything is the same as before this forty-year cycle of wars except much, much worse! - but yeah, I really just don’t actually care about Nezha enough as a character for it to really land. Also Kitay and Venka deserved better, even if literally no one else did.

Anyway, yeah, good series. Would recommend if you like the genre and can stomach all the, well, everything.

#books #the poppy war #the dragon republic #the burning god #r. f. kuang #book review #in this essay I will #this is theoretically a writing blog

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davidmann95 · 4 years ago

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now that it's over, thoughts on Bendis' Superman as a whole?

pretenderoftheeast said: So, thoughts on Bendis' Superman and Action Comics' tenure altogether and separately now that it's over?

Anonymous said: Best and Worst things about Bendis' Superman run

Anonymous said: Now that it is over, what are your thoughts on Bendis' runs on Superman and Action Comics as a whole?

Anonymous said: Retrospective thoughts on Bendis' Superman as a whole now that it's, I guess, done?

Anonymous said: Hey so since Bendis’ Superman stuff seems to be done, what did you think of the run as a whole?

I decided to hold off a bit on writing on this one, if only so that I could reread the Action Comics side of it since Superman stood out in my memory a lot more. But now I have, and as we’re heading into a bold new era of Superman (and it’s coming in fast - just since I made my Superman in 2021 predictions we’ve gotten Ed Pinsent finally reprinting his legendary bootleg Silver Age Superman, Steve Orlando announcing his Superman analogue book Project Patron, an official shonen Superman redesign for RWBY/Justice League, PKJ’s Super-debut turning out far better than I ever expected, Superman & Lois’s first proper trailer largely taking people pleasantly by surprise, and my learning that there’s a Sylvester Stallone Old Man Superman analogue movie titled Samaritan coming out this summer) we’re ready to take a look back with at least a touch of perspective. I’ll lead with complaints, so everybody who’s been waiting for me to say that Bendis on Superman was Bad, Actually, savor this because it’s as close as you’ll get.

The Bad

* I hate to say it, but rereading that side of the run there’s no two ways about it: the structure of Action Comics as a whole is a mess. It baffled me from day one that it was the more acclaimed of the two books for so long - I guess people are hardwired at this point to think of ‘street’ stuff as where Bendis is supposed to be - because it was immediately clear that Superman had a well-defined story he wanted to tell, while Action was the usual Bendis off-the-cuff improvisation. It’s barely even a story in the same way, and it’s certainly not the ‘Metropolis crime book’ people took it as: it’s 28 issues of Superman and his supporting cast stuffed a pinball machine with the Red Cloud pinging off of each other as we wait to see who falls in the hole at the bottom, and partway through Leviathan and the Legion of Doom and 90s Superboy are tossed into the mix to keep it going a little longer. On an issue-to-issue basis it’s frequently really good, but the core plot of the book is *maybe* six issues stretched out over two and a half years.

* I’ve gone into this some before, but structure-wise Unity Saga also has problems: Phantom Planet rules but either it needed to be cut or the back half needed to be a year all its own in order to accommodate the scale of what it’s attempting. It’s got an interstellar civil war leading into the formation of the United Planets, family drama, Rogol Zaar’s whole deal, and Jon’s coming of age, and I’d say only that last one is really properly served. Even Jon forming the United Planets, while contextually somewhat justified in terms of 1. The situation being so far gone he’s the only one who’d even think in those terms, 2. Things being bad enough that these assorted galactic powers would be willing to try it, and 3. Him having the S on his chest to sell it, isn’t at all built up to within the run itself.

* Rogol Zaar sucks. He’s made up of nothing but interesting ideas - he’s an ersatz warrior ‘superman’ of a bygone age of empires up against the new model, he’s the sins of Krypton as a conservative superpower come home to roost, he’s while not outright said to be definitely Superman’s tragic half-brother and the culmination of everything this run does with Jor-El - but none of them manifest on the page, he’s just a big punchy dude with a dumb design who screams about how you should take him seriously because he’s totally the one who blew up Krypton. Even a killer redesign by Ryan Sook for Legion of Superheroes can’t fix that. There are lots of bad villains with good ideas who are redeemed with time and further effort, but I can’t imagine Zaar getting that TLC to become a fraction of whatever Bendis envisioned him as.

* The second year of Action Comics, after establishing itself in its first as one of the most consistently gorgeous books on the stands, leads with Szymon Kudranski’s weak output and then concludes with John Romita Jr. turning in some career-worst work. The latter is particularly egregious because for that first year Bendis writes a really collected, gentle Superman so him getting pushed into being more aggressive should have an impact, but Romita draws such a craggy rough-looking Superman in the first place that it mutes any sort of shock value.

* WE NEVER LEARN WHAT’S UP WITH LEONE’S CAR, WHAT THE HELL. You don’t just DROP THAT IN THERE and then NEVER FOLLOW UP.

The Good

* Superman got his real clothes back after 7 truly ridiculous years.

* Bendis fundamentally gets Clark’s voice in a way unlike almost any other writer - even all-around better writers of the character almost never approach how spot-on he is with having Superman speak and act exactly how Superman should.

* Supporting cast front and center! He writes a dynamite Lois, Perry, and Jimmy (even if many of Lois’s more out-there decisions in the run don’t end up retroactively justified the way you’d hope), Ma and Pa are more fun than they’ve been in decades in their brief appearances, he manages to turn having Jor-El in the mix into a positive, and the Daily Planet as a whole has an incredibly distinctive vibe to it like never before that I hope is taken as a baseline going forward.

* The non-Rogol Zaar baddies? All ruled. Invisible Mafia and Red Cloud are both brilliant ideas executed solidly if overextended. Zod as Kryptonian Vegeta, Mongul as a generational perpetual bastard engine primed to be incapable of self-reflection, and Ultraman as “what if Irredeemable but he’d never been a good guy and also he was a Jersey mobster” are the best versions of those characters by numberless light-eons. Lex is on-point in his sparse appearances. Xanadoth as a mystical cosmic monster older than time who still talks like a Bendis character is however unintentionally a hoot. The alt-universe Parasite is a more intimidating Doomsday than Doomsday ever was. And Synmar as an alien culture’s attempt at creating their own Superman and messing up the formula when they make him a soldier can and should be a legitimate major ongoing villain coming out of this run.

* Pretty much all the art other than what I mentioned already. Fabok does a good job bookending The Man of Steel and Ivan Reis does the work of his career anchoring Superman (special props to Reis as well for drawing the first ever non-Steve Rude interesting-looking take on Metropolis), and meanwhile you’ve got Jim Lee, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, Doc Shaner, Steve Rude, Kevin Maguire, Adam Hughes, Patrick Gleason, Yanick Paquette, Ryan Sook, Brandon Peterson, and David Lafuente doing their own parts.

* Closely related to the art, all the little flourishes with the powers. Super-speed having a consistent visual with the background coloring changing, Clark internally putting numbers to the degrees of force behind his punches and what situations which numbers are appropriate for, ‘skidding to a halt’ mid-flight before crashing through a window, the shonen-ass major throwdowns as portrayed by Reis, how his super-hearing is handled as a prevalent element. Lots of clever bits that added flavor to what he does.

* While Unity Saga has problems, the whole of what Bendis does in Superman as a means of forward momentum for Clark and his world is excellent. The sort of three-act structure of:

** Clark is led to question his place in things over the course of a few adventures

** Involvement in the larger cosmos and the impact it has had through and on his family makes him realize the answer to his questions is that he needs to step up in a bigger way because there’s no benevolent larger universe to welcome Earth with open arms, nor a cosmic precedent for everything turning out for the best without some help

** As a consequence of the lessons learned by this change in the status quo Clark is inspired to make his own personal change in revealing his identity (with Mythological basically being an epilogue showcasing a ‘standard’ standalone Superman adventure while simultaneously highlighting his new status quo and how it fits in as a summing-up of Bendis’s take)

…does a great job of shepherding through ideas that lend a lot of forward momentum to Superman of the kind he hasn’t seen in a long time. Not perfect, but far lesser stories with far lesser ambitions have made huge impacts, so I’d certainly hope at least some of this sticks around even if, say, regardless of any retcons to the main line there are always going to be stories with Clark as a disguise and Jon as a kid. Oh, speaking of whom,

* KISS MY ASS, EVERYTHING WITH JON KENT RULED

Ahem. Probably a less confrontational way of putting that.

Do I think there was more gas in the tank for Jon as a kid? Totally, making him likeable and viable was the one really good thing the Rebirth era accomplished for Superman and I expect we’ll continue seeing more of it in the future one way or another. But whether or not him being aged up was Bendis’s decision, or working with marching orders to set up the eventually-(kinda-)discarded 5G, the coming of age narrative here is fire. He keeps the essential Clark Kent kindness and bit of Lois Lane cheekiness that reminds you he’s still their kid, which is a combination Bendis is basically precision-crafted to write, but his trials by fire give him a background entirely unlike the by-the-numbers “and here’s how Superman’s great kid grew up to be a great superhero too” narrative you’d expect while still arriving at that endpoint. If superheroes live and die by metaphors then Jon in here is what it means to grow up written as large as possible: leaving home for the first time (and seeming to shoot up overnight!), getting into the muck of how the real world works, being beaten down by authority wearing faces you’ve been taught to trust, scrambling to get through with the whole world against you, and in the end getting through by learning to rely on your own strength while keeping your soul intact and your head held high, and even managing to speak some truth to power. It gives him a well-defined life story with room to go back to and explore the intricacies of each leg of for decades to come in a way Superman hasn’t had since the original Crisis - someone someday is going to write a The Life & Times Of The Son Of Superman miniseries and it’s going to be one of the greats - and negates any question that he’s earned his stature as the heir apparent.

* Coming out of this, Superman’s world is fascinating. He’s out but rather than giving up his day-to-day life he’s openly spending part of his life as CLARK KENT: SUPER-REPORTER and part of his job on the cape-and-tights side of things is now KAL-EL: SUPER-SPACE-DIPLOMAT, Lois Lane coruns a foundation helping people whose personal continuities have been fucked over by Crisis shenanigans, Jimmy Olsen owns the Daily Planet but is still doing Jimmy Olsen stuff because that’s how he gets his kicks, and Jon Kent is going to college in the future. I’m not anywhere near naïve enough to think that’s how things are going to be forever, or shortsighted enough to think there’s no value left in the traditional setups, but god I hope these developments stick around for a long, long time to come and potentially become the new ‘normal’ as far as the ongoing shared universe stuff goes, because it all feels like the right and promising next steps to take for the lives of these characters. However it got here, for all the pluses and minuses along the way even if I maintain the former very much outweighed the latter as a reading experience, Bendis has a lot to be proud of if that’s the legacy he leaves on these titles.

* The recap pages at the desks!

#Superman #Brian Bendis #Jon Kent #Opinion

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five-rivers · 5 years ago

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Interview with a Ghost (part 5: Buried)

(PART 1) (PART 2) (PART 3) (PART 4)

"What?" said Captain Jones, as Collins and Paterson finished explaining their understanding of the situation to him. "What? What?"

"That was my reaction, too," said Paterson. "Just, you know, internally."

Jones waved one hand, the other supporting his forehead.

"Er, sir?" said Collins, leaning forward, trying to catch the captain's eye. "How should we, you know, proceed on this? I don't think there's any precedent."

The captain bit back a groan. "No, there isn't. He was insistent that the Fentons, his parents, didn't do anything to him?"

"Yeah."

"But it still can't be- can't be healthy for a ghost or- or whatever he is to be there," said Jones. This was making his head hurt. "They have weapons, and even if it was an accident, he died and they- No one noticed!"

"That is pretty messed up," agreed Paterson.

"That's got to be child neglect, at least, right? Negligent homicide?"

Collins nodded. "We can't really charge them with that, though, can we? Not without revealing he's a ghost and getting the GIW and whoever stole the body coming down on us."

"That could just be something Phantom's saying, though," said Paterson. "We don't know if it's true or not."

"It felt true," said Collins. "He sounded like he was actually scared."

"But can we just let a kid- two kids, with his sister- be in a situation like that? Even if one of them is dead. Especially if one of them is dead. Or whatever Fenton, Phantom, whatever, is claiming to be."

"He didn't really claim to be anything, really," said Collins.

"Look, I already have a headache as it is. What it comes down to is, I don't want a kid to be living under the same roof as people who regularly and publicly shoot at him."

"So, what do we do?" asked Collins. "He doesn't want to leave, and I don't think we can make him, physically."

"No, we can't. But does he know that?"

"I think he's aware of his laser murder powers," said Paterson.

"He kept coming to talk to you, though," said Jones. He massaged the bridge of his nose. "There's something here..." Suddenly, it all came together. He clapped his hands. "He wants to keep his secret from the public, right? That's our leverage."

"Leverage?" asked Collins, dubiously. "Captain... he is still a teenager."

"I know, I know, but hear me out. We tell him, he has to let his parents know, and his parents, they have to make their house safe for him. If they're reasonable, they'll do it. If not, we can get them for, I don't know, going crazy and thinking their kid is a ghost, or having weapons all over their home. Obviously, he isn't. That's the position we'd maintain." Jones took a deep breath. "No need to expose him publicly, and, as long as he isn't, he'll have to act like he's human, right? If he wants to maintain the illusion?"

"I guess that would work," said Collins. "But... do we have to get child protective services involved? I don't see that going well."

"Not if everyone is reasonable," said Jones, a crazed look in his eyes.

"Hold up," said Paterson. "Doesn't this hinge on getting him to, you know, tell his parents?"

"Weapons. Home. Around children. And- We'll agree to bury the rest. Tear up documents. Hide everything. Cover for him. We already know what killed him. What's the point of bringing it into the light?"

Collins and Paterson both nodded slowly. "I'll call him," said Collins.

There was a knock on the door. The three glanced at each other.

"Come in," said the captain.

One of the officers stuck her head in. "Sir?" she said. "The mayor is here to see you."

Danny would have been at home, plotting with Jazz about how to get his body back, but, no, Skulker had to show up, again. He should have wrecked his suit instead of just sucking him into the thermos last night.

"Hah! Ghost child!" shouted Skulker. "Today I will have your pelt! I have new-!"

Danny screamed in frustration, the harmonics of his voice almost touching a ghostly wail. "Can you leave off about my pelt for like five seconds?" demanded Danny, attacking more aggressively than was his usual wont. One of Skulker's arms flew off his body, clattering on the tiles of a nearby roof. "Didn't you have enough of that, helping Vlad steal my corpse yesterday?" There, after days of dancing around the word, he had finally said it.

"Wait, your what?" asked Skulker, pirouetting awkwardly to avoid another barrage of ectoblasts.

"My. Corpse!" screamed Danny. "You helped him steal my corpse!"

"You don't have a corpse, you're still alive!"

"Shut up!" It was a good thing they were so far up. Even at the volumes they were speaking, they wouldn't be overheard. "You don't know anything! I'm half dead, so I have half a corpse, and I had to bury it, and then the police found it, and you helped Vlad steal it!" Danny was basically in tears at this point, hands clenching the metal of Skulker's chest so hard it buckled and warped, holding the unfortunate ghost above his head.

A number of complicated emotions passed over Skulker's face. "Uh," he said. "Time out?"

"What?" snarled Danny. He was more than ready to rip Skulker apart.

"Your body, whatever there is of it, did Plasmius really take it?"

"He basically gloated about it to my friends," said Danny.

Skulker's face twisted up, the metal plates it consisted of glinting in the sunlight. "Disturbing the remains of another ghost is... distasteful, at best." He shifted, obviously trying to get out of Danny's grip. Danny held on, tighter. "Let me go," he said. "I'll spread the word. There won't be a ghost in the Zone who'll work for Plasmius after this."

Danny sniffed. "I want it back," he said.

"Of course you do," said Skulker, nervously. "Just- let me go, alright, ghost child?" He paused. "Phantom?"

Danny relaxed his grip. Before Skulker could recover, he whipped out the thermos and sucked the other ghost in.

"I'll let you go," he grumbled. "Right into the Ghost Zone."

Jones did not like Mayor Masters. A complete outsider, a stranger to Amity Park, the man had somehow wormed his way into the mayor's office. Jones had always suspected bribery, but had no evidence.

This visit of his... it was suspicious. Incredibly suspicious. The timing felt rotten. Masters had barely set foot inside the station before this.

Well, the timing and the questions he was asking. Jones was glad he had told everyone to deflect questions about the body and Phantom beforehand, no matter who was asking.

Jones fixed a grin onto his face. "I'm sorry, Mr. Masters," he said. "We can't discuss ongoing investigations."

"I think," said Masters, "that, as mayor, I am exempt from that rule. I am, after all, your boss."

"That's true," said Jones, "but this case is especially sensitive, and everyone is a suspect."

"I can't possibly be," said Masters. "I didn't even live here two years ago. I believe you are dancing around the subject, sir. Let us not have our personal feelings get in the way of things, hm?"

This bastard- There was no way he should have known that particular detail. Not without suborning the ME or her assistant.

Or stealing the records. The initial reports had gone missing with the body, and the computer system had been hacked.

Jones pressed his teeth together so hard they ached. He could feel them grinding inside his head.

"Why don't I give you an overview of what we know so far?" he asked, voice as sweet as he could stand to make it. "We'll start with Cameron over here. He's the head of our cult division, and a real wizard with computers."

If anyone could drive the man off, it was Cameron.

"I didn't think babypop even had a corpse," said Ember, crossing his arms. "Are you sure he isn't just delusional?"

"He could be," said Skulker, "but that's not the point. He believes it. Do you really want to be dealing with him as a restless spirit?"

"Oh, god, no. He's already such a spoilsport. Can you imagine?" The blue flame her hair was drawn back into shuddered.

"I don't have to imagine," said Skulker. "He tore my arm off."

"He always tears your arms off," said Ember, dismissively.

"He's only going to get worse though," said Skulker, "if it really is his body. If Plasmius is doing anything to it. That anxiety. A person's body should be taken care of properly, not messed about with."

"Hey!" said Technus, who was on the other side of the room, fixing Skulker's mechanical body. "I donated MY body to SCIENCE! I'm perfectly fine."

"Yeah," said Ember. "Some people would disagree with that, but the thing is you chose to do that. Those're the rites you wanted."

"Do you think I, the great TECHNUS, master of all things technological and-"

"No, actually, I don't think you knew," said Ember.

"Ohhhhh! I'll alter all your auxiliary cables, you little-!"

"Can we get back on topic?" asked Skulker, his high-pitched voice cutting above the argument. "We need to get Phantom's body back! Otherwise he'll be completely unbearable!"

The ghosts looked at each other. "Agreed," they said.

Danny leaned over Tucker's shoulder. "Are you sure?" he said.

"Positive," said Tucker. "Sorry, man, but Vlad's super secret super villain stuff isn't online. Your body isn't mentioned at all. Nothing is. His internet enabled stuff is all pretty bland, compared to what we know he's doing. I mean, some of it is kind of sketchy, but it just isn't the same level."

"Anything we can blackmail him with?" asked Sam.

"Not really. We can't exactly say how we got it, after all, so he'd have plausible deniability."

Danny groaned. The groan turned into a long plume of blue mist. Danny growled. "Whoever is interrupting this time-"

"Whoa, calm down, man," said Tucker. "This is pretty normal."

Danny's phone began to ring. If this was those detective he was going to-

It was Jazz. "What?" he asked.

"The ecto-exodus alarm is going off," said Jazz. "Where are you?"

"Tucker's," said Danny. "I'm going to check it out."

"Be safe. Mom and Dad are out there with blasters, and they've notified the GIW."

"Noted," said Danny. He hung up, then turned to Sam and Tucker. "This is a big one, apparently. You might want to stay in."

"Good luck with that," said Tucker, pulling a ecto-rifle from beneath his desk. "I've been wanting to try this baby out."

"Please don't name it," said Sam.

"I think I will!" said Tucker.

"Just don't shoot if we're not fighting, okay? They might not be here to cause trouble. Don't give me that look, I'm trying out some optimism."

Before his friends could say anything about that, he flew up through the roof. From there, he had no problem picking out the crowd of ghosts who had just passed by.

Skulker was leading them. Danny scowled, and flew forward to intercept them, too angry to process whether or not confronting a group of ghosts that large was wise.

"Hey!" he shouted. "I thought you said you'd leave!"

"Chill, babypop!" shouted Ember. "You're a cold core, aren't you? We're here to get your body back."

That brought Danny up short. "Wait, really?"

The other ghosts, largely the rabble of the Wastes, the region of the Ghost Zone right outside the Fenton portal, gave a ragged sort of cheer.

"Yeah. And trash Plasmius's crap."

"Oh," said Danny, taken aback. "He has a ghost shield around his mansion, you know. A human shield, too, before you say I can get past that."

Poindexter floated up, over the mass of the crowd. "He can't keep them up all the time, can he?" he asked adjusting his glasses.

"No, I guess he can't. One sec." He pulled out his phone. "Hey, Tucker, can you find out where Vlad is right now?"

"... and these are the cults that believe ghosts are divine messengers, there's a lot of variety in them, too," Cameron was saying, pointing eagerly at his computer screen.

"Excuse me," said Vlad. "But I don't see how this is relevant. At all. To anything."

"Oh, it's very important," said Collins, nodding sagely. "We got some of our best leads in this case from the cults."

Cameron beamed.

"I am myself quite familiar with the local cults," said Vlad. "If they become relevant, I'm sure I can come back to-"

"No, no, Mr. Mayor," said Paterson, "you won't understand without context."

"I-"

Several dozen ghosts suddenly entered through the roof. Everyone dove for cover.

"Hiya, grave robbers!" shouted a ghost with fiery blue hair. Ember McClain. "Or one grave robber in particular."

Actually, come to think of it, she'd masqueraded as a human for a while, too. Collins was going to have a crisis about how easily ghosts could blend in with humans at some point in the near future. Not today, but before the end of the week. He'd need to talk to a shrink. Preferably one who wasn't a ghost.

Oddly, the ghosts weren't attacking.

The sound of Mayor Masters clearing his throat issued from behind a sizable desk. "What are you here for?" he asked.

"You know, grave robber. We've got a bone to pick with you, until you give back what you took."

A few feet away from Collins, Jones inhaled deeply. He stood up. Collins resisted the urge to drag him back down.

"We don't have Phantom's body," said Jones, "if that's what you're here for."

"We know," said Ember. "That's what this's about. We know who took it, and we don't want to deal with Phantom while he's freaking out over some jerk having his body. So. We're giving an ultimatum-"

"Hey, guys," said Phantom's voice. "I found the shield deactivation button. It was in his car, next to his garage door opener."

"Oh, cool. You trash his car?"

"Nah, I let these little gremlin dudes do it. They looked like they were having fun."

"Whatever, babypop. Let's go get your body!"

As quickly as they came, the ghosts were gone.

Mayor Masters swore, and started for the door.

"Hold up," said Jones, putting a hand on the taller man's shoulder. "Where exactly do you think you're going?"

"To call some competent ghost hunters, since those menaces are clearly after my belongings!"

"Nuh uh," said Jones. "We've got some questions for you."

"Yeah," said Collins, "like why you seem to think that they're going to your house, when they could have been talking about anyone."

"Wow!" said Cameron, smiling. "That was exciting! I'm glad I was livestreaming, like you told me to, Paterson!"

"Well," said Vlad. He paused. "I need to call my lawyer."

"Better make sure they're a competent one," mocked Jones.

Collins was surprised when Phantom materialized in the middle of the room with a long, dark plastic body bag in his arms. So were most people. Across the room, next to the coffee machine, one of his more caffeine-addicted coworkers do a spit take, and Jones burst out of his office in an avalanche of paperwork.

"I want a burial," said Phantom, finally. "A real one, this time."

Silence.

"I think I can arrange that," said Captain Jones.

#danny phantom #dannymay #dannymay2020 #dannymay 2020 #day 27

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moku-youbi · 4 years ago

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MCU’s Lazy Post-Snap Writing (Thanks Disney...)

This could be potentially spoilery for the first episode of Falcon and Winter Soldier, but it is just a general discussion of the world-building post-”snap” or whatever in the MCU, nothing specific about plot. So last night I was watching the first ep, and briefly getting my hopes up when they mentioned how soon after Endgame this is set, I thought okay, maybe we’ll finally get to see some of the fallout from all these people returning 5 years later.

(Because let’s be real, WandaVision quietly killing our lesbians off screen with Maria Rambeau apparently dying from cancer while her daughter was snapped away without so much of a mention of Carol being the only consequence of the snap is a fucking joke. And EVERYTHING that was Far From Home, please. Sure, all the right people just so happened to be snapped away so that you could still have Peter and all his friends be the same age and this one character as a joke that used to be younger and is now the same age...right...)

So, great. Sam’s been gone for 5 years and then immediately lost his best friend to another awful writing decision, but alas. For whatever reason, male pride? IDK, he’s insisting on claiming his ownership over his sister’s home and boat that they technically both inherited, even though she’s a widower who’s been raising two young kids alone during the whole snap era in (I think) the NOLA area, and is just trying to keep her head above water by selling. It’s a strange turn for Sam, who has in the past seemed to be a sensitive and understanding guy, to keep flexing on her about how it’s partially his, even though prior to the snap he’d been living based out of the DC area, and superheroing and/or breaking international treaties around the globe, so...

It seems like an excuse to have him attempting to secure a loan, which proves a difficult proposition for someone without work history for the last 5 years, in a time when apparently banks have been inundated with loan applications following the sudden return of billions of people. Okay, cool. I appreciate that the latter would be a nightmare situation, and it’s this sort of detail that might get overlooked in the films that starts to hint at the major ramifications of Tony’s decision to bring everyone back without rewinding time.

However, the problem (beyond the ridiculous “no work history while you were literally nonexistent” which, if the banks are receiving loan requests from people just returned, would be EVERYONE), is pointed out BY the loan officer, and there’s no real good explanation--Sam is a hero. Even if we somehow accept that the US government isn’t scrambling to do some sort of relief bill, or special loans or grants for those returning to existence, Sam’s situation is different. He has a high-profile job with the military. He is loved the world over. And most importantly, he was dusted in the process of defending the world from Thanos, then assisted in his defeat upon his return. You’re telling me there isn’t payment for that kind of thing?

Even IF no governments around the world are willing to compensate these heroes, you have people like Tony and T’Challa who are incredibly wealthy, and it makes NO SENSE that they aren’t compensating the heroes who work alongside them or helped defend Wakanda. I absolutely refuse to believe that Pepper would be creating some sort of grant, even if there weren’t a regular salary or whatever, for those returning in particular. And it especially doesn’t make sense when you see Tony basically handing over the keys to the kingdom to Peter, and Pepper giving big checks to Aunt May’s charity, or Vision (and Wanda) who has no way of earning income EXCEPT from his superheroing, purchasing a home. How DID they support themselves running around Europe prior to Infinity War if they’re not receiving money from some Avengers fund? And even supposing it comes down to some kind of pride on Sam’s part, even if Pepper had come to him with some sort of restitution payment or compensation for his service, and he was all like “I can’t accept charity,” Pepper would have happily said, “let’s call it a low interest loan, then.” There’s NO REASON he should have to go to some random bank begging for a loan.

Except...the MCU writers are lazy af. They want that drama to be there, they want this to be a motivation for his character, so they ignore the world and the rules already put in place by the past 20+ films/shows. The same as the utter laziness of insisting on keeping the 5 years with no real good justification for it besides Tony Stark wanting to keep his daughter (and even if you’re not big on the theory that Pepper was already pregnant at the time of the snap like I am, I think we’d all agree that Tony Stark would put the greater good ahead of his personal life. He’d know damn well that huge cost of bringing everyone back and it would tear him apart, but he’d DO THE RIGHT THING)

It was incredibly insulting to viewers, and tragically lazy writing. They wanted to have their cake and eat it to. So when they want to jerk some tears, when they want the drama, they make the snap have huge consequences, and when they don’t want to have to deal with the consequences of the snap, they basically pretend it was nothing -- a BLIP, for fuck sake -- that everyone’s already over with and life’s moved on.

I get it, you didn’t want that dark, heavy tone in the Spider-Man film, but you have a chance to explore it with Sam and Bucky. I mean, that’s cool and all, but the problem with insisting on having all your films and shows being part of the same canon, is that you have to MAKE THEM ALL PART OF THE SAME CANON. And while I think they pulled it off beautifully for a while, beginning with Infinity War, it’s started to unravel. The whole setting Captain Marvel in the past of an already established universe didn’t work well and hobbled the story, turning something that should have been good into a clunky vehicle to excuse any potential holes in the story going forward. Endgame was a nightmare, and the tonal shift of FFH after Peter’s journey so far, and questionable characterisation is worse. It makes me worried for Black Widow, which is already suffering from Covid pushing it back. That’s a film I’ve been looking forward to for over a decade, and I’m worried by setting it in the past, it’s going to suffer the same way CM did.

I just find it incredibly sad that the Disney Plus series’ put an end to the Netflix MCU, because those were so well written with create internal consistency, character development, and world-building. They could have been a great way to explore the fallout of the snap, especially with the efforts they went to to distance them from the rest of the MCU while still, technically, being a part of it. Now instead we have Disney churning out flashy, but ultimately hollow content as a cash grab, instead of any real interest in telling meaningful stories.

I will say, snap politics aside, I hold out higher hopes for the remainder of Falcon and Winter Soldier. There are some parts I obviously didn’t like, but on the whole it felt of a higher quality than WandaVision by far (which is sad, because I love that comic and was really looking forward to some surreal, zany fun there).

But on the whole, where I used to be so excited and the first in line for every new MCU film (literally), these days I’m just feeling “meh.”

#MCU #falcon and winter solider teaser #wandavision #far from home #fucking disney ruins everything #I feel much the same way about Star Wars #all flash and no substance #not that I'm some asshole insisting that the older ones were some work of genius #but I was hoping for so much more out of the 8th and 9th films

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joezworld · 4 years ago

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How did the ships react to the Suez Crisis? In our world, it was basically what broke the British Empire. How does it go down in yours?

I’ve been slowly putting some thought into how the rest of this world works, and the Suez Crisis basically goes down the same way it would have in our world - there’s not a lot that could have been reasonably done to stop it, first of all, and second, it’s the United Kingdom - which is the one country that would be the least changed by a sentient vehicle world.

I’d also like to take this time to point out that the Brits are damn lucky that the crisis happened in the 1950s - by the 1960s the US Civil Rights movement included several big moments for the locomotive rights movement, and BR’s modernization plan had put the UK on the US’ shit list from a humanitarian standpoint. It’s entirely possible that, if the Suez crisis had happened in the 1960′s, the US would have intervened against the United Kingdom.

That being said, I will say that the Empire didn’t fall apart as much as it did in our world. Going into the 1980′s, there was a genuine sense of hopelessness in the UK, as they basically gave away the Empire - Canada, New Zealand, Australia, the African Colonies all would be gone by the end of the decade. This was especially intensified by the sentiments of the Royal Navy, which consisted primarily of modernized WW2 ships, and their younger fleetmates who had been raised in a very stratified and Edwardian sort of environment - Britain rules the waves and whatnot - because of intuitional inertia, and were therefore very not okay with the idea of allowing Crown Dependencies to go off on their own.

You also have to consider the massive bollocking Britain was taking on the international stage because of their flagrant locomotive rights abuses - for the time being, the government could keep a lid on things, but not for much longer, and they knew it. Having a citizenry who didn’t think they were being sold down the river by those in power was key to keeping everything in order. As such, the Callaghan and Thatcher Governments were much more willing to use force in order to keep what was left of the empire intact.

Obviously Ireland happened, but that’s an entire shitshow that is beyond my purview.

Then there was the Falklands, and from a British point of view, it went wonderfully, even if it was one of the strangest wars in modern history.

Then came Hong Kong.

You see, after roundly defeating the Argies in the Falklands (even if the Americans did most of all the heavy lifting), there was a growth in pro-empire sentiment both at home and abroad. Thatcher’s plan to return Hong Kong to the Chinese was widely criticized after 1982, especially when it became known that most Hong Kongers wished to remain British. “Anti-handoverism”, as it became known, reached its peak in 1989 after the Tiananmen Square Massacre. Citizens in both Hong Kong and London demonstrated in favor of keeping Hong Kong under British rule. Notable among these demonstrators were numerous ships and aircraft of the Royal Navy and Air Force, who broke their usual stance of remaining apolitical in order to show their support for the people of Hong Kong and the Empire.

Following these protests, PM Thatcher was summoned to Buckingham Palace. Queen Elizabeth had become somewhat more in favour of keeping the Empire together following the disastrous 1987 Fijian coups d’état and worsening of relations in Ireland, and is believed to have informed Thatcher that if she wanted to remain PM, she was to find a way to keep Hong Kong “in the fold”.

The resultant speech, known as “The Home Counties Speech”, Thatcher announced that, effective immediately, the UK would pull out of the Sino-British Joint Declaration, claiming that: “giving Hong Kong to the Chinese would be like giving the Home Counties to The French - They are part of England and England they will remain.”

Naturally this went over wonderfully in Beijing, and Chinese Leader Deng Xiaoping quickly announced that Hong Kong would be under Chinese rule on July1, 1997 - treaty or no treaty.

So naturally there was going to be a land war in Asia, between two economic superpowers and boy o boy did the United States try its hardest to stop it. They privately and publicly offered both sides enticements, threats, sanctions, and even flat-out bribes if they’d come back from the brink.

Progress seemed to be happening, until 1993, when a fleet headed by HMS Ark Royal and HMS Arrow steamed into Macao Harbor, fired a single symbolic shot, and claimed the territory for the United Kingdom.

As one might expect, the Chinese went absolutely ballistic (as did the Portuguese, but they don’t really matter) and it really seemed like conflict might break out at any given moment.

And then it all just kind of... fizzled.

Sensing that some kind of bullshit might happen, the UK had sent a large amount of its surface Navy to Hong Kong and Macao in the spring of 1997. Not willing to be outgunned under any circumstances, the government also hired a large “privateer” force, consisting of former Soviet battlecruisers and retired Royal Navy ships, to keep station there as well. (Inadvertently, this would be the impetus for the “Russian gunship for hire” craze among PMCs in the 2000s)

The US Navy, who really didn’t want to intervene but was afraid they’d have to, had the Sixth Fleet doing “combat drills” just outside of territorial waters, and several off-duty or retired ships, including the USS Wisconsin, “just happened” to be spending some time off in Victoria Harbour for most of July. In an effort to further piss off the “occupiers of their territory”, the Taiwanese Navy also sent a token force to Hong Kong as well.

The People’s Liberation Army Navy, who was in no way equipped to deal with that much firepower, actually did sortie to just outside of Kowloon, before turning around and heading back to base.

--------------

Since then, the sun hasn’t really set on the British Empire per se, but there’s definitely an aura of “one wrong move could break the entire thing”, especially around the subject of Hong Kong - China is still upset about that, and in today’s modern age of terrorism, cyberattacks, and misinformation, there is a genuine fear that China will try to attack from within.

But that’s a story for another time, once I’ve read up on contemporary geopolitics.

#Headcanon #long #background info #united kingdom #having sentient boats messes with so many historical events #uk #china #british empire #ask response #sentient vehicle headcanon #sentient vehicles #geopolitics

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