#I love visual storytelling though

[applesfrombanora]

I know it’s a little thing but I’ve always both adored and been fascinated by the fact that Angeal and Zack wear the Buster sword on their back with the blade facing down while Cloud wears it with the blade facing up

It’s just a perfect little detail that I think plays a big role in the visual storytelling that defines their three characters and what they stand for

[heydragonfly]

alright i know lots of folks don’t love the chaos redesign and some folks are saying they look like meg which like i get, esp with the singular wing but to me? they look like Nyx. they look like they molded their new appearance in the image of their daughter, who they’ve recently reconnected with after aeons of separation. like they have not just emotionally become more the parent of Nyx, but physically mirrored this parenthood, this embodied connection, by choice

(this relationship which they’ve now lost, leaving them alone, again)

(until a certain princess of the dead arrives)

[holopossums]

There's a lot of very emotional scenes in the ROTTMNT movie, for sure. But one of my personal favorites is the silhouette of Casey Jr. as he is slumped forward on the ground, Leo's lost katana cradled to his forehead.

Like wow. This is a powerful shot. You don't have to see his face to know he is full-on weeping, his posture says it all. It's panned out to show the crumbled city landscape and it dwarfs Casey, giving a sense of just how small and helpless he feels. Casey's form also blends in with the dark foreground, giving the impression to me that he feels he might as well lie down on the ground and give up.

Of course, he doesn't really end up losing present Leo, and everything turns out alright in the end. But in this moment, it's the emotions of losing the one he loves and most admires all over again that just yanks your heart out.

This shot looks like what grief and brokenness feels like. I think it resonates with anyone who's ever lost someone close to them. And I love it for that.

[daily-kagami]

Day #78: Movie-goers

[leafdoodles]

Mumbo is literally writing ocs on the Hermitcraft server and I’ve seen no one talking about it.

[puppyeared]

Helloooo popping in to say I love your art! It’s cute and feels soft (reminds me of when you’ve got a really smooth pencil and it just ghosts across the paper) but your poses and anatomy also give it a good feeling of realism :D

classic question here; do you have anything you’d say is a big influence on your art? I love seeing what people answer and trying to connect it back to the kind of thing they currently make :]

!! thank u!!! i do wish i could get more creative with angles, but im happy knowing my art gives u that feeling ^_^

I really enjoy comics!! I like poking thru graphic novels and webcomics, so I've fallen into the habit of exposing myself to lots of different styles over time that I'm fairly explorative with my art. It gives me a lot to study, especially since different artists have different strengths and preferences

I also think of myself as a simple person, so I'm not strongly attached to anything in particular... I notice a lot of artists find their ground in certain interests or aesthetics. But since I'm not really like that, I try to put a bit of myself in whatever I draw to connect with my art better. Its probably why I like taking creative liberty when making fanart lol

im also drawn to indie creative work like games and animation! they tend to be extremely varied and unique from each other, which is great since I work from my own sense of curiosity. I also hate repetition, so having things that set themselves apart visually or otherwise is something I like to look for.

[periwinklepaperrabbits]

Tsukimi festival and the music box of chapter 91

A couple people have pointed out that the boy and girl rabbits in Nene’s music box represent Hanako and Nene. I think this is actually a very important symbol and could actually offer a lot of insight into Nene’s mentality when she said she would stay here.

In the timeline of the story, Obon passed a little while ago. That means the next big festival in Japan, Tsukimi, is fast approaching. And this has a lot of thematic implications. One, Tsukimi has origins in the Japanese nobility writing poetry while gazing at the moon’s reflection on the surface of the water. Two, it is a gratitude festival. And three, one of the main legends associated with Tsukimi is that there are two rabbits kneading mochi on the moon. Maybe you can see where I’m going with this:

Nene has made it clear that, before she described living a long life, that she wanted to go to the moon together with Hanako. Throughout the manga, be it the severance or this scene, there is a constant underlying wish of Hanako living with her. She's not really sure how this would work, but she declares these things boldly and Nene-ly. Yet, it seems this option is becoming more and more unrealistic. And he also keeps trying to send her off alone with that hat of a brain he has.

So she looks down firmly at the reflection of the moon they’ll dance on– the music box. It's melancholy, but it's an ending she will settle with. If the moon is living a long life with Hanako, then its reflection is this after-life situation. She wants to be on the moon making mochi and dancing with the boy she loves, and she’ll settle with its reflection. It’s so romantic, so silly, so Nene— and it must be so, so dissatisfying to her. 

Because she so eagerly suggested to him of living 90 years, of experiencing all those ephemeral, simple things that a human life has to offer. She described it with such wonder and shimmer that it even transferred to him. The strength to dare to dream of the impossible. These two not only fell in love with each other, but with life itself. And that’s something beautiful.

But, as the title of chapter 91 suggests, she wants them to fix their mistakes, the two of them. She doesn’t want to continue being selfish and risk more things, even if she loves that moon-dream dearly. And thus, she decides she’s staying here and not going anywhere. No longer pursuing that moon. She’s letting the music box, her cruel fate, unwind. She’ll be grateful for the nothings she has been given and accept that she can no longer live. 

-but she’s under the illusion that this after-life would be something similar to life, when it’s not. He already made this choice– to abandon life and stop dreaming. And he’s looking at the girl he loves refusing to look up, becoming more like how he was before her. The last thing he wants is for her to stay here and never leave. Because that is reminiscent of what he did for Tsukasa. 

Amane let himself die and stay here. Amane thought it was an act of love. Tsukasa thought it was an act of love. When really, it just made them miserable. (this Amane’s death=love idea is brilliant and not talked about enough imo, the original place I found this idea is mokkemusic's home-bound tsukasa post). And now Nene is thinking this. More than any fate before her, this is the last thing he wants to happen to her. We saw his fear when she mentioned staying locked in a place in the PP arc.

The idea of her being locked and following the horrible path he went down frightens him to no end. She needs to quickly see what becoming a supernatural entails and he has to be honest for once.

So let’s return to the moment and track Nene’s gaze and the music box in the following panels.

The way he tells her this is unsettling (I think he wants it to be, he wants her to recognize that ‘death for a lover’ is unsettling and unromantic). He’s not interlocking their fingers in their usual close and tender manner. Her eyes leave the music box briefly, but then immediately trail back to the music box, as she tries to make the decision seem as pretty as it was before Hanako became all chirpy and unfamiliar (similar to how he was during the severance).

And as he finishes explaining it (in the most horrifying way he can put it), her eyes become blank and unreflective. The “why would you say such a thing” is reminiscent of the picture perfect arc, when he first told her about her death.

And this is usually why he doesn't want her to fully understand these things. Because they're horrifying. Because sweet Nene doesn’t want to die die. She thought she could stay in the after-life with Hanako in a sort of happy pseudo-living in her mochi-making moongazing fix-up plan™. But the options actually before her in that path are so bleak. And- and as much as I love to tease Nene about this, it’s fucking tragic. These poor fucking kids. None of their plans are working, and the world just wants her to settle on her death like a falling leaf. Hell, even so much of the fandom does. 

And she lets go of the music box and breaks down, struggles and pulls his hair. Her music box falls uselessly to the ground in the process (off-screen, we see it in the later panel shown above). He captures her hands, and how Hanako treats her henceforth is so tender. 

Like how he did in PP arc, he cups her cheeks and affectionately tilts her face back up. And he explains the things that he adores about her that most would consider purely flaws— those playful, human, silly, Nene things that inspired him and filled him with life despite his death. That made him see everything differently. Those things she was trying to abandon right now. He wants her to be selfish. He wants him to be a little selfish. Why should they be grateful when this is what they’re given? What harvest have they been given? Why shouldn’t they fight back a little? Nene showed him her strength and fragility and revived those traits in him from his indifference. As tiny light says, she gave him the strength to simply wish wholeheartedly.

So damn it, they deserve to wish a little more. Because despite the mess they’re making, they don’t want to give up just yet. So I just just can’t be angry at them if they start following whatever trail Tsukasa is leading them down. And, speaking of that boy, Tsukasa showing up and reminding Amane of how he gave up is so painful. Because now Amane has the will to hope and not give up, not wanting Nene to either. And Tsukasa is going to exploit that. I truly can’t wait to see how this plays. 

I have a lot more to add but this is getting long and I'm a bit snoozy so I’ll shut up now.

…..

….........

SOME EXTRA FOOD FOR THOUGHT☆ ～('▽^人)  (I’m too snoozy for full sentences and picture linking now but I need to talk more)

❤the famous tsukimi story involves the rabbit offering to throw itself into the fire as food for the old man who came.

❤in the Chinese version of the tradition, the elixir of immortality is what the rabbit is preparing, often accompanied by Chang’e, the Chinese Moon Goddess.

❤the alice in wonderland art released a little before this chapter is very evocative of the music box (mechanical themes, similar toys). Except only Hanako is the rabbit. Along w furthering the music box arg, in the themes of alice in wonderland, Hanako could’ve been leading her to fall down the hole (she’s the kannagi). But of course we know our boy fell in love.

❤A lot of people are pointing out the Karuto and Hanako comparison. I think it’s valid, and my two cents on it is that, yes, Iro does want us to recall that. And they're trying to contrast the two narratives right now. I doubt they’re going to end tbhk the same way (I’m risking looking like an idiot in the future but I’m stupidly confident). Because 

   1) short stories tend to have more shocking endings, because they have less time to develop a well-constructed narrative and rely on the ending to leave the reader 

   2) Aidairo is very self-aware, and will not repeat a storyline twice. 

   3) Hanako and Karuto are so different. Karuto sounded like he was trying to convince himself why Lily and him shouldn’t die though it’s clearly the first thing he wants to do (almost brushing off those reasons). Hanako is just stating facts and sounds so darn genuine in how the last thing he wants is for Nene to die. [insert his imagination of Nene’s life proceeding happily panel ch 86] More than anything he wants her to experience those things she can't experience with him. It’s part of his whole arc in how he’s learning to love life

   4) Nene and Lily are so different. Lily wanted to stay with Karuto and only Karuto. Nene has expressed time and time again that she loves life as well as Hanako, and the stubborn little thing doesn’t truly want to just settle for one of them

❤[the Nene and Kou apple eating picture, nene more hesitant] See her hesitance here. Kou is far more willing to become a supernatural than Nene. Because Nene loves life.

❤I’m pretty sure in the original japanese, Nene uses ‘together language’ when describing their plan (we need to change how we’re thinking about this, begin our happy after-life). Because she’s trying to get them to do this together.

❤I wonder if maybe the tears in Tsu’s eyes are because Hanako swung his knife.

Okay I’ll shut up this time fr fr

[wolperkinger]

want to re-read the book so badly right now right now to refresh my memories on what happens, but alas, i cannot. i'm not at home and i didn't take it with me

[hermywolf]

just watched wakanda forever. cried twice. lost my mind too many times to count. listen i didn’t go in that excited bc tbh i havent been really excited about a marvel project in a while but by GOD this was SO fucking good holy shit it was amazing

[hillaryisaboss]

A film set to unwinnable expectations. Too “woke” for having Halle Bailey play Ariel; not “woke” enough because it is still a classic fairytale written by Hans Christian Andersen in 1837, where a princess falls in-love with a prince.

What I saw was a fabulous live-action adaptation. The acting & music is truly on-point.

Disney also added backstory to the Prince, which was very worthwhile storytelling. Visually, it was a stunning movie. The water effects on the hair are a sight-to-behold. And if you’ve seen Pirates of the Caribbean, it is that style/mood mixed with Disney magic & great songs.

Though the 2023 live-action will never be our cartoon imagination from childhood, the original film from 1989 will always be there for us to watch over-and-over again.

However, if you watch the other live-action Disney adaptations, this one truly is the best one by far. Some just want to hate it for whatever reason.

Halle Bailey did a phenomenal job as Ariel & I saw many African American kids in the audience at the theatre. Representation matters ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

Go see The Little Mermaid!! It is the right film for the moment — a moment where Disney is being banned in Florida.

Sing & celebrate under the sea with this truly amazing film!! Go Halle Go!! Our Disney heroine 🧜🏾‍♀️

[catboybrain]

ok this might be a weird take but . the mario movie should have no voices not even jack black i think

[demontobee]

Good Omens is queering TV/storytelling - part 1: GAZE

I would argue that part of why Good Omens is so refreshingly queer is because it does not cater to the male gaze (which centers around the preferences - aesthetic, romantic, sexual, visual, logical, emotional, political ... - of mainly white men in positions of power):

no oversexualization of groups or types of people: Women or characters that could be read as female presenting are not overly sexualized. In fact, some of them are shown to be grimy, slimy and not sexual at all. All of them are real characters and not just cardboard-cutout on-screen versions of male misogynistic fantasies. They portray real people with real people problems. They are human, or exempt from our categories when portraying angels or demons. There are no overly sexualized bodies in general (as has so far also often been the case with young gay men, PoC, etc.), no fetishization of power imbalances, and not exclusively youthful depiction of love and desire.

sex or sexual behavior is not shown directly (yet): All imagery and symbolism of sex and sexuality is used not to entice the audience but is very intimately played out between characters, which makes it almost uncomfortable to watch (e.g., Aziraphale being tempted to eat meat, Crowley watching Aziraphale eat, the whole gun imagery).

flaunting heteronormativity: Throughout GO but especially GO2, there is very little depiction of heterosexual/romantic couples; most couples are very diverse and no one is making a fuss about it. There is no fetishization of bodies or identities. Just people (and angels and demons) being their beautiful selves (or trying to).

age: Even though Neil Gaiman explained that Crowley and Aziraphale are middle-aged because the actors are, I think it is also queering the idea of romance, love and desire existing mainly within youthful contexts. Male gaze has taught us that young people falling and being in love is what we have to want to see, and any depiction of love that involves people being not exactly young anymore is either part of a fetishized power imbalance (often with an older dude using his power to prey on younger folx) or presents us with marital problems, loss of desire, etc. – all with undertones of decay and patronizing sympathy. Here, however, we get a beautifully crafted, slow-burn, and somehow super realistic love story that centers around beings older than time and presenting as humans in their 50s figuring out how to deal with love. It makes them both innocent and experienced, in a way that is refreshing and heartbreaking and unusual and real.

does not (exclusively) center around romantic/sexual love: I don’t know if this is a gaze point exactly but I feel like male gaze and resulting expectations of what a love story should look like are heavily responsible for our preoccupation with romantic/sexual love in fiction – the “boy gets girl” type of story. And even though, technically, GO seems to focus on a romantic love story in the end, it is also possible to read this relationship but also the whole show as centering around a kind of love that goes beyond the narrow confines of our conditioned boxed-in thinking. It seems to depict a love of humanity and the world and the universe and just the ineffability of existence as a whole.

disability as beautiful and innate to existence: Disability is represented amongst angels by the extremely cool Saraqael and by diversely disabled unnamed angels in the Job minisode. Representation of disability is obviously super important in its own right, but is also queers what we perceive as aesthetically and ontologically "normal". Male gaze teaches us that youth and (physical and mental) health are the desirable standard and everything else is to be seen as a deviance, a mistake. By including disability among the angels, beings that have existed before time and space, the show clearly states that disability is a beautiful and innate part of existence.

gender is optional/obsolete: Characters like Crowley, Muriel and others really undermine the (visual and aesthetic) boundaries of gender and the black-and-white thinking about gender that informs male gaze. Characters cannot be identfied simply as (binary) men or women anymore just by looking at them or by interpreting their personalities or behaviors. Most characters in GO, and especially the more genderqueer ones, display a balance of feminine and masculine traits as well as indiosyncracies that dissolve the gender binary.

Feel free to add your own thoughts on this in the comments or tags!

[angelshizuka]

I love the visual storytelling in this show so much!

Because despite us never having seen Stella physically hit Stolas before this moment (she's thrown things at him, but that's technically a different thing, though, not any less abusive), everything in this scene proves it's happened before. They don't need to spell it out for us, they let the visuals speak for itself.

The way Stolas is backing away in fear, keeping his focus on her, because he knows exactly what's coming.

The only difference is that this time he's not scared anymore to defend himself (because he's officially hit his limit due to the night prior). Even Stella's shocked by it, showing us this really is the first time Stolas stopped her.

He tries to keep standing strong, but lets out a breath and sinks into himself the moment she leaves, because standing up to her took all the energy and willpower he had left in his body.

I feel like (well written) male abuse victim/female abuser is so hard to find in media, so I'm just so happy to see it here! I'm a firm believer of taking male abuse victims seriously, and that yes, even women can be their abusers.

[ohnoitstbskyen]

I know it would probably bring a lot of hate comments but I am begging you to roast the hazbin character designs because I'd love to have someone properly articulate why they don't work so I could send it to people who won't believe me when I tell them. 🫠 Understandable if you don't want to get into it though.

I don't think there's that much there to roast, honestly?

Those designs are clearly an extremely specific stylistic choice, and because that style is consistent throughout the show, it ultimately feels coherent with itself.

There are trade-offs being made. Because Hazbin's design style is SO stylized and so heavy on decoration and detailing, because it puts a lot of emphasis on costuming, it isn't as good at communicating specific character storytelling as a more grounded style could be (it's kind of the same tradeoff that stuff like Genshin Impact makes).

Like, why does Sir Pentious' hat have an eye and a mouth on it that makes its own expressions? Apparently not for very much reason at all, except that Pentious has a bit of an eyes-motif going on in his design and it was one more place to put an extra eye. And that's a valid criticism of his design, but also the entire show is designed like that, so frankly it would be weirder and more out of place if his design alone didn't have that kind of overelaborate decoration going on.

It does create a situation where I have a hard time "reading" the character designs sometimes. For example, Vox, Alastor and Pentious all wear a similar style of suit with upwards-turned shoulders, butterflies and pinstripes. Now, am I meant to read that as Vox imitating Alastor due to his crippling need to replace and outdo him, and Pentious imitating the style of powerful Overlords because he thinks that possessing their level of power will finally give him relief from his paranoia and self-loathing?

Or is it just a design fixation of the creator who keeps putting their characters in suits because that's just what they like? I can't really be sure, because sometimes design elements are used to intentionally tell stories about how characters relate to themselves, their world and one another, but plenty of other times designs look the way they do Because Of Vibes.

But again, that lack of clarity is clearly an intentional trade-off - and the benefit of that trade-off is a design style that is extremely varied, wild, expressive and memorable. Hazbin Hotel seems like a very easy show to draw fanart of, and a very fun show to draw fanart of. Those designs (especially the hyper-expressive faces) are begging to be the subjects of traumatic headcanons, unbearably cotton-candy soft fluff fantasies and weird, taboo, homoerotic power dynamics. Slaps roof of character design, this bad boy can express so much vicarious emotional intensity.

It's very exuberant, very excited about itself and very self-indulgent, it's a style that prioritizes visual impact and visual interest over readability (something which the animators of the show navigate with real skill, props to them) and individual aesthetics over worldbuilding.

And I don't blame anyone for being turned off by that (I certainly was the first time I started seeing those designs going around), but I would struggle to call the show's designs "bad" when they are clearly achieving exactly what they want to achieve.

I have some criticisms, especially re: how the show treats skinny bodies as an unquestioned, desirable default, and employs fatness as a means of alienating and abjecting the audience. That sucks very badly, and is a serious disappointment, and one of the few places where the show feels like it is being cowardly in its design philosophy. But I don't have it in me to do some kind of Hazbin Hotel Sucks And Here's Why takedown, its problems are not unique or extreme enough to warrant it, at least not as I currently understand them.

[elstoy]

about that last pierced!ellie ask its finneee im sure anything you would have written would be amazing 💗💗 I think ur drabbles depict the perfect amount of detail in such a smooth way and r very easy to visualize, little stories that latch onto my mind n just cannot stop thinking abt them hours after the first read !! honestly ur kinda one of my role models when it comes down to some smutty vocabulary and writing drabbles in general ౨ৎ love you lots.

on that note i cant stop thinking abt the one sucking her strap drabble u did a few days ago like ughh she would get actually so lost and sex–drunken watching you suck her off. maybe even when the reader has the dom role 🙏🙏

i am????? u r literally one of the best if not THE best ellie writer on here oh my god i’m so flattered!! ur storytelling and smut are top notch like an actual novel wtf <3

to ur point though… giving subtop ellie strap head is making my mind so fuzzy.

teasing her relentlessly while crouching down to get on ur knees… perhaps being a tad mean and teasing with it as well since u know she likes it when ur a little evil. example a would be making fun of her sweet blush when you pull her plastic shaft out of her jeans. a sweet coo of “such a pretty dick, els” would definitely make her knees buck. and funny thing is she knows it’s not technically a part of her (infact you picked it out yourself) but when you talk about it like it is… arghhh her brain quite literally melts and her hole starts fluttering. with a murmur of “awwh, am i making you nervous? hm?”, she’d be so scared to let her guard, her “tough guy” act down, that she’d probably chuckle nervously and avert her gaze to the side, muttering a lowly “aha, no”. so you’d have to (quite literally) peel her guard down by peeling her jeans and her boxers off of her thighs, which would leave them hung loosely below her little rump. as soon as you purse your lips and have her cock kiss your bottom one, she’d be bucking her hips forward like a dog in heat. you’d coo gently, “betcha’ wanna see it down my throat” which makes her heart and clit thump like crazy. n she’d be quiet as fuck and keep her wordcount down to a zero except for those harsh shaky breaths and grunts. you’d slide her dick in your mouth and down your throat and pinch her thighs and asscheeks whenever she fails eye contact cause her lids keep on closing. she’d probably get off on the sounds of your gags and your teary eyes and cum while holding her breath and having a tight grip on ur scalp. ends up fucking the shit out of ur throat cuz it makes her strap base bump against her achy clit. i know i said she wouldn’t be talking cuz too shy but when she orgasms she definitely grunts “suck. it.” acting like she’s in charge or something :/.

the type to run to the gc and message “srry couldn’t respond just got head” and delete it immediately after.

i need to write a longer detailed drabble sigh.

[heyclickadee]

I understand that people are going to cope how they are going to cope, and trying to find meaning in the handling of Tech in season three is part of that, but it’s also okay to criticize the show.

I like a good character death. Tech’s departure was not that. My issue is not that he’s presumed dead, my issue is that it and the handling of it is nonsense. So (I once again get very negative about my favorite show under the cut):

1. When you kill off a main character, you really have to kill them off. How you do so can vary from story to story, but you really have to do four things:

One, you need a good reason to kill them off in the first place. (“Stakes” is not a good reason. A secondary character, sure, but not a main one. More on that in a minute.)

Two, you need to make it perfectly clear that the character is, in fact, dead.

Three, you need to show the other characters processing and accepting that death. This is important because doing so will allow the audience to do the same and let the character go. This is especially important if you’re writing for a young audience.

Four, you need to make it explicitly clear that the character cannot come back. This is especially true in sci fi or fantasy. Especially if you’re the Character Resurrection franchise.

And guess what the show didn’t do?

Any of that. Any of it. What it did instead was ambiguously remove Tech from the story (uniquely in a show that loves making us watch characters die on screen; last time we saw Tech for sure he was alive), never gave a good reason for doing so in or out of the show, never showed us any character working through the impact of his loss (even though there was ample opportunity for Omega, especially, to do so), and ripped the “could he come back?” box wide open by parading CX-2 in front of our faces. It is never, at any point, handled like an actual main character death. It’s handled as a plot point from which the narrative moves fairly quickly, and treated by all parties as an absence. By all the rules of storytelling, Tech isn’t dead. He’s just ambiguously gone. And that means the writing team did a terrible job if what they wanted to do was kill him off. We should not be debating this after the show has ended if he’s actually dead.

2. I understand why some fans are trying to find meaning in losing Tech. I am not, because that meaning is not offered by the text itself. And, if the plan was to never bring him back, it should have been.

We are not, for example, offered a lesson about how not everyone comes home from the war. In order for that to have been the case, we would have needed to see someone, probably Omega, working through that. We would have needed to see her refusing to accept that Tech is gone—like we do in Plan 99, by the way—and slowly coming to terms with the idea that her brother isn’t coming home. But we don’t get that, not even as subtext.

Something else we could have gotten that would have worked with all the little visual reminders of Tech, empty chairs, name-drops, and even the CX-2 leading? The batch being so haunted by losing Tech and not really knowing what happened to him for sure that they start seeing him everywhere. But for that to work we would have needed, again, to see that as an explicit subplot where someone, probably Omega, again, gets really invested in the signs that Tech is coming back and even starts assuming that CX-2 is him, only to realize that she’s seeing what she wants to see and having to accept that Tech isn’t coming back, but that she can still keep Tech’s memory alive by following in his footsteps. That’s something you can kind of project onto what we’re given in the epilogue, but you do have to project it, because it’s entirely absent from the rest of the show.

As is, Tech’s sacrifice isn’t given any weight. From a narrative perspective, it was an incredibly contrived set of circumstances that accomplished nothing except punting Tech off a train, and gave Tech no choice but to remove himself from the story—exit, stage down. Losing Tech doesn’t, even sub-textually, serve as anyone’s motivation. It does nothing to move the plot or anyone’s character development forward. The primary motivators of season three were Omega’s kidnapping, Crosshair’s PTSD, and Hemlock needing to get Omega back.

Tech’s absence does nothing to move anything forward and only really serves to slow the plot down and make the others struggle to do anything because he’s not there to carry the team like he did in the first two seasons—and nothing about that would have played out any differently if Tech spent the season in a coma in a bacta tank. The only part of Tech’s sacrifice that has meaning is that he loved his family enough to offer it. And that is profound, but that’s not something that would be negated by a return because the love and the offer remain. As for his presumed death? His return couldn’t have taken meaning away from that, because the show never gave it any meaning in the first place.

And no, Tech “dying” isn’t something I have to accept. Tech isn’t a real person, he’s an idea, and an idea that didn’t come to fruition. I can point out the ways the handling of his departure didn’t work all day if I want.

3. CX-Tech was not an overly online theory. I need people to understand this. It was an assumption made by most of the casual audience. My sister, who has no contact with the fandom and doesn’t like me discussing the show at all until she’s seen it, assumed he was Tech. My brother-in-law, who was a die-hard Tech-has-to-be-dead-shut-up guy for the entire hiatus and the first half of season three, was convinced he was Tech. Every kid I’ve spoken to who watched the show thought he was Tech and is deeply confused that he got speared like that. My brother, who doesn’t even watch the show but who does walk by when I’m watching it sometimes, thought he was Tech. You can’t get more casual and away from the fandom than that.

The thing is, the answer we get isn’t that he’s not Tech. It’s, “We’re not telling.” Which means that as it currently stands, a season-and-a-half of CX buildup amounted to a five minute boss fight and a non-answer. That’s…not something that works! That’s atrocious writing if that was the whole sum of their intent all along.

And you can say, well, that was a clever misdirect! Plot twist! Except, one, misdirects and twists only work if the real answer is more satisfying than the false one, otherwise it just falls flat. Two, if it was a misdirect, it’s not one the creative team is willing to own. No one will touch the Tech-CX-2 parallels with a twenty-foot pole, except the Kiners, who have incredibly meaningful explanations for every musical choice but then say shit like, “that chord just sounds good in brass” about Battle of the Snipers (…before going on to say that the four note lose motif from “Plan 99” is Tech’s leitmotif…which is also all over Battle of the Snipers…and is only there according because the batch is divided in that scene, a scene in which Crosshair’s leitmotif is entirely absent even though he’s just supposed to be fighting his own dark side represented by a guy who’s totally not Tech. Sure. I’m going to go eat drywall.) Because acknowledging that and saying that was supposed to be Tech will just make the audience angrier, and they may not even be allowed to do so, and saying that it is Tech—you can understand why they can’t do that, right? The implications are horrific. But that horrific implication is probably what at least some of the casual audience who will never interact with the fandom or a single interview is going to walk away with.

4. The thing that bothers me most about all of this is the combined toxicity of the fandom and the leading from the marketing and social media. Part of the fandom saying that there were never any signs Tech could have survived (in Star Wars, no less) is starting to feel like gaslighting; and while I don’t think there was any malice in the leading in the marketing and social media—I’m even willing to give a tiny bit of leeway for the creative team maybe knowing something we don’t yet—it was handled badly, expectations for this season should have been set early and clearly, and as of right now it all feels like an incredibly cruel prank at autistic fans expense, whatever the intent may have been or may still be.

5. And finally, here’s the thing: I’m willing to give the writers a bit of leeway on this. I’m willing to grant that some choices may have been out of their hands for unknown reasons. I’m even willing to say that maybe they’re not really done with this story yet, that The Bad Batch could just be the first chapter of a longer show that was split up for stupid business reasons, and that the finale is the way it is because they had to have an ending of sorts without actually resolving anything. I’m willing to grant a lot of grace there. In fact, I actually think there’s a very good chance we’ll still get Tech back alive in canon, and sooner than later, if only because no one (not even the voice actors) seems happy about this, most fans are coping but disappointed at best, the creative team got asked about Tech non-stop for a solid year and a half, and the writers don’t seem at all committed. We know from the rest of the show that they know how to definitively kill a guy, and, frankly, Tech in the first two seasons comes across as something of a writer favorite. They like using him!

But whatever I’m hoping or suspecting, and whatever leeway I’m willing to grant the creative team here, the final product is all we have right now. And I am going to criticize that final product for badly handling a (presumed) character death and straight up breaking the central conceit of the show in doing so.