#Ody will have his own arc too

[gareleia]

THE KNITTING SAGA BUT MAKE IT SAD

update: my co-writer friend FINALLY got a tumblr account, so I can tag them now!!

previously: part 1 part 2

next: part 4 part 5

lets talk about relationships, shall we. i'm gonna focus on Athena & Telemachus this time, but Hermes will have his turn later

let's be real, Athena is a hardass. sure, she cares, but she's so emotionally constipated that it really doesn't show that much. especially before she goes through that character development arc after her break up with Odysseus in My Goodbye

(and what a crisis that is)

(because her masterpiece??? failed her??? but she trusted him??? she made him much as in her image as possible??? he was supposed to be perfect???)

(and if he's not perfect, then she failed,,, and she can't fail, she doesn't fail,,, she's a goddess,,, war strategy is her domain, surely there is no way her plan could be flawed,,,)

(what even is the point of her if she's not perfect)

so yeah, she's a hardass. even on baby Telemachus who'd never held a sword before - especially on baby Telemachus, because he's the son of her favored Champion. he may be waaay younger than any of her previous pupils, but she's expecting him to shine just as bright.

Athena, on the first day: let's get down to business! make your father proud! you won't have a weakness! by the time we're done! you're the saddest pupil that I've had! and you haven't got a clue! but I will make a man outta you! Telemachus, a literal toddler, holding a wooden sword as big as himself: ٩(๑❛ᴗ❛๑)۶

and for years to come she trains him relentlessly. she's honestly trying to be nice about it, too. it's just that Athena doesn't do soft or gentle, her default is a neutral face of displeasure, and her idea of encouragement is saying 'you're not as bad as you used to be', or something along these lines.

Telemachus: *succeeds at something* Athena: *raises an eyebrow in a slightly different manner than usually* Telemachus: *le gasp* could it b-be? am I doing a good job??? Athena: it's… acceptable, for your age.

she never once tells him she is proud of him. because surely he already knows. he doesn't need to hear it. his father didn't, after all (ody so fucking did)

and this goes on until Telemachus reaches double digits. then My Goodbye happens, and Athena has Feelings™. she's having an existential crisis, and has to confront the fact that she had done something wrong while training Odysseus, and she can't understand what. which is terrifying, because what if she makes a mistake like that with Telemachus. will he fail her too?

will she have to leave him too, so she doesn't watch him die horribly in a tragedy that could've been prevented if only she had made him see-

so Athena doubles down and starts demanding more and more from Telemachus. the praise goes from sparse to non-existent, and nothing he does seems to be enough anymore. she goes from tough love to borderline verbal abuse, thinking that it's the only way to keep him safe and prepare him for the future.

and Telemachus endures. he has to, because he doesn't want his mother to worry. doesn't want to appear weak. Odysseus had done it, so it's only fair his son should too. and when his dad comes home, he'll be sooo impressed. he can do it!

except…. not really. it's been a losing battle since the beginning, and deep down he knows it. he can't win with Athena, not on his own.

???: if you want to impress her, you'll need the blessing of a certain god! divine intervention! someone who's not afraid to- telemachus: aeolus, what are doing in my closet?!

so anyway, Aeolus and the winions start helping him via winds and stuff, and Telemachus actually starts exceeding everyone's expectations. it's not that he'd been bad before, but he's soft, and not quite strong enough physically to make up for his gentle constitution

everyone is cheering him on. he's the talk of the palace! his mom is so proud! the suitors start sizing him up with consideration instead of dismissing him outright! (and tele, baby, that's not a good thing! ಠ_ಠ). Athena seems pleased for the first time in ages!! but he knows that it's all a lie, and it's killing him.

cause he's a good, honest boye, and he wants to succeed on his own merit, not because of cheating and lying to everyone he loves. that's vile and dishonorable.

que some very important island-wide competition that everyone is expecting him to join and win. maybe it's even his duty as a prince. like, a right of passage from complete boyhood to adolescence.

and there's,,, a lot of pressure on Telemachus to suceed. everyone and their mother are telling him that of course he's got this, he's a prodigy! def his father's son! nobody doubts his incoming victory! he's got this! he definitely won't disappoint them!

random noble: we'll be cheering you on, young prince! truly, we are blessed by the gods to have such a talented successor to the throne! we'll watch with keen eyes as you triumph over your foes and bring even more honor to your family! b(￣▽￣*) telemachus, eye twitching: y-yeah… thank you… (ㆆ _ ㆆ)

so, the night before the competition Telemachus can barely sleep, he's so wrecked by guilt and nerves. he keeps thinking - what would his father do in this situation? all the stories he'd ever heard of Odysseus always painted him as some kind of invincible, righteous, all-capable genius. so the idea of his dad ever grappling with guilt and feelings of inadequacy is just laughable. (oh, if only he knew)

so, he goes to his mom for advice. because Penelope is awesome. but he can't bring himself to admit that's he's cheating - what if she's ashamed of him? he brought dishonor to his father's name, and if anyone knows - will he get exiled?

so yeah, he basically has a panic attack and cries for like, half an hour straight.

telemachus, bawling: if I lose tomorrow, will you hate me? will dad hate me? I can't do anything right and I'm a failure and a horrible person and- just- what do I do, mother? penelope, holding him: oh, love. sometimes you're so similar to your father I wonder if the gods haven't returned him to me in spirit through you.

because no matter what everyone else says, Penelope knows the truth - Odysseus always followed his heart. oh, how he may have tried to forget he had one, to only ever use his head. but a heart he did have - does have, they have to believe that - and it's a bright and gentle one. he may have been hardened by years of pain and struggle in a way that Telemachus hadn't been yet (and Penelope's heart breaks from knowledge that her son will be, one day). but deep down, at ther cores, Odysseus and Telemachus are strikingly similar. and she loves them all the more for it.

and so, with his mother's blessing, the young prince does just as she told him to: follows his heart. he thanks Aeolus for their help, and asks them to stop giving it from now on. either he'll suceed on his own merit, or he'll wear his failure as a badge of honor and an incentive to do better.

and he loses. badly.

and the world,,, doesn't end? sure, the suitors sneer and jeer, but there's a surprising lack of disowning and exile going around. and the nobles tone it down significantly with undeserved adoration, which is definitely a plus, as far as he's concerned.

the only thing is. Athena.

oh boy.

because she's not stupid. Telemachus may have gotten away with cheating so far, but now he'll have to answer to her why he had flunked so badly, and she won't buy his go-to excuse of 'I got nervous!'

athena, expression unreadable: so. care to explain yourself, my stupid pupil? telemachus: w-well, you see… ha-ha… it's, uh… a funny story… athena: you threw away your best advantage! you've had a god perfectly willing to assist you and yet you still somehow managed to lose! telemachus: wait, what-

so yeah, Athena knew all along.

athena, mildly insulted: how stupid do you think I am, boy? telemachus: but! but! but!.. you never said anything! didn't even scold me for cheating! athena, even more insulted: child, I am the goddess of war strategy, where did you get the idea that I ever play fair and straightforward? leave that to ares, the simple-minded fool!

to clarify, she's not upset at him for cheating. she's upset that he stopped doing so. so she throws some choice words at him, implying he lacks both talent and intelligence

and Telemachus defends himself by saying that he'd rather fail on his own merit, than abandon his principles and win by lying and dishonoring his family. in response, she calls him naive.

he tries to implore to her connection to his father by saying that he was just trying to do what's right. he was following his heart, just as Odysseus had always strived to. and he's training to fight for his loved ones, not for glory of being known.

it's a one hit K.O., because it reminds Athena of her recent break-up with Odysseus. of everything they spat at each other during My Goodbye. of anger, of hurt, of disappointment, of betrayal, of I loved you and you failed me, of I loved you and I failed you, of good riddance! and y̶͈̔o̴̘̖͆u̶̻̱͆͒'̸̫̩̌̉r̷̼͝e̴̩̒ ̴͎̻̈́̎ȧ̸̦l̵̗͙͌̐o̸͚͕̚n̷̟̯͠e̵̳̩͠

and is their whole line just cursed? is this their way of punishing her for something? why do they both hurt her so? is it her fault?

telemachus: athena? are… are you okay? (‘-’*) athena, coming off MG flashbacks: well, obviously, boy, why would you even ask that (ಥ﹏ಥ)

Telemachus just hugs her, because she obviously needs it. and she melts into it like never before.

because she wasn't made for empathy or kindness. she's been born to be ruthless and cold. she's not supposed to love and be loved care about anything but winning. it doesn't come natural to Athena, until recently she had truly thought herself unable to, and yet-

yet here, right in front of her, is a boy who loves for the both of them. loves the whole world - sincerely, selflessly. a truly kind and caring soul (the nobles even joke that his true father is Polites).

she can't love.

but maybe… maybe he will teach her.

maybe he already did.

or maybe she always could.

she forgets sometimes, that her fingers know not only the roughness of swords and spears, but also the gentle softness of weaved silk. creation goes hand in hand with destruction, and she can bind countless threads together without breaking them.

and what are humans, if not strings, waiting to be cut by the fates?

also, if Telemachus can teach the goddess of cold cynicism and detached cruelty kindness of all things, then she can teach him swordplay.

yes, it's a threat.

[adrift-in-thyme]

This ask is your excuse to yap about whatever you want! 💙

(I know exactly what you're gonna yap about hehe /lh)

- hero-of-the-wolf

Hehehe tysm don’t mind if I do

THUNDER SAGA THOUGHTS LET’S GO

All the songs? Absolute bangers. Thunder Bringer was my fave. Mutiny close second. Those songs HURT. Eurylochus betraying Odysseus?? Odysseus sacrificing his crew?? His broken “my friends why?” Eurylochus’ “but we’ll die.” Zeus forcing Ody to choose between his own life and theirs?? Then blowing up the ENTIRE SHIP so Ody would die too??? AUGH

Poor Ody can’t catch a break MY GOSH 😭

The sirens weren’t as scary as I wanted them to be. But I loved how Ody tricked them. A very Odysseus move hehe. And having them take Penelope’s likeness alsjskdjskdjs AAAAAHHH

Scylla’s song SLAPPED

Eurylochus my beloved and beloathed. The man wants Ody to be more merciless, then gets upset when he does just that. AND HE OPENED THE BAG?? WHY WOULD HE DO THAT??? THEY WERE ALMOST HOME. I get why he killed Helios’ cows though. He was desperate and starving.

Him calling Odysseus Ody though 😭😭😭 And Ody begging him not to doom them all

And THAT ENDING. I’m still conflicted on Odysseus’ character arc tbh. But their lines and the delivery of them HURTS SO GOOD. AAAAHHH

So yeah in conclusion I’m unwell

[tostadamika]

I question my own brainwaves sometimes.

I was drawing Velma & Garfield together for the wheel.

I was also making my own Velma bc I wanted to.

(Velma sketches bc fuck you I love Velma she's so gender.)

Then suddenly my inspiration goes off & I start writing an entire script for a garfield / scooby doo crossover that I entitled:

"Velma & Garfield - Mystery Of The Absent Arbuckle"

And I have all these ideas for it that are weirdly emotional for me-

-It takes place post scooby-doo, where Velma & the gang split up (they're still best friends ofc) & after college Velma deciding to become a solo mystery solver

-She's also lesbian & deeply scared of love bc she thinks she's gonna be rejected forever and doesn't know how to approach another girl

-The villain kidnaps the mystery gang alongside Jon & Lyman & has magic evil powers

-Having Lyman be part of the story as both him and Jon are missing

-Having Scrappy Doo be part of the main team with Garf, Velma & Odie & have the story give him a redemption arc

-It ending with Scrappy initially going to live with Shag & Scoob but then Scooby and Shaggy know he really wants to go with Velma & solve mysteries because he wants to follow in his uncles footsteps & Scooby finally tells Scrappy he's proud & that he's more than good enough to be Velmas dog/partner. So Scrappy finally tells Velma & Velma officially adopts him & they start a brand new mystery inc. team

I put....SO MUCH thought into this & it's been like only 2 hours since I even had the idea in the first place & now I've made like an entire movie in my mind palace & like-

Where the FUCK was this motivation before.

Only within the last few days has my art block started to crack & break down a bit. I'd say today has been the first day that I've felt that love & motivation for art finally show itself again. It feels good.

But holy shit I don't even know if I'll make this story happen or not, like I can't promise Velma & Garfield will see the light of day bc fuck who even wants to see that besides me but-Idk man. Shit's weird as fuck.

Well. For today being the, ahem, my own 'New Era' as I'm finally taking life by the reigns and changing shit & getting back to being okay again, but just, what the fuck. Fucking GARFIELD & VELMA is what made me go "OH FUCK YEAH DUDE LET'S MAKE ART & WRITE SHIT"

Well, at least I also have been able to feel motivation for my oc comic too I guess.

This was a weird rambley post, just wanted to yell at you all.

Here is the wip of the art that caused this. Hopefully it'll turn out good enough.

[you-must-choose]

Ritchie and Laura

So I vaguely implied it in the very first post, but I'm heavily leaning into the whole "Ritchie is a Discount Ash" Thing in the Papa Meowth AU by making him a Zorua whose parents are a Zoroark and Sandslash from the future, as a parallel to Ash and Delia's whole Mystery Dungeon thing. Why they time traveled is spoilers for Sinnoh. He also has a human sister named Laura who has a mysterious connection to Celebi (mysterious because I haven't figured out what it is or what it means and this buys me some time), as Maria's counterpart.

They've got their own, mostly off-screen journey that strongly parallels Ash and Maria's, including stumbling into their own World Saving Adventures at roughly the same time, though the two journeys overlap occasionally, usually at either the few Canon times Ash and Ritchie have run into each other or during Adventures that are too big to have a reasonable counterpart. This means the two of them and their problems are going to end up plot relevant, especially in Sinnoh.

Anyway, here's their teams up through Orange Islands (they don't show up in the Orange Islands for the record, that's just where Ash and Maria's team list stopped so far). And yes, they both nickname their Pokemon.

Ritchie

Sparky (Pikachu)

Happy (Butterfree) (he probably caught it as a Caterpie but I'm basing the initial stage shown in the list on whatever they first get introduced as)

Naginata (Spearow)

Rooter (Venusaur)

Zippo (Charmander>Charmeleon) (evolves during his battle with Ash's Charizard, which is an actual battle this time)

Torpedo (Tentacool>Tentacruel) (evolves off-screen, not sure when that'll be revealed)

Alec (Morgrem>Grimmsnarl) (A perfect gentleman, in contrast to most of his species. Makes liberal use of Charm and Flatter.)

Sir Daniel (Cubone>Marowak) (the one I mentioned as evolving in the same match as Ash's Cubone. When he's a Cubone his skull helmet is a bit oversized and misshapen for some reason, so it covers one of his eyes and muffles his voice to the point he's almost completely unintelligible, though it doesn't seem to hinder his battling too much and it's fixed when he evolves. based on Sir Daniel Fortesque from Medievil, Because I Can)

Cowl (Arbok)

Grit, Gravel, Grunt, Grace, and Gray (five Dugtrio who Ritchie stumbled into catching in Digglet cave as Digglets. Counterparts to the Tauros Herd)

Quackers (Farfetch'd)

Flare (Beedrill)

Yogi (Ursaring) (Yes, he lives up to the name. How else would he be able to be Sorlax's counterpart?)

Laura

Cadmus (Meowth) (No, he can't talk)

Odie (Growlithe>Arcanine) (Actually evolves in the same scene he's introduced, since Laura bought a Fire Stone from the same vendor as Maria for the same reason that Maria bought Clefable's Moon Stone, at roughly the same time, and that's how they end up meeting each other.)

Rock (Squirtle) (basically Mega Man as a turtle since I made the Squirtle Squad Leader basically Sonic. Has Mega Launcher, Protean and Trace, and somehow knows Sketch, Mimic and Copycat) (yes I rotated which starter ends on what stage. because why not)

Zingo (Electrode)

Hobbs (Hitmonchan)

Grill, Grape, Grand, Gravy and Gru (The other five Dugtrio)

Mochi (Dratini)

Majesty (Nodorina>Nidoqueen) (also evolved at the Stone Vendor at the Indigo Conference because Counterparts)

Arc (Electabuzz)

Lilac (Alolan Vulpix with cybernetic augmentations. I'll explain when I'm done with the lists)

Whirl (Lapras)

...alright, so what's going on with Lilac?

Well, I needed to give them an equivalent to Mewtwo Strikes Back since Maria got a Pokemon out of it, but by that point in the timeline there's only one Mewtwo, and something Celebi-related made the most sense since Laura's connected to it somehow and Ritchie has his whole "my parents are from the future and my egg was laid there" thing, but there's no Pokemon that has a similar relationship to Celebi as the one Mewtwo has to Mew...

...so I made one up.

Celeborg is what happens when you try to take shortcuts when making a Time Machine. Some idiot Mad Scientist in the distant future decided that instead of actually working out how to travel through time, or bothering to program a proper AI, they'd instead install a Celebi DNA sample into a robot and call it a day. The resulting Reverse Cyborg went through a massive existential meltdown blowing up the lab and stumbling backwards in time in the process, and in its unstable mindset decided to make more cyborgs so it wouldn't be alone as the only Thing like itself (and also the scientist may have been working for an Evil Team so the programming that the Celebi DNA wasn't able to sub in for possibly included world domination-type stuff). Somehow Ritchie and Laura got involved and managed to calm it down and it decided to find a place in the present to live peacefully with any of the Cyborg Pokemon who were interested in staying with it.

Celeborg is Grass/Steel Type (because I continue to insist that Celebi's time powers come from its Grass typing and not its Psychic typing. though Celeborg does still learn plenty of Psychic moves) with Levitate as its usual ability and Download as a Hidden Ability. The version in the AU has both thanks to how Abilities work there. Might draw it at some point.

[thealmightyemprex]

Disney Review Request Princess and the Frog

Requested by @themousefromfantasyland who wanted me to discuss Princess and the FRog ,the PRincess film that isnt really talked about and why it is a bit under the radar ....And yeah I wanna talk about that too .See I remember the HYPE for this film :It was Disney going back to their roots ,a princess fairy tale musical in beautiful 2D animation by Ron Clements and John Musker AKA the best directors Disney has ever had ,this was it ,this was going to bring back Disney for a modern age.....And it did fine ,not the game changer Disney was hoping for and as a result instead of bring back Disney 2D after a long hiatus,it was more of a swan song befor one last gasp in the form of Winnie the Pooh .I also saw the film in the theaters right when Disney had kind of become an obsession and for a few years it was the fave movie of my lil sibling.....Till Frozen came out .Also spoilers ahead

The plot of this 2009 film concerns a waitress named Tiana (Anika Noni Rose) who dreams of opening her own restraunt ,and meets Naveen(Bruno Campos) a selfish Prince who has been turned into a frog in a scheme by the evil Dr Facilier (Kieth David ) ,and going by the Frog Prince fairy tale ,Naveen convinces Tiana to kiss him in exchange for enough money to pay for her restraunt .....Only for her to turn into a frog as well ,and the two set off on an adventure to find a way to make them human

This is a film I wish I loved ,cause there is a lot to love .The animation is beautiful ,and everytime I watch it I get a little sad cause 2D has been completly taken over by CG ,at least in America .I like the side characters .Louis the Trumpet playing gator while not having a lot to do is brilliantly animated by Eric Goldberg and played masterfully by Michael Leon Wooley (THough I will confess ,since I found out he played Audrey II in the Broadway version of Little Shop of Horrors ,I keep expecting him to go "Feeeeeddd Meeeee" ).I ADORE Mama Odie ,a 197 year old blind voodoo priestess .She is kind of a deceptively goofy yet wise character which is an archetype I love and Jennifer Lewis gives it her all ,I had no idea the actress was only in her 50's she convinced me she was much older . I think my favorite character might be Tianas friend Charlotte ,a rich girl obsessed with marrying a prince ,she is just so energetic and funny and I love that she genuinely cares about Tiana .Ray the firefly is a character I thought I wouldnt like when the film was being advertised and I confess I dont like his design .....But he is actually the heart of the film ,Jim Cummings givers a great performance ,I love his sub plot about being in love with a star ,Evangeline ,and I remember how shocking it was that Ray DIES .At the end of the film Dr Facilier KILLS him ,and I remeber the audience gasped in the theater .Now I have seen people who either think Rays death is emotionally powerful or straight up silly ,for me....Im a big ball of emotion ,so when that second star eppears next to the wishing star meaning Ray is finally with Evangeline ......I tear up

I really love Naveen as a character ,a disinherited playboy who loves jazz and his arc and romance with Tiana is good.I also just adore the setting ,I think 1920's New Orleans is the perfect place for a 20th century fairy tale (Wish they used it better but I will get into that ).I also love the use of jazz music and speaking about the music lets talk about the songs by Randy Newman .Now I am not a big Newman fan but I think the songs are really good though some are just OK and I am gonna talk about them from my least favorite to my most favorite

8.Never Knew I needed-the obligatory end credits pop song that is good ,but I dont love it ,I kind of forgot this one existed

7.When We're Human-Sung by Tiana,Naveen and Louis Its cute but kind of meh for me

6.Gonna Take You There-Sung by Ray and his Firefly family ,its just OK

5.Down in New Orleans(All versions)-I actually really like this song ,its a good opener and closer

4.Almost There:Tianas song that is really damn good, Anika Noni Rose does a fantastic job ,I think it is also my third favorite song animation wise ....I just like three other songs better

3.Ma Belle Evangeline -One of the most underrated love songs in Disney ,I think the sequence is beautiful(One of my favorite scenes in the film honestly ) and Jim Cumming really shows off his singing skills

2.Dig A Little Deeper :Mama Odies song and its just got a good message while also be8ing a ton of fun and Jennifer Lewis just sells it .I got a weakness for Gospel style numbers

1.Friends on the Other Side-OK I have opinions that are unpopular about Doctor Facilier but I will give him this ,he has one of the BEST Villain songs in Disney .Kieth David really shows off his amazing singing skills here,the animation is perfect ,I like how it builds up to being completely insane ,its fun ,its creepy ,its just a great villain song.....With a perfect reprise ,but I'll talk about that later

I'll talk about Tiana later ,so lets go into what I think is the flaws/things I am kind of meh about/thing that almost work but dont but-...*Sigh* lets just get into it

In the meh category ....The use of celeb voices here are weird.Like usually you get a big star to play the main character or the sidekick or the villain.....But aside from getting the great character actor Kieth David to play the villain,which I get but the other three BIG STARs play supporting characters.Now I kind of get Terrance Howard and Oparah Winfrey for the parents but...I'm just gonna say it ,why is JOHN GOODMAN IN THIS FILM ??I love John Goodman ,dont get me wrong ,and yeah he is a plot point, (FAcilier wants to kill him and gain his wealth ) but he doesnt do much so I am always distracted when I hear Goodmans voice

Annnnnnddd lets get to the part that I think might get me some flack....Lets talk about my issues,AND what I like about Dr Facilier .I KNOW this guy is super beloved he is the part of the movie people REALLY like....And I'm sorry I got problems with him .I'll start with what I like :His design is great ,evoking classic DIsney villains like Captain Hook ,his villain song like I said is marvelous ,I like his evil plan to take over New Orleans and feed all the inhabitants souls to his Friends on the Other Side ,he's got menace to him,I love the fact his shadow is alive .he is played by one of my favorite actors Kieth David who delivers a phenominal vocal performance and I like that beneath his cool facade he is actually a desperate and terrified dude when it comes to his otherworldly buddies ......But while he is made of cool parts ,they emphisize his greed ,his motive is he wants money and power ......Thats boring and it doesnt really vibe with "Im going to let spirits devour New Orleans " .The other is he is more plot villain and not a good foil to the heroes . He has no connection with Tiana really ,they only have one scene together and she apparently knows who he is but thats never explained .I say to make him a better villain

1.Emphisize his back story that he was someone who used magic to fufill his desires the easy way ,and his desperation to pay off his debt is his motive

2.Have him pursue the heroes ,and tempt the heroes.

I wll say he is a fun character ,I just wish he was great .....Oh his death scene is AMAZING and TERRIFYING though, dragged to the spirit world by his own shadow as his own villain song is sung by monstrus spirits ,that was such a jaw dropping scene in the theater ,possibly my favorite Disney villain death

As for things in the I dont like section.....The film begins strong,and ends strong too.....But that middle section in the bayou is just kind of dull.Up to Ma Belle Evangiline that whole part of the film just drags ,including these three minor bad guys that dont add anything ,theres some terrible jokes ,and two of the songs dont do it for me .Humor in general is hit and miss .Oh I almost forgot ,Lawrence is one of the most forgettable villain sidekicks in Disney,I kind of forget he is in the movie

Well Question time

1 - What do you think about Tiana as a character?

I like Tiana ,I think she is a good protagonist ,Anika Noni Rose soes a good performance ,I find her likeable and I like her romance with Naveen.

2 - Do you think this movie would be better if Tiana didn't turn into a frog, or if the frogs journeyed through New Orleans more inteastad of the bayou?

Yeah I wouldve preferred mor human Tiana,and while I like swampy settings ,I wanted more in New Orleans .

3 - Is this movie good, bad, or just watchable?

Its... on the good end of Watchable .I dont return to it a bunch it has flaws ...But its got its good stuff in it .I dunno I always go in wanting it to be better then it is

Overall it almost works but it feels undercooked ,but I still reccomend it .If best is A+ this is about a B

@ariel-seagull-wings @princesssarisa @filmcityworld1 @the-blue-fairie @angelixgutz @amalthea9@goodanswerfoxmonster

[mk-wizard]

So Long, Garfield: A fanscript on how Garfield could end well

Hello, fans and fat cats. Here I am with another Garfield essay, but this one is different. It is not exploration, fan theory or character analysis, but a fanscript on how the iconic comic strip cat could end on a high note. Keep in mind that this fanscript also tries to uphold all the things that made Garfield great and brings the original concept as well as many original ideas full circle. The premise of Garfield was that we saw life through his eyes namely how he saw his owner Jon’s life at how socially awkward, pathetic and bad with women he was. The audience was also subtly led to believe that if Jon ever did finally find a woman namely his most often go-to-gal Garfield’s vet Liz who found him revolting, it would mean the end of Garfield. Yet when that happened, it still went on. I think the story should end now and here is a fan script that I put together on how Garfield could end in my opinion on a high note while honouring its legacy. It is divided into four parts which symbolize the four stages of a very drastic change in one’s life. Specifically, how everything around Garfield changes in an almost domino effect kind of way because Jon and Liz finally became a couple. Note that that four stages serve as four story arcs which make up what would make for Garfield’s very last volume in the book series.

1- Jon wants to marry Liz meaning she will move in and the household dynamic and lifestyle will change forever (resistance). - After becoming an official couple, Jon and Liz decide to move onto the next big step which is to get married. Before, when they were just dating, it made Garfield a bit jealous yet he could deal with it because at least everything else was the same in his life and he grew to like having Liz around as a visitor, but having her around full time means things will change the household dynamic forever. It turns out that adapting to having Liz live with them is going to take a lot changes and it means the way they act, live and do every day tasks will not be the same anymore. Initially, Garfield will react very bad to this because unlike Jon, he likes bachelorhood and isn’t ready to give it up, so he would probably do everything he could to foil Jon’s attempts to propose to Liz and even go as far as making Liz very uncomfortable in an effort to get her to dump Jon. However, Garfield’s stunts in fact backfire as Liz turns out to be very tolerant and patient with him as she is not only good with animals since she is a vet, but kind of see right through him so she sympathizes with him not wanting her to intrude. Also, despite all of Garfield’s efforts, Jon still somehow manages to propose to Liz and she says yes. When that happens, Garfield stops resisting and just resigns. Note that from here on end, the planning of Jon and Liz’s wedding is ongoing in the background.

2- Lyman finally finds his own place and job meaning he will move out, but so will Odie (denial). - This leads us to phase two which also brings up the forgotten yet still present idea that Lyman is Jon’s roommate and Odie is not actually Jon’s dog. After so many years, Lyman finally lands a great job and is able to move out, BUT if he goes, so will Odie. Obvious, neither Garfield or Odie are happy about this because they’re actually good friends. I would imagine that there would be tons upon tons of gags of trying to stop the move out from happening like the pets emptying out the luggage to trying to sneak Odie away so that he secretly stays in Jon and Garfield’s house, but of course, all of these attempts to keep the status quo would not only fail, they would make both Jon and Lyman very angry. I imagine the punchline in the end would be that it turns out that Lyman is only moving away into his own house a few blocks away which is just walking distance. Also, the serious side that keeping Odie isn’t just unrealistic, it’s mean because he’s all Lyman’s got. Of course, Jon and his own friend still be cool. It is also here we finally find out what Lyman does for a living; he is a photographer and he will be taking pictures for Jon and Liz’s wedding. And bittersweetly, while it turns out Garfield and Odie won’t be split up that far apart, them not living together is still a huge change to get used to as their absence in each other’s lives is felt.

3- Nermal comes to terms with leaving kittenhood and abandonment issues in his mind (depression). - At this phase, Garfield is sad and depressed, and things seem to get worse as Jon and Liz are going to the Arbuckle farm to celebrate their engagement. And fun long lost fact; Nermal is the kitten of Ma and Pa Arbuckle... but things have changed there too and so has Nermal. Mom and Dad have their own announcement which is that they are retiring and have decided to start traveling which means they are leaving the farm and the little guy in Doc Boy’s care. And while the parents are optimistic about this new phase in their lives, Doc Boy is facing some issues as Nermal is no longer a kitten. He is now a “teenager” meaning he is no longer cute and has taken up a rebellious as well as an unfriendly streak. He has become spiteful and does unkind things which as first annoys Garfield until he notices a familiar pattern and recalls he went through the same thing... when his previous owner, a pasta chef gave him to Jon. Despite all of his better judgement, Garfield gets Nermal to have a heart to heart talk, and Nermal admits that he is hurt that Mr. and Mrs. Arbuckle are leaving him behind. He thinks that they are abandoning him because he’s not a cute little kitten anymore. Of course, it turns out that the real reason they are leaving him with Doc Boy is out of love. Nermal has needs and requires stability that the Arbuckles cannot give him at their age, so they are leaving him with Doc Boy so he’ll be in good hands and have a good life. Garfield then finally comes to terms with his own abandonment issues and discovers that the pasta chef did the same thing. He didn’t give him to Jon to get rid of him because he was eating the lasagna all the time. Garfield getting older and hungrier was a sign that he was growing up and needed a good home, so the chef helped Garfield find an owner who could be there for him full time. Through this, for the first time ever, Garfield and Nermal finally find common ground and get to like each other. It turns out that underneath it all, Nermal is a lot like Garfield in how he likes to eat and secretly enjoys mischief. So much so that like how Garfield loves lasagna, Nermal adores country style apple pie. At the end of the engagement party and trip, both Garfield and Nermal’s spirits are lifted, and while Nermal has eased up a little, it is hinted that he has become Doc Boy’s “Garfield” which makes Garfield for the first time ever, finds Nermal cute for it.

4- Jon gets to know Liz’s parents and Garfield rethinks his own relationship with Arlene (acceptance). - Nearing the end of the wedding plans, Jon must now get to know Liz’s parents and become accepted by them. It turns out that Liz’s dad is an easy going guy who seems to have a lot in common with Jon while her mom is the stern one who seems to have a lot of Liz’s sarcastic and no nonsense demeanor. She is also a big time zoologist. Meanwhile, Garfield is taking in all of the changes that are going on around them and decides that maybe, change isn’t so bad after all. Namely, maybe it isn’t so bad to love someone other than yourself. This makes him think that instead of just being casual with Arlene yet keeping her at an arm’s length, he decides he wants to go steady with her and officially become boyfriend and girlfriend with her. In the midst of all of this, it turns out that despite how intimidating Liz’s mom has acted towards Jon, she actually always accepted him and thinks he is a good match for her daughter because they balance each other kind of like how her own quirky and socially awkward husband balances himself with her. More importantly, Jon makes Liz happier than any other man she has met before. Once that resolution is made and all of the wedding plans are made, Garfield at long last introduces Arlene to the family indicating that they are officially together. Of course, Jon and Liz being who they are, take an immediate liking to Arlene and agree to take her in meaning that she is also not part of the household too. At this point, the wedding plans are finally put into place which offers tons of hilarious antics namely the things that go wrong to the things that are over the top. Though at the end, the wedding finally happens and the final scene is of Jon and Liz becoming husband and wife while Garfield thanks the audience for coming this far with them and saying goodbye.

The End

Well, there you have it. This is my fanscript on how Garfield ought to end in the best way possible. What do you all think of it? I would love to hear what you all think. Do you think any of this will happen?

If you have a fan theory, character analysis or anything of a comic media you want me to make an essay for, let me know in my ask section. Also, please give this a like, give me a watch and support me either by Ko-fi or Patreon. Links are in my profile.

Thanks guys and as always, stay safe.

[adaparkwrites]

Hi! I’m kind of new to the proper writeblr side of tumblr so pls forgive me if this not a good question. I’ve always wanted to write an original novel but for some reason I always fall “out of love” with my ideas. I write fanfic and it’s easy there because it doesn’t matter as much, I can just take the characters and write a new fic another time, but for my OC’s... I’m so focused on finding the perfect plot and perfect setting that I end up hating everything and not writing :( any tips? 💕

Hello! This is a great question, and I’m happy to offer any advice/tips I can.

(Huge post, content under the cut!)

Transition from Fanfiction to Original Fiction

I, too, wrote fanfiction actively for much of my life. Here are some main differences between fanfiction and original fiction I found:

What I like better about fanfiction

Characters: In fanfiction, characters already exist, you just need to portray them. In original fiction, you have to breathe life into brand new human beings! That was tricky at first for me.

Worldbuilding: In fanfiction, the world is already there. It can be easier to immerse yourself in a world that already exists.

What I like better about original fiction

Characters: My characters can be whoever I want. I don’t have to worry about portraying them true to someone else’s canon, because canon belongs to me.

Worldbuilding: It’s tons of fun to build an original world. Instead of adhering to the laws of a pre-existing universe, I can make up my own.

Both fanfiction and original fiction have their pros and cons. I found writing both helped exercise my creative muscles!

When transitioning to original fiction, it’s okay to write stories where the plot/setting is based off your favorite fandoms. These kinds of “heavily inspired” stories are great practice! Like training wheels as you ride the line between fanfiction and original.

Example of the Transition

Meet Anna! I made her up. She loves writing fanfiction about The Hunger Games, but she wants to publish original sci-fi novels one day. Anna decides to ease herself into original fiction gradually.

Fanfiction, with genre elements: Anna writes a new Hunger Games fanfiction, but Katniss and Cato are fighting in space. She experiments with worldbuilding in the familiar environment of Panem, extending its empire to the stars.

The ‘heavily inspired’ story: After a few months, Anna writes a sci-fi book with her OC Odis. The plot is basically “Hunger Games but in space”, but includes some original worldbuilding to adapt the setting to an interstellar backdrop. Jabberjays no longer exist, but an alien race called the Ja’blian does!

The new story: Anna decides to make a New Year’s resolution to write a new book. This time, Odis is exploring space when he’s captured by a hostile alien civilization. Thrown into an enclosed arena, Odis must fight other alien lifeforms to the death. He wins and prepares to escape. Plot twist! As he runs to his ship, the planet starts dying around him. Odis learns the planet itself is alive. It’s an old, angry god that demands bloodshed, threatening to turn itself uninhabitable if its denizens fail its demands. Will Odis sacrifice himself for the bloodthirsty planet, or can he find another solution?

Anna’s new writing still retains a favorite element inspired from The Hunger Games (fight to the death), but it has taken an original twist of its own. She decides to polish this manuscript further and pursue publishing it!

Troubleshooting: Plot and Setting

Sometimes things go wrong, but that’s okay! Writing is a life-long learning process. As long as you have the determination to push through, you’ll always move forward. In my opinion, that willpower is the single most important ingredient for a writer’s success!

Now for your plot and setting concerns:

Many fanfictions have amazing plots! But even the most basic plots can attract an audience, since the readers are already invested in those worlds.

Unfortunately, original fiction lacks that safety net. It can be a daunting task to construct an entirely new premise from scratch. Sometimes, the hardest part of building a compelling plot/setting is knowing where to start!

So Where Do I Start?

Judging by your ask, you seem to be character-focused. Even when you get frustrated with your worlds and move onto the next... you take your OCs with you. The love and care you show your OCs will be absolutely essential for building a plot!

I’ll be using the example of our sci-fi friend, Anna. She wants to write a sequel to her sci-fi novel, but she’s having trouble with the plot. Luckily, she is still attached to her main character Odis, so these strategies can help her out.

OC’s Goal: What does your OC want most? Think of a way to stop them from reaching that goal. Now they will have to make a journey or a sacrifice (tangible or intangible). Think of what your OC needs to do now.

Example: Odis dreams of finding love when he returns to Earth. But he crash-lands on yet another dangerous alien planet, and his spaceship is wrecked again. Now he has to enter the alien city to find replacement parts.

OC’s Arc: Your OC is going to change as a person. What about them will be different? Think of ideas to bring about these changes.

Example: Odis is abrasive and arrogant. Before he can find love, he needs to learn humility. Maybe he is caught stealing machine parts in the alien city and must do community service.

OC’s Error: Your OC believes something incorrect. What is this false belief they’re clinging to? Think of ideas to shake these beliefs.

Example: Odis believed he could only fall in love with another human. But as he cleans the matriarch trees for community service, he catches a glimpse of a handsome alien watching him from the branches...

I hope this helped! Best of wishes in your writing pursuits, and remember to have fun!

[popculturebuffet]

Amphiba Reviewcaps Catchup Special: Lost In Newtopia/Sprig Gets Schooled/Little Frogtown/Hopping Mall

In a 4 episode marathon to make up for lost time: Hop Pop handcuffs Sprig to him because that’s not troubling and Polly And Anne head off on their own mostly uninteresting adventure. Sprig gets into college and regrets it  much like most college students. Hop Pop goes on a noir adventure while Anne harasses children and it all ends with a wacky mall adventure that ends in an utter tearjerker. Pitter Patter, let’s get at er after the cut. 

Whelp i’m behind. Over the last two weeks i’ve been busy moving into a new room in the house, and moving my stuff into said room and making it feel like home, and when i’ve had time I either had new coverage to start, or a series passing to honor, or in the case of yesterday had to have my wisdom tooth removed because it got so bad I couldn’t think out of nowhere. SO yeah been a pretty exausting few weeks... but with only one episode left before Amphibia likely goes on hiatus for the rest of the year, Halloween special excepted, I don’t really have the time to dawdle on this. So not much of an introduction let’s hop to it. 

Lost in Newtopia

This will be a quick one, but this one was.. eh. Not BAD, as the first, last and middle scenes are all really good. it’s just between theere it’s not much intresting.  The opening on the bus was pure gold as Hop Pop as usual gets fired up about something boring, then casually handcuffs his grandson because that’s normal. Then again this is the same man who also thought brainwashing his grandchildren was a minor slight so this is a step up somehow. Also he does have some logic for it after Sprig blew up a robot factory and , unbenowst to him, stole a powerful credit card for funsies. But .. get a dog leash or something.  The scene was also great as we got to see Anne’s mom for the first time! And the scene with her wanting to get out and try exotic food her tummy’s not ready for was really adorable and relatable as having a young nice, I understand them asking for things they really shoudln’t have and then holding a grudge over it.  But then the episode just sorta.. sputters for most of it’s run time. The bit with the tail shop is rfairly enjoyable, but the mishap with the vendor and the parade just aren’t all that funny and the basic conciet of tryign to do it up like locals hasn’t been done AS often as I’d think but frankly How I Met Your MOther, Back before it didn’t so much shoot itself in the foot as shoot both it’s legs off, did this slightly better with first time in new york, where the inverse happened, i.e. the locals pretending to be tourists.  The ending scene was great, from Hop Pop going from terror at “street weridos” to casual happiness at seeing his grandaughter and adopted grandaughter (And my heart flew to hear him call anne that. I mean it was obvious but i’ts still nice to hear. Like when Scrooge told webby to Call him uncle scrooge but without the horribly scarring assholery the next episode he still hasn’t properly apologized for to her. ) and Polly and Anne’s terrible names for each other.> It was good stuff it’s just overal an okay episode. Good enough to entertain but just ntohing really out of the ordinary for this show, but with funny enough bits to keep invested. Next. 

Sprig Gets Schooled Ehhhhh... this one HAD potetial, an intresting setting, Sprig getting in on his talent, plenty of fun college tropes, Hop Pop struggling with his grandson leaving the nest.. there was good stuff here, but like too many episodes this season it wasn’t used as well as it couldv’e been. 

The episode has the family come upon Newtopia University, where Sprig’s talent with stopping mantises and with a fiddle gets him a scholarship, which is one of Hop Pop’s dreams, but both quickly regret it: Sprig dosen’t fit in while Hop Pop misses his baby boy. It comes to a head with Sprig tryign to sneak in and Anne and Polly trying to sneak in for hyjinks. 

But overall it’s just.. eh. it has a few good gags, but the anne and polly plot has been done so many times by now, and while that alone isn’t enough to make it not all that fun the fact it isn’t funny or unique is when The Simpsons, Undergrads, Futrama , Solar Opposites and Bobs Burgers just off the top of my head have done fratboy hyjinks episodes way better.

 But what dosen’t help is while Hop Pop’s emotional part of the episode, missing his boy and wanting him to come bome, works, Sprig just.. get sbored. There’s nothing about how hard school is or him missing the others it’s just.. he dosen’t like it so he tries to leave. Instead of having an emotinal episode about him possibly fitting in there, or struggling to fit in there or some third thing it’s just.. an average 10 year old not liking college becuase of course he dosen’t. He’s too young to keger or really ond with his clasemates. It’s just an eh watch. Not as unpleasant as quarallers pass but without that episodes good parts to really help it be entertaining. Ugh.  And you might say “well every episode dosen’t have to have an emotinal core jackass” which.. yeah your right. But it has to be funny. Or entertaining or have something and not just be .. eh. You CAN be just a funny episode if you do that right. And amphibia USUALLY does that and has an emotional hook to make it even better. And the proof is in the next two episodes. 

Little Frogtown Now this.. this is more like it. After two less than memorable episodes, we get two classics in a row. Granted since I grew up on calvin and hobbes and thus grew up with the two tracer bullet arcs...

Well three techncially with the haircut thing but yeah, given one of them was in my first comic strip collection ever, the indespensible calvin and hobbes if your curious, I’ve always had a soft spot for noir episodes and to animations credit there have been some classics; The recurirng Numbah 2 detective stories in Kids Next Door, Venture Bros classic “everybody comes to hanks” and of all things, Garfield Babes and Bullets. Yes that happened and yes it IS actually good. 

Oh and if your wondering if Garfield solved something family friendly like a Lasanga Robbery, or his teddy bear going missing or odie being kidnapped for a dog fight nope! He’s hired by a college professors wife to find out who killed her husband since it looked like a simple accident, but unsuprisingly it wasn’t. Oh and did I mention that not only is this based on a story from the book garfield’s 9 lives, which got it’s own special for the rest of the stories it chose to adapt and a few new ones to replace those it didn’t, but in that story it’s about a chuch deacon. That’s right Garfield tackled corruption in the church. Your welcome. But i’ve talked about Garfield Babes and Bullets enough.. I mean for today. I clearly need to cover this and 9 lives as a whole at some point. Let’s get back to this episode. Point is noir parodies are great and gafield has done some weird and wonderful shit.  But my like of it aside this is a genuinely clever episode that has it’s own neat takes on the genre. The basic setup is simple: Hop Pop takes the kids to Sal’s, a restraunt owned by an old friend of his who got so sucessful with his delcious sandwitches and secret sauce he moved up to Newtopia.. but when Hop Pop finds the place he finds it in shambles, with no one there and Sal entirely missing. So while the kids head off for the arcade next door, Hop Pop goes into full noir mode to find his missing friend.  It’s that core that works. Sure lots of shows use the “friend we only just heard of” plot device but here it works because it’s so simply used here: They were friends years and years ago, sal moved away probably decades ago, and he simply hasn’t kept in touch. Both are busy: Sal with his restraunt and what we find out here, and Hop Pop with his family and later having to swoop in when his daughter or son and their spouse died. It’s perfectly acceptable. To me while i’ve bitched plenty about cliches it’s mostly been about HOW you use them. About using them right instead of just coasting on an old plot to fill out your episodes for the season. If you don’t have an intresting story to tell, then use the 11 minutes for something ELSE. And here.. they do and have a fun spin on noir by having hop pop’s narration talk to him. While that’s happened before with narration gags I haven’t seen it in a noir parody before and it’s just pure comedy gold, and Bill Farmer’s acting makes you genuinely invested in finding out what happened to this character you never met. Bill really sells how worried hop pop is without over doing it and how important this guy and his sammiches are to him. 

The final twist while not entirely suprising is intresting: Turns out , after Hop Pop finds people seemingly having stolen the recipie, Sal’s restraunt.. simply went belly up. Which sadly, makes sense: he had good ingredients but he’s in the world’s capital, where ther’es probably tons of mom and pop restraunts and giants of cuisine. It’s hard to start a buisness anywhere let alone the biggest city int he world. So Sal simply pivoted, sold his recipie and became a billionare. It’s a good solution that teaches hop pop a lessson: Change happens, things you really love like comfort food restraunts won’t last forever. I myself miss when this area I live in had a tgi fridays and it’s probably never coming back> Things change.. what matters more is people and moving on. Though he does send hop pop on with a bottle of sauce. It’s a good lesson for kids and a fine ribbon tied on one of the season, and hte series, best.  And of course before we move on we have the b plot which is funny as it is relatable as some little shit steps in line in front of anne and being anne she overreacts.. and gets tazed and gets everyone banned. Not a huge subplot but it’s funny as it is relatable as someone whose both stood in massive lines and had people cut in and felt it was massively unfair. Never got into a fistfight over it but tha’t sbecasuse arcades are rare and cornona probably wiped out the rest. Ha ha.. I hate this year. One more!

Hopping Mall

Last one. Another simple plot: Hop Pop forces the kids to use 2 coppers a piece to buy souviners instead of letting them use the card because it means more.. which is bullcrap. While using your own money for a present DOES mean a lot, my mom gave me money plenty of times to buy gifts and covered me plenty. The real meaning behind a gift for someone is that you picked it out yourself, that whatver thing you picked made you think of them and that you meant it for them. Weather it be a mug, a billy bass, or the great mighty poo on a t shirt, what matters is it comes from the heart. Though Hop Pop also buys himself an easy chair and sends it home and admits h’es a hypocrite so maybe we’re not supposed to take him seriously.  While this is there to make drama mostly for Anne it’s a plot device I like as it’s both the kind of nonsense an adult would make and then not follow, and it leads to a really good plot as our kids find their things; Hop Pop introduces the kids to haggling, which Polly mistakes for using tried and true mafia approved methods of intpmidation, leg breaking, arson and threats of all of the above andc omes back with her own snail and tiny cart. Sprig being sprig finds a gift for Ivy in seconds that’s a nice stick.. that also shooots lasers because I dunno. Also nice of the show to actually MENTION his girlfriend.... several episodes in.. with again NO goodbye to her or anyone else. And yes that’s still a sticking point this far in it wouldn’t of killed them to include that in one of the premire episodes.  Anyways that leaves Anne who finds a nice teapot for her mom, but soon has to do what all people who can’t afford a tea pot too: enter a demolition derby against a mother daughter team using shopping carts. It’s a neat set piece, as is Anne apparently knowing carts because her and her friends hung around the mall a lot, which given we saw her and sasha out and out steal one for hyjinks, it’s a nice continuity nod. Anyways our heroes win the race, but Sprig looses his stick saving polly and their rival has to ravage her tail to save polly again. I also love the return of the “not the baby!” cry from “Marcy at the Gates” which I also swear has been used before on this show but can’t remember specifically where.  It’s revealed their rival, and her daughter both of which are entertaining especially the daughter, wants the pot because it was one of her mom’s designs and it means a lot and that touches a nerve with Anne, so she lets her have it, but does get a lovely butterfly clip from the daughter. After the hop pop gag we get the most infamous, and best scene of the episode that ties the above together.

 Sprig wakes up to find Anne ruminating on the balcony.. and for the first time since she got here really, she breaks down a bit about how much she misses her. And my honest interpretation is she’s been holding how bad she feels for her mom, who she admits to not having the best relationship with but both loving each other dearly: That she likely blames herself for the theft, for listenting to sasha, for getting them all stranded, for destroying her friendship with Sasha and possibly not being able to bring her home with her. But mostly for causing her parents undo pain, having no idea how hurt they are or what they’ll feeel when she comes back, no idea if she’ll even be able to make it home and see them again.. it’s a lot to hold in and with all she’s had to deal with I feel she’s been holding it inside just so she dosen’t snap. She already has enought o deal with especially after “reunited. Thinking for amoment about how her parents are likely in utter misery desperatley looking for her when she’s not even on earth... it’d break her.. and it does. She admits missing her, regretting they fought all the time and sobbing a bit... and the scene only gets sadder when Sprig interjects.  He asks a simple question; What was she like. While we STILL don’t know the specifics we finally find out that his mom died when he and polly were really little, polly was probably a newborn... he never really knew her and wonders.. can you miss someone you never really knew? It’s a sad, sobering moment. We assumed sprig was fine with his parents being gone because like Anne and her parents he just never brought it up. But sometimes a person just burys something or is sad or upset in private, speaking from personal experince here. Sometimes you don’t talk about something beacuse you don’t know HOW and Sprig likely just dosen’t want to make hop pop more upset at reminding him his daughter and or son and daughter in law and or son in law are dead, something he likely deals with every day. It’s a powerfully acted scene and ends as the two cry softly together while the credits play over the newtopia night sky. Just a beautiful powerful scene that ties a mostly comedy episode together into something fantastic and like it’s partner episode, one of the series best. 

And with that catchup is done. Join me saturday for more of this, more loud house, and moe moe moe, how do you like me how do you like me, moe moe moe, why do you like me nobody likes me... if you want more subsuricbe, check the backlogs ont hea ssioated pages, and shoot me an ask for a suggestion or a dm to comission a full review. While Amphibia weekly coverage is wrapping up for a while after saturday i’ll be back for the halloween special and then whenever the show returns in full, Ducktales coverage restarts monday and Loud House Coverage that began with Schooled continues sometime this weekend along with a possible foruth thing. Until then, stay safe and GO TEAM VENTURE! 

[imassivedreamcollection]

Today is the one year anniversary of Once Upon a Time’s series finale. As a six year watcher, I greatly reveled in the show’s magic, storytelling and characters. I love Emma’s journey, Regina’s romance with Robin and Rumpel’s life as the deliciously naughty Dark One and his romance with Belle. I even found a crush in Zelena. I hope my fellow Oncers also loved the show’s run. 

However, like some others, I thought the show could’ve been more than what it was. 

Here’s some of my thoughts on what I’d do to make the show better, but first let’s start with some things that could stay:

Rumple and Belle’s romance.

Emma and Hook’s romance.

Regina and Robin’s romance.

Red and Dorothy’s romance. 

Henry being Emma and Neal’s son. 

The Neverland/Oz Arc.

The Underworld Arc.

The trio of Aurora, Phillip and Mulan. 

The Frozen Arc. 

The Camelot Arc. 

Henry and Violet’s romance. 

Henry becoming Rumple’s apprentice. 

Jacqueline and James’ journey up the Beanstalk and their raid of the Giants’ treasure. 

Some of the realms untouched by the Curse like Dun Broch. 

Jasmine’s story in Agrabah.

Ariel and Eric eventually leaving the Land without Magic and having adventures in Fairy Tale Land. 

Mulan helping Phillip save Aurora. 

Merida. 

The Author subplot.

Hook’s animosity for Rumple. 

Grumpy romance with a fairy.

Okay on to my ideas. Hope you don’t mind I have a lot: 

One

As much as I liked the Blue Fairy as the go to fairy for help, I think they should’ve had Flora, Fauna and Merryweather instead. Think about it; in the “Sleeping Beauty” movie, they were pretty much the real heroines in the story while in Pinocchio the Blue fairy was only in two scenes. I even thought of Storybrooke names for them:

Flora: Sarah Felton 

Fauna: Josephine Allen

Merryweather: Barbara Johnston 

I even thought of occupations for them: Sarah would be a dressmaker, Josephine a baker and Barbara a cleaning lady. (These are references to the scene where they use magic in the cottage) 

I also thought for them to somehow get their memories back before Emma broke the curse and for them to help Henry make Emma believe. 

I also they should powers connected to nature like in the early story of the movie while it was in development. Flora has the power of plants and flowers, Fauna can talk to animals and Merryweather can use Atmokinesis (weather magic) 

Let’s also have Grumpy have a romance with Merryweather. 

Here’s who I thought should play them: Helena Bonham Carter as Flora, Tina Fey and Debi Mazar as Merryweather. 

Two

Maleficent and Ursula should have been Regina’s allies in Season One. Maleficent being Regina’s deputy mayor and Diablo the crow being her partner and human while Ursula owning a beauty parlor and bringing the latest gossip to Regina. Flotsam and Jetsam being human form too and working in her business. 

Three

Pinocchio/ August Booth should’ve also been part of the main cast. He also should’ve stayed by Emma side at least until their teens when she became a criminal. They also should’ve been shown more of his life in the Land without Magic without his father, Jiminy or the Blue Fairy to guide him. 

Four

Let’s make David’s backstory more simple and make him and James the legitimate sons of King George with David being the nice one due being closer to his mother and James being more like his father. On that note, let’s toss in the tragedy of David’s mother getting killed by thieves when he was little in a raid, leading him to have a further distrust of Hook in Season 3. 

Five

Let’s give the reason for David and Abigail’s marriage alliance be due to Robin Hood and the Merry Men raiding King George’s royal treasury and a failed attempt to steal the Giants’ treasure up the Beanstalk.

Six

Let’s start Snow White life as an outlaw begin with her helping Bluebeard’s wife get away from him. 

Seven

Let’s change how Rumple become the Dark One by somehow having him kill Zoso to end the Ogre Wars and prove he wasn’t a coward. 

Eight

Let’s make Red’s boyfriend Peter the wolf terrorizing the village all along and her having to kill Peter. Later, Peter’s pack learn of his death and want to take their revenge of Red and her Granny. Let’s also not make Red a werewolf. 

Nine

Let’s make Maleficent the daughter of Chernabog and Vidia, the Black Fairy. Let’s also have Clarion, the Queen of the Fairies send Terrance to destroy their union, but Chernabog kills him. Let’s show Maleficent’s childhood and how she became the Mistress of all Evil too. 

Ten 

Let’s set Tiana’s story in the “original” Enchanted Forest and make Mama Odie her godmother. Let’s have Angela Bassett play her. 

Let’s make Dr. Facilier’s dept be with Hades and the Underworld. When the gang to the Underworld, he should have a role in the story arc. 

Let’s make Tiana in Storybrooke a worker at Sarah’s bakery.

Eleven

Let’s give Regina a better reason to hate Snow than what happened in the show. Let’s also make her the girl Queen Eva abused when she was younger a la what happened to Cora in “The Miller’s Daughter”. And give us a love triangle between Regina, Eva and Leopold. 

Twelve

Let’s make Robin Hood at first what like he was in the Wish Realm (stealing so he could be rich) and somehow Snow and Charming change him for the better before or after the Curse was broken. 

Thirteen

Let’s make Flynn Rider a former member of the Merry Men who betrays them, stealing some of their loot and running off to eventually meet Rapunzel. 

Fourteen

As I’ve said let’s keep Jasmine’s story in Agrabah, but lets have her never leave Agrabah for the Land of Untold Stories and married Aladdin by the time the Curse is cast; in short let’s keep the Aladdin story from the movie in the show, genie included. Let’s also have the genie protect Agrabah from the curse. Let’s also maybe have Ali Baba put the Genie’s lamp in the Cave of Wonders. I see Aladdin’s genie as not the one who meets Leopold on the show. 

Fifteen 

Let’s keep the number of realms to a minimum: Fairy Tale Land (The Enchanted Forest, Arendelle, Dun Broch, Camelot, Agrabah)  Neverland, Oz, Wonderland, The Underworld ... Okay that may not be a minimum. Sorry. Anyway let’s lose, 1920s England, Victorian England, The Land of Untold Stories, New Enchanted Forest.. Too many realms in the original show, don’t you think? 

Sixteen

Let’s fully tell characters stories and make them count to the overall plot and stick primarily to fairy tales and no classic literature works like Jekyll and Hyde and 2000 leagues under the Sea or movies like 101 Dalmatians.

Seventeen

Let’s have Rumple hear of how Geppetto can build a magic wardrobe and have him kidnap Geppetto and force him to make it like how Ratigan kidnapped Olivia’s father in “The Great Mouse Detective”.

Since I said that, here’s how I see Pinocchio’s story:

Pinocchio’s adventure begins when he’s sent on an errand. After escaping Stromboli, he discovers Geppetto’s been kidnapped. He and Jiminy sent sail to find him and on the way stumple upon Pleasure Island. After escaping there, he finally finds Geppetto and they escape, but Rumple sends Monstro after them. They survive and the Blue Fairy turns him into a real boy and for Geppetto and Pinocchio to seek asylum in Snow White’s kingdom. The End.

Eighteen 

Let’s name the Blue Fairy Evangeline (guess why I named her that. Think of a firefly character you may know) and sadly have her killed by Rumple before or after the curse.

Nineteen

Let’s give Rumple this reason for asking for the first born babies of Cora and Cinderella: to use the Time Traveling Spell to make sure his son was never lost to him.

Twenty

Let’s make The Dragon Mushu from “Mulan” and the mentor of Mulan and give him a role in Storybrooke.

Twenty One

Let’s give Mulan and Phillip Storybrooke counterparts. Let’s make Mulan a self’defense teacher at a dojo and bisexual and in a relationship with Phillip.

Twenty Two

Let’s make Aurora the only “Sleeping Beauty” that Maleficent cursed and have her also curse Phillip as an Yaoguai for him to be saved by Belle and Mulan. In Storybrooke let’s have Maleficent keep cursed Aurora, still asleep, in the basement of her house. 

Twenty Three

Let’s show more characters from Disney and fairy tales like Mad Madame Mim and Goldilocks. 

Let’s make Madame Mim a rival to Maleficent and Goldilocks a stooge for Rumple. 

Twenty Four

Let’s make cursed Eric the boyfriend of Ursula and have cursed Ariel mute with Ursula keeping her voice somewhere at her home or beauty parlor. 

Twenty Four

Let’s have more commotion in Storybrooke after the curse is broken: the Giant trying kill David, Gaston rising a mob to kill Rumple, etc. 

Twenty Five

Let’s have Archie Granny, Ashley, Ariel, Red, The Seven Dwarves in the supporting cast with the Mad Hatter and Flynn Rider and Rapunzel 

Twenty Six

Let’s see more of the Home Office (Greg and Tamara’s group). 

Twenty Seven 

Let’s include more fairy tales like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, The Emperor’s New Clothes and Thumbelina.

Twenty Eight

Let’s make Mother Goose the author of Henry’s book. 

Okay’s that’s all I’ve got.

Thank you to any one who stayed so long to read my thoughts. What do you think? Let me know in the notes section at the bottom of this post.

Thank you for your time and have a good day. 

[jabamaca]

An Idea Regarding the Disney Princesses Line-up (LONG)

When my brother and I watched the new Frozen II Teaser,  we felt a JRPG vibe towards it. With you know, the going on an adventure into new lands and meeting new characters (gathering up party members) shit.

I just had a great idea: How about an RPG (preferably turn-based), with the Princesses (and some other characters) as playable characters?

Okay, let’s get a run-down through ALL the Disney Princess films (and some films that I think that can approriately be considered as such, i.e. Frozen, Moana) and conceptualize if notable characters are Playable, NPCs, and Villains (and anything in between).

Unmentioned characters (most of the sidekicks) are assumed to portray any other element of the Gaem. Anyways...

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

Snow White (Playable) - She is playable, yes; but how? She'll be a Bard(-like?), she will sing to get a debug or to call upon her animal (and non-animal) friends. But later on the story, she will wield a Hand Mirror and use little of the Queen Grimhilde’s power. The story-line is inspired by “A Little Crooked Tale” by forgotten-ladies on DeviantArt. (too lazy to explain the whole idea). Making her a little bit of a Witch late game. She be reluctant about this. I will use the “because plot” phrase quite a bit on this post.

Prince Ferdinand [Is that his real name?] (NPC) - Their setting is set a year or 2 after the film. He and Snow are married and ruling. He will just watch over the Kingdom when Snow joins the party.

Queen Grimhilde (Villain) - N.E.R. (No Explanation Required)

The Huntsman (Anti-Hero / Playable) - He will be an Assassin. He will be like the combination of the appearance/encounter instances of Gilgamesh (FFV) and the very-neutral / conflicted-nature / will-eventually-join-the-party aspect of Shadow (FFVI). A little characterization to him, will do wonders to the story.

Cinderella

Cinderella (Playable) - I imagine, given that she has the Fairy Godmother, she decided to get under her influence.She will be a Conjurer (Mage-Like). I treat the magic involved in the film with the likeness between Alteration and Conjuration school of magic in The Elder Scroll series. Imagine conjuring a Glass Sword amidst the battle, golem magic, cantrip magic. The plot might need to have something really bad happen to Fairy Godmother to justify her taking the role (make her dutiful on this game).

Prince Charming [Let’s make Charming his actual name] (NPC) - Same case as Prince Ferdinand.

Sleeping Beauty

Aurora (Playable) - Nature Wizard, similar with Cinderella but a little more nature-y (plant, animal, weather) given the specialty of her 3 Fairy Godmothers (Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather). The setup for this is also similar with Cinderella’s, but with a touch of Maleficent corruption (’member the needle).

Prince Phillip (Playable) - He will be a... Glorious, noble, badass, motherflippin’, dragon-killin’ Knight!!! I want his character to be more justified, unlike in the “Maleficent” film. That story didn’t happen in this story (opinion and idea influenced by Shadiversity). His father is still alive, so someone will take care of the kingdom once he joins the party.

Maleficent (Villain) - N.E.R. (minus the “characterization” in the Maleficent film, add more mysterious-menacing-villainy)

The Little Mermaid

Ariel (Playable) - I imagine her needing to wield her father’s Trident, due to plot and necessity for her RPG adventures. She will need to go back to being a mermaid for the longevity of the Gaem (because plot). Having wielding the Trident she will have tremendous power, but has little idea on how to use it (game-design-balance shit and plot). With said power she is able to have her own personal sea to “hover” on. Plus, Trident... 3-pointed spear thingy... You can do things with that. Retiarius/Sea-God Mage(?), I don’t know, she has Triton Powers. She be reluctant about this.

Prince Eric (NPC) - He will have to take care of little Melody. (And the kingdom, of course)

Melody (NPC) - She will have her cute moments on the Gaem.

King Triton (NPC) - Something bad will have to happen to him for plot. But will have to have been resolved before leaving the story arc of the “Little Marmaid” area. Yadda-yadda, Triton gives Trident to Ariel, Ariel joins the party, Ariel says goodbye to her family, Ursula continues to be a threat beyond her kingdom/s, end of story-arc. The good shit.

Ursula (Villain) - N.E.R.

Beauty and the Beast

Belle (Playable) - Given that her father (Maurice) is an insane (complimentary) machinist and her obsession with knowledge. I recon that she will take after her father with the Machinist business. She will be equipped with / riding on the contraptions she and her father made in their workshop in the castle (setting is maybe a few years after the film).

Prince Adam (Playable) - Due to plot reasons, he will have to be Beast-form throughout the game (or at least transform to be it when in battle or adventuring). His servants are capable of governing the castle and its kingdom. He be reluctant about this.

Gaston (Villain) - Not really a world-threatening villain. Just an area story-arc villain.

Aladdin

Jasmine (Playable) - Jasmise will be a Dancer in this game. She can have dances that inflict status-effects/buffs on enemies/allies. Imagine the Dancer job on “Final Fantasy Tactics”. She is able to do this because fantasy-magicry, plot, her booty-shaking-capabilities, and game-design.

Aladdin (NPC) - He will not be playable because plot, something REALLY bad happens to him (doesn’t mean die) regarding the Genie and the Lamp. He and the Genie are M.I.A. throughout the game. I made him non-playable to make the Jasmine story-line interesting. I mean: I like Aladdin as a character, but he (and the Genie) being M.I.A. will be the perfect driving-force for Jasmine to be joining the party.

Genie (NPC) - Similar case with Aladdin.

Jaffar (Villain) - All-powerful Genie-Jaffar, baby!!! He be world-threatenning. N.E.R.

Cassim (Playable) - Aladdin’s father. Cassim’s driving-force to joing the party is the same as Jasmine’s. He will be a Thief with magical artifacts in his disposal. He will have a major role on The Hunstman’s character arc.

Pocahontas

Pocahontas (Playable) - She will be a Shaman training under Keketa, and under the mystical influences of the Grandmother Willow Tree. She will be tasked to investigate what is currently wrong amidst the magic of the world. Imagine her controlling nature, like bending the winds to her will.

John Smith (NPC) - He will just be a Trading Ship Captain that always visits Pocahontas given the opportunity. They are still lovers despite the long-distance.

Kocoum (Playable) - Pocahontas’ father (Chief Powhatan) will assign this Survivalist to protect Pocahontas along her journey.

Mulan

Mulan (Playable) - She will be a badass Warrior Princess that can wield any sort of non-magical weapons. She’s that badass (this description may or may not be biased). She joins the party to find out what is wrong with Mushu being on a very weak state on this Gaem.

General Li Shang (NPC) - He still needs to watch-over the kingdom’s army when Mulan joins the party, especially when his co-general/wife is gone.

The Princess and the Frog

Tiana (Playable) - Her story in this game is that a few years after the movie, plot happens which causes Mama Odie to die. Mama Odie, being a magical and spiritual voodoo priestess, goes to Tiana and transfers her essence (spirituality and voodoo powers) to her, making her a Voodoo Priestess; tasking her to confront the world-plot. She be reluctant about this.

Prince Naveen (NPC) - He will just be a supporting character giving emotional/moral support for Tiana.

Lottie (NPC) - Same case with Prince Naveen. 

Dr. Facilier (Shadow Man) (Villain) - He be back with a vengeance bigger and badder. N.E.R.

Tangled

[subjected to change, due to Tangled the Series]

Rapunzel (Playable) - She will be the Healer of the party. Her magical hair will grow back because of plot, and part of the plot is the mysterious Moon magic that was present in Tangled: the Series.

Eugene (Playable) - The Trickster of the group. He has the ability to steal like Cassim; but also has some Charismatic (think the Orator skill-set in Final Fantasy Tactics) and Acrobatic skill-sets. He is one of the characters who are sworn to protect Rapunzel.

Cass (Playable) - The Rouge of the group. She can wield her badass-ery on battle. She is other characters who are sworn to protect Rapunzel.

Varian (Anti-Hero) - Now that’s an anti-hero when I see one. Watch Varian’s character in Tangled: the Series, he’s has a very good setup to being an Anti-Hero.

Brave

Merida (Playable) - She will be a Ranger, complete with a personal pet Bear and Eagle, ready for combat. The plot will be set a few years after the movie and she would have already had a few hunting trip from which she acquired her pets.

The Witch (NPC) - The Witch will be the NPC to summon Merida to go on a quest to investigate the plot and join the party.

Frozen

[subjected to change, due to Frozen II]

Anna (NPC) - She will need to watch over Arendelle with the Queen joining the party.

Elsa (Playable) - The party’s Cryomancer, practically N.E.R.

Kristoff (Playable) - He will be the Brawler of the party, much like a beefy tank who uses blunt forces in combat. He is tasked by Anna to be Elsa’s bodyguard.

Hans (Anti-Hero) - His motives will be politics and vengeance. During the plot he would have already gathered a rebel army from the Southern Isles. Not really a world threat, but a recurring threatening hindrance for the party.

Moana

Moana (Playable) - During the plot she will have to gain full-control of her ocean powers, that’s why she will be the Hydromancer of the party.

Maui (Summon) - Given the plot. He will have to be initially be M.I.A. and then found at the end of the Moana area story-arc; making him able to be summoned by Moana in combat.

So that’s most of the idea I got. Took a lot of effort to put this in text form. So, yeah, all of these are just because of one teaser of an upcoming movie. Be aware that this will have NO relation with the Kingdom Hearts series. This “Gaem” has its own story.

[TL:DR - a traditional RPG with the Disney Princesses as the main centerpiece would be awesome]

[wellamarke]

Laura’s Choice: An Exploration

My initial reaction to the now-infamous ‘Choice’ scene was abject horror and disgust. I couldn’t believe that Laura, of all people, would sacrifice poor little Sam, after everything she’s done for her supposed belief in synthetic humanity.

For what it’s worth, I still worry it was a bit of a manufactured plot point, but this is Humans, you guys: I’ve never been able to hate anything about it for long. I did try to, in series 2, but both times – with the Mattie/Odi storyline as well as Sophie’s Synthee arc – I managed to talk myself around by writing a good old essay.

So that’s where we’re at now. Rather than berate the scene from a writing angle (because there is a lot of really awful stuff to be considered when taking this scene in the context of the race relations parallel they’ve emphasised so much this year), I’m going to explore Laura’s choice from a character angle. 

In the days since the episode aired I’ve been through numerous emotional states, engaged in many debates, and in general come up with a number of arguments that defend Laura’s decision, not as the right choice objectively, but as something that makes sense for her character. Stay with me.

The first thing we have to decide, I think, is this: what question was Laura actually answering? Anatole says she has to choose somebody to die. But was she really choosing:

1) the person she really thought should die,

2) the person she thought had the best chance of survival, or

3) the option that was mostly likely to resolve the situation?

The DigitalSpy interview with the writers would have you believe it’s the first option, and that Laura genuinely chose “her kind” over “theirs”. I… take issue with that. An alliance in which one ally does not seriously consider the other their equal is not, in fact, an alliance. If Laura seriously chose Sam for that reason alone, then Anatole is in the right, as this excellent Twitter thread points out, and if episodes 7 and 8 somehow confirm that reasoning then I’ll snap straight back to my kneejerk reaction of absolute revulsion.

But even within the first item on the list, there is room for discussion. One point that’s been well made by @TheSynthWhisperer on Twitter is that Laura may honestly, truly think that she considers synths as our absolute equals, and yet still, under fire and the threat of harm to her family, fold at the crucial moment. I don’t want to believe that of her, but I have to admit it’s a possibility. As Mia points out in 3.1, up until now Laura’s devotion to the synths’ cause has not come at any actual cost to herself. Not the kind of cost that counts. Sure, she’ll sacrifice a career, a marriage, those things aren’t anywhere near the scale of say… Sophie. Who’s standing right there in the corner, easy fodder for if Anatole gets mad. Who of us can truly say that we wouldn’t give up our ideals in that situation? I’m sure we’d all love to say “Me!”, but unless you’ve had them questioned in circumstances similar to this one, you’ll never really know. Sorry. 

So that’s one theory, though not my favourite, for Sam being Laura’s honest choice for 1: when it comes down to it, her ideals are not as deeply-held as she’d like them to be. She does possess fears and doubts that she has not yet been able to purge from her soul, however much she’d love to, however much she thought she had.

Is there evidence for this line of thought in Laura’s previous actions? Arguably, yes. Every time I watch the series 2 finale I’m surprised by how determined Laura is that Mattie not upload the consciousness code. She’s the character whose relationship with Mia the show has focused on most, and yet she’s the loudest voice saying “No, this isn’t worth it, don’t do it.” Of course, the two situations are by no means the same, but perhaps there is room to argue that Laura’s ideals are subject to her propensity toward panic, when stakes grow to that kind of height.

The other reasoning for point 1: she wasn’t comparing organic life to synthetic life: she was comparing death. We had this hinted at in episode 5, with Sam’s line, “We don’t die in the same way you do.”

Now, in context, he’s talking about Karen, who we’re just supposed to accept is actually irretrievable, and truly gone (despite the fact that only Joe was there to confirm it, He Who Knows Nothing About Synths, for all I kind of love him now). But let’s look at Sam’s line in relation to the synthetic deaths Laura has witnessed first-hand.

She had braindead Max laid out on her dining-room table for a good while, and then saw the code magically make him good as new. She watched Mia and Hester die and then be miraculously brought back to life, even though Mattie wasn’t there in person to do it. We, the audience, remember the bleaker fates of characters like Karen and Flash, but in terms of the ones Laura has actually seen… synth death seems to be an undoable, tragic-but-not-absolutely-final concept.

So while Sam’s life may seem equal to the old man’s, his death does not. Laura has never seen an organic human return to life the way Max, Mia and Hester did. In the heat of the moment, I can perhaps see her clinging to this reasoning, hoping that somehow they’d be able to restore Sam if he did die. ‘They are as alive as us, but perhaps they’re never as dead as us’ - that kind of thinking.

We know this isn’t true, of course, because we know from the Elster Sisters roadtrip that the code is now offlining of its own accord. But Laura’s grasping at straws here. Whatever she chooses, she has to be able to live with it afterwards. A phonecall to Mattie might do the trick with Sam, whereas it’s not going to do Old McOld any good at all.

But what if Laura wasn’t answering Anatole’s question at face value at all? What if she was trying to make a tactical choice? This brings us to point 2, which I like to call “The Max Factor”.

In 3.1, we saw Max faced with the difficult choice between saving Christabel, a synth we didn’t know (but presumably he did) or preserving Leo, his brother, who we know he truly loves. Max, because he’s been elected leader of the railyard, has to set aside his own feelings and choose to sacrifice the person who is, objectively speaking, in the least danger. Christabel is moments from certain death. Leo has about a one-in-three chance of survival. Numerically, the answer is obvious: he should save Christabel, so he does.

To what extent is Laura’s choice comparable to Max’s? Well, although she doesn’t have a computer brain to tell her the percentages, it’s pretty clear from Laura’s viewpoint that the old man is in more danger than Sam is! We happen to know that Anatole doesn’t mind sacrificing the odd fellow-synth here and there to get his point across (RIP Agnes) but all Laura knows is that he’s a purist who’s asking her to set one species above the other.  Clearly, he favours his own kind, or he wouldn’t be here. Out of the two possible victims, Sam has a higher claim on Anatole’s mercy.

Both Laura and Max choose to sacrifice the person who means the most to them personally, and because of that choice both of them risk losing others who love both victim and decision-maker: Max and Mattie’s friendship (which used to be about hugging on sight, remember) is in tatters, and he gets serious words from his big sisters about it too. Laura is making this choice in the sight of Toby, Sophie and Joe, and we see at least two of them shunning her for it later.

Both Laura and Max choose to save the person who they think needs saving most. And in both cases, nobody ends up dying. So technically, both of their tactical decisions paid off.

There’s another similarity between Max’s choice and Laura’s, though, and this one’s particularly fascinating because it’s actually a difference. Both situations have been orchestrated by Anatole. (Whether this is a particular hobby for Anatole or just something he saw work once and decided to use again… perhaps remains to be seen.)

Max, though, has no reason to suspect that Anatole is playing him. He is content to take Anatole’s word for it that (a) Christabel really is dying, (b) Leo really does have a chance and (c) there is absolutely no other way to save Christabel than to redirect the power from Leo’s ventilator. Sorry, guys, what are these lights doing on? You really couldn’t get power from anywhere else, huh? (And gruesome as it may be, especially since one of them’s Flash, but…  there are at least two synths lying around the place who aren’t using their batteries any more. If Anatole’s such a whizz surgeon, couldn’t he do some transplanting? No?)

Because Anatole seems so trustworthy, and has even built up his apparent reasonableness by acknowledging Max’s mysterious attachment to Leo and expressing regret that it should come to this, Max doesn’t second-guess him at all. Looking back at the scene now, we can see obvious hallmarks of Anatole’s manipulation. In a very dark retrospective twist, we might even suppose that he was the one who ordered Flash’s escorts to desert her in the town, thus leaving Max extra vulnerable. Anatole was the one who’d asked her to go on a supply run without Max’s authorisation, after all.

Laura, on the other hand, is acutely aware that she’s being manipulated. Anatole is not a trusted friend - he’s come into her life as a marked villain. And this takes us on to point 3: was she merely choosing the option that would most likely resolve the situation?

Unlike Max’s choice, Anatole hasn’t even tried to dress this one up as a real life-or-death issue. Nobody has to die. He’s being pretty open about the fact that it’s a question of morality, not medicine. There’s no logical reason for this choice to be made at all – especially since Laura is fighting for synth equality, not synth supremacy. It’s completely and utterly fabricated, and Laura and Anatole both know it.

So what should she do? Argue for a third option, like “neither!” or “take me instead?” Either of those would have been a lovely gesture, and I’m sure we were all thinking it while watching. “Neither” is, ethically, the correct response to the question, and “take me” is the one that seems most like the person we know Laura to be – courageous and compassionate.

But she’s also not stupid! 

Of course she considers this. Come on, now. Of course she thinks about trying to outwit Anatole. She’s a lawyer by trade. She relies on her ability to out-logic her opponent on a day-to-day basis. But how often, in the past, has she faced someone who honestly intends to commit cold-blooded murder in her own living room?

Well, once, actually. 

When Hester paid a visit in 2.8, Laura tried valiantly to talk her down. She did exactly what we’re asking her to do in 3.6. She delivered some series-best dialogue, some really hard-hitting, beautiful lines of logic, and what happened? Did Hester suddenly go, “Oh, you’re right, humans are wonderful! I do apologise, here, have your neck back?”

No. Laura’s attempts to reason with Hester only escalated the situation. Hester went from scarily-but-calmly waiting for Leo to arrive to literally brandishing a weapon in Laura’s face, all because Laura tried to go all lawyery on her.

So, faced with a similar showdown: is Laura going to risk it? Is she really going to try and talk Anatole down? Because let’s remember that with Hester, all Laura had to lose was her own life – they were the only two people present. This time, two of Laura’s children are watching, and so is their father. Wouldn’t it be so much better to end the situation before Anatole gets really mad and starts picking people off? He’s come with a miniature army – what’s to stop each of his lackeys getting hold of a Hawkins throat and pressing down until Laura stops wailing “take me! take me!” and changes her answer to one of the actual options?

Nothing! This is a very scary situation! Anatole is clearly not going to be reasoned with. Were he a reasonable person, he wouldn’t be here asking her to choose a side as a test of equality. Anatole, honey, that’s the literal opposite of what equality is.

Which he obviously knows. Because really it all comes down to that line of his: “You’ve already made your decision”. While Laura quite possibly hasn’t, at this point, done anything of the kind, that line makes it obvious that Anatole doesn’t want to test her, he wants to prove himself right! He doesn’t, for one single instant, think that she is going to do anything but what he’s scripted for her.

So she can’t choose the invisible third option. It’s definitely going to have to be one or the other. All right, so who should Laura choose?

Let’s say she does what we secretly wish she’d done, and picked the old man. For a start, there’s tonnes of horrifying ways that could go down, involving the types of blood geysers that put an end to Helen Aveling and Pete Drummond (RIP, guys). Laura obviously doesn’t want to see that, and she certainly doesn’t want Sophie to witness it.

And since this so clearly isn’t what Anatole wants her to do, even the chance that it’s a bluff might not be enough to save the old man. Imagine, okay, let’s imagine she points a finger and says “Old McOld”. (I really wish they’d given us a name for the sake of this essay, but I see that it was a very artsy decision not to, adds to the whole anonymity vs. familiarity angle, hmm yes very clever)

Laura putting one synth before one human isn’t going to prove SQUAT about humanity in general. (Hester again: “Our existence is meaningless to all but a few out of billions…”) Choosing that option is going to make Anatole angry, because he’s come here to be proved right and he’s damn well going to prove himself right. If Laura tries to make a stand for what (we presume) she actually believes (that Sam’s young life IS more worthy of preservation than the old man’s, by virtue of his greater potential for a future) then Anatole, like Hester before him, is not going to suddenly beam and say, “Thank you, Laura, you’ve shown me the error of my ways.”

He happens to believe Laura won’t practice what she preaches anyway, but even if she, personally, does put Sam first… What, suddenly all humans are fine? No, his whole point is based on Laura being an outlier. So really if she tries to prove him wrong she’s just prolonging the (very dangerous) situation.

Anatole will almost certainly push her to switch for her “true” answer, the one he wants her to go for. Personally, I don’t think he’s even considered what he’ll do if Laura chooses to kill Old McOld, because he’s so sure she won’t, but I can see him having Stanley apply as much pressure as he can, get as close to going through with it as is biologically possible before actually killing Old McOld, to give Laura the longest possible anguish and try and force her to change sides. Anatole claims later that he was bluffing, but I think he was only bluffing so far as he knew what she was going to go for.

On the other hand, if she chooses Sam, then Anatole has made his point. Having manipulated, humiliated and demoralised Laura to the point where her own family can’t even look at her, he doesn’t even need to kill Sam - and as mentioned in point 2, Sam was probably never in that much danger in the hands of a fellow synth, anyway. Choosing Sam is not only the option that is least likely to lead to the death of one of the binary options, it’s also the option that will shut this whole thing down fastest. Remember again that Laura’s family is in the room. One of the lackeys has already made an attempt on Joe’s life. This was never just about saving one of the two people in front of her.

Of course, Laura can’t think any of this out loud, and it’s not a novel so we can’t read her thought process – and, crucially, neither can her family. Like us, they’re looking on in horror but they, themselves, are not the ones being called on to make this choice, so they’re not considering the options as deeply or as quickly as Laura has to. I think she knows full well that they’re going to hate her decision. But having decided that Sam is the most logical choice, she can’t exactly go, “Don’t worry, Soph, I’m sure they won’t actually kill him!”

She could explain it afterwards, of course, but it’s going to sound like making excuses, isn’t it? It’s going to sound weak and defensive, and Laura is anything but weak. So she lets them shun her, she doesn’t shout her reasoning through the door Toby’s just shut in her face, because she understands why he’s feeling like that, why it’s better for Toby and Sophie to grieve about it together before she asks them to see things from her point of view.

Nothing Laura did in that room, from the moment they opened the door to Anatole, was going to make the tiniest difference to Anatole’s hatred of humans – except maybe to heighten it. The safest, most logical thing to do was not to hedge, not to pull the concept apart, but to accept it as the binary choice he demanded and just choose what he wanted her to choose.

Of course, in this case, the safest choice was also the most painful. She runs the risk that Joe and the children will never understand what she did, or that she or one of them will die before a reconciliation – that’s the world they’re living in now. So even though she may have chosen the option that gives her the most peace of mind, it’s not… it’s not a LOT of peace of mind, is it? So of course she leaves her phone and keys and flees into the night.

I started out so angry with her, but I’m coming around to the idea that she really did think this through, and her thought process wasn’t “Sam’s a machine and we aren’t”. I don’t want it to be that. I believe in Laura Hawkins and I always will.

PS. i love debating this subject but please don’t reply to this post with any speculations about episode 7′s Big Ole Death, because I’m trying really hard not to find out beforehand! For once lol 

[thisdaynews]

South Africa v England - hosts batting first

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South Africa v England - hosts batting first

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Johannesburg, 3rd ODI, Scorecard

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Live Reporting

By Jack Skelton

All times stated are UK

Posted at 12:0612:06

Post update

Tim Peach

BBC Radio 5 Live in Johannesburg

There’s an area right next to the tunnel that’s been left emptier so children can enjoy their own games of cricket. Lovely.

BBCCopyright: BBC

Posted at 12:0312:03

Post update

Cheers Matt.

Good luck braving the elements out there on the supermarket run.

Glorious weather in Johannesburg in stark contrast to Salford today.

Posted at 12:0112:01

Post update

Chris Jordan wasn’t great. He can’t hide from that. Eoin Morgan stuck with his experienced bowler. You never know, Mahmood might have got smashed too. We’ll never know.

Anyway,Jack Skeltonis back to take you through the interval and the first part of England’s chase.

Posted at 11:5611:56

comments

Ant Myers:Yet another occasion where England have bowled to statistics rather than using their own eyes. Stuck with Jordan because he is a “death Bowler” Mahmood ignored because he is supposedly an opening only bowler.

Posted at 11:5411:54

Post update

Tim Peach

BBC Radio 5 Live in Johannesburg

There are more parachutists landing on the ground at the interval…

BBCCopyright: BBC

Posted at 11:5211:52

Post update

We even had a bit of controversy in that innings.

Temba Bavuma burned South Africa’s review, unsuccessfully trying to overturn an lbw dismissal.

Rassie van der Dussen was out a ball later but he was allowed to review the decision because the Ultra-edge wasn’t working for Bavuma’s dismissal and it was therefore decided South Africa could keep their review.

It was all very odd and England were not happy.

Getty ImagesCopyright: Getty Images

Posted at 11:4911:49

Post update

Simon Mann

BBC Radio 5 Live in Johannesburg

England’s spinners Rashid and Moeen turned the game their way. Pressure on Shamsi, who was excellent in Cape Town, and Smuts to do the same for South Africa. The worry for South Africa is if Roy and Bairstow get off to a quick start against the pace bowlers as it’d mean England can be more selective against the spinners

Posted at 11:4811:48

Post update

England were really good for the first 40 overs of that innings. The two spinners were excellent.

It was spoiled a little by Chris Jordan’s final three overs costing 40.

England will still back themselves to chase this down on a good pitch.

comments

SMS Message: I’m sorry but why do England keep persisting with Chris Jordan?! He doesn’t get a bucketload of wickets and to say his death bowling is meant to be his speciality, he still goes for too many runs late on. Unreliable and I don’t trust his skills. from Jake in wet and windy York.

I’m sorry but why do England keep persisting with Chris Jordan?! He doesn’t get a bucketload of wickets and to say his death bowling is meant to be his speciality, he still goes for too many runs late on. Unreliable and I don’t trust his skills.

Posted at 11:4111:41

Post update

I don’t know what ball Jordan was going for there. It was right in Miller’s hitting arc.

South Africa were 188-6 but they’ve made it to 256-7 from their 50 overs.

England will need 257 to win and draw the series.

50 overs

six

SA 256-7

Big finish from David Miller! He has given South Africa a sniff.

Jordan is hit for a second six over the leg side in the final over.

49.5 overs

SA 250-7

Miller smashes the ball to long-on but turns down the single.

One ball to go.

Posted at 11:3811:38

Post update

Tim Peach

BBC Radio 5 Live in Johannesburg

Tom Curran was furious with Jason Roy for not diving for a possible catch at extra cover a little earlier. It would have been a difficult one to take, especially on the edge of the square, but Curran was angry that Roy didn’t even try. And wasn’t shy to let him know.

49.4 overs

SA 250-7

South Africa’s number nine gets his single with a hideous swipe.

David Miller gets back on strike with two balls to go…

Posted at 11:3711:37

Post update

The England field comes in tight to try and keep Sipamla on strike.

49.3 overs

SA 249-7

Jordan finds his mark this time. A wide yorker. Not much Miller can do with that other than take the single.

49.2 overs

SA 248-7

Miller goes again but misses. A precious dot for Jordan. It still wasn’t a great ball.

49.1 overs

six

SA 248-7

Errrm. I hate to say I told you so but…

Jordan goes for a wide slower ball but Miller picks it. The ball flies 90m and over the stand.

Posted at 11:3411:34

Post update

Chris Jordan is being given the final over by Eoin Morgan despite his poor last couple…

comments

Thomas Knights:So Mahmood bowls a good opening spell, then gets completely ignored by Morgan for the next 40 overs, harsh.

Read More

[adrift-in-thyme]

Gosh yeah, I’ve barely been obsessing over the odyssey but I too am sick on how some people characterize Odysseus. I don’t think I could consume any Odyssey media that isn’t Epic the musical cuz I feel like because Odysseus is a super masculine dude, they’ll give him toxic masculinity traits and make him a cheater. Which is entirely false! He’s a kind and caring man who loves his wife and son more than anything! Sure he’s a little violent but only because he HAS to be. He HAS to do things in order to survive and to protect those he cares about!

even if it’s their own interpretation, I feel like characterizing Odysseus as a cheater in any way shape or form is EXTREMELY disrespectful to male SA survivors. That’s a more off topic thought tho (won’t talk about that anymore I just wanna throw it out there)

EXACTLY

I completely agree!!! It’s this weird thing that’s always driven me nuts where masculinity is equated with toxic masculinity just as often as femininity is equated with weakness. As if a manly dude can’t be a family man who’s both soft-hearted and fiercely protective. Which like WHAT?? It’s yet another infuriating stereotype. And it plays into the whole disrespect to male SA victims thing. Him being a victim doesn’t make him any less of a man per se. It freaking makes him HUMAN.

I don’t get the whole thing with the maids and suitors either. People do realize that they betrayed Penelope and plotted to kill Telemachus right?? They do realize that by completely victimizing the maids they take away the agency they did possess, however little? I’m not saying it’s cut and dry or that’s it’s ok to slaughter a bunch of people (though don’t western heroes do that ALL THE TIME and don’t get slack for it??) or that the maids had this wonderful situation where full consent was given. But come on. You’re gonna villainize the dude whose home they invaded and ransacked and whose family they endangered?

And I feel like with Ody especially he gets characterized by his mistakes (real and contrived). People see him as the guy who got all his men killed by telling the cyclops his name (an understandable mistake because the worst of us comes out under duress. Of course he displayed pride and hubris! He was exhausted and sorrowful and infuriated!). They see him as the guy who “cheated” on Penelope with Circe and Calypso. And they forget the source material. Homer was over there making a character to rival the vast majority of those we have today, a sensitive, traumatized, flawed man who endured SO MUCH to return to his beloved family. A man who, unlike all of his fellow warriors, identified himself as the Father of Telemachus because Penelope and Telemachus are his LIFE. He wrote this awesome character, even gave him a character arc in the Odyssey, and he gets reduced to a cocky cheater.

[fanfic-inator795]

WoY Twoshot: The Dadsome, Part 2

Plot: Awesome actually never held much resentment towards him, in fact he pretty much understood why he left. He also didn’t think he’d ever see the guy again… Funny how the universe sometimes works out.

((Part of the Awesome Arc. Enjoy!

Part 1 of ‘The Dadsome’ here!))

It was about sunset by the time Awesome stepped out of the Skullship’s ‘jaw’ and onto its long tongue. From high above, he could still see a few stragglers left on the beach, wanting to enjoy just a few more minutes on the sand or in the water. 

Most of the tourists and locals however were on the boardwalk, either grabbing some supper or heading home. Unsurprisingly, there were quite a few Watchdogs among the crowd, eager to enjoy their few extra hours of downtime on Baroceon.

Not that he could really blame them though. Going out somewhere was always better than being forced to stay inside a stuffy ship all the time. But before he could go and join them, Awesome made sure to take one last look at himself. Sure, this wasn’t exactly a first impression moment, but his dad had already seen him in one sorta lame outfit that day, Awesome didn’t want him to see him in another one. But thank Grop for Handy and teleportation mail delivery (even if the shipping price was a bit outrageous). 

With his uniform left behind in his room, he was now wearing a tank top with blue and pink paint splatters on it (perfect for a sunny and colorful setting like a beach), bright purple pants and silver fingerless gloves. A gold chain with a smaller yet still shiny and cool charm version of his ‘A’ medallion on it hung around his neck. Finally, he had finished off the outfit with a pair of white heeled sandals. Of course, he had also decided to go with the purple lipstick, just to mix things up a bit, as well as a dark blue eyeshadow.

Smiling in approval of himself, Awesome headed down the tongue and stepped onto the boardwalk. He only had to wait a few minutes or so before he spotted a grey dorsal fin above the heads of the crowd. “Hey!” he shouted, giving a small wave, “Over here!”

“Oh, hey.” The older shark-man quickly maneuvered through the sea of tourists, and gave Awesome a smile once he could fully see him. “There you are, kiddo.” He was still wearing his homemade shark-tooth bracelet and dark grey tank top, though now he was wearing a opened, dark blue jacket over it. His swim shorts had been traded in for a pair of faded brown pants, and on his feet were black sandals. It wasn’t that cool of an outfit but it still looked pretty good - definitely not lame or dorky. 

“Heh, yep, here I am,” Awesome replied coolly, grinning back at him, “So Dad, do you know where our first awesome stop of the night is going to be?”

Makoto nodded. “Sure do,” he said simply before turning to the left and leading the way down another path of the boardwalk - this one being a lot less crowded, but also more thin and not quite as exciting. 

“Huh...” Maybe it was an exclusive place? Shrugging, Awesome followed him, and glanced around at the smaller shops and stalls as they walked. A few of them actually had candles or small lanterns hanging above them, glowing warmly and lighting the way as the sky grew darker. “...Sorta like the lights on the surface back home,” he mumbled.

“Hm?” Makoto glanced back at him, “Your mom actually let you go up to the surface?”

“Well, sometimes.” Like the times when she had no idea he was even visiting the streets and boardwalks of the surface - or, as the island was called in her words at least, the ‘Surface-land Swamp-Pool’. “It’s a really cool place, you know? Definitely a lot different from the towns and cities below it.”

“Yeah, I know,” Makoto nodded, “I visited the island a couple times, and I had a good time. It’s probably changed a lot though, since the last time I saw it.”

Awesome smiled. “Definitely,” he replied, a bit of pride slipping into his voice.

Turning another corner, Awesome could see that they were reaching a dead end, where the stalls were a bit more separated and a couple tables and benches sat at the end of the path. It didn’t really matter though, since his father had stopped walking, and was instead standing at one of the ‘restaurant’s’ front counters. 

“Ey, Mako!” The chef - a man who sorta looked like a starfish but with hair and an extra pair of arms - greeted, “Haven’t seen you in a while!”

“I’ve just been busy,” Makoto shrugged, giving a small smirk as he sat down on one of the bar stools near the counter, “Just a couple of the usual along with whatever he-” He gestured towards Awesome, who still hadn’t taken a seat and was instead just sort of staring at the two of them, as well as the stall. Honestly, the place looked so old, how the grop was it still standing? “-get him whatever he wants too. And, maybe we could add the friends discount onto that bill~?” He asked as he flashed a charming smile at him.

The starfish chef rolled his eyes. “You’re lucky you’re my best customer, Mako, otherwise I would tossed you out on your tail fin before you could even think the word ‘discount’!” Despite the harsh words though, Makoto just laughed it off, with the chef soon joining him. However, once the chuckles died down, all eyes were on Awesome. “So kid, what are you havin’?”

“Oh, uh-” He looked up again, but couldn’t see any real sign or menu anywhere, “I guess I’ll have whatever he’s having?” He couldn’t do better than a local recommendation, right? “Oh, and Blue Smawaii. Haven’t had one of those in a while.”

“Sorry kid, can’t make a Blue Smawaii,” the chef replied bluntly as he got to work, opening up the cooler behind the counter, “Only bottled drinks here. But, I can still get ya the two grilled shrimp kebabs.”

“Oh... Well, that’s cool,” Awesome said, trying not to look too disappointed. Instead, he gave a small smile as he sat down. “Heh, guess I’m gonna get to try one of those awesome kebabs that one of the guys who was stationed here told us all about.”

“Oh no, that place is always packed,” Makoto told him, giving a dismissive wave, “If we try to go now, there’s no way we’d get in. Besides, the kebabs here have the same taste for a cheaper price. Even for not having any fingers, Reg still knows how to make a good grilled shrimp.”

The younger shark-man’s smile faltered, but he didn’t say anything as the two silently watched Reg wash the shrimp before beginning to stick them onto the skewers. 

“...So, why don’t you tell me some more about the stuff you’ve been up to,” he heard his father say after a few moments, “We still have some stuff to catch up on, right?”

Awesome glanced over at him, his smile slowly returning. “...Heh, yeah, totes.” So, he started telling him about some of the sweet parties he’d thrown, the various victories he’d had, some of the people he had met, and he even told him about some of the things he had done as a kid like becoming the star of his dance class and eventually developing his own style. And, as an added bonus, since his dad didn’t know about them in the first place, he wasn’t forced to mention any of his failures or any incidents involving her. Definitely a great added bonus.

There weren’t too many questions or even much excitement from Makoto’s side of the conversation, but there wasn’t any signs of boredom or disapproving glares (things he was more than used to getting from his other parent) either, so Awesome took it as a good sign that he was enjoying the conversation. And honestly... Awesome was too, even if it wasn’t anything too exciting or cool. It was still admittedly just sort of... well, nice!

Although, there was one instance of disapproval from his father, and it was right after Awesome had finished sharing the story about a certain party...

“Wait-” Makoto quickly swallowed his bite of shrimp, “So, ou destroyed her whole house? And you didn’t tell her about it until after she came home?”

“Yeahhhh...” Holding back his laughter, Awesome just gave a sheepish smile, “I mean, I didn’t know the party would get THAT crazy! ...Well, okay I did but I didn’t think it’d be that big of a deal! I mean, like, it was at her summer off-planet home, so she still had her winter off-planet home that she could crash at!”

“Still, I can kinda see why she would be pretty pissed at you for that one,” Makoto lightly argued, not exactly looking too pleased about the incident either. Awesome however just rolled his eyes. Sure, maybe he did feel a bit awkward about some of his other destructive parties when he thought back on them, given that lots of planets in their Galaxy were destroyed not too long ago... But this party? He didn’t feel too bad about it at all. 

Thankfully, Makoto didn’t intend to scold him too much on the matter. “Trust me, I know she’s not the easiest person to deal with,” he said as he turned away slightly, “But Odie’s not the worst. Difficult to please, but not the worst.”

“If you say so,” his son mumbled, pausing for a moment before quickly finishing off the rest of his kebab. 

Soon enough, their meal was finished, the bill was paid, and the two shark-men were back on their way. The sky was darker now, with a few stars managing to twinkle bright enough to be seen. The boardwalk was a lot emptier too, but thankfully this was just one part of the planet. 

“Huh,” Awesome started to say casually, putting his arms behind his head, “This place practically looks deserted. Guess everyone’s just out doing their own thing at clubs or bars or whatever.”

“Guess so,” Makoto shrugged before glancing over at him, “So, anything else you’ve got to tell me?”

While it was kind of nice to know that he really was interested, Awesome shook his head. “Nah, not really. But hey, I’m sure you’ve got TONS of stuff to tell me. Your own rad stories, cool people that you’ve met over the years, maybe even some awesome places that you’ve been to here on Baroceon? Heck, I bet there’s plenty of fun things to do here!”

Makoto paused, and after a moment, he smirked slightly. “Yeah, I guess there are some pretty fun things to do here, and some guys I know that are pretty cool. Think you’d be up for it, kiddo?”

“You know it~!” Awesome replied, practically shouting his answer.

“Heh, alright.” With that, Makoto continued, once again leading the way while his son excitedly followed, grinning the whole way. 

()()()()()()()()()()

Needless to say, where they ended up going wasn’t exactly the place Awesome expected. 

After fifteen minutes of walking, the two had traveled from the boardwalk, to a street, to a small neighborhood that sat on a small hill, giving a somewhat decent view of the ocean. 

“Most of the other guys should be here, since it’s a Friday,” Makoto said as he knocked on the wood of the sliding door. A muffled voice answered, and he slid the door open. Almost immediately, he was met with several greetings. “Hey Mako!” “Wow, you’re actually here this week? Thought maybe you forgot about us.” “Or maybe he just wants to get his pockets emptied.”

“Heh, you wish, Brock,” Makoto smirked, making his way inside. Of course Awesome followed him, and was glad to see that the living room of this house looked at least a little bit bigger and newer than the house looked on the outside. Still, there wasn’t much to it. Just a few dudes sitting around a table, a bowl of chips, and some playing cards. There wasn’t even a radio there to play background music. 

If there was any consolation though, at least the guys there looked kinda cool, along with looking just as chill as his dad. “So who’s the kid?” one guy - a green alien with three eyes and a shell on his back - asked.

“Guys, this is Hersch-” “Awesome.” “Ah, right. This is Awesome, my son. He’s here visiting for the night, and I just figured we could both have a pretty fun time here.” Not having any problem with that, most of the guys scooted over to make room while the three-eyed man went to go get a couple more chairs. 

In return for their welcome, Awesome just gave them a small smile and a ‘S’up?’. “Heh, I can see the resemblance between you two,” another man - one with eyestalks and tentacle arms - commented.

The man next to him however - a dark grey guy with small, black spikes along his back and limbs - didn’t look nearly as impressed as he looked up and down at Awesome’s outfit. “Kawarini musume o tsurete kita no wa tashikadesu ka?“ he muttered. 

Unfortunately for him, it was just loud enough for Makoto to hear it, and in one swift movement, he had hooked his hand under the guy’s arm (making sure to avoid the spikes). He then lifted him up, high enough so that he could see Makoto’s very unamused look. The guy cringed, wincing at the pain. “H-Hey, come on, Mako! It was just a joke!”

“Yeah well, how about we keep these ‘jokes’ to a minimum, alright Mori?” Makoto told him before promptly dropping him back in his seat. Awesome couldn’t help but give a small smirk at the incident, though it quickly fell once he saw the cheap looking chairs that he and his dad would be sitting in. 

However, when he saw that Makoto had no problem with them, Awesome swallowed his complaints and sat down next to him. “You guys up for a drink?” Brock asked. 

The younger shark-man grinned. “Tc’ch, always, bro!”

The others chuckled a bit at that. They could still remember when drinking was fun and exciting for them, even if it was a long time ago. “Pick your favorite, kid,” the man with the tentacles said as her reached under the table and pulled out the various bottles they had to choose from. Once again, Awesome was met with total disappointment.

Cheap beer. Nothing but cheap, generic, barely worth drinking and totally lame beer. Grop, they didn’t even have Thunderblazz! Who didn’t have Thunderblazz?! Still, he was a bit thirsty, so he just picked the best of the worst and forced himself to take a small sip, holding back a grimace. What he wouldn’t give for a margarita or a pina colada or, heck, even just a few jello shots right now...

Once he had finished collecting all the playing cards (as well as a bit of cash from everyone except Awesome, who was allowed to have a ‘freebie round’ since it was his first game), Brock began passing them out to everyone, allowing both the game and any remaining conversations to continue.

Awesome tried to listen and add to their conversation, he really did! Because hey, maybe these guys were just taking a break, and before long they’d break out the good stuff and do things that were actually fun to do on a Friday night. There was still a chance of that, right?

...Well, after several minutes passed, it definitely didn’t look too likely. And, once the conversation shifted from just sharing what had happened to you recently to discussing the prices of fishing nets and boardwalk food, Awesome completely tuned out...

()()()()()()()()()()()()

“A pretty good last game, huh?” Makoto asked as he walked out of the house about twenty five credits richer. Nothing too big - their pots and the amounts they put in them each round, never were - but it was still something.

Awesome, who was in the middle of yawning, quickly replied, “Uh, yeah, totally. Heh, didn’t know you were such a card shark...”

“Eh, I think I was just lucky tonight,” Makoto shrugged, still smiling a bit, “But I’ll admit, I still know how to play my cards right. You know, once I actually have the right cards in my hand.”

The sky was already starting to lighten up, with Baroceon’s nights being a couple hours shorter than most thanks to its placement within its system. The sky was sorta cloudy however, so any sunlight that was starting to appear was mixed with plenty of shadows and shade. The air was cool, and Awesome could hear a few gulls chirping in the distance (far in the distance, thankfully). Despite his night turning out to be completely and utterly boring, he could admit that this moment at least was pretty peaceful.

After a moment or two however, the mood was ruined a bit when he picked up on the scent of smoke, his snout scrunching up a bit in response. Glancing over, he quickly found the source of the smoke, and couldn’t help but stare at it. “...You smoke?”

“Hm?” Makoto met his gaze as he blew out another smoke cloud, “Yeah. ...Is that ‘not cool’ or-?”

“Oh, no it’s cool. I mean, I’ve got nothin’ against it,” he replied, though he still had a bit of a confused expression, “It’s just - I don’t really remember you smoking before. ...But, I guess I was only a couple years old at the time and, like, we were living underwater so-”

“Yeah...” He sighed, “It’s not something I do too often but, hey, it makes a pretty good substitute for the heavier stuff.” 

The heavier stuff... If he had been surprised by his dad smoking, he really should have been even more surprised by that. However, all Awesome could focus on instead was the second set of implications behind those words: That his father actually did live the exciting, partying, wild life he’d always imagined he did, at least at one point. 

...So, what had happened to it? 

Finishing off his cigarette, Makoto gave another sigh and tossed it onto the old, wooden boards. Awesome made sure to step on it, crushing it as he walked forward. A bit of sunlight landed the side of his face, warming it for just a moment before disappearing, blocked by another purple tinted cloud. 

“So, you have a good time tonight, kiddo?” he asked as they turned a corner. The Skullship was still floating above the boardwalk, mouth opened despite it still being an hour and a half before Awesome’s set returned time. 

“Uh, yeah. It was... alright,” the younger shark-man answered, barely able to force a smile. For a moment, he wondered if his father would even notice.

But, whether it was considered a good thing or a bad thing, Makoto did notice. “Just alright?” he asked as he glanced back at his son, “Well, did you actually have a good time or not?”

“Yeah, sure,” Awesome shrugged, his eyes now on his feet, “I mean, it was, like, a pretty good time. So, yeah.”

Makoto stopped. Turning around, he crossed his arms and gave his son a flat look. “You don’t have to worry about hurting my feelings, you know. So come on, what’s wrong? What didn’t you like about it?”

“...” The younger shark-man sighed, forcing himself to look up at his father. “Okay, like... it wasn’t a terrible night or anything! I can promise that I legit enjoyed some parts of it. But, like... I guess I was just, you know, expecting more?”

“...And why’s that?” Makoto asked, more out of curiosity than accusation.  

“Why not?” Awesome retorted, “Like, I just figured that when you started talking about great places and hanging out, I thought you were talking about going to clubs and partying and doing stuff that’s actually cool and fun! Because honestly, why wouldn’t you want to spend your life doing that? That’s the stuff that’s worth doing, and that would actually be worth leaving for so that you could do it all, not just-!”

He stopped, his voice dying in his throat as his body froze. Grop... did he really just say that? His dad was staring at him, his eyes widened slightly. As the few seconds of silence passed, the air was so tense that not even a crashing asteroid could tear their eyes away from each other.

“I... I didn’t mean it like that!” Awesome said quickly, “I swear I didn’t! I mean- I totally understand why you left! I totally get it, and I’m not mad at you for it or anything! Cause, like, who wouldn’t want to live their life partying?! That’s WAY better than just being stuck on your boring home planet with lame losers your whole life! I can’t blame you for wanting something cooler! And I mean, flarp, that’s pretty much the other reason I left home too! Not just to make the kingdom bigger, but so I could have the freedom to live an awesome and epic party-life! It’s what I did before, and it’s what I’m going to do again once I’m done with my training!”

He paused, taking a moment to give his dad a small smile. “So, like, don’t think that I’m mad at you or hate you or anything, okay? We’re still cool, right?”

Unfortunately, his son’s words did nothing to reassure him. In fact, Makoto just looked more upset now. “...What?” Awesome asked, not understanding, “I said-”

“I know what you said,” Makoto replied as he finally turned away. Awesome’s frowned deepened as he clenched his fists.

“...I’m sorry,” he said simply, his words still sounding small even if they were genuine.

“You... You shouldn’t be the one apologizing.” Makoto still wasn’t looking at him. Really, it almost seemed like he wasn’t looking at anything. He was just staring into space as his thoughts raced, though one thought rose above them all: If there was any moment where he had to actually be a dad, this was it. “Hey, Awesome...”

“...Yeah?” his son asked cautiously. 

“You want to know why I live such a simple life? Why I live such a ‘boring’ life?” he asked as he looked up - his face almost looking like it had aged another decade in just a few seconds. “Well, it’s ‘cause I learned something that’s pretty important: You’re never as cool as you think you are.”

“...” Awesome could feel his heart start to feel like it was sinking, but as much as part of him wanted to just completely ignore this, another part couldn’t help but listen as his father continued talking.

“You’re never as cool as you think you are... Even if you feel like you’re on top of the Galaxy, there’s always people cooler than you. Better than you, happier than you. So you try to feel better than them. Do stupid grop, force people to stay by you, do whatever you can just to feel the excitement and the high and the applause and the freedom. But it’s never enough... And before you know it, you’re stuck in your spotlight all alone and trapped while everyone else has moved on...”

“I, I don’t-” Awesome tried to say, his body shaking slightly, but he felt too stunned by all of this to try and argue. 

“It’s just the facts of life, unfortunately,” Makoto told him, glancing up for just a moment, “It doesn’t matter what we try to be, or even what we do. If we don’t eventually stop, we end up dooming ourselves. Make more mistakes, more regrets, until we’re at a completely dead end.” 

Awesome winced as flashes of his attempted come-back party, and even all the mistakes before it, were brought to the front of his mind. He clenched his eyes for a moment, trying to push them back. Those failures didn’t matter, he just had to forget about them and just be even more awesome to make up for them!

As if he could tell that this was what Awesome was doing, he older shark-man then looked his son straight in the eye, once again getting his complete attention. “And as long as you keep living this life - the cool, epic, awesome life that you want to get back to? - you’re just going to keep hitting that same dead end,” he finished simply.

“...” Even if his chest was still heavy, Awesome managed to glare at his dad, growling under his breath as he shook even harder. “Are... Are you serious...? Are you serious right now?! You’re calling what I love to do, what I am, a MISTAKE?! I mean, really?! Seriously, what gives YOU the flarping right to just throw shade on the way I live?! To call me a failure just because you made some mistakes?! I’m-!” 

Almost immediately, he was silenced when Makoto stepped forward and grabbed his shoulder, gripping it firmly and steadying Awesome’s shaking just a little. Another ray of sunshine passed over them like a small wave, lasting for only a few seconds before the shadows of the clouds pushed it along. 

“...I know we still don’t exactly know each other that well, and... I’m sorry about that,” Makoto said quietly, “But... I don’t want to see you end up in that spotlight alone, chasing something that you’ll never reach and that’s just gonna leave you behind in the end. ...But there is another option, you know.”

“...A-And, what’s that?” Awesome asked as he tried to keep his voice steady.

“You can keep partying, and keep enjoying yourself. But... When people start to leave, and you know it’s slowing down, don’t try to stop it. Don’t try to force them to stay, or force it to continue, or wait for new people to join you. Instead, just leave with everyone else. Don’t let them leave you behind, and don’t choose to stay behind. Just let the party end.”

“...” Once again, Awesome found that he couldn’t say anything. He had things he could say but, at that moment, he just had no words. Makoto kept his grip on his shoulder, the two standing there side-by-side, feeling like they were the only two on the planet. But finally, Awesome did manage to say one word: “...Okay...”

It was hard to know what he really meant by that. ‘Okay, I’m going to follow your advice’ or ‘Okay, I heard you’. Honestly, Makoto wasn’t even sure that Awesome knew himself. Still, he accepted it, giving his son a small nod. “...I’ve made plenty of mistakes since I left home. Plenty of regrets, too,” he told him, tightening his grip just a little, “But, for what it’s worth... I don’t regret running into you again.”

Awesome said nothing. No agreeing, no arguing... but he didn’t try to pull away either. 

The minutes seemed to pass like ages as they continued to stand there, words and thoughts and even memories continuing to echo around them. Eventually though, Makoto glanced up at the sky. He gave a small hum. “Looks like it’s gonna rain a bit today... I guess I should probably get back to my stall, just to set things up.”

“...Yeah...” Awesome replied, his eyes locked on the floorboards below. Slowly, he felt his father’s hand loosen, staying just long enough to give him a small pat or two on the shoulder before disappearing. 

“...Hey.” The younger shark-man managed to look up. Makoto was already looking at him, managing a small smile, even if he did look pretty unsure. Still, he continued. “So, if you need to talk or anything... I don’t really mind if you decide to call me. Alright?” 

It took a moment, but Awesome did actually nod back at him. “Alright... Later kiddo.” 

“Yeah, later...” Makoto turned around and walked away, sticking his hands in his pockets as he kept his head forward. After a couple seconds, Awesome turned around as well, heading down the short rest of the way towards the Skullship. ...It wasn’t until he reached the tongue that he realized he had never even asked his father for his phone number. Still, he made no effort to try and catch up with him, and instead just sat down.

He didn’t really keep track of how long he sat there, but he knew it had to at least be 5:30 when he heard two pairs of footsteps walk down the tongue behind him. “...Uhh, Awesome?” Hater asked, “You know the ship’s open, right?”

“Yeah, Hater. I know.”

“...Then, why are you just sitting out here?” he asked as both he and his commander raised an eyebrow at him. When he didn’t answer, Hater asked another question. “...Did your dad turn out to be a huge jerk or something?”

Awesome thought for a moment before shaking his head. “Nah...”

“Well, did he not show up at all?” Peepers asked, trying his hardest not too sound too accusing. 

Awesome however still managed to give a small scowl at the implications, just for a moment. “No, he still showed up, and we spent the whole night together.”

There was a pause. Even more curious now, Hater and Peepers stepped of the tongue and moved to in front of the shark. “Then... What did happen?” Peepers asked, actually looking a bit concerned.

Awesome gave a small sigh, wrapping his arms tighter around him. “...Let’s just say that my old man just finished laying down some harsh truths for me and... I’m just trying to process it, alright?” Closing his eyes, he moved his hand up to rub his eye, not caring about ruining the make-up. 

“...I’m probably gonna stay out here a bit longer,” he told them, “Just, like... Give me five minutes or so. Or, I mean, if you guys gotta leave now, I can just catch up with you later or whatever...” 

The two looked at him for a moment before looking at each other. Not really sure what else to do, they simply moved out of the way and back onto the tongue and up to the jaw. Not too long after this, Awesome felt a raindrop or two land on his snout. The sun was fairly high now, providing a bit more light, but there were still plenty of thick clouds. “Guess he was right about the rain,” he mumbled, using the back of his fingerless glove to wipe the water away, only for three more drops to land on his face. 

With no point to it, he put his hand back down and continued to sit. A couple more drops landed on the top of his head. A raindrop or two here, a few more there, and then- ...Nothing. 

Blinking, Awesome glanced up, and saw the rim of a light red parasol hanging above him, easily blocking the drops. 

He felt Hater sit down next to him, offering an only-slightly awkward pat on the arm while Peepers stood at the former emperor’s other side, still managing to stretch and hold the parasol high above Awesome’s head. “...You’ve got ten minutes,” the commander told him. 

“...Yeah,” he nodded, briefly glancing over at each of them before facing forward once more, “Got it.” Maybe he wouldn’t exactly start to feel great after ten minutes, but it would be enough. 

And so, that’s what the three of them did. They just sat together, staying silent and staying close as they watched the rain lightly fall. 

THE END

((For those wondering what that one guy’s ‘joke’ was, he said “Are you sure you didn’t bring your daughter instead?”. Yeahhh, you can see why Makoto didn’t exactly appreciate that comment. 

Anyway, thanks for reading! Ever since I started writing the Awesome Arc, I knew that I wanted to write a story about Awesome running into his dad, and I also knew that it’d probably be one of the more interesting Awesome Arc stories to write. So, I really hope you all enjoyed it! ^v^))

[marciabrady]

joanleslies submitted: if you are still doing the princess ask: tiana (princess and the frog) and giselle (enchanted) ♡♡

Princess Tiana

Favorite thing about her?: Ok I don’t want to focus too much on her race, because I feel like that’s unfair to her character, but I genuinely love that Tiana was the first black princess? And like, that they didn’t make her a whitewashed depiction of a black woman- they gave her the most beautiful deep skin tone and that broad nose, full lips, and big eyes look that is so iconic to her. I also love the way Annika’s voice sounds, it’s so unique and reminds me of when all the princesses were different. I think she was the last true princess we got- Rapunzel and beyond feel like Pixar characters to me. I also love that cooking is an interest of hers.

Least favorite thing about her?: How incongruous she is. I feel bad because I think way too many expectations were placed on her. Disney princesses have already gotten so many untrue criticisms that now the fact that they’re strong women has to be hammered down our throats until it’s unnatural. I definitely feel like the writing doesn’t allow Tiana to just be Tiana? Like…who the writers vs the directors vs the film vs Annika believe Tiana is are all different people. For instance, the movie focuses on Tiana being a workaholic as a negative. She forgot the message her father instilled in her- yes, wishing on a star won’t solve all your problems and hard work will have to get you there, but you also do need to retain that belief in magic and love. She totally lost that and it wasn’t until she learned to love and balance work with her personal life that she found her happily ever after. But people talk about pre-arc Tiana as if that’s what we should inspire to? The grind culture of it all is…but there was a panel a few years ago and the voice actresses of Tiana, Moana, Belle, and Ariel were there. When asked what their princess contributed to the lineup, they ALL answered- aside from Ariel’s VA- that their princess was the first to show you didn’t need a man. I don’t know how THREE princesses were the first to do this lol but to say this is also way too simplistic and ignores the plight of previous princesses. Annika said Tiana showed you can have your own dream and accomplish that without your love but Tiana literally shows the opposite of this in the film. She can’t accomplish anything because she’s working herself to death. She even kisses Naveen in his frog form because she thinks it’ll give her the restaurant she wants lol so like I said, she’s just very unclear from a storytelling perspective.

Do I like her movie?: Honestly, no lol I desperately want to and there are shining moments but Tiana’s incongruity really is distracting, I find Naveen unwatchable, and their dynamic is awful to me. I also just hate any portion of the film where they’re frogs. It’s childish and the fact that there’s legit SWAMP animals throughout makes me feel like I’m watching deleted Shrek scenes, like I need a little more glam than that lmao I’m hoping the Tiana series delivers!

Favorite outfit she wears? THE MUSTARD DRESS. It’s so insanely flattering!!

Favorite song from her movie?: Ok I just love when Mama Odie sings “your daddy was a loving man, family through and through; you your daddy’s daughter, what he had in him you got in you” reminds me of Cinderella and it SLAPS

Favorite animal (or human) friend she has?: I mean it’s not the firefly with gas issues lol I’ll go with Charlotte!

Which trait of her personality do I most see in myself?: I overwork myself too??? Like a good work ethic? Idk honestly Tiana and I really are not alike in any way

How would I rate her prince?: Bottom tier, he’s so annoying to me

Where does she rank on my top 10 favorite princesses?: Mid-tier! I think she adds value and we can’t have the princess line without her but she is missing a few things from being in my top. I wish she had more heart, but I’m hoping her series will address these shortcomings.

Princess Giselle:

Favorite thing about her?: I love her verse in True Love’s Kiss!

Least favorite thing about her?: Her wedding dress lol I also hate how they made her a parody of older princesses, like it felt blasphemous to me. Also, while I like Amy Adams, I don’t think her voice is special enough to be a Disney princess’s

Do I like her movie?: I loved it when it came out but I find parts of it grating. I think it’s good overall, and the musical numbers are great, but her arc irritates me and I think it has the worst ending of a Disney movie ever lol also I will never not cry over the fact that Mary Costa and Ilene Woods were going to have a cameo but didn’t!

Favorite outfit she wears? Her original animated pink look with the flowers in her hair is literally a DREAM and the way I wish they would’ve designed Rapunzel!

Favorite song from her movie?: Her verse in True Love’s Kiss, as mentioned before! But I like all her songs tbh

Favorite animal (or human) friend she has?: Hmmm I guess I have to say Pip lol but I actually love Idina’s character in that movie and the little girl character

Which trait of her personality do I most see in myself?: The romanticism and optimism she displays when she’s still an animated character.

How would I rate her prince?: TOP TIER. He’s so dreamy and romantic and brave and I love his dedication and commitment to Giselle. I’m sad the film makes it like Giselle becomes too ~deep~ for him after she becomes human as if traditional romances can’t have weight and nuance to them.

Where does she rank on my top 10 favorite princesses?: Mid-tier. I loved her as a child, like when she first came out, but she didn’t really have staying power for me as an adult. I do really like her though! I’m very interested to see how they handle her characterization in the sequel.

Put a Disney Princess in my ask and I’ll answer!

[mrmichaelchadler]

A Look Back at Those We Lost in 2018

Below is a full index of our tributes from 2018, celebrating the unforgettable talent we lost like Penny Marshall, Stan Lee, Aretha Franklin, Burt Reynolds, and more. Each tribute includes a passage from the obituary, a credit to the respective author, and a link to the full piece. 

John Mahoney (1940-2018) 

“Whether it was in film, on TV, or on stage, John Mahoney found a way to always feel like he was present in a scene, listening to the actor opposite him and not just waiting to say his rehearsed lines. I was lucky enough to see him at the Steppenwolf, and he was so completely captivating that he stole nearly every scene he was in. What he did was so subtle—whether it was in “Frasier,” “Barton Fink,” or on stage—that it probably didn’t get the attention it deserved, but he’s one of those rare actors about which one can honestly say that he made everything he was in just a little bit better. And sometimes a lot.” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Jóhann Jóhannsson (1969-2018) 

“He leaves behind an incredible discography, made from his sensibility to tell stories with minimalist melodies, grandiose arrangements and meditative pacing that challenged the conventions of music composition. Aside from his own accomplishments as a nearly unclassifiable composer, his film work was pivotal to helping numerous movies deeply resonate with audiences.” (Nick Allen) [link] 

Steven Bochco (1943-2018) 

“On the Mt. Rushmore of TV creators next to faces like Norman Lear and David Chase, there should be a spot reserved for Steven Bochco, the man who changed the medium of television drama in the way he emphasized ensemble over star vehicles and multi-episode arcs over standalone stories. Shows like “Hill Street Blues,” “L.A. Law,” and “NYPD Blue” earned Bochco a stunning 10 Emmy awards, along with prizes from the Directors and Writers Guilds of America and four Peabody Awards. In 1996, he was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame. He should probably have his own wing.” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Isao Takahata (1935-2018) 

“As a producer, he co-founded the legendary Studio Ghibli with the legendary Hayao Miyazaki and would go on to collaborate with him on a number of his internationally celebrated films as a producer. […] Without his efforts and influence over the years, it is safe to say that the animated film industry would be a markedly different beast than it is now, and definitely a less interesting one to boot.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link]

Milos Forman (1932-2018)

Milos Forman, the Czech-born filmmaker who helped revolutionize cinema in his home country before moving to America and becoming one of its most celebrated directors as well, has died. The man behind such celebrated films as “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” (1975) and “Amadeus” (1984), both of which won Oscars for Best Picture and earned him prizes for Best Director, passed away from what was described as a short illness at the age of 86 at his home in Connecticut. Mixing together surreal humor, documentary techniques and an interesting blend of cynicism and affection, Forman helped put Czech cinema on the map. When he applied those same techniques to the projects produced in his adopted country, the result was some of the most incisive, knowing and most profoundly American films of his era. (Peter Sobczysnki) [link]

R. Lee Ermey (1944-2018) 

“Ermey was fun to watch. He became an actor by playing himself, a rare breed of man who was familiar as himself—an American, a Marine and later, an actor. While many scream over Hollywood's liberal slant or other preconceived notions, Ermey's presence on screen was an example talent always wins out. We're all winners for having the Sarge in our viewing life.” (BJ Bethel) [link] 

Anne V. Coates (1925-2018): 

“Throughout a career spanning over 60 years, she worked on over 60 films, receiving numerous accolades that included two Oscars and four additional nominations, and is credited with creating perhaps the most famous single cut in movie history. [...] In 2003, she was named an Officer of the British Empire by the Queen in celebration of her career. In 2007, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, who had in the past nominated her work on “Murder on the Orient Express,” “The Elephant Man,” “In the Line of Fire” and “Erin Brockovich," presented her with a Lifetime Achievement Award. She received her second Oscar, a Lifetime Achievement Award, in 2017.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Margot Kidder (1948-2018) 

“She was a spiky brunette with a sexy low voice, but she had her goofy side. Her “Superman” director Richard Donner once said that Kidder was so physically maladroit that if she walked into an empty room with a small trashcan in it she would somehow find a way to get her foot caught in that trashcan.” (Dan Callahan) [link] 

Tom Wolfe (1931-2018) 

“As a journalist, he would take subjects that I would ordinarily have little interest in—Southern California car culture, LSD, the early days of the space program—and attack them with both a zingy writing style that was practically novelistic in nature. He had an enormous depth of detail that made the subjects come to life in the most memorable and unexpected of ways. Later on, Wolfe applied those same techniques in the service of narrative fiction and came up with a series of best-sellers that included one of the most popular and influential novels of the second half of the 20th century.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Philip Roth (1933-2018) 

“Early novels like Goodbye, Columbus and later novels like The Humbling might show differences in relative aggressiveness but they grow from the same work aesthetic and the same desired relationship with the reader. Much like the greatest films, they pick you up, they draw you in, they show you a world—and the world, usually, is not the world you would have dreamed up. It is a world in which you are morally and intellectually uncomfortable.” (Max Winter) [link] 

Harlan Ellison (1934-2018) 

“That said: if you want to send Ellison off in style, do as he encouraged, and not just as he wrote: read more; talk back to any authority figure within earshot; raise a stink if you feel like you're being taken advantage of, even if it's by a friend; value your time, and don't be afraid to walk away from somebody you love if they don't; respect artists by paying for their work; denounce superstition whenever you can, especially when it seems harmless; reject platitudes, and don't let anybody tell you that your informed opinion doesn't matter. Life may be a series of confrontations, as Ellison said at least once, but you can't let the bastards get you down.” (Simon Abrams) [link] 

Claude Lanzmann (1925-2018) 

“The 1985 documentary “Shoah” was a movie whose critical reception, at least in its United States incarnation, was defined by a slight paradox. The nine-and-a-half hour movie about the Holocaust, specifically the Nazi death camps operated in Poland, was a work utterly defined by the personality, the aesthetic, and the moral determination, and determinations, of its director, Claude Lanzmann. [...] Lanzmann’s flame was an uncommon one. Filmmakers and people of conscience and compassion the world over would do well to keep its memory close by.” (Glenn Kenny) [link]

Tab Hunter (1931-2018) 

"And yet, it was the very things about him that the system sought to repress—such as a sly, self-effacing sense of humor and his homosexuality—that helped breathe new life into his career a couple of decades down the line. Now that he has left us, three days before his 87th birthday, Hunter will be remembered not just as a pretty face with an admittedly memorable name. He'll also be celebrated as a trailblazer whose accounts of his experiences as a gay matinee idol in Hollywood at a time when such things were unheard of helped pave the way for acceptance." (Peter Sobczynski) [link]

Aretha Franklin (1942-2018)

“Her lyrics told you to think, but her voice taught you to feel. She was a fountain of useful knowledge, too: She could tell you who was zoomin’ who, where Dr. Feelgood’s office was and the exact speed limit on the Freeway of Love. She also knew that the only path to immortality was through her art, so she infused every one of her performances with an otherworldly staying power.” (Odie Henderson) [link]

Neil Simon (1927-2018) 

“Neil Simon’s work was often about human connection. It was a message often hidden in humor, but he was clearly a playwright and screenwriter who believed in empathy and compassion, bringing together disparate personalities to ask a simple but crucial question: If Felix and Oscar can get along, can’t we all?” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Burt Reynolds (1938-2018) 

“His screen persona often fused the strong-silent jock-adventurer with the anti-establishment wiseass, a combination that had never been attempted in movies before, at least not to such staggering effect. In the '70s and early '80s, Burt (that's how you referred to him, as Burt) was the biggest movie star in existence.” (Matt Zoller Seitz) [link] 

Scott Wilson (1942-2018) 

“Every time I got to talk to him, he was unfailingly kind and open and, best of all, filled with great stories. I mention all of this here upfront because as you read this, I want to stress the fact that he was not just a great actor but a great guy as well. [...] Because of his association with “The Walking Dead,” it was ensured that his passing would not go unnoticed and I can only hope that the renewed interest in the man will inspire some to go looking at some of his past work to see what a truly gifted and memorable actors he was. He may not have been the most famous of actors but when it comes to the things more important than fame—little things like talent and decency—what he left behind will more than stand the test of time." (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Stan Lee (1922-2018) 

“It is impossible to fully grasp the influence Stan Lee had over the world of popular culture since he first achieved fame in the Sixties. As a writer, editor and publisher of comic books, he, along with an extraordinary group of collaborators, revolutionized and expanded what could be said and done in that particular art form in ways that reverberate to this day.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

William Goldman (1931-2018) 

“William Goldman changed the perception of the screenwriter in Hollywood, often refusing to give in to studio or directorial demands—his list of “unproduced screenplays” is as long as the ones that got made. He was an icon in his industry that helped pave the road for well-known screenwriters that would follow him like Aaron Sorkin and Cameron Crowe. Movies wouldn’t be the same without him.” (Brian Tallerico) [link] 

Nicolas Roeg (1928-2018)  

“Roeg was one of the least celebrated influential filmmakers of the last half-century. In terms of the techniques that he helped refine, he's as important as Orson Welles or Stanley Kubrick. And if you judged contemporary cinema purely in terms of the grammar that it has borrowed and retained from past masters, you might have to give Roeg the edge, because of how he told stories.” (Matt Zoller Seitz) [link] 

Ricky Jay (1946-2018) 

“He was a sleight-of-hand magician whose illusions startled and amazed audiences throughout the world; a student of the history of magic who used his extensive knowledge to pen several books, and put together a number of museum exhibitions and lectured extensively on the subject; an actor whose cagey screen presence made him a favorite with such filmmakers as David Mamet and Paul Thomas Anderson; a crucial man behind the scenes who helped create a number of the screen’s most celebrated illusions.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

Bernardo Bertolucci (1941-2018) 

“Bertolucci was the opposite of austere, providing the element of danger in these movies—this was dependent on plumbing a sub-conscious that could be seen as out-of-date in some areas, but that was part of taking such risks. Sometimes it felt like Bertolucci was providing the idea of a certain type of Italian film director of his time, and that idea was meant to be more than the sum of his filmography.” (Dan Callahan) [link]

Penny Marshall (1943-2018) 

“To some, she was the co-star of one of the most popular sitcoms of its era and a familiar face/voice on any number of shows over the years. To others, she was a trailblazing filmmaker who became the first American woman to direct a movie that made over $100 million at the box office, a feat she would repeat for a second time just a few years later. Whichever side of the camera she was working on, Penny Marshall was a consummate entertainer who could handle everything from the broadest slapstick comedy to serious drama.” (Peter Sobczynski) [link] 

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