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blueikeproductions · 9 hours

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Some more anecdotal thoughts on TFONE.

Spoilers still.

The concept of the Worker-Bots being lower class, and several characters having serial numbers over names suggests this is meant to be wide spread. Only D-16 and B-127 seem to be this for some reason, with Elita-1 sorta meeting half way. Instead of Orion Pax, you’d think he’d also have a serial number in C-01 or the more on the nose OP-1984. Jazz is a miner and still named Jazz, rather than J-06. Sideswipe could be SW-04, Arcee RC-86, Ironhide, I-98, and so forth. Maybe I’m looking too much into it, but you’d think considering the “demeaning” nature, Sentinel would go farther and strip them of their very names as well as their Cogs.

Sentinel never actually Transforms into his Vehicle Mode at all, and is exclusively in Robot Mode throughout the movie. His wings and jet boosters in his feet make it clear he’s a jet like his toys, but the only thing he turns into is his heavy artillery Apex Armor like mode in the climax.

Despite having a toy that shows the Quintessons can Transform, it’s unknown if they can in the actual film. This feels like an unintended side effect of retconning them as being descendants of Quintus Prime, as technically that should mean they’re Cybertronian, and therefore be able to Transform. The EarthSpark ones are unable to as far as we can tell, with the only Quintus descendants that can being the Terrans. Unless the Quints go the way of the Echidnas and Owls in the Sonic movies, maybe that’s something reserved for a possible TFTWO. Maybe their ship Transforms into a robot called Quintus Maximus, I ‘unno.

Due to copyright jargon, the series usually can’t use the terms Transformer or Transform in non modern animated media super well, leading to clunky ways of describing themselves. The EarthSpark and TFONE books have resorted to calling the species “Transformers Bots” which sounds like a bad SyFy parody show. While G1 and Beast Machines in particular freely refer to the species as “Transformers”, more modern material like Prime and EarthSpark imply the Transformers call themselves “Cybertronians” while “Transformer” is a term coined by humans. Though in RiD15, the Bee Team, in particular Fixit, off and on refer to themselves as Transformers, confusing the matter. TFOne goes nuts, not even trying to hide who they are and what they do, with the species collectively called “Transformers”, their Cogs “Transformation Cogs” like in G1 (they never once call them “T-Cogs” like in Prime), with Optimus able to actually say “Transform and Roll Out!” Megatron sadly never gets to say “Transform & Rise Up!” like his Animated self (and to a lesser extent his Prime self), but Megatron nevertheless adapts Rise Up! as his team’s battle cry.

A little boy in the theater I was in got really excited when the Autobots stumbled on the deer-bots, like he was pumped. Where’s the deer-bot toy, Hasbro? You have a customer.

Like other media, it’s not super clear if these examples of Cybertronic fauna can Transform. They’re not shown to, but nothing suggests they can’t either. They probably would turn into humanoid robots if they got toys, but I like to think, similar to Cyberverse, the deer turn into little cars or something.

The organic plant life is never explained, though Orion and the others don’t recognize it either, and remark in surprise something non metallic can live on the surface. Some fan theories suggest the plant life was due to the Quintessons’ maybe attempting to terraform Cybertron, but the how and why remain unclear. It might just be a throwaway reference to Beast Machines and Galaxy Force, both famously incorporating organics into Cybertron at series end.

The Allspark is never referenced in the film, so how the Transformers reproduce is never specified. Presumably the Allspark still exists, but then again some modern media is slowly moving away from it. IDW never used it in either of its G1 main line books, instead having Vector Sigma, the Matrix, the Moon Bases and Cybertron itself generating life. The Allspark was in TFP and RiD15, but wasn’t crucial to the plot. Prime ends with Optimus and Wheeljack casually fetching the relic in a sector in space, with its (now empty) container used to trap Unicron’s Spark. EarthSpark showed the Allspark existed but quickly tossed it aside, favoring the OTHER life giving relic, the Emberstone. Skybound has yet to reference the Allspark, but going by how close it’s sticking to 80’s material, Vector Sigma is pry more likely. The TFONE Matrix is similar to the Allspark in that it’s connected to Cybertron’s naturally flowing Energon, and without it, Cybertron is doomed to dwindling resources. What this means if the story continues and the Transformers leave Cybertron for Earth we have yet to see.

How the Autobots and Decepticons get their names is a bit clunky. The Decepticons get it in a similar way to IDW, the one reference to it, where they take it from the “deception” of Sentinel and Orion. The Autobots seems to be more spontaneous, it seemingly coming from Orion, now Optimus, reflecting on the miners’ new autonomy with their Cogs, dubbing them “Autobots”. How the Autobots get their logo isn’t known either, the logo just pops up as the credits roll. The Decepticons get their logo from Megatronus Prime’s face mask, as D-16 was a fan boy, collecting related merch. Sentinel, out of spite, torches a crude version of the mask on D-16’s chest which completes the origin. Ironically, as Megatronus never becomes The Fallen and is legitimately heroic as far as we can tell, his symbol being used by Megatron as it is, intentionally by the writers or not, mirrors a similar situation with The Punisher’s logo.

Double checking it, Zeta Prime is apparently a replacement for the 13th Arisen Prime. My guess is they replaced him because without The Fallen, The Arisen word play doesn’t work. Plus, having Orion Pax be preordained to be Optimus like he was in Aligned doesn’t fit here. Zeta Prime isn’t depicted as being the sociopath he’s portrayed as in IDW, but we don’t see a lot of him either, so it’s hard to say for sure (though I doubt he’d be carrying the Matrix if he was). What is for sure is they make it clear, until a future movie retcons it, that the Primes were all benevolent beings shepherding the Transformers. None of that “The Primes are all corrupt and horrible!” nonsense. Sentinel is the only one depicted as being corrupt, but he’s also not a (true) Prime either. Optimus is depicted as the true successor to what the Primes stood for, vs Sentinel who was in it for his own greed. This somewhat mirrors stuff like Nova Prime, though it’s more streamlined so casuals can understand it.

#maccadam #transformers #blueike #blueike productions #transformers one #transformers one spoilers

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arcielee · 2 months

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ARCIE 💜 i think i over did it ._. for the writing ask 😘

1, 2, 4, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 32, 35, 37, 38, 43, 44, 53, 66, 69, 72, 73, 75, 78, 81, 86, 88, 94, 99 👀

All right, Mrs Hardy. Let's do this. 😈

1. do you know how you want the story to end when you start, or are you just stumbling through the figurative wilderness hoping to find a road?

When I first started writing, it was because I had one scene on reply in my brain and I had to get it out of my head (an example of that would be The Sapphire Prince). \

I much prefer my method now, which is word vomit every thought in my head into a doc, which can be events, notes, random conversations the characters we have to whole ass paragraphs.

2. talk about a notable time a narrative or character has looked you dead in the eyes and said “fuck your plan, here’s what we’re actually doing.”

Again, The Sapphire Prince. That story was such a cluster fuck and nobody did anything I wanted them too. 😭 I couldn't even have a sweet moment for my boy Ser Erryk in that damn story!

4. what is the plot bunny you’ve been carrying for the longest? optional bonus question: do you ever wonder why you haven’t written it yet and experience deep existential dread?

First, shout out to my beloved @some-distant-star for telling me yesterday wtf this is. 💜

Probably my Dane!Osferth story that thrums around in my mind. I think it continues to rattle around because I need to figure out how to keep what makes Osferth Osferth, but also have Dane tendencies? I actually started my word vomit doc for it, so we'll see what happens.

9. in an ideal world where you’re already super successful and published, would you want to see a tv or movie adaptation of your work? why or why not?

This is tricky. I have seen situations where the movie did better than the book, but then I am also watching House of the Dragon and have become one of those mouth breathers who say, "But in Fire & Blood...!"

It can be an anime. 🥰

10. at what point in the process do you come up with titles, and how easy or hard is that for you?

Titles are the hardest thing about writing for me. Like, let me shell out 30k+ words for a story and then panic over wtf to even call it. (Dancing in the Dark remained title-less until I finally started going through random Spotify playlists, like a raccoon rummaging through garbage, if you will.)

12. do you ever have trouble focusing on writing? how do you get around that?

If a story keeps escaping me, I will take my dog on long walks and see if it can come to me. By this, I mean I am the crazy lady in a sun hat who is talking to herself while her dog looks confused.

[Image: my dog, who sometimes edits for treats]

If that does not stir my muses, I do not force it and just go wherever they lead me. I have written an entire ass story in the middle of another story so I could clear my head of it and finish on the original.

13. talk about a writing experience that has pleasantly surprised you.

Probably my Call It Dreaming series? It was my first ever Reader Insert that my beloved @f4ll-for-you helped me with, and it profoundly changed my writing style.

14. what’s your worst writing habit?

Probably my overuse of semi-colons.

16. where is your favorite place to write?

Anywhere, everywhere. I have my MacBook that I bring with me, I have a notebook brimming with my ideas, and my phone notepad looking a hot mess.

17. what is your favorite line you’ve ever written?

I really love describing Aemond, but this also comes to mind:

They were all moths drawn to his flame, fluttering with their desperation to touch. You pushed through them, determined to be burned.

All the wild hearted ambition

18. what is your most and least favorite part of writing?

My favorite? The beginning. I love day dreaming, brainstorming, fleshing out a new idea. I love how it repeats in my brain and lulls me to sleep at night.

My least favorite? Saying goodbye. Once it is written, it is gone from my mind.

19. what are some books or authors that influenced your style the most?

Patricia Highsmith's prose style had a huge impact for me. Also Margaret Mitchell crafted my writing in the sense that I could see everything in her story unfold in front of my eyes and I wanted to pay that forward.

20. what is your favorite trope to write?

Probably mutual pining with a sprinkle of slow burn. 🥰

21. pick a writer to co-write a book with and tell us what you’d write about.

A.C. Crispin and it would be a scifi adventure with a ragtag group surviving life after Earth.

32. do characters influence your writing style?

Yes. For myself, I do not enjoy writing for a character that I don't fully understand. My goal, always, is to make it sound like it was pulled from the original content.

35. tell us about a character who’s very different than you who you love a whole lot

This man.

I haven't forgotten. I need you to watch this.

37. when creating characters, what comes first: appearance, backstory, motivation, personality, something else?

It is reactions to the plot shenanigans. This helps me visualize and create a backstory for them.

38. how many stories do you work on at one time?

I have 10 WIPs currently, and 2 which I am actively working on.

43. how did writing change you?

For myself, writing allows that processing time that I need to understand something that happened. It is healing for me. (ex. To Build a Home)

44. any writing advice you want to share?

It is very easy to get swept away with notes and kudos, but if you are not enjoying the process, then what is the point?

Also, the best advice I ever received came from my beloved @sylasthegrim who told me to focus on what they were feeling as opposed to the action that was being done. (Ilysm 💜)

53. when writing, do you have an outline? and do you stick to it?

I do now! And it actually helps me stay on track with the fucking plot, which I definitely need.

66. when have you felt the most confident in your writing?

That is something I still struggle with. Like, I am please with how I have evolved as a write, but then I read someone else's masterpiece and figure it would be best if I unplug my PC and walk myself into the nearest body of water. 😆

69. how do you write emotional scenes? do you ever feel what the characters feel?

Their emotions are my emotions, and it can make or break my day.

72. what do you do if a scene gets too serious?

I follow the muses. If it is needed, it is written.

73. how do you visualize scenes? do you see it like a movie in your head, or do the words just flow?

I can see it playing in my head and I narrate it, out loud, to myself. Then I frantically type or write it down before it leaves me.

75. do you know how your story ends before you start writing?

Most of the time, yes. But if I am trying to write out what I outlined and it is not coming together, I will drop the WIP for a while and let it simmer a bit longer.

78. how do you choose where to end a chapter?

This depends: so, sometimes I write out an entire story, look over the work count, and take that into consideration when I am chopping it up. Other times I outline certain events that need to take place before the chapter can end.

81. if you could go back in time and give your younger self a piece of writing advice specific to you, what would it be?

"Girl, please, for the love of fuck, end that goddamn sentence."

86. which season best matches the mood of your wip(s)?

The kind of winter you see at the wall.

88. if you could have another author write your wip for you (bc we all dream of this occasionally), who would it be?

Oh my goodness, gather round my talented Tumblr kindred spirits, I would pass these out like Halloween candy. 😆

94. do you prefer dialogue or description?

99. was being a writer a dream of yours when you were little? or did it spring up when your older? or is it just a hobby?

I have been writing since I hit double digits. I still have these ridiculous notebooks with glitter covers that are filled, front to back, with my original attempts at writing.

My husband understands to burn them when I am dead. 🥰

ask game for fanfic writers

#ask arcie #mrs hardy ilysm 💜

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wordsandrobots · 3 months

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On reflection, I think quitting 86 EIGHT-SIX because the subtitles wheeled out an actual Nazi slogan is as good a reason as any not to write anything in-depth about it, so I'll simply summarise my thoughts about being recommended this anime as something in the same vein as Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans.

It's not.

There are broad aesthetic similarities but where IBO is a tragedy, the plot driven by characters' flawed reactions to bad circumstances, 86 -- at least for much of its first season -- falls more into the region of moral horror. That is, the horror of being stuck within a society entirely at odds with your personal morals. In this mode, it's quite effective, particularly when using small victories to highlight the wider, inescapable nature of the situation.

Unfortunately, from my perspective, 86's second season promptly drops any pretence of having anything other than a standard heroic arc, ditching the implication of a crushingly cyclical conflict and also any sense of real stakes for the protagonists. Given the show is an adaptation, I'm not sure where to place blame for that. Frankly I'm not inclined to delve further to find out. Within a horror context, the juvenile fantasy racism that forms the impetus behind the characters' struggles isn't a particular flaw. The emotional beats land despite the details. But with the horror elements becoming mere obstacles to be overcome, it's just asinine. This is a world where the major act of exterminationist racism is prompted by an AI apocalypse scenario, and the oppressed peoples are afforded no deeper identity than simply not being blue-eyed and silver-haired.

(In case it's not fully clear what I mean by that, the anime spends zero screen-time on non-conscripted District 86 people. There's no sense of a culture being obliterated by the official policy that stripped them of their personhood, nor of what remains to be saved should that policy be overturned.)

Again I can't say if this comes from the adaptation or the original light novels. It's a fairly brief anime that, in fairness, makes the most of the space it gets. But we circle back around to where I started. At best, the sense I get is of a piece of fiction existing within something akin to the 'imperial anti-imperialism' framework of, say, Code:Geass (or War of the Worlds, if you want the classic British example of the type). At worse -- well, suffice to say 86 is now something I won't recommend to anyone, ever.

It's also just not particularly good, in my opinion. Outside the horror elements, the characters feel extremely stock, lacking interesting details or nuance. There's nothing like IBO's thematic tightness and 86 certainly bears no relation to real-life child soldiers. What it does in this regard is not utterly divorced from reality, but it's framed in terms of conscription, not the reasons kids get drawn into fighting in the situations we usually mean when we say 'child soldier'.

The most positive thing I took from thirteen episodes of 86 is a fresh appreciation for how 'mecha anime' functions as an aesthetic genre, often obscuring narrative genre. If you enjoyed what IBO does, I doubt you'll find much to chew on in 86. Even setting aside its comparative shallowness, it's not remotely the same kind of story.

Anyway. Don't like spending words on stuff I didn't enjoy, but PSA for anybody who gets recommended 86 off the back of IBO: its subtitles have Nazi shit in them, and you won't be missing much by not watching it.

If you can, go dig out Fafner in the Azure instead. I know I rave about IBO a lot but Fafner is by far and away the best mecha anime I have ever watched. While also not a tragedy, it's an exceptional, heart-breaking story framed around war with an 'unknowable' alien horde, that unfolds into a deeply sincere exploration of what it means to fight in defence of home and community.

#86 eighty six #gundam iron blooded orphans #I stand by the difference between juvenile in the sense of 'this is aimed at teenagers'#and juvenile in the sense of 'this displays a lot of shallow ideas about the world'#the former is value neutral #the latter can and should be critiqued #as should translators who ought to fucking know better #and if they do and did it anyway then fuck them

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heloflor · 11 months

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You know, considering how many posts I recently made about Movie Peach and how negative they are, there’s something I feel the need to clarify since I wouldn’t be surprised if people had some assumptions and I don’t want words I didn’t say being put into my mouth (Tl;Dr at the end):

As a completely original character, fully detached from everything other than the movie, I have no issues with Movie Peach. She’s badass in a fun way, spunky, has a few cute faces, and I especially appreciate how despite being a strong female character stereotype she’s very supportive of Mario and builds him up rather than putting him down, it makes her likeable and their relationship very cute.

And yes, this is the way I perceived her from the get-go, but only mentioned it in my movie reaction post made all the way back when said movie came out, hence needing to say it again now. To quote that post: “Least favorite character is DK. It could’ve been Peach but my issues with her stem from how different she is from her games counterpart. If you take her movie character as a brand-new character rather than a game adaptation, she’s actually pretty great as a guide and strong mentor.” And while there are things in this post I now disagree with, this part remains my current opinion.

So yeah, as an original character, she’s pretty great...but that’s also the issue.

Movie Peach is not an original character. She’s supposed to be an adaptation of a pre-existing character who already has her own personality. And as an adaptation, Movie Peach fails at every level. Not only that, but several dialogues keep hyping her up in a way that comes off as Illuminations looking down on Games Peach, you know, the character their own Peach is supposed to be an adaptation of.

That’s why I take such issue with Movie Peach. It’s not the character itself, it’s how bad of an adaptation she is. And if I did my job correctly, every single time I talk negatively of her in my posts, it’s about her as an adaptation specifically. The only instance of me being an ass for no reason is in my table comparison post where I call her a dumbass, which I point out in the tags to be me throwing shade and not something I actually believe.

Now I also want to say that I hate Movie Peach for what she represents and the consequences of her existence on Peach’s character and her perception by the public, so to keep it short I’m going with bullet points:

It annoys me a lot that a multi-million dollars company couldn’t be bothered to adapt her character properly, especially since they apparently closely worked with Nintendo and the concept art very much show them who Peach is as a person (the one where she’s encouraging Mario to fight DK reminds me of the 86 Anime where she keeps having Mario fight her battles while powerless to defend herself; also it’s funny how in the art of Games Peach reacting to Movie Peach it’s obvious the artist had no idea what personality Movie Peach has). The fact she’s a favorite character of mine doesn’t help and makes me feel robbed from seeing a beloved character on the big screen for the first time. And obviously them low-key insulting her by hyping up Movie Peach makes it worse.

Even before getting into the fandom I knew that Peach isn’t the most well-liked character, with many gamers especially finding her bland and boring. This was already sad on its own, but now those same people are praising a character who’s completely different from her for being “so much better” or “finally giving her a personality”. It sucks. Games Peach deserves better than that.

With those things in mind I don’t think I need to explain why the fact this characterization is possibly bleeding out into the games is something I dread. Now I can live with a cover art change, but if they change her actual character I’m going to scream. Especially if they only do it to Peach and no other character. And yes I know some people also pointed out a possible direction change for her voice but 1. for some reason I don’t really care, possibly because she’s been through quite a lot of voice-actors already 2. we only clearly hear her voice in the Showtime trailer during the Kung-Fu part so maybe her voice will differ depending on the costume, it is a stageplay after all, and 3. the Wonder short with Bowser has her let out four noises, one of which has a different tone while the other three keep her usual high octave, so I’m not sure if they truly intend on changing her voice. Haven’t played Wonder yet tho so I can’t speak to all her other voicelines.

Hopefully this will be my last post about this outside of answering asks and reblogs as I’m always open to discussions/debates. I don’t like bringing negativity and especially not drama to my blog but, considering the extensive rant I made about this, it only feels right to make sure people don’t misinterpret where my issues come from, since I can absolutely understand people seeing my posts and concluding that I hate Movie Peach for who she is rather than what she represents.

Now, instead of being negative about Movie Peach I’d rather focus on being positive about Games Peach, mostly through the fics I’m working on.

Tl;Dr: Movie Peach would be genuinely great as an original character but alas she was put inside the skin of someone with a completely different personality from hers. And it's very hard to look past this given the consequences of Movie Peach's existence on how people percieve Peach as a whole now on top of a possible change in her games character.

#Super Mario #Princess Peach #Movie Peach #Mario Movie #Flor talks #long post #yeah I'm getting a bit more personal in my explanations here; it's not an analysis post like the other ones after all #but thing is the main reason why I take such issue is BECAUSE I love the character so it feels personal #I mean I wouldn't be talking so extensively about a bad adaptation of a character if I didn't care about them #oh and for those asking what did DK do; I just don't like his character archetype #tbh I feel like an ass rn for complaining about such trivial stuff when a LITERAL GEN/OCIDE is taking place; and things are getting worse #but I want to put the whole comparison thing behind and this is the last info that needed to be said; so it needs to be posted now #and I mean it this time when saying it's the last post outside of answering asks; I said everything I had to say #(but yeah I don't like bringing politics into my blog as I want it to be a place to enjoy fandom content #but what's happening right now in pales/tine is beyond horrifying #and the fact politicians are using 'we don't want to be called bigots' to justify their inaction is utterly disgusting #just admit you can't be bothered to help instead of hiding behind false political correctness)

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canmom · 2 years

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Animation Night 145: Brid Bard

...Bard Brid? Sorry, the line’s not very clear here. Say again...

Oh, Brad Bird?

OK, so. Imagine there’s a really dad-like guy who directs movies. Someone for a lot of nostalgia for his childhood during which, Cold War not withstanding, he was impassioned by witnessing The Jungle Book (not unlike a certain Richard Williams) and encouraged by supportive parents to pursue animation. And it went well. Really well. Our boy Brad got an ‘unprecedented’ internship at Disney with Milt Kahl(!) off the back of his film The Tortoise and the Hare, had a chill time at high school, then went to CalArts on scholarship where he studied alongside John Lasseter (keep an eye on him. not just because he might sexually assault somebody but also because he’ll be in this story later), Tim Burton and Henry Selick.

In short, about the most direct and uncomplicated route into animation you can imagine.

Brad Bird joined Disney (their investment paying off) in 1978, working on films like The Fox and the Hound and The Black Cauldron, but soon clashed with the studio heads who he judged not to be upholding principles he believed Disney represented. (He would be vindicated in a way by Don Bluth throwing down the gauntlet a few years later and kicking off the ‘Disney Renaissance’.) One of his last contributions must have been to The Brave Little Toaster, where he worked alongside the future founders of Pixar.

There followed a few years in which he moved to the SF Bay Area (perhaps not so gentrified back then(?) but Bird definitely had money), pitching projects left and right. One of his big passions was to adapt the comic book The Spirit. Mostly he tried experiments that didn’t pan out, like making a CG film at Lucasfilm with Ed Catmull, later founder of Pixar. He worked on The Plague Dogs (AN 86) until he got fired again.

Nevertheless, his reel of hypothetical films did catch the eye of Steven Spielberg, who absorbed Bird into his company Amblin Entertainment in order to expand his short film The Family Dog, co-created with Tim Burton, into an episode of the anthology series Amazing Stories. (Family Dog would later spawn a disastrous spin-off series in 1993, but by this point Bird had moved on). I think it’s worth noting this one because it gives a sense of what sort of original ideas Bird is working with: a dysfunctional suburban family as seen through the eyes of their dog. ‘Dysfunctional suburban family’ would be the centre of... almost every single one of Bird’s works since.

Bird continued to work under Spielberg’s wing, still clashing with execs; he got straight-married in this time to film editor Elizabeth Canney. Things seemed to be going well enough, despite his frustrations - until his sister Susan was killed in a murder-suicide by her estranged husband. This understandably fucked with him pretty hard. After a few years of depression he recovered, enough to take an invitation to work on The Simpsons in 1989 after Matt Groening was impressed by the cinematography in Family Dog. (Seriously he’s connected to just about everyone in the animation industry!) He continued on the Simpsons throughout the early 90s, working part-time to ‘oversee the script-to-animation pipeline’ and introduce this same filmic sensibility, as well as contributing to other animated sitcoms like The Critic and King of the Hill.

Let’s fast forward to the end of the 90s. As we’ve discussed... many times on this webbed site, this is when the steam of the ‘Disney Renaissance’ was about to run out, and the new CG era was about to begin. Our boy Brad, meanwhile, is struggling trying to juggle being a Dad(TM) with spending all his time making animated films. Which leads to Brad writing... a story about a suburban family strained by one of them being a superhero, yeah.

But Brad wouldn’t get to make this film just yet. Instead, his successful pitch was something called Ray Gunn, a scifi story about a detect in an Art-Deco retrofuturistic world. This movie also did not get made... but it’s because Warner bought up the studio Turner that was making it, and shut down Ray Gunn. Instead, they offered Bird a different animated film with a nostalgic bent, adapting childrens’ book The Iron Man by Ted Hughes, which was in its turn written to help his children cope with the death of his wife Sylvia Plath (yeah that Sylvia Plath!). Bird liked the pacifist themes of the novel, but while the children’s book has the feeling of a parable, he gave it a concrete setting in the 50s, and centered the story on the paranoia of the Cold War, seen from the point of view of an innocent boy.

So with this first movie we see start to see the major preoccupations of Brad Bird come into play (though he did not write the screenplay in this case). The Iron Giant comes in the middle of a brief handful of traditionally animated films made by Warner to ride on the coattails of Disney; the others include Space Jam and Osmosis Jones. They were by and large not very successful; The Iron Giant was the one critical success but failed for blah blah marketing y’know reasons. Like most of Bird’s films, the core relationship is a father [figure]-son one, in this case beatnik artist Dean who lives in a junkyard and ends up becoming surrogate father to nine-year-old protagonist Hogarth.

The themes of the film are pretty on the nose: in an idyllic American small town (Bird explicitly referred to Norman Rockwell and sitcom character Ward Cleaver) masking severe paranoia falls a harmless alien robot. It’s viewed as a threat by everyone but the social outcast and the child. The military get called in, gung-ho to throw around their toys; by the time the townspeople figure out that they’ve been huge cunts, a missile is in the air. What saves everyone is the fact that our nine-year-old protagonist has gone to the effort of teaching the Giant good old American values, so it goes and intercepts the missile in a heroic sacrifice... undercut with a final hint that it can regenerate. In fact Bird originally planned an ending where full scale war breaks out between the US and USSR, but ultimately this was softened.

What sells it is charming character animation. The production seems to be the opposite of most animated film stories: meticulously planned, prevised and storyboarded, while making effective use of cel-shaded CG for vehicles and mecha scenes, putting it among the first works to experiment in that direction. In another anime-like touch, the animation of the film was divided up by scene rather than by character.

And, within the American full animation tradition, it’s probably one of the only films to address the Cold War at all. Of course there are others from other countries! When The Wind Blows is probably the most direct; anime is rarely directly about the Cold War (the Future War 198X controversy excepted) but it’s implicit in most works that deal with sci-fi and military themes such as Akira. And in modern times, now that it’s History and serious animated dramas are more accepted, you get films like Funan about the Cambodian genocide. In the USSR... it’s complicated.

But in America... while animation studios were recruited en masse to produce WWII propaganda, for the most part animated films from the 50s through to the 80s don’t really touch on the war. They adopt mythological past settings, or tell stories closer to home. Perhaps by the time of The Iron Giant, with the war over, and the specific setting now 50 years in the past, it was considered safe enough.

The characters of Bird’s film are very much archetypal. It’s kind of a fable about the Cold War, and in the final edit of the script, a reassuring one. The ‘illusion of life’ animation techniques are used to imbue each character with enough charm and specificity but they are largely defined by their roles. I’m not saying this to criticise; this is precisely the model of film that American animation specialises in and it uses it to very good effect. Ultimately though because it’s a fable, you can only take so much from it.

Despite the commercial failure of The Iron Giant, it did finally give Brad some clout as a director. A certain John Lasseter to a new studio that was making serious waves in animation... yeah, you know them, it’s Pixar. I wrote about early Pixar back on Animation Night 75, so go check that out if you like.

At Pixar, Bird ended up directing the studio’s sixth film, finally getting a chance to follow up on his pitch for The Incredibles which features... that’s right... a suburban family with a beleaguered father in a setting designed to nostalgically reference a mid-20th-century American aesthetic. Mmm.

By this time, Pixar movies had started to establish a formula. The characters would be some kind of high concept centering on characters like toys, bugs, monsters or fish that wouldn’t face the limits of rendering humans. Usually they would center on a duo of male characters who would start off at odds and but gradually build a bond over the course of the film. They’d be suitable for kids but have enough comedy to amuse adults. There would be a villain to overcome, and a wider sphere of quirky buddies to support the main duo. Women would be almost nonexistent. At this time, it seemed that Pixar could do absolutely no wrong; their films were basically always hits.

But even so, I remember when The Incredibles came out. It hit the nerd sphere like a bomb. I remember all the memes about Edna Mode (voiced Brad Bird) shouting ‘no capes!’; I also remember the articles that argued that the film was in fact Objectivist propaganda.

Looking back, it’s hard to entirely disagree with them! The thrust of The Incredibles is that an ungrateful public rejects the special superheroes, leading to an end to their romantic days of vanquishing evil and staging dramatic fights on top of trains; now they’re all caught up in the banality of the capitalism. Bob, aka ‘Mr Incredible’, works in a miserable cubicle as an insurance salesman; Helen aka ‘Elastigirl’ is an exhausted suburban housewife trying to rein in somewhat estranged superpowered teenagers. The pencil-necked bureaucrats of Society, you see, have denied them the chance to exercise their special abilities as they did in the romantic past.

But lo! There is a new supervillain after all; it is Syndrome, once a starry-eyed young superhero, who after a rejection by Mr Incredible, came up with a plan to create a high-tech scheme to sell gadgets that would make just about anyone be able to use superpowers - even if, the arc words declare, ‘if everyone is special, no-one is’, a sentiment that basically goes unexamined further. However, his plan to stage a superhero battle to sell these gadgets backfires resulting in an out of control robot. Luckily, the Incredible family have been united over the course of their adventures and can defeat the robot, society reevaluates the superhero issue, and the captains of industry heroes can assume their proper roles of being naturally better than everyone.

It is, looking back with adult eyes, a very strange narrative to be pushing; it’s possible to see the feelings that Bird must have put into it but damn lmao dude’s got some shit to examine. But as a film it’s technically pretty much impeccable, with memorable sequences that got memed about as much as any animated film from the 2000s. It opened ‘families amirite fellas’ as an avenue for Pixar to tell stories about, which they’d dig into much further later with films like Inside Out.

But I won’t spare too any more words on The Incredibles, since I’m not actually planning to show it tonight. No, the other film of Bird’s I’m planning on showing is...

Ratatouille! A film whose influence lasted so long that you’ll get an extended parody even in 2022′s Everything Everywhere All At Once. As far as Pixar high concepts go it’s pretty up there, centering on a food-loving rat Remy who befriends a chef and hatches a scheme where he will give instructions by tugging on his hair while hiding under a chef’s hat. This concept was not due to Bird but to Jan Pinkava, director of Geri’s Game, who had developed the film for years; Bird was pulled in to attempt to salvage what Pixar saw as a hopelessly mired production. Bird, with some reticence, took the established design work, but rewrote the script into something that better fit his tastes in filmmaking. Pinkava for his part refused to comment, but left Pixar not much later.

So the Brad Bird angle enters in the secondary plot, with Remy’s relationship with his dad who doesn’t understand his artistic passion for food. The story is probably what you’d expect given these elements! ‘Probably’ because... I actually haven’t seen this movie, it’s like the one major gap in my knowledge of ‘classic’ Pixar films.

Since Ratatouillie, Bird departed animation and started directing live-action films, including an episode of Mission Impossible that breaks the formula (unless it’s got some kind of dad arc I don’t know about), and Tomorrowland which gets back on the 50s nostalgia train. I haven’t seen any of them so I can’t really comment too much except to say that it sounds like Tomorrowland doubles down harder on the vague Objectivism angle lmao.

But rather than an explicit philosophical conviction, which Brad Bird the self-described ‘centrist’ doesn’t particularly seem to have, it seems more that it’s just a channeling of not entirely examined frustrations about his difficult time getting established as a filmmaker. Bird, it seems, grew up basically being told he was a one of a kind animation genius, and entered the animation industry with a lot of romantic expectations which were frustrated by its reality. It’s easy to read his films as mostly being about how people didn’t understand clever Brad Bird.

Bird is a bit of an odd case in another way. Like basically all animators he rails against the ‘animation is for children’ stereotype of the medium that just doesn’t seem to break, yet his films are very much about archetypal characters with very clearly defined, abstracted arcs. Perhaps that’s just what he’s able to make. But he doesn’t seem to be interested in pushing the envelope anywhere particularly weird or discomforting. Beyond his ambition to bring live action cinematography in to animation, his ‘superpower’, once he got to exercise it, seems to be that he’s very good at planning. His scripts are tightly focused, his productions are on schedule, and he’s the guy you call in when old Jan isn’t finishing his movie on time.

Still, all these criticisms aside, he’s one of the major influences on the subsequent decades of CG films, and his films are consistently very solid. So if you’d like to join me - with apologies for the late start - we’ll be watching The Iron Giant and Ratatouille over at twitch.tv/canmom. Hope to see ya there, films start in about 15 minutes!

#animation night #went overboard with this writeup rip

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minasummersch · 2 years

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papyrus & jasmine (but I kinda wanna change the latter part of the Q to "and would recommend to anyone" if that's alright!)

papyrus ⇢ if you put your ‘on repeat’ playlist on shuffle, what’s the first song that comes up? what do you like about it / associate it with?

I've talked about this when I last answered this question here, but I don't have an 'on repeat' playlist. I'll link a song from my 'liked videos' playlist on youtube for you instead!

youtube

I am not sure I could even begin to explain this video tbh. I really like Gilmore Girls and something about the combination of Rory with Taylor Swift songs is fucking immaculate.

And here I'll also link a song I've had on repeat over the last week for you!

youtube

This is the first full song Nino sings in the Anonymous Noise anime/manga. Something about how messy it sounds really stuck with me and I am just living for these vibes. I know rock music totally plays against the aesthetic I have going but I want so badly to one day sing this song.

jasmine ⇢ do you have a movie or book you loved but will never watch/read again? and would recommend to anyone?

Oh boy! I have a long, long list of books, movies, tv shows, anime, manga, and light novels that I toss around as recommendations to friends. I usually like to tailor my reccs based on what I know people like but since I'm not entirely sure about your tastes I'll give a few of the ones I know most poeple enjoy.

Oscar (1991): a movie with Sylvester Stalone and it's a comedy so you really can't go wrong with this

Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun: either the manga or anime, both are amazing imo and the comedy is unparalleled

Summertime Rendering: honestly the best mystery manga I've ever read and it got a boppin anime adaptation just this year, go in with as few spoilers as possible

Pandora Hearts: please read this manga, if not for the plot then just for the art because Mochizuki Jun improves so much over the course of this series and it's absolutely stunning

86 eighty-six: watch the anime and if you're feeling it read the light novel or just wait it out for a second season because this will definitely get one

2.43 Seiin Koukou Danshi Volleyball: okay so I know this is the less popular volleyball anime but I like this one more

IDOLiSH7: i love these idol boys and this is the best idol game turned anime adaptation out there I think

IDOLY PRIDE: the other really awesome idol anime, I love this more than words can say and it's just a good time all around

Ao no Exorcist: read the manga and just avoid the anime please, the manga is much better

Fruits Basket: I watched the 2019 series and I didn't know what I was getting into at all but damn it was worth it, this anime is perfect

Kaze ga Tsuyoku Fuiteiru: I clearly like a lot of sports anime lol, but nah this one is good and has like warm and fuzzy friendship vibes but an older cast so it's a bit more serious

Kono Oto Tomare: music anime about a traditional Japanese instrument with great friendship and romance, I loved this so much that I bought the CD and I will one day play it for my wedding

Ya Boy Kongming: it's got great music and is hilarious, you could not ask for more imo

The Raven Boys: this was a fun time to read, like it had friendship and romance and all that teenage angst but also treasure hunting and supernatural powers

Percy Jackson: someone has probably already recced this tbh

All Our Yesterdays: the only valid time travel novel imo

Here Lies Daniel Tate: there's murder, there's mystery, what more could you want lol

The Devil is A Part-timer: watch season 1 of the anime and if you want to continue past that hit me up because things get messy and your enjoyment will depend on which character was your fave

The Last Fallen Star: a korean mythology middle grade novel

Into The Spiderverse: do I need to say more lol

The Good Place: again a comedy tv show, I do love comedy

Gilmore Girls: this is honestly a fascinating study in character development and writing

Ms Marvel: as a pakistani muslim this tv show was a mood in many ways

And there you have it! A very extensive list of media for you to check out! If you want to talk more about any of these and/or want more reccs join my discord server and feel free to scream in there! I am always ready to talk about fandoms and series I love but there's not enough people around lol

Thank you for the question! Feel free to check out my other answers under the tag mina answers! on my blog!

#vtuber uprising #envtuber #vtuberuprising #envtubers #indie vtuber #vtubers #vtuber #mina txt #mina answers!#get to know mina #mina's musings #mina's ramblings

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aanyaforger · 2 years

Note

Anything you like recently works. I watch literally all genres 🤗

ohhhhhh ok! i'm going to throw in some lesser known anime's that are my personal favorites :3

Showa Genroku Rakugo Shinju - i love anything historical or relating to history. what i like the most about rakugo is it shows the history and evolution of rakugo in the 20th century as well as tells a personal story.

86: Eighty-Six - yes, i love it v much, i cry it's so fucking beautiful and i love emotions :')

Summertime Render - it is a bit gorey, but man. the studio nailed the adaptation on the head. each week i was in awe and it is very very accurate to the manga (as the mangaka worked with the studio personally)

Aria the Animation - it's a nice calm and relaxing anime :>

Golden Kamuy - Another great anime that tells history!

Princess Jellyfish - aahhh it's been so long since i watched but it's a great anime!

Baccano! - all i can say is chaos but in a good way. very fun, but also kind of gorey, but it's very fun and the music is *chef's kiss* (also i think the dub is very good hehehehe)

#ask #anon

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empty-dream · 3 years

Text

86 ep 22 rambling

I just checked, many of the scenes are not played exactly like this in the novel, or just downright not there. And oh my god for the nth time, thank you for the creative adaptation. It really hits solemnly hard from the beginning to the end. The months of waiting are WORTH IT.

Whoa that hits the mark Kiri.

The way I see it, Shin is clinging on Kiriya, someone he makes his objective out of desperation, while the latter lets him go (simultaneously throwing Shin's Reginleif out of the ground zero and letting Shin survive instead of dying with him.)

Fuck this metaphor hurts so much.

I love how they play with the black bars. It feels kinda meta, somehow like caging Shin in. Like when Shin's internal voice berates himself. Or when the image screen becomes so small as Shin feels even lonelier. Or when Lena steps out of the screen. And when they meet, the bars becomes white and fading away.

This scene is so quitely painful :''( It has been obvious since early 2nd cour but hearing Shin spelling it out loud that he wants to go to Rei's place and that's what he thinks about every time he holds Rei's piece hurts.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. God this part is making my hairs stand. They all really say 'Thank you' but their voices are overlapping with Shin's own self-loathing to the point he doesn't recognize their actual feelings anymore. (Particularly in the Spearhead squadron scene, when listening with earphones, Shin's voice comes out from one bud and the character on screen's from the other. So chilling. Hail to the sound designers.)

And I find it symbolic and also painful too that Eugene’s in the 86 memorial monument. (I don’t have a very clear hearing but I think at this point, Shin’s self-loathe is already majorly sounding like Eugene’s own voice because the way ‘it’ says things is more of Eugene’s but those are such cruel words..)

For the first time, Rei's piece is out of Shin's reach. And Shin's anguished scream because he can't reach it or anything else :'(

Probably this Legion doesn't even say all that and maybe it's only Shin who imagines that. Who knows? He's fucked up at this point.

This is cinematical experience wtf. The way red blooms as the flocks of Eintagsfliege disperse. How her face is partially hidden with her bangs. I also love how the anime decides to have her wear the black uniform instead of blue, because it's consistent with what she decided to wear daily after the Spearhead squadron left for the suicide mission.

The slow realization of who exactly it is he’s talking to....

AAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA THE PHOTO. THE LETTER.

THE SCENE WHERE THEY WROTE THE LETTER. Also Shin really went out of his way to write all their messages with identity, huh? Because the handwritings are all different...

Playing Voice of the Chord during this is a cheat move :''''''''''''

FUCK YOU LEGION THEY WERE SO CLOSEEE

Omg Shin's face T____T It’s so cute but it also makes me want to cry.

Nobody dies!!!! T____T Raiden’s expression is the epitome of ‘FINALLY, GOOD FUCKING NEWS Y’ALL”

Welcome back annoying papa Ernst. It's so funny seeing Shin and Ernst agreeing on something and that is to punish Frederica lmao.

This is cute lmao. I want to see more of Lena and Shiden’s interaction.

Kiri finally does what he does best and tried to do at the end of his original life: Protecting her. To the very end, he treasures her so dearly :''') I love this scene so much.

Frederica Rosenfort, 10 years old, empress of dissing people older than her.

They're gonna tease the shit outta him for a week I can feel it

They all want to know about the Major so much T___T I can't wait for them to meet :''''

LAST EPISODE INCOMING I WANT IT BUT I DONT WANT IT IM NOT READY FOR THIS RIDE TO END TT__TT

#86 #eighty six #random saying

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gonewiddershins · 2 years

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1, 9 10 13 15 16 18 23 52 53 55 60 63 71 80 86 107 121 127 134 135 for ur ask meme

wheeeee~

okay so there's are enough of these questions that I'm gonna answer this in parts because otherwise (a) I'll never finish and (b) tumblr WILL end up earing my drafts and I wince just thinking about that. So here we go-

1. a book that is close to your heart

The Beginning by K.A. Applegate. Anyone who's spent some time on my tumblr knows about my obsession with this series. It drilled into my ear and took over all higher life form function way back when I was an impressionable pre-teen. And then after sometime, when I thought I'd found other things to obsess about, I found copies of the final arc and it decided to permanently take up residence in my brain.

The Beginning is the final installment of the Animorphs series, which famously feature kids turning into animals to fight brain stealing alien puppeteers. It's not a climax- it's a extended denouement, because the books have always been about how children people are affected by war as much as as it was about the actual war. Animorphs also ended on a very bittersweet note, something unthinkable to baby me who had never seen a story end this way before. It was a learning experience.

Quote:

"Jake, you can't . . ." She took a deep breath. "You can't equate the victim and the perpetrator."

"So as long as you're playing defense it's not possible to commit a war crime?" I asked. "That's pretty close to just saying that the winner makes the rules because it's the winner who writes the history."

She grabbed my arm and searched for my eyes, forcing me to look at her. "No, Jake, it isn't. There are a lot of close calls in history, lots of wars where the blame is evenly split between the sides. This isn't one of them. Before they came to Earth no human ever attacked a Yeerk. No human ever harmed a Yeerk. This one is clear: We are the victims. They made war on us."

"That's good," I said softly. "All of that is good. We have justification. We're the good guys."

Marco said, "That's right, Big Jake, we are."

I nodded. "That's good for the big picture. See, my problem is a little more personal."

Ax asked.

"Well, Ax-man, you're right, you did call my attention to the possibilities on the Pool ship. And when you did that I guess I should have thought, Well, Jake, it's a harsh, terrible thing to do, but you're justified because, after all, you're the victim here. But that's not what I thought. You know what I thought?"

Cassie released her grip on me. But Marco just took a step up close, right in my face.

"I know what you thought, Jake. You thought Die, you filthy worms. Feel the fear, Yeerks. Feel the pain. Feel the helplessness. You wanted them to suffer and the idea of them suffering and dying made you happy. You were thrilled. You were high."

Cassie winced. She looked away.

I said, "Yeah, Marco. That was about it: word for word."

9. your favourite book of 2020 2022

2022 has been a weird year, reading-wise. My goodreads list is as bare as a chocolate box after two hours in my company, because the site is not good at tracking webtoons and webnovels. Which in turn makes it harder for me to remember what I liked and how much I liked it, because that's 90% of why I use goodreads in the first place. So you know, answering this makes me twitchy, because if I'm not keeping track how would I even know what my favorite is?

BUT. I can tell you which story IMMEDIATELY made me consume other adaptations, scour through all of its Ao3 pages, and go on a re-read almost instantly after the fanfics ran out and it's Spy x Family by Tatsuya Endo. Also, it has an active tumblr fanbase- glory be.

Spy x Family is about a spy, an assassin, and a telepath playing house. It's about found family. It's about two people you really wouldn't peg as parent material at first look being the most adorable parents ever. It's about people calmly accepting (and in most cases not even recognizing) each other's weirdness. It's about the humanity in war-torn places and war-torn people. Also there are a bunch of first graders who are having their own drama and it is somehow vastly entertaining.

Panel: (read right to left)

10. a book that got you through something

deep sigh. Okay, so I have a few mixed feelings about these books today that I didn't have when I first read them, but hear me out here.

Once upon a time, I entered into college as a bright-eyed, hopeful child who was sure she'd have the world within her grasp soon. Fast forward eight months and I was a depressed wreck who spent an hour a day crying and moving slowly but steadily towards suicidal thoughts. Suffice to say, it was not a good time.

In those trying times, books 1 and 2 of the Dresden Files gave me some much-needed laughs. Book 3, Grave Peril, went a step further, making me actually care about the worldbuilding and the character, giving characters actual losses, and getting me emotionally invested in everyone. The rest of the series accompanied me though my hellish time in college, and while it was probably not the best coping mechanism, I'm thankful it was there. Anything to quiet down the screaming in my head a little.

Quote:

“I still can't believe," Michael said, sotto voce, "that you came to the Vampires' Masquerade Ball dressed as a vampire.”

Part 1 of 7 |

#ask meme #jill see the thing #dresden files #spy x family #animorphs #book rec ask meme

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katzkinder · 3 years

Note

(multiple linked image references throughout this post)

Ok, so I loved this post

The part that got me though was when you said “I wonder what type of animal form they take factors into that” - that’s where the gears in my head started turnin’

So I went snooping on each animal counterpart associated with each sin.

1.) SLOTH: are cats sensitive to cold?

So Kuro isn’t JUST a neet that prefers blankets or a kotatsu over the cold… his animal form being a cat does play some part… key word beings some

“Cats are pretty well adapted for cold weather, but when the temperature dips below freezing they are susceptible to hypothermia and frostbite. During periods of cold weather, cats will go looking for a warm place to hunker down. How cold is too cold for indoor cats? Cats prefer warmth but will be okay in rooms hovering between 50-60°F degrees; while their counterparts Lions, in a zoo environment, stay outside in the winter unless the temperature dips below 40°F (in the wild, most lions don’t have to worry about temperatures dropping below 65°F so in most cases 40°F and below is too cold).”

SLOTH SENSATIVE TO COLD? ✅ (yes)

2.) PRIDE: are bats sensitive to cold?

“Bats can't survive freezing temperatures, even when they're hibernating. Any roost bats shelter in for the winter must be at least 45°F or warmer. They also seek out dark, secluded, and sheltered places that can keep them safe from predators. Bats are defenseless while they're hibernating.”

PRIDE SENSATIVE TO COLD? ✅ (yes)

3.) ENVY: are snakes sensitive to cold?

Jeje being a snake is pretty much a given… but it’d be mean to not include him (so no funny ideas outta you, ok Mikuni?)

“What is the coldest temperature a snake can withstand? Snakes usually stay out of cold climates. Because the coldest temperature any snake can thrive in is around 65°F, snakes normally live in the warmer temperate or tropical zones. Below 60°F, snakes become sluggish. Above 95°F, snakes become overheated.”

ENVY SENSATIVE TO COLD? ✅ (yes)

4.) WRATH: are wolves sensitive to cold?

“Wolves don't need to do anything. They're much better adapted to cold weather than we are. Thanks to their winter adaptations, wolves can live in temperatures as low as -40°F. During the coldest nights, a wolf will curl itself into a ball, covering its nose with its tail, which will hold the exhaled warm air over its feet and nose, conserving precious body heat. It will also sleep close to its pack-mates(her Eve) in a unified effort to stay warm.”

WRATH SENSATIVE TO COLD? ♾ (neutral-ish)

5.) GREED: are hedgehogs sensitive to cold?

“Hedgehogs getting cold is a BIG ‘No no’. It slows their metabolism down, leaving them susceptible to infections, dehydration and starvation. It's important to keep your hedgehog in an environment between 72-80°F. Even if it’s not always comfortable for us humans (comfortable for angels? no clue), temperatures lower than 70°F are considered ‘cold’ for hedgehogs and can result in a hibernation attempt, which can be fatal.”

Maybe that’s why Lawless always wears that scarf? Since hedgehogs are severely thermally sensitive then it would make sense…

(Crantz, Gil… please stop the angel from getting any ideas)

GREED SENSITIVE TO COLD? ✅ (yes)

6.) GLUTTONY: are pigs sensitive to cold?

In this case I will refer mostly to Vietnamese Potbellied Pigs because as far as I know, we haven’t actually seen Ildio’s pig form yet - one of the only depictions is Lawless’ stage depictions of the 7 vampire siblings in ep6… and based on his stage depiction of Ildio’s pig form, Viatnamese Vietnamese Miniature Potbellied Pigs seem like they’d be the common type of pig that seems to fit that shape/size.

“The ideal temperature range for a potbelly pig is 65-88°F. Pigs in winter do not need any type of supplemental heat down to at least -20°F. Most potbelly pigs require more feed to maintain heat production and body condition; meaning that housing aside, the more feed/calorie intake, the easier it can be for pigs to regulate their body heat.”

However, seeing as Ildio is an ageless vampire with the mother-effing holy grail of metabolisms, we don’t know if his MASSIVE calorie intake, that he doesn’t really gain much/any weight from, will actually help him in cold weather.

GLUTTONY SENSATIVE TO COLD? ♾❔(neutral/unknown where they stand exactly)

7.) LUST: are butterflies sensitive to cold?

Snow Lily’s butterfly appearance is probably one of the most exaggerated of the 8 servamp animal forms. That gorgeous shade of pink and black aside, I couldn’t find any real buttwrfly species with that wing pattern or wings shaped like that. So color and wing pattern aside, I’d say the closest real-world butterfly to Snow Lily would be a variation of Swallowtail Butterfly.

Butterflies are cold-blooded critters, however, generally speaking butterflies won't fly when temperatures are less than 55-60°F.

LUST SENSATIVE TO COLD? ✅ (yes)

8.) MELANCHOLY: are foxes sensitive to cold?

Even though Tsubaki’s two tails seem to be a play of of the legends of Nine Tail Fox, generally speaking based off his other details being black fox with white on the end of his tail(s), he is most likely a Silver Fox; which is a type of Red Fox.

The upper critical temperature of the red fox is probably between 86-89°F. An official temperature range of what is too cold for red foxes is more or less unknown or unofficial at best. The arctic fox is said to be able to tolerate temperatures as low as -72°F but red foxes haven’t occupied the tundra in the past partly because it was too cold; with their longer ears and limbs, they lose heat faster than their arctic cousins. So we know the average red fox can tolerate and survive cold temperatures, but most likely not temperatures like their arctic counterparts live in.

MELANCHOLY SENSATIVE TO COLD? ♾❔❌ (neutral/unknown where they stand exactly/least affected of the bunch)

and after ALL OF THAT…

the most interesting thing is–

when I first got into SERVAMP, I remember being curious where the concept of ‘the different sins transforming into animal forms’ came from. After a little research, I found that there is a history to it! A very detailed account of the origins and representations of them within history. And a small portion discusses the animal depictions of the original 7 deadly sins⬇️

“An allegorical image depicting the human heart subject to the seven deadly sins, each represented by an animal (clockwise: Toad = Avarice [greed]; Snake = Envy; Lion = Wrath; Snail = Sloth; Pig = Gluttony; Goat = Lust why? I have no idea; Peacock = Pride).”

So Jeje and Ildio’s animal forms are the only ones true to the original depictions of their associated sins.

Pride as a peacock does make sense… but I can understand adding the bat into the mix because - vampires.

I get why they’d change Kuro to a cat instead of a snail because I can’t see a snail being threatening at all unless it’s either severely poisonous or Gary… like, supernatural vampire powers or not, Kuro as a snail wouldn’t be very badass.

Why the ever living f*ck would a goat reprint lust? Originally I was going with the possibility that goat could be related to ram, ram represents Aries, Aries is one of the most lustful zodiac personalities… but no, apparently the goat represents the Devil, lust, lubricity and the damned… so that’s fun - I prefer the butterfly thank you very much.

Apparently frogs symbolize greed because it is a greedy creature in desiring to live in both worlds- on the land & in the water… okay I guess?

& lastly even though the Lion role is also occupied by Kuro within the series, I can understand Wrath not maintaining the original Lion role swing as Wrath is female and they probably wanted a male to hold the depiction of Lion so that the could use the lion’s mane, again, to add to the badass factor… regardless I don’t think Wrath as a lioness would have played out the same way… is it sexist when referring to animals? Whatever - that’s a question for another day.

If you’re interested, the full article can be found here

I am so sorry this random rant turned out WAAAAAAAY longer than I originally intended… I always love your analysis and theory posts so I hope you enjoy :)

YOOO ANON, THAT’S AWESOME! I’ll definitely check that article out!

In return, have this!

We know what piggy ‘dio looks like now! :D

Hopefully this will make your research a little easier?

#servamp #kat’s katerwauling #asks #anonymous #servamp analysis #thanks for the ask nonny!!#tumblr didn’t want to publish this so I just gave up and went to mobile #long post

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bemused-writer · 3 years

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VNC Anime Episode 1

And so the first anime episode came out! I'd say it was actually pretty faithful to the manga; adapting an 88 page first chapter into a singular episode is no easy feat. XD Mochizuki really was making them hefty at first. With that in mind, I figured I'd just talk about some of my first impressions and the few changes they made.

The opening is the obvious first change. The episode itself covers all the same info we learn early on, just in a different order. The manga opted to focus on true names and Teacher's warning to Noé, which ties in more directly to Amelia's plight and Noé's circumstances later on, while the anime chose to open with the vampire Vanitas, which is sort of like the driving force behind people's attitudes towards the blue moon. Will this shift be a big deal later on? It seems unlikely; both give you information you'll need.

I do have to say I hope we get more of this particular art style. The creepy fairytale vibe is so perfect...

La Baleine itself looks amazing as well. In the manga I was always struck by how cool the design was (thanks to Ryou Yamaguchi who designed it), but seeing it animated is something else and made me really think about how if that thing fell from the sky there would be some massive problems. 8D Truly, the only thing keeping that in the sky must be astermite.

Later on, when Amelia destroys all those lights, I realized I'd always misinterpreted that scene. I'd always assumed the broken lights were from Vanitas breaking through the window and, in his usual dramatic fashion, broke everything else, too. But no, it looks like it was indeed Amelia! My guess is that since she's losing control of herself she's also accidentally rewriting the world formula as well.

Okay, I'm going to nitpick the translation just a bit here, but in the manga they go for the more literal "What are you?" which is what Vanitas is really asking. That, to me, seems pertinent, because asking who Noé is is one thing, but asking what he is reveals that Vanitas is used to dealing with all manner of people, several of whom aren't human at all.

And on the note of translating things, I think I'll detour slightly to talk about Vanitas's voice type because I've seen a couple people say he sounds too rough. I get this because the English translation (both versions) tend to make Vanitas sound kind of elegant. However, the fact of the matter is that Vanitas has always been speaking very rough Japanese and isn't very elegant at all. 8D That's a difficult thing to capture in a translation since it's not like he's cursing like a sailor or anything that would make it easy to portray; it's just a style of speech. Anyway, what I'm getting at is that them casting a "rough" sort of voice for Vanitas in the anime actually fits in with how he's been speaking in Japanese.

You know a character has pulled some stuff when one of your favorite moments is them being chucked across the room. XD Ah, Vanitas, if you took a few seconds to explain things maybe you wouldn't be in the middle of a fight right now... However, the anime definitely played up how extreme of a hit this was. Don't get me wrong, Noé sent him flying in the manga, too, but in that he only slammed into the bench rather than through a statue and everything else. While I can appreciate the added drama, it does raise the question of what Vanitas's spine is made out of for it not to have snapped. (^^)"

Wow, Naenia is even creepier animated. :D Her voice is basically exactly what I thought it would be with that delightfully creepy reverb. I'm loving it. And I also like that they kept this manga panel and just added color.

And this is the moment that will have many of you mistakenly thinking Vanitas is a noble-minded fellow, but don't be deceived! He has about 10 million issues and at least half of those are aimed at women. 8D The rest are aimed at the entirety of vampire and humankind. That's not to say Vanitas is without redeeming qualities--he is still one of the heroes of this show--but he's not as straightforwardly wholesome as Noé.

Dante was actually quite a highlight of this episode for me even though he was barely in it. I love the voice they chose for him and he's also the only person who knows what Vanitas is actually like, so he has the most natural reaction to him. XD Everyone is amazed and impressed by what Vanitas has done--as well they should be because it is impressive--but Dante has to work with him. He knows.

This was probably my favorite part of the whole episode. The combination of the music and visuals really emphasized the nostalgic vibe of this moment. It really feels like a beginning and and end. I'm so glad we got to see this animated.

Teacher! They deprived us of seeing him at the start, but we got this shot in the flashback. I still find it strange that they made the estate more... estate-like rather than opening up into a forest like the manga, but it's still effective. We also get to see the silhouette of Louis. ): Truly, everything about Noé's statement, saying he finds the blue moon beautiful, is something we see challenged throughout the series in subtle ways. Can he find something beautiful when it's the source of so much pain? The series isn't over, so I guess we'll have to wait and see.

I will say that the end of the episode with Vanitas's manic grin and Noé's declaration he would eventually kill him by his own hand felt a little more impactful in the manga for me, but it was still very good in the anime as well. I did like that the anime included more people in the "what we gained and lost" section, such as Roland and Loki.

Anyway, the anime is off to a fantastic start! Ahh, the fact that we'll get an episode weekly is so exciting; definitely looking forward to the next. (^^)

#vanitas no carte #vnc #case study of vanitas #bemused's post #long post #vnc anime only spoilers #not sure how to tag that...

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cherry-valentine · 3 years

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Fall 2021 Anime Season

Here’s what I’m watching this season!

86 Season 2 is probably the series I’m enjoying most this season. A surprisingly dark sci-fi series following a small group of teen soldiers who pilot mechs against a mysterious threat called the Legion, season two finds them taken in by a neighboring country who actually treats them well (unlike their home country, who used them as disposable pawns against the Legion). The first few episodes have them taking a stab at living normal lives, pursuing hobbies, getting regular jobs, taking classes, etc. But they’re soldiers at heart, and none of them are content to live in “peace” while a war is going on right outside their doors. The show has a lot to say about war, violence, PTSD, trauma in general, and found-family dynamics. While season one was almost evenly split between Shin and the 86ers fighting the Legion and Lena’s attempts to help them through political and military machinations from inside the Republic, season two is much more strongly focused on Shin and his group as they fight the Legion for a new country, one that has shown them kindness and respect. It’s been interesting to see how other countries are dealing with the Legion, and just how other countries are governed overall. It’s a bit of world-building that the series really needed. The music remains powerful and affecting. The battles are glorious to behold, with gorgeous backgrounds and impressive mecha designs. I’m warming up to the character art, which is still somewhat generic but at least it’s drawn well. Highly recommended.

World Trigger Season 3 is a lot of fun so far. Though I prefer the large-scale invasion arcs we saw in seasons 1 and 2, the smaller tournament arcs between teams have been good, especially when they involve upwards of four teams at a time, creating a somewhat chaotic but exciting feel. The show continues to balance a huge cast very well and has the right mix of action, humor, and emotional moments. The art and animation aren’t the most flashy but they do the job well enough. The show is getting pretty long by this point, so it’s getting harder to recommend it to new viewers, but if you’re looking for a shounen action anime to try, you can’t really go wrong with this one (provided you skip the filler arcs that took up the later episodes of season one). It has plenty of strong lady characters, doesn’t rely on fanservice to make us like them, and has a main protagonist who is more skilled in strategy than actual fighting (in fact he’s one of the weaker fighters in the entire series at this point), which gives the story a fresh take on the genre and avoids predictability.

Kimetsu no Yaiba Season 2 is starting out by adapting the Mugen Train arc again, this time adding in some scenes that the movie didn’t have time for. To be honest, I kinda wish I’d just waited and watched this version. Sure it’s broken up into episodes, but it’s basically an extended cut of the movie that’s much more enjoyable. In particular, the first episode of the season is almost entirely new content that wasn’t in the movie, and I really wish they’d found a way to cram even a few minutes of it into the film. It’s actually Rengoku’s introduction, and it does far more to make him likable and endearing than the entire movie did. So if you somehow haven’t seen the movie yet, at least watch the first episode of season two before doing so (and if you have seen the movie and are planning on skipping these episodes, also watch the first episode, since that’s where the bulk of the new content seems to be). It’s hard to talk much about the animation/music/etc. because most of it was taken from the movie, which had a much higher budget. Of course it looks gorgeous. Of course it sounds fantastic. The new arc starts soon, so there’s that. In general, Kimetsu no Yaiba’s strength is in its execution. It’s proof that you can take a fairly simple (even somewhat generic) story and elevate it to something amazing by giving it an incredible presentation. That’s not to say the show is all style, no substance. The characters are fun and there are some truly heartfelt moments. Recommended to anyone who wants to enjoy some beautiful animation.

The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window is the only brand new show I’m watching this season (and I’m going with the English title because it sounds so cool). It’s a BL (Boys Love) series. I think. The BL stuff is definitely on the back burner as the series focuses on its supernatural plot. The basic idea is that a young man named Mikado can see ghosts/spirits/whatever, which have always terrified him. One day he meets Hiyakawa, an exorcist who recruits him to work for him, with the promise of helping him to not be afraid all the time. There’s also a girl named Erika being forced to put curses on people by some shadowy group, and the plot so far surrounds Erika and the boys helping her escape. Right away, you might notice something odd: the fact that a female character has such a big role in a BL series. I was very surprised by how important Erika is. It’s nice that she’s there and has her own story and is not exclusively used to make one of the boys jealous (there’s a little of that, but it’s definitely not the only, or even the main, reason she’s there). She’s an interesting character for sure. But I do wish the BL elements were a little more present in the story. Another interesting character, and my favorite, is the police detective (or whatever his title is) named Hanzawa. His super power is not believing in any of this supernatural shit, which effectively makes him immune to all of it. His disbelief is so strong, in fact, that his blood or saliva can be used to make barriers to protect others from supernatural attacks! He’s a somewhat cranky older guy, middle aged and married and having no time for nonsense. I love him. Other than that, the art is decent. The character designs look good but the animation isn’t exactly high quality. The opening and ending themes are pretty good.

Note: There were several shows airing this season that looked interesting, but I’ve been so busy with holiday-related stuff that I didn’t get the chance to try them. If I watch them later, I might add them to later write up posts for future seasons. In the meantime, if you know of a good anime that’s airing this season, please let me know so I can look into it. I hate harem and I’m not crazy about isekai. Otherwise, I’m open to anything.

Carry Over Shows From Previous Seasons:

Shaman King

Best of Season:

Best New Show: The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window Best Opening Theme: Kimetsu no Yaiba Best Ending Theme: Kimetsu no Yaiba Best New Male Character: Hanzawa (Night Beyond) Best New Female Character: Erika (Night Beyond)

#Anime #Anime Reviews #Anime Recommendations #Seasonal Anime #Fall 2021 Anime #Text #86 #World Trigger #Kimetsu no Yaiba #The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window

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world-of-puppets · 4 years

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Puppetry Lost Media

In honour of reaching 50 followers last week (now 55 followers, as of writing this) I decided to cover two subjects of great interest to me: puppetry (of course) and lost media.

Everybody online loves a good old bit of lost media. Whether it be being a part of the many searches for the media in question, or watching documentaries about them on sites like YouTube. I’ve been mildly addicted to the latter kind of content for a while. From what I’ve seen, though, there aren’t many videos or articles out there specifically covering lost puppetry. So, in no particular order, here are a couple of pieces of lost puppetry I found while scrolling through the lost media wiki.

銀河少年隊 - Ginga shounen-tai AKA Galaxy Boy Troop (1963 - 1965)

Osamu Tezuka is one of the most pioneering figures in Japanese art and animation. Starting as a manga artist in the 1940s inspired by the animated works of American studios such as Walt Disney and the Fliecer Brothers, he adapted and simplified many of the stylistic techniques of both artists to create his own signature style of big shiny eyes, physics defying hair and limited animation. A style that would go on to heavily influence the world of anime and manga as a whole.

But animation and graphic art were not the only mediums Tezuka would dabble in. Ginga Shounen-Tai, or Galaxy Boy Troop in english, was a television series that aired on the public broadcast channel NHK from April 7th, 1963 to April 1st, 1965. Running for 2 seasons with a total of 92 episodes.

The series was a mixture of marionette characters that utilised the Supermarionation marionette technique, popularised by Jerry Anderson’s Thunderbirds, and limited traditional animation. The story revolves around a child genius named Roy who leads a rag-tag group of heros around the galaxy in a rocket ship in order to revive the earth’s sun and later protect it from alien invaders.

Out of the 92 episodes that aired, only episode 67 still exists in its entirety with French subtitles, and the full episode can be found on YouTube with English subtitles uploaded by user Rare TezukaVids. According to user F-Man on the Tezuka in English forums, footage of episode 28 exists but with no audio, and episode 87’s animated segments exist without the marionette segments. F-Man also claims the reason for Galaxy Boy Troop’s disappearance is due to Tezuka not being proud of the series and having all episodes of it destroyed.

Personally, I think it’s a shame that pretty much all of this series is gone. From what I’ve seen in episode 67, it looks really charming. Tezuka’s signature character design style was adapted suprisingly well to marionettes, and the puppetry itself isn’t that bad either. I love the little face mechanisms like the blinking eyes, flapping mouths and others. It gives the puppets a lot of personality and charm. Like, just look at this old mans eyebrow mechanism and tell me you wouldn’t want to watch 92 episodes of this show;

Tinseltown (2007)

Tinseltown was a 15 minute sitcom pilot created by the Jim Henson company under thier Henson Alternative banner. The pilot was commissioned by the Logo Network and aired as part of the Alien Boot Camp programming block in 2007.

The pilot (and likely the series, had it been picked up by the logo network) features a cast of both puppets and live actors as characters. The premise revolves around Samson Kight, an anthropomorphic bull preformed by Brian Henson and drew Massey, and his partner Bobby Vegan, an anthropomorphic pig prefomed by Bill Barretta and Michelan Sisti, as they attempt to balance thier lives working in Hollywood with life as parents to thier sullen 12-year-old foster son, Foster, played by Paul Butcher. Other human characters included Mia Sara as Samson’s ex-wife Lena and Francesco Quinn as the family’s manservant Arturo.

The Tinseltown pilot used to be available on the Logo Network’s YouTube channel, but was later removed for unknown reason. Since then, the pilot has not been made available online. However the characters Samson and Bobby have made appearances in other Henson related works, such as the improv stage show Stuffed and Unstrung, where they played the role as the shows producers, and in a 2011 video on the Jim Henson Company YouTube channel celebrating Jim Hensons 75th birthday.

I find Tinseltown pretty interesting as I feel like it should be more noateable or known, considering that this is (as far as my knowledge goes) the first Jim Henson Company project featureing openly lgbtq characters as its leads, and would have been the first Henson show to do so had it been picked up. As someone who’s interested in lgbtq+ representation in creative media such as animation, I realised that there’s not many examples of canon lgbt characters in puppetry. The only ones aside from Samson and Bobby I could think off the top of my head would be Deet’s Dads from The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance and Rod from Avenue Q. Though, obviously, there could be more I’m not currently aware of. I don’t think the Tinseltown pilot was a masterpiece or anything. After all, there’s probably a couple of good reasons Logo didn’t pick it up for a full series. But I think it be cool if either Henson co. or Logo made this available online again, if just so we could appericate it as an interesting little footnote in the history of lgbtq rep in puppetry.

With that said, considering the pilot’s obscurity and the fact that it’s main couple haven’t been used in any Henson Related projects in almost ten years, as well as the possibility that there may be legalities preventing the Henson company from releasing it such as Logo still owning the rights, it’s unlikely we’ll see the Tinseltown pilot anytime soon.

Sonic Live in Sydney (1997 - 2000)

Sonic the Hedgehog is a fictional character no stranger to multiple interpretations of him and his universe across a diverse range of media. From the more light-hearted and comedic stylings of The Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog and Cartoon Networks Sonic Boom cartoon series, to more serious faire such as the Sonic SatAM cartoon and the Sonic Adventure videogame duology. One of the more obscure and stranger adaptations of the character came in the form of Sonic Live in Sydney, a one an a half hour live show hosted at the former Sega World Sydney amusement park in Darling Harbor, Sydney, Australia. Originally beginning as a live show with actors in meet-and-greet style costumes, the show eventually was replaced with a puppet show during its last two years.

The shows plot was set in an alternate timeline whos continuity was a mix of the SatAM cartoon and Sonic the Hedgehog 3, where Doctor Robotnik’s Death Egg crash lands in Sydney, Australia instead of Angel Island and attempts to take over before being foiled by sonic and friends. According to Phillip Einfeld of Phillip Einfeld Puppetoons, the company that made the puppets, Sega felt the costumed actor version of the show wasn’t dynamic enough, and wished to replace it with a version featuring live puppets with animatronics. Both versions of the shows plot are identical.

While Sonic Live in Sydney’s soundtrack is available on YouTube, and some photos of the show are available on the Lost Media Wiki, no footage of either the costumed actors version or the puppet show version have resurfaced. The show was closed down in 1999, possibly due to cost, shortly before the Sega World park as a whole in 2000. So unless there is someone out there who viseted the show between 1998 or 1999 who recorded the show via a handheld camera, footage of both incarnations of the show are likely forever lost to time.

On a personal note, I don’t have much to say on this one other than how gloriously peek gaudy 90s Sonic the set/puppet design is. I have no doubt finding footage of these puppets in action would truly be a silly delight to behold...

Legend of Mary (year unknown)

This one is a little different from the other entries on this list as while the film itself in its entiraty is available on YouTube for anyone to view, the information surrounding Legend of Mary, specifically its year of release, remains a mystery as of writing this.

I have mentioned the film before on this blog so I’ll keep it brief here: in summary, Legend of Mary is a short film retelling of the Nativity featuring the Rod puppets of Austrian puppeteer Richard Teschner. the video was uploaded to YouTube by user canada 150 archive. I looked up the people credited in the film and was able to find most of them, but didn’t find Legend of Mary listed in thier credits, and was unable to find the film on sites like IMDB, tMDB or Letterboxd. I reached out to Canada 150 archive asking if they had any info regarding the Legend of Mary’s release date, and after a coupe of months, they replied saying they didn’t know.

And that’s as far as I got on my search for answers, if anyone of you guys has any information regarding Legend of Mary, then it be of huge help in finding the release date.

Sam and friends (1955 - 1961)

Sam and friends was the very first puppetry television series created by Jim Henson alongside his colabarator and future wife Jane Nebel. filmed in Washington, D.C. and airing twice daily on WRC-TV and the NBC affiliate in Washington, D.C. from May 9, 1955, to December 15, Sam and Friends would mark the first apperence of Kermit (though not yet as a frog) and paved the way for Henson’s iconic and revered legacy in the realm of puppetry on film and television.

With the impact this show had in mind, it may come as a shock to some that almost half of Sam and Friends, specifically, 42 of the 86 episodes, are considered lost. With 16 existing, 8 documented, 9 known from memory, plus 8 existing Esskay commercials and 1 memory-known Esskay commercial. Some taped episodes have been shown at venues such as the museum of the moving image while others have been erased. It’s unknown if copies of these erased episodes still exist.

This post would become far to long if I were too list every episode missing from Sam and Freinds, but if your curious, the lost media wiki article has a comprehensive list of all lost episodes.

Annnd that about it for this post. This type of content is pretty different from the stuff I usually post. So I’m egar to see what you guys think about it. If you enjoyed this article, want to see more like it or have ideas for what puppetry-related topics I should cover in the future. And again, thank you all so much for helping me reach 55 followers. Your support really does mean a lot to me, and I hope you enjoyed this as a follower milestone gift.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed this dip into lost puppetry, and have a happy holiday season!

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izayoichan · 3 years

Note

For the 100 OC Questions:

Flynn: 91-100

Fannar: 81-90

Chris: 31-40

Hayle: 51-60

Hayden: 61-70

Vy: 71-80

Lucas: 21-30

River: 41-50

Brooke: 1-10

Meadow: 1-20

A few questions for almost everyone XD

This will be LONG, so under a line.. because LONG!!

Flynn:

91. Do other characters respect your OC, if so, is it out of fear? Or do they respect your OC because they like them?

Some respect him, most do and it's mostly from him being who he is. A friendly guy that's generally nice to everyone. Flynn is simply a very likable fellow.

92. If they were given minutes to live, what would they do? Who would they want to see and say?

The one person Flynn would go to see is his dad, and he'd probably tell him that he loves him and to not take blame for anything that has happened, and to care for the rest of his family. Then he would just hug him until his time was up. His dad is the most important person in the world for Flynn

93. How do they deal with stress?

He tends to go for a run, or talk to someone about what stresses him if he can. Most often this person is Brooke, or later Emil.

94. Do they have a more submissive or dominate personality type?

I think he is a bit of a mix, but like his mom, leaning on the submissive.

95. Do they have a pet?

Atm not really, he has Emil as a familiar, and the family has two pets in Lobo and Felix that he kinda considers his as well without either really being his.

96. Do they have a stash of weapons?

Nope, no stash!

97. Where do they live? Who do they live with?

They live in Brindleton bay with their entire family. It's a lot of people, but he likes that in a way. Even though sometimes some alone time is good too.

98. How do they calm themselves down?

Watching movies, working at the shelter, or just talking to their dad. His dad is his biggest source of calm.

99. Are they co-dependent?

In some ways yes, but also not. He is a very independent person, but he is also used to living very close to family and friends. So he would be a bit lost without them all I think. College should be interesting ;)

100. Are they a day, or night person?

Day person, definitely.

Fannar:

81. Do they have any tattoos? If so, are they significant?

Is it bad that I don't really remember? I don't think I gave them any, but I also have a bad memory.. so maybe, but they're not significant, just something they would have done for fun.

82. Are they good at mental math?

Very, they have that after their dad.

83. Do they get along with others?

Yep, he does, he also has a bit of a tendency to get fans along the way somehow. He doesn't exactly like that part as much though.

84. Are they lazy?

Generally no, but they also can be. They do like to not do anything but slack on occasion ;)

85. Are they self-motivated?

They tend to be more motivated by others, but when needed, they can motivate themselves, so I guess a bit of both?

86. How do they cope with anger?

He isn't a very angry type of person, but when he gets angry he copes fairly well with it. He has always been told being angry is okay, and a valid way to feel.

87. Have they ever been in a situation where they were helpless?

When they saw Emil attacking their mom, and then their twin stepping in and eventually making it his familiar. He felt awfully helpless then and it was not a feeling he liked.

88. Are they organized or messy?

Their fairly organized, better than most teens.

89. Can they remember a lot of information at once?

Yeah, they have a dragon's memory, and they are pretty good at remembering a lot of information at once.

90. What is their occupation?

Currently, they are to be College Student.

Yvreon/Vy:

71. Who do they dislike?

Mages.. hunters.. yeah.. that's their main dislikes.. Death to an extent.. Jael mostly for breaking the Heartlight.

72. What is their motto?

I think to help, and just be helpful in general. Or learn, as much as he can.

73. Do they have any markings on their body?

They have quite a lot of scars, from being attacked by hunters. They also have a heart-shaped scar on their chest, from sharing their heart with their husband Hayden.

74. Have they ever been abused?

Sadly, yes, both by the first humans they encountered, hunters who wanted their heart, and also to an extent the mages at RoM who wanted to experiment on him.

75. What is their biggest fear?

To lose Hayden.

76. What are their goals?

Healing people, helping people. He would love to get his Heartlight back if it was possible so that Hayden would be well, or better. Learning as much as he can, and of course, acquire many shiny things and books!

77. How do they go about achieving their goals?

He works at a hospital, where he helps as many as he can. And the money he earns often go-to books and shiny trinkets as he knows he is well cared for at home money-wise.

78. Do they have a fight or flight response?

Depend's on son the situation. If Hayden or his family is close, he will fight with all his might. If he is alone, it would be flight, to come home and protect those he loves.

79. Is there someone in their life that they care about more than themselves?

Their kids and Hayden.

80. How would they fare in a zombie apocalypse?

Fairly well I think, they are a dragon after all ;)

Hayden:

61. Are they comfortable being in a crowded room?

Yeah, he doesn't really mind. He prefers quiet, but a crowded room doesn't bother him much.

62. How do they relax?

Lying in bed watching movies, preferably using Vy as a bed, as that is the best and most comfortable thing he knows. Oddly helping the kids with math is also relaxing to him.

63. Have they ever harmed anyone and regretted it? Verbally or physically?

The sharing of the Heartlight with Vy, hurts Vy when he feels bad. Or well it did when it was connected. He was never comfortable with that, and it always made him feel bad. Even if Vy told him it was fine.

64. Do they like to dance?

Yes!

65. How do they get around their environment? Examples - horses, bike, vehicle

They have been carried a lot.. other than that, he mostly gets flown by a dragon or uses a portal.

66. What is their pet peeve(s)?

People who mistreat animals, he hates it, and he will call you out on it.

67. Do they have a disability?

Yes, they were born with one. They were born with two magic types that fight each other. Ice and Fire, where the fire side is slightly stronger and was damaging him. He quickly gets tired, and after the loss of his twin, and the breaking of the Heartlight, he has once again gotten worse.

68. How do they react to getting flowers?

He would be surprised, but thankful. He likes flowers but prefers them alive in the ground.

69. Would they ever wear a flower crown?

Yes, especially if made by the kids or given by Vy.

70. Do they like themselves?

Somedays yes, most days.. not really. He tends, still, to feel he is everyone's burden.

Hayle:

51. Do they like science?

Yep, he finds it fascinating!

52. Are they more emotional or logical?

They used to be more logical.. now they're more emotional, and perhaps a mix of both. The mix makes him a very good dad and grandad.

53. How do they deal with their emotions?

Depends on the emotion. Most he talks with Chris about.. Anger on the other hand still gets handled by hitting things, hard. Preferably a boxing bag.

54. How do they cope with sadness?

Often with anger.. by hitting things because being sad makes him angry. But also with talking to his husband, or his family. Sometimes though, destroying an old house into dust is needed.

55. What is something they care about?

His family.

56. Would they die for anyone/anything?

As above.

57. What do they do when they are happy?

Smile a lot, dance with their husband, laugh, and cook!

58. How would they come across to other characters? Examples- messy, lazy, childish, caring, etc.

Caring, very much like a dad friend, that type of person that feels like a dad when you talk with them.

59. Do they have a phrase they use over and over?

Hmh... not really no.

60. In a crowded room are they in the corners, sides, or in the middle?

All of the above depends on the crowd and why they are there.

River:

41. How was their childhood?

Not the best, their dad only saw them as a mage and pushed for him to be the strongest, while his mom kinda tried to make him into his dad after his dad dies. He had an awful relationship with his mother by the time he was a teenager.

42. Are they close with anyone who is going to screw them over?

Nope.

43. How do they adapt to different situations? Do they adapt at all?

It depends a lot on the situation. As a Sage, he adapts to whatever is needed of him. As a Vet, he adapts to what is needed of him there. And for his son, he tries to adapt to being the parents the kid needs.

44. How do they speak? Examples - Are they soft-spoken, hot heated, vulgar, etc.

They have a fairly soft way of speaking, a caring one. But it can also be brunt, harsh and aggravating to many.

45. Are they opposed to violence?

On a general basis.. yes, for occasions, they're fine with it.

46. When is their birthday?

I don't think it has ever been mentioned, I think Mahv will have to say, if not, I guess it is time I give him a date for it!

47. Are they quick to judge?

In general, yes, but he is trying to be better after he misjudged Rylan so badly when they met.

48. Do they have anything they are trying to hide from others?

Mostly how bad they still feel after the death of their husband. How guilty they still feel and so on.

49. Do they act differently around different people?

Yes. He can be loving and caring to some, while asshole to someone else.

50. Do they enjoy the arts?

Yes, especially music.

Chris:

31. How do they overcome obstacles?

By thinking things true, finding the best way past it most of the time. On occasion, he pulls the reaper card though.

32. When faced with a difficult decision do they get stronger or break?

They get stronger. They have a breaking point, but it takes a lot for him to hit it. 15 years away from his family was close to his breaking point, and both Jael and Kieran knew it.

33. Do they have any special powers?

He is a reaper..he has quite a lot. For instance, he is one of very few reapers that can kill a god.

34. How do they change throughout the story?

Well, Chris was a bit of a loner.. so they changed to become someone's lover, a dad, a family man, and someone who often wishes he could be home a lot more than he can.

35. Do they have any friends? If so, are they close-knit?

He has one, Nat, with whom he is very close. Kieran is more the boss than his friend. There is also Mark, who's after him to finding love, they have slipped a bit apart, both having a life outside of work. His best friend is of course his husband.

36. How is their family life?

Busy, especially with his work being on top of it all. But he would not trade it for the world!

37. Are they likable?

Yes, it's a good trait to have when you ferry souls over to the next step.

38. Are they the hero, or anti-hero?

He wouldn't consider himself either, but to some, I guess he is the hero

39. Do they make questionable choices?

Not all too many most were perhaps made before he died 😎

40. How do they become who they are?

They did something questionable and stupid and died. Luckily for them, they also said yes to becoming a reaper and that's why this story even exists.

Lucas:

21. What are their hobbies?

Singing, which is also his job.. he is also a pretty decent kitty bed by now if that qualifies as a hobby.

22. What are their ticks?

Hmh... not sure he has any, probably just fiddling with his fingers when he is nervous if that counts?

23. Do they like children?

Yes, mostly, unless they cling to him and want a photo.. although that more teenage girls. 😂 But in general, yes he likes children, he grew up with quite a lot of them around.

24. How do they react to being around wild animals?

With fascination and awe.

25. If they were given the task to prank someone, who would it be, what would they do, and would the prank work?

It would likely be a bandmate, and it would probably be putting something they hate in their drink. As she isn't the type to prank someone, he would probably fail miserably.

26. Do they have any survival skills?

Yep, they can make fire with two twigs, and they can play music to make some busking money if needed.

27. Are they more book smart or street smart?

Street smart, he likes books, but he grew up in an orphanage, so he learned street smarts along the way.

28. How do they get out of a difficult situation?

Would depend on the situation, he can pay his way out of it, or he can try and run of course. He isn't a fighter so he would rather try and avoid stuff like that.

29. Do they use their body, mind, personality, or force to get what they want?

They don't really do that much.. but to work at the shelter, he used his personality and what he knew they would have to say yes to.

30. What music do they enjoy?

Absolutely everything! If it's music, he likes it. Although everything for its situation. Its not always that black metal fits what you're doing.

Meadow:

11. Do they have a romantic interest?

Yep, and you will soon see who that is.. soonish anyway.

12. How do they cope with struggles?

Fairly well really. They work their way through it, although often they can be a bit snarky when it happens. It's just their way of dealing with it.

13. Do they have anyone they can lean on?

Her half-brother River, his family, her dad, and her mom. Unlike River, she is quite close to her mom, and their relationship is much better.

14. How do they react to someone dying?

If it's someone she cares about, she would like most people be sad. If it's not, then it's more.. eh, shit happens!

15. Can you name 5 personality traits they have?

Friendly, Hardworking, Ambitious, Romantic, Proper

16. How did they become a character?

It was Mahv's idea to have River have a little sister, then she kinda became the kid's mom friend and person outside the family to talk to.

17. Do they get along with others?

Yes and no. She has a way of being that alienates some, but if you see through it, you find a sweet person who is easy to get along with really.

18. What flaws do they have?

They can be a bit hot-headed, snappy, and abrasive when put in a situation they don't expect. She also expects a lot of herself, like becoming the first sage potion maker!

19. How do they influence the story?

She becomes a bit of an icebreaker between River and his mom when they are re introduced. As well as becoming a very good friend to the current kids in the story, the one they go and talk to when things are meh, and parents aren't an option.

20. What do they look like?

Sneaky I know.

Brooke:

1. How do they present themselves to others?

Very straight forwards really, they are nicely dressed and well behaved in general.

2. Do they like animals?

Yes, they love them, specially horses. Sadly animals don't seem to love her back for unknown reason to her.

3. How do they dress?

Nice clean clothing? Nothing special, and never high fashion.

4. How many languages do they know?

Quite a few actually. She speaks Simlish (English), Japanese, Chinese, French, Italian, German and Spanish.

5. How big is their family?

Not big at all, its basically only her and her parents.

6. What is their purpose in the story?

Now that is a secret still. But it will be shown eventually, and she does have a purpose yep! Her purpose has even changed several time over already.

7. Do they know how to fight?

Yes in her own way. (Cryptic, I know, but you will see one day)

8. What is their back story?

There isn't that much. She has grown up with her parents, they have always been strict but quite fair. As long as she follows their rules and guidance, she is fairly free to do what she wants. Their not overly happy with Flynn as her boyfriend, and think she could have done better, but they have accepted it.

9. Why is their name, their name?

Because random name generator made it so!

10. Do they have any nick names?

Not really, Brooke is short enough on its own. Closest is Flynn calling her his Brooke I think.

AAaaand that is that.. thank you for asking, I hope you enjoy!

#100 you say #yes #happy birthday again #figured today was the right day #dandylion240 #my head is now tired #that was a lot of thinking #and pondering #and answering

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