#and the worst part is that it's inconsistent and happens pretty randomly

[anonymousredactedconfessions]

To the person who mentioned the balance between lore and fluff being super inconsistent, yeah I think that's what frustrates most people. I got into Redacted through his lore-heavy stuff (a few months after Inversion finished) and that's what hooked me. The people who recommended him to me were also heavily selling him on the lore. It's hard/frustrating for me to keep up though, because he not only heavily leans on the fluff, but the fluff often feels like it comes from a different story entirely.

I learned to appreciate the fluff. There's still lore there, it's just more like getting bits and pieces that combine into a bigger story rather than a traditional narrative structure of introduction -> character development -> rising action -> climax -> resolution. I can appreciate that it has its own style. The problem is that sometimes (especially recently) Redacted characters just... don't feel like they're even part of the same story. I think the D.A.M.N. crew and the Shaw Pack are the worst offenders here. Sometimes they're characters in a big supernatural soap opera, then they drop that theme and appear in audio after audio just being painfully generic and disconnected from all the plot/lore that was established for them.

Sometimes months pass and the plots they're involved in don't get mentioned at all, even when there's a lot at stake. Ex: characters seem to get amnesia characters get about CloseKnit, the post-Inversion fallout, William's shady activities etc. The plotlines the characters are involved in vanish suddenly and return randomly. Their supernatural abilities go months (sometimes years) without being used or even mentioned. It's downright bizarre seeing characters be threatened by a supernatural cult, then just go five months without mentioning it and instead spend time playing videogames and decorating their apartments or whatever else happens in the fluff audios.

Their characterization changes in the fluff/vs lore-based audios. Fluff David and Lore David feel like the same character transplanted into two different plotlines. Fluff Milo and Lore Milo actually feel like two completely different people. The DAMN Crew in the main Freelancer series feel like they're part of a fascinating magical world, but the DAMN Crew from the fluff audios just feel like a completely different group group of friends with the same names and voices. It's like they come from an AU. That is what bugs me.

At least Vincent and Sam are pretty consistent between their boyfriend roleplays and plot focused audios. Geordi too, even though he doesn't appear as often. Replying to this anon: https://www.tumblr.com/anonymousredactedconfessions/755285410436055040/not-something-that-hasnt-been-said-before-but-i?source=share

.

[nico-idc]

random vent because i'm numb rn and feel like it

This is a vent post, ill probably talk about su!cide, self h*rm, eating disorders and depression. I’ll also cuss a lot, and things will not be censored. Also, this may seem insensitive to people experiencing any of this, sorry about that.  Dont read this if youre triggered by that.

Also, this is my experience with mental health. Everyone deals with it differently. 

So, If anyone doesnt know, I have depression and anxiety. And right now, I’m feeling numb as it’s often described by people with depression. But, numb isn’t a very good description. I can still feel. I’ll still smile if you tell me a joke, or if something funny is on a video. I’ll still cry if there’s something super sad. Emotion is just watered down. I feel it, but not as much as I should. Me and my boyfriend were talking, and i couldnt tell him I loved him. It’s not becuase I dont love him, but I just cant feel much of anything, so I dont want to tell him I loved him. Becuase If i did that, I felt as though I was lying. The funniest thing is, I randomly started crying. Still felt nothing, but hey, I had tears streaming down my face. Who fucking knows why. 

I havent been doing to great for a while now, but this is the worst i’ve ever gotten. Ive never felt numb before. I mean, I’ve felt myself starting to go through the motions, but i’ve never gone completely numb before. And before this i’ve had a few mental breakdowns. Hell, I’ve sat in a corner twice in the past month or so doing nothing but sobbing and begging myself not to move so I dont grab something sharp and cut myself. (I did not relapse, don’t worry). and recently I completely broke down over simply eating a cereal bar, got through it, ate it. I’m good now. 

Figures. That does seem to be my experience. Oh no, big bad issue one time, then magically I just talk myself out of my bullshit, and im fixed. Ha ha, yet I act like I have all these issues. I mean, I didnt even attempt to starve myself, just thought “oh, friends and family wont let me” and didnt. Had a breakdown about a year later, been fine since. Cut for a few months, went to therapy for a few months, stopped cutting. had a few breakdowns about a year or two later, then was fine. was suicidal for a while, went to therapy for a bit, was happy for months. Had breakdowns every now and then, fine now.

ha ha, first time I say alot of this is online. Figures. I’ve done that a lot too. My boyfriend has found out a bit about my depression through this site. Becuase I cant talk to my boyfriend about my shit, but hey random people on the internet! hear about my problems.

So on another note, I recently found a song that describes part of depression pretty well. It’s called “i’m not dead” by boyinaband. it’s linked below, I’ll copy paste the lyrics, and explain how I relate, and what the lyrics mean to me, becuase why not? (lyrics will be in bold)

undefined

I'm not dead

I'm not fixed, but I'm not giving up yet

Basically, this means that im still here, im still depressed, but I’m still trying to fight depression. 

I'm sick of saying that I still don't have anything done

I hate telling friends I'm trying something just to give it up

I never commit to anything, I just say I’ll do something, then decide I dont want to.

I'm still unsure of my emotional state

I'm still incapable of focusing lately

I don't feel like creating

I'm tired of asking Google how to find motivation

I’ve been on break from writing for months now. tried to get back to it, lost concentration. I think this is self explanatory. 

I don't think I've ever made

Something that's as good as I'm capable of

Ha, I dont put in enough effort and commitment to make something as good as possible.

I hate not having a reason to look my best

I only ever take care of myself with the intent to show the internet

I mean, I dont try to show the internet, but I only take care of myself when other people will see me.

If what made me successful was an imposed sense of stress then

I am so so glad that I hated myself

The only thing that makes me do things is extreme stress.

I didn't luck into this position

I struggle with decisions

I mean, im not in any high position, but I do struggle with decisions. 

I wouldn't be my own friend

I'm too inconsistent

I’m inconsistent as hell. I’m in like 10 group chats, don't talk in any of them for months, then just show up like “hi, havent talked to you all in ages, but hi”. 

Without immense pressure nothing ever gets finished

If these words make it to your ears it'll be a fucking miracle.

Yep. I went on  whole rant about this on wattpad. Without pressure to do something, I don’t do it.

I'm fortunate to know more good people than most do

I wish I had more friends I could be physically close to

I dont personally have a lot of friends that dont live in my city, so the last line isnt an issue, but I do know a lot of good people”

I'm pretty good at like 20 different skill sets

At the expense of never being great at any one of them

I’m good at quite a few things. Drawing, math, even writing. But im not great at it. I’m average.

I wish this beat hit harder

I wish more syllables rhymed

I know 99 percent of people really don't mind

I dont personally relate to this, seeing as I dont make music.

I think collaborating forced me to finish things

'Cause I was terrified of wasting famous people's time

Oh yeah. Group projects would not get done if i wasnt scared of wasting my partner’s time.

I wish I could focus on what I define priority

I wish I was as grateful as I want to be

Dont really relate to these things

I wish I knew more people who were mentally stable

But if I did,

I wouldn't let them waste their time on me while I'm disabled

Oh yeah. Id love to have a friend who isnt depressed, but I wouldnt let them see that im fucked up becuase i dont wanna drag them down.

I feel alone

I know I'm not

I have a lot of friends, but I still fell alone in this world

I used to talk to lots of people.

Lately I've stopped

They didn't deserve it,

I've been a terrible friend.

But I couldn't bear to let myself become boring to them

I ignore group chats all the time. no reason. Probably shouldnt. 

I don't let myself get my hopes up.

I love people who do.

Something good happens? what could go wrong? that is my thought precess.

I never know if what I say I feel is the truth

I have no damn Idea what I think, so its so hard to know what the truth in my head is.

I wish I didn't instinctively try to be less specific

So more people could relate, when they read along with the lyrics.

Not lyrics, but if i write/explain something, I immediately generalize things so its relateable.

I can be happy in the moment

I am not when I reflect

I smile watching youtube, but then I look back and think about how I wasted time.

I distract myself with gaming, waiting to get better

I hate it

Youtube will cure depression right? /s

I wanna do the most good, and prevent the most hurt

But I've gotta put on my own oxygen mask first

This is just an important phrase I try to remember when I’m down. for people who dont do well with metaphors, he’s saying that if you want to help people, you need to help yourself first. 

I can't predict what I'll do.

I can never be sure

I am terrified of making promises any more

I can't face my work,

I feel sick from the word

I genuinely believe I'm capable of changing the world

Don’t relate much here, except for the more positive, upbeat tone the song takes on, and i feel that this part, the part above and everything below is dave fighting his depression.

I still think I can get better

I’m holding onto hope.

I still think I can create and get pleasure from it

I hope so, I want my art and writing to improve.

I'll keep aiming to make my emotion and my logic agree

The eternal stuggle. I always try to get the two to line up, it rarely works. I try to use logic more often though.

And become the best version of me

Always trying to improve myself.

I don't want to stop!

I don't want to stop!

I don't want to stop!

I don't want to stop!

There’s alot this could mean. I dont want to stop creating. I dont want to stop fighting. I dont want to stop getting better. I dont want to stop living. I relate to all these things.

I’ll expand on this more later, it’s too late now for me to continue this

[metasnkpotato]

Levi and Mikasa - The same

Hello ! In the (very) long block that follows, I will talk about some things I noticed about the parallel between Levi and Mikasa (and to do, use some elements of comparison between manga and anime, english and japanese version, with the two other protagonists, Eren and Armin, and their third parallel : Annie).

I planned it randomly so it could be pretty messy. If this is the case, sorry in advance. I’m hoping that even so, it will help some that this relationship is interesting, for the understanding of its stakes, or see what we could expect about it in the current arc !

The same since the first time

The erroneous look they have on their parallels is the same as on themselves

Levi breaks the cycle of hate, Mikasa’s opening remains to come

                                                              First appearances in SnK are often essentials to understand a character. These concentrate generally, the problematic of the character, his role in the story, the angle from which we'll have to look at it to analyze him and a condensed of everything he will embody. 

Recently, I was rereading the meeting scene between Levi and Mikasa in the titan forest, at the time of the Female Titan arc. I had never saw it because I began Snk with the anime, probably like many fans. And something surprised me :

This line of “I’m with you” has been removed in the anime.

It may seem unimportant because it's just Levi's attempt to calm Mikasa and  make her understand that even if he’s stopping her at that moment, he has the same intention of going to fight against the Female Titan. EDIT : I’ve been told in comments that it may also imply a way for Levi to tell Mikasa that her attacks will not have much effect in any case, that it is the same and therefore must be withdrawn for the moment.

 At the first reading level maybe, but the connotation in it makes this as a kind of hint about the mirror effect that was about to happen between them. And moreover, without this sentence, it makes their relationship more arid than it already is, since it begins with Levi's order as he tries to position himself as his superior / mentor by placing Mikasa underneath.

[Small digression : It is also interesting to note that the similarity between Levi and Mikasa was made even before they actually met, on two occasions : the first when Levi saved the main trio, by Armin confusing him with Mikasa, and the second one there ]

Anyway, “I’m with you” doesn’t sound very Levi’s character likely, it’s too direct, too polite and too explicit. I thought it were perhaps a clumsy translation so I went on the raw to see what it gave.

In fact, the line is “同じだ “, “onaji da” in romaji, which basically means “It’s the same”, implied “we”, so “we’re the same” can be understand as well, or “the same as you”.

It's pretty remarquable to see that it's those words of “the same” that opens up their relationship, because that's the whole point : they're incredibly similar, and yet very far in terms of opened relationship. 

The same blood, the same behavior, the same personality on many aspects, but not the same level of mutual acceptance. 

We might believe that two characters which are so alike would have a pretty fusional relationship, but in SnK, it’s not how it works. It is perhaps even one of the most important point of the story and all the themes touched in this manga : the difference, for the interaction between people, is essential. After all, it is often the farthest characters in behavior that are closest (Eren - Armin, Historia - Ymir, Uri - Kenny...). And despite the difference between Marleyans and Eldians, some of the most established relationships in the current arc are a mix of both (Sasha - Niccolo, Hanji - Onyankupon etc).

In the relationship Levi - Mikasa, if there is not a medium that comes to help them communicate, it is difficult for them to do so. Ironically, the medium often happens to be someone very different : the first time was Armin in trial, and the second time Hanji in serumbowl, the opposites in terms of personality of Mikasa and Levi.

But with Mikasa it is still more marked : while Eren and Armin both have characters parallels to them (Hanji and Reiner for Eren ; Erwin and Bertholdt for Armin), they accepted them and that made them grow while Mikasa's relations to her parallels are tinged with hatred and rejection. 

One of the interesting thing between these three parallels, Annie, Levi and Mikasa, is that they share in common the negative view they have of each other.

Mikasa sees Levi as a man, certainly strong, but abnormally violent, without seeing his kind side.

Levi sees Annie like a pure sadist which acts only because she’s enjoying pain and violence, without consider the necessity that guides her actions.

Annie sees Mikasa like a wild beast, with no emotion and who would act only coldly and impulsively, without her human side so.

The negative view of these three parallels between them reflets the fact that it’s themselves they see in each other. Levi can’t only think of him as a strong person who must, because of this, be necessarily violent ; and that's why he relies heavily on violence to resolve conflict. Mikasa thinks she’s indeed a wild beast who must be guided by her strength and violents instincts in order to protect her beloved ones. 

[Small disgression again : It's one of the things that Armin is reproaching her at the beginning of the Uprising Arc “Mikasa, rest yourself, you’re still injured and you’re not a beast” , and it's funny to note that Eren picked it up in his hurtful words in Chapter 112 by designate her as cattle, to kindle his rage.]

And Annie has tried to shut herself up as much as possible of all human emotion to fulfill her task, so much that she persuaded herself that she was enjoying killing people - what her strange smiles in fight let slip - when that's not the case.

But fortunately, Levi’s point of view on Mikasa breaks this cycle of hate. After all, as the parents of Sasha mentioned, it's up to adults to break the cycle of hate so they do not let children lock themselves in. It is too late for them, the adults, but not for the children, who represent the future.

That's why during their first interaction, while Mikasa acts inconsistently, insulting him, blaming him for everything, and ignoring his orders, Levi does not give the change and on the contrary, takes on him, even receiving the hit in her place. Here he was, the adult in charge of the child. While he was still shocked by the loss of his entire squad, ready to give up on Eren in considering the worst possible scenario :

He regains the will to fight when he sees a younger version of his self in Mikasa, decided to not let her go through the same pain as him by the loss of her beloved one.

That’s why Mikasa's arc will probably reach one of its outcome when she will stop impeding the fact that Levi and her can make a further connection by recognizes during the Ackertalk that indeed, she is the same as Levi, in many ways. 

And this is not only due to their shared blood but also to their own person, Isayama even stated it in a interview which can be found in Answers Guidebook :

– Regarding Mikasa and Levi’s Ackerman family mystery, we’re also receiving more clarity! Can we say that Mikasa, Levi, Kenny are all part of the same Ackerman bloodline?

Isayama: They are all part of the same Ackerman bloodline. However, their reasons for protecting their respective counterparts don’t have anything to do with the bloodline itself - it’s just their nature (laughs). Within the story, Mikasa and Levi almost have the guardian/knight-like roles, right? That’s because they encountered the existence of a “boss”-like individual, and the desire to work for that person is very in line with their personalities.

As Armin by being invested with the spirit of Erwin symbolically, and the titan of Bertholdt, as Eren by going beyond Hanji on the knowledge and recognizing to be the same as Reiner, Mikasa will be the next to face her parallel, and would have to recognize what binds her to him in order to fulfill herself.

                                                            *

[thattimdrakeguy]

Stephanie Brown’s Robin run sucked.

Having just read a lot of Steph’s Robin run, I can officially say that I think it was one of the dumbest written Robin stints, because the issues in Batgirl don’t add up to the ones in Robin, and the fact it ever happened just based on her character is out of character, and inconsistent.

In Robin Steph becomes Robin mostly out of opportunity, her and Bruce actually get along not counting Bruce being a drill Sargent, Bruce gives her two conditions on Robin 1. No secrets 2. Don’t disobey even small things, she disobeys and nearly gets killed, and she got fired.

There isn’t any “Oh she reminds me of Jason” here that I’ve seen, she doesn’t actually run out away during the night or anything like Jason, she’s never been violent to the point of near murder like Jason, Stephanie Brown is not like Jason Todd. She was obedient until that one moment, and unless it was in some issue I missed, I don’t think she ever went near murderer over anything. At most she was too rough to Penguin. 

In Batgirl Stephanie says it was a “dream” to be Robin, but since freaking when? Unless it was in her diary that’s an eyesore to read for me and I missed it, I don’t think she’s ever once in her whole character’s history cared about being Robin. If anything she freaking had quite the distaste for Batman since childhood which would make such a thing nonsensical.

Nothing she said there ever happened. She literally just broke into the Batcave and asserted herself as Robin. I’m not sure if the writer just sucked or if we’re supposed to think of her as a liar about even little things.

Since when has Stephanie Brown been a pathological liar

So saying it was some dream was just this random line they threw in even if it was out of character going off just her previous character, and then after she gets fired in another issue of Batgirl she says something along the lines of “HE SAID I WASN’T GOOD ENOUGH” and she’s sobbing.

But Bruce was actually quite nice about the whole firing thing. You can claim that Bruce was treating her unfairly given that we know as a reader that he treated the other Robin’s far better, but Steph doesn’t know that, and Bruce handles it in a polite manner given the context that it’s a firing based on Steph breaking a condition that nearly got herself killed.

She got compared to Tim the whole time, but her reaction in this is more disappointment then “I’LL SHOW THEM”.

It’s so off putting

Batman told her simply “don’t disobey or you’ll be fired, okay?”

So why is she acting hysterical after she got fired? He told her that this would happen. She acknowledged that information when given to her, and she acts like she was blindsided or something.

Batman did tell her to stop being Spoiler too, but Batman did that all the time. It’s weird for it to now be a problem. Like never once has she ever been shown to actually care about what Batman thinks that I recall. It pissed her off before cause she didn’t like feeling held down more then a want to impress the guy. It was weird for her to even care about being Robin suddenly too. Unless it was in a comic I didn’t read somehow Steph never said “Batman needs a Robin”, she became a Robin because SHE WANTED to be Robin. It wasn’t for Batman. It was for her. The whole “dream” thing furthers that as well even if that’s never been shown, to my knowledge, to be the case.

It doesn’t make sense for her to wanna be Robin by the way they played it, they randomly change her motive, later on her fans seemingly changed Bruce and Steph’s whole relationship, and then they have Steph come off like she’s almost lying about how she got the job, and then not giving context to Cass like she missed the part were she broke one of the simple conditions.

Batman was a jerk, I’m not saying otherwise.

But in the context that she was directly told it would happen, she did it anyways, it doesn’t make sense for her to act shocked and hysterical to Cass about it. She wasn’t fired because she wasn’t as good as Tim, she got fired cuz she broke one of her two conditions. To clarify she was compared to him, but not being as good as him wasn’t the action that caused her firing, it was how she broken one of her conditions that she was told at the start and acknowledged.

She didn’t break it to save a kid, Batman told her to back away from an assassin that could murder her easily, and Stephanie tried to punch her anyway and was in a position to get murdered. (which is about as far as the Jason Todd connections go as far as her actions go, and so far I haven’t seen that brought up in comic)

Say I had a job and I got told not to press a button or else I’d get fired, and I pressed it one day without thinking and I got fired. It would make no sense for me to be shocked I got fired. I’d be mad, call it unfair (maybe not even that depending on the context), but I would be an idiot to be shocked that my action linked to my firing when I was directly told that would be what happened if I pressed the button.

Before when Batman told Steph to stop she pretty much flipped him off and did it anyway. Even if this happened on a more personal bases, there’s still the fact she never seemed to care about the job before, and if she did that wouldn’t make sense since she hasn’t liked Batman since she was a little kid and never met him.

Stephanie Brown, although I still count her as a Robin, had maybe the worst run at being Robin ever, not just cuz it was so short, but just because it was so badly written.

All of this just to kill her in the next arc.

Honestly Steph deserved better.

If it sounds like I’m trying to call her a crappy person or something, I’m not. I’m just like, dumbfounded at this bizarre run that people have held in typically high regard from what I seen, but the high regard is simply just from fan-fiction over the concept. Her run was written awfully. She was out of character.

Her Robin run was dreadful.

[garbage-empress]

I saw your post you didn't like princess and the frog and I'd genuinely and curiously would like to know why! Everyone I've met at the very least said they liked it, but I'm curious to know what would make someone dislike it! (I promise I won't respond to your answers with rebuttals, I just want to know since I've never met someone who thought the movie sucked)

1. 1920s New Orleans is an awesome setting and the movie wastes it by suddenly veering away from it in the second act into the bayou where we spend the majority of the rest of the movie. I realized on rewatch why I only remembered the first 30 minutes.

2. Speaking of the bayou, almost every event that happens in there is some annoying bullshit that has little bearing on the main plot.

3. Tiana randomly becomes a complete idiot in the third act, forgetting the whole Lawrence being a doppelganger plot that she herself commented on in the first act, and this is just to contrive really pointless drama. Then her, Naveen and Charlotte have a group dumbass moment where they let the clock run out on Charlotte turning them back into humans by having an extended conversation about it until it's too late. There's nothing physically preventing this from happening, everyone just acts stupid until midnight.

4. The movie spends a good portion of the first act deliberately subverting about every Disney Princess trope possible, explaining why it's impractical, then abandons this by the third act and starts rolling with some of the worst cliches like "it's perfectly acceptable to marry someone you've known for a whole day."

5. Dr. Facilier is a really poorly utilized villain, he gets severely sidelined for most of the movie and if you compare the showdown with him at the end of the movie compared to say, Gaston vs. The Beast or Mulan vs. Shan Yu, the fight against him is really underwhelming. Also speaking of him, I think it's kinda shit that they made him look like Baron Samedi. Voodoo(or which ever of its many spellings you prefer) is a pretty marginalized religion and they took the aesthetics of a (mostly) positive deity from a living religion and put them on a villain, which you know, yikes guys.

6. Honestly I think this would have been a much stronger movie if they just took the core story without trying to hammer it into an existing fairytale. It seems like they went backwards of the usual Disney route and the result is a pretty awkward story with a very inconsistent feel. Also Tiana's and Naveen's human character designs I thought were pretty appealing but their human design characteristics aren't really reflected on their frog designs. They're just sort of generic cartoon frogs. I won't even get into the unfortunateness of taking the first black Disney princess and making her a frog most of the movie because I think that point was done to death around the time of the movie's release.

7. Lots of songs but very few good ones. Friends on the Other Side and Almost There are good, the rest are pretty forgettable, which wouldn't be a problem if those two good songs weren't within the first thirty minutes.

Basically my main complaint is that all of the good parts of the movie are squished into the first half hour and it's all downhill from there.

[hypexion]

Descent of Dragons: Cataclysmic Reveals

Here’s all the non-Galakrond stuff revealed so far. Mostly dragon stuff, but there’s some other things to look at too.

Draconic Lackey is the seventh and final Lackey. This seems much more like a one mana card than other Lackeys, so it’s introduction might weaken Lackey based decks. Now that the Class Discover Bonus is gone, this is probably a lot weaker than it would have been if it could offer class dragons more of the time.

Evasive Drakonid is a big Taunt minion, that can’t be removed by spells. Although this probably isn’t a card you’ll want to put in your deck, I think it will be surprisingly strong when randomly generated. You generally want to use spells to destroy minions with this kind of statline, but that’s not an option, so you’ll need to trade, and Evasive Drakonid’s seven attack means you could be losing several minions.

Twin Tyrant is one of those big chunky curve-topper cards. Like a lot of commons, this looks like a another Discover bait card. It’s situationally good, but outside of those situations, it’s not going to make the right impact. This is a card that would benefit from being able to pick a target, but sadly, such a thing is clearly impossible.

To me, Emerald Explorer looks a little pushed. It’s got the full stats for a six-cost Taunt, and it also Discovers a card. That would usually cause it drop at least a few points. Maybe now that class cards don’t appear at a higher rate, Team Five are pricing Discover lower. If you’re looking for a curve filler in Dragon Druid, I guess this might work, since it protects stuff, and generates additional resources.

Dwarven Sharpshooter is basically just Steamweedle Sniper. This could actually be a decent turn one play, since it allows you to threaten most one cost minions, and many two cost minions with instant removal. Whether that’s something Hunter wants to do is another question, but the execution here probably works.

Corrosive Breath is okay, I suppose. Without seeing the full Dragon loadout, it’s hard to know if this is something worth running. The bonus effect is certainly something Hunter wants, but the real question will be if Hunter wants Dragons.

Primordial Explorer is an Emporer Cobra that also gets you a card. While the base card doesn’t see play, the extra card generation might push this up in terms of playability, and if you were building a Dragon Hunter deck, there aren’t that many three cost Dragons to chose from.

Learn Draconic is the first of the Sidequests, and it looks a tad unimpressive. Sure, it’s probably not too bad if you get it randomly, but I don’t think it’s worth adding to your deck. While a free 6/6 minion isn’t too shabby, I’m not sure if spending the one mana to start the sidequest will be worth it. Of course, Mage does have ways to play this for free, so this might not be to hampered by that problem.

Compared to the other two explorers, Azure Explorer... is bad. The problem here is that the base minion isn’t worth the cost, and the Discovery effect isn’t enough to make up for it. While Mage does have some powerful Dragons already, sacrificing early game tempo for late game value often doesn’t work out.

Sand Breath is the first of the Breath spells, which gain a bonus if you have a Dragon. Could Dragon Paladin finally become a thing!? Maybe. Sand Breath actually looks okay, since if you get the Divine Shield, you’ll be able to make better trades that usual, and the extra stat boost might let some minions punch above their weight class. This certainly isn’t going to be a game winning spell, but it could help you along the way.

Candle Breath is a badly designed card. If Dragon Rogue is a thing, it’s an obvious auto-include, because drawing three cards for three mana is absurdly good. Otherwise, three cards for six mana probably isn’t worth it. Sure, synergy is nice, but this is pushing it way, way to much.

Breath of Dreams is a pre-nerf Wild Growth that cycles. So not only is an overpowered card returning, it’s main weakness is being removed! Really amazing design work here, given that that answer to “Should I run this card“ and “Am I playing Dragon Druid“ are the same. In the Dragon-themed set, it’s likely that there will be another Dragons to have this always be on. Playable? Yes. Desirable? No.

Inspire is back! For some reason! Although, Phase Stalker doesn’t look to bad, honestly. Pulling a Secret whenever you use your Hero Power is pretty nice, and you aren’t losing any minion strength here. This could end up being a rather annoying minion, especially in the midgame, where it can be dropped and immediately activated.

Phase Stalker isn’t good for Zombeasts, but not everything can (or should) be a winner in all places. A lot of the time you’ll just be getting extra stats, while losing out on an actual effect.

Dragon’s Hoard is another random Legendary minion generator, because these effects are an easy way to fill out a set. Other than being a cheap activator for cards that care about off-class cards, this isn’t that great. The quality of Legendary minions, even class ones, is all over the place, making this wildly inconsistent.

Lightning Breath takes a fair card, then staples on an absurd bonus effect, making it slightly more well designed that certain other cards. This is very good if you’re running Dragons, since it can take a large bite out of your opponent’s board. I feel like at least one Dragon deck is going to happen, and it won’t be making people that happy.

Molten Breath is the bad card of the cycle. Warrior has piles of removal and Armor gain already, and you need to be running Dragons to get the Armor here. I’d give it a miss, unless you somehow misplace your powerful Rush minions.

Toxic Reinforcements is a Hunter Epic, so does anything else need to be said? This is obviously designed for aggressive decks, since it rewards using your Hero Power, and gives face damaging minions. Except it takes three turns to get your Gnomes, which for an Aggro deck is incredibly slow. Overall, this card has a bunch of parts that don’t really come together to form a coherent whole.

Sathrovarr looks like one of those win more Legendary minions. While getting extra copies of minions is always a useful effect, it’s hard to pull off when it’s on a nine mana card. I guess you can use Sathrovarr on a one mana minion for a guarenteed copy, but I doubt that will be worth it. If this does see play, it will probably be in slow, grinding decks that can stick something worth copying and will benefit from delaying fatigue.

Ysera Unleashed is the first of the Legendary Dragons for this set. While this effect is certainly splashy, it seems questionable as to how effective it will be. Not only is it a delayed effect, but that fact that you’re summoning random Dragons means that sometimes you’ll end up with subpar minions. Feeling like there’s something else to say here, but there really isn’t!

Dragonbane is another Legendary minion that’s just a random object with an orange gem added. It feels like the best time to play and activate this is when your opponent’s board is clear, in order to get that sweet seven damage for two mana. Otherwise, Dragonbane is basically a slightly smaller Ragnaros. That’s not bad, I guess, but it’s also not that exciting.

Malygos, Aspect of Magic continues the proud Hearthstone tradition wherein reading the card does not explain the card. You can get a bigger Fireball or Flamestrike, plus some other options. Since Malygos runs on a small, specific Discover pool, he could actually be quite strong, since if you want a specific spell, you have decent chance of getting it.

Nozdormu the Timeless is an four mana 8/8, with a crazy downside to match. But also an upside, if you can survive. The primary issue here is that your opponent gets first use of their full mana bar, so you’ll need to be prepared for that. It’s worth wondering if Nozdormu will end up seeing more play simple as high-value lategame minion, since his main effect might be too hard to work with.

Waxadred is another long game minion for Rogue, because ???. Notably, this waxy drake is slightly overstatted, and is configured aggressively. To be fair, in a deck that wants Dragons, Waxadred isn’t the worst option. Something that occationally comes back is useful, and Rogue is getting a very pushed draw option in this set. The wording here also suggests that you can activate Waxadred’s Deathrattle to get extra Candles, and thus extra Dragons. Unexciting, but possible playable.

You can’t have a Dragon Apocalypse set without Deathwing. This iteration murders everything, which I guess is appropriate for a Warrior card. Very few minions can survive twelve damage, so this can deal with a lot of stuff. If you can play this on an empty board, it’s also pretty good, given that it’s an eight mana 12/12. Which is also an issue with evolve effects - this is a massive highroll, and makes such effects even more swingy that they already are. The power level is getting pushed pretty hard here, and it could be possible that it damages the game further.

So... many... cards...

At least it’ll be a while until the next batch are shown. Weird spoiler timing is finally good for somethign.

[blundergato]

Some of these final missions in Astral Chain just suck ass and really shows the weakness of this combat style.

A big part of the game is sync attacks, which are like cutscene is moves you do with your legion. The problem is, you can’t cancel out of them and you can get hit in the middle of them AND the enemy can just...jump out of them and completely ignore the fact that you are doing them.

Not only that, but other enemies can initiate attacks as you are performing these moves, so the second you get out of them, you are getting hit with literally no chance to move.

Also, some of the arenas are just absolute trash, especially ones in the Astral Plane. Being able to fall off the edge and take an enormous chunk of damage really sucks, especially when an enemy hits you off the edge. And a big problem with the AI is that the stronger enemies tend to corral themselves against the edge so you have to run over there to hit them. Not only that, but you can hit enemies off the edge, and for flying enemies, a lot of the time, they get stuck out of bounds. A couple of times I had to completely restart the game because they got knocked off the edge and were in such a state that they were invulnerable because the game was trying to respawn them somewhere else, but failing. So not even my long ranged attacks could hit them.

Other times it just completely disrupts the flow of battle because if you knock a non flying enemy off, you have to way a few seconds for them to respawn in the middle of the arena (they don’t take fall damage either, so it’s JUST to be annoying). There are skills that only last a few seconds so this can be a pretty huge problem.

I really dislike that enemies can pretty much armor through any attack you do to hit you. This game isn’t like other Platinum games where a big thing is to not get hit. You are going to get hit in this game and there’s no avoiding it. The fact that taking damage doesn’t really affect the score shows that. And the way the game is designed is that a lot of enemies barely have a tell or their attacks come out super fast. The dodge is so goddamn precise that it makes it more frustrating than anything to get out of the way.

Also, the lock on sucks so much that I’m constantly fighting just as much with it as I am the enemies. It’s pretty inconsistent and just a pain in the ass to move. Your character just goes swinging at random things that I’m not locked onto. When there’s a big ass group of enemies and you ensnare a dangerous one in the chain, because you are locked on to something else, you won’t swing at it. And changing the lock on is tedious and doesn’t really work well. You’re supposed to flick the right stick left or right to change but that shit only works half the time. THE BIGGEST problem with this is that you move the camera with the right stick, so a lot of the time you are just randomly switching targets. It’s INFURIATING.

The enemy placement/design can just be unfair too. There will be projectile enemies that you just can’t see hitting you from off screen as you are fighting something else. There’s not really a cue that tells you they’re coming. You are just getting hit. In other action games, off screen enemies tend to be more passive because you obviously can’t see them and it’s hard to react to them. But in this game, they are still hyper aggressive even off screen, making some encounters feel unfair. 

Some enemies spam the shit out of their long range moves and some of these, like a red tornado attack, track you for a few seconds. It just makes the fights drag out because you have to run away from these things in order not to take big damage, but then you run up to the enemy to attack, and they just super armor through your attack to do ANOTHER tornado. This literally just happened to me fighting some shit enemy; they spawned tornados like 5 times in a row.

Getting stunlocked is a HUGE problem. Enemies can just hit you over and over for some insane damage and sometimes just until you die. Nothing you can do about it either. You can’t dodge out of it and there’s no other defensive option. It just sucks.

All of the enemies in the game are super mobile, even the big ones, and even the slowest moving enemies have attacks that pretty much instantly put them in your face. So trying to lure a giant enemy away in order to rush away and fight another one is a pointless strategy because the giant will just sprint over to where you are; they move about as fast as the player character.

There are some enemies, namely the wolf, that can howl and stun you for a couple seconds. This is honestly one of the worst designs in the game. I was just in a battle with one of those wolf enemies and this giant monster that can do a shitload of damage to you. The giant enemy was always in my face so I could barely SEE the wolf behind it. Then the wolf howled instantly stunning me and then the giant enemy used some big ass attack that just killed me. The wolf will also spam the shit out of the howl move and can also use it while in the middle of being attacked.

One of the most irritating things about combat are enemies that fly or float above the ground. The camera just can’t handle it. It gets into this weird position that just makes it hard to see anything. Also using the Astral Chain on these enemies is weird. The flying enemies that can go invisible are the absolute worst because most of the time they WILL hang out off the stage and the wolf legion is the only one that can see them...but the wolf legion can’t float so it can’t even run off the edge to attack them. It’s so goddamn bad.

There’s just a lot of weird design issues with the combat in this game and I’ve hit the point now, after completing around 60% of the File 12 missions, where I’m just not having fun anymore. This game’s combat isn’t that rewarding, not in the way that other Platinum games are. I don’t really feel like I’m getting any better because getting an S+ on every mission is super easy and the only ones I can’t get S+ on are the combat missions that are comically difficult (only in bonus missions) and I just don’t have the patience to try over and over again.

I was going to try to complete all of File 12, but I think I’m done. There’s not enough in this game for me to come back to it like I did with Wonderful 101 and I never really feel all that satisfied even when I do well like Bayonetta or Revengeance.

[self-critical-automaton]

Whats Been Going On With Me Lately

So basicly the TLDR is:

I’ve been super ill in weird and new brain ways since about mid-december, when withdrawal from my antidepressants resulted in strange intense psychological events, and I’ve been dealing with the fallout and day-to-day distress ever since. I’m terrified that i might have suffered permanent alterations/damage to my mental state, but who can say.

Details under the cut for anyone who wants to know how ive been doing, or wants to hear about what happens when you quit a high dose of fluoxetine cold turkey after five or six years.

Or for anyone who is going through something similar and wants some info/hope, since withdrawal experiences seem to be super idiosyncratic and variable and its almost impossible to find detailed descriptions.

I’d really appreciate it being read, esp. by people in my life, but dont feel compelled or whatever idk i dont make the rules but srsly please read it if you can it took a lot of time and effort

PS: this and several other articles on that blog were a huge help to me getting through the first couple phases, if you’re having trouble with withdrawal please go read PPS: fine to reblog, in fact please do

In 2017 I started getting painful physical side effects from my antidepressants, which gradually got worse until in lateish-2018 I decided to stop taking them outright. Everyone ever says you shouldn’t quit antidepressants cold-turkey, and they are right, but I’d been taking them inconsistently due to the pain, and I was beginning to suspect they’d stopped helping me anyway, so it seemed the best option.

I quit in probably mid-October and for a couple months felt much the same as usual, but then around the 13th of December it all kicked off. At first I had no idea what was happening, and I thought I was suffering a sudden and intense flu coinciding with a bad depressive spike, but after a couple days I figured out that withdrawal can be offset by weeks or months in rare cases, and decided this is what must be happening. That first round of Withdrawal Time had a few soft-edged but distinct phases (lasting about a week each), and I went through by far the worst experience in my entire life, closely followed by the second-worst and then third-worst.

Round One Start! Phase One: intense existential dread

It kicked of very suddenly, around the 13th december, getting rapidly worse over a couple days. I was paralysed with fear as my mind sunk into thinking in infinite circles, unable to do anything other but endlessly contemplate and debate morbid philosophical topics, forced to confront the inevitability of death, emptiness of life, terror of oblivion, impossibility of afterlife, and so on. I also suffered sensory experiences similar to those ive heard described by people who take drugs like LSD, or very severe fever dreams. Sensations of expanded perception, becoming trapped in imaginary scenarios on other planes, that sort of thing.

In this phase I ate almost nothing, and over that week lost 4 or 5 kg. I also had some flu symptoms, mostly as fevers and chills, and could ony, really sleep in short bursts of a couple hours each. There was very little I could safely occupy myself with, as almost all media (books, games, film, fiction and nonfiction, everything really) would in some way trigger me into thinking about an existential topic, and then the terror would resume. I spent what time I could working to fix the problems with my life that I had suddenly become aware of (my social isolation, my medial issues, my mental health, etc), so I made a lot of phone calls, doctor visits, and applied to some mental health counseling services. I also started looking for avenues to make friends and acquaintances online and in person, and did a lot of research on antidepressant withdrawal.

Towards the end of this phase, the dread got more manageable and began to ease off, and I found I could play simple puzzle games to help occupy myself during the day. Listening to certain podcasts also was a source of relief and distraction. However, things remained bad in the morning and evenings, and I ended up referring to these times as ‘morning hell’ and ‘evening hell’. Also, I began to keep a basic daily log of my symptoms.

Phase Two: generalized anxiety

As I segued into this phase, the existential dread mostly withdrew during the day, leaving instead a sense of severe generalized anxiety. I’ve had issues with anxiety in the past, but it’s always been event-related or social, so Generalized Anxiety Disorder style anxiety was an interesting addition to my mental health cocktail. I still suffered the existential dread, but primarily during the Morning and Evening Hells, and as occasional spikes during the day. Mostly, I felt like it was off to one side somewhere, and felt anxiety about thinking about existential topics.

I got little done, but was able to occupy myself with podcasts, housework, simple games, and (oddly enough) Star Trek: The Original Series. Almost anything else I tried would worsen the anxiety, and threaten to trigger existential dreads. During this time I started sleeping more normally, but also began waking every night with chest pains and leg pains, which of course caused a great deal of anxiety about heart issues and blood clots. I also began to feel like I had begun to ‘wake up’ after having sleepwalked through the past year or so.

Phase Three: misc badfeels and weird sensory effects

As phase 2 segued into this one, around christmas day, the anxiety started to recede during the day. I’d get a window of safety varying from half an hour to a few hours, usually starting in the early afternoon. I began to leave the house more, going for walks with my partner, which could occupy me safely during bad feeling times. During those windows, I often still felt bad, but it felt like a ‘normal’ bad, like depression and ennui, rather than the very active generalized anxiety or severe dread. I also began to be able to read again, and to play games more widely. I committed to attending some local social events (some board games/RPG things, and a support group) and mostly tried to get on with life. 

I was frequently quite sluggish and slow, and didn't usually get much work done, even napping occasionally. As my days improved, my nights worsened, with bad sleep and bad dreams. I would also have odd brief sensory effects, such as hallucinations and waking dreams. For the first time since withdrawal started, I began to worry that I was slipping backwards and getting worse again. Up until that point, I had felt like, as awful as I was feeling, there was a slow but consistent improvement.

By early January I was having inconsistent bouts of the existential stuff and the generalized anxiety in the day, but looking back probably not as intensely as in the earlier phases.

Phase Four: inconsistent rehash

Phase four was similar to phase three, except without the consistency that phase three had (at least earlier on) of ‘morning bad, day safe, evening bad’. It also lasted longer than the ‘about a week’ of previous phases. I had ups and downs of general bad feelings throughout the day, with occasional spikes or longer bouts of existential fear or generalized anxiety, and I developed an aversion to going to bed (as most mornings would feel worse than evenings). I usually slept badly, and I started waking up during what I’m pretty sure were sleep-panic-attacks an hour or so after going to sleep. Chest pains and so on were very common and worrying, so I talked to the doctor a lot and ended up on some cardio waiting lists.

I had some depressive episodes which felt very much like the kind of depressive episodes I’ve had over my life, and about the same topics, though more intensely. It was almost comforting, in a back-to-normal sort of way.

Frankly, this whole phase felt like a random jumble of previous phase symptoms and pre-withdrawl mental health stuff, almost like dimming lightbulbs on an old electrical system, fading in and out and going on and off randomly and unpredictably.

Towards the end of January, I had a bad bout of flu, but during that time I felt a lot better in mental health terms. I don’t know if this was due to the distraction of a big obvious ‘thing to survive’ or if it was a natural upswing as part of the arc of that phase. After I got over the flu, I had a couple days of existential stuff reasserting itself, and I was worried that it was a second bout of Phase One, but I stopped recording my log on the 5th of February, so it’s hard to recall anything past this.

Interstitial Period

I’m pretty sure that for most of February, I felt ‘back to normal’, and was feeling more-or-less how I had been before withdrawal kicked off. That said, my capacity to occupy myself has not really recovered. I’m occasionally able to play games or read, but I often have a bad sense of ennui. This may be my natural yearly Seasonal Affective Disorder, or a natural depressive episode (I have consistently if infrequently had times where I’m unable to occupy myself and suffer ennui, just as part of being a depressed person), but I’ve not had one this long before.

I have a strong fear that my cognition/way of being/mental state has been permanently altered by that first phase, that it in some way ‘opened my eyes’ and now I will never be able to go back to how I was. I’m scared that I might never be free of this existential dread lurking in the back of my mind, but also trying to dissemble, forget, or distract myself feels like a foolish naivety. Its something we all have to face, so postponing the inevitable is pointless, but also I can’t overcome or accept it, so I’m trapped in a limbo.

Round Two?

After feeling mostly ’back to normal’ for a while, I’ve been having some bad times again. For about a week or so (end of febuary/beginning of march), I’ve been having existential fears and the ‘big mix of generalized bad feeling’ again, on and off during the day, and especially in mornings/evenings. I was very afraid that it was the beginning of a downslope into a full repeat of this entire cycle, but it’s been pretty consistent so far, rather than getting worse.

I’m hoping that this is indeed Round Two, and that its just a lot less bad than Round One, which would be consistent with what I’ve read about this stuff.

Final Thoughts

Phase one was the worst thing ive gone through in my life, but on good days I feel somewhat optimistic that it’s had a ‘rock bottom’ kind of effect, that I can find some positive things to come out of it.

It’s given me some perspective, and it’s helped me come out of a sleepwalking time in my life. I feel what i’m missing in my life much more keenly (social isolation/ lack of friends, lack of passion, lack of purpose/drive/meaning in my life), but I’m also able to work on them to some extent for the first time in years.

That said, I know these take a lot of time and work to fix, but it’s hard not to look at the glacially slow progress i’ve made as ‘no progress in basically three months’, and sink back into the things-will-never-get-better-so-why-try kind of depression.

I’m gonna keep trying, though.

[electricbluebutterflies]

Jess/Leto + Kisses that start on their fingers and run up their arm, eventually ending on their lips.

I am still not where I wanna be with writing NSFW content for them but at least I tried. Mid-era and also on ao3

Every day the internal weight is different. Every day something haunts her, some part of this life she has claimed feels out of place, but the inconsistency makes it easier, the randomly shifting emotions she hides so well. No one knows. No one will ever need to know.

Today is easier than most, easier to slip into roles and tasks she still must remind herself were never meant to be hers. But they are all the same, and she has become good at them despite…

Jessica never intended any of this, was not made to be a primary woman, but her intent has never mattered. Things happen and she adapts, and out of this a life. Out of this, happiness.

An easier day, a life lived half-awake even as she waits for inevitable consequences, for the apparently delayed punishment for choices that have yet to seem strange at all. Waiting for consequences almost ten years now, almost a third of her life and nothing, and maybe it’ll be alright, maybe they stay safe, maybe-

No. She knows better. Nothing good ever lasts. She will protect what is hers, and she will still not be enough.

This is not enough to darken her mood, not enough to make her difficult as night comes and she waits up for her partner as she does almost every night she is not otherwise occupied. If anything, the fear focuses her heart. She will take what she can whenever she can – and hasn’t that been the problem? If she had been able to quiet her heart, if she had remembered for three damn seconds that her own desires will never matter, if she hadn’t been so distracted…

And she is distracted, a decade later, distracted enough to barely hear the door open. Her posture changes quickly as she snaps out of it, not too late to salvage routines, to try to be pretty enough, to-

Another wave of fear hits, and she knows this one is invalid but it is still real. She is not as she once was, her beauty slowly changing form, and she has trusted her partner’s fidelity since before he offered it but she still-

Why her, she wonders sometimes. Her lover is like sunlight, everything he is believed to be and she knows his every weakness more than any living thing ever will. She has watched what he has become, how at worst the weight of power has made him tired, how little else has changed. She has done nothing here, has not needed to change a single detail, has not wanted to, has not-

He kisses the top of her head and she looks at him with wet eyes and oh sometimes this love feels like the undoing she’d once feared. Like something she will drown in someday, and still she has never wanted anything more.

“Say if you need me to stop,” he murmurs, taking her silence for the permission it is.

She is safe in this space, with this man who has never done wrong by her with any intent. Her body is safe; the hands that undo her dress are familiar and kind, almost extensions of herself. She closes her eyes and tries to focus herself, but she can feel the way he looks at her, respectful and still a little bit in awe of details he has seen thousands of times. If he is the sun, she thinks, then perhaps she is the night sky, perhaps-

He kisses her hand and works upward, leaving little echoes of warmth up her arm and across her collarbone and up her neck and finally her mouth where she wants it most. This is the kind of man he is, delighted by her, expressive enough about it, and she-

She has done nothing to earn this, she reminds herself, eyes still closed and she bites her lip as they break for air because he will stop touching her if she starts crying and right now she does not want that. They have time, for now they have time, they are safe they are here they are-

“Stay with me.”

“I trust you enough.”

And she does, and maybe that’s the messiest part of it all, maybe even more forbidden than how she has used her body. She was never taught what to do with affection, not what to do if, skies forbid, she actually did learn how to care about another human being. It’s the innocence that throws her off, not the fact that her lover has decided most of her skin needs kisses but the fact that she is completely sure that he feels even warmer than she does right now. She knows him, she reminds herself, knows he does not fake emotions past whatever point is necessary to avoid public conflict. The desire in his eyes is real, the soft smiles against her skin are real, the intent in every movement of his hands is real.

She has done nothing. She will bring downfall. She is loved anyways. She will never understand. Someday she will stop trying and accept it all as it is.

Today is not that day, and her mind and body feel comfortably separate as her partner covers her and finds familiar patterns of collision. She is watching this scene from outside, somehow, and it is perfectly alright that way. She will feel echoes of touch in the morning, held against her skin by a tighter underdress, reminders that she is beloved. She is chaos incarnate some days, some minor goddess of destruction of a long-abandoned planet, but she is also what her partner wants most in the world, able to take the weight just enough, able to-

He breathes her name against the curve of her neck and she loves him too much, this beautiful man who will someday burn too bright but hasn’t yet, please give them decades before she has to learn to sleep without him, please-

Jessica takes a particularly bitey kiss as her control is almost not enough, as her body is tense and then it is not and that is enough to make her partner follow. There is nothing else in the world but this, their intertwined limbs and the safety they give each other, both made powerful like this, like-

Her partner shifts his weight off her body and looks her over, looking for marks he didn’t leave. “Still in there?”

She responds with a soft kiss, a sweetness she rarely shows. “I trust you,” she says again. “And I did want that. I’m just…”

He makes a low sound, too low to be a sigh but in that sort of range, like yes he knows this could deteriorate into a fight they’ve had hundreds of times but he’s not in the mood to go there. “I want to…”

“I know.”

And she does. She could recite from memory… if not the exact wording, then at least the general outline of the tangents he gets into sometimes about wanting to do right by her. And he does, she wants to say every time and never does enough to be listened to. She is loved so completely, and she knows, and love like that requires response, and that is how they became what they are, and-

“I don’t deserve you,” he says after almost too long of a silence. “I really don’t.”

Jessica rolls her eyes. “You don’t deserve the constant stress I cause, you mean.”

“Not constant, and you balance it…”

“I try, love.” Things she’d say more if she were braver, she thinks. If she could become the sort of woman who uses endearments while curling up for sleep with her partner. If she were actually good enough.

She’s not sure she is, as she retreats to her side of the bed because she is in no mood to be held and she is fully aware that she’ll probably wake up closer to her partner but…

She does try. And sometimes, in the deepest part of the night, it almost feels like enough.

[wazafam]

Fox's New Girl is everyone's favorite quirky sitcom, and with seven seasons to love, there's a lot that happens for the characters of loft 4D. Like every sitcom, though, this show doesn't go without some inconsistencies and plot holes. Plus, there are some parts that fans may have completely forgotten about.

RELATED: 10 Continuity Errors In New Girl

Sometimes, sitcoms throw in a storyline, just for it to fade into nothingness without so much as another mention. It's time to look back at some of those dropped storylines, and remember everything about what could have been and almost was.

10 Winston As The 'Cool Guy'

When fans are first introduced to Winston, he's a pretty 'cool guy' that just returned from Latvia, where he was playing basketball. His first real moment is trying to manipulative Schmidt into giving him the bigger bedroom.

Next, he tells Schmidt that holding hands with Cece is certainly not 'closing'. This is far from the Winston that fans have come to know and love - and his character goes through a very rapid change and direction.

9 Jess & Abby's Sibling Rivalry

There are only three episodes where Abby (Linda Cardellini) appears, and it's a pretty chaotic time. Schmidt is sleeping with her, and Jess is trying to find her a new apartment so they don't have to live together.

However, after Abby leaves, she's just never mentioned again. Neither of her parents mention her, and the fact that Jessica Day even has a sister is totally disregarded. Of course, she's also not at the wedding.

8 Winston & Birdie

Fans might remember the weird relationship that was Winston and Birdie (Jessica Chaffin). They were bizarre, a bit gross, and oddly had a strange fascination for cats. She appeared for a few episodes, and then just vanished.

RELATED: New Girl: 10 Best Couples, Ranked

Really, they seemed to just stop including her when writing the show. It wasn't that fans really missed Birdie as a character, but this is one storyline that just got dropped.

7 Cece's GED & College Education

Cece has a pretty impressive character arc that changed her throughout the series, and it includes being a model, trying to get a college education, and then becoming a modelling manager. She did manage to get her GED, but the whole premise of her studying was just dropped.

It's assumed that she stops going to college, and works at the bar until she finally decides to be a modelling manager. However, the storyline of her going back to school just faded into nothing.

6 Ferguson

Ferguson the cat was a pretty prominent recurring feline when it came to the show. He was Winston's baby, and every fan couldn't help but love the fluffy pet as he continued to be a part of the show.

RELATED: New Girl: Each Main Character As A 'Bad Ex-Boyfriend' Stereotype

However, fans might have randomly thought at some point, what happened to Ferguson? He suddenly just stops appearing in episodes, and is never mentioned until season 7, where they reveal he died a year earlier. It's a confusing time for fans, and definitely a sad one.

5 Coach's Friendship

Coach was in the first episode of the show, and then doesn't return again until episode 7 in season 3. After a pretty consistent presence, he moves to New York with his new girlfriend, May (Meaghan Rath). He even continues to return for major events through season 5.

However, he then is totally off the map. He reappears for one episode in season 7, and doesn't even return for the series finale. As such a prominent character for nearly three season, the show definitely forgot about him.

4 Sadie's Entire Character

Sadie (June Diane Raphael) was a recurring character, and was an OB/GYN that was friends with both Cece and Jess. She is the one that tells Cece she has limited time to have a baby, and is the one to tell everyone that she's pregnant.

RELATED: New Girl: 5 Best (& 5 Worst) Recurring Characters

Then, she's gone. They do allude to this random dropped storyline in the final episode, where she makes an angry appearance on Nick and Jess' wedding day, after not getting invited.

3 Schmidt's Job

Schmidt working at his marketing job takes up a lot of screen time in the first few seasons. Then, things get a little complicated, and don't really make much sense. There is a lot of talk about how he hates his job, but nothing really comes of it.

In season 7, there is an allusion to Schmidt returning to work after being at home with his and Cece's baby, Ruth. However, for the past few seasons, practically nothing is mentioned about Schmidt's job.

2 The Douchebag Jar

If there's one ongoing joke that every die-hard fan knows about this show, it's the douchebag jar. However, fans see if for the last time on "Landing Gear", which is the 22nd episode of the fifth season.

Considering it was a running gag and is the adorable inspiration for Schmidt proposing to Cece, it could have been pretty funny to see it return for either of the last two seasons. While it's not really a full 'storyline', it's certainly something fans came to love laughing about.

1 Jess As A School Principal

This is another storyline that might be a bit annoying for fans to remember, and realize that it was completely dropped off in the end of season 6 and all of season 7. There was so much lead up to Jess getting her dream job, which she finally did mid-season 6.

However, being a teacher and a principal is one of Jess' key characteristics, and it was a bit disappointing for fans that she was no longer doing so in the final season, where closure was all anyone wanted for these lovable characters.

NEXT: New Girl: 10 Easter Eggs You Missed In The Show

New Girl: 10 Storylines The Show Dropped | ScreenRant from https://ift.tt/2KcDtBb

[sillyfudgemonkeys]

U R entitled to your own opinion. but still what could've been so messed up for you to hate it? I remember you fangirling about Anne back when only the Japanese version was released back in 2016.

Summary (and incomplete list) of my problems. 

Yeah as I played the Japanese ver the first time I was focusing on the positives.....after I finished I...it felt off......tbh it felt off while playing it but I didn’t notice/refused to listen to it cause I was waiting to see things unfold. And while I understood what was going on, there was some crucial information (at least crucial for me to process it correctly) I knew I was missing cause of the language barrier. 

After a 2nd time through I saw it..... I saw how all the antagonists were.....not well written besides Kamoshida and Sae (and even Sae could’ve used some tweaks to her motive, tho not as much tweaks as the rest of the game I think needs). I saw how there was a lot of similarities between P4....and not the good time......it felt pretty copy paste....and tbh if it was going to copy and paste one of the past game’s formula.....it should’ve been P3′s.....But hey...that would’ve mean that Atlus would’ve had to write more overarching arcs in P5 like they did with P3, and we can’t have that kind of effort...... The lack of overarching arcs really hurts Anne, Ryu, and Yusuke (who, even in my first playthrough, I felt he literally dropped off the face of the earth after I finished the dungeon, not his arc where we see Madarame’s confession, I literally forgot Yusuke was there right after I finished the dungeon with like a month to go before the confession). Haru and Goro get screwed in their own way. I felt like the game relied too much on Makoto and Futaba to do stuff (it felt like they were doing everything, barring the MC of course). It didn’t feel much like a Phantom Thief game (tho it takes a bunch of the story cliches without any of the fun). I never felt like I had freedom.....which is a problem when the game’s theme is freedom. Not with the MC’s dialogue, he has like one personality to choose from (which for the most part feels like it’s mostly “jerk, sassy-jerk, funny-jerk” like it’s worse than the PQ options). The endings suck in terms of freedom of choice, it’s like 5 steps backwards from P4 which is wrong since they should’ve at least taken a step forward from P4 considering P5 is next gen and P4 was made on a shoe-string budget. The dungeons...oh my gawd..... Give me P3/4′s any day. Yes I like the randomly generated one’s cause it gave me more choice than P5′s. P5′s were good the first time through, but they are such a slog after that. It’s not that P5′s are big, but it’s that they aren’t bigger! Give me an option on how I want to approach the treasure! Give me a short route, a fast route, an easy route, a hard route, a long route, a medium route, and make it so I can back track and go through all the routes if I want. Give me incentive to take the longer/harder route (better weapons, loot, items but of course it’s harder, higher risk means higher reward), give me the short/fast route so when I’m replaying for the 53rd time I can just skate through that without having to spend an hour going through a dungeon I’m destroying (it says something when the dungeon is so long that it’ll take someone an hour to run through the dungeon on NG+ on safety, while it takes maybe 10-30 min to speed through P3/4 on NG+ regardless of difficulty. Like...god....thinking about playing P5 NG+ on the hardest difficulty must take them like 2 hours a dungeon or more @.@). But yeah I never felt free in the game, the characters never felt free in the dungeon setting (AND THAT’S WHAT ATLUS WOULD SAY IN THEIR INTERVIEWS! The characters are suppose to feel more free in the Metaverse! WHY IS IT THEY DON’T FEEL LIKE THAT WHEN I PLAY?????)

Actually bouncing off that, I hate the characterization inconsistencies. Anne and Ryu get the worst of it, but this also applies to comments on Anne/Mako’s thief outfits too. I love Anne I do, but Atlus screw her and everyone over so bad. She’s suppose to speak out against sexualization but then gets sexualized in her own game. And not even in a “I’m being confident and am being sexy cause I want to” fanservice it’s always “someone is looking at me and I’m uncomfortable and don’t want to be looked at” fanservice...... And the former seems to be what they might’ve wanted to do, the artbook stating her short skirt as a reason.....but then the rest of the game is just her hating her outfit and it’s like “WHAT?!” And it doesn’t help the Devs were like “oh yeah we thought that’d be cute.” NO! NO IT’S NOT ATLUS! I’d give you a pass with her wearing it the first few times and then getting used to it and owning it (cause that’d be growth), but no.....not for 98% of the game......  And then Ryuji, he’s all “protect women’s honor” when it comes to Anne being creeped on by random guys, but as soon as he gets the chance to be a creep he takes it. And it really just messes with his values, or how we see his values in that regard....all cause Atlus wants a cheap laugh. Same goes for the MC, the whole reason he was in that mess was cause he was protecting a woman, and he also creeps on Anne a little (tho not as enthusiastically as Ryu, and you could actually be dating her by those times so you could say that Anne’s actually fine with him doing it). And then Makoto.....her’s is minor but it also deals with her outfit, tho iirc it’s only really during the Mementos convos (and Anne’s does too, but it also happens outside in that and her arc’s theme in dungeon one is also a big factor in why it’s bad), but it’s still there. Anne and Makoto’s views on their own outfits muddles how the game address why they are dressed that way. We get “it’s your will of rebellion” but we have a variety of reactions. Ryuji’s was what I expected everyone to be like aka “mine’s pretty cool, but your’s is strange” kinda thing....cause they seem like it’s tailored for them......And yeah you can say “oh the big bad had some influence in it” but.......that’s just.....weird and it really muddies something that could be easy to grasp.....I mean the outfits kinda do a good job at reflecting their Personas! And, at least with Hashino, everyone seems to like their Personas.....WHICH MAKES SENSE! SO WHY NOT MAKE THE COSTUMES MAKE SENSE EVEN THO THEY ARE ALIGNED TO MAKE SENSE AND lkfelnfsd;aknfal;f AHHHHHHHHHh!!!!

Sorry that’s all I can go into for now. You don’t have to agree with it of course but......it’s just......a lot of things....piled on......and....why....why is it like this..... @.@ ;w;

[secondsofhappiness]

I don't think you've ever said if you think the baby is roberts or not? What are your thoughts about twists happening around or after Xmas?

Aw anon! I’ve avoided this question because it’s such a difficult one to answer for me. I’ve learned NOT to try to guess the storylining of Iain flipping McLeod. He is a law unto himself as show runner but here’s my own set of opinions seeing as you asked for them!!

There are so many theories and possibilities (god bless this creative insightful fandom) and, so far, the theory that Rob isn’t the dad hasn’t been disproven or nothing has happened that makes it very unlikely… it’s still very much a possibility.

I also LOVE the Adam theory. I don’t believe it’s true but it still hasn’t been disproven which is bloody great. Now THAT would be a twist and a half and only fandoms write genius stuff like that no matter what show you look at. It would fit perfectly with their scenes Adam and Rebecca randomly had together, the fact Adam told Rebecca to go find Robert that night, that there was huge focus on Adam’s ability to have kids, that he found the pregnancy test etc. I’d LOVE it to be true but I personally don’t think it is. In an IDEAL world it’d be an ingenious turn of events.

My personal opinion is that Rob is the father. That is just my opinion though. We know the Whites are sodding off (🎈🎈🎈) and clearly one of them will die. We don’t know if Rebecca is dying (insert my already stated feelings on this possibility!) but it’s pretty likely she’s also leaving so that reality, to me, leaves the option of the baby remaining with Rob (and then eventually Aaron too) or leaving with a White. I think these are the likely outcomes…

All factors considered though, there is so much contradiction that it’s difficult to predict the end of the storyline. I’ve tried to make a summary below because there are so many factors that suggest this isn’t a clean cut situation but there are polarising factors that mean it’s confusing… all going under a cut for spoilers!

I mean there’s all of the following…

a) The handling of the ONS fallout. It was a collection of the weirdest scenes that still haven’t been explained or made sense of… you know how, I won’t go into them all. It was about unconventional a one night stand if every I’ve seen one… and on a Soap too. Soaps are never subtle. Maybe it’s more of Iain and his weirdness.

b) The early pregnancy stuff. It was an utter shit show. It was a depressingly bad depiction of a young healthy female and her control over her own sexual health and her handle on her body. It was so bad that it was a slippery slope to not caring in the slightest about Rebecca White. That’s entirely not the point when portraying a newly pregnant woman…

c) No DNA test. Still the strangest factor in all of this. Why even have her shack up with Ross numerous times but have only her assurances that it is Robert’s as the confirmation of his fatherhood….! Jesus.

d) The baby is the major issue between Aaron and Rob. It has continuously been framed as such even specifically stated as such and so any development on that front would have to be enormous and there are suggestions that Aaron is still very uncomfortable around the kid after it’s born. This is very important. Aaron has a heart the size of Leeds but the show has framed this kid as “the issue” from day one so hard work would be needed to ever solve that. That said, I don’t believe Aaron would ever hold anything against an innocent little being. He knows the realities of a poor childhood.

e) Most of the interviews given by Danny or Ryan or Iain barely mention the baby. Emily has done one interview and as far as I can remember it didn’t talk about the parentage much or the eventual future of the kid. A baby is a pretty huge addition to a character’s life and future storylines and you’d think it’d be mentioned more especially where Aaron is concerned

f) The Whites are upping and going. If Rebecca leaves or dies then, to me, that’s an indicator that THAT is the big end to the story rather than a parenting reveal. Her dying is still gross to me but if that’s what happens then it feels odd to have the added “oh and by the way the kid isn’t yours”

g) I get the point that Rob is heading for an epic fall from grace to further snap him out of his ways and prompt a life change and perspective shift but I have this sneaking suspicion that the kid IS the major factor in this. Obviously it is going to be A factor (and should be) but I have a feeling it’s going to be the major one as it doesn’t seem like Rob reverts to his old ways in any big way post Sebastian entering the world. As much as I’m not a fan of kids magically changing a person because it DOESN’T, not entirely, not someone whose actions are extreme and deeply ingrained as Rob! I’ll say it till I’m blue in the face but kids don’t cure people. People’s faults and foibles and issues do not disappear. Children are life changes but they are not magical. I am a product of this as a person and I HATE the idea that kid’s cure a person’s personality. I think based on Iain’s recent interview and the spoilers, Sebastian is going to play a huge part in Rob’s redemption and there’s a high chance that the stuff in December will be the fall out from the Lawrence stuff, Lachlan wanting to ultimately get revenge and I think there’s a high chance the theory that Rob nearly dies saving Liv and or Aaron is going to happen. All of that would have Rob basically banned from his kid’s life, near death etc. I don’t know, I’ve started to wonder if Rob’s life will be made hell by Lachlan and that his life is threatened or Seb’s life and that’s was takes him to rock bottom.

h) I think Thursday’s scenes with Rob and Sebastian (as I’m lead to believe) will revolutionise his character. I am not a massive baby fan but I AM a fan of character development and character based story telling and I’ve THOROUGHLY enjoyed this Rob storyline. It has been hella weird and done in such a damned quirky way that I’ve loved it. We’ve seen him at his worst and I have a feeling we’ll also see him at his best and I think Aaron and Sebastian and Liv will be the things that facilitate his best, his emotional, his human side. I think those scenes may change my opinion on how the storyline will play out as I’m told that they’re highly emotional and show Rob’s character in a whole new light, in that he actively recognises his major faults and that there’s a huge connection there with the kid already that appears revolutionary for him. That’s what I’m told and I’m really looking forward to that tbh. If that’s the case, I don’t think I’d want the baby removed. I don’t think I’d like Sebastian taken from his life if that’s how those scenes play out because if Sebastian is going to be THAT important to Rob or THAT overwhelming for him then I’d like him to keep that. As long as he doesn’t become about bloody nappies or night time feeds I’ll be ok with the baby sticking around and as long as there is further realisation for him that isn’t just Seb related. If Seb turns out NOT to Rob’s in this circumstance then I think I would be devastated too. It’s like the thought of removing Liv from Aaron. Nope. It would be gut wrenching if this is what Seb is to him and perhaps that makes the possibility of him not being the father likely? That’d be an epic kick in the gut if Seb is shown as vital to Rob so quickly and then he’s removed from him… it’s all based on those scenes and I’d love to make a post afterwards as I think they’ll be really revealing.

i) Having Rob think he’s the father then removing that from him is pretty much a repeat of the Adam storyline. Would they do that so soon? (This is what makes the Adam Theory so brilliant to me, he’d be getting the opposite treatment this time! If only we could have this!!)

j) There’s also this major repetition of Aaron and Rob and kids aka having their own. It’s so heavy handed that I wonder if this is all being set up to have Rob realise he needs to be better and as a way to have him realise he does want to be a father but with Aaron. I’d ADORE an adoption storyline with them. For m/m rep it’d be wonderful and these two are nightmares so seeing them parent further down the line would be hilarious but now…? I still feel it’s too soon for both of their characters. Yes their ages are normal for having kids but… well, they’re NIGHTMARES. They’re still growing and learning and doing insane things.

k) For Rob to not be the father it’d mean that Rebecca didn’t know and was a grade A class idiot for not realising that having sex with another bloke in the same week could also mean pregnancy and that condoms break… or that she has been manipulating Rob all this time. I think the latter is unlikely, for me. Rebecca used to be feisty and her whole “nobody uses me” stance at one point has been so brutally buried and killed that, at this point, she’s such a wet drip and so plain and lacking in oomph that I’d struggle to accept she’s been so clever and sharp for months… plus she’s had solo scenes where she’s cried or shown a personal reaction. Granted, there have been few, but like her call to the clinic, they were scenes with no witness or purpose in any manipulation. That said, there are MANY scenes that make no sense in terms of her reactions aka Liv or Aaron and that “don’t hurt me and my baby” stomach shielding (ugh god that was terrible). I can never work out if it’s the acting, the inconsistent writing of her character and Rebecca’s motivations or if it’s actually a THING and that Rebecca will have been interesting all this time without us knowing. I’d LOVE it to be true but the show seems set on portraying her at this hard done by sweetheart who does no wrong, who should be pardoned for all she does, who hasn’t a clue but is so cute about it all that it doesn’t matter… Christ what an awful attempt at writing a bold young female. She could have been so much more. I’d love her to prove us wrong but sadly I don’t feel the show will divert from the current Rebecca.

l) This is a horrible and uninspired way to provide a young m/m couple with a child. It’s just old hat, boring, crass and just yuck tbh.

There are so many other factors that all contradict each other and I don’t know… I guess that’s what I’m saying! I’m quite torn…!

I don’t think I mind either way if I’m honest. I’ve never had an issue with the baby sticking around except for having my personal conditions for it haha :) I have always kind of wanted Rob to show his human side in all this and to show he didn’t hate the kid and did recognise it was an innocent being in all of this.

I think I’m weird because although I don’t like babies, I like kids on the show because they’re often great additions. Look at Arthur or Jacob or Liv or Gabby or April. ED does kid’s well, they just do babies and toddlers badly, imo.

ALSO, I’m also weird because part of me REALLY likes the idea of Rob having something that’s his. A little person who is entirely new and a blank slate to try with and love. Sebastian, if he is Rob’s son, would be Rob’s own little person that wouldn’t leave him, that would look up to Rob, that would see Rob as a hero, that would rely on Rob and I really LIKE that idea. I reckon if Rob stopped being an A class weirdo, expert manipulator and actually thought what he was doing before he did it, I think he could be a great dad, for a soap! Hahaha. I like what it could do for his character. I don’t connect Sebastian to the Whites, though. It’s probably awful but I have zero connection with any of them (except Chrissie a tiny bit) and I couldn’t care less in the grand scheme of things what happens with them. They’re off eventually and so I find it VERY easy to remove them from the equation now. Also, even if they were sticking around, I feel like Rob would always hate them, would always resent them and would never ever feel any connection with them even after having a kid with Rebecca… so, to me, I can separate the two very easily. Shows how bad the writing of Rebecca as a mum has been and how shoddy The Whites are in general!! Adios Amigos!

So anon, what a rant. Who bloody knows! I have really convoluted feelings on the matter and I’m REALLY looking forward to tomorrow’s scenes especially with Rob and Sebastian. I am so excited for them because a friend who has seen them has assured me it’s entirely not like they’re going down the boring stereotypical route, the scenes sound so brilliant for Rob’s character. THAT, I’m here for, even if I don’t find babies cute haha

We shall see soon and whether it’ll all make sense in the grand scheme of things is to be determined but I don’t know about you… if the Whites are buggering off then that’s half the battle for me!!!!! I’m willing to be proven wrong. Do it show, I dare you. Now, as long as Aaron’s character is cared for in this storyline as it progresses then I’ll be pretty happy whatever the outcome. I’m so chill nowadays hahaha. It’s not the Rob centric storyline we wanted but it’s the one we’ve got and in some ways it has been EXCELLENT and so HIM but yeah, there have also been some significant missteps and bloody stupid ideas so who knows at this point… I’m just determined to enjoy it. He’s my nightmare Human. Any centric storyline was going to have him doing nightmare things and learning to be a human so I’m down for that. Hope that answered a bit! ❤️