#but i think it's reasonable to expect this kind of spinoff

[cantsayidont]

I put on the first couple of episodes of MONARCH: LEGACY OF MONSTERS, Chris Black and Matt Fraction's cumbersomely titled Godzilla spinoff show (which I guess is a follow-on to the 2014 American GODZILLA movie, which I haven't seen). I thought it would be fun, but so far it mostly feels pretty hackish: It appears heavily inspired by the Warren Ellis/John Cassady Wildstorm comic PLANETARY, but everything about the narrative structure is unnecessarily convoluted and cryptic, presumably in an effort to seem interesting; none of the present-day characters' motivations make any sense; the flashback sequences are tiresome; and three episodes in, the main story has yet to develop any actual direction or urgency, so it's mostly just flailing about. Also, for a Toho-licensed spinoff of a quintessential Japanese monster franchise, it's awfully dismissive of and condescending towards its Japanese characters, especially the ones who aren't Japanese-American.

I dunno — I've liked the (brief) parts where Godzilla shows up, but the gaijin-to-Gojira ratio is disproportionately high, and the script and acting are only slightly above the SHARKNADO level.

[she-posts-nerdy-stuff]

Ok so it’s like half one in the morning and I’m watching season 2 of shadow and bone let’s talk a little about the original Crows’ return to Ketterdam and anything else I decide to talk about since the show is still playing whilst I’m typing this.

I really like the choices made around the prison wagon in Ketterdam and I think it’s almost definitely meant to be reflective of the one they infiltrate in the Ice Court Heist. However, what’s interesting is that this is the tamer option of the Fjersan prison wagons. When they plan to infiltrate the wagon, the one they first see is described very similarly to what we’re seeing in season 2 in Ketterdam but they end up in far more cramped conditions, with a lot more people than expected all stood with chains and collars holding them upright. In Six of Crows it’s this experience that causes Kaz to have a panic attack and faint, an event noticed by no-one (or at least to his knowledge and therefore ours) except Inej. I’m really intrigued by the prospect that the Soc spinoff could have made reference to the Ketterdam prison wagon and compared it to the Fjerdan one, and especially intrigued by the idea that Jesper would be more alert to Kaz struggling in the prison wagon than he was in the book since he realised Kaz was struggling here. ALSO, the presentation of the stadwatch in the start of this episode is well executed and very interesting. They are very easily bribed and amused by the proposition of such, and we also know the kind of corruption that runs through the city and its powers that be. I found it to be very accurate to the impression we have of them in the books even though there’s no scene where we see this so explicitly to it recollection.

It’s REALLY interesting to me that one of the reasons Kaz knows Jesper is a durast is that when he shoots he never misses. In the books this prospect doesn’t even occur to Jesper; Wylan points it out as a possibility and Jesper denies it, only to later place his trust in it entirely and successfully shoot round a corner to fake Kuwei’s death.

Side note: Did Alina just steal that newspaper in the Zemeni library? I find that unnecessarily amusing

“We’re accused of murdering Tante Heleen” “we didn’t do that - wait, did you do that?”

[thekatebridgerton]

Sooo I finished Queen Charlotte and let me tell you it was a rollercoaster ride. I liked it and then I didn't like it then I sort of reached the middle ground of ' I didn't hate it but It's one of those series I'd only see once, because I didn't end up feeling that entertained while I watched it '

So here's my very honest review of Queen Charlotte a Bridgerton story

Starting from episode 1 I absolutely hated it, in fact if I had decided to form an opinion by just watching episode 1, I wouldn't have continued seeing the rest of the series what? I said I was going to be honest, but I continued watching because that is what you do when you're watching something that you said that you were going to watch since like 5 months ago so here it goes the good the bad the funny.

The good: of course in a photography and artistry and wardrobe oh my gosh these sets have the most amazing wardrobe they deserve an Emmy for that. the reason that I didn't like episode 1 that much is that Charlotte came off as everything you expect a very young spoiled princess to be. But then I got two episode two and I realized okay maybe they are trying to show the progression that goes from beginning at point a as this sort of person and ended up at point B as this very different sort of person which is where the good comes in.

because I think the series really achieved that in walking the viewer through the maturity of Queen Charlotte. And how does a person go from the headstrong outspoken out of touch teenager to the Queen Charlotte that we have all come to love and respect in the series. And I feel like the spin off really conveyed that.

So it came off less of a romance and more of a coming of age story because Queen Charlotte grew on me and I mean young Queen Charlotte you guys know that I love old Queen Charlotte. Lady Danbury also grew on me admittedly her scenes were kind of uncomfortable to watch because really you feel sad for her stuck in a loveless marriage with a man like that ultimately finding her own voice and deciding to stay unmarried but on her own terms.

I only started enjoying the show when I saw it through the lens of a coming of age story instead of through the lens of a Romance story which is kind of what I went there expecting. Queen Charlotte and King George have their own version of The Notebook and it is kind of sad and you know that I don't vibe what's sad movies. But I do vibe with this show telling the realities of what it is to experience a major life event at 18 and find out that this means that you have to grow up a lot in a short space of time. From this on you can actually see the woman that Queen Charlotte progresses to be until she is old, because the foundation is absolutely there and the show walks you through that for me that was amazing storytelling #teamQueenCharlotte #TeamKingGeorge. How she goes from being this young woman that can't imagine getting married to someone she doesn't know to being this mature adult that is considering doing the same thing to her children and what's the motivation behind that.

The medium: oh you know the drill there was a bunch of drama I didn't care about, there was a bunch of secondary characters that only existed for exposition, the pacing was kind of slow. Not exactly good but not bad either just average but for a spinoff that had 6 episodes I'm not surprised

The bad: I think that annoyed me the most is that the spinoff had a lot of saying not showing and I do not like that.

As viewer I am not a child, I do not need to be told that King George is happy with Queen Charlotte time and time again, I can see it in his face and if I as a viewer I cannot tell that King George is happy with Queen Charlotte then it is not the responsibility of the side characters to say it to me.

There Are a lot of instances in this show where you could tell that the dialogue was put in place to let the viwer know stuff that they could very well have guessed from watching the characters interact. You Know which parts I'm talking about, we could start a drinking game, take a shot everytime one of the characters tells you something you are supposed to have already found out by just watching the show.

Don't tell me lady Danbury sponsors a school for girls, because her husband hated educated women, we can already tell by looking at his interactions with women in the show, the dialogue explaining that is out of place it makes me think that the showrunners believe the viewer is dumb. Show me Lady Danbury praising little girls who are studying after paying their tuition at the church and then cut to Lord Danbury shutting her up anytime she tried to say something. That would have been a better way to show not tell. So yes those were my issues with the spinoff

Now let's get to the funny: lets start with my favorite part of any Bridgerton story and that's Lady Whistledown. I just found it hilarious that every single time that Lady Whistledown is taking pot shots at the Royal family little Penelope Featherington is writing somewhere with her favorite pen, the way TMZ writes about celebrities. Everyone thinks later Whistledown is this sort of huge force of nature when it's really your local fanfic writer making observations about celebrities in her diary. This is why we support fanfiction writing guys

The part where Violet found out that lady Danbury advanced the dance with her dad, that was also objectively hilarious because I think that in terms of the book, if Violet Bridgerton ever found out something like that about Lady Danbury, she would have totally high fived the old lady like a homie. This is the type of mother that will go to the dirtiest jail in the county and bail out a girl just because her son likes her. I realize show Violet ain't there yet, but if this Revelation had come after Benedict's season you would have seen a Violet that had no Fs left to give and that is objectively hilarious to me. I'm like Violet, baby why are you acting so innocent. Your eldest daughter jilted a prince to hook up with a Duke that had to be marched to the altar at gunpoint, and your eldest son fell in love with the older sister of his fiance and left that fiance in the altar to marry the sister. While the queen was watching. You should have a lower tolerance for finding out about your family's indecencies. All your kids are horny idiots and they sure didn't get that from Edmund. Stop acting like you don't know what happens when people are horny.

Objectively all the servants in Queen Charlotte special mention because these people have seen some Royal shenanigans and I respect them for that. I mean I find their job must be funny as hell but they have my respect

I'm sure that I will think of more funny things that I found in the spinoff but for now those were my takes tell me if you agree if you disagree but overall I did my duty and I watched it. It wasn't for me but I think it could have been for me if I had been a little bit more invested in Queen Charlotte's romance with King George but I wasn't invested in their love story because I knew it was going to end in tragedy it's sort of like how I wasn't that invested in the Notebook because I already knew that they we're not meant for a happily ever after kind of thing and that it had a sad ending and I like things with happy endings you know and you guys can't fault me for that.

I am the type of person that actively stays away from anything marketed as romance with a sad ending and I knew what I was getting into with Queen Charlotte so it should surprise none of us that I found that it was good as a coming of age story but as a romance it wasn't for me.

And that's the tea

[kafus]

okay well i guess i didn’t need my alarms cause i can’t seem to sleep more lmao. it’s 5 am

soooo pokemon presents in a little less than 4 hrs huh? realistically i’m expecting something either johto or unova related and since they’re apparently lighting up NYC today, which is not usual for pokemon day, i’m kind of leaning unova. i have mixed feelings about this since as much as i actually did enjoy my time with BDSP, i was dually disappointed by them and i’m still sad that sinnoh isn’t going to get the HGSS or ORAS treatment ever - if unova remakes were to be of a similar caliber of bdsp, i’d rather them just not exist at all frankly. nostalgia bias and my immense love for sinnoh aside, i think the unova games, especially bw2, are some of the best games in the entire franchise, and if they are remade, or get bw3 sequels, or whatever, i want them to be GOOD. lets not spit on the legacy of gen 5 now!! but. i remain cautiously optimistic. i’m not a super cynical pokemon fan and like i said i did enjoy bdsp despite everything. also a legends kyurem or whatever would be awesome btw i wanna see the og dragon lol. johto would also be cool but i’m having a lot less thoughts on it for some reason. i’m sure if they announce anything johto ayano will have incredibly passionate thoughts about it

now i’m not really one for predictions, the above talk is maybe the most obvious outcome since they usually do remakes mid-gen. instead i’ll just talk about some things i would WANT even if they’re a pipe dream and i don’t necessarily expect them:

a new PMD. not an explorers remake, a new PMD with a fresh story and everything. we haven’t had a proper new PMD story since 2015 and i MISS IT. i’d also enjoy explorers remakes but frankly i want a new game the most and i wanna play as sprigatito SOBS THE PALDEA STARTERS WOULD BE SO GOOD FOR PMD

gen 3 on NSO with full online capabilities and also connectivity to NSO ports of colosseum and gale of darkness. i 100% do not think this is happening but it would blow me away if it did. the amount of gen 3 that so many people were never able to experience as children, especially me… could finally be done online!!! it’d be cool if they removed all the dumb trading restrictions too but unlikely. (as an aside if they released gen 1/2 VC again with stadium compatibility that’d be epic but i somehow expect that even less)

some sort of new stadium-type game with home compatibility that provides single player trials similar to that of the old gen battle frontiers. i just REALLY really miss old singleplayer battle challenges. i want a new one to spend a bazillion years on making wacky teams and winning w them. i enjoy VGC but sometimes that singleplayer experience hits different

i really am a spinoff enjoyer. surprise me with something new! that isn’t a mobile game with gacha elements! just a whole new standalone pokemon idea. no idea what genre just excite me

MAKE A COMFY FRIENDS SPRIGATITO PLUSH OR SO HELP ME GOD (this is barely related to the presents im just thinking about it i want one soo bad 😭)

and those r all my thoughts i think. these presentations r always a treat because i wake up early and watch them with my friends. i probably won’t be liveposting it on tumblr bc i will be lost in the sauce of discord w the besties. i’ll provide my thoughts later though!

[reitziluz]

so, while idly wondering what reigen’s major might have been, i got inspired to sort out my thoughts on it properly.

first, let’s lay down some straightforward facts from the manga, anime, and fan book:

he must be suffering from impostor syndrome or something similar, based on how he talks about his ”true self”

he was a humanities major (mentioned in the spinoff as the reason he can’t help mob with math which is. so real.)

he’s extremely confident in his argument skills, is good at reading people, and is competent and comfortable discussing things like the relationship between individuals and society, the meaning of life, and what makes a self

he is also knowledgeable about laws and deals with things like insurance companies with confidence

in the separation arc press conference, his narration stated that he had expected to have gotten bored with spirits and such ”within a year, too”, so assuming he had ran it for up to a year before meeting mob, he was around 24 back then

"within a year, too” implies he worked at the water cooler telemarketing job for up to a year, so, since he was around 23

on the same page, he refers to that time in his life as when he could easily get the gist of anything, but couldn’t get into anything more deeply than being curious about it (this is very often translated very, very badly.)

he quit his previous job because he had grown sick of it, and rented the office space before he had even come up with what kind of business he wanted to start

when wondering about why he is working as a psychic, one of the points against it is that it’s not profitable

his father is a local government employee, and as someone who’s very serious about things, thinks reigen is unemployed

his mother is a housewife, and as someone who’s very serious about things, thinks someone has tricked him into doing his current job

his sister works at a bank, thinks he’s a total fraud and that he should turn himself in, the earlier the better

it’s also reasonable to assume that:

he started working at the water cooler job immediately after getting his bachelor’s, as bachelor’s degrees are four to six years long in japan, which fits perfectly between being 18 when graduating high school to being 23~24 while he worked there

he probably finished his degree, because dropping out would have been a massive contradiction to how he said everything had come to him pretty easily – he was thinking back to himself when that was stated and was being pretty harsh about his own fickleness, so it’s safe to assume he wasn’t lying about that

with reigen’s lack of focus and tendency to pick up things that seem interesting on a whim, his degree is likely a mishmash of things instead of something that would railroad him into a specific career

his major was on the artsier or more theoretical side, as graduating and ending up in a job that has nothing to do with your degree because you need to work somewhere and it crushing your dreams and soul is a bit of a trope for those majors (he could have been talking from experience when telling the 7th div folks that they need to live in reality and that society doesn’t care about their fanciful ideas)

his family is likely well-off and at least a bit conservative

he would have received financial aid of some kind or taken a loan to be able to quit and up and rent an office on a whim just two years after graduating, even if he had been working while studying

his parents likely wanted him to get a good, serious job, like his sister going into banking

his father specifically might have wanted his son to follow in his footsteps – and he might have had his best interest in mind, because based on what the japanese career counseling website i used as reference said about ”local government employee”, it would have been a perfect fit – lots of change, working with people, solving problems, needing broad knowledge/skills etc (i’ve lost my mind over this before, there’s so many delicious family dynamics to explore in this)

he could have gone to university because he didn’t have any better ideas and tried to just get a degree that would satisfy his parents while also letting him explore ways to ”become someone”, as in have importance and make a difference

taking all that in, and acknowledging that i do not know enough about how japanese degrees work so i’m basing this somewhat in my own experience with academic freedom, i’m leaning towards reigen having been a political science major who kept taking classes outside his major. psychology, philosophy, maybe some folkloristics or other fun things like that? it would fit with his personality, current skills and knowledge base, and with trying to please his parents while doing whatever he wants to. picking political science might have been a compromise – his parents might have wanted him to study something like law instead of arts, and leveraged paying for his to have a say on his pick

that’s a nifty little hypothesis, right? perfectly reasonable. not much reaching, fits in the themes and narrative aims of canon. doesn’t require any wild leaps of logic. a good point to stop.

…

so hey, you know how when starting a business it’s pretty common to take a loan? and his sister, who works in banking, thinks he’s a fraud? and his father thinks he’s unemployed, lying about working but instead living on money other than his own income? and his mother thinks he’s been tricked and exploited? and in the fan book, reigen says he hasn’t been home in years but thinks he probably should drop by to clear a misunderstanding between them?

does the misunderstanding have something to do with, oh i don’t know, his family backing his loan or otherwise being involved with it and him seemingly fucking off to waste the money on weird shit with no sign that he was going to pay it back??

reigen, reigen please, what have you done, i know you self-sabotage and get into fucked up shenanigans to avoid having to be vulnerable and then you DO fix things in the end but reigen, it’s your family, what have you --

[my-mt-heart]

Welcome back SF, really missed your input.

That's really kind of you to say 🙏 I'm watching this spinoff against better judgment and have a lot of thoughts on it, but I'll try to stick to production topics.

[W]hy giving so many visual cues for Carol?

Like MT and you yourself said, AMC realized (somewhat belatedly) that they can't Carol-ify characters (Maggie in DC/Isabelle in DD) and expect the audience to get excited. The studio knows Carol gets engagement, that's why they keep pushing the character on social media despite the fact that officially, she's not part of TWDU. I believe Melissa/Carol is so conspicuously absent from Nicotero's interviews for related reasons.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't they shove Melissa and Angela aside to make their own spin off?

No, you're right, but each of the people wanting them off the project had their own reasons for it. It's not as simple as "Norman got a big head" from being the most marketed character (although there's an element of that too). There's a lot of people involved and they all had different things to gain from having these two women removed.

So, my guess right now is, it's about the money and someone less with an opinion, so both Greg and Norm have more creative freedom and a couple of spare millions to spend on their vision

AMC spent way more money this way than having Melissa be part of the show from the start, so no, it's not about money and making a TV show isn't a bunch of people compromising on what to do. (More on that a little further down.)

There are many reasons and @jaibhagwan mentioned one of them in a comment to my previous ask, "[W]ho has the most the gain by sabotaging Caryl to make himself look good writing his “love story” spinoff?" Gimple was heavily involved in S11, the development of DD and in part of pre-production, and like I've previously said, he doesn't want competition. (It shouldn't be a competition at all, since a TV show is a collaborative effort and as a viewer I'm capable of liking both Carol and Michonne. Not that the race is between the women, because Gimple doesn't care about either of them.) He wants DD to fail, so he can swoop in to save the franchise with his TOWL show.

Just so no one misunderstands this as a slight and gets upset: Michonne is one of my favorites and I hold Danai in utmost respect. I'm not comparing women or female characters. They bring different things to the franchise and that's a GOOD THING. I want more of that. I also think Clémence is a great actor and apart from the sweeping aerial establishing shots, she's the only enjoyment I'm getting from DD. My issue is with Gimple and Zabel (whose existence as a "fleshie" I can unfortunately confirm to anyone thinking he might be a cardboard cutout), and their no-good storytelling.

@rubberchickeny "They all ring untrue and like he’s trying to manage (badly) the image the media and the public have. He’s contradicting himself, and other information given."

I believe the obfuscation is on purpose and that AMC (by way of Nicotero) is also trying to shift blame for some of their more controversial story decisions.

Everything that happens on a TV show has been approved by the studio responsible for the production. It doesn't matter if you're an egomaniac actor, a spiteful hack of a writer or a burnt-out EP—no one can override the studio. Someone at the studio approved the respec of Daryl back to his S2 self, the choice to deny his found family, the nunbaiting, etc. Every single script goes to the studio for notes and then (eventually) final approval before it's locked. They approve of the episode edit; if they don't like it, it gets reedited to their specifications.

There's a method to the madness in everything Nicotero has been saying.

@kryptoniancape "So he blatantly lied about having no creative control in that hit piece?"

Yes 🤷‍♀️ and you're right, it's a hit piece. The question is why. Why do AMC and Greg Nicotero want you to think that everything that's wrong about this show is Norman's fault? I'm not saying he doesn't bear any responsibility, but this isn't a one-man standup comedy special on HBO. If he made demands AMC didn't want to meet, they could have pulled the plug on those delusions at any point.

SF

“I’m watching this spinoff against better judgment”

Translation: MT is making me watch so I can answer her long list of questions she sent me.

I guess my concern about a possible smear campaign is…are they expecting more backlash later on? If so, I’m terrified to find out what that is. I’m getting so many asks from people wondering why they should hope for a better story in S2, and even though I do think we can put some of our faith in Melissa, it’s still a valid question. Because they should be doing everything to rebuild our trust that was lost the day they announced the Caryl spinoff was canceled, but instead they’re preparing for things to get worse?

Again, all I want (as a fan and as another woman in the industry) is to feel reassured that Melissa’s getting everything a leading lady deserves and that Daryl and Carol are getting the story they deserve.

Fwiw: If Danai was the showrunner on her spinoff, I would’ve been SEATED for that. If Melissa got to showrun or direct, I’d be seated for that too. TWDU needs more women and poc making creative decisions.

[pancake-breakfast]

I've been chomping at the bit to get through the last few chapters of this volume, and finally, it is time!

Stream-of-consciousness thoughts for TriMax Vol. 8, Chapter 5 + Wolfwood Spinoff below.

Chapter 5: Parting Ways

Noooooo, who's parting wayyyys?? Everyone's finally set up to reunite!

LOL, the Punisher looks like it's taken some... punishment... in its fall from the ship.

They're looking for them! That's right, keep looking, guys!

OMG THEM <3 <3 <3 Protect him, Vash! Gods, he's soooo worried.

TBH, I think Vash is right to be shocked. I'd probably be shocked if I didn't Know Things. Gods, I don't wanna Know Things.

Aaand there's the vials! Drink 'er up!

STAMPEDE SPOILERS: I do think Stampede made the right choice in introducing those sooner rather than later. It doesn't destroy the tension around Wolfwood, because he's still Wolfwood and... well... yeah. Hard to get life-saving meds when you're not on great terms with the people who gave you the meds (and tend to go through it like it's candy).

And now he's providing some insight on Eye of Michael for Vash. And us. Good good good.

AND FOR ONCE NIGHTOW ACTUALLY USED THE BLACK BACKGROUND FOR FLASHBACKS. Gods, I wish he did this more often.

Awww, baby Wolfwood!

Also young Chapel, I guess, but I don't care about him NEARLY as much.

I mean, that's one way to train someone, I guess....

Ugh, poor kid. No one should have to go through this. He looks terrified, and probably rightly so.

Ah, there's the bit about his age not being what it appears to be.

He looks... I don't want to say "mournful" over what he's lost. More like he's already mourned it and accepted it as gone forever, and now there's just kind of a gaping hole in his heart where it used to be.

But there were more kids that ended up like him, most notably Livio, who Chapel seems to have recruited specifically as a "fuck you" to Wolfwood.

LOL, this is so them.

Vash in a blanket. Vash in a blanket!!! SOMEONE MADE HIM COZY!!! A:LGJA:OSDJ:FAJS:LDJ He needs to be cozy more often. He even has cozy slippers!

That's RIGHT, Knives! Stop trying to merge your being with your sisters! They'll win in the long run, 'cause they're used to being a hive mind.

Awww, Wolfwood's got a blanket, too. <3 Blankets for everyone.

The migration makes sense. Even in a world where communication isn't instantaneous, news spreads.

Yeah, Knives going after the envoy ships might not be so great.

Eyyy, it's our friend the gunsmith!

"Tumbleweed." That's a very apt name for Vash, all things considered.

Vash is sooooo happy to see him.

This guy. He's like, "My death got ruined by some jerk giving me a reason to live."

Ever-hopeful, ever-determined Meryl. <3

Marlon probably doesn't know it, but he's providing Vash with more than just a weapon here. Given how poorly their last meeting went, Vash probably expects Meryl to hate and fear him, but by telling him this story, Marlon lets Vash know Meryl still has hope in him. Enough hope to want him to be protected.

OMG, he's gonna repair the Punisher. He calls repairing the Punisher child's play. Who is this man?!

Vash, still looking tired and wan, but also looking hopeful again.

(Also, I love his floofy hair throughout this whole chapter. You can really see where Stampede took their inspiration.)

Geez, is Knives even absorbing dead Plants? This is not good. For him, I mean. It might actually work out ok for other people.

Is... is Knives trying to kill himself? Or just part of himself? The part of himself that feels sympathy for Vash despite the destruction of all the Plants? Does he even realize how many of these Plants would probably still be alive if it weren't for him "rescuing" them??

Epic Wolfwood spread! Looks like Marlon got the Punisher back in tip-top shape. (Hats off to @trigun-manga-overhaul for all their work stitching together pages like this.)

Noooooo, don't leave, Wolfwood! Vash needs you around! Have you learned nothing?? *SIGH* This means they're not gonna be getting the band back together, doesn't it.

Wolfwood Spinoff: Freed Bird

I'm glad he's free... but... I don't want him off on his own.

Ahhhh! I'd heard he whittled things but wasn't sure if it was true!

For reference, the ガタ ガタ (gata gata) sound on the right-hand panels is the sound of Wolfwood's knife, and the キ キ イイイ (ki ki-iii) sounds on the left-hand panel are bird cries.

Yeah, flying does a number on one's metabolism. There's a reason birds are poop machines. As anyone who's ever owned a bird knows.

LOL, this driver's like, "I'm glad you're an artist, but I need to get paid in cash."

I wonder where Angelina is....

Wolfwood's already making friends, I see.

Is Wolfwood blushing as he watches her?

Ah, trading women as products is common enough that she doesn't even flinch at the suggestion.

This is a shitty situation, since chances are he gets the Plant in the marriage anyway. Either way, she loses.

I'm beginning to think Wolfwood's not the "freed bird" referred to in the title.

*cue MAPPA flying bird reflected in a close-up of an eyeball scene*

Oh, no. Wolfwood has a soft spot for orphans.

Ah, seems like she's made her choice. Not because it's the choice she particularly wants to make, but because it's the only choice she knows how to make.

Haaaahahahahahaha, she thinks he got to choose his own path. He carved his road to his own path in literal bodies and blood.

I dunno, man. Different strokes for different folks. Something something "give me the freedom of the starving wolves." We all make sacrifices, and we have different opinions on what we're willing to sacrifice. I'm sure Wolfwood would prefer a life of not wandering around, wondering where his next bed and meal will come from, but he should know he chafes under collars and leashes.

You can't believe she doesn't remember you? When did she last see you??

Hahahahaha, he's so determined. He looks angry, but apparently the baby enjoys mad-dogging him back.

Yeah, she's not exactly walking here. She's not gonna remember you from that, Wolfwood!

LOL, eat the bird.

Oh, so this orphanage also adopts their kids out to actual families? Who knew? I thought they were all just Eye of Michael fodder.

Aww, toddler version of Maylene doesn't want to leave big brother Nico.

Now I'm thinking he was blushing at her not because of any attraction, but more out of pride at how much she's grown.

Oh, great. Who's this clown??

Ugh, it's the loan shark. He looks skeevy.

Uhhhh, what happened to Wolfwood? Who's this chick?

Oh, it's Maylene. She looks ready for a fight. Why was she chillin' in a dark room like that?

This panel, tho.

Why'd they beat him up?

Oh, they think he convinced her to refuse the offer? Man, this loan shark guy is dumb. I got the distinct impression she's never liked him. But of course it couldn't be because of anything he's done. It MUST be someone else's fault she's rejecting him.

Duuuuude. This guy assumes Wolfwood somehow seduced her, and he's ready and willing to kill both Wolfwood and Maylene if he did. Seems like GREAT husband material.

LOL, Wolfwood doesn't even justify his dumb-ass question with a reasonable response. You can just tell Wolfwood's head is full of murder-thoughts here.

Ah, now she's blaming him for the situation, too. Vash really has rubbed off on Wolfwood.

It's hard to tell, but I think Wolfwood is protecting her from the gunfire by keeping them both behind the Punisher.

This guy. He's got himself a tank to take out someone he thinks might be getting laid more than he is?

Wolfwood. Buddy. How dare you tell her she should have just married this guy.

Look, she'd rather die than go into a gilded cage! That's how it is sometimes! A cage is still a cage! And her purported husband-to-be is absolute filth!

Oh, good. Wolfy's coming around. At the very least, he wants to defend Maylene, and he recognizes this guy is trash. Just take a few more steps in the right direction, friend.

I get he was trying to keep her from the kind of hard life he's lived, but he's just the bird envying the person on the ground. He doesn't get that there are difficulties on both sides and you kinda have to pick your poison... if you're lucky enough to even have the choice.

He is still proud of her, despite his harsh words and narrow vision.

She may or may not recognize him, but she is aware of the impact he had on her young life.

Author Bonus Chapter

I wanna... just soak in water for a bit....

LOL, always a good plan to run away for a bit of one gets stuck being at home.

What's 1/F?

Wolfwood sure does spend a lot of time covered in blood. WHO'S FAULT IS THAT, NIGHTOW?!?!

"Silly manga" my foot... Tell that to my therapist. (Just kidding; Trigun Book Club is my therapist for this stuff. Sorry, folks!)

Archive

Trigun Vol. 1: Covers + 1-3, 4, 5-6, 7-8, 9-10 || Vol. 2: Covers + Extras, 1, 2-4, 5-6, 7-8

TriMax Vol. 1: Covers + 1-2, 3-4, 5-6 || Vol. 2: Covers + 1, 2-4, 5, 6-7 || Vol. 3: Covers + 1-3, 4-5, 6-7 || Vol. 4: Covers + 1-2, 3-5, 6-7 || Vol. 5: Covers + 1-2, 3-4, 5-6 || Vol. 6: Covers + 1-2, 3-4, 5-6 || Vol. 7: Covers + 1-2, 3-4, 5-6 || Vol. 8: Covers + 1-2, 3-4

Extra Credit: Trigun Vol. 1: Nebraska vs. Vash's Motivations, Vash's Loneliness, Vash's Depression (pt 2 of post), Soupy Brains || Vol. 2: Coin Factoids || TriMax Vol. 1: Lina, Vash, and a Haircut || Meryl, Vash, and the Pursuit of Happiness || Vol. 5: Knives, Vash, and Hatred for Humanity || Vol. 6: Coping Series: Wolfwood, Meryl, Vash || Vol. 8: The Uncoordinated Counterattack

[ncisfranchise-source]

Mark Harmon is sharing behind-the-scenes secrets about his time on NCIS and how he may not have starred in it if things -- including his character's name -- had been slightly different. 

Harmon, 72, recently sat down with ET's Kevin Frazier to promote his new book, Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, A Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor. 

The actor discussed the novel before the conversation turned to NCIS, the long-running CBS drama in which he starred as Leroy Jethro Gibbs for 19 seasons.  

His participation in the show, however, may not have happened for a number of reasons including where he was at in his personal life when the script and auditions first came around.

"I didn't expect to like the script as much as I did when I first read it," Harmon said. "I was reading other things and I was also trying to stay home -- young family and I wanted to try and be home more." 

What hooked the actor? It was the character's name, he shared. 

"I read 'Leroy Jethro Gibbs' and thought, 'Huh, I like that name,'" Harmon said of what initially piqued his interest. "And then for a brief second when I decided that I liked the idea of the project, the name changed." 

The name that Gibbs almost had was far less interesting and certainly a dealbreaker for the veteran actor who had come off of projects like Freaky Friday, The West Wing and JAG before NCIS began airing. 

"Bob Johnson or something like that. And I went, 'No, no, it's gotta be Leroy Jethro Gibbs.' The creator said, 'No, you can't play a guy named Leroy Jethro Gibbs,' and I said, 'Why not?'" the actor and writer continued. "And then it went back and I was happy about it."

He also confirmed that it was not the network but the creator -- Donald P. Bellisario -- who wanted to change the name. 

Harmon left the show in 2022 after 19 seasons to the shock and sadness of fans. He told ET he is still grateful for every episode and all of the success the show has seen. 

"As an actor, you don't think in those kinds of terms," Harmon said in response to being asked about the series' 20th anniversary. "You're thinking, 'TV series, if it does three years, we're gifted.' But they've done well and they've worked hard and so it's a really good group of people." 

"I don't know that any of us thought that the show was going to be around as long as it's been around," he continued. 

The series went on to become so popular that it spawned numerous spinoffs including NCIS: Los Angeles, NCIS: Hawaii and the latest to join the bunch, NCIS: Sydney. 

"We talked about this a lot ... over the years and I always thought that this show had characters, and it had humor, which made it different," Harmon said. "It had a case, but the case isn't what drove it -- I think that's still true." 

Amid its monumental anniversary, Harmon -- who appeared in more than 430 episodes -- said he still understands why viewers come back week after week. 

As for whether or not he would make a return to the show, he's not completely ruling out the possibility that viewers will see Gibbs again. 

"He's probably sitting in a stream up in Alaska fishing," Harmon joked. "Is he going to get out of the stream? I don't know. But if he is, I don't know about it." 

Harmon's book, Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, A Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor, is roughly about the start of the real-life Naval Criminal Investigative Service. 

"When I first got the role in the show, I tried to google NCIS to figure out what it was -- I never heard of it -- there wasn't much information. And if you google it now, there's like 25 pages of information," he said, describing why it was important for him and Leon Carroll -- a longtime NCIS technical adviser -- to write it. 

According to the book's description, it tells the tale of Douglas Wada, the only Japanese American agent in naval intelligence, and Takeo Yoshikawa, a Japanese spy sent to Pearl Harbor to gather information. 

Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, A Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor is available now wherever books are sold. 

[lol-jackles]

Notice that the article blames TW's cancellation on CW's new ownership's business model for profitability? Usually these kind of articles would mention the shows' low or declining ratings as part of the reason for cancellations but nope, can't mention that 40% of the viewers bounced after the first episode!

And then Jensen went s step further

https://twitter.com/JensenAckles/status/1664975127019245570

To all of you who watched, followed, and supported this story, THANK YOU. And to all those who brought this show to life…I couldn’t be more proud of what we all did together. But as they say…timing is everything. With a massive Network shift coupled with an industry strike…welp…that’s some unfortunate timing. Sleep well dear @WinchestersOnCW …until we meet again. Somewhere down the road. 🙏🏼

and he blamed the "network shift" and the writers for striking (which, yikes, I know its affecting pretty much every show and movie but don't blame them for your sh*tty show, those aren't the optics you want, they simply want to be paid a living wage for their work). Which I completely expected from the man who refuses to ever take responsibility for his own actions... ever. I don't think I have even once seen him take responsibility and this time was no different.

Link. In Jensen's case I wouldn't expect him to mention the bounced ratings but lol going for the convenient scapegoats aka "unfortunate timing". Now I'm imagining Jensen cosplaying Ursala from The Little Mermaid singing "unfortunate souls":

Poor unfortunate timing In pain, in need This one longing for a Dean show That one wants Cas to get Dean And do I help them? Yes, indeed

Those poor unfortunate timing So sad, so true They come flocking to my twitter Crying, "Spinoffs, Jensen, please!" And I help them! Yes, I do

Now it's happened once or twice Someone wouldn't watch the show And I'm afraid I had to just sit in my car Yes, I've had the odd complaint But on the whole I've been a saint To those poor unfortunate timing!

[aihoshiino]

thots on saito now he's back?

So Saitou has thots now...............

More seriously, I don't have a ton to say just yet since his reintegration into the cast is so fresh but I'm tentatively interested to see how things go. I really appreciate he wasn't just uncritically accepted back into the fold and that Miyako smashed his face in with a brick offscreen like she deserved so my bare minimum for vibing with this plot thread had been met and I'm excited to see where we go from here.

About Saitou as a character in general... I think I like him a lot more than I maybe should do? LOL

Not necessarily because he's an unpleasant or unlikable character (though I would totally get it if somebody was off on him) but because I think my fondness for him is pretty out of proportion to his actual role in the story. I've said this before but the Strawberry Pro family from volume one (Ai and the twins & Ichigo and Miyako) is my favourite dynamic in the manga so Saitou kind of inherits a lot of goodwill on the basis of being part of that group alone.

I am also, like any other gay person with taste, extremely weak to the trope of "guy accidentally becomes the dad of a troubled teen and doesn't even realise it" so Saitou and Ai's relationship was basically cooked up in a lab to make me so so so so so so so sad and soft. I also just think he and Ai have a really fun rapport when they're together and getting to revisit it is one of my favourite part of rereading or rewatching the prologue arc. Wanting to see more of that dynamic is one of the big reasons (apart from, you know, The Obvious) that I wish we'd get some kind of comfy happy end spinoff or an anthology or something.

I also really like what he does for the series commentary on the entertainment industry, however accidental or otherwise it was on Aka's part. I think when you're writing a story like OnK which is so strongly about commentary on abusive systems, it's very easy to make it onto a black and white issue where everyone involved is either an active perpetrator or a hapless victim - OnK is refreshing to me in that it's very honest about how many people there are in that fucked up system trying their best to just make good art and minimize any harm done in the process but end up perpetuating harm regardless.

Saitou is in this gray area for me where I think it's undeniable that he was complicit in exploiting and hurting Ai - at every step of the way, Ai was a Strawberry Productions commodity before she was his daughter and Saitou loved her even as he was feeding her to the idol industry meat grinder. But at the same time, B-Komachi gave Ai hope. It gave her opportunities and a goal to work towards and it got her out of a truly dogshit situation that she had no power to change without help, even before she was pregnant.

So it's like... yes, Saitou was complicit in Ai's suffering, but he was also one of the very few people in the industry who really, genuinely gave a shit about her. He's not blameless by any stretch, but it's hard for me to WANT to blame him especially since like... the dude lost his daughter!!! I think that's punishment enough, don't you?

Man, I had a lot more to say than expected lol. Thank u for the ask, anon, I hope this was interesting to read!

[bug-the-chicken-nug]

As much as I give BNHA shit amongst my like minded friends, it genuinely did do something neat that I wish RWBY had done:

Showing us the school's best senior team

Like. CFVY is okay and all but they really aren't very narratively "productive" characters at all, they just got a spinoff that makes them all look bad, Coco is riddled with a bunch of completely justified controversy, and in direct show canon they hardly matter except to do some cool fights and for Velvet to get bullied a little.

Instead they could be outright replaced with the Cool Top Dog Senpais, who, even if they would still mostly be there to look cool, would also be serving an important side-role of being like a litmus test of how much you could actually expect a hard working, resourceful Hunter to improve by the time they're closing in on the end of their Beacon tenure.

It could help give structure and follow-through to how haphazard and inconsistent progression is in actual canon, where they keep throwing people power-ups or SAYING they're learning, but then their actual performance is becoming either LESS satisfying, or kind of just all over the place.

They could also be a smoother way to introduce and reinforce both Semblance evolution, and how its still true that not everything is about your Semblance.

Like I imagine one who used to be the underdog freshman with a weak and simple Semblance, now having a much more flashy and versatile one that just steadily expanded on the same basic principle.

And another still having their same simple and boring Semblance as ever, no extra frills, no new things it does, but it doesn't matter, because *they themself* got so much stronger, more experienced, and better at working within its limits.

And then you could have at least one of them die tragically as an easy ticket to bumping up the stakes and threat level, if you wanna go there.

Tbh I would kinda rather that happen than making Pyrrha die, because these guys would be in kind of a Goldilocks zone of being important and potentially very well-liked (to go back to BNHA, I think plenty of people would fucking riot if Mirio died, for instance) but not having too much unfinished business or too much potential future importance to other character arcs, on TOP of how if any student's gonna go fight Cinder and be the maiden candidate... then, like,

A Beacon senior just sounds WAY more reasonable than a Beacon freshman anyway, no matter how "good" the freshman is? Like this isn't a "big fish in a small pond" thing, this is like, literally supposed to be an entire nation's TOP school.

No matter how broken the freshman is, if your best school doesn't have a single senior whose hard work, experience, and maturity is capable of beating out a prodigy freshman, I'd say that reflects pretty damn poorly on your school, and your nation as a whole.

[todayisafridaynight]

About Judgment: In short, I think RGGS was intending to continue the series. There were indeed rumors at one point that the series would end at Lost Judgment due to a disagreement with Kimura's agency, Johnny & Associates, about porting the games to PC--I'm unclear on why, there was speculation but I don't think it was ever stated. Obviously the PC ports are out now, so either that wasn't the issue or they moved past it. There's also just general disbelief around there being a third entry simply because there's this idea (joke?) that Kimura never does three of anything, which isn't true at this point. It is true RGGS historically hasn't done three of anything in terms of spinoff series (Kurohyou, Mobile+Kizuna, and arguably Kenzan+Ishin), but it's also true that none of their past spinoffs have been as successful as Judgment, and we're seeing a lot of "firsts" from the studio lately. The fact is that Yokoyama himself said something along the lines of "and of course, we won't forget about Judgment" (not literally, just the closest English expression I can think of that can be misinterpreted in the way I'm about to explain) while talking about future works. But for some reason, people took it as if he meant it "in mourning" rather than an obvious confirmation of more to come, I guess? A TV show was also announced, so I really don't get why they'd invest so much into a series they were going to end. I know Kurohyou got a show too, but this seems different. Anyway, that's the most recent information, but it's from some years ago. There is a major new development, however: J&A talents' contracts are being cancelled left and right as of the last couple of months due to the agency's dogshit handling of and response to an investigation into Johnny Kitagawa's serial abuse of allegedly hundreds of his talents. That's been going on since the man died in 2019, basically, but a lot's happened this year.

This has left the talents with the incredibly tough decision of either remaining at an agency that refuses to even change its name and is rapidly breaking down or leaving. It has historically been very difficult to do the latter. On top of what you'd expect, J&A controls their talents to an insane degree and has leveraged their control of the media to suppress the careers of those who leave.

Broadly, in terms of how media companies have responded so far, I understand not wanting to associate with J&A and that J&A would likely benefit from the contracts more than the talents, but it still feels like the talents are the ones being punished... I have to imagine at least some of them were victims, so to be victims of the blacklist on top of that... That, and some of these companies kept the truth from coming out for decades.

With J&A losing its foothold in the media, though, there may be no better time than now to leave the agency. I don't know if Kimura will--rumors have been circulating ever since his idol group were forced to break up years and years ago, but while they all went independent, he never has--especially because a lot of seniors like him feel a responsibility to stay and change the agency for the better. As of right now, I'm not aware of Kimura's contracts getting cancelled, so I can't say one way or another if that'd have an effect.

I don't know what happens from here. I'm not sure if RGGS will look at it as collaborating with J&A or with Kimura or both, and how they'll factor in what's going on right now into working with him. Hypothetically, it would be possible to continue the series even without Kimura (any of the other mains do or would make great protagonists), but at the same time, Judgment is hugely reliant on Kimura's charisma. That's why people who play the dub (or people who don't like Kimura) often come away with the impression Yagami's kind of a dick or doesn't stand out much.

So... that's the state of Judgment right now. We won't know until we know, I guess.

OHHHHH OK saucy... sucks about J&A- it'd be cool if yk. they could face the consequences of their actions LMAO but that Could involve displacing hella workers now wouldnt it

[emotionallychargedtowel]

I’m seeing various reactions to the “spinoff” bonus episode of Bokura no Shokutaku/Our Dining Table and it made me want to write about how I see the episode as a very logical continuation of the two leads’ character arcs.

I’ll talk about Yutaka first because his explanation is a bit simpler, although the feelings involved are intense as hell. Yutaka is so afraid that he’ll lose the people he loves most that the fear can become a defeatist belief: “I will lose the people I love most.” I wrote about this in some of my posts about The Eighth Sense. Human beings have a capacity to believe distorted things after trauma and loss. Especially negative beliefs about ourselves or pessimistic beliefs about our prospects in life.

Yutaka doesn’t fully believe this all of the time. But I would expect, based on his experiences and the fears he showed in the last episode of the main series, that a fear of this sort gets activated in Yutaka sometimes. Sometimes fears show up as highly negative, maladaptive beliefs that we try to test and hope to disprove but continue to find compelling (I have an unfinished novel-length Utsukare post that gets into this idea more). So, yeah. Yutaka has been primed for this fear of abandonment for a very long time.

What about Minoru? He’s never been jealous before. But what was his biggest stumbling block in getting together with Yutaka? Internalized homophobia. And it didn’t magically disappear when they got together (though over time and under the right circumstances their relationship could play a part in helping him to heal from it).

When Minoru first kisses Yutaka, he assumes immediately afterward that it was unwelcome. It seems like anything short of Yutaka grabbing him and kissing him back enthusiastically right away was going to be interpreted as a rejection. He doesn’t ask Yutaka how he feels about him or if he's interested in a relationship when they meet at the cafe. It would have helped if Yutaka could have been more forthcoming that night. But Minoru basically rejects himself on Yutaka’s behalf without checking with him at all. And though Yutaka isn't clear about returning Minoru's feelings, he does give some subtle signals. And he definitely never says he doesn't return them. It’s absolutely heartrending to watch. Worse, Minoru doesn’t just assume Yutaka doesn’t return his feelings. He assumes that the kiss was upsetting to him and that Yutaka will never want him to touch him again.

Why does he do this? It’s never stated directly, but I think it’s pretty obvious that it’s because of internalized homophobia. Similar things happen in other BLs. Take Togawa’s abject apology after kissing Nozue in Old Fashion Cupcake, for example, which makes the internalized homophobia piece more explicit through his various references to what’s “common sense” or “normal.” Plenty of LGBT+ folks also have personal experience with this, of course. Internalized homophobia makes it seem as if our feelings, overtures, etc. are bound to be unwelcome and even repulsive to the other person. And this isn't just, like, irrational insecurity. Often it's informed by actual experiences with rejection that have the added knife-twist of expressing stigma or disgust. But you don't have to have gone through that kind of rejection to have a vivid mental image of what it would be like and to convince yourself it's likely to happen to you.

When Minoru sees Ohata’s text on Yutaka’s phone, there's a reason that the idea that Yutaka would two-time him with his coworker and eventually dump him for her seems likely. It's not because Minoru distrusts Yutaka. It's not because of anything about Ohata (well, not unless you count her gender). There may be some garden-variety insecurity at play, like thinking he won't be able to hold on to Yutaka because he isn't good enough or something. But the biggest factor, I'm pretty certain, is that same type of internalized homophobia. After hearing from Yutaka that he likes him back, wants to date him, wants to be with him forever and be a part of his family, after kissing each other and cuddling all night and whatever else has happened between them in the interim, it still seems plausible to him that Yutaka might split the moment he gets a chance to be with a woman. I don't know what's sadder, the fact that he feels this way and a lot of viewers will be able to relate, or the fact that he's not entirely unjustified because there are people who totally behave that way.

Add to all this the fact that just when each of them is feeling insecure in their particular way, the other one starts acting tweaky, and the misunderstanding makes a good bit of sense. I think for a lot of folks this aspect of the episode is uncomfortable. And that's just part of seeing this couple we've been rooting for have this rocky interaction on what ought to be a special day. But I also wonder if some of the bigger sources of pain that these fears touch on--fear of loss (with unresolved mourning for past losses) and internalized homophobia (with all of the deep-down self-hatred that implies)--come through in one way or another and are really hard to sit with.

But I think the fact that they are able to work through it matters. It shows that while these problems didn't go away just because they got together (which wouldn't be satisfying anyway because it would be unrealistic), but there is good reason to hope that they will get better if they keep communicating and supporting each other. That's very consistent with the style the show has had from the beginning, and that so many of us love.

[secret-engima]

Your rock lee thought are utterly captivating… do you have any more HCs or ideas relating to him in your drafts or notes or genius mind? That yin and Yang concept is never gonna leave me now

Uhhh

Ngl I don't usually think about Rock Lee hcs even though he is a Good Boy and I love him. Off the top of my head:

-If Lee is not Gai's genetic son (because *look at them*) I can also see him being Gai's nephew through a half sibling Gai never realized he had until after he met the orphaned Lee and started investigating who the Rock family used to be. Possibly either from a lover that Dai had who never contacted him about the baby or even a divorced wife who took the kid and moved away and then when the kid grew up they somehow migrated back to Konoha pre dying and leaving Lee an orphan.

-Lee is, I think, a lot smarter than some people give him credit for (even me), he just prefers the bluntest solution to things and thus prefers and tends to *think* of the bluntest solution. This means if you can get him on board for something actually subversive, he's actually the perfect accomplice. Nobody will expect him to so something sneaky, so if you pull a prank and then use him as your alibi, people will believe you wholesale and assume you're innocent. Because surely if Lee was involved in a prank, everyone would have seen it coming from a mile away right?

-In the vein of the yang chakra thing, I do wonder if Lee and Gai have enhanced senses of some kind. Probably not hearing considering how much time they spend at Max Volume, but a sense of smell being enhanced I could see.

-His yang chakra overload is also the reason Lee is canonically not allowed anything alcoholic ever. You would think it would help his body process it much faster and make it less effective (which it might do for Gai), but because individuals are individuals and Lee either has more yang chakra or is just ... a different person from Gai and thus his chakra works a bit differently, I would hazard a guess that alcohol isn't what's getting him drunk, it's actually his own chakra that is going kicking into hyperdrive when his body starts to process the alcohol that sends him loopy. Everything is getting supercharged and it makes him loopy and destructive in the manner we see in canon. This could even be his body's instinctive attempt to purge the alcohol gone wrong, or it could also be that Lee is actually ragingly, lethally allergic to alcohol and going into Drunken Fist Mode is just his body and Yang chakra aggressively preventing him from dropping dead by using a scorched earth "heal everything to the point of being hyper and addled" policy.

-Now that I write that out, his instant drunkenness being a side effect of his body purging something he's lethally allergic to actually makes the most sense imo.

-Again in the vein of Yang chakra and how having an overabundance is both a curse and a blessing to poor Lee, this boy has probably only been sick maybe three times in his entire life. I do not remember if there was ever a gag episode in the show where Lee was sick (his comedy spinoff show does not count), but I can see him and Gai both being basically immune system juggernauts without realizing. Which means that Lee is also the go to mom friend for Team Gai when Tenten or Neji do fall sick. Or any of their friends really. Just don't let him near the cold medicine in case those have a bit of alcohol in them.

-Lee is the most supportive shipper friend. For anyone in his friend group. Over anything. You need someone to pep talk you into confessing? Ask Lee. You need help picking a date location? You better have a precise idea in mind of what you want the date to be otherwise you *will* end up in a gym or an eating competition or something insane like that but if you do have an idea but just not a location, Lee will happily go running around making an exhaustive list of possible spots. Need help finding the perfect gift? Again, as long as you tell him what you *specifically* want to find instead of leaving the gift's nature up to him, he'll happily move mountains for you.

-If you don't specify what the gift is supposed to be you're getting color coordinated dumbbells. Every time. *points at the canon wedding arc*. He got them in *orange and purple* for Naruto and Hinata's wedding guys.

-I can't decide if Lee is a good cook or a horrible cook. He's probably that friend who knows maybe two dishes he can cook to the point of making Gordon Ramsey smile and then can turn around and burn salad during a rainy day if he's working with literally any other recipe.

-Unlike Gai who canonically is horrible with names and faces (there is a supremely hilarious scene in Boruto where Gai admits he forgot the name of the shinobi he *fought and lost his leg to*, just that he was a real badass opponent), Lee is the kid who knows everyone not only by name and face but can also pick up a conversation left off two weeks ago without missing a beat. Hi So and So! How's your nephew doing? Did he get that bakery apprenticeship? Wonderful!! etc etc.

-Circling back around to all the many things Lee's canon high energy levels and my Yang chakra HC imply, Lee probably had a nightmare of a time in the classroom or just- for anything involving being still. He can read and retain info but if he's doing doing it while aggressively doing handstands or something it's not gonna stick. He definitely prefers letting Tenten or Neji read the mission briefing and then verbally tell him what they need to do.

[my-mt-heart]

Caryl’s Future

I wanted to hold off on talking about the spinoff until after the finale because without more context, a lot of this is just going to sound like jumping the shark gun and it falls right into AMC’s trap of generating buzz be it positive or negative. But here we go. 

I can’t tell you how much it frustrates me to see Caryl fans vilified for “hating” on the actress who was cast because that is not what’s happening at all. As far as I can tell, you guys have been expressing valid concerns about the characters you love and about Melissa, but when shit hits the fan, blame those crazy unhinged Carylers, right? For what it’s worth, casting a female “lead” doesn’t mean a replacement. There’s no telling how many episodes she’ll be in or what her role will really entail. I imagine AMC’s in no rush to tell us though because playing on our biggest fears is their favorite pastime. They did cast another male role too. Let’s not forget that. 

Casting isn’t the problem for me. Not necessarily. The problem is AMC trying to follow HBO’s example with more explicit content, which apparently means pandering to the male gaze. Nevermind that Daryl’s fanbase is largely women and largely Caryl fans. The problem is a dark, hypersexualized backdrop doesn’t work for Daryl’s character anyway. The problem is Gimple can’t be trusted to handle Daryl’s story with care because for whatever reason, it doesn’t compute that we. watch. for. the. characters. Not for the gimmicks. Not for the location. Not for the explosions. Not even for the zombies. And also, not everybody loves Rick. 

For as much as I talk about Carol, I also identify with Daryl in a lot of ways, namely his struggles with self-worth and fitting in. Watching him find where he belongs, and finding it in Carol, his “soulmate,” has been the most rewarding experience for me as a longtime fan, but to have years of hard-earned, beautiful development stripped away? To have him suddenly questioning where he belongs again? If he belongs with Carol? I can’t suffer through that and I won’t.  Preserving the version of Daryl that I love is too important to me, which means no matter what happens in the finale (and my expectations are extremely low because again, Gimple), I will not watch or give any further attention to something that amounts to nothing other than character assassination. 

As a silver lining, none of this means our efforts over the past several months have been for nothing. Back in April, AMC thought Carol and Melissa were expendable. Now they’re constantly using Melissa’s name and the mystery of what’s going to happen to Carol for engagement because they know she’s a major draw. That’s why Khary made the comments that he did on TTD last night. They weren’t out of the blue and they weren’t confirming that Melissa is done with TWD for good. Her own comments beg to differ (”Carol has more story to tell”), but for now we’re meant to believe everything’s up in the air. And by “for now,” I presume just for the next two weeks.  

I was trying to hold my tongue on this too until we knew for sure, but yes, I do think Carol joining Daryl’s spinoff is a strong possibility now and like I said before, I have very mixed feelings about it. I do want to support Melissa if this is what she’s decided for her character, who we know she cares about so much and would do everything in her power to honor her legacy, and of course I want more stories for Caryl. But this premise is making me all kinds of nauseous, uncomfortable, resentful and not very willing at all to re-subscribe to AMC plus. They need to stop relying on marketing ploys and start focusing on quality storytelling again. An announcement that Carol’s and/or Caryl’s story is continuing might be enough to get me to watch depending on canon, but if I have no reason to think it’s going to be handled right, I’ll just stick to my new method which works just fine. 

It’s been a long day. A long six+ months actually. I’m so tired. There are a lot of asks in my inbox that I will get to because I want you guys to have somewhere to voice all of your concerns. Unless you’re someone who’s trying to shift the blame onto Caryl fans. Then you should not expect a response. 

[allthefoolishdreams]

hiii, this is jeonghoneyss (on my main blog haha), hope you're doing well! some emojis for the ask game, i hope you haven't been asked these already! <3

💫, 💞, 💝, 💌

hi!!! ty i am doing well, hope you are as well!! and ty for the ask 😊

💫what is your favorite kind of comment/feedback?

my favorite are ones that get specific on what exactly the person enjoyed or whatever details they picked up on, i just love detailed comments basically

💞what's the most important part of a story for you? the plot, the characters, the worldbuilding, the technical stuff (grammar etc), the figurative language

oh this ones actually tough bc i dont know, i think all of it is important to varying degrees. but personally a lot of my writing is focused on the characters and getting down a specfic vibe or feeling. or in the case of fics that i base on existing stories the plot is important in the sense that i want to make the story my own while not straying too far from the source if that makes sense

💝what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

definitely you are strange, my love! honestly i didnt think it would get as much attention as its gotten bc it seemed niche, also i expected more people to comment on the casting of felix as black cat, either way its my baby and im glad its gotten a good response!! also my chuck au partly for similar reason since its a niche au but mostly it was my first fic so i was fully expecting it to not get much of a response at all. another one is my minsunglix fic not neccessarily bc the respone since theres only a few comments but the number of kudos it has surprised me ngl

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

i have so many wips in my folder rn and im excited about all of them, idk which to talk about so im going to give one for each chaptered wip i have posted and currently work on:

1. im excited to finish writing my spidey minlix au, i actually have the ending written already i just need to go from a to b. more specifically im excited to write out the two of them having team up moment and of course the Identity Reveals TM.

2. im planning a spinoff for the superchan fic with felix as kara which im excited about getting to