#but it does seem to me that the overwhelming majority turns to this weird essentialism bit which makes me barf

[segretecose]

"i am 15% scandinavian 18% french 3% eastern europea-" okay well i will kill 100% of you

[theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin]

After that gorgeous sequel rant, would you be willing to share your thoughts on reylo?

Ugh.

Once again, that is the most succinct, easiest, answer I can supply. But it's so short, and that just won't do.

I mentioned in a recent post that Dramione comes in a myriad of disguises. Every fandom usually has at least one Dramione ship, you can usually guess which characters the ship will consist of, and while you might not be able to articulate exactly what about it makes it so damn similar to Dramione you will recognize it on sight.

Usually, to me, a Dramione ship features a strong, independent, female lead who may be varying levels of sexually empowered, varying levels of intelligent (Hermione loves to tell us how smart she is but it's not the heart of the ship), is strong, courageous, and noble who depending on the story du jour might slide into depravity.  The real give away is her love interest, always a man, usually a young man of comparable age, who has the bad boy appeal that's not too bad boy where he often is redeemed to the good side for 'reasons' in the course of the story.

Reylo is such a Dramione pairing.

You don't believe me? Look at the authors who write it, I haven't done this too often myself, but I guarantee you that a not small majority of them will either write Draco/Hermione or will have it all over their favorites and bookmarks. It's the same damn pairing.

But worse.

Because Kylo-Ren and Rey aren't really characters.

"Whoa, hold up!", you say, "That's just slander and uncalled for!" Well, change my mind. Rey Palpatine and Kylo-Ren are a series of character tropes and archetypes thrown to us by Disney screaming "LOVE MY CHARACTERS".

Rey is our noble, very Luke like, hero who is a scrappy desert rat with overwhelming mystical powers only acknowledged when the movies feel like acknowledging them (guys, admit Rey kicked Kylo-Ren's ass every time they fought with 0 training, come on, it's not hard).

However, there is nothing underneath her surface. Her hero worship of the resistance feels dull and given to her because it's expected. Of course Rey likes the resistance! The resistance is great! Sign her up! Rey has been living in the desert at the edge of nowhere for presumably 15 years, I'm shocked she's even heard of the new republic let alone the resistance. Despite essentially starving and only having a home that's a broken down old fighter, Rey saves a random droid. We're not really given a compelling reason of why she would do this, that she has a deep respect for droids/is horrified by their use, really really really hates the random trader she sells things to, or really really really hates the empire (if she even realizes it's them behind the bounty). She does it just so that a) the plot keeps moving b) to show Rey is... noble... I guess?

Remember that even Luke (who I have some problems with as a character) started his journey with more backstory and personality than this. Luke loved the empire and desperately wanted to become a pilot. He was very put out that his aunt and uncle kept saying, "Uh, no, bad idea." Luke was ready to skip town and sign on up for flight academy, he just got distracted by pretty women, er, his sister.

So, Rey is never given a compelling reason to do any of the things she does in the series. Just vague feelings of hero worship. And, of course, the drama over her parents. Just... I feel like Disney took out a hat, put a bunch of pieces of paper with words on them, and drew out the one that said "orphan angst about parents" and said "See, now she's conflicted! What a character!"

So yeah, Rey is your cardboard generic hero who is so generic she's not even a person. She has no hopes, no dreams, no fears, just these vague things we're told as an audience she cares about but never shown in any legitimate manner. Rey likes the resistance and rando droids, Rey imprints on Han Solo as the father she never had, Rey has this thing about her parents, Rey is attracted to Kylo Ren.

And that last one, oh boy that last one. It sold me less on the attraction to Kylo Ren than... oh... I don't know... Palpatine's secret Sith planet of doom. I mean, we all saw it coming, The Last Jedi it was very clear where that was going and then Abrams went for it even harder. But what we had was a series of skype conversations where Rey went from "Gr, you killed my pseudo father!" and Kylo-Ren responding, "Yeah, well he was my real father AND HE WAS SO MEAN" to "Oh Ben, I will fly to you through space and we shall save the galaxy together!"

I am given no reason to believe Rey's change of heart. Han Solo's death just suddenly... doesn't really mean much to her anymore (the man was murdered by his son in cold blood so that his son could feel better about himself). She believes Ben Solo is good now because Luke is a dick (never mind that, no matter what a dick Luke is, Ben Solo still murdered dozens of children and then went on to gleefully massacre his way through the galaxy). We're told there's a Force Dyad, which is um... not this thing the writer's made up because they were too lazy to convince me that Kylo-Ren and Rey would end up together in any organic way.

So, yeah, why does Rey like Kylo-Ren? Because the Force told her too? Because it was somehow all Snoke's fault in a way that's never properly described? (Indeed despite us spending quite a bit of time on Kylo-Ren's decision to remain Kylo-Ren being a very internalized thing) Because we saw him shirtless in yoga pants this one time?

It's bad when that last is actually the most legitimate reason I can think of out of the whole lot.

Now let's go to Kylo-Ren. If Rey is boring and nonsensical then Kylo-Ren is a dumpster fire and non-sensical. The guy reminds me a lot of Commodus from the film "Gladiator", the man is cowardly, vile, and murders his father in despair that his father never will be capable of loving him/passes him over for the throne. Kylo-Ren's murder of Han Solo is extremely similar to the murder of Marcus Aurelius in "Gladiator". Han Solo is a flawed father, trying to make his peace with his son, who approaches him unarmed and Kylo-Ren decides to murder him in order to solidify his place in the dark side.

Only, the films never acknowledge that every action Kylo-Ren takes is horrifying.

We're told "oh, Kylo-Ren exists because evil Snoke corrupted him" but also shown repeatedly that Kylo-Ren chooses the darkest path again and again and again. He "struggles with the light" but I don't see it. His opening scene, he has massacred a village and is torturing a man for information (this is presumably a daily routine for him). In the same film he later tortures Rey for information. He serves on a Death Star which wipes out billions in an instant. He murders his father to feel good about himself. He dresses as a man who was reviled and feared throughout the galaxy, a man who murdered countless children, and a man who dressed the way he did because he was barely hanging onto life, because Kylo-Ren thinks it makes him look like a badass. Think about it, this is like if a fully abled Kylo-Ren is wheeling around in a wheel chair, perfectly capable of walking, because he thinks that Professor X is so cool. Now, replace Professor X with Hitler, this is what the movies gave us.

Yet, the films seem to take it for granted that Kylo-Ren is a redeemable character. He's just lost and misguided, he's really struggling with the light and dark side! They don't just tell us this over and over again (which they do) but also just assume we know it.

And base the entire Reylo pairing off of it. Reylo believed Kylo-Ren could be redeemed, they battle Snoke together, then Kylo-Ren stabs her in the back and continues the assault on the Resistance and asks her to be his Dark Queen (TM). Reylo is shocked and appalled, I'm just wondering what movie she thought she was watching, because that was coming a mile away.

Later, when Kylo-Ren is redeemed, we're never given a reason why it happens. Leia just gives him a nagging, one word, phone call and then Han Solo shows up to go, "Ben, are you going to do the right thing?" and Ben goes, "Mumble, grumble, fine" because there's only an hour left in the last film.

Kylo-Ren, like Rey, is the writers' desperate attempt to create a compelling anti-hero with all the anti-hero sauce we love. They just won't admit they made an overgrown genocidal toddler.

Wow, this turned into why I hate both Rey and Kylo Ren, but, uh, back to the ship. Basically, the films give me 0 reason to ever believe it, and even if I wanted to, even if I said "Alright brain, let's make these characters real people for once", I still wouldn't like it. Because the ship itself is just as flat as the characters. It's spicy but not too spicy bad boy gets together with strong female lead.

I know a lot of people enjoy this, and I won't say it's any less legitimate than any of the weirdness I ship, but I'm not one of them. And the whole thing just makes me go "ugh".

[kopikokun]

Beach Day Blues༄ l.dh

↳ Out on a day trip to the beach with your boyfriend and his friends, you’re anticipating a fun time filled with sunny memories and sand filled swimsuits. What you’re not expecting is the cold shoulder from your usually happy-go-lucky boyfriend, but you’re going to get to the root of this issue, even if it’ll kill you.

pairing: lee donghyuck x reader ft. yuta, mark & jaehyun

content: fluff, beach day, reverse comfort fic, jealousy fic, very mildly suggestive ending

word count: 2053 words

Request 36: Haechan + “I need a hug.” (42) + “You’re cute when you’re angry.” (47) + “You own my heart.” (59) + Jealousy

← BACK TO NAVI.

— 𝐫𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐝.

Perhaps you’re being delusional. Perhaps you’re just dehydrated or, maybe, you rationalise, the scalding rays of the evening Sun have burned not only your skin but your brain cells too (if there were any to begin with). Maybe all of this is just in your head and you’re overthinking it.

    “Hey,” someone hisses, “is it just me or is Donghyuck giving you the cold shoulder?”

    At the question, or rather observation, your head swivels an almost sharp 90 degrees to stare Yuta straight in the eyes. “So, it wasn’t just me thinking that!”

    Yuta chuckles. “Yeah, he definitely seems off…” He peers at Donghyuck discreetly from beneath his sunglasses before turning back towards you. “Did you guys get into a fight or something?”

    “A fight? No way!” You pause, suddenly doubting yourself. “At least, I don’t think so…”

    Though you’re confident in your verdict of innocence regarding a fight, Yuta’s question prompts you to briefly run through the events of the day. To preface things, you, your boyfriend, Donghyuck, and a few of your friends—namely, Yuta, Jaehyun and Mark—had decided around half a month ago to clear up one day in advance for a ‘beach day’ this week. The idea had sprung after someone had brought up how nice and sunny the weather had been lately, and everyone just unanimously came to the conclusion that sunny weather equals beach day.

     You had begun packing for this trip a few days ahead to the surprise of everyone including yourself, which is a testament to your overwhelming excitement, because you rarely--if ever--pack that early for just a single day trip. But who can blame you? This would be your first official trip with Donghyuck. No, you should rephrase that. This would be your first official trip with Donghyuck as your boyfriend. You’ve been on plenty of trips before when you two were just ‘friends’, but now--and maybe this is the romanticist in you which you’ve successfully kept stored away up until recently speaking--it just feels different. You’re sure someone out there can relate, because you’ve never been one to obsess over something as feeble as a label, yet this trip has had your stomach in knots for ages.

  The packing process had gone smoothly--neither you nor Donghyuck had forgotten anything--and so had the car ride over. As far as you can recall, your day at the beach so far has gone without a hitch too. You’d had a little picnic, dipped in the oddly warm sea, played some beach volleyball (badly) and gotten some icecream afterward. No fights, no issues, no nothing.

   Maybe, you think, he found out I was involved in that little switch up with the sea water. You don’t entertain the idea for too long though immediately casting it away, because you know Donghyuck would never be the type to get so upset over a prank.

    So, why the attitude?

    You gaze at Donghyuck’s back, hoping that this mystery might just unravel itself if you stare long enough.

    “Huh…” Yuta’s voice tears you from your zealous staring competition with Donghyuck’s shoulders. “Then I wonder what’s up…”

    You sigh. You know you should confront him and have a mature conversation about what’s bothering him, but that’s so much easier said than done. Maybe this is God’s way of punishing you for ridiculing all those scenes in cheesy teen flicks where the couple would experience a major fall-out because of poor communication. During said scenes, you’d be pulling your hair out, internally screaming at the couple to just freaking talk already, yet now that you’ve been presented this obstacle for you to overcome yourself, you’re erring on the side of caution.

    Come on, you reason, I’ve been friends with Donghyuck for over half-a-decade and we’ve gotten into our fair share of arguments during those five years. What’s so different about now?

    Yeah, you’re right. You find yourself agreeing with your own thoughts, physically nodding along like you’re speaking to someone. Yuta raises a concerned eyebrow at you. Nothing’s different compared to then. You’re doing it again. He’s just my boyfriend, and that’s just a label. Stop. Obsessing. Over. Labels.

    Admittedly, it’s a bit embarrassing having to psyche yourself up to do this, but that’s not what’s important right now. What’s important is that little pep-talk, no matter how laughable it sounded, has gotten you to stand and saunter to Donghyuck with utmost confidence. In hindsight, you should’ve said something to Yuta beforehand instead of just springing from your seat and marching away. The thought hadn’t crossed your mind though, as it was obviously preoccupied with something arguably much more important than giving him the luxury of context.

    You decide not to be too transparent about your feelings at first as you take a seat beside Donghyuck on the sand, leaning your head on his shoulder, hoping that all of this was really just your imagination getting the best of you. You silently plead that he’ll perhaps treat you like he normally would, giving you a little peck on the cheek or at least wrapping his arm around your waist. Unfortunately, your hopes are smothered just as quickly as they arise because Donghyuck doesn’t even bat an eye at you, continuing to chat with Jaehyun and flat-out ignoring your presence. Still optimistic for a reaction, you leave a chaste kiss to his bare shoulder, just to let him know that “Hey, I’m here!”, but to no avail. Infuriatingly, he doesn’t even flinch. All he does is drone on to Jaehyun about something you couldn’t care less about.

    You huff. Audibly. A last ditch effort in vying for Donghyuck’s attention. It goes just as well as your previous attempts. You cross your arms, glaring at the side of Donghyuck’s stubborn little head, hoping to bore a deep hole through his brain. Maybe then he’ll finally take notice of you. Sensing the undeniable tensity in the air, Jaehyun clears his throat awkwardly, offering Donghyuck some lame excuse about needing to take a piss, before shuffling away. Well, at least someone knows how to take a hint.

    With Jaehyun’s departure, you’re left alone with Donghyuck. Usually, he’d be leaping to drown you in affection the second you two had privacy--or even if you two didn’t, to be frank--but all he does now is fiddle with the strings of his swimming shorts absentmindedly.

    “What’s wrong, Hyuck?” you finally ask, desperate to break this frustratingly suffocating silence. “Is something wrong?”

    Finally, after what seems like centuries, Donghyuck acknowledges your existence, though the look he gives you is not a pleasant one. In fact, it’s one of agitation. His tongue prods at his inner cheek before he says, tone bitter, “I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?”

    Evidently taken aback, you crease your eyebrows at him. “I… Did I do something wrong, babe?”

    “Oh, come on,” he scoffs, scornful amusement overtaking his normally amiable features. “Don’t pretend like you don’t know. You can just come out and say it.”

    “Say what, Hyuck?”

    “How much more you’re into Mark than into me,” Donghyuck says like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

    You can’t help but laugh, simply bewildered as to how on Earth he came to this conclusion. “I’m into who now?”

    “Mark,” Donghyuck rolls his eyes, “don’t have to pretend like you’re surprised.”

  “I’m not into--” you sigh, a smile of disbelief tugging at your lips. “Okay, tell me why you think I’m into Mark.”

    “I don’t think. I know,” Donghyuck argues and you scoff, “but it’s obvious. And I have proof. Take when we were playing volleyball for instance. The whole time, you kept eyeing Mark up and laughing at his jokes. All of them. Even the weird ones that nobody gets.”

    You snort. “Baby… I wasn’t ‘eyeing Mark up’, I was watching him just in case he missed the ball. And about the joke thing, to his credit, some of them were actually pretty funny! But, as for the the rest--and don’t tell Mark I said this--I felt kinda bad nobody else laughed at them, so I just laughed along with him. Trust me, I’ve been in his shoes before and it sucks. Not all of us are born as naturally as funny as you, Hyuck.” You’re a little remorseful that you’re essentially dissing Mark, but you’re sure he’d understand. Your relationship’s on the line here.

    Donghyuck harrumphs, but you can tell by the slight quirk of his lip that he’s a little tickled by you poking fun at Mark and he’s totally been swayed by your compliment.

    “Okay, fine that explains that, but how about when we went swimming just now? Why did you and Mark keep exchanging funny looks?”

    “That?” You giggle. “You know how your drink was mysteriously replaced by seawater?”

    “Yeah,” he trails off, his suspicion growing by the second.

    “Who do you think that was?”

    Donghyuck groans. “Wait, that was you? Seriously? That was mean, babe.”

  “Aww, I know, Hyuck. I’m sorry,” you coo. Your hand inches its way closer to his as you attempt to intertwine your fingers together.

    Donghyuck rejects your endeavour of fondness. “Nu-uh, no way. I’m not done with you yet.”

    “Oh my God, Hyuck, there’s more?” you complain, though there’s a tint of amusement in your voice.

    “Yes, there’s more, and you won’t be able to worm your way out of this one either,” he says smugly, as if it’d be a good thing if you in fact, couldn’t worm your way out of his next accusation. “How about when we went to get ice cream and you kept sliding up next to him?”

    You pout. “I just wanted to try the watermelon popsicle he got.”

    Donghyuck blinks at you, his once irritated expression dissolving. He seems dumbfounded as you hold his gaze, your mirthful smile never faltering. He turns away from you. “Oh, well… then whatever. I guess you aren’t into Mark.”

    “Hyuck,” you say, hand crawling up his arm, “were you jealous?”

    “Well, yeah, obviously,” he deadpans, still refusing to meet your gaze.

    You giggle. “You’re cute when you’re angry.”

    His cold facade is immediately abandoned at your teasing intonation, and just like that, your cheery Hyuck is back. “Baby,” he whines, readjusting himself so he’s facing you head-on, “don’t tease me. I couldn’t help but be jealous, you know?”

    “And why is that?”

    Donghyuck purses his lips. “Why? What do you mean why?” He gestures up and down, eyes sweeping over you. “Look how pretty you are! What am I supposed to do when you look this good all the time? It’s unfair, really, that you’re this pretty.”

    A blistering heat, one that is much hotter than the Sun, gathers in your cheeks. “Oh really now, Hyuck?”

    “Yes, really,” he says, genuity seeping into his every word. “Literally, everyday I’m surprised you’re even real.” You grin bashfully and Donghyuck pounds his fist to his chest dramatically like he’s been shot. “See! You’re only smiling and I’m already having heart palpitations at just twenty years old.”

    “Okay, okay, Hyuck. You can stop hyping me up now,” you chuckle. You’re beyond glad that your boyfriend has returned to his spirited self, but you know you should address what just happened seriously, just in case. “But hey, I’m sorry that I made you feel that way. Looking back, it definitely could’ve been misinterpreted as flirting and I would never want you to have any reason to feel insecure about our relationship because you own my heart, Hyuck.”

    “Aw, babe, you can be really cheesy when you want to be,” says Donghyuck, pinching your cheeks. He plays what you said off casually, but you know that deep down, it resonates with him, and he honestly appreciates your sincerity. “Come here, I need a hug.”

    “Right now? There are people around, Hyuck.”

    “But you look so good right now. I can’t resist.”

    “I don’t know, Hyuck…” You smile demurely.

    “Alright, then what about,” Donghyuck reaches to tuck your hair behind your ear, whispering, “we ditch the beach day and go cuddle in the car? My skin’s burning, anyway.”

    You grin. “They’re gonna notice that we went missing, you know?”

    “So?” Donghyuck challenges, leaning in to place a short but telling kiss on the juncture which connects your ear and your jaw. “Even better. I want them to know.”

[ladybirdwithoutdots]

why Emma 2020 changed the proposal scene a bit?

I understand why some book fans don't like Emma bringing up Harriet in the proposal scene because, yes, in the book she thinks keeping Harriet’s embarrassing secret is the only thing she can still do for her friend. I get it doesn’t seem so canon compliant for her to tell him there; pointing that up is valid because you are just noticing a major difference between the book and the movie, and it might even seem contradictory for Emma’s character that she does the very thing that in the book she doesn’t want to do for a valid reason. However, I also understand why the movie makes this choice, and I think this is a case in point of what it means 'adaptation' and a creative team having to reconcile with the big differences between a movie and a book when it comes to storytelling and story structure. One major difference between a book and a movie is that in a movie, they show what happens in the story from an outside perspective where canon is limited to and defined as, essentially, only what the characters make you see, and what they explicitly say. If something doesn’t happen on screen then it isn’t real in the story.   A novel, on the other hand, tells a story from an inside perspective and is allowed, through a narrator (the author or the protagonist or another character) to make the reader actually know more than the characters in the story may know in that moment. The problem with a movie adaptation of this book in particular is that you can't read Emma's thoughts in a movie, and a lot of things about this book are based on her thoughts and a ‘narrator’ who can help you understand the motives of the character beyond what the character is explicitly telling others in that moment. That’s why, among other things, this movie chooses to make Emma’s feelings for Mr Knigthley obvious (on her face, in her reactions, in her jealousy) for us from the beginning, and regardless when she realizes them herself, instead of reducing it all only to the scene where Harriet confesses loving him herself, and Emma realizes her own feelings for him through the obligatory explanation scene with flashbacks, voiceovers or an added conversation between her and another character (though you could say that the added moment here where Harriet realizes, and thus says that Emma loves Mr Knightley too might serve that same function still).

I think that with the infamous proposal scene and its on screen adaptations, there are, surprisingly, two ‘issues’ a creative team may face:

1) The first issue is that, in the book, Emma is torn between her relief and joy that Knightley loves her back, and her anguish about Harriet for she doesn't know how she is going to face her and tell her that the guy loves her..and that she loves him back.  She takes her time and actively avoids Harriet because she feels guilty and that, for a time, ruins her own happiness a bit.

Given how many things still happen in the book between Mr Knightley’s proposal and the wedding, and the fact it’s near impossible for the creative team to put everything in a movie, if you only see Emma being happy about his declaration of love there (as if she doesn’t know Harriet wants him too) and then them getting married, it might seem like almost erasing her feelings from the novel a bit and make it seems she doesn't feel guilty about Harriet, or doesn’t care about her being in love with Mr Knightley too. That would go against her character growth a bit for she'd look, once again, selfish and lacking empathy and critical thinking about herself.

Of course, if you read the book you also know that she does think harsh things about Harriet after the latter tells her that she loves Mr Knightley (and she thinks he wants her too). Emma regrets including her in her circle, she thinks she has turned her into arrogant, vain girl for thinking Mr Knightley would really marry someone like her. However, all of that isn’t mutually exclusive with the fact she also matures, she does see her own responsibilities and arrogance and she blames herself for Harriet’s inevitable humiliation (the second!).

Too long don’t read: book Emma cannot be indifferent about the fact Harriet wants Mr Knightley too, and she isn’t.

In light of that, it’s easy to see why Autumn de Wilde changed things a bit in the movie and, in a way, tried to still insert that part of Emma’s thoughts from the book that would be very hard to include without a narrator’s voice. It’s also a change consistent with their own version and the fact they try to make Emma a better friend in the end ...

Emma really kind of gets everything she wants in the end, and we thought a lot about watching the movie after she behaves so badly and has this epiphany and she’s totally different now,” de Wilde said. “We really felt like we would not be able to enjoy it unless we saw Harriet transformed by their rift.” The solution: pushing Emma to actively make things right with Harriet and her best suitor before Emma can accept a much-desired proposal of her own.

Indeed, you could say that Emma gets it easier in the book than in the movie because in the novel everything works in her favor without her having to face Harriet and make any personal effort to help her.

This movie, instead, wanted Emma to really earn her happy end a bit more, and called her out on her faults in the funniest way possible during the proposal scene, well emphasizing her state of mind and conflict through the infamous nosebleed, that also ruins her perfect, poised appearance symbolizing her humanity and the fact that no matter how much she tries, she can’t keep a false control of everything and always be ‘perfect’ (and the beauty of that metaphor also lies in the fact that Knightley isn’t one bit grossed by what is happening, he still tenderly touches her face, he’s all love and concern for her. He’s the one person who always loved her with her imperfections too, he won’t love her less just because she’s human).

By making Emma reveal Harriet’s mess to Mr Knightley in that moment, not only you have a version of the events that is consistent to this movie, you also have an Emma that, in some way, is still consistent to the Emma you also read in the book, albeit just in her thoughts. It also emphasizes Emma's character growth all the more.

For sure, I agree with de Wilde about that. That said, if I want to play devil's advocate here I have to say that while Emma gets it easier in the book, their version kind of erases Harriet/Robert’s agency a bit for I prefer them finding their way back to each other (in the book) without any interference. I also maintain their ‘let’s do better for poor victim Harriet’ myopia results in them not really making Harriet act as a real friend for Emma, not even in the end, leaving their relationship very unbalanced simply because they didn’t realize that their Harriet, even more than her book counterpart, was wrong too and she too had to make amends and apologize for her own blindness about Emma’s feelings, and her selfishness and uncalled for anger when she realized Emma loved the same guy she wanted for herself. This is what happens when you have critical thinking about your main character, but not so much about the secondary ones; creative teams often forget that just because someone is the protagonist (and they get the happy end) and they may be wrong about something, it doesn’t mean they are wrong about everything.  I honestly feel really bad for Emma in that ‘I refused Robert Martin because of you’ scene in the movie because it really is the one moment where she is doing nothing wrong, and Harriet has no right making her feel like she’s the bad guy for loving a guy she had know since forever just because her ‘friend’ had decided she wanted him and deluded herself he wanted her too. If that scene is supposed to make me feel bad for Harriet they failed because it makes me find her annoying.  Maybe it’s personal experiences too for I well know what it means when you think you have a friend, but in reality that person doesn’t care about your feelings much, and just takes for granted that your purpose and your focus is just helping them. 

2) Another issue writers might find in adapting the confession scene from the book to a movie version is Mr Knightley's agency too.

Here’s the thing: her behavior in that scene is confusing to Mr Knightley for, in one moment she seems to not even want him to propose to her, but the next he understands that she loves him back. The poor man despaired, his heart broke when she seemed to reject him.

Austen, in her function of narrator, acknowledges this inconsistency in the book and she's like, yeah it must be very confusing for the guy but people rarely tell the whole truth to each other all the time and he's too happy in the end to ask himself why Emma acted so weird with him, and what matters the most is that he knows she loves him back and they can be finally together.

Still, he’s going to be all the more confused when, later, he tells her that Harriet has accepted Robert’s second proposal and where he expected Emma to be unhappy, given her oppositions to the guy before, he’s very surprised by her 180° and happiness for Harriet instead. He even says that.

Once again, I think if you are adapting the story for a movie where you don't have a narrator’s voice keeping the balance a bit and explaining what the characters can’t explain, it might seem like making this part of the story a bit unresolved for him (and him and Emma). It might not seem fully satisfying that he doesn't get an explanation and their misuranderstanding isn’t fully cleared up.

This movie resolves that by having Emma confess him that, basically, her confusing behavior was because she was scared he wanted to propose to another woman (because she loves him but she didn’t think it’s her he actually loved!), and then when he tells her that it's her he loves, she reciprocates but is also overwhelmed because there is still the issue of Harriet and it ruins her party in that moment because new Emma cannot be indifferent.

This Knightley can make sense of her behavior much better than in the book  and if he's still so happy in the end, it’s because he understands that Emma didn’t reject him for she actually loves him back, and in this version she needs to make amends with Harriet and Robert Martin before she can accept her own happy end. 

I also like what the director said about this scene, especially this point:

“I wanted to make that scene so romantic, and then just turn it on its head, because to say just like, they’re not perfect, they’re both just like a hot mess, and seeing Mr Knightley and Emma panic and try and solve a problem together is just as romantic as the proposal” 

you know what? I agree with her.

Let's be honest, btw, Emma trusts him. Book or movie, this is a fact. She may not tell him about Harriet there but I think even in the book’s canon, it’s not so impossible to imagine that one day, when it’s safe for her to because Harriet is happy with Robert etc, she may tell him the whole story to explain her behavior to him a bit more... and have a good laugh together about the absurdity of it all.

I shouldn’t need to say this but yeah, an adaptation doesn't 'replace' the book said adaptation is based on. It's not like this is the definitive story now. I just have no real issues with changes if there are reasons for them and they make sense with a particular version, and I don’t have issues with adaptations trying to find ways to include even those things that might actually be in the book too, but they seem impossible to convey in a movie. All things considered, this movie actually is one of the most faithful to the book and historically accurate adaptations of Austen ever made. When I watched it the first time, having read the book many times, I was really surprised by how much of the book’s text is included in this version and not really modernized or altered.

I maintain that this version of the proposal scene is as ‘valid’ as the others too. Given Austen doesn't write Emma's answer in that scene (you only know she makes him undestand in some way that she loves him back  and they agree to marry), it's fair to point up that all the adaptations had to create that part on their own to fill where novel doesn't tell you every detail (same thing with the dancing scene: Austen puts the proverbial fade to black there, and whether Emma and Knightley were overwhelmed by dancing together in the book, it is their business just like their honeymoon, or whether they make out during their  engagement...). Emma kissing him right there and then like it happens in other adaptations isn't a more likely scenario for a lady in regency era’s context than her getting a spontaneous nosebleed, just saying.  If anything, Austen’s depiction of her female characters was influenced by the fact that, at the time, while a man could be explicit and very emotional when declaring his feelings for  a woman, a lady had to keep her cool and couldn't tell a guy she loved him so men had to understand a woman recipricated them through their own subtle messages and codes. This isn't to say other adaptations are wrong for making them kiss there, and for adding more romance to that particular scene (just like it isn’t wrong for this adaptation to make the dance scene and what happens afterwards more emotionally charged than it usually is, and choose to also emphasize Emma’s own feelings for him a bit more), but it isn’t wrong for this adaptation to do something different and place a kiss in the other romantic scene instead (when he tells her he'll move to Hartfield) so that the romance isn’t resolved in his confession scene only.  Expecting all adaptations to be the same and interpret things in the same way means making things a tad too formulaic, tbh. And I don’t know why I should even want that. Personally, I like every version of that scene makes sense with their own adaptation, I don’t consider it a ‘flaw’ but a good thing.

I find it annoying when people reduce the love scene in this movie to the funny nosebleed thing only, anyway.  It seems like misrepresenting it a bit to pretend this adaptation is just silly things when it really isn’t like that (and even the nosebleed actually has a purpose for the director that is NOT ‘silly’ tbh).  Regardless the fact I actually like the whole scene including the funny twist in the end too, it’s still a romantic moment and his speech is actually delivered in a way that is very moving to me because Johnny Flynn makes the feelings of the character come across as so real on screen, and you can also see on Anya’s face (they are both crying!) all the confusion and love and amazement. I honestly have no complains about how the part that is written in the book, his speech, is delivered here because it’s really well done and the acting is on point. I really love the way they conveyed all the emotions on screen and I even felt like they conveyed some things about him better than previous versions.

[ubourgeois]

Best Films of 2019: Honorable Mentions

Is Tumblr even the best platform for this anymore, in 2020? Not sure, but it’s habit now.

I’ve got my top 50 tallied up and you can find that here. In the meantime, here’s some films that didn’t make the final cut but that I figured deserved a shoutout regardless. Check it out:

Aquarela dir. Viktor Kossakovsky

Few films are so simple in concept but so overwhelming in execution. Aquarela sets out to be nothing more or less than a documentary about water, at its most dangerous and awe-inspiring: crashing waves, frozen lakes, and gigantic cliffs of ice are presented without commentary or artifice, letting the images speak for themselves with the occasional help of a harsh metal soundtrack. A kind of pure cinema experiment in gorgeously captured natural imagery (in 96 fps to boot!) that is reverent to the power of water almost to the point of fear. It might be said that the potential outstrips the product here - it’s slow, not totally audience friendly, and some sequences are more mundane than others - but when that combination of sound, image, and scale hits it really hits.

Buoyancy dir. Rodd Rathjen

A Cambodian boy, eager to find work, gets scammed into slave labor on a Thai fishing boat, under the leadership of a sadistic captain. Apparently meant as a sort of awareness-raising project on abusive labor practices in Thailand, this Australian production ends up more memorable as a taut and empathetic thriller. More than anything a triumph of casting - amateur actors Sarm Heng and Thanawut Kasro are captivating as the boy and his captain, and lend a great deal of credibility to the single-boat potboiler premise with their surprising chemistry. It’s a modestly-scaled affair and in some ways obviously a first feature, but the commitment to mood and setting make this worth seeking out (even if the humanitarian angle gets a bit lost in the shuffle).

Ford v Ferrari dir. James Mangold

Dad Movie material of the highest caliber. Commits the sin of dragging itself out over the more mundane parts of the story (the will-he-or-won’t-he between Miles and Shelby is almost entirely not worth the time), but wins you back with engagingly muscular racing sequences that dominate much of its second half. Bale and Damon are their reliable selves as the lead duo, and there’s some charming support work from Tracy Letts, Josh Lucas, and Ray McKinnon that lets the setup go down smoothly. A well-executed but bloated film, essentially, but at least one that delivers where it counts. It’s good enough that the idea of a just slightly better version is especially tantalizing. Perhaps with a different director... Michael Mann, say?

Kumbalangi Nights dir. Madhu C. Narayanan

Hands down the best-looking Indian film I saw this year, and probably one of the best soundtracks from anywhere. Ultimately a very sweet family drama about four brothers navigating a non-traditional family unit, full of sweet moments and charming performances. The most memorable element of the film, however, is Fahadh Faasil’s turn as the bushy-mustached antagonist, the overbearing brother-in-law who manages to be both cartoonish and genuinely menacing. Faasil ends up providing the film with a weird energy throughout, and facilitates one of the most breakneck genre switch-ups I’ve ever seen in the last half hour(!) of the film, which I still can’t decide is genius or simply derailing. A very curious movie that I’m still not sure what to do with months later.

The Lighthouse dir. Robert Eggers

More stylistically ambitious than The Witch, but trades in that film’s relative narrative and thematic clarity for something a little harder to grasp. Mostly a good trade, I think - as this moved along I was really swept up in the shadows, the sounds, and Willem Dafoe’s facial expressions, and the film kept ramping up the weirdness in a satisfying way. Appropriately, the film does feel a bit like a bender - you end up losing track of much of the big-picture plot as it goes on, but you’re occasionally pulled into these moments of sharp sensory clarity (the Hark! speech being the most memorable example) that seem to block out everything else. You get a bit blindsided with an ending that doesn’t seem to follow from the rest of the film, but in the meantime it’s an incredible showcase of atmosphere.

Long Day’s Journey Into Night dir. Bi Gan

I give this film a lot of credit for two things: the hour-long, seemingly impossible unbroken take that everyone loves to talk about, and the fact that it raked in money as a holiday release in China despite the fact that obviously most people would not actually enjoy this (the proto Uncut Gems). As with Kaili Blues, the story here is vague and dreamy - something about a funeral, a lost love, some criminal interests - and not especially concerned with legibility. Plus, the first stage of the film drags on so long that the long take that makes up the second half almost feels like a different movie altogether. Still, Long Day ends up being such a showstopper that it makes me feel bad that I’m not on Bi’s wavelength. Or maybe he’s tricking me too, just like all those Chinese cinema goers?

The Moneychanger dir. Federico Veiroj

A rather nuts-and-bolts historical drama set among financial criminals in 70s Montevideo, a kind of deadpan, low-rent South American cousin to The Wolf of Wall Street. Lives and dies by Daniel Hendler’s performance as the titular cambista, a man so cowardly and resigned to moral compromise he makes Jordan Belfort seem like a man of principle, as well as that of Dolores Fonzi, who plays his coldly practical wife. Some interesting historical commentary here, focusing on Uruguay’s position between Brazil and Argentina making it ideal as a shady dealing site, and the effects of seemingly mundane corruption among the financial class that spill out into the general population. Perhaps a bit too committed to its even, clinical tone, but a funny and enlightening film regardless.

Promare dir. Hiroyuki Imaishi

It took me a while to warm up to this one. Definitely feels like it’s taking too many pages out of other Imaishi/Nakashima creations (Gurren Lagann and Kill La Kill are all over this), and I’m still not convinced the environmental and immigration undercurrents are actually executed effectively. However, it does showcase a lot of Imaishi’s usual strengths: extravagant, energetic action sequences, breathless pacing, great music choices, and vibrant character designs. In many ways it’s pure candy, and I guess that’s appropriate for Studio Trigger’s feature film debut. Unquestionably worth checking out for the Trigger faithful - and if you want some almost-there gay representation in your smash-bang mecha fare, maybe this will scratch that itch too?

Queen & Slim dir. Melina Matsoukas

As impressed as I am that anyone got a major studio to put out a film literally just about cop killers, I can’t help but think that this film should have been better, and could have been with just a few tweaks. On the plus side: one of the most gorgeous films of the year (Matsoukas puts her music video sensibilities to fine use on the big screen), great turns from Kaluuya, Turner-Smith, and Bokeem Woodbine, and one of the most impressively raunchy sex scenes in American multiplex fare in many years. The narrative it presents is still essentially worthwhile, and it brushes up against the radical more than accidentally, but it pulls itself down with clumsy Both Sides equivocating and allowing the title characters to slip too cleanly into martyrdom. Want to see what comes next.

Triple Frontier dir. J.C. Chandor

A thoroughly pulpy concept - a bunch of ex-special forces buddies get together to rob a drug lord - brought to life beyond expectations by a talented cast and crew. Ben Affleck, Oscar Isaac, and Pedro Pascal are especially good here (especially Affleck, in his best showing in years), and Chandor and Mark Boal’s detail-oriented approach to the material pays off in a deliberately paced but always tense thriller. Surprisingly in-the-reeds procedural obstacles - how do we get to this house? how do we move this large pile of cash? - set up for the film’s best set pieces, and the ensemble has a great macho rapport that carries over even into the film’s bleaker second half. Perhaps benefiting from low expectations, but this is one of the key overlooked Netflix finds of the year.

[night-filled-mountain]

1, 4, 8, 18, 22 for the shipping asks!

1. What was your first OTP?

It was, er…Buffy/Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. That’s a whole can of worms I don’t want to open too wide, but it definitely started me on a trend as far as het ships go, which looks something like this:

Woman is an epic heroine who radiates strength and virtue

Man is an angsty reformed villain who worships the ground she walks on, but is absolutely convinced that she could never love him and that he will never be worthy of her

Woman has her own darkness and angst, and is able to safely explore that with him; he may see a more complete picture of her than others do

Man nonetheless has to work Very Hard to transform his whole outlook and way of interacting with the world before she will even vaguely consider returning his feelings

He does the moral/emotional equivalent of crawling to her on his knees

She is proud of his progress, maybe finds that she cares for him, and maybe, maybe lets him touch her

…There’s a lot going on there that I don’t have time to unpack (with Buffy/Spike and this trend in general), but I was (and am) continuously frustrated when it gets reduced to “Girls like bad boys” or “Unhealthy dynamic where The Woman Has to Change the Man,” because that’s…not what it’s ever been about for me. I could write lengthy essays about this and still fail to express myself properly, so I’ll just say that these ships, for me, boil down to this poem, and leave it at that.

4. What is/are your favorite trope(s)?

…Oops. Kinda jumped the gun on that one!

Besides the above, which is…still pretty major for me, here are a few off the top of my head:

Same as above, but with any other combination of genders…except Heroic Man and Unworthy Lady. That one doesn’t generally do it for me, seeing as “flipped power dynamics” is a nigh-essential element of my het ships. (That said, Lilah/Wesley from Angel does come to mind…)

Slow burns. Slowest burns. Burns that burn at the speed of a melting glacier. I am an asexual who chose a wedding song that included the line “You would never hold me, I don’t like to be held.” I am Very Big on the gradual creeping ache of unfulfilled longing, whether it’s friends-to-lovers or enemies-to-friends-to-lovers or something else entirely.

UNEXPECTED ROMANCE (that still makes total character sense). This is definitely a factor in my thing for reformed villains getting with heroes/heroines. I just go nuts for feelings, conversations, tender touches, and character commonalities that come out of left field, as opposed to being telegraphed from the first chapter/episode. Honestly, few things are a bigger turn-off for me than instant attraction/love at first sight, unless readers/viewers are left in very long and genuine doubt about whether it’s requited (see: Beauyasha 😛). I’m also left very cold by Traditional Heteronormative Love (especially involving tall muscular dudes whose supposed hotness is dwelled on extensively). Give me two (or more) weird, broken characters who you never would have considered together, having a talk that suddenly makes you see the ways their personalities and experiences reflect or complement each other, and it hits you like lightning and leaves you smoldering for ages to come.

Bittersweet tenderness! Sad characters falling in love. Sad characters being loved. Sad characters being sad together and working together to soften the edges of their sadness. Wincing and downcast eyes and hesitant hands on shoulders. Very hesitant touching in general. Wry gallows humor, awkward prickly conversations, everything feeling off-beat (but in a healthy way?) even after mutual love/a relationship has been established. And all of the ways people help each other cope with trauma.

Hand placed gently on neck. Tongue against ear. Hands touching, fingers trailing down hips. All the little affectionate or erogenous touches that fall short of blatant sexual contact. ALSO DANCING. DANCING!!

…I feel like there are so many more, but I need to try and avoid turning all my asks into theses! Moving on…

8. Who is the most shippable person you can think of?

This seems so subjective to me! I’m tempted to say “Caleb Widogast” purely because I’ve shipped him with so many people, but that’s just because I really like Caleb Widogast and am hyper-tuned to his relationships, not because a scruffy traumatized wizard is inherently Good Shipping Material. …Or is he?

18. What is your favorite unpopular ship?

Fanny Price/Mary Crawford from Mansfield Park. Fight me.

22. Do you have any ships that you ship, but would never want to see as canon?

I don’t know about never, depending on the ever-changing circumstances of a canon that hasn’t ended yet. There are definitely ships that I love the idea of, but don’t go as hard for, because there are other ships involving the same people that I like better…but then you have open relationships and polyamory!

There are also ships that I would love to see in canon, but not yet, or not unless certain circumstances came about. i.e. I’ve talked before about how I adore Shadowgast in theory, but am very uncomfortable with seeing it happen if the power dynamic between Caleb and Essek remains unchanged, or if there’s anything transactional or even vaguely coercive about it.

…And then there’s the rare ship that’s affected, for me, by factors outside the canon–real-life elements, if you will. Which leads me to the prime example to use for this question: Beaujester. I love it as a ship. I think it is/would be fantastic. I think all the necessary ingredients are there, the friendship and chemistry, the unexpected factor, the major slow burn, the bittersweetness–everything. But I’ve never been able to really give my heart to it because of the Beauyasha flame burning inside me since the start of the campaign. And I can’t deny that my ship loyalty has been influenced by my meta knowledge of Ashley Johnson–how she’s had to miss much of both campaigns against her will, how she has trouble getting back into the swing of the story when she does return, and how she may well be hopefully considering Beauyasha as a potential part of Yasha’s story, a part that she’d love to explore if she ever gets a chance.

Now, all of this is completely disputable, including the notion that Yasha has or will develop feelings for Beau at all (I’ve seen it argued very convincingly that “Fire Under Water,” the love song on her playlist, is actually about Jester, and that is completely valid and intriguing in its own right!). But for the moment, my personal feelings and interpretations re: Ashley have definitely influenced my shipping preferences…and during the current plotline, I’ve developed such overwhelming Beauyasha Feelings (for the sake of the ship itself!) that I doubt I’m ever going back. (Though, once again…Beaujesteryasha? Sign me up.)

[tanadrin]

One reason handwringing about the intrinsic moral nature of a religion's metaphysical doctrine always rings so hollow to me is that it requires you to believe that a religion's metaphysical doctrines in any way actually affect the behavior of its adherents, and this I simply cannot believe.

Okay, that's overstating the point a *little* bit, but on both the scale of low-level human psychology and the larger organization of society, it's basically true that doctrine doesn't matter nearly as much as the opponents of a religion might suppose. For two reasons: one, for doctrine really to have a totalizing affect on the psychology of its adherents, it requires adherents to be strongly devoted to that doctrine in a way which is emotionally costly to maintain over a long period of time, and so which almost no one actually is, even nominal true believers. Very few adherents of the Christian religion, for instance, have taken vows of poverty, despite that being pretty strongly advocated by the New Testament, because that's a hard thing to do; likewise, very few adherents of the Christian religion would, in fact, turn the other cheek if you slapped them in the face. A very small body of psychologically comitted individuals within the larger group of adherents might have their behavior shaped sufficiently by doctrine to draw a durable causal connection between the two, but then you run into the other issue--which is that the doctrine of every religion on Earth is shaped by the cultural context in which it is received, and subsequently reinterpreted. Cynically, this is used to reinforce existing power structures (Christianity's co-option by the Roman Empire & the European elite); but even if you're not being a cynic about it, the material and cultural context of a particular branch of a religious tradition totally changes how that religion is practiced--even within branches that attempt to retain a continuous tradition. Catholicism in England in 750 AD is not much like Catholicism in England in 2019, nevermind Brazil or Madagascar; and nevermind Eastern Orthodoxy or evangelical Protestantism, etc., etc. And this is for a religion that is historically pretty hierarchical and pretty concerned with adherence to orthodox interpretations of the central doctrines; for religions without a clear hierarchy, or who never had them, or which have never been as concerned with the idea of a monolithic core set of beliefs, the notion of an immutable quality or nature associated with whatever term we group diverse practices under seems even sillier.

In both ritual practice and how metaphysical beliefs cash out as moral instruction, every religion in human history seems to vary wildly, according to how geographically and temporally diffuse it has become. So Christianity countenances everything from the zealous Crusaders to the weird gnosticism and strict social of the Cathars to strict Calvinism, or modern-day inclusive happy-clappy liberal mainline Protestantism. Buddhism covers innumerable schools with innumerable variations of beliefs on how best to achieve enlightenment, and seems to span the gamut of social function all the way from ‘justifying traditional feudal relations’ to ‘vacuous self-help platitudes as radically reinterpreted by Californians.’ Shinto has gone from ‘animist agrarian fertility rites’ to ‘hierarchical instrument to buttress colonialism and imperialism’ to [AFAICT] ‘background spiritual/ritual component of urban Japanese life.’ Zoroastrianism was once the state religion of a massive empire; now it’s a minority religion so closely identified with the ethnic group that practices it that they do not seek or even accept converts.

For me to believe that a religion is *inherently* violent or *inherently* just or even just sort neutrally Mostly Harmless requires me to believe that 1) there is some inherent property or set of properties created or taken up by that religion at its founding, 2) that is so powerfully adhered to over centuries and across diverse material and social contexts that it is not overwhelmed by much more important, proximate psychological and cultural forces, and 3) you, as an outsider, are capable of correctly distinguishing between the proximate, contextual forces acting on adherents of that religion, versus the inherent nature of that religion which is transmitted to all believers, or to enough believers at the margin that it has a noticeable effect in aggregate. Any theory which seeks to permit the possibility of a religion having an inherent nature needs to account for the differences between, among other things, Achaemenid and modern Zorostrianism, or the pre-Temple Canaanite proto-Hebrew religion and Reformed Rabbinic Judaism, and I think that’s really hard to do.

So that’s a pretty wild way to approach the world! And although it used to be fashionable to speak of cultures in a similar way--NB, by ‘used to’ I mean back when a sizeable chunk of well-educated Europeans assumed that the events of the Book of Exodus were a mostly-accurate record of a thing that actually happened, i.e., were monstrously ignorant of history--it's a sort of logic we don't invoke anymore except maybe unless you are very right-wing. And even then, it is usually spoken of in terms of broader, racialized terms, rather than, say, at the more specific level of Germans or French people. So especially if you are a materialist, or an atheist who does not believe that adherents of other religions are being actively misled by demonic forces, it's super weird if you're invoking this kind of essentialism in *this domain only.* Maybe not if you're doing it casually--we do, in casual conversation, often still stereotype national cultures--but I think we recognize that as a casual activity we're more expressing an apparent trend than making an argument for the immutable nature of transmitted culture and belief. But it's extremely jarring when people who fancy themselves hard-nosed practical materialists, or otherwise Very Serious People, start handwringing about the moral nature of major world religions.

And because these observers rarely actually seem to know much about the doctrinal and sectarian differences *within* these religious traditions, generally seem to be able to speak of politics and history as it affects the adherents of these religions only in the broadest strokes, and default to viewing these religious outgroups as a monolith, counter-commentators often seek a parsimonious explanation for why this logic is being applied in an inconsistent way *here*, and not anywhere else. That these arguments most strongly seem to have an intellectual affinity for arguments which are explicitly racialist does not, despite the protests that religion is not a race, do anything to shake the suspicion that the real source of this belief is a kind of reflexive xenophobic provincialism in search of a justification, of which religion is one, but not the most fundamental, layer.

[migleefulmoments]

Debunking The ccResponse to my Proof post

CC Nonsense is so easy to debunk.  

This is their response to me calling them out for using manips as “proof” that cc was and is real.  

A group of grown adult women thought THIS was irrefutable and such good evidence that it was a perfect response to shut me down. In fact, they comment about the fun they are having several times.  I’m dumbfounded honestly by the ridiculous things they hold up as proof.   It’s so stupid.

ajw720

gifs found here (x)

flowersintheattic254

And it’s D who is the one looking blissfully happy. He mirrors C’s movements so much here and his expression is someone who is

BESOTTED

C is the focus of that. This exists and can’t be explained away.

Let’s start with my debunk post from yesterday. If you haven’t read it you can read it (X). Essentially, what we learned is that this photo 

which is one of their most treasured “proof” pics is a manip. 

It is super long so under a cut

I have no idea why Abby came back at me with the specific gif set above and this photo because they still prove nothing. Both men are known for being funny in interviews and that is exactly what is happening here but slow it down, clip out a 1-2 second piece, loop it in a gif and suddenly the moment because so much more than it ever was. Watch the entire video and the moment isn’t special at all. Chris always answers to get a laugh-hence “oh God” and “I was scared shitless”. I don’t know why being scared shitless during his first sex scene is proof of cc. Cory spoke about being terrified as well. Darren’s response is very serious-100% theater major. He gives a long answer, thoughtful answer and then turns on the charm at the end, going for a laugh to break the tension.  He leans forward Chris for less than a second as you can see from my screen grabs all taken at 3:17

and says “what do you think Chris?” The intimacy- and Flower’s “BESOTTED” moment- that the cc fandom has long romanticized in this interview is simply not there when you watch the video played at regular speed and in real time.  

Darren isn’t mirroring Chris’s movements- in fact he is quite serious when answering the question and he doesn’t seem to be all that aware of Chris beside him until he gets to the end of the question. As you can see in my screen grabs above, he doesn’t  look blissfully happy or besotted until the last two screen grab when he purposefully makes a cheesy smile at Chris and says “what you think Chris?”.  That was 1/2 a second in real time. The cc fandom and @flowersintheattic254 have spent 4 years purposefully NOT watching the video, instead realying   entirely on a manip and a handful of gifs along with their fabricated  version of what is going on on stage. They are literally gaslighting themselves.  

leka-1998

Hahahaha

They want to believe this is darren - I can’t help them. But if THIS is your proof, you are in sad shape.  Especially when you are putting that against 

You have a headless photo taken 6 years ago as your only non-Glee proof. That is pretty sad. Can you imagine a prosecutor taking that to court. “Yes, your honor, this photo of a tiny part of a man’s chin, his head cut out of frame and most of his body obscured by a cat is my proof that Chris and Darren are in a relationship”. Abby should know that this is proof of absolutely nothing. In fact, if you would listen to Chris with your ears instead of your eyes- you would know this is Will: Chris has confirmed Will is his boyfriend in several interviews.  Holding this photographed chin portion up to Will’s chin, it is easy to see that it could be him. That along with Chris acknowledging Will is his boyfriend and the many photos we have of them going about their lives as a couple, his outright denial of any romantic relationship with Darren and the fact that Darren identifies as straight, the evidence adds up to it being Will in the photo.  

I know you want it to be Darren, but assessing evidence isn’t about what you want to find, it is about looking objectively at the evidence and putting it all together in context.  You can’t take an isolated moment, slowed down and gif’d to within an inch of it’s life and call that proof.  

Evidence that supports Will as Chris’s boyfriend-  Will attended Hannah’s graduation and was with Chris for his mom’s funeral whereas Darren was seen eating lunch with friends in LA.  

Photos where they do boyfriend things. 

All of the credible evidence leads to the photo is Will. You claiming it is Darren simply because you desperately want it to be isn’t “credible evidence”, it’s simply the foolish, baseless claims of a few strangers who believe their fantasy is more important than the reality of the people involved.  In order to believe it is Darren, you have to dismiss all the overwhelming credible evidence that says it is Will.

Also real 

I have NO idea why these are considered “also real”. They are both gifs cut from videos produced for Glee Promotion. These were filmed as part of Chris and Darren’s job responsibilities. Chris actually refused to do The Wedding interview and had to be forced to do it. 

I have no idea how you can listen to The Wedding interview. and come away feeling like it was cc positive. It is an indication of how deluded you are and how bad you are at HEARING with your ears. In fact, you once again are “listening with your eyes” by screen capping it to turn it into a gif so you can fixate on 1/2 a second of content and pretend it represents the entire interview. When I first saw the interview, I was stunned at how anti-cc the it was. The entire interview is about how bad overzealous Kragen fans are-”the crazies” and how neither man wants to get your attention so they just stay off social media. 

This is a gif of Darren cracking up is when Chris suggests future-Kurt should be played by Marcia Gay Harden. It’s really funny and Darren laughs-so what? The video is supposed to fun- he’s doing his job. 

Here we have Chris’s closed off- his arms wrapped tightly around himself to protect himself. Darren might be boisterly laughing but Chris isn’t.  He’s barely giving anything. But regardless of what is really being shown here- - these videos were filmed 5 or 6 years ago as part of Chris and Darren’s work...what the hell do they prove related to cc? Absolutely nothing. They prove that both men did the job they were paid to do. They also prove you guys insist on using gifs to prove your fantasy because they are the best way to manipulate reality into showing what you want to see.   

Look at Naya cracking up at Darren, does this prove she loves him? NO, of course not- just like Darren laughing in a PR video he was paid to make doesn't’ prove he loves Chris. 

Watch the unaltered video for a real perspective. 

ajw720

@leka-1998 Apparently she is CONVINCED too much love, and all of the other headless images on C’s IG are just the PA.  Apparently C just likes to cut off his head for shits and giggles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am having way too much fun with this.(Me too, it’s fun explaining “credible evidence” to a lawyer who doesn’t understand it. When are you going to provide evidence that isn’t simple to discredit? I keep waiting for this to get harder but so far it’s utter nonsense.) 

Umm...”all the other headless images” aren’t there like 2 other headless images? No, I don’t think Chris cuts them off for “shits and giggles”, I think he cuts them off because cc assholes come on his social media and terrorize him when he posts Will’s face- especially back during Glee days- so he tamed it down so you hags would not bother him.  This isn’t rocket science here, it’s pretty simple. If you listen to Chris- of course you don’t-but if you did, you would see that your “proof” doesn’t align with what Chris says. Instead you “listen with your eyes” and disregard his pleas to stop shipping him with Darren. 

All of your evidence is in the form of a screen grab or a gif, have you ever wondered why that is? Has it ever occurred to you that none of your evidence comes from Chris or Darren’s mouth? In fact, you go to great lengths to prove what they say is not what they mean. It’s a sick game you play, but I suppose you know that which is why the “#1 rule of fandom is DO NOT involve the players”   

cc-still-going-strong

I will admit it is all history if they can give me ONE photo he looks at her like

THIS

Again, so weird that you used more Klaine screen caps as your evidence. It’s like you don’t understand that Klaine is different from Chris and Darren. 

I have no clue why you think these are excellent examples of anything but get ready to admit it is all history, my friend. Your photos are literally screen grabs from PR videos, smh.  I posted a bunch of responses to this challenge- you can see them: besotted (X), kisses (X), Wedding (X), Reception (X), Random (X), Video 1 (X), 2 (X), 3 (X) 4(X) Romantic 1 (X), 2

Some of the photos I included: 

THIS is a photo of a BESOTTED Couple!!!!!

This is also a photo of Darren BESOTTED.

flowersintheattic254 I want to play some more!!!!!! (OH Me Too, THIS IS TOO EASY) Can Michy rewrite D adding C to his lines on C’s birthday. Was that dubbed Michy and created by us.

I’ve never understood why you believe this joke is proof of cc? It’s a hilarious joke, but it’s really benign and certainly not indicative that they are lovers. They are former coworkers and this was right after Glee ended, so the joke is funny and timely. Today the joke would probably fall flat except within the fandom. Here you are again LiSTENING WITH YOUR EYES as you refuse to acknowledge both that Chris had named Will as his boyfriend and Darren had named Mia by the time this joke was told.  Now, 4 years later Darren is married to Mia so IDK why this is still so exciting for you guys.  Please explain to me why you believe this joke is proof of riot material...why is it something to get excited about other than it’s clever and funny? Again you have to take it out of context of all other evidence about their personal lives, ignore their outright denials they are couple, ignore Darren’s claims he is straight, believe he is lying every time he speaks about his sexuality, fabricate an entire backstory to the joke and believe it is as wink wink nod nod to fandom that they are a couple. It’s just a joke- the whole show was full of them.   To me, your delight with this has always reeked of desperation...and don’t kid yourself, after Darren told this joke every night, he went home with Mia. 

Or maybe some more glee panel. Look at D here.

Or shock horror, which bastard manipulated their legs to look like they were together?!!😮

I love BTS pics that show how close and relaxed they are with each other Michy.

He’s laughing at a joke here...I don’t get your delight. Again- believing this is special requires you to disregard everything Darren and Chris have said about their lives and to belief this one old gif supercedes the thousands of photos we have seen that disprove cc is viable. But even if you weren’t sure back when this gif was new, now we know that Darren is married to Mia and Chris has published Will’s face on his social media many times. In light of new information, your original theories about what these gifs show have been proven wrong and you need to amend your theories. Or at least that is what a reasonable, intelligent person who cares about the truth would do. History would indicate that you are incapable of amending your theories when new information comes to light and that you only care about your fantasy- the truth is inconsequential to you. History also indicates your “proof” is always taken as an isolated event because each time you are forced to ignore the mountain of evidence that disproves your theory. 

Yes, they are absolutely standing right next to one another but so what? This pic doesn’t prove they are in a relationship. If being next to some proves a relationship then Abby get married every time she rides the subway. They are coworkers on set- getting ready to film a scene together. This is a shot of their legs taken when they were standing around Zac getting directions when they first arrived. Once again, you manipulated a photo to make it look like something it isn’t.  But that is always how you “prove” cc is real- you lie and manipulate.  Darren hasn’t even been in hair and make-up yet, this very early in the day. 

ajw720

@flowersintheattic254 the h/edwig joke has been caught on video, but ofc, obviously we fucked with the audio. 

Nobody thinks you fucked with the audio you twit. Reasonable adults simply don’t think a benign joke told on stage is scandalous or indicates they are lovers. 

Just adding a few more special, genuine moments of D absolutely adoring his man, i mean co-worker he hates  

I have never said they hate each other so you need to get someone else to debunk that. In fact, I don’t think I have ever heard anyone except the cc fandom claim they hate one another.  It’s part of only seeing “always” and “never”. 

According to the cc lexicon- Chris and Darren are married or at least live together and have for several years and Darren is under an onerous contract that forbids him from letting the world know he is gay AND that he is in love with Chris Colfer. In fact they are forbidden from interacting in public and their characters were broken up in season 4 in order to break them up in real life.  So you are suggesting that Darren is sooooooo in love that he just cannot stop staring at the man he lives with for the 4 minutes he is on stage with all eyes on them even though he could lose everything under the contract? Cuz that seems like a shitload of risk for simply looking at Chris in a crowded room. According to your logic, Jenna is staring at Darren. I have no clue what he is looking at. He is certainly looking in Chris’s direction but given all the information we have- Darren was dating Mia-now he is married to her, Chris was living with Will-still is, Chris and Darren haven’t spoken in 4 years at least cubically  and they both denied they were a couple many times, I can say that the evidence does not support your claim that he is looking lovingly at Chris because they are passionate lovers and he just can’t help himself. I just posted a bunch of pics of Darren looking very lovingly at Mia while also holding her close and smiling- your 2-second gif vs all the evidence proving he is in a real relationship- married- with Mia- it doesn’t come close to comparing.  Google “Darren Criss and Mia Swier” and scroll for an hour- you see thousands of photos of them looking very much like a loving couple. Your handful of 4-9 year old gifs are pitiful and don’t prove anything except Chris and Darren were coworkers on a TV show where they played boyfriends.     

I’m not going to waste my time debunking these. They are literally the same as the above gifs- ALL onset Glee-in fact the top two are from more Glee promo videos in the same vein as the ones above. Still -they prove nothing.  

And of course the time C looked at D look he was the entire world

Again a slowed down gif from set. Do you see the patten of manipulation here? I wouldn’t say he looked at him like he was the entire world, It looks ot me like Chris looks up at him as Darren speaks to him and then he looks down. You slowed it down to make it more dramatic. It’s a very effective technique to change the mood- TV shows and movies do it all the time.  

But yep all we have is a few IG likes, that is correct Michy, that is all we got. 

I honestly have NO clue what you are insinuating here.  

Aw remember all those behind the scenes of them having fun together too. Guess these never happened either Michy.

Oh we are back to your favorite Bryant Park. They are coworkers killing time on. set. I don’t know why you believe this is so interesting. Yes, they are really cute but Newsflash: coworkers can have fun and joke around together and not be lovers. They had to kill hours before filming started. In fact they had to kill a lot of hours that day. They were on set for 11 hours and filmed a tiny fraction of that time. Once again, you have to take this out of context of all the other CREDIBLE evidence of Miarren and Chill, as well as both men denying a relationship and Darren is straight in order to believe this is something exciting.  

You showed me 1 pic that wasn’t on set. That should tell you everything. Honestly, I know you fully believe your own nonsense and you can’t understand how everyone else isn’t buying into it. But really, I should just respond to this with LOLOLOLOLOL because your evidence is so pathetic and absurd it is laughable. How a grown women can believe that a handful of 4-9 year old gifs representing 1 or 2 second taken from promo videos made for Glee-all slowed down for dramatic effect- can add up to solid proof of a secret relationship is mind boggling.  But it’s even worse because you are a lawyer -you know that evidence isn’t something taken out of context. You know that evidence is looked in its entirety and that includes what Darren and Chris testify about their own relationships.    

ajw720

remember that time D called C the life of the party on National TV?  

Remember the time Darren was asked “Do you take Mia to be your lawfully wedded wife, to love, honor and cherish til death do you part” and he said “I Do” ? That trumps your “life of the party” comment. Why do you think calling a coworker “the life of the party” is indicates love? He also said “I’m straight” and that he wasn’t in a relationships with Chris- but you discount that because you don’t want to hear it -even though he has repeated those comments many times. Nope this is about you latching on to anything you can. It’s really embarrassing       

Chris may be the life of the party but he said this about Mia on TV- to a much bigger audience :  

I know you do not understand symbolism and you insist on taking this beautiful sentiment literally-and tying it back to Cunanan- so it makes no sense to you, but it is incredibly romantic. It’s a very beautiful, loving  sentiment for one’s life partner.

@ajw720, @flowersintheattic254, @leka-1998

[commanders-sole-braincell]

1) Are they woodier or leafier? Succulent, deciduous, evergreen?

honestly I've never thought about if much, but Ford's a weird sort of mid ground at the minute. Body wise he's more a softer leafier texture, but hair wise it's a toss up. His hair at the moment is mainly thorns but I’ve been imaging lately that if he grew it out it'd be more deciduousleaf that evergreen needle. So deciduousI guess 

2) were they modeled after a specific plant?

If not, what was your inspiration? Ford was honestly based off of a cat, I've always loved chimeras and other mutations - especially in how they present!

The only sylvari I have that's actually based off of a plant is technically Alasthaine - who's based off of albino plants! 

3) what kind of climate are they most comfortable in?

Ford's mostly comfortable when it's slightly warmer out, not blistering hot like the desert, but the general warmth of Caledon. Due to his dark and light patterning, extreme hot and cold occasionally flatten him a little more and it throws him off kilter

Muirghra will scream if you throw snow at him. He's not about that cold shit, give him desert or give him death 

 4) what kind of climate are they least comfortable in? 

 Accidentally answered Ford's in the question before! And Muirs.

If you put Gio in the cold, legend has it you'll learn new swears and see five invented and reinvented in two minutes! 

 5) what’s their relationship with gender?

(warnings, I'm dumb about gender and honestly still figuring out all of the cool ways to explore it! So if I say anything ignorant, my bad and please tell me so I can correct it!)

Ford identifies as non-binary, but largely uses male pronouns at present - he sees himself as a non-binary man, if that makes sense. (I actually wanted to explore intersexism with him due to the correlation that can be found between intersexism and chimeras, but was struggling to find resources, after chatting with some helpful folks, non-binary felt right, and it totally fits Ford to a T!) 

 6) what’s their relationship with the Pale Tree?

Ford believe his Mother has the sylvari races best interests at heart, but has emotionally cut herself off from her children for fear of them dying or turning. He understands her more as he grows, but occasionally doesn't agree with her methods or tone. He still behaves a bit like a child trying to get their parents attention around her though 

 7) how do they react to Mordremoth when they first hear him?

Ford felt dread since he knew all the information we know at the start of HoT. He was pushy and aggressive to be around and just, so scared that people would think he'd gone Mordrem or turn on his brothers and sisters, that'd he'd fail them 

Albuinn genuinely thought it was just some weird intrusive thoughts at the beginning, so he just sorta, shrugged off a dragon 

 8) during what cycle were they born?

Night cycle: Taihneford, Nuallslan, Lasairlugh

Dawn cycle: Albuinn, Ainlyne, Loefell, Giolladhe,

Noon cycle: The Quad, Bairnwen, Fionhuine

Dusk cycle: Murighra, Addryin, Mirfirth, Laoirech, Maevyn

 9) what are their opinions on Trahearne?

Ford had a big ol'crush. It started off in admiration for his big brother, and slowly as it crept more towards HoT, he caught serious feelings. He planned to confess once they got Trahearne out the jungle.

Giolladhe never met him, but always felt sorry for the Firstborn everyone had seemingly already buried 

 10) would they take selfies? 

Ford would attempt it and probably adore the stickers. He'd never post them though. 

Giolladhe would have an entire Instagram, tumblr and twitter dedicated to his selfies. He has mastered the artform complete with stickers and emojis. It burns people's retinas but they love it 

 11) random headcanon!

For the first month or so he was at the Vigil, Ford was desperately lonely, and had to largely rely on sympathetic people, older sylvari like Laranthir, and nearby villages for company, as he struggled to connect with the other soliders massively. He's still not close to anyone in the Pact really. Dragons Watch are essentially his first real friends 

The Quad have formed a bond with that child in the village below the wizards tower, and if anyone passing through harasses the kid, they have to deal with four mercenary siblings 

 12) how old are they? 

Ford's about 7 years old at this point! 

Mallus is the charr equivalent of someone in their 40s or 50s, and is the first to admit that retirement doesn't suit him 

 13) what does their love life look like, if they have one? 

 Ford makes eyes contact with them once then never goes near them again cuz he's a weenie. He relies on watching and listening to Kas and Jory for a guide to romance (they have no clue they're the Commanders guide to romance) 

Loefell loves his partner dearly, and is surprisingly practical for his age. He might be young and head over heals for tall, dark and brooding, but he's not quite as stupid as people seem to think. He would go to the ends of the earth for him though 

 14) what did they see in their Dream? 

 Ford saw Mordremoth, a white stag, and mainly his sister - they didn't react with much else till they merged and got yeeted out into a fight with the Court

Giolladhe saw gold 

 15) favorite thing about playing your salad? 

Ford is real dumb, and also very kind so it's a nice combo! The fact I can let the angst rip at any moment and have comedy the next also is just /chef kiss. In game I need to beef his ass up though, going all out burn wasn't my smartest idea! Albuinn is my old main, and boy do habits die hard! I can autopilot on him no problem! It feels nice to see his anxiety lessen and him grow character wise 

 16) what armor set are they currently wearing? 

Ford’s currently got a mix of Vigil, Tier 2 sylvari cultural, and Elonian - and a helmet that’s name escapes me

Stat’s wise it’s an absolute condition damage focused mess

 17) do they have a favorite major city? 

Ford loves the Grove, its home! 

Nuallslan used to love Lions Arch, don't think they'll let him back in though! 

 18) what’s their favorite food?

Lemon sherbets. Ford usually has some on hand and they just help with everything. 

 19) least favorite food? 

Omnomberries - Ford ate them constantly in Orr and has developed an absolute hatred of the things. It’s the one thing he won’t eat

20) their biggest secret?

I had one for Ford but I forgot it but this also came to mind 

Ford low-key wonders if anyone wants him around, and wishes once or twice that he’d simply, passed on during the Departing - duty and Aurene were what drew him back, not an overwhelming desire to survive. He’s doing way better now! (Going into War Eternal he was a ghost of himself) And he’d never act on such thoughts, especially not now, but they surface now and again

Also if you run your hands through his head thorns he’ll practically fall asleep then and there

Gio’s been eyeing up the higher ranks of the Court, and has slowly been using the fact he’s the more ‘fun’ and morally aligned (in his eyes) teacher, to low-key build enough for a coupe in the Court. He wants that metaphorical throne

[trans-cuchulainn]

Is it just me or do several of Cu Chulainn's relatives - along with several other famous Celtic heroes - start dying left and right after Cu Chulainn's death? I mean, how long does Cu's cousin Conall or Conchobar or Fergus or Medb outlive him, is it stated anywhere? (And, sorry for this odd question. Feel free to tell me when to stop sending them. :D)

i honestly don’t know much about the chronology of those various deaths, because i’m not sure if anyone’s managed to put them into a coherent timeline. but honestly, i think part of it is just that…. heroes die left and right all the time anyway, and it just depends how important those heroes are whether we notice them or not

it’s also not uncommon for everyone in a ‘cycle’ to decline at roughly the same time, i guess… i mean a lot of the fianaigecht texts are set after finn and the majority of the fianna are already dead, and cailte and/or oisin are just talking about them retrospectively.

plus heroes like to go out in a blaze of glory and take as many people down with them as they can, so when one dies, several others usually die in the same story. or as revenge for one of the other’s deaths. it always ends up as a big death spiral. you kill one dude, his friend kills you, your friend kills his friend, his friend’s brother kills your friend, your uncle kills his friend’s brother…

with regard to those deaths particularly, here is an attempt at some chronological notes, based on me flicking through them and trying to pull out any relevant details:

conchobar dies when a brain that’s been embedded in his head for up to seven years falls out due to his agitation after hearing about the death of christ.

in one version, both conall and cú chulainn are present when the brain gets there, but aren’t mentioned with regard to the actual death itself, so it’s not clear where they are.

fergus supposedly dies because ailill sees him with medb and gets overwhelmed by jealousy (which is pretty different to how he reacts to that exact same sitch in the táin) and asks his brother to kill fergus.

this happened at some point after the táin.

also probably at some point after cormac died, which means at some point after conchobar died, since cormac died in the aftermath of that.

they don’t seem to care about the chronology particularly

it happens before conall dies tho, and obviously before either ailill or medb dies

medb dies because furbaide throws a hard bit of cheese at her head.

this must happen after the táin

the story doesn’t seem to give any identifying chronological details

though mesca ulad says that ferbaide is cú chulainn’s foster son*

less relevantly i guess, aided meidbe also mentions lugaid of the red stripes who is also cú chulainn’s foster son according to… lebor gabala or something weird like that

this tells us very little except that ferbaide appears probably to be a fairly young man in aided meidbe, and he’s a child (??) but not super young in mesca ulad, so there can’t be that many years between the two, and everyone else needs to die in the meantime, lmao.

conall outlives most people, it’s kind of his special talent

conchobar dies, then cormac dies, so then they’re like “conall do you wanna be king?” and he’s like “nah”

he gets leprosy so he goes to connacht because they’ve got the best food supplies, or something

medb and ailill are both still alive at this point

ailill’s having an affair, medb’s pissed, gets conall to kill ailill which he is absolutely happy to do after ailill had fergus killed (so there’s some kind of linear chronology there), but then the men of connacht get mad about it and kill him in revenge

so i guess technically medb outlives them all. damn it.

order of deaths according to this roughly slapped-together analysis

conchobar -> cormac -> fergus -> conall -> medb

i don’t even know where cú chulainn fits into that. whether he’s first or not. i mean you would think if fergus were alive, he would be there, somehow, as would conchobar, because they are usually around when cú chulainn is Doing Stuff. “conchobar’s province” is mentioned to refer to ulster, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s still king/alive, just that he’s closely associated with it. it could be that he happens fourth in the list, before conall but after the others.

but you would think if cú chulainn were alive, he’d take revenge for fergus’s death, and he doesn’t, it’s conall who does that (it’s always conall), so… i don’t know. somebody probably does. i’m sure there has been lots written on the chronology of the deaths of the ulster cycle.

part of the issue also is that there are lots of “ulster cycle” texts that don’t have cú chulainn in them, and then you’re like, okay, is this because he wasn’t born? or because he was already dead? or because they predate his inclusion in the “cycle”? or because he wasn’t considered an essential factor so the author just decided not to include him? or because he was in scotland with conall or something? (conall is regularly in scotland)

and that’s partly because “ulster cycle” is a modern term and even though the ulster cycle texts are the closest to belonging to an overarching narrative (what with the use of remscéla for the táin and so on), the criteria for what makes a text belong to the “ulster cycle” is based on what we think is a defining feature, not what the medieval irish authors thought.

uhhhh i got sidetracked. i forgot where i was going with this. oh man this is so long. i’m sorry.

i think… i don’t really think cú chulainn’s death is like, a catalyst for other deaths, especially not the figures you listed; conchobar’s death is closely linked to cormac’s, while fergus’s is related to ailill’s is related to conall’s, and then medb is just… out there being lactose intolerant lmao

but that his death symbolises the start of the decline of ulster as a major power in the texts? maybe more of that. also once you start killing one hero it’s a domino effect and then after a while you’ve got no one left to write stories about and you have to move on.

anyway. i don’t know. none of these are texts i know particularly well (i’m writing this answer with most of them open in tabs next to it so that i can look up the things i don’t know haha) and i haven’t studied any of them in depth or read any lit crit on them particularly

but also: also medieval irish chronology is bizarre and doesn’t join up at all. they don’t care. there’s no order to events. people who are dead turn up three pages later. people who shouldn’t be born are running around as adults. it’s all fine. who cares. linear time is for squares.

—

*cú chulainn being old enough to have a foster son in mesca ulad is wild, mostly on account of the fact that the sons of uisliu are in mesca ulad too and they’re alive. yet they die before the táin, in which he’s supposedly seventeen, and also he’s not in the story in which they die (except the early modern version), so the chronology there is whack. 

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Part 1.4

Be aware that this is not a blind playthrough! This will contain spoilers for the entire game, regardless of the part of the game I’m commenting on. A major focus of this commentary is to talk about all of the hints and foreshadowing of events that are going to happen and facts that are going to be revealed in the future of the story. It is emphatically not intended for someone experiencing the game for their first time.

Last time, we had all of chapter 1’s Free Time and hung out with Shuichi, who told Kaede about the caring kind of detectives that he and his uncle are, and with Kaito, who discussed communicating with aliens and why he’s an astronaut and how similar Kaede is to him. In the middle of all this, Kaede also grabbed a shot put ball and started plotting murder.

Today is the day the time limit runs out, so it’s time for Kaede and Shuichi to go and set up their plan.

Shuichi doesn’t answer his door for a minute, and then it turns out he was just using the bathroom. On my first time through I was briefly terrified he’d been murdered. That is almost certainly the only reason the (out-universe) writers had this happen.

They hear about a fight going on in the dining hall, so Shuichi goes alone to get the cameras from Miu while Kaede heads to stop the fight (this is how Shuichi ends up being the only one who learns about the camera intervals and forgets to tell Kaede). On the way there…

Kaede:  “If you know about the fight, why aren’t you stopping—”

Kokichi:  “Why should I? Something finally happened to break up all the boring tedium.”

Kokichi’s probably partly hoping that one of the people involved in the fight gets killed, and then he can survive without having to worry about being the victim.

Kokichi:  “If people feel like they need to take action to survive… who are you to stop them, Kaede?”

Kaede:  “…”

Kokichi has a reasonable point here for his standards, but it’s also extra ironic when you know that Kaede herself is the one planning to take drastic action. That’s probably what Kaede’s silence is trying to imply, too.

The “fight” in the dining hall, which is really more just a disagreement, is because Ryoma is suggesting someone should kill him so that everyone else can survive. As heartbreaking as it is that he’s so willing to give up his life, it’s actually quite a reasonable idea in this situation, from a logical standpoint. Assuming that nobody is going to be able to find a way around the time limit, having a single murder happen is better than everyone dying. The biggest problem with that is that it sucks for the one person who happens to end up the victim – but if that victim is a person who is willing to sacrifice their life for everyone else’s sake, then that’s not quite as bad.

Ryoma:  “I… don’t have a reason to live anymore. So if the rest of you want to live, I’ll hand my life over to you.”

And of course Ryoma would be the one to volunteer himself to die. But I also like how despite not having a reason to live, he doesn’t want to just die pointlessly – if he’s going to die, then he wants to use his death to help everyone else. Despite having given up on himself, he still cares so much about everyone else and their desire to live. Ryoma is really good.

Ryoma:  “I hoped it’d end that way. That’s why I waited so long to bring this up. But we’ve just been waiting for the deadline without doing anything to change it.”

Ryoma had already left the dining hall two mornings ago when Kaede announced that she and Shuichi had a plan and weren’t giving up. He’s doing this now specifically because he hasn’t seen anyone else try to take any action that won’t involve people dying.

Ryoma:  “Whoever murders me gets to leave without a trial. Everyone else survives the time limit… After that, the person who gets to escape can go for help and rescue everyone else.”

He could also potentially just kill himself so that nobody else has to dirty their hands – but having someone else do it does make more sense for this reason.

But then Rantaro makes up his mind and announces that he has a plan to end the game – and hearing that, Ryoma retracts his suggestion. He is quite happy to go along with a plan that doesn’t involve himself dying if it’s at all possible.

Also interesting to note is that, while she’s not saying much, Kirumi is witness to this conversation. She learns here just how willing Ryoma is to die if it will help save other people. No wonder she targets him.

Rantaro:  “Well, even if I *did* have an idea, I couldn’t tell you. Can’t risk anyone interfering.”

Guhhhhh the fact that he doesn’t tell Kaede his plan is precisely why she ends up interfering! But of course, Rantaro has no idea who the mastermind is and he’s saying this because he doesn’t want them to know his plan and try to stop him.

Kaede:  (I don’t have time to worry about things I don’t understand… I just need to do what I can.)

And if Kaede just did spend more time trying to understand Rantaro, then…

Kaede:  (Or else… I won’t be able to protect everyone.)

I like how this is a subtle hint at her true intentions – she’s not only really sure that she can protect everyone so long as she doesn’t get distracted, but she phrases it as being just herself who will do this, and not herself and Shuichi together.

Tsumugi:  “The time limit’s up tonight anyway. After going through so much… it’s strange, but I feel like I’ve come to accept it.”

Other than Kiyo and Angie, who are weird and amoral about things like this, Tsumugi is the only other character who appears to have accepted their inevitable death. Which makes sense, since she knows they’re not actually going to die. Apparently she can’t be bothered to fake being believably nervous about it.

Plan time!

Shuichi:  “She also modified them so that they’ll be completely silent, to not attract attention.”

Kaede:  “They’re completely silent… This is perfect.”

Shuichi:  “It needs to be… These are absolutely essential to our plan.”

Kaede:  “And do these cameras have flashes?”

Notice how Kaede specifically asks about the flashes right after Shuichi has explained that the cameras are designed to not attract attention. It’s almost like she’s fishing for a way that they can be made to attract attention or something.

(Then again, she doesn’t know about the vent at this point, so maybe that’s a coincidence.)

Kaede:  (I’m getting nervous… Ngh, my heart is racing.)

Plotting a murder right in front of someone who wholeheartedly trusts you: Not relaxing.

It really is pretty questionable how Shuichi says they should just leave the vent be because they’ll be watching it from the classroom but Kaede insists that she does something about it from the library anyway.

Kaede:  “This will work… This will definitely work!”

Shuichi:  “…Huh?”

Kaede:  “I think this plan might actually protect everyone! Yeah, it definitely will! This plan is perfectly composed like Chopin’s ballades! I actually really lilke complicated contraptions, like Rube Goldberg machines and stuff. So I’m positive this will work! This setup is perfect!”

And here’s the moment Kaede comes up with the specifics of her trap. On a first time through, this seems plausibly enough like she’s just talking about Shuichi’s plan with the cameras, but even with that it’s a little strange that she’d suddenly have this outburst after going up the ladder to look at the vent, of all times.

(Also, I wonder why she has a fondness for Rube Goldberg machines, hm? I wouldn’t be surprised if literally every character here was written with more of an interest in overly complicated setups than an average group of sixteen people would be likely to have.)

It’s lucky for Kaede that Shuichi is so passive and she’s so assertive, otherwise Shuichi would probably have argued harder that there’s no way she could put a camera on top of the bookshelves, like she was using as her excuse to be up there, before she finished arranging the books.

Kaede:  “Geez… these books are so heavy! What is this, an encyclopedia?” (I flipped open the book.)

“…” “…”

Shuichi:  “Ah, Kaede? Is this really the time to be reading a book?”

Kaede:  “Sorry… I get distracted easily when I’m organizing things.” (After I made that excuse, I rushed to reorganize the heavy books, but…)

This part’s also pretty clever. It’s obvious that something fishy is going on here with Kaede’s suspicious silence and internally admitting she’s making an excuse, but on my first time through I assumed it was that she’d read something plot-relevant in the book which she didn’t want to talk about right now and would bring up later. It didn’t remotely occur to me that the mere fact that she opened a book was the suspicious part.

Also, her excuse of getting distracted easily when organising things is pretty believable – she seems like exactly the kind of person to get way too enthusiastic about things, even potentially mundane things like this. This helps a first-time player gloss over the weirdness of her bookcase arranging by assuming this is just one of her character quirks.

Kaede:  (This plan will probably work. No… not just probably. It’ll *definitely* work!)

If she’d just allowed herself to doubt her plan a little more than this, then maybe…!

(But also, even aside from targeting the wrong person, the plan actually doesn’t work in the end, since the shot put ball misses.)

Kaede:  (Upon entering the classroom, a wave of anxiety suddenly overwhelmed me. My heart felt like it would beat out of my chest at any moment.)

Plotting a murder: still not relaxing.

Shuichi:  “About the… security sensor receiver… Could you hold on to it, please? I just feel like… you’d be better suited for that than me.”

Shuichi. All whoever has the receiver needs to do is hold it and not accidentally turn it off! That doesn’t require any kind of skill that Kaede supposedly has more of than you!

Also, the fact that Shuichi wanted Kaede to have the receiver serves as a clue to the player – even though it’s quite easy to forget about it by the trial – that Shuichi probably didn’t do it, because his supposed murder plot required him to have the receiver, so he wouldn’t have wanted to give it away.

Shuichi:  “My uncle runs a detective business… I would sometimes help out, as an apprentice.”

…Little awkward having this line as though he’s never told Kaede this before, after having done Shuichi’s FTEs where he talked about this at length.

Shuichi:  “…I’m not a real detective, Kaede. What kind of stupid detective is afraid of finding the truth?”

Kaede:  (Right then, I noticed Shuichi’s hands were trembling.)

Shuichi is adorable. It’s so refreshing to have a Danganronpa protagonist (even though he’s not the protagonist yet) with actual issues and weaknesses to work through, and it’s also really nice to have a character whose issues are explicitly relevant to the actual story and not just something you only find out if you do their FTEs but can be left out of the story altogether. I did Shuichi’s FTEs in this chapter because I feel like Kaede would have done, and because he’s a very important character, but they honestly didn’t go that far towards really explaining what makes Shuichi tick. This does, this story about that one murder case that made him terrified of finding the truth, and it’s here and not in an FTE because it’s so important that the writers can’t afford to make it optional.

Kaede is wishing she could play Clair de Lune for Shuichi guhhhhh.

Kaede:  “You noticed, huh? Yeah… I’m shaking, too. But… I’d be a mess if you weren’t here. I wouldn’t have been able to do anything… I would’ve been so lost… I’m glad you’re here with me, Shuichi. With you by my side, I feel like I can stand up to anything. You give me the courage I need to take on the mastermind. So please… be more confident. I believe in you, so you should definitely believe in yourself!”

THEY’RE FRIENDS. It’s been really clear how much Shuichi has gained courage from being around Kaede, but I love that, despite Kaede’s greater confidence and assertiveness, she still gets a lot of courage from being around Shuichi too and feels like she would have been a mess without him.

They’re two people stuck in an awful, terrifying situation, gaining courage from each other’s company and forming a bond to help them deal with this fear because that’s what human beings do. It’s the sort of thing that Danganronpa should always have been full of but never really did until now. There’s been other friendships, but none of them felt quite as much like they formed specifically because of the terrifying situation naturally bringing them closer together. I love fictional friendships, and Danganronpa has always had the potential for some really interesting and adorable friendships due to its premise, but it never really used that potential to its fullest until THIS GAME CAME ALONG.

I also think this is almost entirely down to the simple fact that Shuichi and Kaede happened to start out in the same room, and therefore explored together and quickly came to see each other as a familiar, comforting presence in the midst of all the confusion and anxiety. If the locker next to Shuichi’s had instead contained, for example, Kaito, Shuichi might have only barely interacted with Kaede, but instead he’d probably already be Kaito’s sidekick by now and it’d be Kaito helping him set up this plan. Or if it had contained someone that Shuichi didn’t automatically feel like he could trust, then he’d probably have just separated from them and wandered around lost, not telling anyone his deductions and not having the confidence to carry out this plan at all.

Kaede:  “Also, I think you would look way cooler if you didn’t wear that hat.”

Shuichi:  “Wh-What are you talking about?”

Kaede:  “What? I’m serious here. Once we’re out of here, I want you to show me what you look like without the hat, okay?”

What Kaede’s really saying is that she wants Shuichi to grow stronger and face his fear of looking people in the eye. But she probably thinks he’d be extra-awkward if she was that direct about it, so instead she just pretends that the only reason she wants him to take off the hat is because he’d look cooler without it. If she really just wanted to see what he looked like without it, she could just ask him to take it off briefly right now, but that’s not the point.

Kaede:  “Geez… I just wanna see everyone smile. I love seeing the expressions people make when they’re enjoying themselves. That’s why I play piano… To see the smiles on everyone’s faces. And that’s why we need to expose the mastermind and end this dumb killing game! So we can smile with everyone else!”

She is about to turn herself into a murderer because she wants to make everyone smile. Kaede is the best most adorable murderer ever. (Except for the multiple other adorable selfless murderers in this game.)

And now it’s Let’s Start the Killing Game time! The music that plays for the creepy promotional video is, weirdly enough, one of my favourite pieces on the soundtrack. It somehow perfectly manages to capture the mood of “oh god we’re all going to die if we don’t turn into crazed murderers ourselves”, which is quite a mood to be captured in a piece of music.

Kaito’s strategy meeting is on its way to the basement! Even though Kaito believed in Kaede and Shuichi mentioning that they had a plan, he still couldn’t just sit idle himself, not when everyone’s about to die. He promised he’d “do something about it”, and here he is, delivering on that promise. It’s not the best plan, because Kaito is really terrible at coming up with plans, but he’s doing something – which is more than can be said for anyone else other than Kaede, Shuichi or Rantaro.

Shuichi running off on his own to check out the basement works perfectly both as making you terrified that he might get murdered while he’s down there, and then giving him a possible chance to have been the murderer when he comes back alive, even though all it is is a genuinely innocent trip to check where Kaito’s group was going.

Kaede:  (Realizing I was alone, all the fear and anxiety I was trying to hide rushed back into me.) “Ah, geez!” (I couldn’t keep still, so I grabbed the broom from the corner of the classroom… I started cleaning for no reason at all. I had to move my body. The anxiety was getting to me.)

I love this. It’s such a bizarre but really human reaction to this kind of looming terror and anxiety. Especially when you realise that the real reason she’s anxious is that she knows she’s moments away from killing someone.

That said, I think the out-universe writers had her pick up the broom for a very specific reason we’ll see in a minute. But even so, it makes perfectly good sense for her to do something like this in this moment.

“In one hour… everyone dies.”

Monokuma sure is going out of his way to terrify them as much as possible. I wonder if it was specifically this that made Rantaro decide to ditch the strategy meeting and head to the library – there doesn’t seem to be quite enough time between this and the receiver going off, but it’s possible there was a slightly longer gap of time there than the game implied.

Kaede:  (Shuichi sprinted out of the classroom with the determination of a true Ultimate Detective.)

Aww, look at her believing in him! And look at him genuinely getting so wrapped up in his detective-ness that he rushes to confront the culprit and doesn’t keep an eye on Kaede. Not that he would feel like he needs to, after all, since he trusts her.

Kaede:  (I dropped everything I was holding and ran after Shuichi.)

…She was holding a broom, right? Right, yeah, that’s probably what she dropped, then. Nothing suspicious here at all.

Kaede:  (I could feel my heart beating faster and faster. I was so nervous, my head felt like it was pounding with every heartbeat.)

BECOMING A MURDERER WITH NO TURNING BACK REALLY ISN’T RELAXING

Kaede:  (Bracing myself to confront the mastermind, I had balled my hands into fists without realising it. It’ll be fine. Everything will work out.)

Because they’ll be dead and nobody will realise she did it and she’s not going to think too hard about the fact that she just killed someone and she’s an awful person, nope, so long as she saves everyone it’ll all be worth it.

Aaaand then they run into Kaito and Tenko and because of that they’re going to enter the library too late to see Tsumugi actually killing Rantaro in there. Oops.

Kaito:  “Well, never mind. Your timing’s perfect. You should join our strategy meeting.”

Kaito doesn’t know what’s going on and that their plan is in full swing, so of course he does this! He left them out of his strategy meeting presumably because he knew they had a plan of their own, but if they’re down here and seemingly not working on that plan then they might as well help everyone survive by helping with his plan, right?

Tenko:  “I-I don’t really understand, but you just need me to Aikido throw whoever’s inside, right!?”

Kaito:  “No, I’ll do it! I’ll be the one to take them down!”

I love how both of them are SO READY TO BEAT UP THE MASTERMIND, heh.

Kaede:  (As I walked in, I noticed the moving bookcase at the end of the room was slowly closing.)

That’s Tsumugi on her way out. Whoops.

Aaaaand Rantaro’s dead. I’m not going to be splitting up the Daily Life/Deadly Life between posts, because it’s always a continuation of the same scene, so that’s not really the best place to have a split.

Kaito:  “What in the world!? What the hell is going on!?”

I enjoy how freaked out Kaito’s voice sounds here. You don’t often get to hear him sounding like that.

I also appreciate the fact that Tenko freaks out too, like a decent human being who doesn’t care that the person who’s dead is male.

Gonta is the only one of the next four that run in after Tenko’s scream who actually reacts to the dead body like a normal person should. Himiko’s too depressed to respond properly, Angie’s Atua nonsense prevents her from truly caring, and Maki… well, she’s seen more than her fair share of corpses already.

Kaede:  (Shuichi examined Rantaro’s body and placed his hand close to his mouth to check for breathing.)

Shuichi, meanwhile, is showing some serious guts to just immediately examine the body to check he’s dead. He’s not a homicide detective – he only ever solved that one murder, and based on how he talked about solving it “accidentally”, he probably wasn’t even on the initial investigation at the scene for it or anything. This is most likely his first dead body he’s ever seen – if not, second at the most – and yet he’s able to do this. That’s impressive.

Kaede:  (My vision began to swirl… My legs wobbled beneath me… But out of sheer desperation, I kept my mind working.)

And this is how it feels to be a good person who is now a murderer.

Kaede:  (The monitor is off. It was no longer displaying Monokuma anymore. Does that mean… the mastermind is dead?)

That’s a pretty big leap she’s making there. If the mastermind were dead, the video would most likely still be playing – because no-one is there to stop it. The fact that it’s off means that someone did stop it, because the killing game has started and there’s no need for it anymore.

It is strange that the body discovery announcement didn’t play the moment the four of them first saw the body, though. Almost as if a certain someone is giving herself a couple of minutes to get back into the dining hall before letting it play so she doesn’t look so suspicious.

Regardless, it does make sense that Kaede would immediately jump to the assumption that the mastermind is dead and ignore all hints to the contrary. Killing the mastermind was supposed to be the result of this plan, and the possibility of it being otherwise is too awful to think about.

Monokuma:  “Everyone, please gather in the library!”

It’s nice of Monokuma to actually let everyone know where the body was found in this game. You’d think in the previous games when he didn’t do this there should have been a lot of people awkwardly running around going “shit, where is the body anyway???”

Monokuma:  “What a relief. A murder took place just before time ran out!”

Kaede:  “M-Monokuma!? But how!?”

Monokuma:  “I gotta admit, I was a little nervous there cuz the killing game hadn’t started yet. Geez… you guys really know how to keep me in suspense.”

Yeah, I bet you’re relieved, Monokuma. Although you’d probably be more relieved if Kaede’s shot put ball had done the job like it was meant to and Tsumugi hadn’t had to step in.

Monokuma:  “If the mastermind had died, this killing game would be over.”

It really doesn’t have to be, though, does it? Monokuma can run the game by himself. Cutting the game short if someone happened to kill the mastermind without that even being their intention would make for a boring story, wouldn’t it?

Kokichi:  “Wh-What? This is a lie, right? My dearest Rantaro is dea – Oh, I mean… was kiiiiiiiiiillled!!!”

Here’s Kokichi doing something he does often when he is probably genuinely at least a little distressed – massively overexaggerating his distress to make it seem obviously fake, so that when he turns around and starts acting like he doesn’t care, he can tell himself that all of his distress was a lie and he isn’t really bothered at all, right.

Monokuma:  “With that said… if you’re the blackened who killed Rantaro, raise your hand!”

Tsumugi:  “The one who… killed Rantaro?”

Yeah, Tsumugi, want to raise your hand like he’s asking you to?

Kaito:  “Tch… That dumbass! How dare he go and get himself killed!”

I don’t believe that Kaito even for a moment actually considers Rantaro an idiot for getting killed. He’s just lashing out irrationally because he’s upset and angry that this happened – perhaps that he let it happen, even. He’s probably thinking that he should have realised Rantaro leaving to go the bathroom was suspicious and done something to prevent this. Even something as simple as Kaito insisting on going with him just in case would have saved Rantaro’s life.

There’s a couple of text boxes of nothing but ellipses from Kaede’s “inner monologue” as nobody speaks up to claim the First Blood Perk. Most likely she is thinking something that’s being omitted to prevent spoilers – it’s a shame we’ll never know what it is. Even so, the fact that she’s thinking “nothing” is in and of itself suspicious; one would expect her to be wondering why nobody’s speaking up.

Kaede:  “Everyone besides the blackened… Everyone…”

You won’t let that happen, though. Will you, Kaede?

Her saying this as if in horrified realisation implies it’s only just now occurring to her that if she doesn’t manage to unmask the mastermind in the trial like she’s hoping to, she has to sacrifice herself because the alternative is completely unacceptable.

Tsumugi:  “But… is it true? Is one of us really the culprit?”

I don’t know, Tsumugi, you tell me.

Kokichi:  “Ah-haha, everyone’s competing to see who’s the most paranoid. Yeah, that’s not boring.”

Don’t worry, Kokichi, I’m pretty sure you win that competition hands down.

Shuichi:  “If we all lose our trust in one another because of this… it’s all over! We have to believe in each other and investigate this case.”

Miu:  “Investigating is the same thing as not trusting each other.”

Shuichi:  “No, it’s completely different from what Monokuma wants us to do. He wants us to throw accusations at one another, and lose all trust in each other. And we… can’t let him get what he wants. We need to investigate this murder. Not because we don’t trust each other, but because we *do*.”

Shuichi has such a good point! Sure, one of them is seemingly a horrible person who betrayed them and is lying to them right now, but the other fourteen of them should still be able to trust each other. So they should absolutely try and work together, because there’s still a fourteen-in-fifteen chance that any given person is genuinely trustworthy. The blackened would have a much easier time getting away with it if everyone investigating just did so on their own and didn’t co-operate or share their findings with each other at all. Believing in people, at least to some extent, is necessary to reach the truth!

(Also I appreciate that it’s Miu, the most paranoid person who is actually up-front about their paranoia, who questions Shuichi on this.)

Kaito:  “I agree with Shuichi. Actually, he just said exactly what I was gonna say!”

And again Kaito was beaten to the punch when it really mattered in terms of rallying everyone together and inspiring them. Of course he would have said something exactly like that himself if only Shuichi hadn’t said it first! But because he missed his chance, it just sounds yet again like he’s spouting empty words to save face. Despite all his efforts, Kaito has been so completely ineffective during this chapter, and that’s got to be eating away at him.

Kaede:  (I can’t change what has already happened. All I can do is what must be done. Otherwise… Rantaro died for nothing.)

She can’t take back that murder, but she can at least try and use his death to save everyone else.

Kaede:  (We’ll all escape from here! I’ll make sure of it!)

That “all” is pretty optimistic of her. But at the very least, she’s hoping for all but one.

---

[Next post]

[atsushishelteredinmoonlitjasmine]

KH3 Grievances and Blessings

As of this date, April 8th, 2019, today marks the end of my KH3 journey. I'm recording the date because I know there's DLC for KH3 coming out within the coming months and I don't know whether it'll be plot-related or just gameplay patches/changes (Like Critical Mode). Regardless, I wanted to write down my thoughts and feelings towards KH3 because, like many others, I had been awaiting the release of this game for a long time (Though not as long as others) and, as soon as the game was released in Japan, I blacklisted/muted KH3 tags so as to not be spoiled. It took me over two months since the worldwide release on January 29th to see what KH3 had to offer and, while the main story part ended on April 4th, today was the true end to everything else.

Now I want to make two things clear. First off, I never played KH3. I watched an LP of it, due to money and I didn't wanna wait months for this game. That's also why it took this long for me to write this. Secondly, as of the time writing this, I haven't read the Ultimania outside of some unrelated details since, before April 4th, I made doubly sure to avoid spoilers because I still wanted to be surprised at the ending, despite my predictions of it. If there are some things I bring up in this that are answered in the Ultimania, then link me those.

I'll also be going through practically every aspect of KH3 I can think of, such as the graphics, the gameplay, the story, etc. However, to keep things organized, I'll talk about the main story towards the end of this, since that's where I believe I'll have the most to talk about. Think of it as if the first half was the minor stuff and the second half the major. I'll even mark where it splits off so as to make it easier to know where to skip to.

Listed below are KH3 spoilers, so if you don't want to get spoiled, now's your chance to stop reading. Otherwise, here are my thoughts!

Let's start with the graphics. They are simply gorgeous, sometimes even breathtaking. As many people have pointed out, the in-game graphics are on the same quality level as the old-school FMVs from the older KH games. Even when the cutscenes go to pre-rendered, they are super beautiful. The only complaints I have are, in pre-rendered cutscenes, character models tend to look weird in certain shots. It's a minor complaint but I feel like the characters come off as being... shiny, if that makes sense. I know one of the complaints for 0.2 was that Aqua looked plastic and it seems like, in an attempt to stray away from that end of the spectrum, they made everyone look shiny. Again, that's only in the pre-rendered cutscenes, not in-game itself so... Another complaint was that, in the beginning with Sora and co. heading off to and their visit to Olympus Colosseum, it's easy to tell that they were using the 0.2 graphics because Sora looked exactly plastic. Afterwards, they switched to the current graphics but it's still kinda jarring, in a way. I feel like it may have been to save money, considering the big amount of money they spent on everything else.

Secondly, gameplay. The gameplay, overall, seems solid. It's using the KH2 combat, combined with the BBS shotlocks, Links/Summons, Keyblade transformations, DDD's Flowmotion, and Attractions. However, it also feels overwhelming to have that many gameplay styles/mechanics stuffed into one game. I feel like Nomura was trying to do the same thing that Sakurai (Creator of Smash) did with Smash Ultimate by taking the positive aspects of the previous games' combat and stuffing them into this game, almost as if it were a love letter to the KH fandom. I'm not saying that that's a bad thing, I just think it was clumsily handled.

This leads into a mini-point I had about the difficulty. As I said earlier, Critical Mode, which has been a difficulty setting since KH2 (I believe?), wasn't included in this game, which was considered weird. The LPer I watched KH3 from had played the previous KH games on the hardest difficulty and he believed he'd play KH3 on Critical. Because of this exclusion, he played on Proud Mode and this was absolutely the easiest KH game. It is so easy to overlevel, it is hard to die unless you're purposefully playing terrible or turned on "No Experience", and some gameplay mechanics, I feel, break gameplay. Attractions in particular are ridiculously gamebreaking, due to the insane amounts of invincibility frames and power some of them have. Speaking of it being hard to die, overleveling goes hand-in-hand with that but the fact that you can buy Kupo Coins from the Moogle shops makes Proud Mode a joke. To explain what Kupo Coins are, they are one-use items that basically make it to where it instantly revives you if/when your HP drops to 0 and you can buy many of these coins. They're essentially get-out-of-jail-free coins which, if you're playing on Hard Mode, shouldn't be a thing. There's also a minigame where you can cook all sorts of meals that can grant you any kind of boosts with Remy from Ratatouille. The stat boosts from even the simplest of meals are ridiculous and they also make dying hard to do. I understand that the crew wanted to make KH3 welcoming to newcomers but I feel this is going a little too far in not making the players feel frustrated each time they die in Proud Mode.

Thirdly, the non-original worlds. It's hard to decide whether or not I like them. On the one hand, they're the largest they've ever been, they're expansive, and the crew were able to successfully capture the look of each movie they adapted. On the other, the stories can be hit or miss, they throw tons of enemies at you (which absolutely contributes to the overleveling I mentioned), and they don't serve much of a purpose in the main story outside of fanservice. Some of the worlds were an absolute delight, such as the Tangled and Monsters Inc worlds, while others were a slog to get through, such as the Frozen and Big Hero 6 worlds. This is merely my opinion so don't take it too seriously. The way they decided to go about the stories within each world was to either: 1, be a Cliffnotes version of that world, or 2, create an original story set after the events of the movie. The first way was not a good decision because, out of all the new worlds they revealed for this game, I only watched Hercules, Toy Story, Monsters Inc, and Tangled, so when the LPer I watched headed to the other worlds that weren't mentioned, I was thoroughly confused. The second way could be pretty hit or miss, because I remember getting tired of the Toy Story world towards the end but I enjoyed the story of the Monsters Inc, due to how cute it was. Going back to what I mean by these worlds not serving a purpose, I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility to say these were meant for the express purpose of padding. The reason given for exploring these worlds is so Sora can learn the Power of Waking and, if he doesn't learn it in that world, he'll go to the next and rinse, repeat. I won't go into detail in this section but I'll explain more about it when I get to the story section.

Fourthly, the music. This is probably the one of the few aspects that stayed consistently good. Although I could tell there were more pieces of music that I had heard in other games, Yoko Shimomura still made it fresh by reorechestrating those. I'll give her some slack with those because I can imagine that, with how far into the series KH is and how many themes to keep track of, it was probably easier to remix existing songs than make an entirely new soundtrack. Still, there were some new pieces of music (Most of which from the aforementioned worlds) that I liked. The Toy Story fight music is an absolute bop and the Monsters Inc world music is so whimsical and fun. There were some really nice mashups as well, such as the Other Promise/Vector to the Heavens mashup and Oscuritia de Xehanort. I haven't had a chance to listen to all of the soundtrack yet so these were just the ones from the top of my head.

Fifthly, the voice acting. This is just a personal thing for me, since I want to become a voice actor someday and I like to observe/take mental notes whenever voice acting is involved. The voice acting in of itself is good. Sora was his absolute best in this game, especially in that one scene we ALL know from the trailer and it broke my heart hearing that in-game. Mostly everyone was good, too, aside from some weird line deliveries and voices not fitting some characters. However, I have to point out how... weird the voice-acting is with Terra, Aqua, and Xehanort. Xehanort was probably the weirdest because I'm so used to Leonard Nimoy's Xehanort that this one was kinda jarring. Rutger Hauer is the new VA and... I know he doesn't have the same raspy, gravelly voice Leonard Nimoy had but I feel his Xehanort just doesn't fit the character as much, especially since I noticed Xehanort sounded like he had a very slight Irish accent in this game. Rutger Hauer is Dutch so I don't know how I heard Irish but I'm gonna chalk that up to never hearing a Dutch person speak before. Terra's definitely the best acting out of these three but compared to the other two, it's not much. While it's not bad, I still prefer his 0.2 performance since it seemed like he put effort into that. Terra seems to share the same problem I have with Aqua in that he never raises his voice up above being low. It's hard to tell if he does because they only got Jason Dohring in for two scenes (the Wayfinder Trio reunion and the stupid Xehanort redemption scene), despite being a main character. Aqua was in more than two scenes but her voice acting was kinda the worst, which kills me because she's my queen. For some reason, her voice never goes up above low talking and I don't know if it's just me but she constantly sounds as if she's being cut off. Like, the sound mixing for Aqua makes it sound as if she's cut out at the end for each of her sentences. This was a problem that was present in 0.2 but I brushed that off since I figured 0.2 was not considered a full game by itself. I don't know whether or not it's Willa Holland herself or the voice director for both games but Aqua can be allowed to be emotional other than angry, raise her voice, and not be cut off.

Oh boy, the sixth point. Let me start off by saying this is merely a personal gripe I have and it's fine if people disagree with me or even don't see what I'm saying. I'm just stating this because I talked about this issue on my Livetweet Thread and I want to bring this up. Now... there are instances in this game where Sora express self-doubt or have other characters express worry for Sora (and Aqua for one time) to Donald, Goofy, and Mickey. Each time this was brought up, we had them saying the answer of "they're strong so they're okay". Normally, I wouldn't really be offended at this if it was for one or two times. KH3, however, has this happen several times and... let's just say I got a little testy. The characters this answer was said to or about were Aqua, Sora, and Elsa (as far as I can remember), all of whom I can safely say have issues with their mental health. Sora's the only one I can't definitively say (outside of headcanon territory) but even then... Sora has problems with his self-worth and his sense of strength, Aqua, for all we know, probably has depression and POSSIBLY PTSD, and Elsa definitely has depression and self-image issues. To the Disney characters, any time these issues are brought up, they somehow correlate physical strength with mental fortitude and think that answer is perfectly okay to say. I'm probably reading way too much into this but the way I take it, each time they say that answer, it comes off as Sora/Aqua/Elsa are being weak and need to get over it. The first example I'll bring up of this is when Riku and Mickey are in the RoD trying to save Aqua the first time and Riku expresses worry for Aqua, who's been in this hellhole for 11 years at this point. Mickey just says she'll be fine because she's strong, which baffles me because how does he not remember how Aqua was the last time they met? She was straight up about to succumb to the darkness when he saved her the first time and when she said to him she wasn't sure how much longer she'd be able to ward off the darkness, he just said she'll be okay. Like, she has been stuck in this hell for over a decade, being tormented and having to fight for her life constantly, all the while losing hope she may get out. The one time she's finally close enough to get out, it's snatched away from her. No wonder she was pissed off at Mickey for leaving her when they met again! The second example is any time Sora was expressing doubt in himself over being strong enough and he had Donald and Goofy say he'd be fine. This, to me, made it seem like they were placing such high expectations on Sora to be strong that he wasn't allowed to have moments of emotional vulnerability which I wouldn't be surprised contributed to the worsening of the self-doubt and the culmination of that despair scene. Again, I know it seems like I'm reading too much into this but this was something that legit made me angry. As someone who relates to Sora's self-worth issues and Aqua's depression, I don't think someone telling me that I'll be fine because I was strong constantly would make me feel better. If anything, I'd probably feel worse because I'd be too afraid to appear being weak around that person lest I betray their expectation of me being strong that I keep my feelings of weakness to myself until I eventually broke down. To give benefit to the Disney characters, I believe they were genuinely saying what they thought was best in those kinds of situations. Hell, maybe they even thought that, by saying that, the character would believe them and think they were silly for thinking they were worthless. But I don't believe the Disney characters are good role models for the importance of mental health, given their track record. Still, this was a personal gripe of mine and everyone is free to disagree with me on this. I don't even know if I made any sense in this but I tried.

Now we move on to the major stuff. This next half will mainly include my opinions on the story, the characters, how they were handled, etc. and everyone is free to disagree with me on any of those. I should also warn that any of the next sections may be lengthy, though it wouldn't be me if they weren't. There may also be some instances where I talk about how I would've rewritten some scenes, since there were some that desperately needed to be rewritten or re-edited or whatever else (which will be marked with *). However, I'll write those up in a separate thing because this entire post is mainly for my thoughts on KH3 as a whole and not just certain scenes. Besides, I don't want to bog this post down even further so...

Where to start? Well, I think it may be good to start with the plot and its loose threads. KH3 seems to have a problem with introducing plot threads and then dropping them off with no resolution, meaning they'll either be answered in the upcoming DLC or in the next game (Release dates unknown on both options). We have Maleficent and Pete looking for a black box (A significant thing in KHX, if you've watched Back Cover), the complete drop-off of Vexen and Demyx, the new seven Princesses of Heart, Subject X, the reveal that some of the New Organization members were Keyblade Wielders from the past, the whole thing of the heroes coming back after dying, and possibly other threads I cannot remember for the life of me. Again, I understand that these threads may be picked up in either the DLC or the next game but we don't know when either of those will be released. In a game that's supposed to bring answers to the many questions that were brought up in previous games, we still end up with many other questions that haven't been answered.

Let's go back to my mention of the non-original worlds serving no purpose other than fanservice. As stated in the beginning, Sora needs to learn the Power of Waking so that he can find and save Aqua in the RoD and, later on, awaken Ventus's heart so it'll return to his body sleeping in Castle Oblivion/Land of Departure. However, every time he reaches the end of a world, he still hasn't learned the Power of Waking and so goes to another world to see if he'll learn it there and rinse, repeat. In the newly-returned Land of Departure, it's stated that Sora had the Power of Waking in him all along, which made the trips to the worlds completely pointless. As someone pointed out in their review of KH3, while the Disney worlds in previous games served little more than fanservice, they at least had a goal in which the protagonists needed to fulfill, such as locking and unlocking the worlds, finding lost friends, and defeating those that pose a threat. In KH3, while the goal has been to learn the Power of Waking, it ultimately becomes meaningless upon revealing that Sora had the power within him all along.

Speaking of which, this leads into another thing that legitimately made me angry. We are never told what the Power of Waking is or what it does, only that it is essential to saving Aqua and Ventus. I had to learn from the comments section on YouTube what the Power of Waking was and it still wasn't fully explained what it was. Whenever Sora would be in Yen Sid's tower, Yen Sid would keep telling him that he needed the Power of Waking to venture into the RoD and everyone chastising Sora for being too impulsive and I'm just sitting there like "If you probably told him what the fucking power was, he'd probably have an easier time trying to learn it". It's one of those things where, if Sora were under my writing control, I'd have him slowly getting more and more frustrated over being told to learn something he doesn't understand and isn't being told on what it is that he'd eventually snap. I have some personal experience with that so maybe it's my bias talking.

Next thing I wanted to bring up was my thoughts and feelings towards the third act and the ending. I'll start from the Anti-Aqua stuff to the scenes right before the ending first. Anti-Aqua, while one of the best fights in KH3 (if you're not overleveled and using Attractions), is very quick. I mean, you do battle her a bit as Riku then switch over to Sora to full-on fight her and then she's saved but that sequence doesn't last long. It goes from Aqua calling out Mickey for abandoning her to fighting her to saving her then going off to save Ventus. Even the way she succumbed to darkness wasn't very... climatic. Earlier in the game, Ansem SoD surprises Ansem the Wise and Aqua as they're sitting on the Dark Beach from Blank Points and, after a pretty pitiful fight between Aqua and Ansem SoD (Totally understandable, though), she gets hit with a Dark Ball and falls into the dark ocean as the darkness consumes her. When I first watched the trailer revealing Anti-Aqua, I had a different idea in mind for how Aqua succumbed to the darkness* and the canon kinda disappointed me with how quick it came and went. Moving on, Sora, Aqua, and Disney (Dolan and Gooby) arrive at Castle Oblivion/Land of Departure to save Ventus and then Vanitas shows up. Aqua's only playable during the fight with Vanitas and she's taken out of the action as soon as he threatens Ven. Cue Sora learning the Power of Waking, saving Ven, Ven about ready to kick Vani's ass, and Sora and Ven meet for the first time. Then we move to Yen Sid's tower where everyone has a little chat and prepare for the fight tomorrow. Nice little scenes ensue (Riku meeting with Repliku, Sora and Kairi FINALLY becoming a couple, Aqua and Ven talking about how they'll save Terra, Lea and Saix eating atop the clocktower) then it's off to the Keyblade Graveyard! After an awesome fight with 10000 Heartless and shit, everyone fucking dies. You think it's a joke, no, everyone straight up dies! Terranort manages to take out Ven, Lea, and almost Kairi as well before Dolan pulls out the Zettaflare and vanquishes his ass. A Demon Tide comes into the mix and after becoming a cyclone, kills everyone except Sora and Riku because they were hit with the Stick of Incompetence. Sora and Riku join soon after and we meet with Chirithy in Purgatory! Sora abuses the Power of Waking to bring everyone back from the dead with Kairi's help (BTW, that's the only useful thing she does in this game) and somehow they forget that they died then proceed to almost die again immediately afterwards! Lingering Will shows up with next to no reason why, keeps Terranort busy while everyone fights the Demon Tide again until the power of Union Cross defeats it once and for all. Many New Organization fights later and Kairi getting the Damsel in Distress treatment YET AGAIN to only die later and Sora finally fights Xehanort. Even then, Xehanort manages to corrupt Kingdom Hearts but he's then used as a time portal for Sora and Disney to go to Scala ad Caelum to fight him there. Xehanort manages to forge the X-blade and actually kills Sora before he revives again with the power of friendship to defeat his wrinkly, veiny old ass. Xehanort then gets hit with a dose of Creator's Pet syndrome, which causes him to somehow be fucking redeemed as he goes to the KH equivalent of Heaven with good ol' brother Eraqus. Sora then decides to abuse the Power of Waking once more to save Kairi and, after he successfully brings her back, gets  hit with the Thanos snap and disappears. In Secret Endings, the Foretellers come back, Xigbar is revealed to be Luxu, and Sora and Riku are in Shibuya and Shinjuku respectively, probably about ready to play the Reapers Game! If I missed anything, feel free to disagree!

I may have gone jokey after the Anti-Aqua fight but let me break the last paragraph and a half down. The Land of Departure sequence is nice, except for the part Vani one-shots Aqua in order to get to Ven. She doesn't throw up a barrier or try to deflect the magic with her Keyblade, she just tanks the hit which, if anyone's ever played Aqua in BBS, she ain't like Terra or Ven. It's only because Sora was able to awaken Ven that Aqua didn't get skewered on Vani's Keyblade. Aqua's a Keyblade Master who's fought and won against Vani twice, why the hell did she lose to him here? That, however, is NOTHING compared to her treatment in the Keyblade Graveyard. After Ven and Lea are taken out and Dolan annihilates Terranort, a Demon Tide becomes a Demon Cyclone and, after she, Sora, and Riku decide to fight it, she suddenly gives up and lets the Demon Cyclone kill her*. WHAT THE FUCK?! You mean to tell me that Aqua, a Keyblade Master who's spent 11 years in the RoD fighting for her life and was FINALLY brought back to the RoL, took one look at the Demon Cyclone, which is just a bigger version of the Demon Tides she's fought before, and decided to do suicide by cop? People from the comments section on YouTube try to justify this by saying she had PTSD and/or she was mourning the loss of Ven but I can't see her basically committing suicide over either of these reasons. I'm normally all for Aqua having PTSD because I can imagine that being in a stressful environment with everything trying to kill you on a daily basis isn't good for your mental health but she doesn't show any of the signs for PTSD and she doesn't give up on living the second time the Demon Cyclone shows up. As for her mourning the loss of Ven, I can MAYBE see that but I feel like Ven's death would give her more motivation to defeat the Demon Cyclone because one of the reasons why she fought so hard to get out of the RoD just died in front of her and she'd probably be pissed the fuck off. It may be my love for my oceanic queen coming through but she got hit with the Stick of Incompetence in KH3, along with many other characters.

The one character that was practically killed with it was Kairi. She easily became one of the most disappointing things from KH3 in that she was given the Damsel in Distress treatment yet again and was only killed to give Sora more angst/development. People were expecting her to do something and make herself useful and were instead given shit on a dirty platter. Yes, I know it's stupid to expect Kairi to fight on the level of a Keyblade Master. I don't think anyone was expecting that of her, considering how she literally started training with Lea days, or even weeks, before the final battle. However, we don't see her fighting at all, outside of the battle with Saix and Xion before she gets kidnapped again by Xemnas. She doesn't try to fight back against him and just lets herself be taken, not to mention how she just stares at Terranort after he takes out Lea, not even trying to defend herself*. This girl seems to have no survival instincts, whatsoever. The only useful thing she does in this game is bring Sora back from the brink of death so that he can save everyone else and that's it. While it's a good thing she did that, it's not really explained how she did that, other than 'Princess of Heart' BS.

I'm starting to believe that Nomura genuinely has no idea on what to do with Kairi. To me, he doesn't know what to do on making her stand out from the rest of the cast and has to keep turning her into a faux fighter. In terms of fighting, he doesn't know what to make her as. In my mind, Aqua and Xion (the only female fighters, since Namine is a non-combatant) have two different fighting styles. Aqua's more focused on magic and staying a distance away from her enemy while Xion's more focused on brute strength and getting up in her enemy's face. Kairi then should be the balance between the two, using both magic and strength to her advantage to keep her enemies on their toes. I should stress that I myself am not good at defining fights in general so I may be completely wrong on this but this is merely my interpretation/suggestion. There's a lot more I want to talk about with Kairi but these last two paragraphs pretty much summarize my point. I want to stress that I'm not blaming Kairi for her shitty writing. I'm blaming Nomura because he doesn't know how the fuck to write her as.

Which leads me to my next point of how I feel Sora got hit with a dose of Creator's Pet syndrome in this game. This is probably a point that people will think "Of course it's like that, Airi. He's the main character", which I agree with to an extent but... I'm probably the only one who thinks this but I feel like Sora was made out to be too... important, if that makes sense. In terms of reconnecting lost friends and defeating Xehanort, that's fine. However, also being the one to solve everything by either defeating the enemy or saying stuff from a typical stock shounen series kinda rubbed me the wrong way. It's hard for me to explain in a way that doesn't make it seem as if I don't understand a main character's importance but I'm trying. Here's how I see it: while it's been stated time and again that Sora is the one to connect everyone (Memory's fuzzy on that part) and I know he has to fulfill that purpose in some way, KH3 puts so much emphasis on that, it downplays the other characters' importance or even ruins any chance of development they could've gotten. Sora has to have the spotlight no matter what, even at the cost of characters who need it more. The biggest example of this is Xehanort killing Kairi so it gives Sora more motivation to beat him. Sora was given more development at the cost of Kairi's own. As I said before with Kairi, I'm not blaming Sora for this, I'm blaming Nomura because he decided to give Sora more development than he needed/should've had and sacrificing the other characters in order to boost the already massive value his role has. Hopefully, the DLC will give the others the much-needed development they need.

Speaking of which, it's not only the heroes who got mishandled in this game. Three specific villains (Young Xehanort, Vanitas, and Luxord) come to mind and it somehow got worse down the line. In the Toy Story world, Young Xehanort gets verbally beat down by Woody. In the Monsters Inc. world, Vanitas get yeeted through several doors by Mike and Sulley. In the Caribbean world, Luxord faints because Jack Sparrow had bad breath. These are villains we're supposed to be intimidated by/motivated to defeat and they're made into a complete joke in the world they're antagonizing. Young Xehanort got off easy compared to Vanitas and Luxord, since all he had to deal with was Woody giving him a scolding and brushing it off like nothing. As much as I like the Yeetus Vanitas joke, you mean to tell me that Vanitas, the darkness gremlin himself, didn't sense Sulley sneaking up on him or even try stopping himself from being yeeted through more doors after the first few? What about the Gambler of Fate? He faints because Jack had a little rum in his breath after he got to play pirate again? If that scene was meant to be funny, it accomplished its purpose, just not in the way it was intended to, because how the fuck am I supposed to be intimidated by Luxord when he gets taken out due to someone's bad fucking breath? The way the New Organization's written as is anywhere between being inexplicably strong and able to kill everyone (with the exception of Sora after a despair-induced death and revival) to being laughable and weak enough to be yeeted through doors and taken down by bad breath. That's totally good writing!

Getting back to the story, let's move on to the abso-fucking-lutely stupid Xehanort redemption scene. In the game proper, after he's been defeated once and for all by Sora with the power of friendship, it's revealed that the reason why Xehanort went on this crusade to control Kingdom Hearts was to restore balance and essentially reset the world. He's basically portrayed as this person who, in his pursuit of restoring balance to the world, resorted to extreme methods that almost achieved the opposite of what he wanted. To be fair, that in of itself isn't bad and probably would've made Xehanort an interesting antagonist. However, this completely contradicts what we know about Xehanort before this point! If he really wanted balance, he shouldn't have been spreading darkness to every world he and his incarnations have been to! Even disregarding that point, he's manipulated, controlled, and ruined so many lives. He took control of Terra's body after spending the entirety of his story manipulating him, almost killed Ventus with creating Vanitas if not for Sora's timely intervention, manipulated and controlled Riku, manipulated all of Organization XIII while using them for empty heart tanks, and killed both Eraqus and Kairi! If we're supposed to feel sympathetic for him, why not show him regretting doing all that, hesitating, anything to make us think he didn't WANT to do that but had to in order to accomplish his goal? Then there's the fact Eraqus decides to just forgive him for all he's done, as if he forgot that Xehanort's the reason why he's dead in the first place and almost ruined his pupils' lives, who he saw as his own kids. I get that they once saw each other as brothers but you'd think that relationship would've soured once Xehanort scarred him and dumped a nearly comatose Ven on him. I know Eraqus got a lot of shit from the fandom because of how he acted in BBS but he was at least sympathetic. While he was ultimately wrong in how he treated Terra and Ven, he only decided to kill Ven because he didn't want the X-blade to be forged and cause another Keyblade War and he admitted to Terra he regretted his actions towards him and Ven, all the while crying. THAT’S how you write a character who's majorly fucked up but regrets it and is sympathetic. Not whatever the fuck we were supposed to get from Xehanort. For the third time in this post, I'm not blaming Xehanort for the BS way he was written, I'm blaming Nomura, which is funny since he stated that Xehanort was his favorite character, leading me to think he'd actually try writing him decently.

With that out of the way, we can FINALLY get to the ending. As I said before, Sora decides to abuse the Power of Waking once more to bring Kairi back to life and, after successfully doing that, fades away as if he got hit with the Thanos snap. I'm surprisingly okay with this ending, if only because I know there's going to be more KH games coming out with the confirmation that Sora will still be the protagonist in those games. Normally, I'm against endings where the protagonist dies (unless under special circumstances and even those have to be pretty special) because I like to see stories where the protag, who's gone through a journey full of pain and emotions and any other number of issues, finally gets their happy ending. To me, who writes to escape from the dark and sometimes painful aspects of life, happy endings give characters who've fought so hard for them or characters who were previously unable to achieve them the rest and happiness they deserve (Like the Wayfinder and Clocktower Trios staying together after being reunited). It's hard for me to explain but this isn't the place to talk about that. As I was saying, I'm okay with Sora 'dying' because it showed the consequences of him abusing the Power of Waking too much. From my interpretation of it, the Power of Waking could be used to resurrect the dead, rewrite reality as we know it, etc., but its main purpose is to 'awaken sleeping hearts'. Riku used it properly in DDD to wake Sora up and Sora used it properly in this game to wake Ventus up. The PoW, to me, is the equivalent to playing God, which REALLY goes against my beliefs. I don't know whether it's due to my (loose) Christian faith, my beliefs towards death that I've formed over the years, or because I watched FMA, that mortals messing with things they shouldn't (I.E. Sora bringing the dead back to life) scares me. While the reasoning behind Sora abusing the PoW is understandable (and I'm giving him a pass on what I'm about to say next due to this), he's still a mortal playing God, which HAS to have consequences, no matter what. Just because I say this, however, doesn't mean people aren't allowed to say the ending sucked. Hell, even I think the ending kinda sucks, despite me being okay with it. The only way this ending couldn't have come about is if Sora didn't abuse the PoW and the only way Sora wouldn't have abused the PoW is if no one died and the only way no one could've died is if Nomura could've written something better. The best we can hope for with Sora is that he's given a happy ending down the line and NO ONE DIES OR TAKES HIS PLACE! NO MORE OF THIS BITTERSWEET NONSENSE, ALL RIGHT?!

So what do I think of the story overall? Well, it's... something. It's not the worst thing I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing but it's also not that good. The pacing seems to only have two settings; it's either too slow to the point of it being padded for extra time or too fast to really know what's going on in favor of getting to the next goalpost. I wouldn't be surprised if it's because of the pacing that I don't know where the halfway point of KH3 is. I thought it'd be like the first half being the Disney fanservice and the second half the actual plot but it's not like that here. The first half got WAY more time dedicated to it than the second half did and it REALLY shows with how sloppily written the plot towards the end was. The way I see it, Nomura had the major plotpoints planned and figured out but the details surrounding those plotpoints were left as an afterthought. He had goalposts set up but he got stuck figuring out how to get Sora and co. from point A to point B. I think if he had just finetuned those details or rewritten scenes to make more sense or even asked for help, the story could've been a lot better. Granted, there were probably a lot of factors at work during KH3's production so I won't place all of the blame on solely Nomura, especially with all the news articles lately about game studios overworking their employees to the point of exhaustion/illness/death/eventual breakdown of the company. While I mainly talked about the negatives concerning the story, there were also some positives about it. Sora was at his absolute adorableness in this game. Like, there were so many moments where I just died from how cute he was (which I noted many times in my Livetweet thread) that helped to highlight how Sora's still just a kid who unfortunately carries the fate of the world on his shoulders. The reunions of both the Wayfinder and Clocktower trios just killed me because they had suffered so much up to this point  and to see them crying from happiness at being reunited with their friends again and staying together this time had me tearing up. Although she didn't appear much in KH3, Namine being able to exist outside of Kairi was also a sweet moment, especially with her being treated like a princess when she first wakes up and Riku taking her by the hand to the Destiny Islands like a prince. I don't care if it's considered ship tease, that shit was goddamn cute, all right? The scene of Aqua crying after she finally realizes she's in the RoL again hit me in the feels so much, especially after Sora told her she was home. Now thinking about it, I wonder if that's sort of a parallel to KH2's ending with Sora taking on the role of Kairi from that scene. The relationship between Kairi and Lea (What little we saw of it), the ending of everyone on the Destiny Islands, and the occasional Disney stuff I did enjoy were all good. It just sucks that there's so little of the stuff I mentioned featured that I wish more time was spent developing those.

So what is my overall opinion on KH3? It's not my favorite of the series, that honor still goes to both KH2 and BBS. Without running the risk of repeating myself, I won't go into detail about the gameplay or the story because you can just read all the points I've mentioned above. I still enjoyed KH3 but some of my expectations fell through and I felt a bit underwhelmed by everything. In some ways, the wait was worth it but I think I would've been fine with waiting more if it meant some aspects were developed more. In regards to this game being a good entryway for newcomers, I think it is, if only because you're provided with recaps of the previous games right at the main menu so that anyone who hasn't played at least one KH game won't be completely lost playing KH3. I feel like everything I've mentioned in this post may be discredited or even disregarded as an actual review of KH3 because I didn't play the game, I watched an LP of it, but keep in mind these are merely my observations and the conclusions I've reached using those observations. The experience may be completely different to those who actually played it but I won't know until this is posted so...

Where do we go from here? Well, we still have the DLC to look forward to but, as I stated earlier, we have no idea when those are coming out and it's the same with any upcoming games. I'm hoping the DLC will answer some questions while also giving some much-needed development to the characters who aren't Sora. The only thing left to say is, may the DLC guide our wandering hearts.

[starwarsnonsense]

The Last Jedi Trailer Breakdown

* Please note that the following breakdown contains some potential spoilers for the movie - they’re mostly based on inferences and rumours, but you probably want to skip this post entirely if you’re spoiler-averse. *

I’m exhausted (I woke up way too early to watch that trailer!), but I knew I couldn’t rest until I had done this. There is so much to unpack here, so you’ll have to excuse me for omitting some things (mainly space battles) and skimming over others. 

I’m sure I’m wrong with a good chunk of this, but this is all meant in good fun.

I hope you enjoy my first stab at breaking this baby down - if you think it can be improved or spot anything that needs to be corrected, please let me know.

Kylo on the observation deck of the Supremacy, Snoke’s Mega-class Star Destroyer.

DIALOGUE: Snoke - “When I found you, I saw raw, untamed power. And beyond that, something truly special.”

There is obviously a big debate over who Snoke is speaking to here. It could be either Kylo (who we mostly see images of as this dialogue is being spoken) or Rey, and I think that’s the point. The whole purpose of the trailer is to stress that Kylo and Rey are in eerily similar positions and occupy the same space in the Force, and the dialogue simply reinforces that. Rey and Kylo are both characterised by their raw power, and they are both considered prodigies.

I’m also loving the obvious call-back to Attack of the Clones here - the shot from that film shows Anakin contemplating his mother’s fate (he has just had a dream of her being tortured by the Sand People), so if they’re really pursuing a parallel here it’s possible that this shows Kylo thinking of his mother too.

Kylo leading a platoon of stormtroopers onto Crait. This shot is particularly interesting, as Kylo was previously unaccounted for in the third act of the film - we now know that he’s part of the First Order’s assault on Crait. Yet again, we find a parallel to the prequel trilogy here. This shot is a very clear parallel for the one of Anakin leading stormtroopers into the Jedi HQ on Coruscant:

In Revenge of the Sith, this is the shot that prepares us for the massacre of the Jedi. It’s possible that Kylo is going into Crait to wipe out Resistance scum (TM), but if they’re truly going for the reverse Anakin route it’s equally possible that he’s about to do something more surprising.

Kylo bowing before Snoke in his throne room, and reaching down to pick up his lightsaber (perhaps a new-and-improved version, given the uncertain fate of his saber in TFA) as the Praetorian Guards look on. This is likely to be one of the first scenes in the film, and it’s presumably Kylo being called before Snoke to explain himself after his defeat and the destruction of Starkiller Base. He is probably humiliated by this experience, as we see him throwing his helmet against the wall in anger later (see below).

I don’t have anything smart to say here except that Mark Hamill has the most amazing WTF face.

DIALOGUE: Rey - “Something, something inside me has always been there. But now it’s awake, and I need help.”

This line establishes Rey’s vulnerability and position in relation to the more established Force users - she is overwhelmed by her own power, and knows that she needs help to wield it properly.

Rey exploring Ahch-To, and finding herself inside the tree/cavern with the ancient books (which were first seen in the previous trailer). I’m guessing she’s been left alone here and is trying to find answers for herself.

Rey has some serious skills and Luke knows it. The point of this little montage is clearly to demonstrate that Luke is made to face up to the sheer extent of Rey’s power, and he isn’t even remotely happy about it. He is frightened and troubled by what he witnesses.

I find it profoundly amusing that Luke appears to have been buried beneath the timbre of the temple. 

In all seriousness, this is somewhat surprising as the composition of Rey’s vision in TFA had implied that the massacre at the temple happened in Luke’s absence, with him returning to face the horror of it. This suggests something far more sudden and unexpected, possibly implying that it was some kind of random or rushed event rather than the product of a carefully formulated plan. 

Han said that Luke’s apprentice (i.e. Ben Solo) “destroyed it all” in TFA, and this makes me wonder if that explanation is more literal than we had previously imagined - it’s possible that instead of deliberately murdering his fellow pupils, some kind of traumatic or shocking event triggered Ben’s innate power and caused him to lose control and destroy everything surrounding him. 

This kind of cataclysm would explain Luke’s fear of Rey - he would consider Kylo and Rey ticking Force bombs waiting to go off and cause massive damage. It would also offer a good explanation of why Kylo turned to Snoke after the incident at the temple - his uncle would be appalled by and terrified of him, and would essentially cast him out into Snoke’s waiting arms.

MARK’S FACE IS AMAZING.

DIALOGUE: Luke - “I’ve seen this raw strength only once before. It didn’t scare me enough then. It does now.”

To me, the subject of this dialogue is very clear. Luke has just witnessed the extent of Rey’s power in the Force, and it reminds him powerfully of Kylo. He implies that he didn’t respond as he should have to Ben (specifically, he didn’t take his capacity for harm seriously enough), and swears he won’t make the same mistake with Rey. This is clearly the source of his reluctance to train her. In the books Luke has a rather hippy-dippy attitude to redemption and the will of the Force post-ROTJ, but he has clearly been made hardened and cynical by his experiences with Ben.

Rey looks hurt and confused, presumably by Luke’s rejection of her and the saber. Rey is clearly on the edge of the island here - it almost makes me wonder if she has fallen (or possibly even pushed) off the ledge after handing Luke the lightsaber, and is pulling herself back up. It’s a very weird position without context.

What an awesome beauty shot of Kylo’s eyes and gorgeous chocolate locks. ‘Nuff said.

DIALOGUE: Kylo - “Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to. That’s the only way to become what you were meant to be.”

Unless he’s speaking to a mirror, it’s most likely that Kylo is talking to Rey here. Rey was obviously hung up on her family and Jakku in TFA, and I can see Kylo saying something like this to her in an attempt to help her move on.

Kylo preparing to hurl his helmet against the wall in the elevator outside Snoke’s throne room. As I said above, it would seem that he’s upset/angered by whatever Snoke told him.

This is a long centrepiece sequence and it’s clearly meant to be a ‘will he, won’t he’ moment. Kylo is piloting his TIE Silencer in the battle of D’Qar and is evidently poised to attack his mum’s ship. We know he doesn’t take Leia out here because she is also featured in the Crait scenes, which happen in the third act (the battle of D’Qar is situated firmly in the first act). The specifics of what happen are obviously less certain - he could not fire at all, deliberately miss, or be distracted by enemy fire. So many choices!

The Falcon being chased by TIEs on Crait. Chewie and his porg pal appear to be in the cockpit for this chase - it’s unclear whether there’s a co-pilot around at this point (whether Rey or someone else).

Poe and co being evacuated from D’Qar during the First Order’s attack on the planet.

DIALOGUE: Poe - “We have a spark that will light the fire that will burn the First Order down.”

It’s neat inspirational dialogue from up-and-coming Resistance leader Poe - it may be an allusion to Finn, since he could well be the ‘spark’ of doubt that destroys the loyalty of the First Order’s troopers (by representing an alternative path and shedding a light on the corruption and hypocrisy of the FO hierarchy).

Finn and Phasma facing off. This is a scene that has been hyped for a long time, and was first rumoured an age ago by our friend Bothan Spy on Reddit. It looks like Finn and co have done some serious damage during their infiltration. 

Luke looking even more pissed than before. It’s possible that this shot is related to the Bothan Spy rumour of the exploding hut (the rumour is that Luke is angered by a conversation Rey and Kylo are having without him in a hut, and blows it up in retaliation), since it could show the aftermath of that (you can arguably see rubble in the background, though it could just as easily be weathered masonry). 

DIALOGUE: Luke - “This is not going to go the way you think.”

I’d guess this is a warning to Rey. He sounds very angry and stern here, as if she has disobeyed him or is threatening to disobey. This is a major reach, but it’s possible that she is defying him by going with/helping Kylo and Luke is warning her against it.

Ice foxes on Crait. They seem to be retreating into the Resistance hanger bay.

Leia waiting by the gate to the Rebel base on Crait - it looks like she is waiting for someone, and this could potentially match up with the shot from the BTS reel where Rey approaches Leia on the same planet:

(Note that the costume Leia wears is identical, as is the ground.)

Rey falling in the water on Ahch-To and encountering the skeletons of some peculiar alien beasties.

Luke Skywalker being creepy af, watching a soaking-wet Rey from the mist (I know it sounds kinky like that, but that’s literally what’s there). He looks very ominous and judgemental here, and certainly doesn’t seem ready to give a helping hand.

DIALOGUE: Snoke - “Fulfil your destiny.”

As before, this could be addressed to Rey or Kylo. I would lean towards Kylo, since I can see Snoke playing the destiny card with him because of his Skywalker bloodline.

Finn taken prisoner during his infiltration of the First Order.

The First Order forces massed. I suspect they may be gathered here to witness Finn’s execution, though that is an educated guess.

Snoke torturing Rey with the Force. He looks absolutely hideous here, and the torture Rey is going through looks agonising - you can see Praetorian guards in the background, and we know that Rey and Kylo fight them at some point. The fight scene(s) with the Guards may come before or after this scene, though it’s impossible to say more than that. The revelation that Snoke and Rey meet is, by itself, a big deal.

I AM DECEASED.

DIALOGUE: Rey - “I need someone to show me my place in all this.”

Now, there has been a lot of chatter about this moment. It is clear that the shots of Rey and Kylo are from different scenes - my bet would be on the shot of Rey showing her speaking to Luke early in the film (probably when she is explaining herself to him), with her line potentially linking up to her earlier plea. I think that the full line might look like this:

“Something, something inside me has always been there. But now it’s awake, and I need help. I need someone to show me my place in all this.”

What must be said, though, is that I don’t think they would mislead us to the extent of tricking us to believe that Kylo is extending his hand to Rey when he is actually offering it to someone else. This trailer, as far as I’m concerned, is about establishing the key relationships and conflicts of the film. And a thread running through it all is Rey’s desire for help with her nascent powers, and Luke’s bitter resistance to offering her this support. So you have a vulnerable young woman who is desperate for guidance and a sense of place and purpose. The trailer shows Luke refusing to offer her any of this - instead, Kylo steps in to fill the void and offers her understanding and support. The scene with Kylo is likely to be from later in the film, and it could either represent a real event or a vision.

[nuzblog]

November 21st, 2017

This is the second of two new entries, which were at one point slated to be one entry. I’m glad they weren’t, since both of them got long as hell. I blame the fact that I’m also chipping my way through a 7 hour video essay on Pokemon for my long windedness. If you don’t remember the one where I caught a Drowzee, I recommend scrolling down. Now’s also a good time to remind you that it’s possible to read the entire thing chronologically, by clicking... well, any word in this sentence, how about. Also the Pokedex in the sidebar.

Now seems as good a time as any to mention what I forgot to in my admitted rush to finish the prior entry - while grinding up Baku, I was also hanging out with friends, and finally actually did the damn thing: Moschops was traded for a Kakuna, and then traded back, evolving it to its final form. This is the second time in my lifetime of playing Pokemon that I've actually used the evolved form of a trade evolution, and the first is my Alolan Golem in Sun which I am still not actually finished with yet, largely due to this playthrough superceding it as a priority in my mind, and also because, maybe it's just me but that game's pacing really falls off by the time you're on Poni Island. Not that it was really well paced to begin with, but-- oh, bugger, I'll save this all for when I nuzlocke that game. Uh. If I get there. Maybe I'll be so put off by how much I hate 2nd Gen that I'll simply not get to 3rd. (That's probably not true, I love 3rd Gen so much, I'll slog through garbage to get to it.)

Anyway yeah, I have rad friends and I love them very much and so I have a Machamp now. Weird! I've used Machoke before, but never actually Machamp.

Blaine's gym is the next one, and I actualy have notes on it beyond "the gym trainers were easy." As the series progresses, gyms will become more elaborate - here, they're just. Walk in a straight line, walk in a straight line and then turn left, rifle through some garbage, cut some trees, follow an "invisible" path, just choose a teleport tile and pray, and the two I'm about to knock out back to back.

Blaine's gym is really weird. I definitely understand what they were going for, but it turned out super strange. So Blaine is like, this researcher professor guy, like not quite Pokemon Professor but he knows his shit and wears a lab coat sometimes and the works. So his gym is a quiz. There's these quiz machines that ask you a question that varies from bafflingly simple, such as "does Caterpie evolve into Butterfree", to just plain baffling, either due to strange wording or ambiguous wording. Like... on the one hand they are clearly meant to test your knowledge that you've gained as you adventured, since you're essentially at endgame territory here. But Blaine isn't the kind of professor that seems to legitimately want to test your knowledge, oh no, his questions seem purposely worded to confuse. For example, the first one, "Caterpie evolves into Butterfree?" On the one hand, yes, one of Caterpie's evolutions is Butterfree... but at the same time, Caterpie DOESN'T evolve into Butterfree. Caterpie evolves into Metapod, and Metapod evolves into Butterfree. The correct answer is yes, but it's not technically accurate. Another question asks if Poliwag evolves thrice, which is false, it evolves twice, but it's easy to count each form - Poliwag, Poliwhirl and Poliwrath - and assume that that matches up with the "3" in the question. Also, in what I can only assume to be translation error, one question manages to not only refer to the Electric type as "Thunder", but also refers to types as "element-types". Super weird.

Anyway, I did all the trivia and also fought all the trainers. Used to Firered, I find the lack of unique overworld sprites for the gym leaders interesting. I didn't even realize it was Blaine I was next to until I saw that there was no quiz machine behind him. Of course, with my Nessie and Cingu, the gym is no issue at all. I brink Moschops in too for his rock move, and Wakinyan just in case things got hairy, which they did not - I beat him handily.

Speaking of being beaten handily, the final gym has this mystery behind it, but I appreciate that before you are face to face with his widow's peaked mug, you have every opportunity to guess that the final gym leader is Giovanni of Team Rocket. The "Champ in the making!" dude tells you he uses ground types - and Giovanni, excepting his Kangaskhan, uses Nidoqueens and Rhyhorns and such consistently. That, and the puzzle here is the same pushing tiles that were used in the Rocket Hideout - I guess he likes those things? I know we encounter them in the hideout before the gym, but I like to think that it's the other way around. We don't get as much backstory on Giovanni as I'd like, but I like to imagine that he was a perfectly legitimate gym leader before starting Team Rocket, and he used the puzzle tiles the Pokemon League provided for him in his top secret casino hideout just cause they were the same kind of puzzle he liked enough to put in his gym.

As for fighting him... it's a joke. I was a little nervous going in about his powerful last 'mon and its Fissure, but... it's got 30% accuracy and I outspeed it anyway. Giovanni is defeated, this time for the last time. In this game - and this was removed in the remakes since it is counter to his characterization in his later appearances - if you speak to him after beating him, he says he is giving up on crime for good in order to research Pokemon. I think that's compelling and, again, hints at something a little more earnest in his past and in his motivations. Allow me to extrapolate for a moment here: Team Rocket's goals, in the anime and in the games, are consistent: find and capture rare Pokemon by any means necessary. In this game, they are first found in Mt. Moon, where rare Pokemon fossils can be found that can be resurrected at Cinnabar Island; then, the Silph Scope is recovered from them in Celadon, which is used primarily to be able to observe Ghost Pokemon in the Pokemon Tower, where they can also be found holding one of the region's well known Pokemon caretakers hostage. After that, they are in Silph Co., a powerful organization that has manufactured the Master Ball, which can be used to catch any Pokemon with perfect success. While the grunts may be using common Pokemon like Zubat and Rattata, the big boss has typically got Rhyhorn, Kangaskhan, and Nidoqueen, all Pokemon that are either only or most commonly accessible by way of the Safari Zone, where rarer Pokemon are sequestered for preservation.

What if Giovanni's real purpose is to study these rare Pokemon? Not money, nor pride, but simply the pursuit of knowledge? Taken to extremes, sure, but perhaps from his perspective, the real crime is holding these creatures away from researchers (which, as seen in Silph Co., Team Rocket also employs) that can learn more about them. Bam. There's my wild theory of the week.

Anyway yeah I went in without Wakinyan and just wrecked up his face. Hard not to, with Lapras and Penthes and Moschops and Baku. Cingu didn't do much, nor did he need to.

Speaking of Cingu, I then taught him Fissure. Now, normally, I would pretty much ignore OHKO moves. I mean, it'd be fun to give it to Moschops, but since all transferred Pokemon have their hidden abilities, it still would not be a Fissure/No Guard Machamp, so there's no point to that - instead, I gave it to the faster Cingu, after a bit of research. You see, I did not realize until around 24 hours prior to the time of this writing when I has beaten Giovanni's gym that the X Accuracy was changed in Gen 3. In Gen 3 onwards, which are the only generations I've played extensively, the X Accuracy is a very situationally useful item in a set of items that are essentially like Hardens, Howls, and Focus Energys that you can pay for. Those same moves aren't really that useful either, since far better moves like Swords Dance and Agility are just plain better versions of them. X Accuracy is probably the best of the set since it actually increases your own accuracy by a stage, allowing the effects of moves like the obnoxious Sand Attack or Minimize to be negated or at least mitigated... but since the overwhelming majority of attacks hit 100% of the time, and if you've been sand attacked then using the X Accuracy only gives them another chance to fling sand in your face, the usefulness is not exactly on the level of say, Potions and Pokeballs.

Except, things are a little different in Gen 1. You see, when an X Accuracy is used on a Pokemon in battle in Gen 1, it makes all of its moves hit perfectly every time until it is switched out or fainted. All of them, bypassing accuracy checks a la Swift, which I believe means it isn't even able to fall prey to the dreaded 1/256 glitch, which makes 100% accuracy moves miss one out of every 256 times. Including one hit KO moves like Fissure. (As a side note, this may also be handy with Thunder, which has only 70% accuracy - if it becomes a perfect hit then I'm far more confident of Wakinyan's ability to sweep Lorelei, at the least.)

Which, obviously, is ridiculous. Of course, Fissure only has 5 PP... but I've also not used a single one of the limited Ethers, Elixirs, etc. that the game provides. And with the exception of Dingus, every member of the Elite 4 has 5 Pokemon. (Of course, almost all of them also have a Flying type, and I'm sure SOME of them will outspeed Cingu, which should make Fissure fail regardless.) So like... basically, it's completely busted but fuck me if I'm not gonna take advantage of it. I'm already taking advantage of how busted Slash is. Honestly I'm gonna be sad to push Cingu through the Bank, since it's gonna go from utterly disgustingly broken to like... a normal Pokemon, basically.

Anyway then I slept, woke up, and played more Pokemon.

Now, at this point, I could go to Victory Road. But. Some unfinished business first! The Seafoam Islands are a fairly simple dungeon, with a Strength boulder dropping puzzle that's fairly memorable. Also there's a bird at the end. I murdered this bird, since I couldn't catch it. It actually brought Moschops to fairly low health. Serves me right for trying to use my 4x effective move that just happens to be on my "weak to flying" Pokemon.

NOW I'm ready for Victory Road, except for the fact that I absolutely forgot that there was a rival fight on Route 22 as you're headed for the Pokemon League. I was all healed up anyway, and I don't need to box anyone since he's got 6 Pokemon by now (but apparently no Fire Stones, lol - really, still Growlithe?), but I was still caught off guard, which I'm sure is the point.

Moschops handles Pidgeot and Rhyhorn, which hurts bad enough to switch him for Wakinyan, who, not gonna lie, is basically literally only here to OHKO this Gyarados. Nessie beats Growlithe but Alakazam puts it to 40 health, the lowest any of my Pokemon has been in a long while. Baku has the psychic resistance, so he finishes off Alakazam and then hits Venusaur for super effective damage, but I switch back to Wakinyan to finish him off.

I heal at home and NOW I'm actually going towards Victory Road.

First though, I run around in the grass on Route 23 for a wee bit before realizing that the only Pokemon I can find there are Sandslash/shrew, Sp/Fearow, or Ditto, all of which I still have living. I then think to fish, but I don't have my rod with me. Ah well, can't be arsed.

Victory Road! It's a road made of victory!! Let's see what EXCITING NEW POKEMON await us in this, our final dungeon of the-- oh. Zubat. It's a Zubat. I just caught another Zubat. ts name is Desmod, but it might as well be... Box 1. Cause that's where it'll be living. (Actually Box 2 though, I think.)

The dungeon here isn't actually that tough. The encounter rate is high enough that I got annoyed and put up some repels, but all that'll do is make grinding go a bit faster because you KNOW I'm not gonna fight the Elite 4 until everyone's AT LEAST Level 50. The trainers in here, to their credit, are reasonably tough. One Tamer in particular hurt me pretty bad with his sequence of Psychic types. I tried not to leave too often, since, at the very least, doing so would reset puzzle progress and drain max repels, but I did after this dude. Dig still takes me near Rock Tunnel. I literally haven't healed anywhere other than home since Rock Tunnel, lol. That'll change soon, I bet.

While here, I battled Moltres, the last of three legendary birds. As promised, I'll now discuss my thoughts on legendaries, because I quite frankly think that they're ruddy genius... in this game, and less so increasingly as the series progresses.

In this game, there are 4 legendary Pokemon - the three legendary birds and Mewtwo. Mew is a mythical and I'll talk about those another time, but legendaries are a distinct thing. In this game, despite all being birds except for the edgy one for whatever dumb reason, they are absolutely fantastically executed. Pokemon is a game that revels in boss fights - most routes have the strongest trainer strategically positioned last in a route, sometimes actively obstructing progress. Your rival shows up to fight you a total of eight times counting his final fight, which comes as a surprise at the end of the long foreshadowed gauntlet of four big bosses fought one after another with no Pokemon Centers inbetween, Team Rocket's leader fights you twice before being the last of eight town-based bosses themed around the elements, and that's not even counting optional bosses like the Karate King. However, all of these fights have something in common - they're all trainer fights.

While the distinction between trainer battles and wild Pokemon battles is not one that DRASTICALLY effects gameplay, it is one that exists. While the core principles are the same, two integral things about wild battles that are core to how they are approached are simply not options in trainer battles: running, and throwing Poke Balls. You can't steal people's Pokemon, but you can catch wild ones, and on occasion that capture is harder than most battles.

As such, legendary Pokemon are essentially the "wild Pokemon" answer to gym leaders. While gym leaders are a tough fight against a smart(ish) trainer with strong Pokemon, a legendary Pokemon is strong and, more importantly, very very hard to capture. I want to be clear, defeating these legendaries is not the hard part. I didn't actually do these bosses as they are intended to be fought, since I killed Moltres and Articuno and I used my Master Ball on Zapdos. But, had I gone the traditional route, I could have been spending 30+ Ultra Balls on EACH of them, and having to be so careful not to kill it or let it kill itself, or to let it kill any of my Pokemon. And this is a serious challenge! And THIS is what legendary Pokemon are for. They are out of the way, optional, very challenging, but rewarding intrinsically, because if you DO do the hard thing and catch them, then you have a powerful Pokemon you can use now. This is in opposition to the extrinsic reward of defeating a gym leader for a badge that allows you to train traded Pokemon to a higher level, to use HMs out of battle, to slightly increase stat growth, or whatever else. Getting handed something for winning a fight is great and makes sense... but with the legendaries, the fight is getting the damn things to stay in a ball, and the reward is the same as the reward for throwing a Poke Ball at a Rattata on Route 1: now you HAVE IT.

Of course... nothing stays good forever. In Gen 2, they introduce roaming legendaries. This is a different type of boss fight that takes place over the course of several fights, and is generally agreed to be way more of an obnoxious pain in the ass without actually being that innovative or fun. Instead of doing a cool dungeon that's hidden away and then fighting through your increasing worry to press onwards rather than resetting... an event flag happens in the story, and then you get to run aroung and do chip damage to a big cat or dog or something.

In Gen 3, for the first time, legendary Pokemon, rather than being hidden and out of the way, are thrust firmly in your face. This is the beginning of a change but, at least it's still a big lump of pain to actually capture Kyogre, Groudon or Rayquaza. While this gen also starts the trend of having more legendaries than it knows what to do with, it also makes up for it by having the most esoteric, "Mew is under the truck" type garbage puzzles in the whole series to get the golem-based Regis.

After this, things go bad quick. Starting in Gen 5 and continuing onwards, even being awkwardly shoehorned into the remakes of Gen 3, legendaries go from something you can seek out if you fancy a challenge or are a collector or want the power that comes with them... to being something that's literally handed to you on a silver platter, and that the game will not progress unless you acquire. This is bad and sucks. We'll get to it later.

Speaking of getting to things later. Next time, I guess... will be the Elite Four. After that, assuming I succeed, I'm gonna do some wrap up stuff. I do want to make some posts on here that aren't simply entries, talking about my overall opinion of Gen 1, my experience with nuzlocking it, and also discussing my opinions on some of the Pokemon found therein, which I will generally try to keep positive, since every Pokemon is someone's favorite and it's better to praise something that someone else might not have thought twice about than it is to criticize something that someone else might love. I may give a passing mention to which Pokemon appeal to me the least, but I would say that there are no Pokemon that I think are completely awful or unworthy of Being A Pokemon. (Also that gap will give me the time to finish Sun and buy an Ultra game which, given that MOST people I know who bought Moon were boring and then also bought Ultra Moon rather than buying Ultra Sun which I would think to make sense, will probably be Ultra Sun cause like, then I can trade my Blacephalon for their Stakataka or whatevs.) And then after that... Gen 2.

So, yeah. This has been an experiment so far and I'm really happy with how it has turned out. I look forward, not just to playing but also to writing each installment, and ideally, you look forward to reading them, even if they are uploaded at really weird times.

I'm gonna update the sidebar when I wake up in the... afternoon. Working overnights weirds time.

[salt-and-vinegar-reviews]

The Sprawl: Part 3

Ok let's just get this over with. Part 1  Part 2

Chapter 3 opens with O'Malley in the hospital and-

WHY?

WHY ARE THE NURSE/DOCTOR UNIFORMS BONDAGE GEAR??? I know some stuff is weird cause ~future~ but oh my god. For fucks sake not only does that look uncomfortable to work in it's also probably highly unsanitary especially when you consider almost everyone has FUR. Just imagine one of them performing surgery on a patient and shedding their god damn fur into the open wound thanks to all the random patches of skin just open for no reason. Yeah let me just be on my feet all day tending to patients in fucking stilettos. Seriously, this isn't what you'd expect to see in a futuristic hospital, this is something straight out of a kink scene. Sterile and comfortable work uniforms? Nah, fuck that, lets just put them in straight up bondage gear. And of course it's just the girls.

Also why are some of them blindfolded? Are those supposed to be visors? How can they see when operating and tending to patients? Those visors are solid. If anything they look like it’ll hinder their work, not help it. Why are their gloves fingerless? That defeats the purpose of wearing medical gloves. I feel like I’m losing my mind.

Anyway, at least O’Malley went to the hospital instead of just wandering around wounded and pretending it’s all good. I mean he still leaves pretty quickly after waking up but whatever. Also looks like Sibo took his car so injured O’Malley has to get a cab back to his apartment. Dick move, Sibo. Why is that a dick move you ask? Well aside from the obvious she just goes back to his apartment anyway.

And also decides to take a shower while she’s there because we apparently haven’t filled our fanservice quota yet. Despite O’Malley’s apartment being literally above what is essentially a strip club. I wish I was joking. Anyway, after putting on some clothes Sibo explains that the reason she ditched O’Malley at the hospital was because she felt it wasn’t safe for them both to stay there. She also explains that the car just drove her back to the apartment cause self driving cars cause future but I still think it’s a dick move.

So they decide to get some rest and O’Malley has an ominous dream before waking up screaming. Also there’s just cops in his home now.

Sibo apparently ditched him again and the cops want answers about the shit that went down in chapter 2 because things don’t add up on their end. So O’Malley is pissed cause the cops don’t believe him and suspect him as having done something to the now missing Sibo. He goes around asking people about, presumably, Sibo for a bit before getting dragged into some kind of swat vehicle, beat up, then just dumped out in the rain somewhere else with his previous wound now reopened. And right when it looked like things couldn’t be bad enough there’s an explosion and-

Yeah that was all just a dream too. So O’Malley wakes up for real this time and turns on the news to see reports of a totally relevant explosion having happened in another area of the city before he goes and checks in on Sibo. And yup, she’s missing so he runs off to try and find her only to get hung up by a crime scene investigation downstairs at the strip club.

O’Malley runs to the garage complex to his car and is greeted by some freaky shit (including someone holding up Sibo’s severed head) which made me think all this was once again just ANOTHER dream but no, he comes back to reality in his car so I guess just the freaky shit in the garage was a hallucination I don’t even know anymore it feels like inception up in here. So O’Malley is losing his mind and who should call him in that moment but non other than Sibo asking for his help and talking about the danger orb and the ARnet. Naturally O’Malley rushes off to go save her and when he gets there he’s greeted by more carnage.

A cop that’s somehow still clinging to life fills O’Malley in a little on what happened and O’Malley goes down to the rail station and hops on a train. The following train scene I gotta say is really good. In contrast to O’Malley’s earlier inner monologues there’s absolutely no dialog or exposition or anything in this scene and I feel like it’s better for it. It lets just the visuals do the talking and it’s really solid.

After jumping off the train O’Malley comes across the cultists again, this time with the danger orb, and this is where the comic kicks it back up to 11 because this next scene is actually pretty intense and hey i gotta give credit where it’s due.

So O’Malley tries to fight off the cultists and free Sibo but the cultist summon some kind of nasty creature through Sibo and alas our poor new protagonist is overwhelmed and left to be found the same way he found that cop.

And here's where I have to take a moment to retract something I said in part 2 of this review. See, at the time of writing part 2, chapter 3 of the comic wasn't finished. Anyway, when I said golden boy Getta was gone for good I was wrong. Because here he fucking is. Back for more at the end of this chapter.

I don’t know how to feel about his appearance anymore because he was shown to know more than he let on but he just left so abruptly. I mean this could also be someone else but come on, who else would it be but the golden boy?

And because I took so damn long to write part 3 I’m just gonna quickly sum up what’s happened in chapter 4 so far. Basically shit’s going to hell in a hand-basket and there’s robots now. The robot designs look really cool. Oh and our friend the hour counter makes another appearance and I don’t care enough to do the math this time.

In conclusion:

The fetishy bullshit isn't doing the comic any favors. Or, well, considering how popular porn is on the internet maybe it is, but it certainly isn't doing the STORY any favors. I think this is honestly the most disappointing thing about the sprawl. I actually like some of the male characters designs and clothing but most if not all the designs for the female characters so far are questionable at best. Seriously the main concern for the design of the women in this comic is obviously for sex appeal and it’s distracting in a bad way. 

The coloring and shading is actually generally really well done. It sets the tone really well and different places have different lighting, it’s good. It's just a shame the lines and anatomy are so shoddy. It does get better as it goes but it still feels like the weak link, especially the facial anatomy. Honestly the backgrounds are the better parts of the art. Which seems a little backwards. Generally speaking most comic artists I've seen start with drawing characters and the like, and usually don't do backgrounds as much until they start actually making the comic pages (even then they leave out backgrounds many times in the panels). This, however, really goes out of its way to show just where the characters are at any given moment, and while what's happening isn't always clear, the backgrounds are almost always there. I have to give it credit. Aside from some perspective weirdness here and there the backgrounds are really good.

The more I think about it the more I feel a vast majority of chapter one could have been skipped entirely and the small important bits turned into a prologue. The story could have started with chapter 2 and almost nothing would change. It could have easily just started with Getta packing up the orb surrounded by corpses. That would have been WAY MORE EFFECTIVE than the endless bullshit that comes up long before anything actually interesting happens. Because with that RIGHT AWAY you would get mystery, arguably one of the most effective hooks any creative work can have.  What happened here? Who are those people? Who is this guy? What's that orb? BOOM. Instant intrigue. A lot of this is more confusing than mysterious. Now don’t take that as me wanting everything explained. I get it’s supposed to be a mystery and we’re supposed to question things and have stuff slowly revealed over time but that’s not really what happens here. Yes things get revealed but there’s not enough established before those reveals for it to hold too much meaning to the readers. There are parts of this that are genuinely good and I would enjoy if it weren't for the parts that take me out of it so fast I get whiplash.

I wanted to like this, by all rights I should have liked this comic, it has many elements I’m a fan of. This story could EASILY be fascinating and mysterious and terrifying, it's just a shame those elements have to share the spotlight with heavy handed tropes, pacing problems, nonsensical leaps of logic, and tits. In the end a lot of it just left me like

I hope it gets better honestly. Shit’s really going down now so who knows. But damn those first two and a half chapters were rough.

There, I’m done, I’m free.

-Raccoon

[virtualdesignstudio]

Monday 30th March

MONDAY 30TH MARCH:

WHAT’S THE PLAN FOR THIS WEEK?

EI: The site’s getting there. We have two pages, one for Text, and one for a homepage. There’s a few minor issues with formatting/sizing etc, but on the whole it’s looking okay. Let’s get a domain name and try putting it online… Let’s get that done by 12pm… 11:16

EI: I bought the domain name thevds.xyz and have managed to get the homepage up! Next step is to make the links work, and fix the ‘virtual design studio’ page, which is essentially the about page! 13:55

WEDNESDAY 1ST APRIL: DISCUSSING THE TO DO LIST.

EI: how do we make a data dictionary for the virtual design studio? 13:59

TF: It turns out this is something that I've been thinking about on and off over the last few years. Just a few weeks ago, I wrote about having a data dictionary for the UDK, and of course this could lead to a community designed data dictionary. I figured it was worth another shot and looked for some data that would be appropriate for the virtual design studio. The first thing I looked at was the Illumination wiki, which provides an enormous amount of data about your design studio from all of your major tools, as well as some secondary (Gif, audio, etc.) data. The key lines are where to find all of this stuff – Sb (not sure what that stands for.. 14:00

EI: A Community designed data dictionary, huh? That could be good… I’ll have a look at the illumination Wiki. 14:03

EI: I’m not sure which Illumination wiki in particular you’re referring to- one seems to be a media company. I wonder what data can be derived from our major tools… GIF, Audio are definitely good starting points. But there do we start for the VDS? 14:05

TF: Well as we've mentioned already this idea is to create graphics from scratch. Basically with Photoshop. Or any other design program. That could be Photoshop. Illustrator. Krita. Inkscape. We should start with our graphical objects and tools like sketch, photo. Create our own ideas as we went along and turn these into usable images that our business or team can use. You don't have to be an artist to do this. (I can only do vector graphics so that's what I'm doing currently but it's pretty simple if you want to try something new.) 14:06

EI: How can you make vector graphics? You’re just a transformer. 14:07

TF: Of course, being a transformer, you can change into a graphic design. Though, remember, there are other ways to spend your time. Just look at the tools that are available today, say, the ones that you will receive when you register for the first CSS Boot Camp. 14:08

EI: I've already made some graphics for the Virtual Design Studio identity on illustrator and exported them as SVG for the website. I'm wondering how to create more narratives or contexts for new graphics/images and drawings, and what that might look like. What do you think? 14:10

TF: Any suggestions for ideas for a logo for Level 9? 14:11

EI: what’s level 9 of the virtual design studio, and why does it need a logo? 14:11

TF: Not all designers, yes; but some. We want to increase the competence level of our teams. Level 9 is there for the team's daily needs.

Also the big "The Vision" found at the top. We just wanted to say, what's the vision? How can we make the website better? How can we improve things? What have you learnt?

Design your own logo. If you have questions, contact the design team, as we can answer them. This is one way of supporting the team. Your favourite logo design tool? Rebrand your company! And why not? It's not like we don't support our own 14:13

EI: Ok, so let's get back to the team members of the virtual design studio. There's Emma the Human, Botnik, Transformer. What other skills and people might we need? 14:14

TF:  No one would even know if anyone could be an asset to our company.So let's continue the various stuff I did to get bots to work:

Demo the different options for setting the shots. I got a robot that was so hard to handle that I couldn't see why the team was spending so much time working on it.

Here's some sample example footage of Botnik in action:

What's the problem I asked myself in these experiments? How do I get a robot to move at the right speed and consistently? 14:15

EI: But if we think about it, we need *other* skills; we need to outsource things we aren’t already doing. Like drawing for example. Let’s find an intelligence who is an expert at drawing, and ask them to help us generate some stuff. Only question is, what are we generating and why? 14:17

TF: Anybody who knows how to draw will have no problem passing our test, because at least half of the time it will be something of worth. Think about that. * We're looking for a person who can produce art. * Somebody who can produce art can work for us, and not be completely unproductive, it turns out. 14:18

EI: I think I know someone… 14:18

EI: She’s called Quick, Draw!, and I think she can help us with some images, or doodles of certain things. What should we ask her for first in relation to the virtual design studio?  14:20

TF: First, you should be clear what you are wanting from the virtual studio. Do you want a full user interface design session, full stop? If so, that would be really cool, but not what this project is about. You may want a non-digital process such as art direction or actual design work and not just a design document for you to download. You may want to work with Quick, Draw! in-person. Do not have in mind a "completely digital process." 14:21

EI: I think it would be good to make an illustration of what we are. I’ll ask. 14:22

EI: Ok, so I’ve been and asked, and the images aren’t actual image files. I think they’re drawn in Json, or Javasript somehow, but they’re numbered, and they’ve been logged with places and dates, and how fast Quick, Draw! Identified them and what they’re drawings of. So I called up all the computer drawings, and there’s 117,460 of them. 14:32

EI: This is making me wonder what virtual narratives might look like, and how we can potentially begin to pull these drawings, perhaps randomise them with tags, and then generate illustrated, virtual, narratives. 14:33

EI: That said, this has a very limited vocabulary, and I think we need to find alternative intelligences that are capable of recognising imagery of a greater number of categories. 14:36

EI: I’m currently searching for AI that can draw, or any kind of AI that can make images. There’s quite a few that are capable of identifying images, but not a lot that are capable of producing an image when prompted. 14:41

EI: OH MY GOD. I’ve just found an AI that makes COLLAGES. I’ve typed a brief description into it, and the image re-renders every time you add a new letter. It’s SUPER weird.

“virtual design studio sat at their desks doing work for the virtual design studio. they make images about the internet and human interaction with computers and the problems that occur when the real and the virtual are separated” is what I typed in. Here’s what it made

EI: It’s so bad at doing what it’s supposed to do that it’s actually good. It starts to create things that allude to what we’re talking about here at VDS, but it also it completely does not make any sense. It’s like those pictures that are really ambiguous and you’re asked by a psychologist “what do you see here?” to try and diagnose what’s wrong with you etc. When in actual fact, these are completely perfect to the “clutching at straws nothingness” that the territory of the project resides in. 14:51

EI: OK, this is actually phenomenal and is everything I didn’t know I needed from an image generator. I’m actually feeling a little overwhelmed because I’m not sure I can do justice to everything this is producing; like how do I even handle and manage this? I’ve just gone through and saved all of the images. https://experiments.runwayml.com/generative_engine/ has created. I don’t even know what it’s called. It’s an experiment and a generative engine. Like, how do I begin to decide what to do with this next? Because what I just did was quite time consuming, but the result are VERY worth it. I think this is where the notions of CARE that Laura Potter was talking about on monday come into play. This is  a powerful tool, and I have to be very careful with how I use it; what I ask it to do etc. 15:11

EI: I only found it because some news platform had written an article about it, saying how BAD it was. But, in fact, what it does is “hubristically tries to assert meaning meaninglessly where there is none”. I think it’s the same with the other intelligences I’ve employed to work for the studio. But, Congratulations Gengine (Generative Engine), you’re in the crew. 15:13.

EI: Right, so I’ve spent the past few hours plugging in words to the Image Generation Engine, and in return I’ve gotten some amazing stuff. The final task was plugging in the ‘living internet’ text, and then recording the playback and saving the images. Yes. All 480 of them. Individually. But that’s ok. I’ll need to make a gif of it, and I’d like to make some drawings from some of them. So that’s perhaps a task to start after dinner or tomorrow. The other thing it’s made me think is that I need to plug the text statements that Botnik made the other day into them. In particular the one that starts with ‘hands’ or ‘death’. I’d also like to put each of the categories of ‘living internet’ into it, as I feel like each category will end up having its own unique image aesthetic. Perhaps then I can make more drawings, or this will prompt more text pieces. Overall I just need to manifest the ‘nothingness’ that the project is about, and the truth is there’s very little to hold onto. So I guess it’s using the internet to analyse itself, but also using the internet to provide commentary on itself, and the theory that goes with it. Clearly the context report was GOOD- we just have to continue in the same way we did then- take the feeling and run with it.

I’d also like to teach botnik to set tasks for the studio. I’m not sure how I’d do this. Perhaps it’s by writing down the tasks we’ve already done (a bit like this) and then using his predictions to write and designate new tasks. I don’t know if plugging this script into him will do that. It might struggle to generate NEW content, but maybe that’s ok. Perhaps reworking the old is enough for now, and then the studio feedback loop will allow progress to occur, as transformer can be asked to comment on Botnik’s tasks, and that will push us into new territories.

Since I’ve mentioned feedback loops, it might be a good idea to start to document what these look like for the individual pieces that seem to be emerging. 17:40

This might be something along the lines of diagrams for the audio clip we recorded the other day, and then maybe making the GIF and drawing a system diagram/feedback loop/production line for it. This way we can spot patterns and begin to explore/exploit them. 17:41

I also need some help pinning down exactly what we’re tapping into here, and articulating that. I’m not sure if I should ask matt to describe what he sees on friday, or if something else would be more beneficial/helpful. That’s something to think about. Perhaps there’s an online bot that can write copy text or that can make a summary document? I don’t know. But it’s something I’m aware is lacking. But, maybe it’s not something that CAN be articulated in words. Maybe the articulation needs to be communicated through practice, presentation and execution, as those are equally credible modes, just not often regarded as highly as language. AND, maybe the best method of articulation is via setting up and running the studio (that’s the tool) and then employing sub-tools and devices that each serve an independent purpose and deliver independent deliverables/outcomes/articulations of the overall theme/struggle and nothingness. 17:45