#but its so tonally disconnected with the events that its out of place

[resizura]

i was playing dmc 3 for the first time and i love how ridiculously over the top it is and i wish capcom did the same for resi like obviously not as outlandish as dmc but again the whole like “dark serious tone” of resi remakes just feels weird as a capcom game and it kinda feels like it insists upon itself

[justices-blade]

ooc; TOA Anniversary Munday!

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is.

Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing!

Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together.

tagging: you :)

Name: leo

Pronouns: he/him

Birthday (no year): :)

Where are you from? What is your time zone?: yes. cest (gmt+2)

Roleplay experience: 12 years total, 10 years on and off on tumblr

Got any pets? i had a bunch of fish at various times in my life but the last hag of a molly murdered all her tankmates it was a whole thing

Favorite time of year: autumn

Some interests and things you like: dnd, drawing, gaming, a bit of cosplay. i like frogs :) and rock.

Some funfacts & trivia about you: - i once kneed myself in the eye on accident - ive made 47+ ocs just for ffxiv - funny character voices are my passion - i either go completely silent or get really loud while gaming. i also make actually physically wounded noises when my character gets hit

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play? ffxiv, apex legends, flight rising, honkai star rail, enstars, soulsborne, splatoon. its a list of all time for sure

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: ghost/bug, spiritomb/armarouge

How did you get into Fire Emblem? was really into smash bros for a while and got interested in fire emblem. my friend had a copy of awakening and i watched her play, and when i asked my dad to get me path of radiance when he was in the us he got radiant dawn instead

What Fire Emblem games have you played? the gba ones, tellius, the 3ds ones and engage

First Fire Emblem game: radiant dawn

Favorite Fire Emblem game: also radiant dawn

Any Fire Emblem crushes? i dont do crushes but pandreo? ephraim also makes me feel profoundly unwell. also call me brendan reed because limstella,

If you’ve played the following games, who was your first S support? - Awakening: stahl - Fates: niles - Three Houses: idk tbh - Engage: pandreo

Favorite Fire Emblem class: thief, mage

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class? thief (high skl/spd/res/mag, dogshit con def and hp, normal str)

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? golden deer

If you were an Engage character, which Emblem would you Engage with? micaiah or byleth

How did you find TOA? saw it here and there while scrolling fe tags on tumblr... was scrolling the tellius one and saw an active leonardo??? and i was missing tumblr rp at the time and i was like okay sure why the hell not (i would write edward regardless though)

Current TOA muses: edward, chad, denning

Who was your first TOA muse? If you don’t have them anymore, could you see yourself picking them up again? edward has taken up permanent residence in my brain since i was 14 he is NOT leaving

Have you had any other TOA muses? im at three and im staying with these three until further notice ✌️

Do you think you have a type of character you gravitate towards? little guys and pensive freaks. theres closer descriptions of my archetypes but this is good enough

What do you believe you enjoy writing the most? hmhmhm. i like themes of belonging and not-belonging i think? places and people with which you feel at home, places you feel adrift and lost and that disconnect where it falls apart. i also really like unreliable narration, horror and that unsettling slightly delusional tonal dissonance when i have occasion to whip it out to maximum effect :)

Favorite TOA-related memory: keras kai elephas was so damn fun to me i need to stress this. first lore event really hit and solidified that i definitely want to stay!!

Got any delusions that didn’t see the light of day in TOA that you’d like to share? wil boey kliff and jean. are At My Door. theyre not getting in anytime soon but Hey.

[oddygaul]

The Boy and the Heron

God damn this movie is a hot mess. The pacing is all over the place; the tone is all over the place. It feels like it’s trying to be a metaphor for a dozen different things, but none of them come through particularly well, and it ends up being a big, unpolished jumble of ideas. Plus, in its eagerness to foreground those deeper themes, fundamental things like character motivations, goals, and narrative cause-and-effect are left by the wayside, leading to much of the movie feeling like a disconnected series of events with little tying them together.

I understand the desire for an artist to make something that’s solely for themselves, or to write a story with the primary goal of deeper thematic resonance; in my opinion, though, if what you're writing has gotten to the point where the basic A to B plot of your story doesn’t really make sense, I think you may have gone too far.

Now, a work that’s all subtext, no plot can work if the vibe is there - that’s pretty much the definition of a tone piece, and I fuck with a lot of tone pieces. In this case, though, I did not think the vibe was there. The tone bounces from a measured, somber meditation on grief, to a wondrous journey through a strange land, to a fast-paced goofy caper when the parakeets get involved… I didn’t feel much of a coherent tonal throughline.

Okay, so fine, the themes?

A lot of people are saying the whole movie is about Miyazaki’s struggle with leaving behind his legacy without a direct heir. While that’s a compelling idea, that subplot is introduced roughly… *checks notes* 5/6ths of the way through Boy and the Heron, so you wouldn’t exactly call the movie a very effective vessel for that message, would you?

Was it about Mahito seeing his mother again, to move on from her death? She miraculously appears but they barely talk. Is it about accepting his stepmom into his life? Well, she’s gone for half the movie. Is it about rejecting fantasy / escapism to live in the real world? Well, okay, but the stepmom is the one that went in there in the first place and Mahito hated it from the jump, so no one really changed their minds here.

Speaking of the stepmom, it’s weird as hell that Mahito’s process of accepting his dad immediately marrying his dead wife’s sister is treated like a personal journey. No, that’s a weird fucking thing to have happen to you, and you better believe a kid is gonna be fucked up about that for a while. I understand this isn’t out of the norm for the setting / time period, but it clearly bothers Mahito. I don’t see how a lonesome, magical journey to another world is the right salve for those feelings as opposed to like, a frank and open conversation with his dad.

—

Miyazaki once famously said that the problem with the modern anime industry is that no one draws from real life anymore - that character designers learn how to draw anime girls only by copying other anime girls, turning the entire industry into a grisly moe ouroboros devoid of any authenticity.

What the fuck is this, Hayao? Did you design this by looking at a real human being? Or is this a baachan based on a previous Ghibli baachan which was itself based on another Ghibli baachan? The moe ouroboros tolls for us all, Hayao. It tolls for us all.

—

Having vented those frustrations, there’s a lot of gorgeous stuff in this movie, of course.

The stepmom’s house is so neat - the modern, western-style house built straight onto the classical Japanese architecture, Winchester-mansion style.

As opaque as Mahito was to me, it’s funny as hell how aggro the kid is. It was fuckin on SIGHT with the heron, bro.

Everyone is so stoked about these birds shitting on them all the time

The world of the tower had a very different vibe to Ghibli’s classics that was pretty cool - a very Greek / Elysium feel to much of it, a place stuck between life and death.

This is the bougiest way I’ve ever seen someone drink water

these weird fucks

—

When taking the lore at face value, it’s wild how this movie is basically an Annihilation + Bloodborne lovechild. So basically an extraterrestrial meteor crashes from the sky, and begins terraforming the area around it; as it does so, it distorts not only space, but time itself. Much like the wildlife in Area X, the parakeets enter the tower and are drastically altered to serve their environment’s needs. The way the tower seems to hold onto alternate versions of people that have entered and keeps them there, stuck outside of time, is reminiscent of what happens to the Southern Reach trilogy’s research team.

And then on top of that, we have the great uncle calling Mahito’s stepmother inside the Nightmare of Mensis, excuse me, the tower, so that she can give birth inside, allowing the child to ascend and become the ruler of the realm?

Oh Amygdala, oh amygdala! Have mercy on the poor heron.

Just saying, ‘the Heron isn’t actually magic, it’s merely a lookalike biological simulacra of a heron created by the reality-warping crash-landed U.F.O.’ wasn’t on my bingo card going into this movie. lol

[tobi-smp]

you might be able to expand on this in a way that’s smarter then me, but honestly; i think technoblade apologists rely far too much on word of god for their analysis.

like, it feels like every time technoblade (the character) is analyzed in the context of the Text Itself, the fans will say “that’s not what techno intended” or “he didn’t think that when acting techno”.

this is probably because cc!techno cares so little for the the fourth wall. but as someone who analyzes techno it also annoys me. “cc!techno didn’t plan to kill anyone canonically during doomsday, cc!jack just challenged him” regardless of what your cc intends, c!techno still bombed a country and shot at other characters, and for him to think there would be no casualties in that is ridiculous.

this fourth-wall-breaking honestly gives quite a few issues like this; techno acts like killing tubbo was unimportant or even funny because “it’s minecraft” and anyone still angry at him about that is just irrational. obviously, because c!tubbo still has to live with the scarred body and the huge amount of trauma, this makes c!techno seem like a Huge Dick. but pointing that out always gets so many angry responses.

rivals duo enthusiasts make so much “techno heals and cares for dream” content, but in actuality techno wants his lore to be only funny so he says “i’m not getting tortured. that seems like a you problem.”

i’m not saying that techno isn’t nice— because he is, to ranboo and phil and niki— but because he participates is HUGELY SERIOUS topics (bombing a nation twice, tommys exile, terrorism and taking hostages, dreams torture) and then acts like he doesn’t care, it just makes him look…. Bad.

i dont really know where i was going with this. basically i just wanted to complain about how one of the most argued about characters doesn’t even seem to be serious about the serious parts of the lore.

perhaps you can somehow expand on this in a way that’s smart T_T

Honestly, techno apologism takes techno's word as absolute truth Way too often in general (both in character and out). which isn't unique to techno fans by any means, but it's particularly bothersome because it leaks out into how they talk about other characters, All The Time.

a quick example would be techno arguing that l'manberg was corrupt because tubbo was given presidency without an election. the reality of the situation was that they were in the middle of a crisis (a war that just came to an end, the death of the president with no one to take his place, and the destruction of the entire nation), so it Wasn't under normal circumstances. l'manberg would've then held elections every couple of months had they not been exploded before that could happen. (there's also the fact that nearly everyone that'd be a part of l'manberg was there and could've voiced their concerns, instead the crowd cheered. they didn't get a ballot but they still expressed their approval).

and of course things that he says about other characters being taken as word of god (him wholesale inventing the character flaw that tommy sees himself as a hero with the theseus speech despite the fact that tommy denied it right then and there. or cc!techno making the joke that tommy's only facing the consequences of his own actions, Twice.)

but more on the topic, there Is a massive tonal difference between techno's viewpoint and everyone else's, and that's completely on purpose ! but that creates some of the worst discourse this fandom has to offer Because techno involves himself in serious lore while still insisting on carrying his non-serious roleplay style.

when you take his word on it and Only his word on it it strips other characters of their nuance because he doesn't see or Care about their motivations or the context behind them. that's why it's so easy to paint the butcher army as purely evil from his perspective. Technoblade doesn't care about releasing withers on l'manberg, Technoblade doesn't care about having shot tubbo, Technoblade doesn't care that quackity is terrified of him, so why should they? why should anyone?

people refuse to see the butcher army as a response to technoblade's actions because technoblade doesn't treat his actions as if they have weight. and so quackity is taken to the fandom alter to be sacrificed as an uncomplicated villain (either alongside tubbo or while painting quackity as a manipulator who coerced the rest of the butcher army), and this Long before las nevadas was a part of the lore.

but then of course, if you look at his actions and attitude from any other perspective (minus philza) he just looks, Cold.

he's bombing l'manberg because of a failed execution and philza's house arrest but he won't even acknowledge that tubbo's execution or his destruction of l'manberg was something that he should've apologized for. he painted tommy as a dehumanizer because tommy chose to stand by his best friend, but techno is risking the lives of people who haven't wronged him without remorse because philza (his best friend) got hurt. he's angry at tommy for betraying him (to the point that he's indifferent to his literal death), when he refused to take tommy seriously over feeling betrayed with tubbo's execution and when He was the one who lied to tommy during their partnership.

he refuses to engage with other characters on an emotional level because that would suck the dumb fun out of his actions (and I don't mean dumb fun as an insult here, I love his roleplay style when it Isn't tonally dissonant from everything around it). but from the other perspective that comes across as indifference to suffering, willful ignorance, hypocrisy, or just outright cruelty.

which just isn't how his character Should be read with how its being acted, but it's the only way To read it in context.

techno wants his character to be the comic relief on the server but he still wants to involve himself with heavy lore, which would still be Possible if he was fine playing a villain (just look at jack and niki with their team rocket arc). but the problem is that he presents his character as emotionally disconnected from everyone around him outside of a select handful of people (and even then, he won't engage with certain things seriously for fear of being pulled into serious lore) while still wanting his character to be read as good (or at least lighter on the gray morality scale).

the solution to this would be a more careful implementation of techno's involvement with the lore. keeping him involved in conflicts in a way where his character doesn't bump elbows with the darkest aspects of the server. either by having him Not involved with things like doomsday or having him involved in a way where he isn't an instigator, Or by technoblade the content creator taking the L and taking his roleplay more seriously when he involves himself in serious lore.

instead we have the insistence that it's not technoblade's fault that people died when he killed them because it doesn't fit with how cc!techno wants to engage with those events.

[dgcatanisiri]

I’ve said before, the kindest I’ll be to TLJ is to say that it’s a decent first draft, but... It’s DISCONNECTED from TFA, the movie that IMMEDIATELY precedes it. No one brings up Starkiller - not even pointing out that Poe’s actions and reactions could easily be considered PTSD from the torture and trauma if they wanted to frame him as being in the wrong, no, he’s just written off as a hotheaded maverick who needs a lesson in humility from Holdo - Finn shakes off the coma in moments, Rey has no reason to give a bisected fuck about Kylo, yet immediately becomes infatuated with him, Luke left a map in TFA but wanted to just be left to die in TLJ... Nothing in this movie has any ties to the movie that came before. Which, honestly, just meant that, to conclude the story of the sequels, the one TFA started, TRoS basically had to downplay things left over from TLJ - hell, TRoS at least ACKNOWLEDGES events in TLJ, which is honestly a lot more than TLJ seems willing to do with TFA, despite, again, taking place almost immediately before it.

And then there’s the internal plot - the timeline is a convoluted mess (the Resistance is under an explicit sixteen hour ticking clock, yet Finn and Rose jaunt off to and back from Canto Bight - a disposable point in the plot ANYWAY, considering that Finn and Rose don’t even accomplish the goal they went there for - in the middle of a fuel crisis, AND Rey’s training is explicitly taking place over days if not weeks, but she manages to arrive in the nick of time, while still having real time Force communication with Kylo, who is with the ships chasing the Resistance). The First Order has the military might and strength of the Empire with no acknowledgment of the personnel loss that losing Starkiller - a weapon built out of a goddamn PLANET - must have been. Leia and Holdo both hold Poe losing people against the dreadnaught against him, when a) one man fighters have been established in this universe to be hyperdrive capable in all trilogies, so there was no reason to hold the fleet there, b) taking out the dreadnaught made tactical sense, given the firepower it had and the manpower on board - 200,000 crew! Combined with Starkiller, that should be a MAJOR blow to the FO, but, because this is TLJ, the FO just has infinite resources from no where, and c) the dreadnaught is the kind of target you’re SUPPOSED to use those bomber fighters for, if they couldn’t take going up against it, they should have been scrapped for parts ages ago.

Like... I’m sorry, but if you want to trashtalk Rise of Skywalker on the plot level, you have to start with the fact that TLJ left them with no real conclusion to be had - the Resistance is left with enough people to be carried in the beat up weed van that is the Millennium Falcon, while the First Order SHOULD have been reduced to maybe a cruiser’s worth of troops. Because they weren’t the Empire, built on the bones of the Republic that had stood for a thousand generations. They were a fringe group, pushed out to the margins of the galaxy, where they built in secret - which means that if they’d made a major production push of a fleet capable of taking on the New Republic, which DID get a lot of the resources of the Empire as it collapsed, SOMEBODY would have noticed it and done something. When TLJ closes, both sides are basically at a stalemate with neither of them capable of striking back. They just don’t have the manpower or the resources anymore. I’ve said for years, when TLJ, I do NOT feel a sense of hope for the future, like the previously downbeat endings in this franchise - AotC may have started the Clone Wars, but Anakin and Padme get a tender moment together, a respite in the storm. RotS has the Empire ascendant, but Luke and Leia are with loving families and the new hope is intact. ESB has Lando and Chewie heading off to find Han and Luke has been fitted with a new hand - they’re ready to keep going. TLJ just feels like both sides played out the fight to the inevitable conclusion of everyone being left with nothing but ash.

TLJ was F - L - A - W - E - D. And I’m not saying that TRoS is beyond reproach or anything - I’m pissed that they reduced Rose to basically nothing, Palpatine didn’t really need to be there, Finn deserved to do more than shout “Rey!” through most of his screentime, especially when they had the stormtrooper rebellion subplot to work with... But a lot of the plot level flaws of TRoS stem out of the way that TLJ left things. Not all, but it was NOT this groundbreaking thing that changed the game. I honestly end up with the feeling that it was just a first draft that, due to the ridiculously fast pace of pumping out this trilogy, went straight to filming with like no editorial oversight. 

Which is a failure when we’re talking about movie two of a trilogy and movie eight of a saga. The whole trilogy fails to be a cohesive whole, in large part because for some ungodly reason, the plan had been to rotate writers for each part AND give those writers almost no time to weld their stories together. JJ Abrams and Rian Johnson, say what you will about them as storytellers or people, are both VERY different in their styles, and making the two try to mesh... doesn’t work. Lord knows what would have happened if Trevorrow’s ideas had made it out of the concept phase, but it wouldn’t have been better, just had more tonal clash, because, again, we have a different writer with a different style who sees different things out of the movie and the franchise.

The problems of the sequels are foundational. But the movies ALL have their own individual problems. You can shake off most of the problems in TFA by viewing it as set up... But then TLJ tosses aside a lot of what is being set up - TFA is clearly setting up a Finn-Rey dynamic, but, to fit the way that Rian Johnson’s already planning TLJ, Rey has to go off on her own. TFA has Finn wielding that lightsaber multiple times, so VERY clearly indicating he’s Force sensitive, to the point of being narratively framed as the counterpoint to Kylo, but they never interact again and TLJ reduces him to bumbling comic relief. TFA speaks of the Knights of Ren, presumably students from Luke’s academy who joined Kylo, but then they’re gone in TLJ and are functionally replaced with the Praetorian Guard. Snoke gets a lot of fanfare as being this hidden manipulator of Kylo from birth, then gets tossed out of the plot in TLJ with no explanation of his motivations.

Just... Look, I get that TRoS was a disappointment in a lot of ways, but it really was, for the most part... Honestly, all we were ever going to GET after TLJ. Because there wasn’t a continuation offered by TLJ, other than reusing the characters. TLJ was telling a story all its own, unconcerned with connecting with the rest of the series. It wasn’t a deconstruction with intent to reconstruct, in the way that KOTOR 2 was. It was demolition, taking a battering ram to the established foundation, trying to build something ELSE in its place.

[circuitlover]

Neon Genesis Evangelion: The End of Analysis

Is this a ridiculously naval-gazing post about Evangelion? Yes. Is it an accurate assessment of the franchise as a whole? I have no idea. I tackled this as an unknown initially, starting the series with zero contexts beyond the usual recommendation of “you should watch this.” Which is part of the reason why I’ve been a little hesitant about even broaching this subject to begin with. I’m so removed from the zeitgeist, both in terms of not being a regular anime viewer, as well as it being long past Evangelion’s relevance as a franchise, that it seems everybody already has their opinion on Evangelion all figured out. So at least indulge me, as I scramble around for something.

‘The End of Evangelion’ is a certainly a gratifying conclusion, as we finally get to see much of what was being concealed behind the veil (well, as much as one could reasonably hope for). It also reminds us of some long-standing questions. Why do the Evangelion possess such a bizarre tendency to be ill suited for battle? How do NERV’s continue to run unabated from governing bodies? What exactly is the mystery surrounding the origin of the ‘Geofront’? These were all broad strokes of why I felt unsatisfied by the original conclusion (the hastily arranged make good of the final few episodes of the series), and though I don’t expect every minor detail to be answered about such a multi-faceted world, I still feel these were questions pertinent enough to have been resolved in some fashion. Now I’m a little more aware of the troubled events leading up to that ending and it’s quite admirable that they managed to deliver something, despite the haphazard nature of those final two episodes.

 It’s clear that End of Evangelion intends to underline the original series from the start, dropping us back at the critical juncture where episode 24 had left us. Even if one could feasibly state that we reach the same point after the events of EOE, I’d argue that we inhabit a vastly different headspace by the time we reach it here. It’s not difficult to surmise what happens between the gaps left between the final two episodes, though everything is lent much more credence here, now that we are left to witness the macabre reality of what the entire series has been building towards. NERV headquarters is finally attacked by SEELE, and with this, we finally see the bloody climax. Now free to depict the attack in full detail, the opening half is certainly full of action and excess, though far from mindless, with only the most unflinching of viewers (or those divorced from its context) likely to derive any sort of baseless enjoyment from these scenes. The various lingering shots of deaths sit uncomfortably here, but nonetheless punctuate the finality of it all. If anyone could have accused the series of taking a wholly unexpected (and saccharine) turn towards it’s finale, then EOE is it’s biting rebuttal.  As cold as the NERV headquarters is, with almost everything bad that has occurred almost exclusively originating from within it’s walls, it’s still disconcerting to see such a familiar setting being callously destroyed in a matter of minutes, along with it’s inhabitants. The conflict has essentially existed as a faceless one; both the audience and Evangelion’s protagonists seldom knew what they’re truly been up against. It’s a war being played out by the pawns, and here we see the severity first-hand.

 As their headquarters are crumbling, so are the pilots. Shinji is in no fit state, evidenced by his own bemusement over his actions towards a comatose Asuka. It may be shocking, and his actions are far from admirable, but given the context, it’s hardly surprising. After all, his confidence had been built up; only to be meticulously broken the instant Kaworu reared his head. This compounded with his earlier apprehensions after Toji’s departure, his various disingenuous, failed, and otherwise doomed relationships leaves his mental state in tatters. I personally don’t like Shinji, but then again, it’s quite clear to see that you’re not really supposed to. Even without Hideki Anno’s spiteful intent of wanting to deconstruct the typical shonen hero propelling Shinji’s arc, it’s quite safe to assume that anyone who had any lingering empathy for Shinji will almost certainly have abandoned such notions at this point. The Shinji we were first introduced to, awkward, unlikeable, with an overriding sense of hate and self-loathing, has now given way to complete apathy. “I’m so fucked up” seems to ring more an acknowledgement, than it does a realization.

 Like Shinji, Asuka too has succumbed to her trauma, but on a much more literal scale, being broken in both mind and body. They are two characters that are seemingly analogous to one another. But again, first appearances can be deceiving, as by the point of Asuka’s introduction, we are already keenly aware of Shinji’s nature. He openly laments his position; Meanwhile, Asuka is brash and outspoken, embracing her identity as a designated hero, rather than cowering behind it. How they choose to define themselves is different, but the underlying reasons are gradually revealed to quite similar. Both driven by an inherent self-loathing, we witness the pair at varying levels of despondency, though rarely at the same time. In fact, for as consistent as emotional turmoil is through NGE, it is rarely overt, leaving most characters to wallow in their own abject misery. Almost everything operates on a certain level on duplicity, some of which, admittedly, isn’t apparent upon first viewing.

 Rei is ostensibly disconnected from the very beginning, though that makes the act of attempting to interpret the character, quite difficult. Very little is revealed about her, and most of the development is concerned with what she is, rather than what she does. Her role is pivotal to the overall narrative, and the themes being explored, as she is, by design, a doll that emotes. Which I guess is where her appeal lies. The mystery intrinsic to the character is never completely done away with, even at the very end. And the case could be made if the third incarnation of ‘Rei’ is even the same character that we’d become accustomed to, as her eventual rejection of instrumentality is a stark contrast to the cold pragmatist that bookended the TV series.

 The (quite literal) congratulatory nature of the series conclusion was always conspicuous in its inclusion. Evangelion had never been a work that had an interest in servicing its audience, at least in terms of a ‘happy’ ending. Which isn’t to say that wasn’t a possibility, but the tonal dissonance in which it was delivered never quite rang true. As an audience, we were conditioned to cautiously enjoy any brief respites afforded to our characters, as more often than not, it was simply a prelude to the turmoil that was soon to be heaped upon them. All of which (keeping with tradition), means the course correcting of EOE ups the stakes by an order of magnitude. The imminent attack is at the worst possible time, with each pilot being indisposed. The first big sequence, the assault on NERV, is a veritable massacre. Everyone’s fates are conclusively played out, whilst the Evangelion units become the focal point. 01 is promptly captured, whilst 02 (along with Asuka) is sunk to the bottom of the lake. This leaves Misato to attempt to galvanize an unstable Shinji. It’s kind of galling to see Shinji act so despondently in the face of her imminent death, though his selfishness probably obscures that fact until it’s too late. For me, Katsuragi is probably the most well meaning of the entire cast, but tragically, is someone woefully inept of providing the emotional support that others around her need. Her own weaknesses are clear to see, and although many of her problems are often emphasized for comic affect, she is still one of the few who straddles the line between her duties and profession life, perhaps the most convincingly. Like most other characters, she serves as juxtaposition to Shinji’s own conflict, and highlights how everyone is dealing with their own issues, just with varying levels of inadequacy. Her final actions echo her previous (failed) attempt at comforting Shinji, with her own loneliness giving way to fleeting intimacy.

Everything hits a crescendo once the Evangelion finally make their appearance, quite literally. Asuka awakens, and with it, her centrepiece battle takes place. I’m sure that it isn’t really something that I need to go into exacting detail about, because the following scene is enduring all by itself. Though it is notable as a culmination of the various elements all coming together; music, animation, along with the story. This is where EOE leverage’s its theatrical status for all its worth, eschewing the patchwork TV production in favour of something grander.  The actions scenes are often impressive and horrifying in equal measure, and there is probably no greater proof than here. Asuka’s death is certainly disturbing, and much of that is down to how they chose to portray that violence. For me, it recalled earlier moments, where the eldritch abomination like nature of the Evangelion had been evoked. These moments give the audience a brief pause for thought, where much is suggested of how horrifying their (The Evangelion) unshackled nature truly is. The unease, which these moments produce, suggests that something is terribly untoward. Most of which is conveyed in how we (the audience) see others react, gleaning what we can from cutaway shots of onlookers recoiling in horror. If recollections of Unit O1’s previous ‘feast’ already served to perturb, then this surely toys with our imagination yet further. We only see Unit 02 itself being devoured, and now knowing what we do about the distinctly human aspect of the Evangelion, the horror of Asuka’s fate here, trapped inside, now inhabits an altogether more unsettling space. The series ending, try as I might to appreciate it, was never going to suffice. It was nice to see Shinji’s own paradigm being settled, but I felt like it would have been more effective with a little more of that ambiguity stripped away. For as much as Neon Genesis Evangelion likes to steep itself in duplicity, this is where it’s felt like it was something of a compromise. The inner turmoil was my key takeaway from the work as a whole; it forms the crux of every relationship, and dictates the course of every action. It’s a lonely show, something that if not apparent from the get-go, slowly permeates throughout the narrative. Shinji is an initially an awkward character to relate to, bumbling his way through his scenes, though much of this weak nature is revealed to be a product of his environment. The world in which this all takes place is irreparably damaged, and even if the true extent of the second impact isn’t made expressly clear, it becomes quite apparent that humanity lives on in its own self-inflicted dystopia. It is this inherent contradiction that defines nearly every relationship, as each is unwilling (or unable) to acknowledge their true feelings. It is ultimately a self-destructive existence for the likes of Shinji, who permeates multiple meanings to his interactions with people, the paradoxical nature of which is explored in the conflict that defines the multiple endings and interpretations. Shinji is our proxy, but even so, it can be difficult to empathize with him. A hero he may be, but it’s more by designation than by design. It’s a role, which he consistently questions, as he exhibits almost none of the values we typically associate with someone tasked with such a mammoth task. He ostensibly comes of age throughout the series, gradually gaining some semblance of self-worth, though it a precarious act as he constantly seeks assurance from his father, and later anyone (which becomes something that Asuka resents him for). No character is treated like a proverbial puppet more than Shinji. In fact, it is SEELE themselves, who objective turns out to ultimately “break” Shinji, rendering his ego to naught. For all intents and purposes, it could be argued that the whole world is literally against him, at least by his own perceptions. His relationship is Asuka is extremely strained, initially showing hints of affection, with their hilariously depressing kiss encapsulates this dichotomy; Neither the circumstances (nor the characters) allowing for anything to take place. Even the slight reprieve offered in the finale (Asuka’s acknowledgement amidst the fallout) is obfuscated by the context in which it’s delivered.

Shinji’s journey dictates the ending, first, in the original series, where his perspective colours the ambiguity from which we see the fallout. Thematically this works (and I can see why some may prefer the agency it gives the audience), though I feel that the abstract nature of this ending, robs it of some emotional resonance. This conclusion is also hampered (at least for me) in how abrupt it is, with certain story threads left dangling. In my opinion, ‘End of Evangelion’ lives up to it’s billing as it gives a much more balanced and subjective conclusion, where we see first-hand “The Human Instrumentality Project” in effect. I was suitably invested to the point where I wished to see how the end was reached, and of course, see something that wasn’t cobbled together with recycled animation or slight of hand. I can certainly appreciate the original ending as a companion piece, which serves as a more personal and intimate resolution. But the fact remains, a lot of the fascination surely lays with how incomplete this all feels, with each finale, seemingly answering as many questions as they create. That said, I find that both endings offer up a surprisingly optimistic message. The original may be more overtly upbeat, but I think that EOE’s is lent more credence by virtue of the horror that precedes it. The life affirming message is delivered in the most tragic of circumstances, and I perhaps find that most heartening of all. By no means does ‘End of Evangelion’ end on a positive note, but I think it’s enough that it carries the promise of one. The somber sentiment may be more prevalent for some, though my rebuttal would point to the fact that, for as depraved and unethical the means may be, everyone ultimately wants to be happy. There is something to be said about the apparent theology that makes up a large part of Evangelion, and even if it has no real implication beyond the aesthetic (those initial warnings from long-time fans that, yes, a lot of the pseudo Christian imagery is window dressing at best. ), I still feel that its prominence casts a large shadow over proceedings. If nothing else, it certainly lends a morbid atmosphere to the show. When one starts to take this aspect into closer consideration, it’s easy to see why theory regarding Evangelion has become so prevalent. One of the constants throughout is the titular Evangelion. Though they remain a focal part, their function, both narratively and thematically, are constantly shifting. Initially agents of change, they are presented as a mysterious, if helpful force. Gradually this is peeled back, as various allusions are made to what they actually are. Throughout, we see how their pilots are affected by their experiences in their cockpits. Shinji is continually drawn and repulsed by the idea of piloting his Evangelion, seeing it as a means to forge something meaningful, whilst at the time, also aware of how dependant he becomes of his new role. Rei is driven by a sense of twisted duty, one that routinely sees her sacrificing herself (needlessly) for the cause. And Asuka perceives her role as raison d'être to obfuscate her own past, this being both a strength and a weakness. For better or worse, the Evangelion define them, and as the story progresses, we see that this takes on altogether more sinister connotations.  When viewed as an allegory, I think Evangelion holds multiple meanings, depending on what part is being referred to, or indeed who is viewing it. My initial impressions were pretty much taking it at face value, though I think the misdirection of the opening is a deliberate ploy for the most part. I’ve read that some take it as a deconstruction of the very genre it inhabits, though not having much experience with that myself, I choose to focus solely on the emotional aspects. Indeed, the psychological (and philosophical) strands become much more prominent as the series progresses, as it steadily veers into becoming a wholly oblique affair. Humanity may live on, but in spite of itself; something which is made abundantly clear, throughout.

Though its message initially seems quite muddled, I still feel it one that still manages to remain pertinent. I certainly can’t fault it for ambition. And there is something to be said about a piece of work that I simultaneously feel, is one of the most bleak and uplifting things I have witnessed, flawed or otherwise. I appreciate the themes that it chooses to explore. I like the characters, even in spite of everyone being contemptible in some glaring way. And in that respect, this series is nothing, if not a parade of characters struggling to deal with their emotions. But maybe that’s why I like it amidst all the abstract craziness; it retains a very human message.

[animebw]

Binge-Watching: Future Diary, Episodes 7-10

In which I break down the issues with this show’s tone, logic takes a swan dive onto a frozen lake, and Yuno hints at a dark inner truth.

Let’s Talk Tone

I’ve had the concept of tone in storytelling on my mind a lot lately. I know, I know, can I get any nerdier. But hey, as an amateur writer, tone is fascinating to me, because it’s one of the hardest storytelling... things to control, but it’s also one of the most important facets in an audience’s reaction to your story. An audience can’t always tell why they like or dislike the things they do, but they can tell how certain stories make them feel, and how well they make them feel it. Whenever I write for this blog, the first thing I consider is how this particular set of episodes made me feel, and what that feeling says about my reaction to it, because that’s often the most honest indicator of just how well put-together the episodes in question actually are. I’m currently watching three series that I’m writing about here: Gintama, my Angel Beats re-watch, and Future Diary. And what fascinates me is that those former two shows may have genuinely the best control over their tones out of any anime I’ve watched, able to segway between comedy and drama and absurdism and sentimentality with lightning-sharp precision and a masterful understanding of how to cross those gaps and merge those differences. They’re pretty much my go-to examples of the benefits of anime’s genre-blending ethos, and I highly recommend any budding writers to study how they operate (or just read my posts that do the analysis for you).

And then there’s Future Diary, which may genuinely be one of the worst examples of tonal craft I’ve ever seen.

Perhaps it’s just the misfortune of watching it alongside Gintama and Angel Beats that throws its discrepancies into such sharp relief, but still. This ties back to my much-discussed frustration with how unfinished Future Diary’s script comes across; without the necessary connective tissue to tie its scenes together, you’re never prepared for the next emotional headspace the show wants to take you. There’s no opportunity to readjust from the last scene before you’re thrown headfirst into a jarring new tonal setting, and by the time you’ve adjusted to this new one, the show’s usually already jumping ahead to the next one with equally off-putting abruptness. Yukki and Yuno can barely survive an encounter with a psychotic three-year-old that leaves them both emotionally and physically exhausted, and then the very next episode begins as a harem comedy where tripping equals pulling girls’ pants down to their ankles by accident for some reason. The asshole from Yukki’s old school starts out as a complete asshole to him, threatening to tear down his new life, and then they’re instantly hanging out in the same friend group the next scene. And we have barely five minutes to get to know Yukki’s new friend Hinata (five minutes in which the most significant event involving her is the aforementioned unintentional panty flash, no less) before she’s seemingly killed off and jump-starting Yukki’s crisis about still not being able to have friends. It asks you to take in so much in such a short span of time, but unlike Angel Beats, the storytelling isn’t strong enough to support the density of disconnected ideas.

Honestly, though, I think the biggest offender in this regard might actually be the music. Perhaps an odd nitpick, but something about it really rubs me the wrong way. There’s very little stylistic consistency, and it has a tendency to be remarkably over-expressive, like it’s screaming the emotions of the scene at you rather than supporting them. It makes the already massive gulfs between the emotional states of two scenes feel all the wider, especially when a flashback to Ninth’s past turns into a shojo love story out of fucking nowhere complete with “heart-swelling” string music that wouldn’t feel out of place in Kimi ni Todoke, but feels remarkably bizarre here. And the combined weight of all these frustrations is a show that I just can’t let myself sink into, because the tonal inconsistency is always yanking me out of it.

Sherlock No-lmes

Of course, the problem of not getting sucked into this show’s world ends up compounding into another, larger problem: if you’re not invested in the story being told, you’re far more likely to notice when the story doesn’t make sense. I’ve harped on this show’s logical gaps before, but man are there some whoppers in this bunch of episodes. Honestly, it reminds me of the first draft of a fantasy novel I wrote back when I was ten (since revised and started thinking about sending it to publishers; wish me luck!); events happen because the writer wants them to happen, with no thought put into the logic of how these events happen. This is where the story really falls apart; the very least you need to accomplish for a deathgame plot is to make the game itself an engaging competition, but the strategy and logic at play isn’t just broken, it’s outright nonsensical.

To focus on the biggest offender first, let’s look at just one astronomically poorly thought-out moment: when Yukki springs Rei’s trap and opens an envelope of poison gas that he just grabbed from the deliveryman thinking his diary was in there. It’s supposed to be an “oh shit” moment of defeat being snatched from the jaws of victory, but there are three gaping flaws with the way this moment is built towards.

One: For the characters to even know there’s a package incoming, Yuno has to do some sort of weird meditation/hallucination thing to... see into Rei’s mind? I think? Seriously, what the hell was going on there? Because I don’t see a single logical explanation. But they needed that information for the scene to play out in that specific way, so the writer just shoved a solution in there that caused more problems than it solved.

Two: What happened to the delivery man? Yukki opens the package pretty much the moment he gets his hands on it, right after he takes from the delivery man, but the next shot of the door has it inexplicably closed, like he was never there. Where did he go? Did he just vanish into the ether after fulfilling his structural role in getting the package where it needed to go in the split second before the gas was released?

Three: If Yukki was knocked down by the gas in an instant, then how the fuck was Yuno completely unaffected long enough to drag him into the bathroom? Seriously, there is no way she could have stayed on her feet that long.

And that’s just one turgid moment in a sea full of them. How did Rei manage to booby trap the entire house, including boarding the windows up, in such a short period of time? How did Yuno clearly say words, and thus breathe, while not inhaling the gas? If Hinata getting ripped apart by dogs was just a misdirect, then why did she look genuinely horrified in the moment when there was nobody around she would need to act for? Why is everyone so weirdly respectful of the rules everyone else sets up, as in, why does Hinata actually let Yukki go after losing the coin toss to Asike (this could be explained if it fit her personality as someone with a strong sense of honor, but if that was the intention, it doesn’t come through clearly enough to not be confusing)? There are still clever moments, like Yuno using Yukki’s diary to trick Hinata in the coin toss (because it only takes in information he observes, it can be misleading if his observations are wrong) and Yukki using his future sight to direct everyone into blocking the windows necessary to keep the dogs out, but there’s nowhere near enough of these smart plays to make up for the staggering amount of thoughtlessness surrounding them.

Bodies in the Backyard

That said, for all the frustrations I have towards this show, there’s still one area where it’s piqued my interest: Yuno Gasai. I mentioned this in my first post, but if there’s any chance for Future Diary to redeem itself in my eyes, it’ll be with the eventual reveal of just what’s going on with our resident yandere. For someone so integral to the main plot, we still know shockingly little about her, why she fights, what lies in her past, why she loves Yukki so much, and why she decided to become so damn involved in this whole mess. And I do count that as a flaw, because it means I have very little reason to care about her in the moment. But there is, at least, potential for an interesting character here, and we’re starting to see hints of a much smarter, much more genuinely dark storyline than anything we’ve gotten out of the show so far. It’s revealed at the end of episode 10 that she’s buried the mysterious bodies in her closet and has no memory of them, or of Yukki even coming to her house before in the first place. If Akise is right that she buried her memories out of a sense of self-preservation, then this makes for the first real time we’ve gotten a sense of how she operates, how her mind selectively self-exterminates for the sake of holding onto the version of reality she wants to live in, where she and Yukki reach their Happy End together.

There’s something quietly tragic about Yuno, an undercurrent that hasn’t (yet) been ruined by overexplaining and bizarre plot turns. As Ninth reminds them, there’s only one survivor in this death game; either Yukki or Yuno is going to have to die at some point. But Yuno still holds onto that belief that they’re both going to make it out okay, desperately trying to convince herself it will come to pass. And Yukki, in a completely understandable moment of cowardice, can’t bring himself to tear that delusion away, placing himself in the role of her boyfriend because the alternative is too hard for him to consider. It’s the first time with Future Diary that I’ve actually kind of felt the discomfort it’s been reaching for, as opposed to just being confused or feeling discomfort from an entirely unintentional source. Yukki can’t take this lie back without doing serious mental harm- and likely physical harm as well- to everyone involved. And his emotional complexes are too severe to overcome the desire to do the right thing, so he’s stuck in a relationship with a violent, possessive stalker that he’s desperately trying to see the good side of, trying to find some way to make this hopeless situation work. But as the episode 10 ending reveals, there’s still a lot he doesn’t know about his beau, and something tells me there’ll be hell to pay once the skeletons start tumbling out of the closet.

Whether or not that payoff will actually be satisfying remains to be seen. But for now, there’s at least a shred of hope that Future Diary can salvage something meaningful out of this mess of a narrative. Here’s hoping they don’t fuck it up.

Odds and Ends

-Nice of you to exposit your entire character to us in the bathroom, Rei.

-”Double, double, toil and trouble.” Okay, the subtitlers had fun with that one.

-”Found you! As if.” kajsdhakjsdasd Yukki you utter dork

-OH SURE JUST SNEAK INTO A CRIME SCENE NO BIG DEAL

-”Oh, how beautiful! I wish to take a picture for my blog!” Nothing but extra motherfuckers in this world, huh?

-Yes, look at those dogs that are outside and ravenous that have always been there but somehow surprise you enough to make you fall over. Whut?

-Man, even the Murmur segments are becoming less fun.

-Oh my god duel of the gays hell yes

-You know, it’s weird that outside of the diaries, some people just seem to have straight-up superpowers like Genius Baby and Control Dog Army. It feels inconsistent.

-”Sicko.” “This is my job.” askjdhaskdjhasd

-”Yukki, first we try the food!” A girl after my own heart.

The journey continues. See you next time!

[aclockworkfilmsnob]

Thoughts on Britannia Hospital (1982)

Anyone who has seen a good chunk of Lindsay Anderson's films knows that a common trademark of them is having, let's call them, unorthodox moments. Events that transpire in a much more strange and experimental fashion than the rest of the movie. They completely lack subtlety and the statements being made are on a Paul Verhoeven level of obviousness. Some of these moments are great and enhance the film, like the sheep scene in O Lucky Man! and the spider scene in This Sporting Life, while others leave a lot to be desired, like the predatory coffee shop scene in If…., or the silent film techniques utilized in select scenes of O Lucky Man! Whatever the case may be, these moments are undoubtably strange, and to some they may be a major turnoff for Lindsay Anderson's filmography. I can't help but feel like some stuck up critic lambasted him for this one day, telling Lindsay that you can't just sprinkle in moments of absurdity into an otherwise cohesive film. In turn, he decided to make an entire film built on the foundation of outlandish scenes, and Britannia Hospital was born. If I haven't made it clear enough, this is not a primary example of a cohesive movie, for better or worse. The last thing I would say about this film is that it's predictable, or in any way traditional. But that doesn't necessarily warrant praise for its originality. Britannia Hospital is easily the weirdest Lindsay Anderson film I've ever seen. I'd go as far as to call it even more cynical than If…., or at least just as much so. Just about every main character in this movie is an awful person. The only exception I can possibly think of is Mick Travis, played once again by the incomparable Malcolm McDowell. The thing is, he's barely in the movie. I dare say he's in it as much as Mark Hamill is, which is not a lot at all. Anyone who hasn't seen the past two Mick Travis films will find themselves somewhat underwhelmed by how flat this guy is, the only thing we EVER find out about him being told to us through one quick line of expository dialogue (which may or may not hint at this being a direct sequel to O Lucky Man! but it really doesn't add much to the film at all) and fans of Mick Travis will be even more let down by how little of the film he's actually in. This movie would have been so much better had it centered around the journalist Mick Travis sleuthing through the dark unrests of Britannia Hospital, giving us a legitimately sympathetic character to work as a catalyst for the audience to discover the shocking and absurd truths of the facility. But this is only one of many subplots in the entire movie, and without a central character it really falls apart. The beauty of the other two Mick Travis films is getting to see different ways this guy interacts to his horrible surroundings, but in this movie you don't even scratch the surface of that. Yet still, he's the most entertaining part of the film, because you're never emotionally disconnected from him. The rest of the subplots really leave a lot to be desired. There's a lot going on with union workers, media men, Hospital higher ups, and a borderline mad scientist Doctor. For a film that's less than two hours long, this movie has a LOT of subplots to juggle, and it doesn't do an amazing job at it. I barely ever feel for any of these characters, and thus I'm left more or less uninterested in what's being done to propel the plot and what statements are being made throughout the story. Yes there are some interesting and admittedly funny moments, but barely anything that ever sticks with you. All of these sub plots could be divided into separate movies of consistently good quality if they were just given time to breathe. Hell, I'd say that the Mick Travis subplot would have made for a GREAT film, or at the very least a phenomenal short film. Of course this movie has a lot to say about society, government, corruption, and all that wonderful stuff, and I really appreciate the fact that it handles this subject matter in a hyperbolic and tongue-in-cheek way, but as a whole it just doesn't work as well as it could have. There are ideas buried in here that are downright brilliant, and in some cases there were comedic bits that had me audibly laughing. But the moments of comedy and satire miss more than they hit, at times you're really left scratching your head wondering "What is this movie trying to say? Why is it trying to say it this way? Is this really necessary?" I appreciate the cynicism and the fact that it's outwardly provocative towards every touchy subject it brings up, but I refuse to hail this as a masterpiece solely because it didn't sell out or try and appeal to the lowest common denominator. Something I've noticed about all of the other Lindsay Anderson films I've seen so far is that the weird moments are almost never total highlights for me. Don't get me wrong, I've liked a lot of them, but none of them have ever made me go "this is my favorite scene in the whole film." Britannia Hospital, as I've made clear many times, is a weird movie. But there is one moment that REALLY sticks out as just being totally bizarre and out-there. I won't give it away, all I'll say is that it involves Mick Travis, and I absolutely loved it. It was by far my favorite scene in the whole movie, I was jovially laughing and even started to clap at how much I was enjoying it. If you think I'm being cryptic, believe me, you'll know it when you see it. The ending of the film is definitely memorable, but I'm not so sure it was all that great. While most of the film totally feels like A Clockwork Orange in its cynicism, satire, dark comedy, and even moments of ultra-violence, the ending of Britannia Hospital goes full on 2001: A Space Odyssey. It really sets itself up to be some wonderful comedic pay off, but it just ends up being strange and somewhat philosophical/deep, but not necessarily brilliant. In fact, I'd call it more preachy than anything, the only moment in the movie I would actually call pretentious. It just feels so out of place, and I'm still struggling to determine whether or not it was intentionally pretentious, because I wouldn't rule out that possibility. It's not a horrible ending, but it's kind of unsatisfactory. I think I get what they were going for, but it's just tonally out of place. The thing about the film is, I really can't call it lazy. There is no point in this movie where you can look at it and go "oh that's a total cop out" or "it's clear that no one tried hard when making this." It is so abundantly clear that everyone working on this movie (save for maybe the sound designers, their work didn't exactly wow me here) was trying their absolute hardest to make the best, most original and entertaining film they could. You can look at just about everything in the movie and understood why people thought this was great, why they thought it would work. It's certainly a cautionary tale for any aspiring filmmakers out there, especially screenwriters. I could easily see myself being the writer of this script and thinking to myself that it's just pure perfection, and it's kind of daunting to think about. I definitely can't say I have contempt for this film, I'm certain it was made with heart and dedication, and I believe it shows immensely. I can see people loving this film, praising it as a masterpiece, and demanding a Blu Ray release. I am just not one of them. This film was an overly ambitious mess, a culmination of so many great ideas and entertaining scenes that could not mesh very well. It's an admirable attempt, and some moments are genuinely great. It's well acted and well directed enough to prevent me from getting mad at it, and I do recommend Mick Travis fans check it out for closure, but I do not see myself rewatching it anytime soon. 6/10

[devereuxxo-blog]

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[pixelpoppers]

Wandersong and Difficulty

Wandersong can broadly be split into two types of gameplay:

Exploration: Reach a new area, wander around meeting people, and help them with their problems by solving some low-pressure puzzles. This gets you access to the next type:

Dungeon: Progress through a series of more-intense puzzles featuring and building on the dungeon's particular theme. At the end is a story scene with the area's climactic encounter. Once you've done this, move on to the next chapter and a new area.

The exploration gameplay is relaxed and generally lacks failure conditions. If you just go everywhere and talk to everyone and try things you'll get through. Instead of challenge, it provides atmosphere, worldbuilding, and character development.

The dungeon gameplay flips that balance. Until the story scene at the end, it generally has much less world/character content and much higher challenge. Each dungeon has its own themed mechanics and exactly what challenges you need to deal with vary, but in addition to increasingly-complex low-pressure puzzles this is where you'll find precision jumping puzzles, bottomless pits, time limits, and even a stealth segment. In short - this is where the failure modes are.

Thankfully, Wandersong is very forgiving - 'dying' generally means getting quickly teleported back to a nearby checkpoint, costing very little time or progress. But bizarrely, I found myself more frustrated by these failures than I have been by more challenging and more punishing games. And I think it's because I feel like they don't belong in this game.

For one thing, it's a bizarre tonal shift. In the story of the game, there's no particular reason that only the dungeons should have real danger. Yet the exploration segments play more or less like a point-and-click adventure where you can't die, and the dungeon segments play like a puzzle platformer where suddenly you can. (It reminds me of the few out-of-place moments where you can die in Legend of Kyrandia: The Hand of Fate.) It comes out of nowhere - unlike, say, Super Mario Bros. where dying is part of the premise from the beginning, it's a couple hours into Wandersong when you first fall into a pit and then find yourself back on solid ground with no explanation. It's abrupt and it breaks the expectations the game has so far been building.

But the worse problem is that it makes the game's strengths subservient to its weaknesses. I'm most of the way through Wandersong and even the toughest challenges haven't taken me more than a couple of tries - but I'm an able-bodied adult in good health who is experienced with platformers. It's easy to imagine another player who doesn't tick all those boxes picking up Wandersong because they heard it was easy and had a fun story. It's easy to imagine this player enjoying the exploration gameplay segments, getting to know the world and characters, getting invested in the journey and story, and enjoying the antics and dialog. It's easy to imagine this player appreciating the low-pressure puzzles and the way they contextualize and pace the game's events. And it's easy to imagine this player struggling more and more to get through each dungeon until they hit a wall they can't get past. Like my experience with Catherine, they are now blocked from the content they signed up for by gameplay that's essentially disconnected.

This feels absurd to me. To me it's obvious that the game's soul is in the exploration. The dungeons ratchet up the tension for pacing reasons, to make each chapter's climax feel properly earned - the difficulty is in service of the story. And that totally fails if the difficulty blocks off the story.

It's kind of amusing to read reviews written by people who seem to want a more active and challenging game. The Dualshockers review outright celebrates the dungeon difficulty spikes, with the pull quote "Wandersong is a generally easy game, but each successive dungeon gets progressively harder, luckily." And I can see where the tougher dungeons would be a refreshing change of pace if you're bored by the exploration segments. But if you are, I'm not sure why you'd choose to play Wandersong at all?

If it were up to me, I'd tweak the dungeon puzzles to make them less of a barrier. I'd remove any failure mode that results in death and respawning. I'd increase the margin of error on any precision jumps or time limits. And I'd strongly consider making them skippable.

[swipestream]

Action Comedies in Anime and what we can Learn from Them

A dire warning to sushi lovers everywhere!

Perhaps influenced by Anthony’s recent article and the ensuing discussion, I decided to watch anime for the first time in a few years, settling on the series One Punch Man.  It follows the exploits of heroic, dull-witted Saitama, who decides to become a costumed hero after failing a job interview and encountering a half human, half crab mutant in his underwear attacking people nearby.  Unfortunately, after three years of training, he has reached a point where he kills every opponent with a single punch, leading to a boring existence where no villain, no matter how terrifying or deadly, presents any challenge to him.  The series is very good, both action-packed and funny, and made me think about anime action comedies in general.

The genre (and this applies to Japanese live action movies, too) presents an interesting dichotomy right off the bat.  On the one hand, the Japanese are fantastic at action.  The choreography of the fights, the ebb and flow of the action, the way they build up villains as all-powerful, horrifying menaces, and protagonists as the ultimate, tough, stoic heroes is masterful and worth studying.

On the flipside, they are terrible at comedy.  With a small handful of exceptions, comedy anime lacks jokes, have poor “beats”, and are full of hokey, canned humor.  I don’t think this can simply be attributed to a difference in tastes between East and West, either.  Not only is one of the exceptions, Detroit Metal City, one of the funniest creative works I’ve ever seen and read, but this doesn’t apply to, say, Hong Kong movies, which are often uproariously funny.

Regardless, this combination of a strength and weakness is important to keep in mind.

Kenshiro was modeled after Bruce Lee, Mad Max, and Ogami Itto.

Before looking at the pure action comedies, let’s examine a few action series that benefit considerably from humor.  First up is the shounen classic Hokuto No Ken, or Fist of the North Star.  A favorite of little boys and girls alike in 1980’s Japan, it’s not a series one would imagine to be rife with laughs.  Taking place in a post-apocalyptic society heavily inspired by Mad Max, giant, evil punks brutally torture and murder innocent people simply trying to survive the hellish nuclear wasteland.  And yet, when the hero Kenshiro arrives to dispense justice on the evil-doers, the resulting comeuppance is often nothing short of hilarious.

Check out this scene.  Or this one.

While the major fights between Kenshiro and the other powerful martial artists in the series are kept serious, his disposal of sadistic flunkies, always ending with a deadpan omae wa mou shindeiru (“you are already dead”), is an important element in the show’s success.

If everything was kept serious, the series would quickly become monotonous and a tad depressing, with so many episodes featuring cruel punks victimizing helpless villagers.  However, thanks to the more humorous approach, one is constantly looking forward to the punishment Kenshiro will dole out to the villains, which is as gratifying as it is funny.  And it stays fresh and interesting, since they always change it up.

Lastly, while I love a good dub, Hokuto no Ken has to be watched with subs, to the point where it’s a far worse, even different show in the English translation.  The anime is a phenomenal voice-acting achievement, with Akira Kamiya perfectly encapsulating Kenshiro’s stoicism and coolness through the smallest tonal inflection, and the late, great Kenji Utsumi conveying the overwhelming power and ruthlessness of the main villain Raoh.  Credit the voice acting with much of the aforementioned humor, or how memorable the character’s toughness and emotions are.  In fact, I struggle to think of an anime where the voice acting had this much significance.  (Most times, it’s a non-factor for me in rating a series) Needless to say, the English translation is not up to the task, being poor even by regular anime standards, and making Kenshiro sound like a nebbish, dweebish schoolteacher.

Another good example of comedy being used in an action series is in Grappler Baki.  Here, the humor comes from a different source.  Namely, how ridiculously over-the-top everything is.  While it occurs in the manga, one scene perfectly crystallizes this.  The monstrous American convict Spec has escaped from a maximum security prison, killed countless guards, and made his way to Japan.  At one point, he comes across several generic Japanese delinquents, one of whom is holding a gun.  What does he do in this situation?  One might think he would beat them up or kill them, despite the firearm.  Or perhaps he would even take the gun and crush it in his hands.  That’s what one usually does to build up a big, scary villain, right?

Well, author Keisuke Itagaki takes it a step further.  See, Spec bemusedly takes the gun from the delinquents, and then, remarking that such little toys can’t hurt him, proceeds to shoot himself in the face, blowing off a portion of his cheek.  One can’t help but laugh at such a creatively absurd situation.  Yet again, this humor is vital in keeping the series fresh.  Any power fantasy, no matter how well-executed (and Grappler Baki does it better than anyone, in my view), can become monotonous self-parody if not spruced up with the occasional wink-and-nod from the creator.

Moving on to actual action comedies, one can learn much from 1988’s Sakigake!! Otokojuku.  With a main character who is a blatant rip-off of Kenshiro, it takes place in the world’s toughest and most brutal high school, a Japanese all-male institution where every student is a powerful fighter, teachers make the students go through insane physical challenges, and crazy duels to the death break out constantly.

A big hit during the late 80’s, it is largely forgotten nowadays. In this case, it’s perfectly just.

It starts off promisingly enough, with fun fights and the humor being a combination of how over-the-top the school is and the ways the main character humiliates the sadistic teachers.  Unfortunately, the series loses its path halfway through, completely abandoning the comedy and turning into a melodramatic series where a powerful student dies each episode, everyone cries and mourns him, only for him to come back later.  In this, it’s badly aping Hokuto No Ken.  The latter series had (genuine) character deaths and was meant to be occasionally emotional, but these moments were few and far between, so they actually meant something.  In Otokojuku, its regularity and meaninglessness makes it eye-rolling emotional miasma.

There is also a disconnect in settings.  Characters dying in the brutal nuclear wasteland of Hokuto No Ken makes sense.  Teens dying in modern-day Japan, under the full knowledge and participation of the school principal, who is portrayed as a positive hero, makes the series idiotic and perverse.

Lastly, Hokuto No Ken never abandons its humor, even near the very end.  Otokojuku does, and it becomes borderline unbearable when combined with the weepiness.

For another stark example of what not to do, consider Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo.  Set in a futuristic world where the protagonist, sporting a golden afro, must defeat an evil emperor, it’s supposed to be a parody of other anime.  Unfortunately, “parody” here means “make a reference to, without any actual jokes or commentary”.  For me, it simply reminded me how much better those other shows were.  And unlike the other examples we looked at, Bobo is downright silly, with characters constantly yelling in an exaggerated, silly manner, chibi animations, nonsensical fights and “random” events, etc.  This could potentially work in a pure comedy, but in an action comedy, it robs the fights of any stakes or interest a viewer has in them.  This is in start contrast to Grappler Baki or Hokuto No Ken, where the combatants and fights still maintain complete credibility.  Here, the bad comedy makes the fighting worse and irrelevant, leading to a series that is torture to sit through.

Better, more original character design than most anime leads.

Which brings us back to One Punch Man.  Despite being much sillier than Hokuto No Ken, and featuring ridiculous villains and heroes, (a sexy, buxom, insect-like villainness called “Mosquite Girl” and a hero who looks like Snidely Whiplash being a waiter called “Spring Mustachio” were particular highlights) the fights are always treated seriously.  They are animated and choreographed exceedingly well, far better than in most straight action series.  Some of the humor is based on parodies of other properties, but it has actual observations to make, and is not reliant upon it.  The premise itself is funny, and frequently exploited; a random guy attains ultimate power, but it only makes his life boring as he no longer finds combat exciting.  Furthermore, he still lives a standard, humdrum life in his modest apartment, watering his plants and getting excited for weekend sales.  The fight scenes would make for a good action anime by itself, and the humor would be enough for a decent comedy.  Together, it’s an excellent series, better than the sum of its parts.

We have only touched upon a small number of action comedies in anime, both among those I like and those I don’t.  Still, we have gleaned many important lessons from the ones we examined above.

Most importantly, humor is a vital element for most action series, not just action comedies, keeping it fresh and exciting, but it should never come at the expense of the fights.  And one shouldn’t abandon the humor halfway through, a lesson many Hollywood movies could also learn from.

Action Comedies in Anime and what we can Learn from Them published first on https://medium.com/@ReloadedPCGames