#but this guy is very fair and a huge fan of these characters and story and all the actors

[carry-on-every-neverland-magic]

Watch "when the whole point of a show comes together" on YouTube

Beautiful video essay about 'When we are in Need'

[buried-in-autumn-leaves]

I'm gonna be honest as someone who is VERY obvious ab the fact that Baxter is my favourite olba love interest, the way Derek is held to such a higher standard than him makes me like so upset 💀

Because this guy is genuinely such a nice person with a really bittersweet story and he's overlooked so constantly for just like.... BAXTER IDK LIKE-

This standard goes beyond just him, it applies to his family. Sure it's fair to say that Derek was parentified, but the idea that his parents are straight up bad people is just ignoring a huge part of Derek's character. Could they have maybe made MORE of an effort to take pressure off Derek's shoulders? Sure, definitely. But Derek put a lot of that on himself, it's insane to hold his parents to the crazy standard and then in the same breath go thirst over Cliff who literally bribes his kid to not be mad at him when he genuinely fucks up.

The inherent biasis against the poc characters in this franchise (conscious/intentional or not) are so strong. I think there's obviously some nuance with Cliff in this case since his ethnicity is 'unspecified', but that's also its own issue because of the fact that a large majority of people view white people as the default, so they end up making Cliff and Cove white for 'simplicities sake'.

That part btw has been posted about before by actual poc creators in the fandom (I'm not totally sure how they feel ab tags so I won't specify) so like they are def more qualified to speak on it than me, it's just a good point I think ab.

And again this isn't even to hate on Bax, that's my boy. I literally never shut up about his stupid ass. But the way Derek and his family are portrayed in fan content is just such an ick and I feel like a lot of you need to unpack why you think the way you do and fix your shit idk

[ladyluscinia]

Draft clearing. I think I had more of a point on the topic of Jenkins and genre I wanted to make when I gathered these, but I'm not feeling it anymore. However, I need spread awareness of his absolutely baffling ideas about pirate media and how he sounds half-convinced it must be a formulaic action/adventure. I only picked up on this by reading way too many interviews back to back so I'm not surprised I've never seen anyone else mention it, but like. It's wild. And he's SO additionally weird about how showrunning a piece of media about pirates relates to whatever concept he has of pirate media in his head.

Here's the link to my interview compilation if you want to check my sources on these.

Jenkins Quotes on "Pirate Genre"

"I think actual pirate stuff is fine, but it's not necessarily my cup of tea. And I think Taika [Waititi] felt similarly.

[...]

Showrunner Jenkins sees Our Flag Means Death as having "joy. A lot of joy. I like Stede because Stede is, to me, the outsider artist of pirates. And I think in designing the show, I was conscious [of the fact that it's] a hard genre to do anything to. It's a very stubborn genre because it's been done so well and so often. So I kind of tried to look at, like New York, like Alphabet City in the '80s via a pirate genre via Mad Max and try to throw all these different things at it. So I think you'll get a different feel than you'd get on a normal pirate thing. I think we achieved that with our amazing crew." - (Gizmodo, 2/22/22)

"I guess I really… I get kind of bored. How much pirate can you do? They're going to rob stuff. They're going to steal ships. There's only so many pirate stories you can do." - (Collider, 3/24/22)

Despite creating a pirate show, he himself says he's not a huge fan of pirate movies. - (EW.com, 12/13/22)

"I don't want to see a bunch of pirate things that I've seen in other things, I'll just go watch another thing if I want to see that. That's not really my thing. I like the genre, but it's a very hard genre to budge. I want to see relationships in a pirate world." - (TV Guide, 10/5/23)

"The pirate genre is fun, but I wasn't dying to make a pirate show. Taika wasn't dying to make a pirate show. But the thing that was interesting to me was that Stede finds love, and he finds it with Blackbeard." - (Variety, 10/13/23)

"I think there is something in the show about how piracy is a brutal way of life. It's essentially Mad Max, this world. There's no law, there's just strong and weak." - (Polygon, 10/21/23)

"And it’s also a pirate show, so he’s got to die." - (Vanity Fair, 10/26/23)

"Another thing I love is what I call shaggy stories, stories about people navigating each other. When you plug them into different genres, you get this great engine that comes with it. I'm not particularly dying to write a pirate thing, but I want to write a bunch of characters trying to navigate each other in a pirate thing." - (Vulture, 10/28/23)

"But I'm like you. I'm not a big pirate person. In general, it's a big creaky genre that's hard to budge, but I think the show benefits from we can pull pirate stuff out when we need it. Ultimately, yeah, I want to see these different relationships and perspectives on different relationships. Then it's fun to plug it into an overwrought genre.

[...]

Pirates of the Caribbean, those movies are great. That's not necessarily what I hunger to see, but in that genre, it's great. You're not going to beat that, especially on something that's lower budget. We've seen a lot of this stuff, so it's fun to take it then and don't do any of that stuff." - (Metro Weekly, 11/1/23)

"I think it's more interesting to me that I've never seen a love story like this in this genre, and you dream for that. Really, pirates, what can you do that's different with pirates?

[...]

To me, to tell the story about these two men in this very hetero action genre, falling for each other..." - (Metro Weekly, 11/1/23)

---

...This is the same guy who just ended a season on the British Navy blowing up Nassau for symbolism reasons that I'm pretty sure have nothing to do with the love story. 🤨

[cinnamonest]

I know nothing about Persona let alone Goro Akechi but after reading the bsf and yan profile post I want to give this man a hug (and my tits). His story seems so sad ;-; and he's so pretty and for what?? 💢

Honestly, as much as I enjoy genshin I never truly found it to have any meaningful or extremely well written characters (which is not a bad thing, I just can't take them seriously when they all look like that lmao). All credit to making me think twice about them goes to writers and artists in the fandom. So the change in content feels soooooo nice. Made me appreciate your writing in another way

I've heard about Persona a LOT for years, but I didn't have a huge drive to play it until your liveposting (p.s I love the LP so much) and especially the posts with that one insane policeman guy who is a loser (affectionate, also giving him my pussy). Any recs? 😅

HE IS MY BABY BOY you're so right he is so pretty 😖😖😖 Akechi is genuinely an excellently written character, and Persona 5 Royal is one of the few games I think fully deserves to be so hyped as it is.

Tbh I think the problem genshin and similar games has is that there's so many characters, you have to essentially go out of your way to dig into lore to get anything beyond surface level from them. This happens a lot in series with lots of characters — like with Danganronpa for example, your experience of a lot of characters completely changes upon playing their free time events. A lot of genshin characters get very little screen time on the main story, so all their characterization is in their quests, lines, and character profile content. Which to be fair, with a game of this nature that's kinda the only way to really do it, so, I'm just glad they give us that extra content tbh. I've played some gachas that would introduce new characters but give very little beyond a design and name which is kinda sad when you want to know more about the lil guy you're playing with.

But AAAAAAAAAAAAAA thank you so much anon I am going to ramble here, but I'll put a tl;dr at the bottom!

Soooo if you want to get into Persona, I'd recommend the series in a certain order with some notes. There's 5 main entries in the series and a lot of spinoffs.

A word of advice in general with marathoning a game series: with any series it's a good idea to play in order of chronological and thus technological progression, especially if you intend to play the series back to back, otherwise going from a more recent game to an older one can damper your experience due to the decrease in graphical quality, gameplay smoothness, and general content quantity.

However for this series, the ideal order to play really depends on the factors of 1) which version of Persona 3 you choose to play, and 2) if you want to play Persona 1 & 2.

Regarding Persona 1 and 2: These are some of those games where your enjoyment will strongly depend on whether or not you're a person who is okay with some of the frustrations, limitations and slowness/jankiness common to old games (they came out between 1996-1999). I know some people don't mind or see it as a sort of vintage charm, while others get very frustrated with that — if you're the latter, I'd recommend saving yourself the frustration and skipping them, but if you like old games or have a high tolerance for jankiness, you could start here. I will also say that, even amongst the vintage/90s games fan crowd, P2 is definitely more popular and considered better than P1. It's also much better on the aforementioned issues.

Also, unless you have an original PlayStation or PSP, you'll have to emulate these.

Regarding Persona 3: there's several versions — the original came out in like 2006, then there was a remake version called P3 FES which added an epilogue (which is being added to the recent remake soon anyway), then a PSP remake called Persona 3 Portable (which has ports on modern consoles), then the most recent remake, Persona 3 Reload, came out just a few months ago in 2024.

Obviously the newest remake has vastly improved graphics and added lots of gameplay content. However, one of the biggest differences is that P3 Portable had the option to play as a female protagonist — this altered a lot of aspects of the game and is exclusive to that version (which has disappointed a lot of people hoping she'd be in the 2024 remake), so you can't play as her if you play Reload (unless, I believe, you play PC, there's a volunteer team currently making a mod for her).

Personally, I bought P3 Reload, and couldn't get into it, so I dropped it. Then I bought P3P on a whim and LOVE it so far. Getting to play as the girl protagonist makes a massive difference in my opinion, and more than compensates for the older graphics/gameplay. It's not just the romance routes either, her dialogue options, interactions, music, and overall vibe is different enough that it changes the feel of the story.

It really depends on what you value more — 2024-tier visual quality/gameplay and the epilogue, versus the Female Protagonist experience, so just pick which you prefer.

For the order thing, if you choose to play P3P (or the original/FES for whatever reason), I'd start here, but if you want to play Reload, I'd play it either last or just before P5 Royal.

Moving on, Persona 4: Golden and Persona 5: Royal are both the definitive editions of their respective games. They're remakes of the originals with a lot of added content, and unlike Persona 3, there's no reason to play the older versions over these. Notably their themes/vibes are kinda opposite of each other (big city world-scale societal rebellion versus small rural town murder mystery), I wouldn't say either story is better or worse, they're not really comparable and more a matter of personal taste.

As for the stories, admittedly if you've read my posts, you've essentially already been spoiled on the identity of the killers, but honestly it's still worth experiencing the story, there's multiple big plot twists before and after the reveals regarding Akechi/Adachi.

I would play Persona 5 Royal last, largely because it's widely considered the best entry to the series and is by far the longest. However if you only intend to play one game, it should definitely be P5 Royal. The only real flaw to P5 is it's much easier than previous games.

From here, there's a few more spinoff games, whether or not you want to play them really just depends on if you enjoy the genre. There's a bit of lore in some of them but nothing critical.

Dancing All Night/Starlight/Moonlight - dancing rhythm games

Arena Ultimax - fighting game, acts as an epilogue to P3&4

Persona Q 1&2

These are Nintendo DS spinoffs with chibi style art. I haven't played these and admittedly don't know much about them, I think they're dungeon crawler genre? It's popular for the aspect of which it involves the characters of the different main games, so you get to see them interact with each other.

The downside is that these games are oddly expensive, I think because there weren't too many copies. I intend to get them eventually.

Persona 5 Tactica/Strikers:

These are P5 spinoffs that put the cast in alternate stories, strikers is the closest to a true sequel from my understanding, tactica is more of a dungeon-crawler. I didn't get them because Akechi isn't in strikers and is just minor dlc for tactica.

The Phantom X

This is upcoming I believe, it's going to be a mobile game with a new cast.

The TL;DR of my advice:

- Play P2 only if you're into vintage gaming

- Play P1 only if you're REALLY into vintage gaming

- Play Persona 3 Portable if you really value the female protagonist/male character romance experience, otherwise play Persona 3 Reload

- If you play the original Persona 3, FES, or P3 Portable: start with that, then P4 Golden, then P5 Royal

- If you play Persona 3 Reload: play P4 Golden FIRST, then both P5 Royal and P3 Reload in either order.

- Play the spinoffs just based on what type of games you like, if any.

[ticklinglady]

You know, I find it to be truly fun to think about connections of various writers and wonder how those might play out in the story, however then I remember that Asagiri himself isn't particularly interested in doing this, aside from some exceptions. For better or for worse, which is a matter of preference, he truly creates an entirely new story with some references to the real people, despite using their names and alluding to their works. Usually I'm rather cool with that, "Let the man go wild, he's awesome! 🥰", however sometimes I can't help, but feel like it results in some missed opportunities for the story. If you name characters after real people, might as well play with the allusions to them a little more. Here are just some examples of the connections between the real writers, that I am aware of, yet they played no role in the BSD at all:

Akutagawa Ryunosuke was the student of Natsume Soseki and loved his teacher dearly - zero interactions between the two during the story

Q/Yumeno Kyusaku was quite a huge fan of Edogawa Ranpo and Edogawa later became the benefactor of the writer - zero interactions between the two during the story

Tayama Katai and Mori Ogai became acquaintances during the Russo-Japanese war and spent lots of time talking with one another while at it - zero interactions between the two during the story

Edogawa Ranpo was the first person to translate and introduce Lovecraft's writings in Japan - zero interactions between the two during the story

Akutagawa Ryunosuke loved Poe's works and translated them into Japanese - zero interactions between the two during the story

Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville were great friends and Melville adored Hawthorne so much, that it influenced the creation of "Moby-Dick" a lot and from what I have seen many people say he was actually in love (maybe the writer was indeed in love with him, but I am afraid, I'm not qualified enough to talk about this. Feel more than free to add info to the post) - zero interactions between the two during the story

H. P. Lovecraft was quite a fan of Edgar Allan Poe and his works were heavily influenced by him - zero interactions between the two during the story

Nikolai Gogol and Alexander Pushkin were great friends and influenced each other a lot - zero interactions between the two during the story

Fyodor Dostoevsky was one hell of a fanboy of Alexander Pushkin and even had the honor to give an official speech at the anniversary of the latter's death - zero interactions between the two during the story

And etc.

I mean, don't you guys think it would have been interesting to see Mori and Katai interact, given Katai's heavy dislike for the mafia? Hell, Mori might have even been made the main reason behind Katai's strong emotions! And then there's the situation with Akutagawa and Natsume. I find it to be truly surprising that Mori and Fukuzawa were made Natsume's students in the BSD, yet the person who was actually Natsume's student in real life hasn't even talked to him so far. Nathaniel and Melville are actually part of the same organization, yet there's nothing about it, though to be fair, the Guild members suffer from the lack of screentime in general. But just imagine if there was a tragic love story between the two instead of the one we got with Margaret arffufgbh. However, like I said in the beginning, it's a matter of preference. The story still works on its own and Asagiri still gives us from time to time such interesting references so in general I am very content and happy X3 I'm just saying here my thoughts on how fun it would have been, if he had gone even further

[daily-hanamura]

Question, is the thing about Yosuke dying his hair canon? Because I saw a couple times people say Yosuke, Futaba and once even Chie all have dyed hair. And. If it's true it's kinda hilarious because.

Blue hair.

Naoto, Yusuke, maybe Mishima, P3 male protagonist, Fuuka, that one goth guy in P2, all have blue hair.

And sure, goth guy and protag Could have dyed their hair, even if protag is unlikely because the dialogue in PQ when he talks about uncovering his eye somewhat implies he is too lazy to style his hair and just lets it do whatever.

Even Fuuka might have dyed hers but she just doesn't give off the Vibe.

But Naoto? Yusuke? Naoto would Not Have Risked walking into the police station with dyed hair in a thousand years, much less such an unnatural color. And Yusuke's hair color is consistent through the story even though Madarame would have never wasted money on hair products for him so the color is most likely natural.

Mishima had probably a lot more to worry about than his hair.

You could say it's just a stand-in for black hair but Persona has characters with black hair(making it kinda pointless to replace it with blue) and Fuuka's is so aquamarine it looks green.

So. This would mean that blue is. A natural hair color in the Persona universe.

You could argue that people with lighter hair colors are rare in Japan because it's a whole Thing with Ann, and Ryuji does dye his, but Haru and Akechi have very much brown hair and they too seem super unlikely to dye it.

It would make sense for Yosuke to dye his hair, it sounds like something he would do, but I just find it really funny that of all the colors, he choose Brown.

Mitsuru and P3 FeMC have bright red hair, Akihiko and Souji have white/silver, a bunch of people have blue hair, and the characters that do dye it have... Brown and Blond.

Ah, yes, the Persona Universe. Where imagination comes true, butterflies are gods, TVs are portals to another dimension, the day is 25 hours long to some people, a random app you didn't download on your phone gives you the power to kill or brainwash anyone you know the name of, and blue is a natural hair color.

This stopped being about Yosuke 2 sentences in, I just wanted to share the blue hair thing with someone.

Oh wow thank you for sharing your blue hair thoughts as a huge fan of funky anime hair colours it's nice to see a break down

I swear I thought Yosuke dyed his hair but the more I think about it/try to look for evidence I think it's just a thing that I saw in a fic. I honestly have no idea anymore. To be fair though, it may be the case that he dyed it from one funky anime hair colour to another funky anime hair colour. Blond Yosuke, anyone?

EDIT: ACTUALLY thanks to the friendly reminders in notes I've just remembered

Yes it is indeed true yosuke DOES dye his hair

[heich0e]

hewwo liv i think you mentioned you read nonfiction so i was wondering if you had any recs? i'm trying to widen my repertoire a bit more and start reading more nonfiction (as much as i love fiction i think my brain has started regressing a little), but the only nonfic ive ever dipped into are my econ textbooks haha

also i hope you're having a good day !!!!!

HI GUY!! i think one of the best parts abt non-fiction is how nondescript that classification is, and consequently how enormous and diverse your options are within it. i think it's easy for people to generalize non-fiction as being boring retellings of fact or history, because most people's first introductions to non-fiction reading are academic. but in reality there are so many different types of nonfiction, and so many different styles of presenting it in writing. (for the sake of simplicity i'm gonna just limit this convo to narrative nonfiction, but if u wanna read something expository like a text book or instruction manual power to ya.)

my recommendation would be to start with something like a biography or memoir. to me, reading a really good biography doesn't feel very different from reading a novel. you're still following someone's story, they're just a real person and not a character. from where i'm sitting right now i can see trevor noah's biography 'born a crime' on my bookshelf, and i remember really loving that one the first time i read it. having been a fan of his comedy, his narrative voice felt authentic and familiar throughout the book. setting aside his demonstrated talent for storytelling, it's also just a very interesting look into life in south africa under apartheid, along with its lasting impact, and as a mixed race child, noah's personal perspective is extremely compelling.

(keep in mind, i read that book as someone who was already a fan of trevor noah's so i immediately had a personal connection/interest to the story. if you have any comedians/musicians/actors/artists you really enjoy, maybe see if they've done any writing—that could help find something you connect with! i also recently read david mitchell's 'unruly' and i really enjoyed that one too—but i find him funny, and like learning about the history of monarchies. 'crying in h mart' by michelle zauner is also great.)

true crime is another popular non-fiction genre that i find people have an easier time getting into. i'm not a huge true-crime reader myself, but i've read a few interesting ones! i tend to go for ones that are more local to me, so i won't necessarily give any recs for this one.

i also had a weird phase where i was reading a lot of books about boats and shipwrecks. not sure what that was about. i read walter lord's 'a night to remember' when i was like 10 and i think that really is what it can all be traced back to. 'the wager' by david grann was fantastic (he also wrote killers of the flower moon which was very good, and not about a boat) but i recognize this is a very niche area of interest that u probably do not care about.

i also really like essay collections!! they tend to sort of cross or blur a lot of lines when it comes to genres, because while some would consider 'essay collection' a genre in and of itself, the essays themselves usually as collected around a particular topic or theme. another added benefit of essay collections are u can kind of leisurely pick away at them, or jump around in the book, since you usually aren't beholden to reading them cover to cover and following a single narrative thread. less pressure!!

a couple other recommendations, though at this point i'm sure you've given up on me (fair):

'the patriarchs' by angela saini

'i want to die but i want to eat tteokbokki' baek sahee

'persepolis' by marjane satrapi

ok i'll shut up now!! i don't even think this was helpful!! my advice to you would be to think about something you're already passionate about/interested in, and find a book about it!! or think about something you'd like to know more about or be better educated/informed on. it's out there i promise <3

[headgehug]

Did you end up checking out FE Three Hopes? I just finished a route about 24 hours ago and... I might prefer that game to Three Houses? I feel like the interactions on the battlefield make more sense than in Houses, it feels like the gameplay/story integration really works better.

However, I know it's a controversial game (to be fair, everything about the Threeverse is) and I totally understand how it could frustrate a lot of people (the ending I got was pretty inconclusive, but I thought it ended in the right place. Do I wish there was a continuation? Yes. Am I also satisfied with the current route? Yup.)

EDIT: ignore this post. me when I type without double checking what game I'm talking about. I'm talking about Engage here 😅

I did play a lot of 3 Hopes although I didn't finish it so that may affect my opinion.

I definitely see why people would like it, but I didn't necessarily love it lol. I thought the throwbacks were very cool and they could introduce new players to old games, and for fans of the old games, it was so awesome seeing characters I loved in HD action! I will say that because the gameplay is so (for lack of a better word) easy, I did play it very often while I was into it.

buuuut I didn't love the mechanics. I thought they incorporated way too many things, with the rings and the huge free roam base, it was just a lot! it was a little overwhelming to me. it didn't feel as natural as Three Houses did. i think the main issue for me is that it wasn’t a standalone game, so elements felt awkward, reused, or unnecessarily revamped. the ring concept was very cool but I didn't like the gacha elements loll just give me 12 relics not like... a million rings i have to pull 😭

finally, storyline. 3 Houses was so perfect in my mind. it wasn’t the first game I played but it was definitely the most impactful one. the villains in Hopes felt weird, like I beat them over and over and somehow they came back? lol! their characters were cool, but it just didn't hit for me. I generally just feel like 3 Houses had a better developed world and the motivations were extremely interesting- every FE game I've played is about some random evil guy (nothing wrong with that!) - but Houses gave us Edelgard and I really just have a hard time with a game that's trying to improve on her story.

all of this to say it wasn't the game for me but I did pour dozens of hours into it and some of the new characters were really cool!! please do tell me your takes on it!

[summerstrash]

having complex feelings about the x-factor 2024 announcement.

pros:

Pyro and Frenzy are there. Be Gay Do Crimes Twink + The Giant Woman I Always Want To See = Good Shit.

The guy who's writing this book is well-known for his one-shot rewriting the Hanna-Barbera character Snagglepuss as a mid-century homosexual playwright. Considering that Pyro is here, this is promising.

Alex is no longer wearing the classic costume, which reduces the chances of him being forced into the Goblin Gown significantly, forcing his arc to rely less on his sexual objectification.

The solicit seems to imply that social media will act as either a framing device or a plot point, which I like the sound of.

Alex and Frenzy serving on a team together rockets her to the #1 spot on the list of Potential Alex Summers Sex Mistakes, since she's a slightly bitter Scott ex with BDSM inclinations.

My longtime Twitter mutual Gail Simone called it a gem of the line, and I'm inclined to trust her judgment on many things.

The writer specifically namedrops Alex and Frenzy as characters he's excited to write, which implies they'll see at least some focus.

The artist is Bob Quinn, a guy I quite like and who sent me free art once for my birthday when Knights of X was delayed.

As someone who hasn't read much X-Factor from the 90s due to my ongoing feud with a particular writer from that era (iykyk), I'm kind of looking forward to seeing what X-Factor as a government team is like, as opposed to X-Factor as an investigating body.

cons:

Alex in a leadership role is never a good sign. Bad things happen to Alex when he leads.

Not a huge fan of the fact that the current known roster includes three white guys and two WOC, with one of the WOC also being a visible mutant who has fur instead of human skin, and the other being a medium-to-dark-skinned black woman famous for being buff and angry, and the three white guys are all blondes, ranging from "dumpster twink" to "hunk"

Alex working for the U.S. government feels like a microagression against me personally, as I've been very vocal about thinking that Alex needs to finally come to terms with the fact that clinging to mainstream institutions and dominant social groups will only ever hurt him, and I was hoping the Hellions or Limbo could be that for him in the Krakoan Era

The marketing seems to imply a different tone and genre from the domestic/workplace horror-comedies Alex has been part of for the last five years, and I don't know how I feel about that yet.

Greg Land is doing the covers, and I hate that for me.

"Who will die?" Of the characters we have announced so far, Alex is the most expendable. He's one of three blond white guys, and while Warren seems to be taking center stage as the Face Of The Team, and St.John's movie counterpart is returning to theaters this summer in Deadpool & Wolverine, so I doubt they'd kill him off in comics at the moment, Alex feels kind of superfluous as a co-leader, and he also is just...less loved, I think.

"Who will fall in love?" Again, worried for Alex because one of his, like, three recurring stories is "gets picked up by the scruff of his neck by a girl way out of his league so she can use him to self-actualize while playing at transgressive forms of heterosexuality." We don't really have similar core recurring storylines for other announced characters.

"Who will be the first to sell out?" Honestly I feel like St.John might be the answer to this question. He's a novelist. Novelists have egos. He's worked for the U.S. government before, under Mystique. And I guess this kind of makes me sad.

The fact that the whole cast hasn't been announced yet fills me with fear that Lorna will be in this, mostly because a fair chunk of FTA seems to be focused on catering to nostalgia on some level, and Alex/Lorna is very 90s. And frankly Dr. Dane should be doing better for herself than the man that left her at the altar for a gay man's girlfriend.

So yeah, I have complex emotions about all of this and will be watching with a fair amount of suspicion as we draw closer to the release date.

[mermaidsirennikita]

honestly i do think they're skipping him again and they will do her season before his...they seem to be setting her up more, they've cast her first husband and we saw set photos of them departing for their honeymoon. meanwhile we've heard nothing about his love interest....again.

I don't know how legit it was because it was just a graphic on my dash, but I saw something with the episode summaries for s3 and the mention of That Guy was basically like "he searches for a purpose" and like. He's been searching for a purpose THE ENTIRE TIME. That has been HIS WHOLE PLOT. The writers also seem to be searching for his purpose?

And I mean, to be fair, Netflix is a cruel mistress and for all anyone knows s4 will be the last for this show. Even if it does huge numbers; it's not cheap, it will eventually wear out its welcome, and I imagine that a lot will depend on how this next season does in terms of viewership.

Buuuut I don't think Shonda wants it to end on 4, and she's doing the play (and I don't know how well this play works in this day and age, but I still personally feel like she's a TV maven of a different era in some ways) of setting up long-term future stuff. Otherwise... why even have that character's husband subplot be an actual... subplot? She's been offscreen most of the time. They could've easily been like "and she was off in Scotland where she met her husband isn't that great", and if they ever got to her season... You deal with it then. Which is what the books did, basically. There was no OBLIGATION to have this be a subplot.

I mean, I just think that That Guy is a very thorny character for the writers. Because the actor has his fans in the fandom. But he was undoubtedly used to queerbait in the s1 promo, sorry! The whole *shocked and confused but Intrigued* face when he opened a door on two men embracing... in the trailer? Please.

So there's that, but beyond it I also think that his story is exceptionally hard to adapt within the framework of the show's promotional wokeness (that's not me shading wokeness, it's me shading how that show does it) and plot structure. Because you keep that story, and you cast a woman of color, and she's basically a slave. Before a white man saves her. Or you cast a white woman, and then that gets backlash. You could always just... rip the plot to shreds and do something almost entirely new, which they obviously aren't against. But I think it would have to be ripped up even more than they already rip things up, if they wanted to cast a woman of color. And if they DID do TSPWL as s4, I feel like they'd feel pressure to do so, as they'd have two white pairings in a row before then.

(And that feels so weird to write, because I really hate that That Show has created a weird dialogue surrounding race with its casting... but I mean, let's be real, that IS the dialogue. That's the place they've put themselves in.)

It feels like they kinda wanna buy time while they figure it out lol. Or maybe he'll be s4! Maybe all the people on my TL are right and they've cast his heroine!

But it seems.... much more certain that they've cast The Doomed Husband. And I mean, WHWW was always my favorite book in that series, sooooooo. I also think that a lot of it just depends on what Shonda is vibing with. It SEEMS like she vibes with the heroine of WHWW this season. I've never gotten the sense that she cares about That Guy lmao

[light-wolf]

Now that I've had some time to process yesterday's trailer and all the new info, let's talk about Monster Hunter Wilds!

Ok, so right from the start the game seems much more "cinematic" than usual. I was actually surprised to see them spotlight the story/cutscenes/characters so soon since they usually wait until later trailers for that. We might get a bigger focus on the story this time. The tone seemed a bit too... serious? dramatic? I don't know, it felt a bit off for MH, but it's still far too early to jump to conclusions. To be fair, the trailer debuted in a PlayStation event so maybe they wanted to cater to that audience. I'm sure there will be plenty of the campy humor we're used to, so I'm not concerned.

What I'm not so sure about is our hunter and Palico talking. Sure, our hunter had (optional) voice lines in Rise, but they were limited to gameplay. Having the hunter actually engage in conversation with other characters worries me a little, because I've always felt that MH is one of those games where the player character works best as a blank state. Even some of Rise's voice lines felt wrong to me because they implied a certain personality for my hunter, one that wasn't necessarily the one I imagined. The other reason I'm concerned about this, is that it will very likely further reduce the amount of voice options for both hunters and Palicoes (if we even get options at all) and that makes me sad (I'm not a huge fan of the voices from the trailer), but I'll reserve judgement until we have more details. It's up to Capcom to prove me wrong.

About the other characters, I know Gemma is getting lots of attention (understandably), but I just want to say that I love Alma's design, she's so pretty! Also having MH4 characters (possibly?) returning is great. Cool stuff all around!

I'm very curious about the supposed seamless integration of story and gameplay. Breaking the traditional hub>quest>hub loop that we've always had makes me nervous, but it could be interesting. I wonder what it means for multiplayer, though. How will it even work? The way World implemented it was very criticized, so I hope Capcom has a better solution now.

The dynamic climate/seasons/whatever looks very cool, and I love the amount of small monsters and how they all interact. Large monster herds are also interesting, but I need to see how that works in actual gameplay.

Speaking of large monsters, I don't really have much to say about the two they showed. Probably early game monsters, so not the most interesting (and not the most memorable designs ever either), but they're not bad. Doshaguma has a very fucked up skrunkly face but it's growing on me. Chatacabra looks pretty fun and is my favorite of the two so far. Always cool to see more Amphibians.

We finally have a name for the raptor mount! Seikret! I LOVE these guys and I hope we're able to customize them. They seem like a natural evolution of the Palamutes (RIP) and I love them so much and I need to pet them and cherish them forever. Also them letting us bring two weapons to a hunt has interesting implications, but I need to know how it works exactly before getting hyped.

Other gameplay thoughts: I kinda hated the slinger in World so I groaned when I saw it was back, but we'll see how it works this time. Not sure what to think about Focus Mode and the wounding system, I really need to see actual gameplay before judging. Honestly I feel that way about almost everything, it's all too unclear still.

Overall, the trailer left me with a lot of questions, but I'm still incredibly hyped! Luckily we know we'll get more info during Summer Games Fest next week (including a new monster!), so it'll be a short wait this time!

The biggest question (for me) remains if this thing will be on the Switch 2, which would be the ideal scenario for me. Please Capcom I'm begging you. If that's not the case, I'll probably get a PS5 (there are a few other games I wouldn't mind having access to). I'll have to get a new console either way, but I have some money saved just for that.

That's it for now! Looking forward to next week!

[greed-the-dorkalicious]

What did you think of the Fullmetal alchemist live action movies? Cause I hated the first one and haven’t seen the second or third. Are they better?

I liked the first one, but to be fair I was following behind the scenes very closely from the moment it was announced. I know that it was very much a labor of love (the director had wanted to do it for a long time and waited like 10 years for Japan's CGI tech to get to a point where they could do Al justice; Ed's actor is a huge Ed fan who straight up studied manga panels to make sure he got Ed's running motion right), so I've got a lot of fondness for it.

It's also the ONLY adaptation that has ever included Al's line from the incident with Nina: "Mr. Tucker, if you say one more word, this time I'll be the one to snap." It might not seem like a lot, but the omission of this line has imo led to a lot of misconceptions about Al's character, so I was so excited to hear it!

That doesn't mean I don't have my criticisms of it, though. I feel like it was pretty lacking in humor, and Mustang's character felt really flat lol.

As for the second and third... Eh? Honestly I never got around to watching the third. The second was like, fine? (Although I'm pretty sure they spray-tanned Scar's actor, so uh...)

The thing about the second movie is, ironically, I feel like it was worse because they had the chance to do a more close adaptation of the manga. For the first movie, the director said that while he wanted to do the whole series, he wasn't sure they'd get greenlit for a sequel, so the story was done in such a way that it would leave room for a sequel while also managing to be a complete story within one movie. Because of that it ended up being a fresh take on the series that remixed different elements of the plot, which you see a lot in the video games and such, so I liked that. With the second and third they had room to actually do the entire plot, so it's like... It doesn't feel new and intriguing. It's like, yeah, these sure are some guys doing Ed vs. Scar. I could also see this at an anime convention in like 2010, just with less CGI.

TL;DR (shrug)

[nacricissa]

Rating OC headcanons tag

Thanks @rhikasa for the open tag!

Rules: Use this headcanon generator to generate some headcanons for your OCs! How accurate are they?

No-Pressure Tags: @macabremoons, @squarebracket-trickster, @steh-lar-uh-nuhs, and an open tag!

Elise

Elise needs a nightlight to sleep: 8.5/10, she probably needs something comforting to sleep, and at a certain point she starts needing external magical help so she doesn't warp the world too much with her dreams. If the nightlight is a spellform to help with this that would probably count, so I'll bump up from my original 6.

Elise uses the word "like" like a comma: 10/10, she loves emphasizing her "temporal accent" and uses as many 2010s colloquialisms as possible.

Elise can hug you, but won't: 3/10, she is physically capable of hugging, and doesn't tend to initiate hugs, but that's mostly due to fear or rejection. If you want a hug she will hug you, and gives hugs freely to her brothers.

Eric

Eric is not good with social cues: 7/10, I am autistic so most of my characters are too. However, I have some conflicting characterization of him as sort of oblivious (read, sheltered aristocrat knows too little of the world) early in the story, and an excellent group dynamics man later. As such, I'm going to say he's not great at social cues but over time learns to observe them with stunning ability given his lack of natural talent, from which he is then able to manage interpersonal conflict very well.

Eric cannot drive: 4/10, well, given he was born several decades before the invention of the car, and then gained the ability to teleport he probably hasn't driven much, but I'm not going to go so far as to say he can't, especially since Elise has taken pains to make sure she can drive (She was only ONE YEAR out from driver's school when she got kidnapped by the universe. Not fair at all)

Eric's favourite colour is pink: 2/10, seems unlikely, somehow, only because I cannot see him having a favourite colour at all. He would likely prefer warm colours to cool colours, and bright colours to muted colours, so he probably has little against pink, but it's not his favourite.

Davriel

Davriel has punched a hole in their wall: 6/10, Davriel is not a particularly expressive guy, most of his anger tends to well inside him rather than venting out. He also tends to use magic before his fists. However, he may well have done it just as an experience, to see what it's like, because the whole "destruction of property" thing is of little import to him, and would not provide a barrier. Certainly if true it would only be after hooking up with God, he's much more liberated at that point.

Davriel is very willing to eat inedible things: 9.9/10 on a technicality, since really nothing is inedible to him and Elise, they can convert any substance to energy if desired. For that reason he is very willing to eat things that are "inedible" if he needs the calories, and also he would also be willing to eat a whole host of strange things if prompted, so it would be 10/10 if inedible things existed.

Davriel is not good with social cues: 10/10 as I said earlier my autism does tend to seep into my characters, and this guy was even more sheltered than Eric was, so by virtue of low exposure to humans he's not great with them.

Sorceress

Sorceress is afraid to close their eyes in the shower: 2/10, this is interesting. I am unsure if sorceress has ever had a shower. She also used to be a siren, so it wouldn't be a fear of water thing, nor does she tend towards fear in general. There might be something in there with past life triggers and dysphoria, but I somehow doubt it. The only fear would be that Elise was pranking her tbh.

Sorceress makes your mom jokes: 0/10, the only way Sorceress would know your mom jokes would be through Elise, either from her inherent knowledge of the language of magic, in which non-literal statements are generally a bad idea, or personal contact. Sorceress is not a huge fan of Elise, and certainly wouldn't want her mannerisms rubbing off on her, so I doubt she would ever use them.

Sorceress forgets to eat sometimes: 10/10, this woman is a scientist. There is no way she hasn't used the mastery over using the bridge to heal her body to recover her nutritional reserves. She probably thinks eating is a waste of time, unless it's a new food.

[k3itar0-with-a-three]

Dangan Rambles (needing a bit of help with a fangan thing)

So, I've been wanting to make a fanganronpa video series for a long time, but I lose motivation easily and I've only been doing things myself. I've wanted to ask for help, but I have few friends that know the story of Danganronpa, and those who do usually are very busy due to school stuff (fair, since I'm still in hs too). I've been aching to ask for help from people, but I have a good amount of trust issues regarding the internet (not even due to past experiences or anything, mostly bc I'm a person that overthinks A LOT, and since I'm still a minor I'm worried about stuff like gr00ming, etc..).

this is a passion project with literally no money being put into anything, so when it comes to things like voice acting I even considered doing it all myself since it's just something I like doing, but there's only so many voices I can do, haha...

Another thing, I feel a bit crushed when it comes to writing characters and the overall story. I already wrote the executions, who would die, the plot (in short), and made the character designs (...using GL2 bc I still need to draw official splash art, and I only used it to make their designs).

So in short, I kinda need help in making this little fan project (even if it doesn't turn out to be a video series and it only turns into like- some kind of fanfiction or a slideshow with a fanfiction reading in the background) but I'm way too scared to ask for it TvT

I already have a HUGE google doc with the characters, deaths, executions n stuff, but practically nothing in terms of writing the actual story lmao-

I'll probably end up cancelling everything in a matter of time bc of my own issues, but who knows! I'll keep you guys posted if anything happens. Feel free to ask any questions :)

[lizzylucky]

Thoughts and Observations From The Movie, Part 2/4

Welcome to part two of the silly things and fun details I picked out from the Rise movie!

My sister and I often pause the movie here to reread the options on this whiteboard for destroying the key, and it never fails to make us laugh. My one question: when and how did they test Donnie’s stomach? He wasn’t even there!

Also, feels like a callback to TummyTello, somehow. It also leaves me wondering why Donnie’s Stomach was an actual idea for destruction, regardless of whether it involves TummyTello. Guy must eat some crazy stuff XD

Further content below the cut!

“So… You’re Running Out of Ideas.” by Syr E. Piphany.

Okay, okay, bear with me- I actually have a little theory for this one.  This is a screenshot from when Leo asks Donnie to locate Raph. Donnie tells him that Raph is practically- and then that he actually IS- on top of them. What I noticed here is that on this visual locator he has, none of the little character icons are oriented the same way their real life counterparts are. All six characters are in the same area and standing pretty close to each other, and I would assume that, kinda like google location sharing or snapchat location maps, you have to zoom in further on the map to get more specific locations.

This kinda sounds like it’s going nowhere, but what I’m getting at is the idea that when multiple people are in the same location, given that we know the icons will not be oriented perfectly to the people they represent, they’ll probably appear in the same orientation every time. 

Which would mean!! that Donnie has intentionally designed his tracker app to have icons show up with this orientation when people are close together, furthermore meaning that he chose to put his big brother in the center of them all on purpose. As an artist myself, this could be coincidental, but very rarely are things like this done without purpose, and I like to imagine it’s a subtle way to represent Donnie thinking the absolute world of his big brother; that he would turn to Raph for guidance even before Splinter, whose icon is on the other side of the circle from Donnie’s. 

I also love that the icons for Donnie’s best friend and Donnie’s “twin” are on either side of his.

And, as one last afterthought, I think this could also be a subtle nod to how Raph’s krangification becomes the center of the story and main motivator for all the characters for a huge chunk of the movie.

Does ANYONE ELSE SEE THIS?????

That absolutely looks like a masked face in the biogrowth at the top of this building. In truth, it actually looks a lot more like one of the paper ninjas than it does the Shredder, but the similarities are still there, and it works as further evidence that the Shredder and the goals of the Foot Clan were all hinged around the Krang.

Is anyone else floored by the size of this skull that Krang 1 or whatever is sitting on? I always would forget about it pretty immediately given Leo’s cheeky “surprise!” here, but this thing looks like the head of a freakin’ dragon or something. I wonder what it is? And how it got to, let alone died in, the technodrome.

 One genuinely non-serious theory my sister and I occasionally talk about is the idea that the technodrome is actually a massive egg, and this was the incomplete embryo of whatever it would have become. Further non-serious evidence, which can be seen in the next images, is that the technodrome, in spite of being extremely technologically advanced, is clearly… alive, not just pure tech. Actually, everything the Krang use seems to be bio-mechanical in nature, to some degree.

It will probably be made pretty clear here that Donnie is my favourite character, just a fair warning XD But man I love this scene- one, because of the Autism-ADHD solidarity shown between PB&J immediately previous, and, two, because it’s actually a seriously incredible show of strength from Donnie. 

Many fans of Rise, and of Donnie especially, also have Autism (like Donnie is confirmed to have) and/or ADHD (including myself) and understand that sensory issues mixed with New Things You Don’t Understand can be absolute hell. Like, ruins your day, renders you inactive, unfocused, nonverbal, made to be a shaking ball of anxiety, hell. Not always, but the point still stands.

Additionally, and as much as I am all for Donnie’s softshell not being seen as a big weakness because it’s natural and still more protection than any normal person has (not to mention the advantages it offers him in terms of swimming and flexibility (also probably feels really nice for scritches and sleep piles)), it actually does seem a relevant point here that this is, technically speaking, the most vulnerable part of Donnie’s body. So actively choosing to expose it to an unfamiliar and highly advanced, invasive and living technology on top of the difficulties that come with the above described neurodivergent tendencies goes against his nature in so, so many ways, but he does it anyway. 

Mikey being worried about his vulnerability here, in spite of feeling out of place before, makes a lot more sense from this perspective. Knowing all that, honestly-- it just never fails to impress me.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

[clove-pinks]

I am away at a furry con (MFF) since Thursday, and now I'm watching the 2022 Netflix production Scrooge: A Christmas Carol for the second time. The one with DILF Scrooge, or as my wife called him, MILF Scrooge (for Miser I'd Like to F—).

Fair warning that I am a huge Christmas Carol fan and love/would fight Charles Dickens (like most people who have read a lot of him), and I enjoy this story in many different iterations. The Netflix animation looks cheap, but you get used to it, and I personally loved the new elements added to the plot, which kept it interesting while adhering to the same basic frame. Scrooge now has a lovable old mutt to humanise him (which belonged to Jacob Marley, who is now a dog guy), Marley is an older man with crazy Continental moustachios, and there are rock opera-esque musical numbers. If it's painted in very broad strokes, so is the original.

I liked the nod to the historical Charles Dickens by making child Scrooge in this version work at a blacking factory due to his father being in debtor's prison. They really didn't do justice to the 1840s clothing usually depicted in historical versions of A Christmas Carol—everything was very darker solid colours like a later 19th century look (and props again to the Muppet Christmas Carol for going so hard with the costuming). Scrooge's nephew wears trousers with the hem at the ankle and what looks like spats; I would have liked to see him in 1840s-style trousers with instep straps. Or least a very low hem, as shown in all fashion plates of the forties.

Several characters have TV Tropes-worthy Incurable Cough of Death, it's great. This is why the world needs more 19th century authors still getting TV and movie adaptations (although maybe not more Dickens, who has way too many already).

The costuming may not be very good, but we get a lot of Scrooge in his dressing gown and I feel like they went for a more 1850s aesthetic? Big sideburns but not nearly enough stripes and plaids. At one point in this version Scrooge yells at a young couple smooching that he sees from his window, reminding me of Old Tomkins.

All of the voice actors nail the singing parts, which helps.

My wife accused me of liking the characters because they "look like Frank Mildmay." Sweetie please Frank Mildmay is from a much earlier part of the 19th century; not all of the 19th century men I like are interchangeable!

While this version is not really "historically accurate" by any metric, it was maybe accidentally more accurate by making the extended cast more racially diverse. A real area of working-class London in this era would have a noticeable amount of Black people, European Jews and other immigrants, Lascars, etc. So that part was more realistic despite the musical numbers.

Accessibility note: the captions are great!! I rely on captions due to auditory processing disorder, and these were unusually good, describing sound effects and musical cues as well as dialog. A+ job on the captions.