#cgi animation aspect

[frederickabberline]

It literally just hit me that we're going to see a new, prettier Undertaker animation model

[magnus-the-maqnificent]

Thinking once again of a potential animated TMI series

[is-that-your-true-face]

I dunno. Does anyone think that western film studios in 2025 are capable of doing any better of a job with a "live-action" Zelda film than what IGN did over 15 years ago as an April Fool's joke? 😅

That aside, there is one thing I'd prefer and will likely regret lol that the 2027 movie do that IGN did not and that is to let Link talk, at least if they adapt a game that's not BotW/TotK where his silence is actually canon. And if he is left silent, give an acceptable reason for it and treat it according to that reason-- he does yell, after all, so he's not physically incapable of vocalizing.

But if he does talk, please, for the love of all that is holy, don't have him talk more than is believably necessary. We already got burned by a talking Link once. Let the reintroduction of that concept be gradual.

So uh how we feeling cause I'm not exactly excited. I'm gonna be cautious with my expectations.

[0ssianic]

the war of the rohirrim is a good movie 👍

[quercus-queer]

In case anyone was wondering about the Lilo and Stitch movie here’s the highlights from someone chronically online enough to have seen the movie through snippets lol

Nani does in fact give Lilo up to the government, ppl defend it by saying David’s mom is her foster mom now but Lilo is still in fact in the system and can easily be taken away from David’s mom if conditions are “unfit”… the exact same situation Nani was in before lol

Took away all of Nani’s support system that the original movie develops for her except for David/his mom

Had Nani treat Lilo like a burden for “realism”… anyway…

Lilo literally says “you’re so smart Nani, I think you should join the Marines”

Nani was deeply connected to her culture and family, that aspect of her just isn’t there at the end of the day (and part of that is because Sydney is not indigenous Hawaiian and it shows… in looks, actions, and line delivery) and the conclusion to her story being giving up her kid sister to the state and leaving her home for a “better” education and future is atrocious

They had her go to California to study marine biology. First of all, it was implied she was a pro surfer in the og movie no hint of marine biology. Not every persons dream is college and it doesn’t need to be part of everyone’s story… the choice of “putting yourself first” in order to get a better education is very #girlboss… Second of all, Hawaii has multiple universities with marine biology programs that would give far more money and benefits to a native Hawaiian than literally any Californian school let alone UCSD lmao

They changed their island from Kauai to Oahu… most obvious reason they did this was because that is the island their resort is on and overrun with tourists. However, with this location change and their wack ass narrative changes they also made going to California even more blatantly propaganda because that is where the University of Hawaii at Manoa is… ALSO, Oahu has major cities… you know how Sitch has to find new meaning for existence because he can’t do what he was programmed to do because he’s stuck on an island with no big cities… yeah…

On this note, pretty much removed all substantial tourism commentary

Jumba is the villain, he sounds like a whiny computer nerd and it’s miserable

Pleakley is lame, rip queen 🕊️

Lilo is pretty well adjusted and normal lol? No fights, no biting, no trying to curse her enemies etc… she’s literally a normal girl which… alright then???

There is no Gantu (rumor has it this is at its core because they don’t want to make law enforcement look bad)

CGI is literally so fucking bad like besides aesthetics the actors literally don’t point to where Stitch is and when they’re supposed to touch it they often miss lol

Editing is also terrible. Every scene lasts like 5 seconds and is jarring, so genuinely terrible I think shows like this are gonna further ruin kids attention spans lmfao

Nani misses Lilo’s actual performance instead of just being late to pick up Lilo from practice after getting into a fight…

Myrtle isn’t white #diversity win

No ugly duckling subplot

Bubbles is not the social worker and is working against the gang (again removing all of Nani’s support system, he literally shows up for every holiday with the fam in the og)

Changing the social worker role from an externally imposing black man with good intentions to a gentle woman has some undertones tbh considering this is the justification: “According to Camp, it was easy for audiences to believe that a towering man with a "Cobra" tattooed on his knuckles was a social worker in the animated movie​​​​​. However, that kind of exaggerated character design doesn't translate convincingly to live-action.”

The new social worker literally tells Nani that the right thing to do is to give up Lilo… very different from Bubbles doing his best to keep the sisters together. Keeping family together is a prime goal in social work btw…

[angelmichelangelo]

Any thoughts/opinions on TMNT 2007, either in comparison to other iterations or about the characters/relationships in general?

oh boy have i got some thoughts on TMNT 2007 !

straight off the bat i’d say it feels so set apart from all of the other ninja turtles movies we had/have at that point. they’re a little older (i can’t remember the canon ages but wasn’t it pretty much fanon for a long time that they were at least early 20s?) and starts their story off kinda at their end.

2007 was also supposedly a continuation of the 1990s movies. whether you want that to be solid canon or not (personally i don’t) but either way, they’re kind of in “retirement” stage of their lives with everything with shredder already happened and this is kind of just the aftermath of that.

the relationships in this movie !!!!! oh my GOD it’s just near to absolute perfection. i usually don’t always super love the classic raph/leo tension just because sometimes it feels a little overdone and can really take away the shine from other aspects of the movie, but i really do like how different it feels here.

raph is so obviously not coping with having so much of his family dynamics changed. and i think that’s why the whole aspect of the movie being set after all of their biggest most heroic adventures works well, because in a way, this movie just highlights how much their lifestyle has impacted them. imo raph struggles with having leo so far from home. he’s going through a little bit of separation anxiety, can’t regulate his emotions properly and lashes out bad.

leo obviously takes this all the wrong ways. he’s going through something too so he’s blind-sighted to the fact that raph isn’t intentionally trying to piss him off. they’re back butting heads maybe because it feels most familiar in a way that hasn’t been since leo left.

b-team in this movie is just. chefs kiss. so much to unpack here, too.

donnie who is finally being highlighted for how much he does for his family behind the scenes, normally quietly bumbling along, now here he is, trying to keep a sense of normality and feeling under appreciated!! which rightly so!! he kind of just gets this shit load of responsibility thrusted onto him when leo leaves and raph distances himself. he’s treading water in the deep end, barely afloat but rarely does he really lash out because he wants to do good, and keep peace (mostly for mikey’s sake, I would argue)

and mikey. oh mikey. easily one of my favourite interpretations of mikey in this movie. he’s kind of mellowing out and maturing in a way that i think hits leo with full force when he comes home from south america. all because he’s had to grow up and pick up the pieces left behind in the wake of their family kind of slowly crumbling apart.

they’re all hurting in this movie but mikey’s hurt is so painfully obvious and so masked when he’s putting up with a job he really hates, barely seeing much of either brother he has left because of their schedules and feels cooped up. he trips over himself with just pure glee when he sees that leo is finally home. he’s still that kid at heart, despite everything, that truly believes that his big brother can mend this. it’s a really bittersweet thing to think of him just hoping his life would fall back into place again after it being so out of sorts for so long.

TMNT 2007 isn’t a perfect movie by any means. whilst i adore the way the turtles have been written, is still falls into the trap of making don + mike background characters towards the last half, giving leo + raph the limelight once again, and sometimes leo does act a little out of sorts but i could just pin that down to him having some sort of PTSD, so it remains high in my ranks regardless.

it’s not perfect but it’s still really really good. the animation holds up pretty well. it paved the way for 2012 in regards to CGI turtles. the voice acting is something i don’t see hyped up enough. nolan north as raphael?!!! i feel like as a fandom we definitely sleep on that fact way too hard

the plot is original and fresh and it’s clear that this wasn’t just a cash grab, but a real love letter to the franchise and to the fans:) the people that made this cared for these characters and this world and it shows :)

the fight scenes are really fun and easy to follow. the leo raph rooftop scene is just incredibly done. whoever wrote that.. please always be involved in tmnt wherever you are.. honestly pure fire some of those lines

nobody feels like a caricature of themselves here, which often happens with tmnt when a new universe is introduced, just to establish their character roles. i really love the thought of them in the wake of the fight and after the dust settles and they’re trying to cope with their feelings and problems separately because they don’t know what else to do. they need a million hugs, please, i would love to see more of this that isn’t just the last ronin. show me the turtles in their 30s trying to adjust to their lives changing drastically as they’re getting older and recognising their trauma, finally. i would eat that up!

in anyone hasn’t seen TMNT 2007 (which, i’d assume most of my followers probably has) then i would absolutely recommend it !!

forever mourning the mikey centric sequel we were supposed to get before the studio shut down and forever sending wishes up that there’s someone out there with enough money and a dream to bring it to life in some way shape or form (i’ll take a comic. a mini series. anything lmao)

TMNT 2007 will always have a special place in my heart :)

[littybeech]

Ten things the Twilight animated series can do better than the original movies (if they care enough to, please add all your own points to this as I will, too.) :

1. Include ALL of the book scenes, without having to change them to make them easier to film (for obvious reasons, since it’ll be animated they shouldn’t have much issue there.)

2. Their daughter, Remoulade can actually look like the book described her (or better or worse) and not the CGI monstrosity we got twelve years ago.

3. Make all the characters fit their book looks to complete accuracy. Alice was 4’10 and the movies made her 5’5. They let Edward have brown hair when he’s a ginger. Jacob and the wolf pack had better be above 6’5! I want 23 year old Carlisle and 26 year old Esme playing parents to like three legal adults and two 17 year olds.

4. The parentification of Bella Swan, by both of her parents, mustn’t be ignored. Bella was making sure the bills were getting paid by the time she was 10 cause her mom was ‘too flighty and distracted’ to do things like that consistently, she also learned to cook and clean early on too because her mom’s cooking was inedible and she’d improperly mix cleaning solutions dangerously. She got a job at 14 and took care of the groceries and any other issue necessary on top of being in AP classes in school. By the time she moved in with Charlie, she was basically more of a parent than he was. He did the bare minimum to ensure her car’s safety by installing snow chains on her tires without telling her and she cried because she wasn’t used to being taken care of.

5. How she cries when she’s angry is peak girlhood and I hate that they got rid of that in the movies. She stomped her feet bro, like c’mon she was so angry and anxious and annoyed all the time and they only focused on her angst.

6. Integrate aspects of Midnight Sun too, maybe incorporate them both so we can get a more full story. Twilight on its own was a bit of a snooze fest compared to Midnight Sun. We’re gonna pretend that Edward hunting and eating Esme’s abusive ex-husband isn’t hot af?

7. Add in more character’s back stories. Alice’s abusive father and stepmother, Emmett’s gambling and womanizing as a human in Tennessee, etc.

8. Unfortunately we need to make it clear that Charlie’s not winning any father of the year awards here either. He congratulated Jacob after forcing a kiss on her and joked about Jacob pressing assault charges on her after she breaks her hand punching him away.

9. Maybe ask why the Cullens…’need’ so desperately to come back to Forks every couple of years? Like they’re multi-billionaires, they’re immortal and there are plenty of gloomy, cloudy places they could live in semi-permanently. Why Forks when they know the Quileutte tribe knows what they are and they know it makes them so uncomfortable? It just seems unnecessary.

10. More of Edward reading Mike Newton’s inner-monologue. I know it would depend on whose perspective we get but I think the idea is hilarious.

[fruitsofhell]

I'm starting to reach the point of Tenna brainrot where I'm beginning to develop that critical eye for his fandom portrayal, bolstered heavily by him obviously having some Tumblr Sexyman Bait mixed into him, but as someone who is usually violently repulsed by true Tumblr Sexyman Bait I have been having a blast noticing how he subverts those tropes. For me right now the biggest tell of people focusing on him as A Tall Guy In A Suit vs the little goofster he is how softly they draw him, cause its also my biggest fixation with his design.

Tenna's has a uniquely soft and rounded character design for what he is - a CRT in a shiny suit rendered as an early CG model. Not only did Toby take that aesthetic in the direction of SNES pre-rendered sprites so that instead of being polygonal he would have that unnaturally smooth finish, but he also took the time to blast Tenna's palette with a bright lavender tint and no black outline. Then on top of that even, his CRT head is stylized to be as rounded as possible, and almost every pointed aspect of his character besides his nose has a soft taper just by nature of the lumpy, clay-like model he is. And these details serve a couple of goals:

First and most interesting to me, combined with the big cartoon gloves and coat-tails, Tenna's softness really helps sell him as a Rubber-Hose adjacent - and therefore old and nostalgic - looking character without it being too forced. Or even worse, trying to bluntly mimic the Rubber-Hose style in a way that would have made me furiously critical lmao. Literally the defining part of those designs that I see people mess up is how rounded and 3D the characters were. Besides oddities like Mickey Mouse and a few other super early characters' ears, characters of that era were overwhelmingly designed to make sense in 3D space. The style is sometimes referred to as the "center-line style" because on reference sheets you would see characters broken down into spheres with lines down the center to help portray depth.

This to say, if you want to get to the fundamentals of that style, an essence that can transcend the most obvious aesthetic tropes of pacman eyes and black and white, you make characters very tubular and *rubber-hose-y*. Tenna is very much that and in a way that dates him back to a nebulous essence of that old cartoon style, as well as making him distinctly a product of clumsy but adorable early CGI -- in a way harkening back to the early baby steps of 2D and 3D animation. (And fuck it, it kinda gives me digitized claymation vibes sometimes). Nevertheless, this collection of subtle and unsubtle visual motifs come together to make Tenna appear and feel old, charming, and most importantly, soft.

If Toby wanted to like really, really say "This guy is a TV cartoon" a far more obvious aesthetic to draw from would have been Hannah-Barbera type characters in the Modernist style, which uses economic design tropes that are so embedded in our idea of a cartoon you will find attempts at a rubberhose style accidentally using them, despite the styles being diametrically opposed. That gorgeous Hatsune Miku design for the vocaloid song people keep super-imposing Tenna over is a PERFECT example of the artstyle on a character who's design otherwise has nothing to do with it, emphasizing the focus on bold, flat shapes that often don't reflect any sort of real depth. Tenna could have easily been in a style like that, but no matter how many circles you may use in the design, they'll never be spheres, they'll never have that sense of depth and therefore almost tangible softness that Tenna's design has. Toby's artstyle, though not heavily related to either tradition, does rely a lot on flattened perspective and bold shapes in character designs, so it is very interesting to see Tenna arrive intended to portray an era aligned with those pre-existing conventions, but completely blowing them out of the water.

This because on top of evoking that nostalgia, Tenna is meant to evoke it with a specific kind of softness -- to make him as unassuming and friendly-looking as possible, almost unnaturally so. I don't think it's meant that the form is a distortion or facade of his normal self, but the fact that Tenna is the softess, puttiest thing in the entire canon so far implies there is a really strong reason why he's uniquely defined by these ideas. I mean we saw Tenna lose his cool and drop his silly act, and we got The Sprite - which is so gorgeous in its own way - Tenna's electronic themeing finally pulling some sharpness out of his design, made unnatural both by bringing attention to his inhuman parts and clashing so oddly with the soft rendering of his model. But even there the intention is not that Tenna is dropping a facade, that state was abnormal, and if the electronic in him was meant to conflict with his putty exterior you would maybe see more angularity on the TV in contrast to it. He coulda been a real ENA-like, if not by default then in that expression, but NOPE! It's all still cohesive!

In design, Tenna is constantly vying for Ralsei's spot of softest fluffiest guy around, and any aberration from that portrays him as being uncharacteristically harsh. He is defined by being soft, comforting, fun, nostalgic, and basically not anything that usually defines a Tumblr Sexyman. He's not particularly skinny by cartoon standards (nor curvy, I support you guys but we gotta be FR), he's not edgy, he's not secretly cruel (more just has the potential to manipulate people), and he doesn't have those toothy pointy design tropes that define a lot of those characters. He does for like, one sprite, and even then as I said its clashing in every way against his default personality. And I feel like when people forgo these aspects in his design, I can begin to assume they are doing so in his personality as well.

With constantly sharpened static teeth comes a more cunning character than he is ever portrayed to (successfully) be. Every time his suit is drawn to be more angular or his joints more defined, someone is forgetting his suit was primarily design to appeal to children, not parallel his old business partner. Obviously the only valid people in the Sharp Tenna Camp here are those who draw him in the Modernist TVA style (and everyone else cause this post is not that serious). But like as someone who actively has been studying why he doesn't give me the Tumblr Sexyman ick and being really delighted by how he maneuvers around all these tropes in a SUPER visually and narratively compelling way, I am a bit disappointed to see him just drawn like... as TV Head Tumblr Sexyman #9.

DONT MENTION HIM next to that asshole from Hazbin Hotel either OMFG! Tenna is my (and Kris') best friend from the corny gameshows, cease the slander!!

[sometimes-i-write-good]

ok i might be in a minority here, but i have nowhere else to put my opinions (so obviously tumblr.com gets to hear it)

the live-action snow white wasn't bad. it was actually a pretty good live-action remake. they added new songs, created depth to characters, and fleshed out a story that probably wouldn't have translated well as a bar for bar remake. ((HTTYD is a good film to go scene by scene since it, on its own, is a strong story with developed characters and solid arcs.))

Snow White (2025) actually creates a love interest with a personality??? there's more to it than 'this guy sees her singing then shows up at the end' - like the guy in the original is in there for all of 5 minutes. that doesn't give a very realistic *true love* story

[we will all ignore how i am delusional and "fall in love" with any fictional character in media i've never seen bc of an edit i saw at 3am]

BUT my biggest thing I would like to address is how 'anti-woke' everyone is when it comes to Snow White being remade. Let female characters be soft and feminine. This is a movie about being fair and kind, why can't she yearn and be in love? Ya know, those kind of comments.

just know if someone says something like that, they haven't seen the movie. there's soft, yearning love in this film. they literally ADDED two songs between snow white and her love interest. she still very much finds love - and her kindness and fairness plays a huge part in that.

the ENTIRE message of the film is about being kind. rising above fear and anger and selfishness to create connections. snow white is still very much the gentle soul she is in the original. there's a growth of character there that the original doesn't have (and yes, it is very much because snow white is the first disney princess in the first full-length animated film so obviously they're not going to have the plot beats nailed down - i am well aware) and i'm glad that the little kids who see this film are going to have a good role model of a leading character. she's not 'ultra-feminist' the way everyone has been so dramatic about. she doesn't spit in the male love interest's face or have a single moment of 'you think i can't do this cause i'm a girl, huh?' it's literally written as if you gave the original snow white a backstory where she's a princess to a kingdom she loves and someone cruel and punishing took over. i dunno they just replaced the bits (again, these existed very much because for the first full-length animated film they were going off the knowledge of 'cram bits in there, the more bits the better') of the seven dwarves with lore that strengthened the new story aspects. she creates connections while she lifts and inspires people.

just please try to remember this is a movie teaching kids to be kind if you feel inclined to leave a hateful comment - critiques are different. by no means is the movie perfect. there's PLENTY of things i wish were handled differently (*cough* the evil queen. cgi dwarves. wardrobe/hair *cough*) what i do hope people take away is that this is the way live-actions should be handled. maleficent works bc it expands on a new character, creates something new while still bringing the old things we love to life. it doesn't feel like a pointless money grab. snow white, at the very least, tries to do the same thing. (that doesn't mean this wasn't a pointless money grab but they attempt to hide that fact better than some other films)

feel free to take everything i say with a grain of salt. i am a disney adulttm (derogatory). don't hate on rachel zegler though. she is, by far, the most redeeming part of the film and does not deserve catching shit for Disney being the overarching problem in all areas.

((also if you want to watch this, please pirate it!))

uhhh i mean, totally don't break the law to watch this film...

[marciaillust]

ok dmc final thoughts; liked: - stylish op, - fun musical choices (the chase scene set to last resort by papa roach made me smile. The genocide set to american idiot made me cackle), - the main character is quite goofy yet endearing when they find the time to showcase that aspect of him (ddr my beloved), - good to excellent animation with a few surprising choices in ep 6 (and the 3d was decently incorporated, people who complain about it don't know what being attacked by bad cgi looks like),

disliked: - the show (8 eps x 20 mins) doesn't have time for anything, including characterisation, motivations and naturalistic exposition which results in tell don't show exposition galore, - the subpar storytelling efficiency and repeating flashbacks don't help, - id say on the whole the series feels like a recap episode of a greater arc? or like when an anime makes a movie out of a season of television (considering the 8 eps of 20 mins that's 2h40min in total which might as well be a slightly long movie. and tbh when one looks at it from that perspective it starts making a LOT of sense. Like imagine you're watching idk an action movie; the decorum of the media kinda informs you that we got about 2h, maybe not everything will be elaborated on - we're operating within a certain constraints of form. A tv show reads differently in that regard and tbh harms this project in my opinion) - the show comes off as insecure in many many aspects: from trusting the audience to understand what's happening on the screen from context clues, to dialogue and character's behaviour within a scene - not much to write home about frankly tl;dr I'm rating it eh out of 10. I'd be hard pressed to find something uniquely worth experiencing about it

[marsoid]

Hi Mars! I really like your work and I especially love your comics ~ they each have the perfect amount of intense and gay af moments, which are important qualities that I look for in the webcomics that I read! 🤣☺️

Another thing that I love about Long Exposure and Ride or Die is how cinematic they are, and that particular aspect is truly a testament to your talents as an artist!

My question for you is have you ever thought about what either comic would be like if they were adapted for film or television, and would you want them to be live-action or animated?

AHHH OHH GOOD QUESTION

if Long Exposure were live action, i'd want it to feel like this:

very moody lol. think Chronicle, Short Term 12, King Jack (all of which were inspirations)

if Ride or Die were live action, i'd want it to feel like this:

dramatic and dark (neon noir?) but with big moments and action highlighted by intense color. and a mix of practical effects and cgi for the horror elements. thinking like, Drive, Baby Driver, Watchmen (tv show), Bullet Train, and Candyman (2021).

NOW, IF THEY WERE ANIMATED....

surprising no one lmfao i would love if ROD or LE looked anything like spiderverse!! it's a big style inspo for the ROD comic as well

to add onto that, ENTERGALACTIC is another spiderverse-esque styled movie that i love the look of. if you like spiderverse i recommend it btw, esp if you're looking for something more adult oriented

there aren't a ton of cgi animated movies/shows i like the looks of admittedly, so that list kind of ends with spiderverse and entergalactic. BUT!! in terms of 2D animation, captain laserhawk would probably be the first thing i point to for animation inspiration if ROD or LE were to be TV/movies. i'm a new big fan of bobbypills animation.

for ROD specifically, i love the animation (esp the car animation) in Chiaki's Journey, a series by the Line Animation studio. it's BEAUTIFUL!!! i'd absolutely die happy if an animated ROD looked anything like it

special bonus shout out to this love death and robots episode directed by Robert Valley (who's also behind Motorcity)... I don't know if a full LE/ROD series/movie would fit in this style, but i DO LOVE IT SO MUCH so i thought it was worth mentioning lol

anyway yeah dreamy sigh!!!

[princesssarisa]

My personal misgivings about Snow White (2025):

*That it looks like a soulless and unnecessary remake of one of Hollywood's most important classic films.

*The awkward-looking CGI dwarfs.

*Rachel Zegler's sassy smirks in the teaser trailer. Yes, the animated Snow White can be sassy in her own cute way, but not like that! Those expressions look too self-consciously snarky and modern. Fortunately, the full-length trailer doesn't include them as much, so maybe the actual movie won't either.

*That some of its "innovations," which Disney pats itself on the back for, will just be rehashes of other adaptations of the tale. For example, Snow White coming into her own as a leader and (apparently) leading masses of people to reclaim her rightful throne from the Queen? That was already done in Snow White and the Huntsman and at least two or three other adaptations too!

*The marketing campaign's disrespect for the original film, though it was much worse at the beginning than it is now. I agree with the public backlash against the vibe of "We're improving on the original!" from Rachel Zegler and Gal Gadot's early interviews, which Disney probably encouraged from them. That was annoying, just like it was when the cast and creative team of 2017's Beauty and the Beast did the same thing. But at least the backlash seems to have made Disney realize that this time, the "We've improved it" approach wasn't going to work. Now the marketing seems to be glorifying the original Snow White instead, and highlighting all the aspects the remake is lovingly recreating. But they're still saying that with this movie, the story "comes to life"... as if it wasn't fully brought to life by the original film! As if simply being live action makes the remake more engaging and "alive" than the animated version, when part of the reason for the original film's wild success was that it proved just how effective animation is as a storytelling medium!

Aspects of Snow White (2025) that I don't have misgivings about:

*Updating Snow White's personality and goals to appeal to modern audiences, give her more agency, and be less focused on romance. Like it or not, it isn't 1937 anymore! The animated Snow White is a lovely character, but she does reflect a 1930s male perspective of ideal womanhood. I'm all in favor of defending traditional, soft femininity, but lately I've seen so much glorifying of it and so much harsh backlash against heroines who don't conform to it ("girlboss," "NLOG," "pick-me girl," etc.) , that it feels almost as if modern "feminists" just want girls back in the kitchen.

*That Rachel Zegler doesn't have snow white skin. They're giving an alternate explanation for Snow White's name.

*That Snow White's love interest Jonathan is a commoner instead of a prince. Who cares?

*That the dwarfs and Snow White will clean the house together instead of Snow White cleaning for the dwarfs. That's not an appalling piece of wokeness! A German film version of the tale from 1955 already has them do just that!

[alpaca-clouds]

Something that will forever be a thing that drives me nuts, is people not understanding that yes, there are aspects about art that are subjective.

Look, no matter how good or bad a piece of art is, it does not mean it will connect to you. That is fine. As a picky eater, I always likened it too food. Were those eight-course meals that I got served in France objectively better than a fucking Pizza Hut pan pizza? Yes, they were. I will still choose the pan pizza every time, thank you very much.

And it is the same with media. One of my favorite movies of all time is Van Helsing. And I can tell you a lot of things the movie does good. I like the soundtrack a lot. I find the comedic timing in the movie amazing. And some of the actors are great. However, is the main reason I am watching this, that I am a simp for Hugh Jackman and Kate Beckinsale? Yes. Yes, it is. And while the script is funny to me (like I really do enjoy the humor), it is certainly no master piece and if I was a youtuber, I could probably do a two hour video on stuff about the script I take issue with. Don't get me wrong. It is not a bad script by any means. Just... very mediocre. I am able to tell that. Just as I am able to call out the CGI that has aged a lot worse than the CGI in other movies. And some costume choices that were... less than ideal. I still love the movie.

Or maybe an even better example: I freaking love the movie Megamind. It is one of my Top 5 animated movies of all time. But the script was written by two guys who had never learned or studied screenwriting. And this shows. While the script had been edited a ton by people who knew more about screenwriting than them, it absolutely shows in some places, that it was written by folks, who just did not know how to best pace out scenes and stuff, how to work with show and tell, and how to think cinematically. But you know what? To me it does not matter, because I love Megamind and Minion as characters. Again, I am not saying it is a bad script because of it, just that... it could have used even more work than it got.

And this, too me, is part of the reason why I even in my childhood had a big issue with people who are like: "I love this piece of media and hence it is objectively the best thing that was ever created!"

I had this a lot in my first real fandom. Digimon. Because, yeah, it is perfectly fine that you connected more with Digimon Adventure or Digimon Adventure 02, but this does not mean that either of them were better written or better crafted than Digimon Tamers. Like there are very obvious problems in the writing of the first two seasons. Mind you, these days - after getting my answers on why this happened - I am way more chill about it. Like, I get that the people who wrote this were still trying to do the best with the options given to them. But partly because those options were limited, that "best" was just not the same "best" Konaka could do with Tamers, due to on one hand having more experience, and on the other hand just being a lot more stubborn about certain things.

Again, no, that does not mean you have to love Digimon Tamers. It also does not mean you have to dislike Digimon Adventure or Digimon Adventure 02. Like, heck, while I would argue there are more problems in Adventure, they are a lot more noticable in 02 - and I still like 02 more than Adventure, despite the animation being at times worse than some of those fan animatics on youtube. And yes, I mean animatics. Actually things that are not fully animated. Because 02 was suffering from timecrunch in the production a lot, so the animation really at times is a mess.

Why am I talking about this now?

Well, mainly because I am once more annoyed by this. By the fact that people do not acknowledge the fact that writing and art does have objective factors. And that there are rules to follow - or that if they get broken need to be broken for a good reason. Like, you absolutely can for artistic reasons subvert any writing or artistic rule. Totally fine. But only if it is done for artistic reasons and not, let's say, because of fucking time crunch.

And yes, this is still because of Arcane, and me being very, very sick of people claiming season 2 was well written. It was not. I am sorry, there are rules to writing and those rules were broken. Most notably rules of set-ups needing either a payoff or a clear subversion, and the good old screenwriting rule of "show, don't tell, you are a visual medium after all". (Please note at this point: Show don't tell was always for Screenwriting and visual media, it was never meant for pure prose writing, as in prose writing you will always just tell - given words are the only tool you have at your disposal. Yes, it usually works better if you write about characters in whose head your POV is not more in terms of reactions, rather than 'XY was angry', but other than that... there is only so much you can do as someone just using words.)

Like, it is perfectly fine if you totally connected to the story or specific characters. I mean, despite seeing the flaws with the writing - given they were really, really noticable - I would lie if I said I did not cry at some places. But yeah, if you were all there for Caitlyn, Vi, Viktor or Jayce, all power to you.

But the writing was not good. And from all we know the chances are very good that the reason the writing was such a mess was executive meddling of one sort or another. (Very probably the writers getting less time to tell their story than they had expected.)

And that exactly is why I am so fucking pissed at people being like "Oh, but the writing was great!" Because what you are saying with that is basically: "Creative interference and executive meddling is the most amazing thing. Creative people should not have their own freedom. Who also cares about people learning writing as a craft. Let's just let AI write this stuff, I don't fucking care."

And I actually do mean that last part. Because while I do not think that AI had written anything for that season, the time crunch made it so that there were certain things showing up, I have seen a lot in AI writing. Mainly the tell over show, and the set-up without payoff. Because AI is obviously not good with setting up and paying things off, because the AI does not plan a story. It just gives you a line of words in a row, that it has predicted have a high probability to go with a prompt it was given. And those usually do not have a payoff to set-ups.

Also, yes, I am very much the person, who will always give the creative behind any project a lot more benefit of the doubt, than any executives. There are times where it turns out that this is not warranted, and it turns out that indeed, something was weirdly written, because like some guy, who might or might not have been called Joss Whedon, wanted to write something that was titulating for himself. But still, in many cases where a piece of media turned out to have obvious issues, and someone broke their NDA, it often is the case that some executive was to blame for the mess that existed. Be it, because they wanted to pander to a specific audience. Be it, because they wanted to force in certain advertisements. Be it, because they decided that the creatives would just not have the time to do the creative stuff - or not enough time within the piece of media (runtime) to tell the story they wanted to tell. Be it, because some producer decided that his nephew Larry needed to have a role in the show, and because now this role was played by Larry, who was after all his nephew, this role needed to be way bigger than it was originally intended to be.

No, I do not know what happened behind the scenes of Arcane season 2. I can make some educated guesses, but I do not know it. But I know at least in part what happened behind the scenes of Digimon Adventure and 02, and exactly that makes me kinda pissed of people excusing stuff that was fully and completely there because of executive meddling.

Because yeah, most people who write for TV and movies have in fact somehow learned screenwriting. Not all at uni, some are self-taught. That is totally fine. But they have learned writing. The producers meanwhile have not. And it shows.

[hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger]

Marvel have screwed up 4 Spider-Man cartoons in a row. Combined with Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends from the 80s they clearly have a fetish for Spider-Man having a social circle of fellow superheroes and so I wouldn't be surprised if the characters in YFNSM who were swiped from other super hero titles will indeed wind up as those superheroes.

Also, am I the only one grossed out that for the sake of having a diverse cast they swiped from all these different superhero brands and race and/or gender swapped other characters when they could have just used the actually diverse characters from actual Spider-Man comic books?

Like, why swipe Nico Minoru from Runaways when Sha Shan was right there!

Why bother race swapping Norman and Harry Osborn* or do a borked adaptation of Tombstone (where he is neither albino nor connected to Joe Robertson at all) where he is your Flash Thompson substitute when you could have used Hobie Brown and/or Randy Robertson?

Why crowbar in Amadeus Cho or a random Wakandan woman when you could give some attention to Phillip Chang and Glory Grant?

Why have a race/gender swapped version of Curt Connors, a character for whom his masculinity is probably critical for various reasons,** when you could use Komodo?

You can't even argue that these characters are too obscure to be used because to normies, shit even amongst most comic book fans, Nico Minoru and Amadeus Cho are also obscure as shit.

This isn't even getting into the sacrilege that is how they utterly FUCKED Spider-Man's origin, both in terms of how they handled the spider bite and Uncle Ben's death and by having Norman positioned as his father figure.

Not to mention...the animation. Shit is the animation janky AF. I literally watched an episode from the MTV Spider-Man TV show to compare it to YFNSM and, whilst that has aged, it was in practically every regards VASTLY superior to this garbage. That includes the CGI animation btw. Yes, this show's animation is WORSE than a Spider-Man TV show from over 20 years ago!

Shit dude, I remember people hated the MTV show back in the day, but looking back that was only because we were spoilt without knowing it. Back in 2003, the comics, cartoons, video games, movies, etc that we were getting were all different, they all had their unique spin on things. But they also ALL fundamentally understood this character, his world, what it was supposed to be. We too it for granted that a Spider-Man story would have Peter Parker, you know, in character.

Now? Now it's a fucking MIRACLE if they don't entirely fuck him up.

*Two characters for whom it is probably integral for them to be caucasian. In the iconic Drug Trilogy by Stan Lee, a core aspect of the story was the fact that Spidey encounters a lower class black teen (whom he didn't know) afflicted by drugs as well as discovering his affluent white roommate was an addict too. Randy Robertson literally spells out that people mistakenly think it's a problem particular to lower class/African American communities, when in reality it affects everyone. he even stares daggers at Norman when he says this.

**Such as drawing a parallel between himself and Peter. Both because they are scientists transformed into animal themsed superhumans but also because Curt's actions endanger his family, making Peter question if his powers and choices to use them may also endanger his own. A problem that, in my eyes, resonates more for a male character.

[worflesbian]

i've been looking at extinct megafauna again so. targ post!

given how ubiquitous targs seem to be i think it makes sense to view them as a genus (or family?) with domestic pet targs being a different species to livestock targs and wild targs having several different species across the various ecosystems of qo'nos.

pet targs (left) are obviously based on boar (in a little costume no less!!), but livestock targs (right) seem to be more warthog-based, and ik this could just be the difference in design from next gen to enterprise but i like to think it's because they were bred for very different purposes! it's hard to gauge the size of the cgi targs in this episode of enterprise, but in the same scene some dead targs are hung up in the ship's galley and they're smaller than the average earth farm pig -- i wonder if these are equivalent to the goats that were brought on earth sailing ships, and targs on wide open farms get much bigger?

then there's wild targ to consider! wild targ supposedly travel in herds, unlike wild boar on earth which keep to smaller groups of 8-15. descriptions make it sound like targ herds can get pretty big, and i know that smaller animals can be herded but i like to imagine wild targs and their herds as bison-sized. like the extinct earth hell pig (entelodontidae)!

they seem pretty much exactly what the writers of trek were going for with their descriptions of targs. hell pig :) i think the challenge aspect of hunting is really important for klingons so having wild targs be a lot bigger and meaner than the ones we see on screen would make sense, which would lead me into the discussion of food supplies in the empire and who hunts vs who farms but that's a whole other post. as is the implications of targs being both a food species and a pet species! were pet targs and livestock targs once two seperate wild species who were domesticated alongside eachother? or one species domesticated in two different directions? share your thoughts 🐗

[sunnylovesgirlythings]

“We do you hate berry bitty adventures? It wasn’t thaaat bad.”

*inhales*

• it used the excuse of “promoting healthy eating” to cut a group of the main characters that included one of the only darker skinned ones.

• severely whitewashed the only darker skinned character it retained and visually reduced her to just a palette swap of the white main character in a different outfit.

• removed all gender nonconforming aspects of characters design and personalities. Making every single one of them hyper feminine (except one but I’ll get. To. Her.)

• neutered all the characters personalities to the point they all feel like the same person with a slightly different quirk stapled on.

• removed the texture from all curly haired characters hair leaving them all with straight to at best wavy hair.

• removed the gimmick of them all wearing cool hats (the brands never recovered from this and I’ll never forgive them for it. Bring back the hats!)

• actively removed non conventional traits from characters such as removing plum puddings glasses and retconning female antagonist sour grape from an older woman to a teenager. God forbid a woman be old.

• making sour grape the only slightly alternatively dressed one while inventing her a nicer hyper feminine twin sister.

•despite that she’s still only allowed to be at best a bit harsh.

•replacing all the unique and interesting pets the characters had with a set of boring colour coded dogs

•had genuinely awful and stilted cgi as its standard animation.

And i could go on and on and on and on.