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quarterette · 4 years

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Utawarerumono: The False Faces ep 13-25 Liveblog

Gonna just straight up do individual episode comments, since the second half is gonna be denser in content. As with the first half, this is a rewatch and will have spoilers for the games.

Opening Comments: Man there’s not much movement in the animation but its beautiful all the same.

Ep 13:

- *spit take* why are they sending Rulu? IDK if it was because the directors weren’t informed about the whole “baby of the family” detail because I can’t imagine Shis letting this happen

- Interesting how instead being of a secret force that Oshtoru sent, Haku and gang are now the accompanying force to Rulu and Atuy.

- I’ll be pleasantly surprised if Entua makes more sense in the anime than in the games

- oh wow Dekopompo is even worse in the anime, straight-up running off on his own.

Ep 14:

- I like how instead of Atuy catching the arrow the twins have a force field. Granted, it make Atuy even more of a non-entity

- the extreme long shots of the CGI soldiers are really nice. I don’t feel like we see the loss of formations as they come into contact with each other often in war anime

- why are the twins running like that - imo that way too much movement for dainty girls (maybe I’ve watched too much anime)

- wow they totally recontextualized retrieving Shinonon and cut down a lot of potential runtime.

- did they seriously remove Atuy’s bloodlust

- you know open-eyed Ougi is growing on me, him and Nosuri have such lovely eye color

- poor Maroro

Ep 15:

- I’m relieved that the adaptation art makes Raiko look less like Lelouch. Always seemed like lazy design to me, him and Mikazuchi look nothing alike.

- did they introduce the telepaths in MoD? I can’t remember.

- that triple-take of Zeguni dying was just silly. If it were one slice x3 it would have been fine but this... Oshtoru be flexing with that mountain.

- I never really felt calling Witsu an Eva was quite right but with the Akuruturuka.... yeah I see it.

- truly we are in the war arc proper now.

- Heh wouldn’t it have been interesting to have the proxies’ subservience kick in instead of having the twins shield Haku. Oh well missed opportunities. IMO it would have worked well with the accelerated timeline the anime needed to achieve.

- what is with the triple takes this episode

- ah haku wasn’t even able to save them gg

- post episode revisiting the VN comments:

they hint at the telepaths, and as I thought the Vurai razing the city wasn’t in the VN. It was a good showpiece and works with Vurai’s characterization, but messes with Haku’s as a cost - the VN suggests that Haku inherently can be ruthless (he suggests scapegoating Moznu for Anju’s kidnapping, which the anime totally skips over), while it looks like the anime is gonna use this mass destruction as the reason for steeling his heart. I can’t say I hate that the writers chose to have the main characters in the fray, but it definitely requires more suspension of disbelief that everyone got out okay compared to the VN.

- Interestingly we don’t see Oshtoru’s mech form at all. I do like the increased bro scenes between Mikazuchi and Oshtoru

Ep 16:

- Yeah we immediately feel the ripples of that last episode changing Haku’s trajectory... its a logical trajectory but... ugh. I’m not sure how I feel about such a contrary Haku. It wasn’t really a thing in the VN? So frustrating augh. Utawarerumono was never a story big on moralizing about war... and the anime writers aren’t doing a great job adding it in.

- I’m 99% sure they pulled some of Ukon’s lines for comforting Haku here from a conversation they had in the VN waaaayyy back around the gigiri fight, making the scene all the more frustrating. The concepts of powerlessness and loss of life is something that Haku had been introduced to the moment he woke up and had already been working on dealing with. I can’t say its an invalid take that he’d be shook over mass destruction (I mean, most people would) but it’s a sharp deviation from the VN.

- Oh wow they’re totally gonna retool the banquet to deal with haku’s trauma instead of him dealing with his memories of being the LAST OF HIS KIND aren’t they.

- yeah they did

- oh god don’t say the word seduce haku, rulu’s gonna die from blood loss

- lol i don’t remember the twins being tied up

- rulu is dead

- and now haku is dead too. I think only Ougi and Yakutowaruto escaped unscathed.

- this did give me the bro bonding that I had been missing in the show thus far. Not enough drinking scenes! like literally the VN is literally just baths and booze between the action lol

Ep 17:

- ah finally the flashback episode. lol all the crunchyroll comments are like “watch the first season”.

- haku calling his new buddies family... oof mito’s knowing gaze makes it all the much sadder

- Haku:”did you need to go that far” Mito: “lemme do it again with Tuskuru”

- hah “reposition your camera” nice, easy way to not show his face

- heh stares at your sister-in-law’s butt, that’s actually a pretty subtle hint without adapting any of the monologue from the VN that he kinda had feelings for her

- damn this is probably the most complete vision of the future we get in any medium

- hey to be fair the ameterasu blast was mutsumi and not exactly a product of mankind fighting each other - but it does go to show just how little Mito knew about what was actually going down

- to continue with my frustration, we see that haku is called out by his bro that he has a habit of “conceal don’t feel” so it makes his emo bit last episode even more jarring - though in hindsight I guess his depression comes less out of the blue for his friends now - its just that the reason is misattributed

- oof “make up for lost time”

- ooh I like the final scene with Woshis as the delegate to Tuskuru. The VN did fine without it but man what a cliffie for those watching the first time.

Ep 18:

- oof we’re not going to have any shinonon/kiwru antics are we

- man I can’t wait to see Benawi - he was my favorite chara in Uta1 after Touka

- wow they really did just ignore the fact that Kiwru is the prince of Ennakamuy and cut him out of the party

- dugh never mind I don’t like ougi’s open eyes here

- speaking of ougi they totally glossed over his role as reconnaissance

- and have they even mentioned that nosuri is trying to retake their clan’s name?

- cocopo still best bird

Ep 19:

- of course you’ll be sweaty haku, boro boro only wears that brown undershirt in tuskur smh

- i love how all of the dads we see dote on their daughters so much

- of course only now do they mention the fact that atuy and haku are drinking buddies and we just have to take it at face value

- actually seeing those sailor uniforms in action make atuy’s regret that much funnier, the stills don’t quite do it justice (though really, it’s the sound effects carrying the team)

- lol the background soyankekur antics are great

- cocopooooo noooo damn this romance with mukkur is great

Ep 20:

- huhu woshis was allowed down to the underground garden huh

- benawiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

- dang they didn’t use the hot air balloon ;-; so disappointing like if they do it this way they won’t even get to retake the supplies ;-;

- i guess its a good way to hint at kuon’s identity

- something is wrong with kurou’s face

- also where the fuck is nosuri - i know kiwru is a lost cause for this show but nosuri too? they really are trying to wipe out the tactics seen in the VN

- i do think the line about kurou’s line to kuon about “ripping the country in half” is nice - can’t remember if it was in the VN but at this point most of the good lines seem to be coming out of the VN

- ugh the twins are such a cop out, still think they should have went with the hot air balloon strategy

- we hardly knew ye mito

Ep 21:

- dang I’m pleasantly surprised by these CG soldiers

- bye bye munechika, still salty you can’t turn into a mech

- oof “I’m sure my mom was someone like you” this show lives and breathes on dramatic irony

- bye bye anju, what was the point of actually having oshtoru there when the tea was delivered? makes him seem more incompetent than he is, though entua was nowhere to be seen - imo for the best

- oshtoru, an honorable man through and through, giving up your mask, lowkey too honorable for your own good

- okay one of my favorite things is how regularly dekopompo is ignored during the generals’ council meetings; overlapping voices isn’t really a thing in the VNs due to its nature as a written medium first and foremost

- oh interesting Oshtoru’s men are coming to defend him that’s new

- oh no torture time ;-;

- post episode VN notes: ugh they also dropped the Woshis power grab of locking Dekopompo and Raiko outside of the gates

Ep 22:

- Yes go be a dad Yakuto and stop Nekone from doing stupid shit please oh please oh please

- Man they are seriously retooling oshtoru’s downfall aren’t they - wish it didn’t come off so crudely planned. Like, y’all know Oshtoru is loved by the people, did the generals not think some sort of rioting would happen if you let that info go public? Granted the original plot of having Entua sneak the info out is pretty contrived... but at least it better preserves the perceived competency of the generals by forcing a smaller timeframe in which everything goes down.

- man people watching this will be so confused next season when they realize Kiwru is a prince

- wut Kuon you should know you probably won’t be able to get info to the princesses once y’all leave. Good that Shinonon is going on ahead to Ennakamuy though.

- eh are they’re gonna try leaving by sea this time? even though Ennakamuy is in the mountains?

- secret tunnel ~ ♫

- aw no Evenkuruga reveal for Nosuri and Ougi. Though, I guess the anime never established that their base was in the Hakuorokaku basement...

- you know, since they just generalized the jamming barrier it’s kinda nice to see that the gang had to sneak in the hard way. IMO that’s one of the “game design justifies the plot” moments - the VN tries to keep everyone together so you can have all your unit options when fighting, but let’s be honest smaller strike teams work at times.

- oh hi Honoka, you’re not arrested here? guess not.

- oh god have they been translating Atuy’s “onii-san”s as “mister” this whole time? I can’t say that “love” was a better translation but that’s just tragic

- I wish we got more hints that haku actually has been doing some training (aka the SRPG parts of the game) rather than these random moments of competency and knocking out the guards.

- good god oshtoru your honorableness is gonna be the death of you. how can you trust Vurai. Seriously idk how it’s gonna turn out here, but Vurai literally wants to see Anju dead in the VN.

- ok i lie splitting the party was a terrible idea. they are taking way too long to convince oshtoru to take a stand. these men are way too stubborn. jk its fine

- whelp there goes the boat

- aw yeh Yakutowaruto lets go

Ep 23:

- Yakutowaruto continues to be a badass

- ugh and of course Oshtoru gets hurt, and he’s not gonna tell anyone

- ok I’m enjoying how acrobatic these twins are

- the plot change ripples continue to be seen; there’s no distractions at the gates since dekopompo is inside the gates. Raiko’s strategy stuff does make for good tension tho.

- ugh the fact that Soyankekuru is in the capital is gonna complicate things. The moment Atuy is seen to defect he’s screwed. That’s gonna change the timeframe of things second half.

- lol Kuon god powers time, hope there weren’t too many casualties. Poor Nosuri now has two sacks of people to deal with...

- ok I feel like I’m seeing more poor art quality this episode

- wow it seems that everyone’s on board for some arson today

- bruh don’t take him through the sewers Oshtoru’s wound’s gonna get infected

- oh god who thought it was a good idea to give Rulu a blade.

- Cocopo best bird. Period. MVP.

- Soyankekuru, what a guy.

Ep 24:

- ooh mech fight in the city? oh nvm its just a sword fight. a sword fight between two beasts. thank god vurai ain’t that dumb

- wait they said there was a barrier in the palace, but i don’t think there was a barrier for the outer walls? why the frick didn’t the twins just teleport out for the last bit? they were pretty close to the gates... unless they needed the gates open anyways?

- vurai? not dumb? scratch that, good god do y’all not care about the safety of the people? guess not cuz it’s MECH FIGHT TIME (ok, if we’re honest oshtoru’s the one who initiated so yes he’s equally dumb)

- water vs fire, groudon vs kyogre, this is what animation is all about YASSS

- the twins’ shield is too OP

- haku please stop indulging Nekone

- will the twins actually be able to seal Vurai? they were kind of trash at doing their job in the VN (though they did have the good excuse of being exhausted for this particular instance)

- ok that nekone running sequence is jank

- damn haku blocked that punch? oh no he’s on fire

- looking like nekone’s “it was my fault” is gonna be part of a cascade of setbacks rather than the final blow. I’m kinda glad - the VN’s take was probably the most exasperating part of the whole story - gutwrenching but also made me want to punch her. I’m up for arguing whether or not taking that away was a good thing

- oh no the salt. no. how could you put it at the post-credits scene.

- vurai’s confirmed dead? that could be a problem next season.

Ep 25:

- dang what an opener giving us no info just kuon looking sad. we had emo haku now get ready for emo kuon i guess

- nuedori is probably my favorite song after kimi ga tame, such a good song to overlay the time skip over

- man anime viewers must be so confused. like they saw Haku and Oshtoru get out of town but only Oshtoru show up. man this is so effed up.

- no not the fan noooo augh brokoro in the kokoro

- sad nekone really sells it doesn’t it

- dang I knew Ennakamuy was surrounded by mountains but I guess the anime went and interpreted that as a CRATER

- at least kuon didn’t leave until later in the night?

-i know the twins did a spell in the VN as well but seeing the visual change between haku and oshtoru is a bit silly

- what’s with the flower field that’s so cheesy

- i can see why someone said laughed rather than cried during this particular use of kimi ga tame - the alternating shots to his saltification is just silly, there’s so many prettier shots for showing people dissolving - like the VN gave you a very serviceable “standing on a cliff as the sun rises and you fade into dust” why didn’t you take it

- side note in the VN i was imagining it something like this scene from CCS but different lighting (sorry I could only find the english dub on short notice, timestamp at 1:13:24):

youtube

- also how could you get everyone off model during such an important part

- you know what I’m just gonna pretend that there was some really bad production crunch so they had to do a rush job smh

- i do like this orchestration tho

- oh god the cheese never ends, now it’s raining

- that said it’s not terrible, but definitely missing something compared to the VN

- haha with some of your decisions next season you might just end up in Denebokshir Haku. jk we all know how it ends

- boro boro ;-; yes go hug your kid she needs all the comfort she can get

#utawarerumono #utawarerumono: the false faces #utawarerumono: itsuwari no kamen #spoilers #things i've watched

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grelrik-da-bozz · 5 years

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starco, something to think about...

Ok, so it has been almost a whole week and I’ve been celebrating about this ‘final’ they brought to the horrible curse that was cast on Marco and star almost 4 years ago.

It really is good to see that the one most affected by the curse (Marco) is finally free of that... disgusting situation he was in, but since we are talking about Disney, and considering what we have seen during the third season there is a huge possibility that they will spoil everything and come with a “we loved each other before the curse” scenario, even though there were no signs at all (specially from Marco) that there was anything but friendship between them.

Now about this bad transition we have three direct responsables!

The first one being the curse of the bloodmoon itself as it was the direct thing to affect Marco's personality and interfer with his decisions after being cast on both Marco and star, they both acted differently, slightly at first and almost unnoticeable on star but on Marco it was... quite obvious specially in season 3! But there were times in season 2 when you were all like “wtf? why did he do that?” Running with scissors is a good example. Follow me on this ok? Marco decides he doesn’t want to return back home as he has a different life in Hekapoo’s dimension (making star useless as now the one who has his attention in the ‘adventure cool section’ is H-poo) but then star asks him “What about your parents or your friends... or... me?” we see Marco do something quite particular... that in this last episode (Curse of the Bloodmoon) had a special sound and now everything is different! Marco had decided already, he was a 31 years old man, had made up his mind, but the curse forced him to change it. And I honestly hated that part of the episode! How come star decided to casually forget mentioning Jackie She should have said “What about your parents or your friends... or... Jackie... or me?” (some people have argued that star had feelings towards Marco before the bloodmoon but most of them base that presumption on the book*).

Now, the second direct responsable is star, for not accepting Marco's advice when she decided to go see what Tom had prepared for that party, even though Marco had already been right many times before about things related to the outcome of how bad everything could be if she continued using magic, doing what she considered right, following her own ideas, etc. and that only because of the Mary sue powers they ended up a-okay. (Honestly she should have at least said "Marco has already been right sometimes I should listen to him this one time, I mean, he is my friend.”) But no, she didn't, and do you wanna know why she didn’t listen to him? Because star is a strong independent “warrior” princess and that makes it all fine, right? I mean as long as a girl says that she is a strong and independent woman it doesn’t matter how much damage she broughts to anyone, we have to see it as positive. So yeah, sarcasm aside, a huge chunk of responsability falls on her shoulders**.

Finally the third responsable for how badly the curse developed are both “the plot” and Daron & the team that helped her, we all have heard some couple of things about the show, starting from the fact that Daron was already quite sure of how she wanted the show to be, she had more or less worked on it in her head since she was... how old 14? 13? More or less a teen age for sure, and therefore had been munching on that bone every once in a while for the last 15 years! Also is worthy mentioning that she said a couple of times that she had changed things during the course of the years but the idea was there, as solid as it could be and with steps she wanted to follow, now, following her trajectory so far and knowing a couple of her works we know she, for some reason, liked to add some drama in her stories***. And also she seems to be more or less on board the “social/genres/let’s-break-the-stereotypes train” although that could also be Sabrina Cotungo, who, by the way, got promoted to director for Season 3 (promoted might be a bad term as what actually happened is that the other two guys in charge of directing the show in Season 1 & 2 left after they finished), therefore took care of some of the importante decisions for the third season and apparently is the one to blame for it to be so... shity, Now I wonder if she was in charge of the story boards in the episodes where there was social drama issues... Anyway, returning to the topic of blamming the horrible development of the bloodcurse and the third group of responsables, Daron (as far as we can asume) had this idea of Marco being a really tough subject for star when love was in the middle, I wouldn’t be surprised if she actually had planned for her to fall in love with Marco but that she would also suffer about it cause he had eyes for other girl! The thing is they developed in more than one episode the story for that to happen, they made Marco a really brilliant co-protagonist and many felt quite nice with him finally getting to get the chick he wanted, many out there celebrated it, of course there were also starco-fans who hated it, but the thing is we can’t deny the way they two got together was good! ponyhead helped Marco and Jackie to break the ice, to finally have him telling her she was his crush, accidentally of course but she did, star helped as well, but at the end of the episode we had a strong hint that she liked Marco, that was only a hint, something that star had not really gave her mind too much time to think about, she wrote in her diary something about Marco, how she felt about him and didn’t want him to read it because obviosly she probably wrote that she felt something strange, like butterflies in her stomach when seeing him. She was more or less oblivious to how strong her feelings where and I feel like the real issue here is that star was never meant to end with Marco, I feel that Daron wanted her to suffer a little for Marco and then turn the page, to return back to Mewni and continue her life, sad, angry with herself, but ready to give her heart another chance to find a good guy to love.

*: For those out there who don’t know about it, every cartoon of the last decade (perhaps even a little more than a decade) has done some thing(s) like that before, bringing something special or that expands the lore and that exist only in a type of merchandise that you have to buy in order to read and know. MLP, Adventure time, etc. It’s not something “new” that SVTFOE has and in all of those mentioned cases they had been clear about one thing: the book/magazine/comic IS CANON but it is a SEPARATE CANON, they are not interconnected, even if the author says so. Lauren Faust for example! She had said before some things about specific ponies, ideas she had or things she had planned for some moment in the story... but the show has pointed at other direction. So yeah, we can respect the book but we can’t really take it as 100% interconnected canon. **Ok, I have to point something else about this star issue, yes, she is not the only one responsable, some could argue that Tom is the ‘main responsable’ there, but to anyone other there wanting to say that I’d like to know your answer to this: Did Tom plan involved star and Marco dancing? The answer is a huge NO, yeah he is the one who wanted to dance with star, something bad cause he would have never told her that her sudden change on feeling about him was due to the curse, but it was something he had thought for what he believed was the best, he had never thought about Marco being his friend at the time nor did he planned for them to have their souls linked. And, as people suggest star was already a little bit in love with Marco before the curse so, that would explain why those feelings were slowly increasing in her heart for the latino boy, but then there is a little something I wanna talk about. Star managed to finally overcome her crush on Marco and decided she wanted to start dating Tom once again, after she tried to dress him like Marco, overcame her addiction to his musk, etc. She returned his hoodie and closed the portal... they could have ended it right there, Marco could have returned just casually and for some episodes, fighting Meteora and stuff. ***About the drama that Daron had done in some other projects she did before SVTFOE, we have at least a couple which are the most well-known ones. There is this short animated thingy where the girl is captured by some folks, they take her away and her “boyfriend/husband/lover/whatever” takes it on his shoulders to go and rescue her, when he arrives and is all ready to break the ‘bad guy’ it is revealed it actually is a Bad girl, a MILFy looking bad girl who acts all sassy with him and in a matter of seconds they are kissing right there in front of the “princess”. The short clearly points to the idea of “hey girls, never expect a boy to free you from a dangerous situation, free yourself and punch his face because you are strong and independent”… you probably understand my point, is not a bad lesson but I feel some other Disney princesses did it a lot, lot better. So anyway, the idea is clear, the ‘main character’ who casually looks quite similar to star. The second short I remember is this one where this girl is cutting with scissors some pieces of cloth that other two girls pass her, to work, she is pretty much daydreaming and ends up being fired, her dreams are all like stuff from the 70s you know, way too colorful and stuff (this short is all drawn in black and white) which is fine, but the design and others… makes it feel odd. (Personal opinion). The third one is probably the most famous one, this young girl leaves her house after her older sister tells her to stay away while she sees the pictures of her ex, which seems to be dating someone else, the young girl (has a lizard as her pet, she talks and hears the pet talk) enters a pub and drinks some beverage she steals and has some kind of alusination and gets scared, fortunately the older sister’s ex recognizes her and acts as if he had been looking for her to help her out of the situation, taking her back home and… that’s it. As you can see two of these three shorts have things in common, a protagonist daydreaming with what seems to be ‘magic in her imagination’ which is what we know star was going to do (she didn’t have magic, they suggested Daron to make the magic real minutes before she presented the story board for the pilot) and secondly there is some naughty thing going on as both the blonde princess and the older sister seem to “like” their couple/ex while they are kissing/dating someone else.

#svtfoe #star vs the forces of evil #curse of the blood moon #blood moon #bloodmoon #curse of the bloodmoon

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nemrut · 7 years

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Fanfiction: The Changeling by Annerb (Harry Potter)

Summary: Ginny is sorted into Slytherin. It takes her seven years to figure out why.

Rated: Fiction T - English - Drama/Angst - Ginny W. - Chapters: 11 - Words: 189,186 - Reviews: 392 - Favs: 1,248 - Follows: 1,008 - Updated: Apr 19 - Published: Apr 19, 2011 - Status: Complete - id: 6919395

Link: fanfiction.net

So, I burned through this in the last few days and I have to say, it has been quite a while since I last enjoyed a Harry Potter fanfic this much. The way I understand it, there are three stories planned, two of which are complete as of this point, the first one about Ginny through the years 1-6, culminating with the Battle of Hogwarts, than the period after the war and before her return to Hogwarts to finish year 7 and then the last story which has yet to be posted about year 7.

I think the way this story stands out to me is the way it handles the Harry Potter cast in general, in that it has an excellent handle on each and every character. Every person is pretty much their canon self. Malfoy, Snape, Fleur, the Weasley's, they're are all perfectly in character. I think this is pretty much the most perfect depiction of Draco Malfoy that I have yet to see in fanfiction. He is exactly as he is in the books, no dumber and no smarter. Ginny, of course is changed but not in a way that replaced her character with someone else entirely but rather that she is still Ginny, only changed through her different life experiences.

I didn't mention Harry, because him I felt the one changed the most, but also in a good way. With Ginny being a different character and thus actually a bigger influence on him did allow for some genuine changes in his character and an openness to reflect on himself and others in a different way than before. He is still a good character and distinguishably himself but a bit more developed.

The OCs, speak all the Slytherins and some Ravenclaws I actually really enjoined. I completely agree with @Newcomb in that Antonia, the whole time, reminded me also of Ophilia Karait, only not as a cheap knock-off but rather based on the same character archetype, that of the immensely competent, cunning and mysterious older Slytherin girl.

Here is a confession of mine: I fucking love the immensely competent, cunning and mysterious older Slytherin girl archetype. Honestly wish there were more of her pulled off competently. Her taking Ginny under her wing is something I was super happy about. As such, her presence was enjoyable whenever she appeared and she never overstayed her welcome as she's used sparingly. (Here I confess that I also was shipping her with Ginny, but it never broke the story for me as the Harry x Ginny thing is being built up rather organically)

Ginny has two friend-groups in Slytherin, one being her two best friends Smita and Tobias and the other being the girls of the parlor and I find that while the latter group may not have been developed as much as I would have liked, I still appreciated each and every character.

The friendship between Tobias and Ginny worked really, really well for me. It's true that Tobias is not a groundbreaking character, however, there is such a profound sense of friendship in the way that he interacts with Ginny, that he actually became one of my favorite characters in the fic. I thoroughly enjoyed his interaction with others and the interesting parallel he served to Snape. In a way, it was very subtle and clever critique of Snape. Tobias and Snape serve very similar roles, only Tobias never allowed himself to be broken and twisted by life as Snape and never took it out on the helpless by being incredibly bitter and mean-spirited. Spoilers after the cut but the conclusion before for those who do not want to click further:

It has its flaws but nothing at all game-breaking and if you at all like Harry Potter fanfiction and the wizarding world, you owe it to yourself to at least check it out. 5/5

The story also had me genuinely fooled that Tobias and Ginny had grown apart, that what happened to their group, the incident at the Ministry and Smita's absence were enough to break apart their group, especially with Ginny spending less and less time with him, clearly not knowing how to handle this. So much so, that I it was an actual surprise that Ginny told Neville that Tobias had been spying for them. I guess my only complaint in that regard is that I wish there had been a hint or something to foreshadow this, or maybe there was and I missed it. Which leads me to Smita and while she is the less impactful person, her role I actually enjoyed even more. Yeah, her character doesn't leave much of an impression, I honestly had already forgotten her name but it's so rare to see such a realistic portrayal of the development of friendships in a medium where friendships are celebrated to the point of giving you unrealistic expectations of them.

Sometimes, people grow apart, for better or for worse. Smita was an incredibly important person for Ginny for a few years but that's simply not something that necessarily will always stay that way and that's fine as well. There wasn't a big fight or an ideological rift between the girls, just different priorities and life took them on different roads. Sometimes friendships can't be saved and that's not necessarily a bad thing. I honestly loved this.

The Parlor was something that I also loved. It's a clever invention, one that feels particularly fitting into the Harry Potter mythos and works exceedingly well in the story as it serves to explore Ginny's characters in a multitude of ways, as both a regular member desperately seeking advice, companionship and a place to belong and later as a leader who is responsible for each and every single individual in it and is probably the thing I am looking forward the most in the third story, to see Ginny trying to rebuilt the Parlor, to invite new girls into it and see on whom she will ultimately pass the torch to.

In general this has been a great story exploring Slytherin, one of the best I have seen in fanfiction. There is no Slytherin wank, no bashing. Slytherin is not a "pit of snakes". It's not Game of Thrones with schoolchildren where every character is Littlefinger, Varys or Cersei. No senseless scheming or arbitrary ranks or whatnot. They are just kids for the most part, but it is still distinguishable from the rest due to its unique nature.

As a whole, Ginny has been an excellent character to use for this, genius even. Since she is a year younger, the story gives us a new cast to play with and at the same time, removes her from canon events enough that the focus is always on her journey and not necessarily derailing the plot, although the canon elements are still happening in the background and shaping her life. Ginny finding her place in Slytherin has been a gripping journey, one told expertly with not a spelling mistake in sight and with smart stylistic choices.

For example, I loved that her first year was basically a haze, as both her worldview being shaken and being controlled by Riddle had a tremendous impact on her, one that she couldn't shake for a while. It was carving her own space with Quidditch, the life-line that the Parlor threw her and making friends with Tobias and Smita that ultimately allowed Ginny to get on her feet and finally claim her place in Slytherin, which was, on a whole, really satisfying to read.

Ron dressing in Slytherin colors to cheer on his sister was also one of the more heartwarming moments in HP fanfiction that I've seen in a while. It deserves mention that I also loved how her family reacted to her being in Slytherin, how they tried but their prejudices would get in the way at times and say thoughtless things but which they also ultimately were able to overcome.

As to the negatives, I guess I agree that there could have been a bit more characterization on the Parlor girls, although I guess that will come in the third story. Still, some more distinction among the girls outside of what they pursue wouldn't have hurt. And while I appreciated the story not having Ginny derail the plot by overtaking it, as this is very much a Slytherin Ginny story and not a Dark Lady Ginny story, I have to admit it's a bit weak that Ginny's influence on Slytherin hasn't really altered anything so far. Sure, I guess there will be a slightly more positive perspective on Slytherin as a whole, especially in the younger years, but the fact that Ginny and the additional Slytherins who stayed had virtually no impact on who died and who didn't is a bit weak, especially since Ginny had a device that was able to suck up all magic which, in hindsight, was a bit OP, way too good and ultimately still pointless. "I'll have twenty" indeed, that thing is probably the best magical device after the Hallows and better than the freaking cloak.

I liked that the Slytherins faced stark consequences for their bravery. There was death, injury and fallout from that, stuff that the second story explores in an interesting manner, only that the impact is really only felt by them, not by the plot at large, if that makes sense. Their impact is restricted to them alone, not the larger picture. Could have led to more or less deaths of canon, something like that. Make things better or worse and not have them stay exactly the same. Looking back, that is really disappointing. The second story, while still interesting from start to finish, does get a bit overly angsty at times, especially Harry but at the same time, Harry's conflict with the Ministry is something that I really appreciate and found to be the most realistic I have seen and I am including canon in that. I quite like the trajectory that is being set up and I hope this will ultimately lead to Harry to becoming something other than Auror and that this will allow the story to throw off the last shackles of canon. Snape (and I don't think there is any chance of Ginny naming any of her children after him, if they have any) has been handled really tastefully, I have to say. Also rather in character, he hasn't been glorified or bashed. Instead, there was nuance in the way the story used him and different characters saw him differently and all for good reasons. As I said earlier, Tobias is a nice contrast to Snape and while admittedly he wasn't in as extreme of a situation as Snape ultimately found himself, he managed to handle himself much better than Snape did at that age. Characters in general haven't been whitewashed, the Malfoy's being great examples of that. Even after their turn, they didn't do a 180 but rather remained their slightly antagonistic, aloof selves who aren't suddenly super regretful and nice but rather awkward, distanced people who don't quite know what to do.

Narcissa going "you might not have helped me but rather doomed me as a traitor if I'm still getting thrown into prison" was one of my favorite lines in the story. Not a lot of stories do that. Even Harry, he's not being treated as the next Merlin or something but rather the rock to the scissors that was Voldemort. Sure it was important but that doesn't mean they like him any more for it or value his input outside of the public perception of him. The fact that Harry is not leading the Ministry in any shape or form and rather has only some minimal influence that he has to carefully balance is fascinating and super believable.

I think, ultimately, that is the greatest strength of this story. It is so very grounded and mature that it never overextends itself and knows exactly what it is it wants to do and then efficiently does it. This is not a story that has been written on the fly but rather was meticulously planned and edited and the effort is shown and has paid off in every line.

#fanfiction #harry potter #hp #the changeling #annerb

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unixcommerce · 4 years

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Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American Women are Starting Businesses 6 Times More than White Male Peers

Due to the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the protests that originally broke out in response to the killing of George Floyd captured on video, corporations have pledged hundreds of millions of dollars to social justice causes, as well as to help struggling small businesses.

Companies like Google, Facebook and Salesforce have committed grants and funds to increase entrepreneurial opportunities to people who traditionally have been shut out of billions of dollars represented by the top venture capital firms – Women, Black and Latinx entrepreneurs.

And the company that Facebook and Salesforce chose to facilitate their SMB grant programs was Ureeka, a startup founded by Melissa Bradley, David Jakubowski and Rob Gatto, that provides mentorship and guidance through their platform to help their community membership of entrepreneurs’ get answers to their most pressing questions.

Interview with Melissa Bradley of Ureeka

I recently had a LinkedIn Live conversation with Ureeka cofounder Melissa Bradley to learn more about Ureeka’s mission to help underrepresented entrepreneurs succeed, and her own recent experiences raising $8.6M in VC money. Below is an edited transcript from a portion of our conversation. Click on the embedded SoundCloud player to hear the full conversation.

smallbiztrends · Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American women starting businesses 6X more than white male peers

Small Business Trends: Tell us about your personal background.

Melissa Bradley: So I’m a serial entrepreneur and investor. I’ve spent the good portion of my life trying to start businesses and run businesses that I have working for someone else. So I am a typical entrepreneur. And during the course of time where I’ve probably now created about four or five businesses, I’ve always run into two big problems. One is finding people who actually believe in what I do and are willing to support me. And we can talk about what that support means. And two, finding investors. And part of that is obviously because I’m a woman. We know the statistics are not in favor of women getting investments. And then some would say, I have the double burden, I say I have the double opportunity that I’m also a woman of color. And I’m also gay, which is sometimes transparent and not transparent. So I’ve got a few things that do not put me in the typical category of white, male, straight starting business.

And so I have found over the years, that it’s been really hard for people to one, be willing to even listen to me and understand my idea, but two, and probably more importantly, believe in me and my idea since many of my businesses have specifically focused on people of color, which is ironic, right? Because demographically, we are about to be the majority. In many states, we are the majority of the population. We are clearly a trendsetter when it comes to culture. We clearly rule certain industries. Like we just talked about sports and fashion and media, and now beginning to really emerge in finance and FinTech. But they don’t look like me.

And so I have struggled with access to people who are willing to help me in terms of good advice. I’ve struggled with access to people willing to invest in me. I’m not looking for a handout. And I’ve struggled for people to actually even want to, in some cases, do business with me. As my first company, people have said if I knew that you had been a person of color, I’m not sure I would have contracted with your company, which is just absolutely absurd.

Small Business Trends: Tell us about Ureeka.

Melissa Bradley: Ureeka is a platform that is designed to democratize access, short and simple. Our whole mission is democratize access and reduce friction, particularly for small and medium sized businesses. But recognizing that the next wave of entrepreneurs are indeed women and people of color. We have a very specific focus on reaching out to them and making sure that they can grow the business they want to grow. And that is done primarily through coaching support, through access to content, that behind the scenes chatter that happens in those firms. And then also access to capital.

Small Business Trends: You talk about Ureeka’s intentionality to go after the “fastest growing, largest and most interesting market opportunity – which is not the Harvard and MIT pedigree, but the underrepresented entrepreneurs”. Why is that Ureeka’s area of interest?

Melissa Bradley: I think there’s two major drivers. So one I’m a finance major, right? So I go where the numbers say. And so I think it’s important because African American women are actually starting businesses six times their white male peers. And so it’s just a natural evolution with a 40% decline in white men starting businesses and a sharp increase in the number of black women in addition to women in general. I think it just says, that’s where we need to be spending our time, right? When investors say, “Who is your market?” We want to pick a fast growing market. No, not rocket science.

The second thing I would say is that we also know that, that market is typically burdened and saddled, yet they do great things, right? I mean, African American business owners and Latino business owners are actually the highest employers in this country. So it just speaks to the fact that go where the numbers are, both in terms of employment and startup and growth opportunity, but also go where there’s a market need. And there’s some research that I did almost two years ago now that said that it takes a black entrepreneur a quarter of a million dollars more to start the same exact business as their white peers.

So there’s clearly a market opportunity and gap. And I don’t know about you. I don’t know the record of the RAMS, but I’m going to bet on the underdogs, right? If nobody has given me money and nobody’s paying attention to me, but I am killing it when it comes to job creation, then I’m going to go with them. And so that’s really what the drivers are and what the whole premise in terms of why it’s important that you go after underrepresented founders. And there’s also a slight nuance there because I know in this world of high tech, there also tends to be a focus on VC backed businesses, which tend to be tech businesses. And those are great. We love them. We are a tech business, but we should also know that there’s all whole swath of businesses that are not tech businesses that are doing well, and that are making millions. And only 10% of black entrepreneurs even run tech companies.

Now, we want to change that. We want more folks to feel good about that, but you get 90% that are not running tech businesses, that are running retail businesses, that are running food businesses, that are running hospitality businesses. And the world is basically saying, “We don’t care about you because you’re not VC ready.” So we just really went where we saw there was a huge opportunity and a huge need and communities that we know that nobody else was paying attention to. And so in some cases, we’re following the numbers. And in other cases, we’re capitalizing on what we call first move advantage because everybody else is ignoring these folks.

Small Business Trends: Why is that still the case? Why is the market still a market? Why are VCs still really just completely ignoring this opportunity?

Melissa Bradley: So I think there’s a few reasons. I think one is that the market is the market, right? I mean, I think that people have to understand the drivers of being a finance person. So I don’t want to just throw out bias and racism because that’s part of it. But the reality is, investment is based on past precedent. And so unfortunately we are perpetuating this historical under investment because nobody has seen a winner yet. And we’re all waiting for a winner. We forget though, you can’t get a winner if you don’t step outside the box. So I think one is the markets are just naturally driving repeatable, scalable behavior that one would argue is not broken. I mean, the markets appear to be working, not for everybody, but they’re working. So there’s really no incentive to break that trajectory.

The second thing is which I hear and I struggle with, but in some cases it could be true, is I don’t know where they are. And so yeah. Not every entrepreneur is hanging out at MIT or Stanford. I’m in DC. There’s tons of entrepreneurs sitting at Harvard University. There’s tons of entrepreneurs at HBCU, but no one is going there to scout them. And I think part of it is they don’t know. And let’s be honest, there is an additional cost, emotional and financial. And we do have to understand that for better or for worse, the margins that are allowed to do any kind of innovation in finance are limited. And so people tend to be relatively risk averse.

And then the final thing I would say is that I don’t think media… I’m so grateful to be here and have seen your work and really appreciate you. And all the folks that you talk about have started doing these panels. I don’t think people even know we exist. I think that there is a few anomalies, right? That make the success stories that back in the day, I’m dating myself. We used to have ebony. We had black enterprise. And you get that one. As long as you could find one a month, you’re good.

But all of the social media that’s happening, I think the successes that we do have get lost in the noise. And so people struggle to say, “There’s one, there’s one, there’s one.” And let me be clear. Pattern recognition sucks, but it is a way to at least create the proxy for people to say, “I can at least think of what.” And I think we’ve got to do something where people can at least think of one, because once you get to one, the beauty of this community of entrepreneurs and particularly entrepreneurs of color is everybody knows each other. It is a highly supportive ecosystem.

So if you can find one and you call them on the phone or you text them, they’re going to give you at least 10 to 20 others that are doing just as good if not better than themselves. So I think those are just a few reasons that we’re finding folks aren’t really focusing in having this conversation.

Small Business Trends: You guys also recently raised a pretty significant amount of money and from a number of different venture firms.

Melissa Bradley: We did.

Small Business Trends: Why don’t you tell us a little bit about that.

Melissa Bradley: Yeah. So, coming from the East coast and not looking at me like my co-founders, venture is not typically my first path of thought around raising money. But when we realized after about a good six months of trying things and piecemealing things together, we realized this really could be a tech company. And it just seemed a natural opportunity to say, “Let’s go raise some venture capital.” And we had the conversations like do you think people are going to give us, the three of us money? Do you think people are going to invest in the idea where we’re actually trying to talk to people like me?

And I have to say, as I’ve told everybody, I was pleasantly surprised. I had been to Silicon Valley before. I had worked out there before. I knew a lot of these firms. And I would say the openness, I think in part, because they knew Dave, our co-founder through both prior investments, but also in a very colleague collegial way that there was an openness to at least listen. No one shut us down and said, “That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard.” And everyone’s biggest question was how are you going to get these businesses to trust you?

And we said, “We’re still working on that. We don’t take that for granted. We’re still working on that.” But it was clear that everybody who came in saw a gap in the small business market, right? Everything is so fragmented, such redundancy that they saw a real opportunity to aggregate, not consolidate. And because we had a partner strategy from the onset, they saw that we were not trying to be Pac-Man and eat up the ecosystem. We’re really trying to firm up and shore up the ecosystem.

So with that, we got some great response. We got some folks who said, “Let me wait and see.” And of course now they’re like, “I wish I had not waited.” But we were thrilled to be able to raise $8.6 million from folks in the Midwest and on the coast who most importantly were willing to support what we’re calling this next wave of entrepreneurs. They had lots of questions, but they believed in us, which was important and that’s all of us equally. They believed in our focus because we were very clear. This is a business that’s going to be open to all, but we’re going to laser in on women entrepreneurs of color. And nobody backed down from that. And in fact many said, “I hope you can pull it off because we’ve seen many iterations before you. And it hasn’t happened.” So we are very fortunate to have some amazing investors behind us.

Small Business Trends: Talk a little bit about the grant programs, but also I guess folks are trying to figure out, well, why does Facebook or Salesforce, why do they need somebody like Ureeka that we’ve never really heard of?

Melissa Bradley: We asked the same thing. Why do WE need Facebook, Salesforce, etc? We actually turn the tables because money is a dime a dozen, right? I mean, I think post George Floyd, everybody… Money is raining out windows. And we wanted to be mindful, right? That if we were going to enter into these partnerships, there were three things that were happening. One that it was legitimate, right? That there was a real honesty and earnestness around helping entrepreneurs of color and not just some quick media blurb to get you out of the public fray. The second thing was is that they weren’t just going to give money. And I know that sounds crazy because everybody says, “What do I need? Money, money, money, money.” But I say the same thing to entrepreneurs that I say to my kids. “What do you need the money for?”

Money is a means to an end. And I will tell you, in my years of doing this work prior to becoming Ureeka, we did a pitch competition. And we had a young lady that won $25,000. And she was over the moon. We followed up with her three months later and I said, “Hey, do you want to come to this program we’re running because you just seem like you might need some assistance.” She said, “Girl, I’m on the next plane because I have yet to cash the check. Because I don’t know what to do with the money. Because my needs far exceed the check size. So I’m just sitting here looking at it.” And then, so that was important that we weren’t just going to be giving money.

And then the third thing is we wanted to again, make sure that we were able to continue the relationship, right? Because again, writing a check is just the beginning, not the end. So, once we realized that all of our partners wanted to do that, what we were able to do is partnering with all of these companies that you mentioned after we did our due diligence and they did theirs and not only deploy the capital, but make sure they had access to free coaching. Make sure they had access to free content and then obviously help them with some of their problems.

Some of the biggest problems we’ve seen in all of this is having offline businesses pivot to online. And I don’t know about you, but I’m barely managing Twitter and Instagram. And oftentimes I need the help of my kids. You’re probably so much better than me. And so we find that there’s a level of expertise that people were going to pay somebody to do that. And I lose my mind when entrepreneurs outsource too much because then their goal is your intellectual property. And so we were able to say, “You got a grant, but you also got some coaching. You also got some one on one assistance.”

So we have companies like Keeping You Sweet, right? That makes what I think to be some of the best gluten-free sweet potato, natural cheesecakes you ever seen, alternatives to sugar, that are now selling in whole foods market. I had a knee replacement. There’s a company run by a black doctor, Kirsten Shepard Ahmed who has this gel I think is magic, but it’s called Pain Stopper. And we helped her get past $100,000 a month by being able to really help with the coaching and the consulting assistance. We’ve seen people’s Facebook followers go up 500% because they were a part of the coaching program with a company called Harvest 9 with the number nine. They got the coaching and then wanted more. They had 100% increase on Instagram.

So, money is a means to an end. And so I think we were able to make that value pitch to the companies and then tell the entrepreneurs that they got more than just money. It really increased our trust, but it also increased our value to the entrepreneurs because let’s be clear, people are writing checks left and right. But if I don’t know where to spend it, I don’t know who to hire. I don’t understand how the algorithms work in IG or Shopify, what good is it? And we find when I mentioned to you earlier that it costs a quarter of a million dollars more for a black entrepreneur to start the same business. About 30% of that is just churning through professional service providers who don’t have our best interest at heart. So we really solved a perpetual need in a time of crisis to help these entrepreneurs survive.

Small Business Trends: You keep talking about raining money. I’m like looking out my window right now and I don’t see money raining … There’s a lot of people that are saying, “I don’t know where to get money.” Are you saying that money is becoming more accessible or available because of what’s happened recently with some of the social unrest?

Melissa Bradley: I would say that more money is becoming available. I think the question is still, it’s raining. Now whether or not we can reach over the balcony and get it before it passes us is a different story. But sure. There’s a behind the scenes Google Doc, right? Going around of all the commitments that everybody’s made since George Floyd’s death unfortunately. I’m giving us till Christmas and people’s guilt and concern may or may not wear off, but there’s a lot of folks who have stepped up, I think some in tremendous earnest. And I think it’s okay to say self-interest because they’re businesses are small businesses and so why not invest in your customers? And then I think there are others who are putting out dare we say, vanity programs and that’s up to them, right?

But I do want to reiterate, there is a opportunity that I’d say most major companies right now are investing in some kind of program and outreach. Many of the first four runners were money. Some of them are now saying, “How do I use my team and my staff. I’m sitting on a wealth of expertise. How do I give back?” We have a lot of companies including Salesforce that gave us employees to be coaches. I mean, imagine like duh, but how amazing that was, right? To have people on the inside, tell us how to make this stuff work for you.

So yeah, I think that there are lots of programs. Now, let me be clear. It’s raining, but there’s still a catch. There’s still caveats. There’s still prerequisites. But I would say there’s been a tremendous spike in individuals and institutions, both philanthropic and not, that are really trying to think about how do I get more money in the hands of black and brown entrepreneurs. We’ve seen PayPal doing it. We’ve seen Netflix doing it. Even companies like a Netflix that you never would have thought about this before. I think people are catching on A, we’re a viable marketplace. We have over a billion dollars purchasing power. But B, again, they’re beginning to really look at the data and say where some of the fastest growing small business is. How do I make sure that I start that relationship with them.

CHECK OUT MORE:

Brent Leary One-on-One Interview Series

This article, “Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American Women are Starting Businesses 6 Times More than White Male Peers” was first published on Small Business Trends

https://smallbiztrends.com/

The post Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American Women are Starting Businesses 6 Times More than White Male Peers appeared first on Unix Commerce.

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unixcommerce · 4 years

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Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American Women are Starting Businesses 6 Times More than White Male Peers

Interview with Melissa Bradley of Ureeka

smallbiztrends · Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American women starting businesses 6X more than white male peers

Small Business Trends: Tell us about your personal background.

Small Business Trends: Tell us about Ureeka.

Small Business Trends: Why is that still the case? Why is the market still a market? Why are VCs still really just completely ignoring this opportunity?

Small Business Trends: You guys also recently raised a pretty significant amount of money and from a number of different venture firms.

Melissa Bradley: We did.

Small Business Trends: Why don’t you tell us a little bit about that.

CHECK OUT MORE:

Brent Leary One-on-One Interview Series

This article, “Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American Women are Starting Businesses 6 Times More than White Male Peers” was first published on Small Business Trends

https://smallbiztrends.com/

The post Melissa Bradley of Ureeka: African American Women are Starting Businesses 6 Times More than White Male Peers appeared first on Unix Commerce.

from WordPress https://ift.tt/3kaQtDD via IFTTT

#IFTTT #WordPress

0 notes