#disney sucks but of all places of all companies they did it

[albtrosz]

let me say that i am SO GLAD that there’s finally a romantic relationship between two women who aren’t really feminine being shown in media. and who would’ve thought that disney?????? would make that happen

[pickypickypeak]

It's kinda sad that Disney's films with a black leads get the short of the stick

Tiana is well loved but she was a frog for most of the movie and that people care more about the tropes in her movie over the issues that were present

Ethan Clade is a decent character and Disney (the animation studio, not the whole company) proper first gay character who is one of the main character from not a minor character but no one didn't watch his movie because they were too busy complaining about the lack of original films, oh the irony

And finally Asha, who is deliberately meant to be an homage to the classic heroines without needing to a princess with a love interest, but is lauded as the real villain because of the wonky premise that idiots immediately use to describe her and her movie bad and only care about her if she's paired with an imaginary Jack Piss-in-the-Snow boyfriend they made up based on a concept art that never said anything about her being in a romance with

Mmm… I wouldn’t say tiana gets “the short of the stick” yes there are alt right idiots using her as a scapegoat to “prove” we white people are oppressed (“they should do white tiana next!!🤡”) which sucks but overall like you said I think she’s well loved and put among the best disney princesses by the ACTUAL disney fandom (because she is. Sorry not sorry) also she’s getting a tv show which is possibly becoming a sequel?? I mean there most definitely are movies that did WAY worse than princess and the frog lol (home on the range? Chicken little?)

Yeah, strange world was a very unfortunate movie coming out in a very unfortunate time. Kinda same with wish. It’s not really about skin color in their cases imo though.

I don’t wanna dive too deep into this “race” matter because I’m not black so I don’t really know what these characters and their reception mean to the black community in terms of rep, but hey – literally no offense anon I know you’re coming from a good place – while I like addressing these issues let’s also talk about the positive aspects! Being negative about people being negative is what keeps the negativity going lol, let’s show them reasons why these characters are awesome instead!

Tiana and ethan were both groundbreaking characters for different reasons, tiana was the first afro-american princess which was HUGE at the time and ethan was disney’s first gay character who is actually gay on screen??? I’m kinda relieved we skipped all the hate for that lol, youtubers would have been insufferable about it if it became a hit. But I’m happy some kids will have this movie to look up at as they grow older, I’m sure it’ll mean the world to them to see it so normalized in s disney movie.

And finally asha being a blending of classic and modern disney heroines brought a smile on the face of people who actually watched her movie without prior biases. Wish was just not for everyone. It’s cool.

(Also you wanna know about a disney leading black lady who doesn’t get enough credit????? BRANDY’S CINDERELLA!!!!! I ONLY WATCHED IT RECENTLY I CAN’T BELIEVE THAT MOVIE IS NOT A DISNEY MAINSTREAM!!!! IT’S SO GOOD!!!!!!)

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

First off... Definitely go see THE BOY AND THE HERON / HOW DO YOU LIVE?

Number two... I can't believe I have to say all of this, but... Some avenues of animation fan-land need to C-H-I-L-L... Not just with this movie, but with a multitude of other things, but I won't get into them here. I just wanna talk about how Miyazaki's new film did in the U.S. Fantastic $10-13m opening, already bests the domestic totals of SPIRITED AWAY and PONYO. Looks to make a decent gross, maybe even outgross WISH- hey wait a minute...

So, one of my first questions is... Why are we even bringing "Disney" into this?

Or WISH for that matter?

I feel bad for the WISH filmmakers honestly, for all their hard work to culminate in their movie losing money at the box office. It barely passed $100m just recently. That all has zilch to do with Miyazaki's new movie. Or anything, for that matter. You might as well single out DreamWorks and TROLLS 3 while you're at it.

This should be about Miyazaki's new film, possibly his last, that he came out of retirement - in his EIGHTIES - to make, and how it's doing.

This and GODZILLA MINUS ONE's successes should be looked at, it shows that there are markets for other kinds of movies, it shows that some audiences will be there for some things... And that's great! We need more room in multiplexes for these kinds of movies, and their respective successes I feel are a positive sign for that...

Buuuuut, what the hell does HERON's success have to do with Disney?

I get that Disney is one of the largest players in both animation and mainstream movies, but really- BOY AND THE HERON's success is only going to tell Disney executives one thing, and it's what I just laid out above. It's not going to singlehandedly convince Disney execs to allow Walt Disney Animation Studios to open a full-on 2D unit and greenlight a 2D animated movie. HERON would have to make MARIO numbers in order to possibly do that, and that's being generous... And Disney used to distribute Ghibli films, too, even well after they called it quits on 2D films. (They released THE WIND RISES through the Touchstone banner in 2014.)

Like, let's celebrate the new Miyazaki film doing great without having to center Disney all the damn time. There are so many 2D movies that get made every few years all around the world, and they're far more accessible than ever before.

Why do we need big bad Diz to try again when so many other filmmakers are doing new and innovative stuff with that medium? And besides, what if they make a 2D movie and it has the same writing style as WISH, STRANGE WORLD, RAYA, etc.? "You made a 2D movie Disney, that's great! But it's still MID!" Disney gave you back the evil bad guy villains with King Magnifico, but WISH still sucked to you... You're just not going to get what you want out of this company anymore.

I get that Disney's 2D films are the bedrock of the enterprise, and of feature animation history. I get that in their official "canon", 46 of their 62 features are largely 2D/hand-drawn... But, we gotta stop expecting this big conglomerate to do it when they've steadfastly refused to for a decade now. They're answering to market research and what they think audiences want, not people like us who can detect a Milt Kahl head swaggle from a mile away...

Instead of making shallow remarks that only put down the animators/filmmakers, and not the bigwigs at the company (this whole "that'll teach 'em a lesson" mentality is among the dumbest on twitter and a few other places), just go find cool 2D stuff being made elsewhere and put your energy into making that stuff more known. You've got internet, right? Just google every year's crop of animated movies and even TV shows (like, say, SCAVENGER'S REIGN. Go watch that!), it's all right there, yeesh.

Like, let's celebrate BOY AND THE HERON's success, not make this another Disney Animation and Pixar bash-fest. Miyazaki didn't come out of retirement and hand-craft this film - which is an often heavy and painful reflective work on loss and grief and life and death and the universe - at his old age... for people to act like this is a playground, pitting it against another movie that has its own reason for existing. It just seems, among other obnoxious things some animation fans are currently doing, disingenuous to me. What is this hierarchy? Can we just enjoy and celebrate the art for once?

[lunarsilkscreen]

YouTube Algorithm

Factually by Adam Conover, suggested my stab at the YouTube algorithm was incorrect, and alleged quite a few different things.

Here's what I think; this is a piece discouraging other creators from trying to create, because they're used to being paid a certain amount per piece created.

So instead of actually addressing *real* concerns that one *could* have about the internet and content hosting, they're adding to the oppression of indie and small creators.

Termed; Indie creators, who by the way, rival medium sized record labels and producers in size. They're not small creators, but they still brand themselves as such. This is how *real* small time creators are being choked out from being able to join these platforms and create content.

They're using keywords like bullet points, as if that creates *real* topical conversations. "As long as you hit all the daily keywords and bullet points people will see your video."

These are people who paid services to artificially increase subscriptions, views, and reactions to their content. Instead of realizing that on these platforms, they already had a social currency advantage.

And instead of playing to those strengths, they followed videos intended for small creators and failed. This is because they weren't listening to the market trends to begin with.

"Why should I be online? These other companies *will* pay me."

Now that those other companies are shrinking, and they have to find other income sources, they can't figure it out, because they're not playing to their strengths and to their audiences, that they themselves built up.

And because of that, they're pushing newer creators out of the market, just because they think they have to act like Mr. B*.

They have literally no idea how to play to their fanbases. And blame *that* on the algorithm.

You might have a million subs, but they might be bots. (That's my band name, I'm calling dibs right. Now.) They might be subscribing to you because their friends do, or for clout, or because they're watching trends.

YouTube isn't your employer on the platform.

Now, here's why certain platforms; NBC, CC, FOX, basically [enter tv channel name].com why they failed.

They weren't competing with YouTube. YouTube's original intent was small time and literal independent creators. (0$ unfunded, no help) could make content. Not your "Factuallys with Adam Conover" who have a staff of people.

They were competing with subscription based services, and they leveraged free content in an effort to attract business. But they were still over reliant on their TV channels.

In most places today, if you have a Comcast subscription, you have a cable TV subscription. So why would anybody go to the website, when they can just TiVo what they want? Especially if the interface is trash? Like every single one is.

And you know who won that battle? Not YouTube, YouTube isn't in the same space. Netflix and Hulu did. By a wide margin.

Hulu started hosting all those failed channels content on their site (for free, with ads) and with a much better interface. Netflix had unique content, and was very cheap. Having just dropped their DVD business, it was nearly all profit for a while there.

But now Netflix isnt paying for smaller companies to make shows anymore, so their prices inflated.

That's why a lot of shows today suck (Disney/Hulu Marvel vs Netflix Marvel for example.) Their budgets are bigger, and with a bigger budget, there's much more risk.

And because there's more channels, Netflix, Hulu, HBO, HBO+, HBO Max, Disney+, Starz, etc etc, there's much more competition in that *high end space* because they want control over the market share.

And right now, right in below that is a wide open market that these creators who are trying to keep growing by pushing small performers out of the market;

That space, wide open for small and mid-tier ("indie") creators to profit majorly. It's a space that the bigger creators cannot penetrate, and so they try to control the space instead.

I'm including formerly indie creators like Bread Tube (yes including contraptions), Man Tube, Joe Rogan, Left Tube, and Right Tube. They're not small anymore, they're not independent. But they think and *act* like they are. And this penalizes creators starting out like they once did. Because they think you need to be a PhD drop out with a degree in telecom.

I could honestly tell you the path forward, but I'd have to charge.

Stay in your big dog spaces you created for yourselves. Stop canceling small time creators because you've lost touch with the world.

Kevin Heart said this about Dave Chappelle: "Dave Chappelle has a sense of freedom that I don't have. I have people, an organization to worry about. So I can't do the same things Chapelle can do." (Paraphrased, I think he'd be cool with it tho.)

Y'all aren't small time creators anymore, so you need to start thinking differently about your impact on the small time creators markets. And more importantly, get your fat a* out the way. Before you start affecting people's lives, including your own contractors.

They can't breathe, get off their necks.

[aaronsrpgs]

X-Men '97, Generative Human Intelligence, and My Problem With Studios

For me, the biggest problem of AI/generative art/predictive text is that it's created without the permission of the people who produced the source material, trained by underpaid people, and used by venture capitalists to suck up money and stop paying people.

A lesser problem is that, because it's trained on extant work, it almost always feel derivative and/or bad. I don't want to pursue criticizing it based on aesthetic stakes; I want to destroy the machinery and rob those who fund it.

It's me, I'm the Luddite.

HOWEVER, I can level those same aesthetic criticisms at someone else: the studios producing superhero shows and movies based on comic books. I just finished watching X-Men '97 season one, and it felt like it was created by generative human intelligence trained on X-Men comics. Which I mostly mean in a bad way.

Caveat: The show is decent, there are some cool moments, and I honestly feel like the people who worked on it had their heads/hearts in a good place and worked hard. I want studios to keep paying people, especially marginalized people, to work for them! Preferably under union protection.

However, as someone who's read entirely too many X-Men comics, the show felt like a vinegar reduction of decades of comic books.

Now, is that bad? Not necessarily. It's a good way to attract new audiences, and as someone who can appreciate stripped-down prose and movies that are only 90 minutes, I understand the impulse to get rid of the cruft and show the "greatest hits."

But the reason I like the X-Men comics I keep revisiting is that they're full of what I like to call friction or tension. And I don't mean dramatic tension. I mean that these comics were produced by (usually) a writer, a penciller, an inker, a letterer, a colorist, multiple editors, some sort of company president, and response to reader reactions. And they had to come out every month (usually), meaning there was an intense deadline, and they were heavily situated in the time they were produced.

God bless Ann Nocenti, editor extraordinaire.

Whoa, sounds bad, right? The opposite of an auteur system. But there's a very human friction in these books, because they were caught up in the interests of the (mostly) young (mostly) men making them.

Why did multiple issues of X-Men written by Chris Claremont feature sci-fi author Emma Bull's "filk music" band Cats Laughing? It wasn't because they were thematically related or popular at the time. It's because Claremont and Bull were friends.

Most fiction teachers would say that this sort of idiosyncrasy was bad, and in a novel written across years and released all at once, I'd agree! But in a serial format, I think it adds friction; it slows down the reader and makes them notice that is a product of humans in the specific time they were produced. And I like being reminded of that! I don't think all works should include it, but it's something that comics and TV shows can pull off, and that movies and novels are less able to do.

Speaking of Chris Claremont, he was the writer that really brought in and magnified themes of civil rights and queerness in the X-Men. His characters were human, radical, and varied. He wrote powerful women in a time that was rare in the industry. Also, his stories were very horny.

Put Professor X in bondage gear, you Disney cowards.

But Claremont is also a Zionist (I gather) and has written a lot of pro-cop X-Men stories. That sucks! To see him try to write stories of radical civil rights and boundary-pushing feminism while also objectifying women, writing about his personal fetishes, and doing some All Lives Matter stuff—that's tension.

I appreciate tension because, again, it helps prove that there are humans behind the work: fallible, changing passionate humans. I would rather read a story that tries and stumbles than a story that speedruns hitting all my personal beliefs like some sort of American Ninja Warrior MFA Graduate.

Watch him smoothly ride from queer representation to police abolition before front-handspringing into post-capitalist utopianism.

Which brings us back to X-Men '97. it's a sleek 10 episodes with clear character arcs for most of the characters involved. Impressive storytelling! But every sleek beat it hits is drawn from old X-Men comics (Lifedeath, Fatal Attractions, Second Coming, and many more). It feels like the writers' room was trained on 60 years of X-Men comics and isn't producing anything outside of that.

A short digression: isn't that how all human creativity works? Good question. Let me address it from a deeply objective and researched position: FUCK NO!

A single example: Jack Kirby read the pseudoscientific works of Erich von Daniken, which proposed that aliens had visited Earth in the past, as documented in many works of ancient peoples. It's a boring historical book. And Jack Kirby read it and made The Eternals.

POW POW! Shoot your alien gods.

I think a rabid consumption of media buttressed by a devout pursuit of creative skills will cast whatever work you do in an exciting and alien light. Please try!

I want to end on a positive note and mention my favorite part of X-Men '97. It's Morph! Morph's a shape-changing mutant who didn't appear much in the source comics. In the show, Morph is explicitly nonbinary, referred to with "they" pronouns. And they're 100% in love with Wolverine (who Claremont at one point wanted to write as a gay guy).

There are lots of great scenes with Morph coming to comfort Wolverine while he's in the shower, or turning into Wolverine's unrequited love Jean Grey to say "I love you" while Wolverine is unconscious and healing.

It reminds me of Mystique, the "evil" shapeshifter originating in Claremont's X-Men run. According to later X-Men writer Scott Lobdell, "It was always Chris's plan that Mystique and Irene Adler (Destiny) were lovers, and that Mystique at one point had transformed into a man and impregnated Destiny and she gave birth to Nightcrawler. So, Mystique and Destiny were actually Nightcrawler’s father and mother."

According to Claremont, Mystique was also Sherlock Holmes, and Destiny was the same Irene Adler that appeared in Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Scandal in Bohemia."

Later X-Men comics went pretty deep in exploring how Mystique, as a shapechanger, made a perfect spy, a confused double-triple-quadruple agent, and someone who transcended gender and fucked with identity.

And while X-Men '97 flirts with that (by having Morph flirt with Wolverine), Morph mostly serves as a vehicle for fan service cameos; they turn into X-Men and Marvel characters that otherwise won't appear in the show, seemingly so that fans can point at the screen and identify the character.

The end of season one sets up a potential status quo for Morph and Wolverine that's more character focused. And I would love to see that! But until then, Morph remains the face of human generative intelligence, referencing the history of X-Men comics that Disney and the show's writers' room have consumed in order to regurgitate as a 20-minute cartoon.

[majaloveschris]

i havent a clue what this shit is myself. im in between a shonky pr contract and a situationship gone wrong. that being said what are the chances that chris letting them inside his house were a part for if the deal, to enhance "believability"? physically near them? because thats what really pisses me off. is there a possibility that legally he can't say no to having these racist slackers within close proximity. we get mad at him for being around them but what if hes obligated to? i didnt really want to ask because then it feels like im letting him off the hook and im not. i have no idea whether hes deliberately choosing violence or is genuinely stuck doing things he wouldnt normally do because who really knows. if theres anything i do fully believe its that someone else is managing his social media content: the love hearts, melting emojis, lovey dovey stories etc bullshit bullshit. ehblaggh im not an expert, im just really confused 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️. what do you think the actual details of a pr contract might look like? PS: i too hope that you are safe and well. It takes nerves of steel to stay calm while being reasonably close to something so scary 💛💛

I think the main reason is that they suck doing this whole thing, and also because it's more comfortable and easier this way. Let me explain:

1. It's not that suspicious. For example, doing pap walks or being seen at different places by a paparazzi would be more giving than being at his place, and they don't even have to be alone.

2. They can choose the perfect images and videos. We all know now that doing something in public, like the pap walk or Disney, isn't really working for them due to their lack of chemistry and the fact that they look like they don't even want to be around each other. However, if they do stuff like the scare video or when Justin shares a story, they can take another one, and another, until it's perfect. There are no fans or bystanders like in New York who can film or photograph them while they are unaware. And even when they did this, the results were usually pretty crappy, like the scare video clips.

3. They don't have to go to public places together, and there won't be any professionally taken pictures. It's like they don't have to be on the same photo, so there will only be a few actual photos of the two of them.

I think he is definitely obligated to do certain things, but he and his team are trying to do the very minimum; they are trying to get through this whole thing without them actually needing to be seen that many times. Maybe Chris would rather do something like this in places where he feels comfortable and where he can have his friends and family members with him. I assume they provide them a safe place, and I think the same can be said about her; that's why she always brings her friends along. I guess Chris and his team think it's better to do that rather than be out in public together.

I could be wrong. This is only my opinion. He doesn't seem to enjoy her company, so I wouldn't say he is so happy that they are there, but it's better than being in public.

Thank you so much! It's definitely scary, but I'm trying to remain positive, and I'm more worried about those who live near the border; luckily, I live on the other end of the country.

[groochi-gang]

it kind of sucks when quotes are stolen and the author becomes dead to the world. a very famous and never-credited quote from a very private, now-deleted personal blog that only exists on internet archive, written by non-celebrity woman Jamie Anderson: "grief is love with nowhere to go." this quote reminds me of one with similar mysterious origins, "grief is love perserving." episode 8 of wandavision, a popular marvel show where that quote is supposedly from, aired in 2021, yet is predated by a tiny internet comic allegedly made in 2019 that verbatim says that same thing. made by a very small, surrealist french artist Emil Friis Ernst, it's hard to toe the line between innocent coincidence and not even knowing of Emil's existence or his work to even steal from, and plagiarism that just has a strong argument for reasonable deniability. not to mention, i swear that quote made rounds before 2021. i remember seeing them in what's basically now lost media tumblr posts before wandavision even existed. Jamie Anderson's identity is a mysterious one, and her lack of social media makes it impossible to communicate with her and know the possible origins of her quote or her desire with how it's handled. her quote is only credited some of the time, sometimes it says -Unknown. maybe she refuses having a platform because she's shy? maybe she dislikes social media on a moral level? maybe she, too, doesnt know the origins of the quote, and its all a crab bucket of opportunism? there is no way to know because there is no way to ask, whoever she is. what i can say is that songs, articles, and all types of media have used that quote. and each person that used it and passed it off as their own original work have possibly profited from it. of course, it's entirely possible that Wandavsion's usage of that one perserving-grief-quote is entirely part of the creative process, where multiple people can have the same idea at once and not steal from eachother. reposting without credit, plagiarism, and overall confusion about who made what is an occupational hazard to the creative field and can be ruled off as such, same with two people coincidentally thinking the same string of words at once and not intentionally stealing from the other, right? it's an innocent and maybe mildly embarrassing and confusing thing at best and a huge loss at worst. but the thing about disney, owner of marvel and wandavision, is that they partake in unethical business practices, such as having a track record of stealing from places, in particular people, that are far less popular than they are. the writer of the show, Jac Schaeffer, has actually gone on record and described the creative process for that particular quote, specifically framed through a feminist lens. if that is true, that means skill and thought between multiple people went in to creating that quote, and it wasn't just someone or a some company stealing something. it appears that they are the ones to have popularized it. but in the back of my mind, i cant help but feel a bit cheated. and im still not convinced that they're the first one to say it. assuming the best and that the jac schaeffer and/or her creative team isnt pathologically lying, then it's true that she and her editor luara monti didnt steal that quote. but that still doesnt mean they created it, it's still predated by that comic. so who is the true creator? it's true that there is a popular creator, but that there isn't one single creator. maybe it's constantly being created, and there is no singular creator. created by multiple people by accident, over and over, unintentionally interlinked through a deep, shared feeling. maybe it's a meta-poetic commentary on human connection. or maybe disney did something bad again. there are popular and meaningful quotes that affect parts of the population and culture at large, and for them to have such preventably obscure origins is a huge loss. what other amazing quotes have the authors come up with before dying to obscurity?

[spock-smokes-weed]

I’m just gonna vent my feelings about Star Wars for a bit cus I’ve been overwhelmed by them and I don’t want them to bleed over when talking about the franchise with other fans. ie. get really in my feelings mid conversation and just rant at them. Cus that can be awkward

I find myself overwhelmed at the saturation of Star Wars media that we have rn. Overwhelmed to the point where it hurts my brain and I find myself souring on the originals. There’s just so much. So much where every corner of the universe is being expanded upon and explained and I can’t help but feel like it’s unnecessary. I watched the originals first and there was this certain kind of magic to the fact there was a lot you didn’t know. You were plopped into this world with no explanation and the story just happened. The need to pick at every detail in Star Wars like a scab, to create a whole new thing about of it really takes away from that.

I try so hard not to sound like one of those shitty fucking fanboy who’s like “new Star Wars is RUINING the ORIGINALS” because those people suck, and I don’t want to make other fans feel put down for liking the new things. Or put the original up on a pedestal. It’s not that new = bad. Or what you saw in those movies getting expanded upon is bad. It’s just the capitalism of it all I guess. Disney is going to wring all the blood they can from these stones and I feel like I’m just kinda drowning in blood. Disney being the one who is now dictating what is an isn’t “canon” is always going to be upsetting to me on some level.

The great thing about the legends comics in novels is that it was passionate people who were coming up with ideas one what they personally thought would come next. It was all disjointed and uncohesive by design. There was also the clone wars which was a passion project paid for by Lucas’ own dime. It felt like an infinite possibilities that you could take the universe. But now this Disney, they fully control the narrative on the universe and idk that bothers me. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve loved a lot of these projects. The animation of The Bad Batch gets to be as stunning as it is because of Disney’s money. But I think about the recent season on Mando, and the new Ahsoka show, and all the new movies that have gotten announced, and I just get a fucking headache.

I like when stories have endings, and if I’m being fully honest with myself, Star Wars did end in 2005 with revenge of the Sith. I’m never going to want to think past what happens in return of the Jedi because I don’t need to know. If I want to know I’ll make something up myself. And I guess that’s the whole rub here. I feel completely overwhelmed and paralyzed by the sheer volume of this story that refuses to end, that it’s hard for me to be creative with it. It’s hard for me to care about the main six movies because like, in the shadow of all the new stuff they don’t matter anymore.

I know that’s making me sound like a shitty fanboy again, but I guess what I’m trying to get at is like. It can be hard to carve out your own creative vision for the world of Star Wars when the biggest company in the world is making that creative choice for you. It’s hard for me to get the same kind of creative excitement the first few times I watched the originals, because now when I see Luke I think of CGI mark hamill or bitter old man Luke.

The oversaturation of Star Wars and Disney milking every corner or it makes me feel kinda bad while watching the main six because like. What’s even the point now. If you’re going to make Luke a deadbeat and even end the fucking story, when what’s the point of story the two trilogies were trying to tell in the first place? That’s my most bitter and cynical part talking. But it is something I grapple with

This is a stream of consciousness style ramble, just me getting some of my feelings untangled about the pew pew space movies. I think the things I always come back to is that anything disney makes is not considered “canon” to me. As in the sense I don’t consider it part of main story George Lucas was trying to tell. I don’t say this to mean I hate these things, I love a lot of these shows, but I’m going to take what I like and not consider anything from them set in stone. I don’t want to make it look like I’m sucking Lucas off either, I have my problems with him, but he told a complete story with a beginning and an end. You had the clone wars too, but that’s still supplemental material. I can only view the main six movies as fully canon because they tell a full story that’s really good and is the only thing I really care about. I’m sorry if I suck for that but this is to keep me sane.

[davidmariottecomics]

Comics Job Security

Hello! 

This week, Amazon gutted Comixology. Roughly 75% of staff was laid off in one fell swoop, with the remaining staff kept on with the knowledge that they are there to "mop up" and then will be let go. I've said it before, and we all live in the world and should be aware of this anyway, but Amazon sucks. And this is the latest in a series of bad practices that they've had. 

Also this week, the HarperCollins Union hit their 50th day on strike. One of those "post your cancellable comics take" tweets did the rounds over on Twitter. I questioned what, if anything, ever happened with all the creators who took money from Substack and said they'd be following up with the company in light of the amount of transphobia, nationalism, fearmongering, and misinformation spread through their distribution system. In publishing at large, there's also a lot going on in terms of the relationship of the author/editor and the reviewer, particularly on Tiktok and conversations around the general disconnect between decorum and actual professional behavior in the industry. And across the larger landscape, there's a lot of job instability happening in entertainment/tech--from massive layoffs at big tech companies to continued layoffs and restructuring (often merger based) at some of the media conglomerates to the lingering concerns about increased use of AI. 

This week, I want to talk about what that all means on a creator level and how you might be able to help cushion yourself from some of those blows. 

State of the Industry Just using publicly available information, we can say 2022 saw a weaker year across the entertainment industry as a whole. Bloomberg reported it as the worst year in like 3 decades for some of the major media companies as the split between the idea of theaters, traditional TV, and streaming become more complicated with things being reopened and, generally, some amount of fatigue over streaming's big swing changes and increased segmentation. And this will always matter to comics because Warner Bros owns DC, Disney owns Marvel, and various other comics companies are owned by other big media corps. 

In the book industry, overall book sales are understood to have fallen by about 6% last year. However, some categories still saw growth, one of which being adult graphic novels (which includes a lot of manga). That's an especially important number given that the previous year, 2021, may have been the greatest year of comic sales on record. Which is also very interesting given that comics sales records are getting increasingly hard to track. 

So overall, it's kind of a weird landscape. While a lot of comics and book publishers themselves might in okay shape after last year, their parent companies might not be doing so hot. And when the parent company isn't doing so good and is looking to tighten purse strings, publishing is an easy target. But also, maybe publishing is in a good place because while book sales were softer in 2022, books remain one of the last bastions of physical media (go to your local Target, chances are GOOD that you now have a book section in what used to be the Movies and Music section--not that they're all gone, but that the ration has inverted). 

Overall, I can't predict where publishing itself is going, but I think these factors are important to keep in mind, particularly when we're seeing things like the Comixology layoffs. 

On Cancellation In terms of staying afloat and secure in this industry, a lot of that for a creator comes down on the personal level. To that end, I wanted to talk briefly about being "cancelled". Projects get cancelled, people don't. Everyone knows that J.K. Rowling is a transphobe who has decided to double-down on her public persona being an advocate for anti-transness. Folks have extensively gone over her works and pointed out when they are transphobic, racist, and otherwise inherently engaging in the language of oppression against different groups. By all means, were "being cancelled" a thing, she would and should be. And yet, the upcoming game based on her works (and based specifically on one of the most antisemitic aspects of her work) is apparently the top selling game on Steam of the year so far even though it won't release for a few more weeks. 

There are also sooooooo many other celebrities we can look at, some of whom have not just been convicted in the court of public opinion, but LITERALLY CONVICED OF THEIR CRIMES who, uhh, lemme check my notes, continue to receive regular work, tour, and otherwise be hyped up and make money. The good news for dirt bags, I guess, is you can be a dirt bag and suffer relatively little punishment for it as long as there are people who enjoy your work, even if the work itself is also compromised by your dirt bag views. 

Relatedly, I think when we're having the conversation of "cancellable opinions" and using that language instead of, lightly controversial opinions or hot takes or whatever, it normalizes the idea that both "cancelling" is a thing and that it doesn't/shouldn't actually have any effect. And as a result, it makes accountability that much harder. 

So, no, you aren't going to get cancelled in comics. But there are a number of people who are in hiring positions who are paying attention to creators' behavior and who may want to hold those who are acting poorly accountable for their behavior. And I think that standard, largely, is like "hey, is this person fearmongering against a group of people" or "acting in a criminal manner" or "being a bully" or "closely associating with a person who does one of those things". So you should probably try to be a cool person to avoid losing work for being a dirt bag. 

Positive Considerations to Make

With that all understood, not being a dirt bag does seem like a pretty good way to ensure future work. But with the changing landscape, that's not enough. What else can you do to keep yourself in a good place? 

1. Be informed about this stuff. A big part of my personally following up about Substack is I still see a lot of people gravitating toward it and signing up and issuing their newsletters there. I understand that some of those people are being paid by Substack to be there--some are even receiving health benefits. I also know a lot of folks are defaulting to Substack because they've seen other people--including those who got paychecks from them--be successful there. It's similar to Patreon, right, where at least in the US comics community, it kind of blew up to be the standard quickly, and while there are definitely people using alternatives like pixiv fanbox or Subscribestar, there's some safety in name recognition of the platform, regardless of it's problems... This is not to say that I won't work with people who have a Substack, just that to be informed, it's worth pursuing and seeing if there was follow-up from people who theoretically were being courted and had some amount of power in that dynamic to make a change and whether or not anything came of it. I'll also say, Trung Le Nguyen shared a public Patreon post about declining Substack's offer that I think is worth reading. 

2. Be considerate about who you work for. I feel for the people who've lost their jobs at Comixology. I am in solidarity with the folks on strike at Harper. I inherently dislike their parent companies (Amazon and News Corp) and unfortunately find those companies disrespect for their employees unsurprising. Which is not to blame the folks at Comixology or at at Harper--there are many lovely people working there and fighting the good fight within the larger corporate megastructure. But between, say, not crossing the picket line and signing a deal with Harper while the workers are on strike to, say, using the Creator Resource publisher page to check in on the latest about various comics publishers as organized and vetted by your peers, knowing who you're dealing with can go a long way for you. 

3. Be considerate for those you work with. This is one of those things that gets repeated again and again, but comics is a collaborative medium. You can point at all the ways and times that isn't true, but, generally speaking, comics are often not made on an individual level. And a lot of us have very different takes on what behavior is acceptable--some folks are very comfortable producing NSFW work and some aren't, some are open with their political views and some only speak up occasionally, some people are very private and some are very open. It does you good to know the comfort levels of your peers and collaborators because sometimes a misstep might come off as a larger slight than it's meant to be, which is always unfortunate. 

4. Last and not least, don't buy into NFTs or AI or whatever the latest criminal "art" fad is. Y'know, that one seems pretty easy, but boy howdy. Just avoid that stuff. 

5. If you write a blog about the actions of various companies, know you may be putting yourself in a precarious position in the future, but feel secure in standing by your morals and the facts. 

And, again, a lot of that all folds in to if you act nicely and respectfully and professionally, other people in the profession will meet you at that level, which can be helpful when things are uncertain. You certainly can find success in comics outside of the industry, and different people have different standards of what they're looking for, but not being a jerk is a good thing. 

I think that wraps up this week. Next week: The brandification of nerd culture, or how Funko became the new Band-Aid. 

What I enjoyed this week: Abbott Elementary (TV show), Blank Check (Podcast), Honkai Impact (Video game), House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski (Book), Kaguya-Sama: Love is War (Manga), Drip Drip by Paru Itagaki (Manga, I actually read this a few weeks ago and think I just forgot to mention quite enjoying it), Coraline (Movie), 17-21 by Tatsuki Fujimoto (Manga, I've only read the first story so far, but quite looking forward to the rest), Dungeons & Daddies (Podcast)  New Releases this week (1/18/2022): Sonic the Hedgehog: Scrapnik Island #4 (Editor)

New releases next week (1/25/2022): Godzilla Rivals: Round One TPB (Didn't work on this, but plugging Zilla)

Final Order Cutoff (1/23/2023): Sonic the Hedgehog #58 (Editor) 

Announcements: Arizona Comic Book Arts Festival - 2/25! It's a one day comic-focused event in Phoenix, AZ. Tickets are only $10. Attending artists include me, Becca (who once again is dropping some new stuff on their Patreon, see below), Mitch Gerads, Steve Rude, John Layman, Henry Barajas, Jay Fotos, Jeff Mariotte, Marcy Rockwell, John Yurcaba, Andrew MacLean, Alexis Zirrit, Meredith McClaren, James Owen, Ryan Cody, and many more! Come and see us! Becca'll have some very cool new merch, too!

Becca contributed to Aradia Beat, a Magical Girl Anthology Magazine! It's now on Kickstarter! It's both a tribute to 90s magical girl stories and part of a larger project about the overall preservation of magical girl stories! 

We're also waiting to hear back on if Becca got in to another con on their own, but may have another update soon. 

And finally, happy Lunar New Year! 

Pic of the Week: This is just our little banner pulled from the AZCAF site! It came out really well! See ya there in just over a month! 

[signalwatch]

90's Watch: Don't Tell Mom The Babysitter's Dead (1991)

Watched:  02/09/2023

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing:  First

Director:  Stephen Herek

Sometimes a movie goes off the rails so fast and so hard, feels cynically produced on top of that, that it's hard not to just get mad, fold your arms and complain til the credits roll.  For the past 32 years, I'd successfully not seen Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead (1991), which came out when I was 16 and was working through my Gen-X feelings of rejecting things I felt were marketed at me - but specifically at a very dumb version of me the people selling me stuff mostly took to be an idiot.

In 1991, Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead was *heavily* sold at teen audiences with ads on MTV and elsewhere running seemingly non-stop.  Certainly I saw  trailers before other movies.  And you always knew:  if the movie looks like this, and they're advertising it this hard, it's because it sucks and they need to get people in before word spreads.  

There was a long tail of 1980's-style comedy into the 1990's, enough so that it probably deserves its own niche, but this movie feels like a 1987 release more than something that would hit at the same time as Home Alone. 

The pitch is this:  

Kids are left at home for two months under the care of a mean old lady.  She dies in the first ten minutes, and the kids dispose of her and accidentally the money they were to survive on.  For reasons, they do not want Mom to know (and Dad has some mysterious shadiness about him that is never teased out).  

Instead of BOTH teens getting jobs so they can survive, only one does (Applegate).  She works for a day at Clowndog (which looks like a very bad job, but a very fun place to eat), and then lies her way into a job at a fashion/ uniform company as an executive assistant.  And never worries about getting caught.  Even as she steals from the petty cash.

Kids learn life lessons.  Romance is found.  The ending makes zero sense.

You can blame the director for this, but Stephen Herek directed a number of watchable films, from Critters to Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure to some big-budget, successful, live-action Disney films. In short - I think he knows what he's doing, or especially did in the 1990's.  But if he also shot what was on the page for this movie, then... you know, these writers more or less don't have a track record after this movie that I'd write home about.

Curiously, this entire family lacks scruples while also having a complete lack of charm or any redeeming qualities.  Movie:  this stuff is important if you want people to care about the ending.  Counting on the audience being dumb kids only sells so many tickets.  At least try to make us care whether the children live or die.  I mean, we've already shown a curious callousness to life and death once in the movie.  What's one or two kids less?  But the kids all get one character goal and spend the duration whining about whatever their thing is.  There's no love or even hate between them.  They merely co-exist in space.

Despite a really solid title that promises a dark comedy full of hijinks, we get a pretty basic "fakin' it til you're makin' it" comedy made popular in the 80's with Working Girl and The Secret of My Success welded onto a teen summer romp about being a dipshit.  And, despite the fact it looks like a comedy, there's almost nothing present to illicit actual laughter.  I laughed audibly exactly once, at a supporting character's choice to clutch a jar of M&M's as a coping mechanism.  

The set ups of the film intended to provide our hero with challenges all seem to point to:  this girl is going to jail.  And she is going to jail because she's an idiot and everyone else in her family is an asshole, from youngest kid to absentee, lying mom who has skipped the continent to go bang a shepherd. 

What's odd about the "makin' it" business aspect is that she... doesn't?  She hands all of her work to Kimmy Robertson, and her solution for saving the company is to turn their industrial uniforms into highly 1980's-specific and impractical designs that seem like they'd just bring more shame on the workers than a smock or a golf shirt.*  

Either one of these movies might have been fun on their own, but together...  

It feels like no one sat down with the script and said "does this make sense?"  Like - ok, I'll buy the shitty mom also didn't tell the kids who she was hiring to babysit them for two months.  I'm not sure how this old bag was qualified or why she thought making the kids miserable was not going to get back to the mom.  Ignore all that.  Babysitter is dead within 10 minutes.

But I also don't get what the kids thought was going to happen when they had to explain to their mom they threw away a corpse.  Like - that woman presumably had friends and maybe people who loved her...  The movie could have set it up so that wasn't true, but it didn't.  They just throw her away.  (Apparently Bad Mom also left 2 months worth of cash?  Jesus, lady.).

But it also does weird little things like - they give the kids two cars, but then one is stolen partway through the movie (by drag queens.  And that plot point never, ever returns...  when it so easily could have).  Like... why?  Why one car?  It makes whole chunks of the movie not make sense.  Like - did they call an ambulance to the farm?  Did they get a ride?  

Look, I could spend an hour naming Things In Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead That Could Have Easily Not Happened And/ Or Been Fixed.  I will spare you.  When other people think that's criticism, I find it both dubious and annoying.  I mean, I am 100% right about all my thoughts on this, but I doubt I will sway anyone who loves the movie for any reason.  Shine on, you crazy diamonds.

But, jesus.  This is the laziest @#$%ing movie.

It also costars Joanna Cassidy, who I know mostly from Blade Runner, and who is clearly in a wig here but allowed to be over 40 and hot, which is shocking for the period.  And it has John Getz, who was the main guy in Blood Simple, here being horny at Christina Applegate.  Josh Charles plays Applegate's paramour and he's... fine.  David Duchovny is there to show you what happens when no one knows what to do with you as an actor.  I think the secretary/ Josh Charles' sister played Admiral Cornwell on Star Trek: Discovery.  

The movie is wisely anchored by Applegate, who was most famous at this point as Kelly from Married... With Children and seemed ready for bigger things.  If the movie is watchable, it's that Applegate is watchable and likable, and not playing a broad, dumb character.  Her scenes with Joanna Cassidy and John Getz suggest a better movie that doesn't exist when they aren't on the screen.  But it's hard to sell to boys wanting to see Applegate a movie when she's on TV every week, and I don't think the movie did a great job of marketing the Makin' It portions of the film.  Applegate's career is worthy of discussion because she's proven multiple times she's hilarious, but she has to be the straight man here to literally everyone.

Who knows what happened from script to production to the editor's block?.  Anything could have.  And probably did.

I will possibly try this movie again in another 32 years to reconsider.  

  *I say this as someone who worked back-to-back at Chuck E. Cheese and The Disney Store

https://ift.tt/aBxntMz

from The Signal Watch https://ift.tt/yuMK0Xo

[alanshee-keeper-of-realms]

Off the Animation Table a Modern Who Framed Roger Rabbit AU: Similaritys

Miklos and Mickey Mouse share one just ONE similarity, their love and protection of children. Especially when the kids is the child of the Mouse who he suddenly forgot how to parent and just happened to forgot entirely that he brought her to the parks in the first place.

.

Yuki hated being surrounded by crowds, and her father was a magnet for them. At 8 years old she'd been dragged to the parks once again and again her father laughed as people instantly came up and asked for photos, he seemingly didn't notice his own daughter being forcibly shoved away,

She squeaked as she shuffled her way out of the group that had completely engulfed him, staring at the wall of people, she felt actually kind of frightened looking around she went on all fours and darted away, dodging people as she just went anywhere, 

Tucking herself in a secluded area she started to cry, tail tucking itself around her as she was terrified. Not noticing a tiny head in the bushes near, nor the rustle as the toon took off, 

“Stupid Dad, any other kid would want to be his child.” She sniffed, ears drooping, 

“Well yeah being Mickeys kids great until you get to deal with the crowds and have to share your own parent with the World,” a voice made her jump and turn fangs baring, 

A toon with a hood on only snorted, arms crossed in front of them, a smirk visible despite the sunglasses even obscuring their eyes,

“Some fangs you got there kiddo,” they reached up and pulled it off, she instantly was confused as it was..... her Dad? 

“Oh great I've been dragged into one of your plays of I'm the damsel,” She huffed brows furrowing, turning away,

“Wha- ohhhhh nope!” He flopped down taking the sunglasses off and placing them on his head, as a mouse pup appeared and scurried up placing their paws on his lap as he scratched them between the ears,”I'm Miklos the accident of Disney, I look like your daddy but I ain't the Grey fur tell ya how I was made?”

Her head turned, eyes scanning over him, she huffed rolling them before tucking her knees to her chest. Unbelievable that her dad thought she would play along,

“Let me guess story is this time that you were a toon created by mixing up colors,”

“Again kid I'm not your Father,” he spat and she flinched, his own eyes rolling and motioned towards the hedges that surrounded them,

She crawled over to the edge as he pulled the bushes apart. There was her Dad signing autographs laughing and shaking people's hands, shock ran through her as she vollied between the Toons, looking back at the mouse beside her eyes widening, as he shrugged,”But the stories right on the money,” 

“Woah,” he snickered as she tried comprehending such, she'd never even heard of an accident at the company, but it did make sense,

“Yep! Miklos the Grey Mouse at your service." He sat back down as the mouse pup batted at his pockets,

"Alright lil shit, you knew I'm carrying cheese on me," he playfully teased the child as he reached in and pulled out the familar orange cube, the pup grabbing it, scampering off as he called"Mooch!"

She snickered as the kid stopped, standing bipedal turning stuck their tongue out before stuffing their cheek and continuing to run off,

He himself laughed as he elbowed her, motioning to her dad still in the middle of the terrace sucking up the attention,

"Wanna play, let's see how long it takes yer pops to realize you're gone?”

She instantly felt conflicted. Her mother would be furious, but then she realized that her mother would not be angry at her. Getting a grin on her face, feeling a bit malicious towards her Dad as the group began moving towards Fantasyland,

“More like how long it takes to also make my mother pissed at him because I'm missing,” Miklos let out a laugh, eyes twinkling with mischievous intent,

“I like your style kid! Now come on everyone's at the parades and with Mickey in the Parks they will be distracted, I bet your hungry,” She did feel a bit peckish, so she stood, as he placed a pair of sunglasses back on and tossing his hood back up,

She followed curious of this toon, and honestly if she ended up in trouble it would just get his dad in trouble more, however her eyebrows raised further as he lead her towards the Villains housing, this felt like forbidden territory, but spotted Maleficent conversing with Tremaine and Medusa at a table, Miklos just striding up,

“Hello Mal, Tremaine if Minerva comes screeching how her kids lost” he pointed with a thum over his shoulder,

The ladies looked as she waved, not sure how they'd react, however Medusa laughing was not what she was expecting,

“Oh my Michael is going to be in the Apartments for this!” She cackled, the Elder sorceress cracking a smile as she brought a cup of tea to her lips

“Indeed, do not worry Yuki” She looked to the younger Mouse toon,”I shall alert your Mother when she comes looking where you are.”

“your not gonna tell her now?” she was confused as the Fae laughed with the other two,

“And spoil what is most likely going to be the most entertaining evening we've had in months?”

“Let alone we are not his babysitters, we are here to encourage bad behavior,” she turned as Ursula in her Vanessa form strode over and sat down across from Medusa,

“And some children are just wanderers, it's his fault for not paying attention,” Tremaine smoothly said as a waiter came to collect their orders,

“Have fun dear, Miklos has plenty of abandoned Pups for you to run around with.”

Yuki blinked as the women went back to talking to each other, Miklos snorted as he headed inside,

Several amazing smells of the restaurant greeted her nose. Patrons were sparse in this area despite a menu with prices showing, it felt almost parisian in feel and appearance,

“Hey Chef Louis! You think you could whip up something for the kid. Michael up and let her get lost and we are playing how long till Minerva finds out an explodes,”

The French chef poked his head out grinning,

“Of course! Poor dearie, he used to care so much more, but we have you little one!” he shrugged as he used his toon abilities to quickly move through the kitchen as Miklos sat them down at a table,

Yuki couldn't help but look around as several pups appeared sitting next to Miklos who pulled a paper out and pulled his hood off and placed the glasses on his head,

“Uhhh Miklos?” She stared as more pups appeared,

“Hm?” He looked up then grinned at the sight of well over 50 of the tiny toons standing bipedal,”Oh! These guys just want their food, come on kiddos line up like we practiced you know the rules,”

To her surprised she watched in an orderly fashion they shuffled one by one stopping holding their paws out he dropped a piece of cheese into them she was even more surprised at the tiny

“Thank you!” From some before they scampered out,

“Mickey won't take care of the kids he fathered I will,” he quipped at the last happily skittering off, even Louis looked amused as they dodged his feet as he came to deliver two plates of food

[theghostpinesmusic]

A few flashback photos from our day in Skagway! Vertical shots coming in a separate post because Instagram sucks now...

Our first "real" stop (in the sense that the boat docked and we got off and stepped onto land instead of just another boat) was in Skagway. I didn't really know anything about the town before we got there, and while I was excited to learn more and to take in the sights, I was also a little worried that this particular day's activities were going to be too tourist-y for my tastes. Especially after the previous day's eye-opening trip up the fjord, I felt like traveling around Skagway and its environs in the company of a "costumed guide" (as advertised) might feel a bit...inauthentic?

Luckily, I needn't have worried.

Now, tourism is a strange thing. The relative "authenticity" of this or that experience is something that's pretty much always on my mind to some degree when I'm traveling, whether we're talking ten-year-old me at Disney World (I was a weird kid) or forty-year-old me in the "wild" mountains, surrounded by twenty other backpackers, all of us tracking our progress on our phones in real time. In this particular case, we were in Skagway in the first place because we were on a cruise, which is a super *fun* way to experience just about anything, but rolling into town on a huge ocean liner and then getting chauffered around all day because you have money is hardly the best way to experience any place from anything approaching a local's-eye view.

That said, I've had a ruggedly romantic notion of Alaska in my mind my entire adult life, informed by obsessively reading Krakauer and other nature/adventure writers and, later, my own adventures in the mountains and on the glaciers of not-Alaska, and while I'd always known this trip, on its face, was not going to be some Artic Dreams-style struggle for survival, I'd hoped to glean some small sense of what such a thing might be like amidst and maybe in spite of the buffets and slot machines (both literal and figurative).

I'd managed this on the boat up Tracy Arm, and with a little help managed it in Skagway, too.

We learned a bunch about the history of the town and the Alaskan Gold Rush in general, as well as how to pan for gold (this part was sort-of geared more toward kids, but it was still interesting). We learned a bunch of *fascinating*, intense stuff about the Iditarod, met some sled dogs, and got to play with sled dog puppies (If I hadn't already raised my own puppy, this might have been the best moment of my life). Then we rode a train along an absolutely crazy Gold Rush-era railroad track (built for the Gold Rush but only finished after it had petered out).

The train ride, in particular, was great: I like learning stuff, and I like seeing massive mountains and valleys, *and* riding trains, so I was pretty much set. Plus, while all of the day's events were presided over by our "costumed guide," he really came into his own once we were his captive audience on board the train.

As we found out over the course of the train ride, our guide had made his way to Skagway and his employment there via a journey that had a lot in common with the Gold Rush pioneers he was being paid to teach us about. He had, apparently, taken the job somewhat spontaneously after finishing college in New York state, moving away from everything he was familiar with to this small town in Alaska that he very clearly already loved after only having lived there for a few months. His enthusiasm for, well, *everything* was contagious, and I'd be lying if I did said he didn't remind me of myself a little bit at that age, or at least the version of me that I'd tried and likely often failed to be back then. At forty-two, his excitement and earnestness were reminders that in the last twenty years I've become less adventurous and more guarded than I'd like. As the train ride finished, he took his last few minutes with us to recite a legitimately lengthy poem about the Gold Rush written by a local poet, and despite the train car being packed by a group of hungry tourists, you could have heard a pin drop when he finished.

The whole experience was inspiring enough that Lindsey and I decided to take our last bit of time in port to hike out to the edge of town and take a trail a mile and five hundred or so feet up into the mountains to the first alpine lake we could find. There, we ran into a guy who'd left his cruising family behind temporarily for a similar reason, and we all spent a few minutes talking about (you guessed it) tourism and authenticity and all of that fun stuff. Then he took our picture!

The end.

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

Ugh...

Here we go again with this... Something something, "It's not my fault Disney is making these sequels! I avoided their latest original movies because they sucked! I shouldn't be to blame for that!"

A) These Disney Animation and Pixar sequels were likely always going to be made regardless of how the recent original movies performed financially. In the biz, if a movie makes a shit-ton of money, it's likely getting a sequel. It ain't 1997 anymore.

B) There is no blame or punishment, per se... The system in the world of mainstream American feature animation is working as intended. It's capitalism 101. It sucks, yes, but that's how it is. The performance of one movie dramatically affects the slate, or even the studio's survival. Must we dredge up what happened to Blue Sky after The Walt Disney Company bought them and their first movie released by them lost money at the box office? Better yet, all the times Disney Animation faced shutdown for many decades.

C) What if... Hear me out... These sequels are all pretty good? Better than the recent original stuff, even? Impossible! Something can be a critically-acclaimed audience favorite, and you'd still have gaggles of people online insisting the thing in question is garbage. Just look at TURNING RED, for example. It's all fuckin' subjective at the end of the day.

D) It's never gonna be good enough anyways, so why bother? I don't think I can name a *single* Disney animated movie where almost everyone was on the same page, praising it... Since THE LION KING? The latter-years Renaissance movies all had their detractors, as did the early 2000s movies, as did all the "Revival" movies (why don't they do 2D anymore? Because a lot of people avoided PRINCESS AND THE FROG and WINNIE THE POOH). I remember there were at least a few people who didn't like TANGLED, WRECK-IT RALPH, etc. etc. Were very vocal about that or didn't think they were "Disney enough" or whatever. Hell, even LION KING used to get flack for the KIMBA similarities. Plenty of the now-beloved films overseen by Walt Disney himself were largely greeted with mixed or negative reviews upon initial release. It'll never be perfect, it's just the nature of the beast. How the movies live on, is the more important part. Not the opinions of self-appointed "experts" on the Internet. Again, it's all personal preference.

The thing is, the movies Disney chooses to make is kind out of our control. No one should be obliged to pay for a product so that you get the next one like it ("vote with your wallet!"), but unfortunately, that's how the biz works. If you're not game on the latest films from the studio, you're also not to blame for what they do next, but they're gonna do what they're gonna do. That's just that about that. Hell, the thing can be a big success... And they'll still do the opposite of what people want! Off the top of my head, not an animated movie, but WORLD WAR Z 2 not moving forward despite how well the first one did. Again, it sucks. But... If WDAS ever got to a point where they were making things that I just did not want to see whatsoever? Then I'd go watch something else. It's ultimately the higher-ups' decisions that are at fault.

Very rarely are financial failures looked at logically, very rarely do executives ever try to pick up the pieces from there. Instead it's "never make this kind of thing again" or "shut this place down". It happened to Blue Sky. It happened at DreamWorks, projects cancelled (B.O.O., MONKEYS OF MUMBAI, etc.), staff laid off, a whole animation unit closed down (Pacific Data Images), etc. Disney Animation threw 2D features out twice, cancelled many movies, laid off tons of people multiple times, they faced complete shutdown multiple times. Animated movies are expensive and require lots of people and resources, they're fragile as is. COVID-19 really cut into their box office, and it doesn't help that going to the movies costs a fortune.

I'm not saying this is all a good, it's not. I've just made peace with it, and can only hope films keep getting made, staff still have work and roofs to keep over their heads, and maybe... Just maybe, I'll like the movies, too?

Anyways, I hope I like MOANA 2. I'm curious to see what the director and writers and artists and musical talents all bring to this world that was created by the first film.

[the-firebird69]

Walt Disney world and Disneyland all of those places are in debt and we don't know how they did it they had sales of paraphernalia to hold them over and it was selling pretty good I couldn't go there so they started buying Mickey mouse cups and all sorts of stuff and really it's really bad management if you can't do that and of course I was tryi John remillard a lot of people hate him for it and now he doesn't own it nope so here we have a problem the place is owned and operated by a Mac and he's not doing anything with it beyond a few small renovations that he's been planning for 50 years they're just going to let our son just sit here and do nothing. And he also wants to put him in the mental hospital as soon as tomorrow or today our son says no, never and we shall stop it and we'll stop him he's been doing it for years and he is insane and that's why he's doing it he has a frontal lobe that doesn't let him fit straight it's absolutely true but right now he's got that load inside him. We don't want you here we don't want you around to make you the wrong decisions everyday every few minutes in other words you've been detected as a loser and join up with them and hang out with them you should have no place to go no you know and then request elsewhere cuz you're made up of funny people who don't know how to do stuff to begin with and are annoying as hell it's unfortunate for you you're going to keep talking and talking and talking to never do anything they don't want to work they don't want to go outside they don't want to go to the museum or see something new or even go to the same park and behave they want to be a problem and just have stuff given to them it's some sort of baby bird. But your problem is you right now we cannot have you doing these things to our son mac Daddy we can't. So we're going to start taking your stuff as your forces are dwindling anyways by the time this conflict is over between you two morons both sides will not be standing and it's a waste of time you see that other armies are forming up to go down is this what needed to happen now we're upset and we're angry and we are coming down on people but yeah that's what we're doing her son says it every time he sees you the stuff is getting a week from him and wants things for nothing and right now we are heading in to his area and we're heading into the rings and we're going to shut down this idiot show he's going to set up some groups and I'm going to do it special teams to take over your companies because you're not incompetent but you're pretty much going to be there pretty soon and it's not your fault it's your boys

Thor Freya

This is bad and this is horrible but it's expected you boys suck can I sell a company what am I going to buy there's nothing to buy if they don't want I just be sitting there buying stuff and sell it we can't run stuff because you're all stupid that's not really that good. All my life back you voice of mine took my life a long time ago you can see what's going to happen it's not my fault and you were turned into someone who think differently and ruined me and I don't need that they do understand this point do you think my people should take over that stupid argument and of course I don't want them to but he wants to survive every time he goes there he's under some kind tap that you idiots supposedly justice system is you with your fat face f****** it up you understand it's like you're announcing to the world our kind of lawless slowly carefully so they can kind of remove Us and how they have to I need new people out of my life supposed to go down there and arrest just the people who are trouble and people stood up for this piece of garbage to live like him went to head primate and everybody's going to die for nobody called Trump he left the building too he's also a TBI victim I don't know what to say I got to have you out of my life you ruined what I was doing you ruined my life before that as you retards now you're working on ruining whatever else you can and he's aware of it that you are these suicidal freaks and you do have an attitude about you and it's terrorism and you're trying to convert people to not care about themselves but I'll tell you what you're just going to die anyways I'm watching you go and I got you what you did to me and he has not heard it yet but that's what it is you want to take down the whole realm so what I'm not even part of it because of you idiots now you're not part of anything and you can't see that you're all going to die he says and I agree you're a freaking stupid I tell him this some of them can figure it out a little we had this argument a lot he says they figure out a little and they forget those are that Swift can you imagine everybody else because talking is idiots is a waste can you imagine a group of people that have a leader who can't tell from what you see happening to these morlock at the tunnels what's going on with it can you believe that it is amazing to he and I they're going away they're gone forever anyways it's been a pleasure getting screwed by you f****** morons and you're out I've got you I got you back one way or the other either way you look at it you're dead

Mac Daddy

Our son says and daughter I guess he doesn't want to sell Disney and he's laughing but really he does not want to and doesn't care if it's in arrears doesn't have to be but the place will be bankrupt if he sells it to anybody else and gone so he won't be able to hold on to it and we don't want the max in there and who says I want ownership so you want to talk to him about it cuz he didn't start out owning it and other companies

Thor Freya

Olympus

[aita-blorbos]

WIBTA For Not Letting my Ward See Her New Friend?

I (30sF) am currently the legal guardian to “Cadence” (13f), whose parents are on another continent for work. They have plans to officially move back to the states within the next few months, but have opted to send their daughter here first so the culture is less of a shock (my girlfriend offered for us to take her in, for reasons I’ll get to shortly). Until now Cadence has been homeschooled by her mother, so she’s pretty excited to attend public school for the first time, even if it means she’ll be transferring into 8th grade in the middle of it.

I live with my wife “Eliza” (30sF), our girlfriend “Hadley” (30sF), and our daughter “Jayne” (13f). The reason Hadley decided to offer up our home to Cadence is because she thought we could kill two birds with one stone: not only did Cadence need a place to stay and a friend would make her transition easier, but it would be in Jayne’s best interest to also have someone with whom she could socialize. Due to severe bullying by her now ex-best friend (“Jennifer Kingsley,” 14f), Jayne is being homeschooled by my wife (who’s qualified to teach) for the remainder of the school year. She wants nothing more than for the world to leave her alone, so sometimes getting her to therapy is like pulling teeth. As her mother, I want nothing more than for her to be happy, and to heal. We figured hosting Cadence would be worth a shot since the interaction would be one on one, it’d be in a place Jayne is most comfortable, each girl would have her own separate space, and the house is big enough so if they don’t get on they could easily avoid each other. When we talked it over with Jayne, I don’t think she took us seriously. We made it clear that we expected her to be polite at the very least. Cadence is still our guest regardless of whether they get along. It’d be ideal if they did, but completely fine if they didn’t.

The day Cadence officially came to stay with us, Jayne took her arrival very well. At first, she wasn’t keen on making friends because, and I quote, “girls suck,” but I think it changed when they actually met. She came out of her bedroom to say hello and helped Cadence put her things in her new room (which is across the hall from hers) without us asking. They spent more time chatting than unpacking to the point there was only one shirt hanging in the closet when Eliza went to tell them dinner was ready lol. She’s still a little prickly, but she understands this is a harder transition for Cadence than it is for her, so she’s being very good about keeping the snark to a minimum (thank God, because we had to explain sarcasm to Cadence). When we said our goodnights, Jayne was in a much better mood than she’d been in weeks. She couldn’t stop smiling. Apparently, she even snuck over in the middle of the night to keep Cadence company in case the homesickness was too much.

Cadence has settled in nicely. She’s incredibly sweet, bright, and bubbly, if a bit naive due to her upbringing. She has video calls with her parents every night (9PM our time is 6AM for them!), she helps Jayne with math (she can recite so much of pi, it’s nuts), and on her first movie night—which happens every Friday—she picked out and watched her first Disney movie: The Lion King (and unsurprisingly, she loved it. But first Jayne had to talk her out of Bambi; we plan on watching either Turning Red or Zootopia next week!). All in all, things are great on the home front... until now.

When she got home from school today, Cadence excitedly told Jayne and Eliza she made a new friend all by herself: a very sweet girl named Jennifer took her under her wing and made her part of her little group. Immediately suspicious, Jayne asked if it was Jennifer Kingsley, and by her description (since Cadence didn’t get her last name), it was. Until this point, Cadence didn’t know anything about or even questioned why Jayne’s been homeschooled instead of going to the middle school, but Jayne and Eliza told her the story. Cadence was surprised since that’s not what Jennifer told her at all (shocker). When asked how the topic even came up, she said that Jennifer wanted to visit her house so their parents could meet and they could get permission to hang out after school, but Cadence told her she lived with us. Jayne snapped that she better not have invited Jennifer over, and Cadence swears she didn’t. It’s not her house and she’s not that dumb, so of course she didn’t?

Jennifer is still an extremely sore subject for Jayne, which is understandable given how fresh the wound is. When Hadley and I came home from work that evening, Jayne had locked herself in her room and was refusing to speak to Cadence. She ignored her over dinner too. Cadence thinks the friendship with Jennifer can still work so long as she keeps it strictly to school, but Jayne doesn’t want Cadence or Jennifer anywhere near each other. She doesn’t trust either girl to keep it just to school, and frankly, neither do I. I’m not sure how much of Jayne’s anger is out of fear Cadence will turn on her and she’ll lose her as a friend, and how much is just pure rage due to it being Jennifer. We’re sleeping on it for now since, when Jayne gets like this, she’ll bite any hand that tries to calm her. This is why I get her to therapy.

I’ve had my share of toxic relationships when I was a teen. I can’t control who Cadence interacts with when she’s at school, but in my experience, what starts there never stays there. It’s going to follow her home eventually, whether she knows it or not. At the same time, I want to do right by Jayne.

WIBTA for not letting Cadence see Jennifer?

[iiirenxcc]

I’ve been cleaning and organizing my new “temporary” office in the boot room.

It sucks for I sold my equipment, supplies , and all my inventory that I had over the years. I did however find some gems of packaging items. which made me not so devastated. and I had to tell myself it’s only part time and temporary. I am so blessed for opportunities like this just for this reason.

And I get to do the one thing I miss the most which is packing up orders and sending out happy mail. It was seriously my favorite thing to do and of course unboxing videos and having Wyatt smell scents I knew he wouldn’t like to eat his reactions lol. The kids are very excited about this announcement I told them this morning and it was all cheers for they have been begging me to come back. since this company has paid me unlike a few. (Not gonna mention any names)

The stream and content creating is my full time job and I needed something that wouldn’t jeopardize my time, interfere with my sponsorships and collaborations. so it kinda fell in place with what would work out.

Selling everything was a big heavy lift off my shoulders especially the Disney scentsy buddies I had an obsession with collecting them and it wasn’t healthy and parting with them was very difficult but I knew I had to for how Woke they are, and it was my way of showing that I stand true by what I believe in.

With that being said I have my first online launch party started, and going while I finish getting this area cleaned and organized and see what other gems I can find in the basement.

I honestly haven’t smelled any of the new scents or got to see what’s new in the scentsy world. But here’s the link

HTTPS://nadiastewart.scentsy.us/party/18301777/launch-party