#for the first time they actually cast teens to play teens and it changed my life

[thirstyvampyr]

not to be sentimental on main but can i just say how proud i am of these babies?? when skins was airing all i could think was this is history, this is too good to be true because of the sheer talent from everyone involved (daniel kaluuya even wrote some of the episodes?!). and now seeing them all thrive? ugh my whole heart ;_;

[iintervallum]

Sometimes I think about how the dndads cast should be on tumblr, with them having a subreddit(you know how they can be) and dndadstwt being like 10 people, tumblr would be the perfect place for them to see more of the fandom, if they wish to that is. Since quite a lot of people on here are way less honed in on negativity than reddit and twitter.

My edit of this is getting long lol so I'm putting it under a cut

Especially reddit, the people on there honestly I think just get too attached to a specific format or way of doing things, its a common pattern in any long running show fandoms i've been in where its reddit that constantly complains about the "good ol' days" and hate any new changes made. I would sometimes drop in and just see a lot of Scary hate at times, or people getting very irritated with the rule breaking, or just complaining that they're "forcing" the humor. I saw a post like that when i just started s2 and that couldnt have been more incorrect (yeah the piss jokes got a bit much but every other part was golden!...pun not intended)

There were absolutely points where I felt my interest wanning, but I think people would get pretty vicious about it and make a lot of mean spirited accusations. Like if anything the things I really enjoyed about this season was how different it was to s1, the contrast was really nice and i liked a lot of the story choices made, i still think about the apollo four teens and the fucking goof realm episodes, they were amazing. Which is why I remember thinking it was odd that they suddenly started involving the dads from s1 more, but knowing now that Anthony was struggling with people not liking this season as much it makes perfect sense.

Idk if it were just me, but i liked the earlier parts of the season for how the teens were still kind of discovering more about themselves and through gathering each anchor, learning more that their parents are people too, with their own fuck ups revealed and the teens have to clean up after them, so having it shift to be about Willy again was a little odd if i'm being honest(I didnt hate it but a repeat villian is hard to do, and for what its worth i think Willy did get the end he deserved and i loved the finale).

Funnily, in its own way it fits the theme of being a teenager and having to live up to your parents expectations. In a meta sense this being the successor to the first season and it being awkward at points and having issues with its identity is very fitting and just like how teenhood actually is.

I've gotten off topic but my point is fandom is just fandom, and letting it influence the way creators can view their own work is an interesting side effect of the internet and the way we navigate with the media we enjoy or hate. And spaces like reddit are grown in a way to encourage more brutally critical ways of analysing media which has very little consideration for the creator. By no means am I saying that the creators of things should be coddled, heck I literally airing my own annoyances with the podcast in space where i'm uplifting the positivity of tumblr over those spaces lol. I just mean that seeing the more genuine side of the fanbase would be more of a better time for them.

EDIT: (I just phrased things better, fixed the spelling and grammer errors and added more thoughts) The more I ruminate on this the more I think that it would honestly be a good idea. Like I do get the base worry of being too close to the more intense side of the fandom, as people on here are unafraid to gush about the show in ways that can be a little much and theres parasociality and all that jazz.

But it would be really good at least to see some actual genuine positivity, so many people provide their thoughtful meta and theories that even if widely off base are just interesting to read through because of how various different people see themselves in the characters they play. And even the critiques people give are not unkind, they come from a place of wanting to understand the choices made better.

I mentioned this in the old version of this post but having a blacklisted tag that only the people who don't wish their post to be seen by the cast use, something along the lines like how the magnus archives fandom has "do not archive", would be a very useful tool to create a barrier in the fanbase. I know i'm someone who feels very nervous about creators seeing the posts I make. Something like "not safe for dads" could work well or any other joke or pun about it being hidden. I doubt it would be filled with discourse or whatever it would mainly be people hornyposting since i know fandom well enough lol.

[misscammiedawn]

what is your hypno origin story? (have you shared it before?)

Cobbled together from some old posts, as I couldn't find a definitive "this is our origin" post:

From our post on why we love Hypnotic Theory

My earliest days online I remember reading up on subliminal advertising techniques and going down a rabbit hole of "Painted Ice Cubes" and other such things which seemed too weird to be true.

From there I ended up reading Subliminal Seduction in my late teens out of curiosity and was kind of fascinated by the concepts at play. I was already well and truly fascinated with hypnosis but hypnosis was this magical spell that was cast by magicians. This psuedo-science of advertising execs promising that glimpses of sharks and phallus' would unlock the secrets to sales was my first and unfortunate step into understanding the theory behind it all.

Next step was of course M.K Ultra which is 100% a meme in today's hypnokink community and at best an aesthetic for serious torture-brainwashing play which is at a much higher level of anything than I'm really capable of. But it cited itself. Which got me looking into the history of Mesmer and Braid and then onto a bloke named Milton Erickson...

Archive.org had a lot of his stuff. In fact all of his stuff.

Between Erickson in my textbooks and Derren Brown on my television, right at the start of his career when the fascination of mentalism was still tied heavily to hypnosis (and early Derren Brown was a Fae and a bit of an ass XD) my earliest teachers were pretty bad at consent. Which lead to certain expectations of hypnosis which lead to me picking bad partners at the start of my career.

But Erickson's stuff compelled me.

Early 20s Camden used a lot of Ericksonian speech patterns in her play. Though back then she was only really hypnotizing people under compulsion and usually while hypnotized to channel or outright become a character.

The fact I read medical journals is the moment I knew this fascination had evolved into a life altering obsession. That this was my One Thing.

It was the studies of Erickson working on participants with amputated limbs to study the phantom limb theory that really got me to sit up and pay attention to the science behind it.

At this point of my life I'd been studying on surgeries being performed with hypnosis (a terrifying concept. When I have my surgery I will be hypnotized to go under for the anesthesia like a good girl) and I had seen EKG readings that proved that hypnosis changes the way that the brain scans.

Every step of my life I have leaned on evidence and proof and every step of my study into hypnosis taught me it was not fantasy. It was reality and the more I accepted that the better I was at both hypnotizing, free of doubt and insecurity, and being hypnotized, trusting it works.

I still struggle with that. A lot. Thinking I am just acting or following along. But the more I read the better I feel.

I got my certification at the age of 23. I am not a fan of George Kappas (his work is misogynistic to my eyes) but his school taught me for a year (one of my classmates and the person I studied with for my finals is actually another high profile member of the online hypnosis community) and taught me the most important lesson any school has ever taught me:

I ALREADY KNOW THIS.

I was 23 years old and knew as much as the instructors. That was a good feeling.

Also my classmate and I are still friends. We're not super close, but she and I are in contact. I spent some time with them at a recent hypnosis event. It means a lot to me that even though my name and gender changed, they still remember me.

In my 30s I moved on from academic hypnosis materials to community driven information. I have read Lee & Pynch's book on Amnesia, sleepingirl's Brainwashing and NLP books and of course Wiseguy's Mind Play. I've also taken Wiseguy's class, though didn't bother taking my final. Which was a good use of $1,200.

Every now and again Sleepyhead will show up and just put a book in my hand. I think her copy of The Encyclopedia of Stage Hypnotism has graduated into my copy of The Encyclopedia of Stage Hypnotism (Sleepy, you can have your books back at any time).

These days I am lazy and can't really read much. I'm studying therapy more than anything with my latest obsessions being Janina Fischer and Melissa Tiers; Tiers herself being a world class hypnotist that many of our top community members have spent big bucks to train under.

-

From our post on Truth Spells

My earliest hypno-fantasy was to have a hypnotherapist ask me if I was in love with someone (who I did not really have feelings for, but social pressure and all that jazz) and I kept that silly little 14 year old's dream in my heart.

-

From a set of Hypno Asks

1. How long have you been into hypnosis?

Since I was a teenager at least. I used to fantasize about hypnotherapists taking me deep and asking me the truth to questions which were too emotionally complex for me to untangle myself. I used to stare out of windows and think of pendulums and grandfather clocks. I got into the hypnosis community when I was about 19 via Yahoo Groups and kinda followed the growth and pilgramage from platform to platform.

I guess I did kind of get the therapist honesty thing happen to me one time, but that's another story and you'll have to ask for it specifically.

2. Describe your first experience with hypnosis

I remember when I was young I couldn't really move my computer or stretch audio cables, so I needed to make a little cot for myself in the corner of the room. I was awful in my early days. Just listened to files without care for my safety. I just wanted an escape. I bought 45 minute files. I recall one framed like a bank heist with pink mist seeping into the vault of my brain to change things. Predated Inception, even. I was always scared neighbors would hear so I put the speakers on the ground and pulled headphones in and just slept away. I had tons of rituals in the early days, scented candles, boiling baths, anything to try and make it work better. I was AMAZING at visualizing back in those days. I would just get absorbed in the fantasy.

My first interactive partner was an RP buddy on Yahoo Groups who became my first Master. He kept me for about 5 years. I adored him. Did everything he wanted. Even to my own detriment. He was an awful human. I am ashamed I followed him.

My first IRL session was with the woman I married. There was the golden glow of an American sunset pouring through her window as the heaviness of a 12 hour journey across the planet to see her was catching up with me. Her parents were going to drop me off at the hotel to sleep. She thought she could keep me there with her if I fell asleep. She stroked my brow. Cooed for me to just relax. I sank into her lap. It was pure peace and serenity. She tells me she snuck in our first kiss while I was under.

3. Are there any TV shows/movies/books you liked when you were younger that you think got you into hypnosis?

There was like a Magic Block on TV when I was growing up. Masked Magician SECRETS UNVEALED, Sabrina the Teenage Witch and The Hypnotic World of Paul McKenna. I watched every week and was fascinated. I loved magic as a child. But it was all the mystic allure and not real. At least until one of my mum's friends was telling her about being on the McKenna show, a show where they hypnotize people in the audience and do skits. British Broadcast Standards do not allow the airing of any hypnosis so they always made it seem secret and taboo, hidden behind a blurry screen and mum's friend had THE SECRETS. So I listened (she had a Pepsi that night so couldn't go on stage) and was just fascinated. It was not just real magic, it was something that could work on anyone. That real person who was in my life had witnessed it and could have "gone under". I remember my obsession was born in the childish awe of that story.

That should cover it, I believe.

[cordelia---rose]

15 questions for 15 friends

i was tagged by the wonderful @johaerys-writes, thank you so much!

ARE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE?: nope! my mother found a book of rare names, wrote down a whole bunch, and my father only liked one of them. fun fact, only three people in the entire world have the same first name as me ⭐

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED?: oh man in terms of like any tears at all…like this morning because my PMDD is hitting me hard at the moment and i saw my dog being cute and it was all too much for me but in terms of a big, proper cry…probably a couple of weeks?

DO YOU HAVE KIDS?: i am actively filled with repulsion and dread at the thought of having children so it’s a good thing i don’t

WHAT SPORTS DO YOU PLAY/HAVE YOU PLAYED?: i used to play hockey, netball, tennis and rounders at school and then whatever they made us do in PE but i’m not a huge sports person, especially not teams ones!

DO YOU USE SARCASM?: too much. i realised in my teens that if i’m deliberately deadpan and sarcastic all the time, people just think it’s funny and don’t look at me weirdly when i’m having an especially autistic day and can’t mask well because it just blends into my usual demeanour. everyone at work thinks i’m very dry and sarcastic when actually it’s mostly just me failing to understand social cues.

WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE?: gosh honestly i really don’t know. although i do pay a lot of attention to people’s smiles, i think you can learn a lot about a person by how they smile. whether it’s forced or natural, if their eyes smile too, if they hold their happiness back or let it come out unrestrained, etc., so i’ll go for smiles!

WHAT'S YOUR EYE COLOUR?: boring boring blue

SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS?: can we not have both? i’ll always have to pick scary movies though because horror is my favourite genre, but i love a final girl ending!

ANY TALENTS?: ooh this is tough because for me a talent is something you’re just naturally good at, but the things that other people would probably say i have a natural talent for are my hobbies which i’ve worked at for a long time so i wouldn’t be able to say if it’s an innate talent or just a skill i’ve honed. i think i’ll probably say playing the double bass (or upright bass in the USA) - i tried it out at a musical open day thing at my school and decided i liked it, and then twelve weeks later i sat a music exam for it and passed with top marks despite it usually taking several years to get to that point!

WHERE WERE YOU BORN?: england. i was doomed from the start.

WHAT ARE YOUR HOBBIES?: my main ones would be writing, reading, gaming, obsessively researching and then yapping about my special interests, and baking! i also do some crafty stuff when the mood strikes (i’m not really very good at it, but that’s chill, because it’s just for fun) and i’m not sure if it counts as a hobby but i love going on the trampoline!

DO YOU HAVE ANY PETS?: i have my dog who is simultaneously the reason i get up in the mornings and the reason i don’t want to get up in the mornings, and also a crested gecko who mostly just vibes doing her own thing.

HOW TALL ARE YOU?: 5’7”/1.70m

FAVOURITE SUBJECT IN SCHOOL?: this changed so drastically over the years! when i was younger it tended towards history, then when i started secondary school i still loved history but classics became my main area of interest, but after i decided i didn’t want to pursue a career in that field i cast about a little bit and realised that while i hated, like, plant biology and chemical reactions, i was really into specific aspects of science and that’s what i’m studying at uni now!

DREAM JOB?: forensic anthropologist, i’m undertaking my master’s in this and i really hope i get to have a career in this one day, it’s my life’s ambition.

Tagging (i barely talk to anyone on here lmao so it's definitely going to be fewer than 15! also there's with no pressure): @stressedanime @royalthorned @a-good-sandwich @toy-soldiering @claudiadiary

[renamusing]

While the writers keep playing us, here are some future plots to consider after robert comes back (ryan HAS to comeback at this point ok? i wont accept anything else):

Post-prison Denial - Aaron cannot forgive Robert or accept that he is back; he shifts the blame for Liv's death from Chas to Robert because Robert LEFT THEM

Post-prison Blues - Robert deals with his PTSD badly which engages Aaron's redemption arc; he stays by Robert's side and helps him through it

Reunion 3.0 / Seb's return - Robert gets access to Seb (he comes to some sort of agreement with Rebecca or something happens to her offscreen whatever) and seeing Rob and Seb (their son!!) together in the village destroys any willpower Aaron still had to fight against his feelings for Robert

Wedding 3.0 - this needs no explanation

Surrogacy 2.0 - i dont actually mind them going there again if only to get them their Sugden-Dingle daughter

The Return of Andy Sugden - everything is going well for Robert and Aaron but Andy's return shakes things up; the farmboy that Jack Sugden caught Robert with back in the day is working with Andy now; so we get jealousy and misunderstandings and high drama in the Still-Madly-In-Love-Husband front (because that's Aaron innit) and Robert finally tells Vic and Andy about what happened with his dad when he was young.

Teen Seb Comes to Stay - Seb decides he wants to live with his dads at the village permanently (rewashed Liv plot i know but im making it easy for them!!) there are issues with his little sister at first but they get quickly resolved. Seb and his auntie Eve become thick as thieves and become the village nightmares

The Return of Adam Barton - because Aaron needs his mate back at some point and I doubt Vic will settle with anyone else ever

Robron vs Caleb - this just seems like it would be fun idk. it could have something to do with Seb because he is just like his dads and finds trouble everywhere which Robert and Aaron always have to solve in the end

Robert vs Kim&Andy - at this point in my AU Andy is with Kim (romantically or as business partners idc) because it serves the purpose of killing two birds with one stone so that Robert can finally FINALLY win back Home Farm

Robert Sugden's Regression - being in charge of Home Farm ofc changes Robert a bit and he starts to become the thing he fears most: his father. Cue him pushing his children and Aaron to the breaking point until, in true soap-fashion, they break up again. The kids split too. Aaron takes their daughter and Seb stays with Robert. And this ofc leads to:

The Parent Trap: Robron Edition - Seb and his sister plot to get their dads back together through a series of funny shenanigans, but then one of them gets seriously hurt in an accident (they should watch out for those evil farm animals amirite? or was it another drunk driver? only the soap gods know) so all the progress they made crumbles. Aaron and Robert blame each other and seem broken up for good

The Biggest Mugs In The World - Aaron and Robert try to prove to themselves and their kids that they dont want anything to do with each other but every time Aaron sends Robert his divorce papers Robert 'misplaces them' until Aaron finds out Robert has been ripping them apart and chucking them into his fancy fireplace. They fight about Robert being a control freak and Aaron a jealous queen, because every person Robert has flirted with since they separated has ended up fleeing the village with their tail tucked between their legs (Aaron made sure of it). This goes on until they have angry make up sex and then hate themselves for it.

Reunion 4.0 - *PROBLEMATIC PLOT ALERT* Seb and Eve become romantically involved and try to hide it from their families (aunt and nephew fits the Dingle lore somehow lmao). When they are found out Robert goes apeshit and casts Seb out of the village (like his dad did to him once) but he and Seb are at The Layby and before Robert can make the biggest mistake of his life, the love of his life arrives just in time to stop him. Robert realizes what he has become and decides to leave Emmerdale himself (after all, he was always the disaster, the one unable to make anybody happy, he should have never comeback etc) but Aaron won't have it. They can't live without each other, and that fact has never been clearer than at that very moment (shot to a teary-eyed Seb behind Aaron). Robert begs for forgiveness and Aaron just scoffs because forgiving Robert is the easiest thing in the world. They had promised each other messed up forever, had they not?

You know. I know.

[ealvara7]

Watching the Tour Cast for the Very First Time!!! ✨

During a conversation in one of the Discord groups I'm in, one of my good friends shared with me a Beetlejuice Tour boot that included Jackera Davis as Lydia!

I'm still going to see the musical on May 22nd, but I thought this would be a really cool way for me to get better acquainted with how the Tour cast play their roles!

I'll leave my notes under a "read-more", so you can keep scrolling! Thanks for reading, regardless! ✨

-

Jackera's voice is beautiful... 💖

She doesn't linger on a lot of her notes, which gives off the impression that her Lydia is more angry about the situation she is currently facing. That's a nice take on her character!

-

Justin jumpscared me the first time I saw him! I've only ever heard his Beetlejuice voice on a couple of YouTube videos, so getting to see his face was such a surreal experience- (The initial silence when he pulls down the paper was depressing...)

I've actually noticed this on a couple of GIFs, but the area where the banjolele was thrown in The Whole "Being Dead" Thing was moved to the back! I'm not sure if this is consistent on all stages, but I imagine this was done in order to adapt to as many of them as they can!

Similarly, Sandy does not appear at the beginning in the Tour version. This I had been aware of for some time now-

-

In the Tour version, the house is hidden behind a curtain, which is something Beetlejuice mentions just before it opens.

In the boot I'm watching, Justin goes:

"It's a house!!!"

Then he does a little pose, which immediately knocked me out-

Also, I now see what people were talking about with the tongue thing Justin does... and now I can't unsee it-

-

Another Tour change that I had known for some time is the usage of electrical items for the Maitlands' death. Adam purchases an eletrical adapter, rather than Manchurian tung oil, in order to light up the new mobile connected to the crib. Some of the lyrics in Ready Set, Not Yet have also been changed to reflect this.

-

Jackera has to have my favorite characterization for Lydia so far!!!

I always imagine Lydia to be rather lively, like her cartoon counterpart, but still carrying the angst that she is going through in the musical, and Jackera does this! The only difference is that Jackera leans more on the angry side of Lydia, which gives her more of a punk teen vibe. I love it so much, and I feel like she plays off the rest of the cast so well!!! 💖

-

In Fright of their Lives, the chorus simply walk in rather than the set opening to reveal them. It's a little heartbreaking to see that change... but I get the idea at this point-

On a lighter note - Justin interacts with the chorus after they get interrupted and says:

"Sorry guys... I'll pay you for the full thing-"

Once again, knocking me out-

-

Beetlejuice's mood ring hair... is not present in the Tour version. I had been very well aware of this for some time, but out of all the changes made to the Tour version... this one was the one that hurt me the most.

In my heart, Collettejuice most certainly has mood ring hair, even if it's not visually presented on stage.

Speaking of Collettejuice... I've notice a ton of little things that make him distinct from other Beetlejuices. For example, he is very fidgety and fast - he usually apologizes more than once when it comes to a situation that he's in. He also appears to be more disconnected when it comes to his emotions - rather than being sad, he likes to make fun of his own misery. He'll also get really angry when things don't go his way.

-

During Say My Name, Jackera's Lydia is just absolutely not having it with Beetlejuice. Instead, she is very quick to turn down his offer and simply stands her ground.

Also, when the Maitlands appear, Colletejuice is just visually bitter and upset towards them??? Oh my god???

It makes his "old pals" statement feel more condescending, which is a very nice twist from other Beetlejuices, who usually look happy to see them!

-

I find it kind of adorable that at the beginning of Act 2, Jackera's Lydia is much happier with Beetlejuice, but still not entirely sure about all the little quirks he does. It's like when you're getting better acquainted with a new friend, which is exactly what is happening here.

-

I love how Collettejuice is just absolutely embarrassed by his plan to have Lydia marry him. Like, it's the only option he has, but if he had it his way... he absolutely would not be doing that.

"If you wanna save Barbara, I need you... to marry me!"

"WHAT?!"

"..."

"It's a green card thing... guys..."

-

There are a couple of instrumental additions in the Tour version, but easily my most favorite has to be the violin addition in Home.

It's slow... and sad... and somber... It fits with the rest of the song perfectly, and I can no longer imagine the song without it.

Jackera also did a fantastic job with this song! Home requires a ton of strength when it comes to hitting certain notes, and she pulls it off perfectly! I'm so glad I got to hear her sing! 💖

-

In the Life or Death scene, the wheel has been replaced with stocks. Before Otho dies, he is carried off stage by two skeletons.

Beetlejuice's game show outfit in the Tour has the same yellow blazer. However, the outfit is now green at the top, and blue at the middle and bottom.

I... am personally not a fan of this design choice. I feel like having all blue in contrast with the yellow works wonderfully to create a bold look. Adding green at the top makes the outfit blend in a bit... and that just doesn't work for me.

That being said... I adore the addition of the lapel pin on Beetlejuice's wedding blazer! I'm a huge sucker for Beetlejuice wearing a rose or any other kind of flower on his lapel-

-

I feel like I've said everything that I have to say for this boot, except for one more thing...

Justin's wonderful addition to the last "This guy knows what I'm talking about!" will never stop making me go crazy whenever I hear it.

"Look, I only joke because I see myself in you... later tonight."

[softness-and-shattering]

About the Mean Girls musical movie

I know Ive had conversations before about the cultural context stuff, that it seems like the message was not as effective as the first movie when the stuff its talking about, how girls are wrong whatever they do and everything is up for criticism and filming, and you have to pretend to be sweet and kind fairy princesses instead of being allowed to be human. And Id have to go back and find those posts to see what I do and dont agree with now. Because I just saw the movie. And honestly, I liked it. A lot of the visuals were really fun and interesting, which I think is impressive in a movie that mostly takes place inside of a high school. Regina more than once looks like she's in a music video, and that works because shes so hyped, its like she lives in a reality where not only do people break into song, but she's always in a music video. She really sells the character, self-assured and in charge and perfectly manipulative, and even when she's being vulnerable you're like, but is this another deception? She's more villainous in this version, and by the end maybe more human as well. (also the costuming is phenomenal, that Halloween angel dress?? The entire Halloween Someone Get Hurts sequence might be my favourite. )

Also Renee Rapp, who plays Regina, is just incredibly hot. She also played Regina on Broadway so it makes sense she has the character down. Thats not film critique thats my personal admiration. Its almost a little silly with the "oh no Regina is gaining weight she cant fit her clothes" because she looks amazing. [Edit: She's also obviously - I was gonna say she seems older than the other "teens" but actually she's 24, so Im having a moment of feeling old. And she's actually the same age as Auli'i Cravalho who is a lot younger in my mind because holy shit Moana came out EIGHT years ago?? Angourie Rice/Cady is 23, Jaquel Spivy/Damian is 26, Avantika/Karen is 19, thats more the age I thought they were but not the cast seems to be mostly 23-26. Its so weird when times moves the same for people while your image of them in your head stays the same. So Rapp isn't older she's just a bit bigger (neutral/positive). And she's been playing the role for a long time. And Im allowed to find her hot because she's a goddamn adult and so am I. This paragraph is not critique it is me blogging on my blog. Now Im annoyed at myself for Caveats of Fear but Im gonna stop dwelling on that now.]

On that note, though I originally liked the musical quite a lot, the significant fatphobia in it soured it for me. And Im happy to say in the musical movie, they changed or omitted those lines. I was waiting to cringe and they just sang something else. So that was great. I think the only fat character was Damian (why does that suddenly look like a vampire name?) - Jaquel Spivy - and he seemed comfy and cool, no self deprecating fat jokes or anything. Generally the lines/jokes that were uncomfortable or a bit bigoted have been changed. Though there isnt any disability rep, and theres a random character the burn book claims puts alcohol in her inhaler, like a 3 second joke.

And the big thing is that a lot of the meanness is shown in montages of vertical video and comments - no-brand tiktok obviously - and I think thats pretty realistic, and also in the original theme of not being mean to peoples faces but talking all kinds of shit behind their backs. And I think the montage format is effective in mimicking that endless scroll eyes glazing over stuck in the doom scroll/stuck in the spectacle. The music was good. I really liked how they overlaid the Spring Fling/thematic music with the math competition. If anything, Cady is not as good of a character, her Plastic switch is basically overnight, the scene with Aaron at the party is still kinda of awkward, she doesnt get as much room to breathe, while almost everyone else comes off really well. Heck even the candy cane/glen coco guy did well, I was actually suprised at how differently and yet excellently the actors acted their lines, compared both to the previous movie and the musical. Auli'i is fantastic, scary Janis is *scary*. And I simultaneously want to be her best friend. (It certainly helps that her art is augmented with embroidery and she's carrying embroidery hoops in multiple scenes. Fiber arts my loves.)

When I first saw a trailer my thoughts were "ugh we dont need another movie of this," but I think Ive changed my mind. Its similar enough and different enough that for me its a good adaptation. Also - I almost forgot to say - Janis gets a girlfriend for Spring Fling. Its not a plot point, we're just montaging getting ready and Janis goes to pick her up (in the lavender suit), and Damian is taking photos with two other sapphic couples. And he gets a crush/admirer who again, is just there to be there and doesnt interfere with the main story. I might change my mind again once its had time to settle in my thoughts, but initial impression is that its a fun movie I would watch again. Maybe we want the social commentary to be more incisive than it is, and in the end it is entertainment that needs to not be too boring to hold peoples shortening attention spans. (also neutral). Maybe thats wishing for it to be a movie that its not trying to be, and thats always a recipe for disappointment and also not great or fair analysis. What a fantastic line to end on*.

[mortallyclearwonderland]

Top 10 Best Polish DUBs part 2

6. The Ice Age franchise, similar to the Shrek and Madagascar franchises, seems to be way more popular and liked in Poland than in the USA. While the general sentiment in the US is that the first one is somewhat of an underrated classic and the best and every single one got only worse and worse. Meanwhile, in Poland, its sequels are held in much higher regard. Yet again, it's thanks to the funnier dialogue and much better voice actors. Sid became an iconic character just like Donkey from Shrek or King Julian from Madagascar, most likely thanks to the fantastic work of Cezary Pazura, an actor and voice actor who makes everything he's in so much better. Piotr Fronczewski as Diego is also great with his warm fatherly voice he sounds way more sincere. If Diego had the same voice in the English version he would have even more simps fans. Wojciech Malajkat is great as Manfred. He would later voice Puss in Boots from Shrek. As the franchise went on not only the quality of writing went downhill but also they started casting celebrities instead of the real VAs or even regular actors. Queen Latifah, Drake who was in like 5 minutes of a movie.

7. Winx Club is way better in Polish, in my opinion. I don't know if it's because their VAs aren't actual teenagers who don't have as much experience, or if they're adults trying to sound like teens and failing miserably, or if their voices are just that annoying. Whatever the case might be the Polish actors strike a great balance between sounding mature but youthful at the same time. Like teens that are on their way to becoming adults but still with some childish tendencies. Not a twelve-year-old trying to sound grown-up or a 40-something-year -old trying way too hard to be cool and hip with the kids. And Polish versions of the songs are amazing.

8. Totally Spies makes their heroins sound way more mature just like Winx Club. To not repeat myself let me tell you about something different, the dialogue changes. It's not censorship or completely changing the meaning of the dialogue but the vocabulary. In the show, they are very much Valley girls. In the Polish version, they still use slang that was (and still is) used in Poland at the time but they also were capable of using big words. Maybe English slang is more annoying, at least to me.

9. W.I.T.C.H. BLAH BLAH better and more mature voices BLAH BLAH better and funnier dialogue BLAH BLAH. What is worth mentioning are the voices of the male characters. Caleb's English VA doesn't fit him whatsoever. I know Greg Cipes sounds like that even as an adult but still. If Caleb looked like his comic version he would be fine but not when he looks like he is 18 or older. Imagine my shock after growing up with the Polish deep manly voices only to watch the English version and hear boys who haven't finished going through puberty yet. I've heard that the Polish language is sometimes referred to as snake language because of the ć, ś, ź, ż, sz, cz, and many other sounds, so Cedric's VA has a time to shine. English Phobos sounds more whiny than menacing.

10. Shark Tale is regarded as one of the worst animated movies ever both in terms of animation and the story. Highly exaggerated in my opinion. I mean it's not great but it's not Food Fight, Video Brinquedo, Animated Titanic, and many others. I think why it's not as hated by me and many other Poles it's thanks to its dubbing. I don't know if you know this, but there is a Polish comedy ''Kiler''. The whole plot of the movie is that the main character is mistaken for a killer. So, the Polish dubbing of Shark Tale is basically a parody of this movie. They even got Cezary Pazura (the guy playing Sid) who played the main guy in ''Kiler''. Instead of gay-lisped Jack Black we have Jarosław Boberek aka King Julian. Now that's a team-up better than the Avengers.

It was a surprisingly hard list to make, not because there are no great Polish dubbings but because there are so many good ones. Any movie or show could've been on the list. To make it easier I asked myself ''What Polish dubbings are better than the original?'' and ''What dubbings had the biggest impact on me but also on my country as a whole?''.

The reason why most of the list consists of shows and movies from the early 2000s is because that's when Poland had a little golden age. There were a bunch of great movies and shows coming out, so it was easy to strike gold. (And that's when I was born.) Now with all the trash coming out, it's way harder to do. The translators for ''Wish'' tried their best to fix those broken lyrics.

But nobody's perfect. I'm a firm believer that there is no terrible Polish dubbing but they still can make mistakes, questionable decisions, and voices that will make you switch the channel until they stop talking.

See you soon, in ''Top 10 worst Polish DUBs''.

[nehswritesstuffs]

So, um, it's time for Nehs to go off again on One Piece bc my gears are turning thanks to Lore Piece being solid as per usual. Spoilers for chapter 1097 are under the cut, as well as talk of some of the basis of Crocomom, a fanon theory I do not ascribe to but don't necessarily dismiss, so if you do dismiss it then don't read I guess.

Okay, um... so I've been kind of thinking that Bonney isn't really twenty-four years old for a while and something more like a middle schooler (10-14), but this chapter to me sort of soft-confirmed it, as well as set things up for this other crazy-ass fucking thing I didn't think was even possible.

'Cause the end of the chapter puts things fourteen years ago, right? No mention so far of a kid despite Ginny's enthusiasm to get into Kuma's pants. Oda would have mentioned a kid, especially if it was already ten years old. Kuma is too cute to have been a dad and NOT gotten a moment with his baby. (LORD ALMIGHTY why is Kuma so adorable in this edition of Lore Piece I just wanna smush his cheeks and tell him he's doing a fantastic job at caring for his flock and being a rebel.) This means that Bonney is one of a few things:

Kuma and Ginny's daughter they had after rescuing her, giving her a different family name to distance her from the Buccaneer race, ala Ace going by Portgas

Ginny's rescued relative we don't know exists yet

Kuma's adoptive daughter that he takes in bc she looks hauntingly like Ginny

Ginny's daughter from things happening while she was kidnapped

Ginny's clone in the Clone Trooper sense, taken and prematurely aged

Ginny's clone in the Boba Fett sense, taken w/o being aged

No matter how you shake it, unless Bonney is some until-now-unknown child waiting to be rescued, all of these options point to her actually being somewhere around tween/young teen in actuality but presenting like an adult in order to get taken seriously. The anti-eyebrow piercing would even play into that, being a potential way for a kid to prove they're so big and tough and able to run with the big kids take me with you Shanks I'm no anchor. So, we're getting to her true origins soon, also where Vegapunk comes into play, whether he is a cause or a secret-keeper or whatever.

Now, remember how I said something about Crocomom? As it turns out, I feel like if we get any confirmation for the trans!Crocodile fan theory, it's gonna be within the next two or three chapters. Why? I think Croc is potentially connected to whomever captured Ginny. Iva, being their fabulous self, is not above using their power to disorient opponents. While this could mean that Crocodile is a cis man but got temporarily femme'd and turned back after humiliation, it also leaves open the possibility for Iva putting Croc through permanent HRT for either punishment purposes (so unwitting ftm not changing you back candy you've been bad now go learn a lesson) or for negotiation purposes (already afab ftm but give us our Ginny back and I can make you grow a dick and lose your tit fat). While I don't think that Crocodile was necessarily designed to be transgender from the beginning, I also feel like Oda has to know about the Crocomom/trans!Croc fanon and he is specifically the kind of author who just shrugs and goes with shit fans make up. That's how he got almost all, if not every single, birthday for the cast, so why not this twist? Like, I wasn't sold on it the first time I encountered this theory, but like I said: I never discounted it because we never know what's going on in Oda's brain. He really gave us a good potential set up here, so it'd be weird if he didn't use it.

(I still think that Crocomom specifically is a long shot since Luffy's five at this point, so unless Dragon is going to potentially wage war on his ex/babymama and neither of them mention Luffy, it leaves even more parts of the puzzle that don't quite fit (and Croc wouldn't already be ftm bc that's a lost chance at a new character design, which we all know Oda is shit at resisting). There's a lot of them that already don't fit to me, but that's neither here nor there. I'm just concerned that even if we do have ftm!Crocodile thanks to Iva's Devil Fruit, that a lack of Crocomom would mean that One Piece has its own version of the Blaise Zabini Debacle in the works (apologies for bringing HP into it but it's true) and we as a fandom are better than that.)

OR I COULD BE WRONG ABOUT ALL OF THIS AND GINNY WAS CAPTURED BY MARINES, GIVING HER TO VEGAPUNK FOR EXPERIMENTS, WHICH WOULD LEAD INTO OTHER STUFF but yeah

None of this theorizing I think could have been possible, like, ten/fifteen years ago, because part of me feels like Oda has been putting his foot down a lot based on what it is we've been getting. Some stuff could have, yeah, been sort of meddled with by the editors/SJ at this point, but it feels like he's been able to get away with a lot more than he did before. Being such an important asset can do that.

...but yeah, if none of this happens (or is at least more firmly kickstarted) by chapter 1100, chances are that we're not getting it.

[edwinadaily]

COSMOPOLITAN UK | A few weeks ago, Charithra Chandran was having a dinner party with some of her oldest friends. A few of them work in advertising and marketing, another is a doctor, one is a lawyer. None work in ‘the industry’. ‘Have I changed?’ Chandran asked them, as plates were cleared and wine glasses topped up. Their answer was unanimous. ‘No way.’ ‘In fact,’ one joked, ‘it’s actually sad how little character development there’s been.’ They all laughed. ‘Sometimes dickish things come out of your mouth like, “I’ve got a fitting with Dior next week!” Look, your life might have changed, but you certainly haven’t.’

Their words reassured Chandran of something she already knew. In just two life-changing years, she had gone from being a philosophy, politics and economics graduate preparing to start a job in management consultancy, to playing a lead in one of the biggest TV shows of the past decade. In the year since she appeared in Bridgerton’s second series, caught in a love triangle with Jonathan Bailey’s Anthony Bridgerton and Simone Ashley’s Kate Sharma, her trajectory has shown no signs of slowing down. This year, she stars in a handful of films including Good Intentions, a short with Micheal Ward (who you’ll know from the Oscar-nominated Empire Of Light), as well as playing the lead in teen rom-com How To Date Billy Walsh. And just a few weeks ago, she was in India with Ashley for the Dior pre-fall show (hence the fitting), which she describes as ‘special and incredible’. But while 26-year-old Chandran may be sitting front row, booking lead roles and appearing on magazine covers, she still feels like that same wide-eyed graduate, the one with no idea what would come next.

‘My life just feels so... normal?’ says Chandran, over a builder’s tea in one of her favourite central London cafes, her hair slicked back in a silk headscarf. 'That is the number one thing that has left me feeling sane. I worry that if my personal life was fully in this world, these crazy experiences would start to feel normal. I need to be surrounded by people not involved in the craziness.'

Most of her friends – like the ones at the dinner party – are from school and university, and the industry friendships she has tend to be with older women, including her Bridgerton cast mates Golda Rosheuvel (Queen Charlotte) and Shelley Conn, who played her mother in the series. ‘We hang out all the time. We go see shows; we grab tea or dinner. Golda’s so cool, sometimes I wonder why she wants to hang out with me. Shelley is literally like my older sister; I’m super close with her family. They both give me advice constantly about how to hold yourself in the industry. They provide perspective as well; they’ve been in it for so long, and they’re both women of colour; they remind me how far we’ve come and how far we have to go. Everything that I go through, they’ve been through it tenfold. I really rely on their counsel.’

The road to Bridgerton

Chandran auditioned for the show in 2020 before the first series had aired. At the time, her career as an actor was precarious. She’d loved performing for as long as she could remember (‘I was that annoying kid who always wanted to be the centre of attention’), acting throughout school and university, even performing in the West End with youth theatre companies, but she’d never really considered it as a viable career. ‘I never even talked about wanting to act because I felt embarrassed. Saying you wanted to be a professional actor felt like saying you wanted to be prime minister or an astronaut.’ Her reasons were twofold. The first was a lack of South Asian representation on screen and stage, – ‘For a long time I didn’t really have any inspiration to look towards,’ she says – and the second was familial expectation. ‘I’m the literal opposite of a nepo baby. My parents are doctors; we didn’t know any actors or journalists. Anyone who’s not a medic was foreign territory for us.’

Though her parents hoped Chandran would follow them into the profession, she credits their progressive attitudes with giving her the courage to follow her dreams. ‘They always expected academic excellence, but they gave me so much freedom and trust. I don’t know if that was an active choice or [if] it was because they were immigrants, junior doctors and single parents who didn’t have time to be focused on me 24/7. Either way, they really let me be me.’

Being herself meant giving acting a serious shot before starting the management consultancy job. She deferred the start date for a year and, in between working as a tutor and running a food bank, spent time crafting a CV and a showreel to try to get professional representation. Her graft paid off, and she signed to an agent who began to get her auditions for film and TV roles. Her first was a Bollywood dancer in the star-studded Marvel film Eternals, which Chandran landed after finding an advert on Instagram, helmed by the likes of Angelina Jolie, Richard Madden and Salma Hayek. On set, it was Kumail Nanjiani who really stood out for Chandran. ‘Being on a proper movie set with this fellow brown actor looking buff felt amazing. He treated us with so much kindness and grace.’

Shortly after, Chandran landed a role in Amazon Prime’s Alex Rider series, and then came her even bigger break: Bridgerton. The process was turbulent. The world had gone into lockdown and after a handful of virtual auditions for Ashley’s role (Kate), Chandran was told she looked too young for the part. Months later, out of the blue, she was approached again, and by that point, season one was already out and the show was a breakout hit that became the most-viewed English-language series onNetflix at the time. ‘While they continued looking for Kate, they had me on the back burner. I’d got a part in another show, so I was like, you know, okay, I love the sound of Bridgerton, butI have [other] work so, whatever. And then season one came out and I was like, “Oh, man! It’s such a good show. I would have loved to get that!”’ This time, the team wanted her to audition for the role of Kate’s younger sister, Edwina Sharma. ‘I desperately wanted to be in the show, but I didn’t want to do it solely for that – which is such an ego trip! I only had one credit at the time. But I was fully being like, “Okay, tell me more about the role...’ So I read for it, and then I didn’t hear about anything for months. I was like, “Okay, well, clearly it’s over!”’

Then, one afternoon, while helping out in her mum’s allotment, she received a call asking her to audition with Bailey and Ashley. ‘I didn’t even realise I was still in the running. But the chemistry read was so special. I remember they looked so beautiful on Zoom. The lighting was amazing, and I was in my dingy dining room in the dark. I thought, “Okay, I need to step up my game.”’ Clearly she was already bringing her A-game because she landed the part.

Surviving the spotlight

Bridgerton has a habit of launching the stellar careers of its leads. Almost overnight, season one’s Phoebe Dynevor and Regé-Jean Page went from emerging actors to household names. ‘So many of the cast members who’d been through it were like, Charithra, get a therapist because this is crazy,’ she remembers. She took their advice, and while therapy has been invaluable, nothing could truly prepare her for such a life-altering experience. She cites events in particular as ‘anxiety-inducing’, explaining, ‘There’s an impostor syndrome there. I leave and I want to cry every time!’ It sounds intense, and the internet’s opinions only exacerbated it. ‘I think when anyone is first exposed to this [fame] on the level that I was, they read the comments, they google themselves. And when you read the really aggressive ones – I know this sounds dramatic – but you feel really vulnerable. I’m a normal person – I’m taking the bus, I’m taking the Tube. You’re thinking all it takes is one person being slightly too deranged and trying to hunt you down... It took me like a solid four months to [get] through that.’

When it comes to social media generally, and whether she feels any pressure with what she posts and the persona she presents, Chandran is typically low-key. ‘I’m not famous enough for people to care about me enough to feel that now! I’m not thinking to myself at any point, “I wonder how the public will receive it.” Maybe I should! But even if – fingers crossed – I continue to do really cool things, and I do get more famous, I’m a very open person. I’m not trying to hide anything. I’m very active on social media and I share loads of parts of my life. But that’s what I’d be doing anyway, even if I wasn’t doing this. I don’t do things differently because I have a platform.’

One thing she is clear on: she doesn’t read negative comments any more and focuses her attention on what a powerful impact the series has had, particularly for young women of colour. ‘I get so much energy and enrichment when I meet someone who’s watched it and tells me how much seeing Simone and me on the show means to them.’ She adds, ‘She is so beautiful. We both went through a baptism of fire together, so we really bonded for life over this very seismic experience that we had. We’re connected by something so big.’

Chandran is clearly proud of the show, however not all responses to Bridgerton have been positive. While the Shonda Rhimes Regency-era romance has largely been praised for the diversity of its stars, some critics have questioned the casting, suggesting it’s tokenistic and that the characters of colour aren’t afforded sufficient context or cultural recognition and could just as easily have been played by a white actor. ‘It’s not a perfect show,’ says Chandran. ‘No one’s out here saying this is a perfect representation of anything. If we were to do it again, I’m sure we’d make certain different decisions, but it’s a damn good try. And it’s a really bold try. Let’s enjoy the fact that we have this and continue striving for more.’

Chandran says some of the commentary that bothered her the most were ‘the comments that said I only got to where I am because I’m Eurocentric or I’m white-passing. That really bugged me because all my life I’ve had to face prejudice for not being those things. I have a quintessentially Tamil face, not even Indian, people can place me as a Tamil. You open books, you go to a temple, you see the pictures and paintings; they look like this. So it’s like, bro, I didn’t go through prejudice and discrimination for you to now belittle my identity. When the show was coming out, that’s all I could focus on.’

From Regency to romance

As she gears up for the release of her next project, How To Date Billy Walsh, this time around, her feeling is one of excitement. She plays Amelia, a precocious teenager who, much like her Bridgerton character, finds herself caught up in an unlikely love triangle with her best friend Archie (played by Heartstopper’s Sebastian Croft) and an elusive new student (Cobra Kai’s Tanner Buchanan). The film brims with all the fun, campness and nostalgia of a classic romcom. ‘We wanted to make something that was really timeless,’ says Chandran. ‘My cousins who are 12 and 13 are still watching Clueless, The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. We wanted to do something fun and heart-warming that harked back to the 90s.’

While classic teen romances are praised for their charm, they’re less celebrated for their diversity. As a woman of colour, did it feel like a big deal to be at the helm of a high school romcom? ‘I think it’s so interesting because what I really loved and appreciated was how not a big deal it felt, and I think that’s a real testament to all the people that have come before me, all the directors, producers, actors who have paved the way. I love representing my culture, and I love playing characters who are culturally specific to me,’ she says, ‘but on the flipside, I also enjoy playing a normal person where the story isn’t just about her being Indian. That is what I want for my career as well. I want to do things about race that start important conversations, and things about love and friendship. I don't want to be a one-trick pony.' When choosing roles, she says her approach is simply to find characters who feel truthful. 'The times I've said no are if it perpetuates bad or lazy stereotypes, if it's a character I've already seen before.'

As a romantic lead, her performance is effortless. Amelia is a plucky teenager who reels through the full spectrum of emotions when she develops a crush on the titular character, faces off against bullies and navigates some complicated feelings towards her best friend. Her portrayal of a girl caught in the full throes of an all-consuming crush is vibrant and hilarious, but she also imbues Amelia with a real sense of vulnerability.

Chandran shares some of Amelia's confidence and her thirst for new experiences, but her own memories of dating as a teenager were quite different. rowing up in Oxford, she went to an all-girls school. Most weekends involved house parties with boys from the neighbouring schools, where she would be the only one to get, ‘no attention from the guys,’ she remembers. ‘I thought, "Maybe they’re just not attracted to brown girls." I’m curvy; Indian women tend to have curves and fat in different places. All my friends were white and skinny. It was confusing, but I never took it personally. I used to wonder, is it because they see a brown girl and think, “Oh, she probably can't drink, she’s probably really prudish” – what assumptions were they making just from the colour of my skin?’

While she was at university, one of the boys who had been on the same teen house-party circuit messaged her on Facebook. 'This is a guy I’d seen every weekend for almost two years. He said I was cute and asked me how we knew each other. What’s mad is that I didn’t go to uni and have some glow-up. I looked exactly the same at 19 as I had at 15.’ She believes his sudden interest reflected a broader cultural shift towards diversity. ‘By that time, there were more Black and brown women in magazines and in lead roles on TV. I realised, "Oh, I'm trendy. So now you see there’s an attractiveness there. Because I objectively know I don't look different." That kind of shit happened quite a few times.’

Needless to say, Chandan ghosted the message. ‘I’m not a trend,' she says with a playful eye-roll. In life after Bridgerton, she admits dating can be difficult to navigate. She doesn’t use apps because ‘even before the show, people would see me on Instagram or google me. Which we all do, it's fine... but it started to get weird. So it is harder to meet people, but I don't think I'm famous or successful enough to ever have to worry that someone’s dating me for clout’. Plus, she knows what's important in a potential partner. ‘If I think about what kind of person I want to date, the number one thing I'll say is that they need to be a feminist. I'm a feminist, I'm an advocate for women. I went to a girls school, my family is a matriarchy.’

Dating aside, the fact that Chandran’s life hasn’t changed all that much is a testament to her ability to keep both feet on the ground. There’s also perhaps the knowledge that, should she ever find herself changed by fame, her best friends will absolutely be there to bring her back to reality at the next dinner party. ‘They're the most important people to me’ she says. ‘I love to be surrounded by women. I love the men in my life, but I just prefer women. Women made me feel safe, they make me feel heard.'

[megafighter343]

Rewriting Dragonball Evolution

So, I typed this up some many years ago, but never posted it anywhere. The tragic passing of Akira Toriyama brought this back into my thoughts and I figured you folks at Tumblr would get a kick out of it.

Rewriting Dragonball Evolution

Dragonball Evolution is essentially the standard bearer for bad live-action films based on anime. It wasn't the first,with the Guyver films first starting the trend, but it's considered the biggest example of how Hollywood just doesn't get anime. It comes across like a game of Telephone of the plot of the original Dragon Ball, but mixed with 2000s Hollywood sensibilities; Goku is a broody teen, Chi Chi is a love interest, Bulma has just a single streak of blue hair, there's a race-against-the-clock eclipse, the Dragon Balls can show visions, the Kamehameha Wave is called “Airbending” and so many more.

But can it be made better? Maybe not a masterpiece, but an entertaining blockbuster and not a miserable failure that we got? Well, I'm gonna give it a try. Now, this isn't gonna be a full re-adaptation, with casting changes and all that. No, the main focus here is taking the story we've been given and do whatever is needed to make it better, more faithful to the source while still being able to draw in an outsider audience. I'll be going scene to scene, giving them tune-ups, adding and removing where necessary. Ready? Let's Go!

Scene 1: The Awakening of Demon King Piccolo

First, we start with the opening, where we get the legend of the Demon King Piccolo, sealed away by the Mafuba. We come upon a village under siege by the Red Ribbon Army. Yep, we're bringing in the Red Ribbon Army, just for this opening. The siege is overseen by General Blue, who has been informed of a Dragon Ball in the area, accompanied by the somewhat clumsy rookie soldier, Mai. Yeah, we're adding Mai to the Red Ribbon Army for the movie as a greenhorn private in the troops.

The people are threatened, one of them dropping a pot in front of the General and reaching for it in a panic. The General is amused by his behavior and picks up the pot, taunting the old man (“What is this? Some kind of rice cooker?”) and playing with it while the old man begs him to leave it alone. He's speaking his native language, but the clearest words are stuff like “Mafuba” and “Daimao Piccolo” before General Blue kicks him aside and throws the pot onto the ground, smashing it.

General Blue laughs, joined in by a few troops, before they go back to their search for the Dragon Ball. However, out from the shattered Mafuba, Piccolo emerges and he slaughters everyone. Villagers, soldiers, they are all nothing in comparison. The only one who survives the onslaught is Mai, who had the sense to hide during Piccolo's rampage. She pleads for her life, swearing fealty to Piccolo. Piccolo, after a brief, silent stare at Mai, walks away and then comes back with a Dragon Ball clutched his hand. He will spare her as long as she aids him in finding the Dragon Balls.

Title Sequence

Scene 2: Training with Grandpa Gohan

Now we cut to the scene the movie actually started with, where Goku and Grandpa Gohan are training. Important here is that we make sure that while Goku is a teen, he still retains a lot of his more distinct characteristics as a happy-go-lucky, fight-happy kind of guy. This isn't Peter Parker, it's Son Goku. The two spar with Goku winning, rather than losing. Here, the situation pressed is less Goku's friendless background, but that he's starting to surpass Grandpa Gohan, and that perhaps its time for him to move on to a new teacher in martial arts. The scene's major piece of importance is that as a token of congratulation, Goku is entrusted by Gohan with his most sacred possession, the Four-Star Dragon Ball.

Scene 3: Party!

Yes, there is a party in this one, but we also cut out the school stuff. Goku was homeschooled by Grandpa Gohan, though he probably doesn't know all that much since he was more interested in fighting. The party isn't for Chi-Chi, though it is held in Chi-Chi's homeland of Fire Mountain. See, it's someone's birthday! Unlike the original movie where it was Goku's (and how the hell would Gohan even know his day of birth? Does he just go with the day he found him as a baby?) this time it's the birthday of Grandpa Gohan's mentor; Roshi.

The scene introduces us to a few classic Dragon Ball characters at once; There's the Ox King, Roshi, the Ox King's daughter Chi-Chi and Roshi's apprentice, Krillin. The important notes for this scene is Goku and Gohan arriving during an exhibition between Krillin and Chi-Chi. The fight draws Goku's eyes, both drawn by the advanced techniques Krillin is using and the fact that Chi-Chi is hot and more importantly, a really good fighter. Chi-Chi wins the fight and we get a little Meet Cute between her and Goku to set up their romance.

We also get some formalities, Goku and Gohan meeting Roshi and Krillin, exchanging names and setting up Krillin as comic relief. You know, he hits on girls and gets turned down, but he and Goku get along great. Plus, because it's a party for Roshi, we get servers in bunny suits! The Ox King knows that old pervert well.

Happy birthday, Roshi!

For some fanservice, we get a brief scene of Krillin offering flowers to one of the servers, who turns them down due to “allergies” and the main course is a pig roasting on a spit (sorry, Oolong.)

We get a scene between Goku and Chi-Chi with them away from the party, engaging in small talk. Chi-Chi spills the beans to Goku about how her dad has a Dragon Ball. Goku, surprised, sneakily shows Chi-Chi his own Dragon Ball. This turns out to be a mistake as Mai, disguised as a server, overhears how there's a Dragon Ball in Fire Mountain.

Scene 4: Party's Over!

The party gets attacked by Piccolo, Goku and Chi-Chi running back and seeing the carnage unfold. Piccolo has claimed another Dragon Ball and is now threatening Grandpa Gohan for the location of his Dragon Ball. Gohan refuses to talk and holds Piccolo off, telling Goku to get away. Goku, Chi-Chi and Krillin manage to escape, but Gohan dies in the process. Maybe have Goku hand the Dragon Ball to Krillin and try to save his Grandpa, but getting swatted away by Piccolo.

Happy birthday, Roshi...

Scene 5: Enter Bulma

Goku, Chi-Chi and Krillin return to the ruins of Fire Mountain, checking for survivors. Ox King and Roshi made it, but obviously Gohan did not. As they're grieving, a motorcycle arrives on the scene, driven by Bulma Briefs of Capsule Corp. She demands to know what happened to her Promethean Orb, no one knowing what she's referring to until she notes that she picked up on its energy signature. She pulls up her scanner, scanning over the group and getting heavy beeps from Goku. She pulls a gun on him and tells him to empty his pockets. Goku does, pulling out his Dragon Ball.

Bulma tries to take it, but Goku blocks her, telling her just what the Dragon Ball really is, how they summon the great dragon Shenron who will grant a wish. Bulma, who had been using one as an energy source, is disbelieving of the true nature of the Dragon Balls, but sees that it's not her Dragon Ball, as it only has four stars while hers had five.

Goku gets her up to speed as to what happened and Bulma is talked into joining up with them to try and get back the Dragon Balls, needing her tracking device, which she redubs the Dragon Radar. As they prepare to depart, Goku talks to Roshi, asking for a chance to train under him. Roshi agrees, Goku and Krillin high-fiving at the news, the dorks.

Scene 6: Building Up Power

So, we begin the journey proper, Goku carrying everyone's stuff on his back and running alongside whatever vehicle Bulma whips up for the rest of the crew. This time, Chi-Chi is part of the team from the start, plus they got Krillin added and an early Roshi. They make a stop at Roshi's home on Turtle Island to pick up his Dragon Ball and then do some training before seeking out their third Dragon Ball. Goku starts learning the signature move of the Turtle Style, the Kamehameha.

Meanwhile, Piccolo decides to build up an army of his own sons, either through blood or eggs. Within little time, three sons are born in front of Piccolo and Mai; Tambourine, Cymbal and Drum (sorry, Piano.) He sends them out to seek the next Dragon Ball, the Sons of Piccolo taking off.

Scene 7: In The Bandit's Trap

During their search for their third Dragon Ball, they get dropped into a trap, but Goku and Krillin jump their way out, confronting the thief Yamcha (who probably has a pet cat, Puar. Sadly, he can't talk here.) Yamcha challenges them for the money and valuables. Krillin steps up first, holding as well as he can before being knocked back into the hole and onto the still stuck Roshi. Yamcha challenges Goku next, but Goku tells him to hang on since he's using his Power Pole (yes, he has that in this version) to help Chi-Chi and Bulma out of the trap. This ends up being Yamcha's downfall as the sight of two pretty girls results in his shyness kicking in hard so when Goku squares up, Yamcha is so unfocused that he gets taken out with ease.

They eventually convince Yamcha to join up with them to gather the Dragon Balls (Yamcha joining so he can wish to get rid of his shyness.) We have a quick search for the next Dragon Ball. This leads them into the path of the Sons of Piccolo. The three square up with one of the three male fighters; Yamcha vs. Cymbal, Krillin vs. Tambourine and Goku vs. Drum. The three sons win their fights, but Roshi is able to step in and actually proves he's still got it, blasting right through Cymbal with a Kamehameha. Tambourine and Drum go into retreat as they are outnumbered and it looks like the other three are getting up. This clears the path for our heroes to collect their third Dragon Ball.

Scene 8: The 23rd Tenkaichi Budokai

This is the location of the final Dragon Ball, so four of our fighters enter the tournament to ensure their chances of winning while Piccolo and Mai also take spots. The tournament mostly goes to montages for the first round, so here's a quick bracket.

Goku d.. Tienshinhan (Yeah, we'll have Tien cameo here and lose out to Goku in the first round)

Chi-Chi d. Yajirobe (Another cameo! Chi-Chi makes quick work of everyone's pudgy samurai friend.)

Mai d. Yamcha (Poor Yamcha, just can't catch a break...)

Piccolo d. Krillin (It's a harsh beatdown. Thank Kami that Roshi brought Senzu Beans for after rough fights. It'd be tempting to kill off Krillin here, but it'd also be kind of unfair since he still hasn't really won any fights. Eh, I'll let him live.)

This sets up for the semi-finals, where Goku wins against Chi-Chi and Piccolo wins his match by count-out. Curious that Mai didn't show up... something Bulma and Yamcha go to investigate. We get Piccolo vs. Goku, which goes in Piccolo's favor at first, but then Goku lands some good hits in. However, the match ends via ring-out after Piccolo takes a Kamehameha that he easily could've avoided. You know, maybe he could've DODGED!

But hey, Goku wins the tournament and is about to be given his prize... only to find that the Dragon Ball has been stolen! Gasp! Not just that, Bulma comes up and tells him that their Dragon Balls have gone missing too! Double Gasp! Meanwhile, Roshi had gone off to seek Master Mutaito's help in learning Mafuba in the hopes of sealing away Piccolo again, returning with a new sealing pot to put him in.

Scene 9: Chasing the Dragon

We get to Piccolo's castle, the Demon King preparing to summon Shenron, but the heroes catch up to him. We get the split off for fights as Krillin takes on Tambourine again, Yamcha goes up against Drum and Mai fights Chi-Chi. Meanwhile, Goku and Roshi make their way to Piccolo, Roshi attempting the Mafuba but failing, like he did in the original.

Things aren't going great for Piccolo's army as Krillin lobs Tambourine's head off with a Destructo Disc (though if the MPAA doesn't like that, we can replace it with a simple Kamehameha) Yamcha beats the Drum with Wolf Fang Fist and Chi-Chi puts Mai out for the count. However, Piccolo does kill Master Roshi, leaving it all up to Goku. Now, important to note here is that Goku doesn't turn into the Oozaru. That's not a plot point at all because Goku just doesn't have his tail. Eclipse, full moon, doesn't matter. No tail, no Oozaru, just Goku vs. Piccolo, round 3.

Scene 10: Make a Wish, Goku!

Goku wins by propelling himself with the Kamehameha and punching right through Piccolo, like he did in the source material. Then he summons Shenron and uses his power to revive those killed by Piccolo. Shenron agrees, but tells Goku that there is one who refuses to return from the afterlife. When asked, he gives the name: Son Gohan. Goku demands to know why, so Shenron's eyes flash and an astral projection of Gohan's spirit comes to talk to Goku.

He tells Goku that he has lived a full life and is happy to move on and that Goku no longer needs him. He has grown into an excellent fighter and a great young man. He tells Goku to keep training under Master Roshi, to seek out the next great fight and all that good stuff before finally saying goodbye. Goku says goodbye as well before his grandpa's spirit vanishes. Shenron finally grants the wish, reviving Roshi and any others killed by Piccolo, the Dragon Balls going inert and not unusable for a year.

The crew leaves the scene victorious, with hook-ups for Goku and Chi-Chi and Yamcha and Bulma, both couples kissing and Krillin turning to Roshi and telling him “Not gonna happen, old man.” We get a few laughs as the heroes ride off into the sunset, Goku running alongside their car.

Post-Credits Scene

The post-credits takes us to the ruins of Piccolo Castle, Mai recovering and seeing Piccolo and his sons dead. She leaves to find her way back to the Red Ribbon Army. However, deep in the castle ruins, a vial of Piccolo's blood cracks open and slowly from it emerges... Piccolo.

So, that's how I would've written Dragonball Evolution. For the most part, the bare formula does get us a point A to point B with plenty of action and comedy like you'd expect from Dragon Ball. Would it have been a better movie? I think so, though I will admit the cast does bloat up quite a bit thanks to the addition of Krillin and Piccolo's sons, but as long as I gave them stuff to do, the whole thing works well, I think.

Hope you all enjoyed this little thought experiment.

Rest in Peace, Akira Toriyama.

[secretgamergirl]

All the seriously queer stuff in the back half of Sailor Moon

In case it wasn't obvious when I released a little mini-RPG a few months ago where you basically play as the villains, I've been gradually making my way through the entire run of Sailor Moon for the past year or so. Specifically I'm watching the 2014 Viz dub that covers all 200 episodes, trying to be as faithful as they can with it. It's been a really interesting experience, since I absolutely watched the old DiC dub back in the day, saw a fansub of one of the movies around the same time, and heard plenty of things about the missing seasons (particularly the infamous "cousins" thing from the Cloverway dub) over the years, and now I have all the context. And the context gets really shockingly overtly queer, turns out!

So first, let's just all get on the same page with the English language localizations of Sailor Moon over the years. Back in the 90s, Sailor Moon aired… well everywhere, with the English language version being a dub from DiC, which I will go to my grave defending as probably the best dub of anything I can think of. Fantastic casting all around, changes to the soundtrack that were actually for the better (keeping all the melodies but recording new versions that… aren't optimized to sound show-perfect when recreated by the cheapest sound generators one can shove in a toy, plus some original songs shoved into a few episodes). They did make some edits/cuts, but pretty minor ones, especially compared to the complete reworkings most anime of the era went through when coming to American TV, and I'm still not used to Luna not being prissy and British here.

That dub only lasted up through the second season. Past that, there was a dub of seasons 3 and 4 from Cloverway, which had some really questionable performances, and is where the infamous "they're cousins" bit came in. This also aired on TV in some places, but didn't have nearly the same omnipresent distribution as the DiC seasons (… and now I'm feeling old as I ponder whether to explain how local TV affiliates did their own thing back in the broadcast days). Then in the early 2000s there was a DVD release from Pioneer with cut/uncut versions of everything, apparently, which may or may not have recycled those dubs. I don't really have the energy to track that down, specifically. Anyway all the rights expired, gathered dust forever, then Viz picked it up and did this new faithful localization, and it took me about a decade to spot it on a streaming service.

So we've got 5 seasons, 200 episodes total, and a hell of a lot of formulaic structuring here. Every season (or half a season) we've got some main villain with an evil plan we may or may not get any details on, and some small number of underlings who then take their 5-10 episode long turns pursuing their goal in a way that inevitably generates monsters of the week, and meanwhile every season we have another conflict on the good guy side where someone is trying to locate some special person and ignoring the 50 or so obvious signs which main cast member it is while the audience gets frustrated. Oh and each individual episode has the same rigid structure of everyone getting caught up in some wacky teen trend, then there's a monster, they transform and fight a bit to no real end, then Sailor Moon gets around to using a finisher because that's literally the only thing actually capable of ending a fight. Honestly it's less "formulaic TV writing" and more like some sort of daily meditation. No way in hell I'd be able to sit through all of it if I had to look at the screen the whole time. This is background viewing while I work. Oh and I'm assuming everyone has at least enough passing familiarity to understand that if I say the name of a planet I'm talking about a teenage girl who's the reincarnation of some sorta magical girl/sentai squad member.

Season 1 has pretty gay vibes in places, but MOSTLY there's plausible deniability for all of it. We spend about half the season just establishing the characters of Moon Mercury and Mars, then quickly bringing in Jupiter and playing it up like a big shocking reveal for Venus. There's also a bunch of relationship drama between Moon, Tuxedo Mask, and the guy who runs the local arcade that she has a crush on and spends a while thinking is actually Tuxedo Mask instead of his actual identity of uh… a college-aged guy we're saying is the destined love interest of this 14-year old girl he's frankly pretty abusive towards. So, a lot of straight nonsense there. Meanwhile the evil queen's got these 4 generals, two of them are plainly dating, and no matter how you slice it, that's pretty overtly queer, but there's a valid argument to have over how we actually should slice it.

I was aware at the time that the DiC dub just ran with Zoicite here being a woman, making this a straight relationship, and I kinda figured they did a bit of tweaking and editing to hide that this was actually one of those bishonen types who were popular at the time who happened to be gay. Honestly though, watching it through a modern lens, it is REALLY hard to not just see a woman here, even when we're throwing he/him pronouns around. Like, if I'm handling a new dub, I'm just going to say Zoicite is a trans girl, who I'm at least headcanoning as being out for years, on HRT, and at that point where she can put on a suit designed for a man and nah that's a woman wearing a suit. Kinda just wraps around and makes me appreciate the old dub's handling more than the new one.

Season 2 (or R) doesn't really give us anything to work with, if I'm honest. There's probably some gals-being-pals energy amongst the main cast here and there. That's kind of always low-key present, especially with Jupiter, who has the whole big tough girl who wears long skirts thing sorta gay energy, and I want to say she ends up going to a dance with Mercury somewhere early on because one of them can't find a date otherwise.

But, we've got this filler arc with two dark elves in a tree who just kinda both hit on everyone of the opposite gender while the main cast sits in a holding pattern, then we get a proper villain squad not really getting enough spotlight time to have much of anything going on, and this whole weird thing where Moon and Mask's annoying toddler comes back from the future to… brainwash Moon's parents into thinking she's their daughter, and then she gets turned into an evil adult, and there's this whole bit about her having some sort of grim reaper/time guardian as a nanny (this is Pluto, the outer planets really have different things going on)… but again, mostly straight/cis flavored nonsense.

Then suddenly here comes season 3 (or S, pronounced "Super" which makes things real confusing), from a director who would later go on to create Utena, and in addition to just being the single best season of the series for a number of other reasons, everyone is canonically into girls now! It's shockingly overt about establishing that too, and reiterating the point several times.

It all gets started with Uranus and Neptune showing up. We kind of have this three faction conflict this season, where there's a proper main villain and squad of monster making minions, but then there's also this overtly queer power couple whose goal is basically to check out the "pure hearts" monsters of the week keep ripping out of people because they need to check them for these three macguffins they need to… reform the holy grail of all things to give to their leader they're too oblivious to know is actually Moon.

More importantly though, aside from making it abundantly clear that these two are banging every night, they have this very open relationship where Neptune is more than cool with Uranus hooking up with any given girl she's inclined to, and/or grabbing gals for threeways. And like, this isn't me taking a broad interpretation of things, it's weird how directly they just come out and say this. The other thing we have going on is that Uranus is just, like, the butchest of the butch.

Literally everyone just assumes she's a guy when they first meet, and quite a few people go into serious denial when corrected on the matter. And she kinda tends to react to all the misgendering with the sort of bemused nonchalance that makes it pretty easy to read her as actually being nonbinary. I swear there's an episode where she clarifies she's not a guy with that particular sort of emphasis suggesting that doesn't necessarily narrow things down to just "girl," too. And apparently Crystal actually DOES bite the bullet and flat out state she's nonbinary (or at least "both male and female"). That's cool, but there is no way in hell I'm going to sit through Crystal.

Anyway, point is, everybody wants to hook up with Uranus. Everyone. There's a whole episode where the power couple straight up takes Jupiter out on a date, the rest start gossiping about her being out on a date with two girls, everyone starts off shocked, then someone clarifies who it's with and everyone's like "oh, well yeah then I'd take them up on that too," with a little extra push back from Mars before she gets called out as trying to stay in the closet when she's clearly got a stash of photos of hot girls in suits.

This of course really makes me wonder about that Cloverleaf dub and why they went with that whole "cousins" thing to avoid addressing the overt queerness here, instead of taking the same approach DiC did of just making Uranus a guy. This would technically introduce the problem of having a guy in a miniskirt for fight scenes, but, eh, that'd be easier to edit around than you'd think. Uranus generally enters a fight scene pre-transformed firing an attack off from offscreen, arguing with the core cast a little, and leaving. Attacks are stock animation you can drop in anywhere, so that much is easy enough to chop out or replace with Neptune's attack. I don't know how one would even begin to cut around all the overt gay stuff though.

Nothing especially queer going on with the evil side of things. The villains are kind of amazing but too career oriented for relationships. I guess just for the sake of giving full context for the seasons most people haven't seen and fill in the obvious hole in the roster I can mention the eventual deal that the little goth girl Chibi-Usa spends the season hanging out with turns out to be the main villain's daughter, Sailor Saturn, and kind of the antichrist? Like I said, the outer planets aren't just cast expansions, they really have their own stuff going on. She also dies and reincarnates, doing so the long way where she sits the next season out being just a baby, which once again begs the question of whether when everyone dies at the end of the first season they just kinda magically come back to life with missing memories just as a temporary thing for a filler arc to play with or they really dd all reincarnate and have new families a decade and change later. Weird that that never got firmly pinned down.

Anyway though season 4 (AKA Super S, which is pronounced "Supers" and now you see why I prefer just numbers)… sucks and you should skip it. No sense of stakes, no real character work, non-threatening villain, shockingly dull monster designs, no outer planets, an ending that just drags on for what feels like forever and has no payoff. The only things it has in its favor are the inherent absurdity that people are wondering if Chibi-Usa is like full-on dating Pegasus (yes, the horse) and Fish's Eye.

So we have two different miniboss squads this season, the latter of which is a quartet of permanent-child acrobats working for the impressively titled if boring in practice Dead Moon Circus, preceded by three animals-turned-into-humans-by-a-witch with a weird What-you-originally-were's Eye naming scheme. Two of them are just dull slutty guys, but Fish's Eye is plainly and overtly a trans woman, and gets something of an arc about being willing to give up her own humanity for the greater good. It's a shame she's stuck in the practically unwatchable season, but at least she's on the REALLY short list of major villains who gets to have a happy ending. Usually even when someone has a nice redemption arc with the power of love and friendship they still get bumped off by another villain.

Different localizations have done different things with her. Some go "crossdressing gay guy" some just say she's a woman and leave her transness out of it. The 2014 localizaton is pretty unambiguous about though, so, that's really nice. Casting could be better, but still.

Then finally we come to season 5 (Sailor Stars), which I think is even more queer than season 3 was, which is really saying something, and was also directed by someone who would go on to helm another girly show with a serious case of The Genders, Ouran High School Host Club. Structurally it's a bit weird, because the first few episodes are just straight up taking a mulligan on the terrible finale of season 4, this time with the outers in (Saturn hyper-ages back to her standard 10 or whatever and gets a bunch of inexplicable knowledge and memories which is cool but never really paid off), the main villain doing something, and as a shocking rarity for the series, this whole mini-arc where characters are broken into pairs of one inner one outer and get to bounce off each other in a way the series frustratingly usually never does.

More importantly though, at least for this post's purposes, basically the first scene of the season is Uranus and Neptune having a flirty exchange ending with something along the lines of "let's save the pillow talk for when we're actually in bed together later tonight," which sort of sets the tone for just how blatantly these two are talking about their extremely active sex life in no uncertain terms, out in public. Some of the other characters are a bit weirded out by their complete lack of filter, but hey whatever.

The real proper start of the season though has our core cast finally starting high school, once again reminding us that everyone is at LEAST 4 years younger than everything about their designs, interests, and handling of responsibilities would indicate. This also reminds us how deeply creepy the Moon/Tuxedo Mask relationship is, but fortunately he hops a plain to America and is straight up out this season, and as an added bonus Chibi-Moon finally goes back to the future. Before you get too excited she IS shortly replaced with an even younger, barely verbal new mystery gremlin called Chibi-Chibi whose existence nobody can account for, but at least she's actually cute and not akin to the baby from Dinosaurs. More importantly though, as the girls enter high school they end up in a class with the titular Sailor Stars, AKA The Three Lights, AKA Fighter Maker and Healer, a popular boy band who are also a new mysterious set of Sailors with what I assume are intentionally quite confusing gender shenanigans in play.

Normally, they are hot lanky boys, boastful about their masculinity to the point of it bordering on misogyny, but also super super femme, with earings, hair down to their ankles, and very noticeably female VAs in both Japanese and English. Then when there's a fight they're very plainly hot lanky girls in bikinis and one of them has an attack shouting "Star Gentle Uterus!" before hitting a monster with a glob of liquid to a disgusted reaction. And their transformation sequences (and bikinis, and some shirtless scenes) make it absolutely crystal clear that yeah there is some magical reconfiguring of their bodies when making the switch. The show pointedly avoids elaborating on what the deal is past that in terms of which they form they started with/feel more comfortable in/why they switch it up/etc. which would normally frustrate me as one of those Schroedinger's Queer Rep situations, but I very much get the impression that we're going for intentional confusion and ambiguity in service to a general message that if you're into someone you shouldn't have hangups about their gender or what it says about your own sexuality and just kind of accept your feelings and them as a person and I am pretty OK with that.

The cast is too. Mercury Mars Jupiter Venus and for good measure Luna all kinda spent the entire season fixating on how to hook up with any/all of The Three Lights, meanwhile at basically any moment there isn't a fight scene or some plot exposition happening, Fighter is VERY ACTIVELY pursuing Moon in a sexual fashion, with pretty overtly stated tension before damn near every commercial break over whether this is going to be the scene where Sailor Moon gets absolutely railed by this maybe-genderfluid pop star from another world. And I have to just say as a brief aside that while we obviously never go there, I kinda wish we did? Tuxedo Mask is WAY too old to be dating someone Moon's age, even if we do the thing where we just add 4 to everyone's stated age. Plus he kinda treats her like absolute garbage for the whole show, and even when they're in a more wholesome mode the whole thing feels toxic and messed up. Meanwhile Fighter here is literally the same age, clearly into her, and beyond the one character flaw, an actual decent person. Though again, really damn forward. Still beats the hell out of the guy in college dating a middle schooler, and kinda flirting with his own prepubescent future-daughter.

There's also this huge confrontational thing between Fighter and Uranus, where it's slightly unclear if Uranus is being protective of Moon, violently jealous because Neptune is totally and surprisingly overtly open to hooking up with anyone from this boy band too, or just kinda trying to defend her position as the hot androgynous badass who swept into town with the intent of hooking up with every girl in the zip code eventually. Meanwhile Fighter thinks Uranus is a kind of toxic macho dude and really questions the whole "she's not a guy" thing, which is, you know, interesting. Pluto never really weighs in on this because… Pluto kinda lives outside of time and space and has maybe 8 minutes of real screen time in the entirety of the show.

Past that, we've got a bunch of other gay stuff too! We're back to cranking the general queer energy of the core cast up past the point of plausible deniability with regards to each other and a random girl trying to pass along a love letter with some confusion as to who it's for. It also bears mention that when the full deal of the new characters and their gender flipping comes to light, Jupiter makes an active point of making it clear that she is still 100% down and like, hey, I already knew you were the least conflicted of the bunch about how bi you all are, but I appreciate the active refutation of transphobia is still cool. We've got an honestly adorable pair of villains where one is frankly such a bimbo she's completely incapable of doing the evil general thing on her own or preparing her own food, and her hyper-competent girlfriend helping her out while also having to come up with cover stories because they're supposed to be pitted against each other. They'd definitely get a nice happy ending in one of the even numbered seasons, especially once it's made clear that they're very much being coerced into the evil stuff/taking things down from the inside, but… yeah this season ends up going super dark.

I don't want to totally get into how absolutely pitch dark the big 8-part series finale gets and spoil the hell out of it since if it wasn't clear, the odd numbered seasons are all really good stuff you should watch on your own, plus this one has a bunch of genuine twists, but I have to get into some of it in my mission of explaining how gay it all is. Consider yourself warned.

As happens kind of a lot in Sailor Moon finales, the bulk of the season 1 cast gets killed off once the main villain steps in to start getting her hands dirty, but here it's early enough on in the arc for Moon to really process it and give it the weight that maybe it'll actually stick this time. In particular of course she's worked up about Tuxedo Mask turning out to have died off camera at the start of the season (the impression to that point being that he's too distracted with a trip to America to check his messages or maybe just straight up ghosted her), but then almost as broken up over losing Mars, because yeah, those two in particular actually end up with a surprising amount of low key romantic tension between them by the end of things.

Then once it's time to get the outer planets off the table, all four of them end up in a no-win situation against the villain, who does that villain thing of of offering them a choice of just being killed and having their souls ripped out to be made into new stars (this is kind of her whole thing, see), OR if anyone's up for it, they can switch sides, still get their souls ripped out to be made into stars, but given funky magic bracelets that allow them to stay alive, just, you know, corrupted by evil and acting as her new villain squad. It's actually established right before the last one gets vaporized that all her original henchgals are in fact the Sailors of other planets she forced into the same deal just before the last one gets vaporized for failure, making it that much tragic in retrospect that the cute competence-disparity couple didn't make it.

Anyway, Uranus and Neptune actually take the deal. Like, zero hesitation. Part of it is eventually explained as Uranus having enough faith that she's too into her girlfriend to be fully corrupted and might get a chance to sucker punch the villain with her own soul extractors (which she IS it just doesn't work), and failing that Moon'll probably swing some kinda deus machina (which is an admittedly safe bet, honestly). But another part of it really is just "yeah screw it, if I still get to be with my girlfriend I'll take being evil over being dead" and they really do go through with it and promptly murder their oldest friend and a very young girl. Don't let anyone tell you Sailor Moon is one of those power of love and friendship always triumphs sorta shows. I don't know that the power of love and friendship even ties the scoreboard if we tally things up over the whole series. Oh and the final final final showdown has a nude Sailor Moon with angel wings just trying to hug it out with the main villain, which I guess could also maybe be read as a bit queer.

So yeah. Sailor Moon. When you don't have a puritanical edit, it's queer as hell. Everyone's bi or non-binary-and-sapphic. Several different flavors of trans rep. Goes out on a note of not getting hung up on gender. All of this in a roughly 30 year old series now, aimed at young impressionable girls. … actually for that matter it's also a show aimed at girls with really powerfully horny monster girl designs all over the place. Possibly relevant.

Oh yeah, and maybe consider throwing me some money via Patreon? I can't actually cover next month's rent as things stand.

[misscammiedawn]

50 Days of HypnoKink - Day 43: Hypnotic Theory

Alignment: Ambivalent or Top. I know there are resources on learning how to Bottom. But have you considered I prefer private instruction?

Jokes aside. I love hypnotic theory. I always have.

My earliest days online I remember reading up on subliminal advertising techniques and going down a rabbit hole of "Painted Ice Cubes" and other such things which seemed too weird to be true.

From there I ended up reading Subliminal Seduction in my late teens out of curiosity and was kind of fascinated by the concepts at play. I was already well and truly fascinated with hypnosis but hypnosis was this magical spell that was cast by magicians. This psuedo-science of advertising execs promising that glimpses of sharks and phallus' would unlock the secrets to sales was my first and unfortunate step into understanding the theory behind it all.

Next step was of course M.K Ultra which is 100% a meme in today's hypnokink community and at best an aesthetic for serious torture-brainwashing play which is at a much higher level of anything than I'm really capable of. But it cited itself. Which got me looking into the history of Mesmer and Braid and then onto a bloke named Milton Erickson...

Archive.org had a lot of his stuff. In fact all of his stuff.

Between Erickson in my textbooks and Derren Brown on my television, right at the start of his career when the fascination of mentalism was still tied heavily to hypnosis (and early Derren Brown was a Fae and a bit of an ass XD) my earliest teachers were pretty bad at consent. Which lead to certain expectations of hypnosis which lead to me picking bad partners at the start of my career.

But Erickson's stuff compelled me.

Early 20s Camden used a lot of Ericksonian speech patterns in her play. Though back then she was only really hypnotizing people under compulsion and usually while hypnotized to channel or outright become a character.

The fact I read medical journals is the moment I knew this fascination had evolved into a life altering obsession. That this was my One Thing.

It was the studies of Erickson working on participants with amputated limbs to study the phantom limb theory that really got me to sit up and pay attention to the science behind it.

At this point of my life I'd been studying on surgeries being performed with hypnosis (a terrifying concept. When I have my surgery I will be hypnotized to go under for the anesthesia like a good girl) and I had seen EKG readings that proved that hypnosis changes the way that the brain scans.

Every step of my life I have leaned on evidence and proof and every step of my study into hypnosis taught me it was not fantasy. It was reality and the more I accepted that the better I was at both hypnotizing, free of doubt and insecurity, and being hypnotized, trusting it works.

I still struggle with that. A lot. Thinking I am just acting or following along. But the more I read the better I feel.

I got my certification at the age of 23. I am not a fan of George Kappas (his work is misogynistic to my eyes) but his school taught me for a year (one of my classmates and the person I studied with for my finals is actually another high profile member of the online hypnosis community) and taught me the most important lesson any school has ever taught me:

I ALREADY KNOW THIS.

I was 23 years old and knew as much as the instructors. That was a good feeling.

Also my classmate and I are still friends. We're not super close, but she and I are in contact. I spent some time with them at a recent hypnosis event. It means a lot to me that even though my name and gender changed, they still remember me.

In my 30s I moved on from academic hypnosis materials to community driven information. I have read Lee & Pynch's book on Amnesia, sleepingirl's Brainwashing and NLP books and of course Wiseguy's Mind Play. I've also taken Wiseguy's class, though didn't bother taking my final. Which was a good use of $1,200.

Every now and again Sleepyhead will show up and just put a book in my hand. I think her copy of The Encyclopedia of Stage Hypnotism has graduated into my copy of The Encyclopedia of Stage Hypnotism (Sleepy, you can have your books back at any time).

These days I am lazy and can't really read much. I'm studying therapy more than anything with my latest obsessions being Janina Fischer and Melissa Tiers; Tiers herself being a world class hypnotist that many of our top community members have spent big bucks to train under.

In fact, here's an exert from a moment that I first started reading her Anxiety Toolkit.

Thing is I'm a really bad study. I read these things and absorb them, they change how I think and how I approach things, but after I move on to the next book I forget what was in the last one. The ways my style changes remain but I am just horrible at internalizing rote facts and learning.

People say I'm clever. Goddess even told me once that she thinks I know more about hypnosis than her, which is a compliment I cannot accept. I know my shit. I practice.

I just don't feel good at this.

I never really finished school. I got pulled out at 16. I was an average student at best who was trying her hardest. I remember seeing that one Simpsons episode where Bart breaks down in tears over studying for a test and failing and feeling seen. Teen me wanted to go to college, wanted to be Smart because at the time I thought Smart was strong.

I get really weird about my perceived intelligence because I cannot believe myself to be smart... but somewhere along the way I tricked people into never really seeing me as the dumbass I feel myself as. I guess the thing I'd say here is, I have massive amounts of curiosity and I enjoy learning.

I just suck at memorization. I should be nicer to myself for that. Theory brings me joy. I should be proud of that.

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Day 42: Gradual Descents

FULL SCHEDULE MASTER POST

Day 44: Fluttering Eyelids

[uglygirlstatus]

What is degrassi and should i watch it (because the screen caps you posted were hilarious)

Hehehehe thank you for asking, though you may regret it. Degrassi is an iconic long-running Canadian High School Drama that essentially invented the genre. Its roots stretch back to 1979 with The Kids of Degrassi Street, which was a season of standalone episodical dilemmas. From there it evolved into Degrassi Junior High and Degrassi High, featuring a more set cast of characters through the 80s and 90s. Admittedly I have not watched these earlier iterations of Degrassi, it’s something I hope to remedy eventually but just haven’t been willing to put in the time yet.

A decade or so after Degrassi High (and it’s spinoff movie) finished, the creators had an idea to create another spinoff based around the now-middle school aged daughter of one of the previous teen characters (who was teen pregnant of course). In 2001, Degrassi: The Next Generation first aired (the working title was the jokey Star Trek reference but then it just stuck) and my life 20 years in the future was preemptively altered. There are 384 episodes across 14 seasons. I’ve watched them all through in chronological order twice. After season 14, the show switched to Netflix for 4 seasons Degrassi: Next Class, however the characters and plot lines were just a direct continuation of TNG Season 14, so I effectively consider them seasons 15-18. A lot of people hate Next Class but they’re wrong. I’ve watched Next Class four times because I actually watched it multiple times before even starting TNG.

What can I say about Degrassi. Degrassi is amazing. They have covered every topic you could imagine, some with grace and respect and power, and some with less of that. I think a lot of what makes Degrassi special is the fact that they only hire actors for the teens who are between the ages of 12-19. They’re very clear that they’re striving for a level of realism that adult actors wouldn’t be able to bring to a teen character. Because actors are younger you definitely get performances that are sometimes questionably acted and extremely funny as a result, but there are also a ton of really amazing actors on the show that really bring their all to playing these teens who are going thru shit, which hits harder in turn because you’re like ‘oh you’re litrally a baby :(‘. Right now, between Jenette McCurdy’s book and The Rehearsal there’s (rightfully) a lot of talk about the ethics of child acting and whether the ends justify the means and I’m not going to use Degrassi as an argument for either side, but if it’s something you can handle watching, the cast and characters are really something special.

Anyway Degrassi is the peak teen drama and it’s a blast to watch and an even bigger blast to discuss with people. On my second watch-through I watched it with my sister who had never seen it, and we spent each week after watching just discussing every character arc and who we do and don’t like and (her) predictions for what was to come. It’s just good TV like it’s dramatic and funny and heart-breaking and uplifting and powerful and stupid and FUN. It’s zany and ridiculous but it’s also grounded in real emotions and real circumstances. I recommend it to everyone I know and they say “fuck you ali I’m not watching 400 episodes of a teen drama” and they’re wrong for it.

If you are actually considering watching it obviously the correct way is to start at the beginning and watch in order but also technically you can sort of jump in at different points since the cast changes as the show progresses. There are plot lines and characters from earlier seasons which are mentioned again in later seasons but there are also plot lines and characters that are completely forgotten so. In my opinion the best chunks of the show are Seasons 2-5 (for the heart) and Seasons 9-12 (for the drama) but honestly every season has at least some really good storylines and character moments so I would recommend watching everything!!! If you’re in Canada (and maybe other countries?) all the eps are available FREE on YouTube in HD as official posts from the Degrassi team. If you’re in the States, HBO recently ruined your free YouTube access and you have to watch it there now

Alternatively there is a really good YouTube video about Degrassi that I love that you can watch to see if your interest is piqued although there are some spoilers obviously. But not even spoilers for everything like it doesn’t even touch upon my favourite Degrassi plot line where the kids of Degrassi illegally purchase a human kidney

tldr: WATCH DEGRASSI

[tomyo]

Oshi no Ko and Celebrity (more specifically child celebrity with a large tangent on being a public persona)

So in my seasonal anime catch up, I finally watched Oshi no Ko.

Admittedly I was kinda not expecting something that great after they kill off their best character right away. Ai is left to be this great discovering mystery of who was she really when she wasn't being the perfect idol. I can't say I found it extremely profound but if there's something I do like, it makes clear some aspect of the focus on youth in the idol industry.

So like, there's a little bit of ick at points in the series. We meet our adult main character obsessed and possibly in love with a 16 year old idol. Ai herself is quite off putting being treated with some sense of adulthood despite being a teen mom. I still don't know how I feel about Ai overall, she talks in her last moments about wanting to have her kids join her in the industry that quite literally killed her on the day she became an adult. Initially I didn't think much of that aspect until we start to see more characters get added.

We meet characters like the adultified Arima who's already gone through a career fallout by highschool, Minami who is a gravure model (more or less soft lewd photos) already by her freshman year of high school (therefore pressumably started in middle school), Akane who is partially a victim of evil editing, and Memcho pretending to be a teenager to be in the industry (The 20 year age cut off was up until recently the age of legal adulthood in Japan). We see these unusual circumstances where we are meant to recognize these characters as children in questionable situations.

The small arcs Aqua follows in this first season basically all cover where an adult has failed. Questionable agencies trying to hire Ruby, uncaring directors on a show Arima cares deeply about, Akane being unsupported by the adults when she's a victim on online harassment, and so forth.

Aqua is played off as a character with only one goal in mind, to find out who is his biological father so he can get revenge of Ai's death. He's already been long worn down by the industry possibly from a mix of being a reborn adult, growing up with an idol mother, and then after working is the industry in the background while trying to learn of it to find out how to find his father. In contrast to Ruby's eye spark of naive hope for the industry, his eye tends to be sullen and turn black, particularly when he is manipulating the industry for his results.

However, Aqua tends to have a secret secondary goal that he himself isn't fully conscious of which is to not let someone else fall into the situation Ai found herself in. He will avoid connection while also leading change when something harms the other youth talent around him such as flipping the script to give Arima the performance she wanted for her favourite scene or organizing Akane's redemption PR with her castmates. Side note, plenty of talent industry stories tend to focus on ideas that performers hold beef and rivalry with each other all the time where thus far, Oshi no Ko has made that more of an outlier rather having cast members being extremely supportive of each other's work while the higher up are more so the problem. Even things like the maybe one good adult, Yoriko (the mangaka) still wanting to appreciate the adaptation of her series even if it was a subpar production shows how meaningful these relationships tend to be on a human level. Either way, it is always satisfying to see how Aqua try to foster a healthier industry with his more mature understanding.

So manga spoilers from here on out.

Akane's analysis of Ai was the first moment it occurred to me that Oshi no Ko had anything decent to say about the entertainment industry. Ai always gave off the energy of an unrestrained child which is actually what she turns out to be. She is a product of parental abuse who was scouted at the vulnerable age of 12 and quickly was hailed as a major success in that industry, certainly nothing short due to the fact she puts on an excitable and childish personality. She treats her pregnancy with coy jovialness as being described that she might be too small to naturally birth children. She has to be taught concepts like it's okay to say "I Love You" even if you don't mean it. When I play through her scenes, all I can feel is this weird contradiction of childish naivety mixed with disciplined skill. At home she dresses in this motherly way while acting very ditsy while being fully in control as an idol. She somewhat reminds me of the weathernews idol Saya Hiyama, ironically who is in her own scandal right now. If I were to picture Ai's smile in real life, I would imagine it the same as Saya Hiyama's with the always perfectly v like smile showing off her yaeba teeth. Giving this false sense of vulnerability with the watcher when she makes a mistake when she makes a mistake on the weather is somewhat I see Ai to be like except with a more mischievous air.

For another [long] side tangent, being in a personality industry, its interesting to see how fans fail to recognize a curated persona. Back when I spent more time as a cosplayer, I had learned how to act out a persona not only to be in character but also to attract others to you. Maybe the slight ill feeling this series gives me is the reminder of my own experiences as a teen to early adult delicately balancing a believable relatable image while showing only part of myself. There was some sense of that emptiness I felt like Ai's where there was disconnect between the loving emotions I would portray to reality of how unattached I felt (now I know I have BPD though). My relation to the characters lies somewhere between Ai and Memcho. Ai being more like my younger self where as Memcho hits pretty close with her tomboyish look, the bleached hair with the roots growing in, and the bubbly personality and bone structure that helps you get away with appearing younger. It's been a joke among my friends the last few years that I get mistaken for still being in my early to mid 20's despite nearing 30 in a few months and moreso, as an underweight 20 year old, I had experienced a lot of leering eyes determined to believe I was as young as 14 for bizarre and creepy reasons. Some aspect of that perceived youth gives me haunting memories and frustration of arrested development where I struggle to be treated as an adult while on the other side it is in fact part of my current business. One thing that is less thought about artist alley is that you do in fact make choices weather to buy or not based on the seller as well. It's not too rare to see kawaii artists invoking the same energy their art gives in how the present themselves. It's come to the point where I tend to spend a few hundred on a dye and cut right before a new show as well as there being a select wardrobe I pick from every trip I go on. I have a makeup bag always on the ready of some easy to put on products I rarely use outside of events and often a much more larger amount of hair tools to get something of a proper styling. These are things I wear because I love them but they are also almost exclusively used to match the appearance of my booth. Likewise, there is a semi exaggerated persona put on to create a welcoming air to my customers that is tweaked to match the energy of different types. Over Sakuracon, there was an embarrassing moment where I called out to a tiktoker while still switched into a more boisterous energy from a previous customer that I had yet to switch out off and horribly scared them off. It also tends to be easier to pull of this energy during or right after talking to fellow artists as it helps build up the approachable personality, its like we are all doing warm ups together. When I see people like Saya Hiyama pull off multiple instances of being so embarassed that she trips over her words with a big giggly smile, I truly admire the persona but am a bit shocked how much people have bought into it being fully real. Especially in the internet age, its very interesting to watch the gap between the viewpoint of creators and fans/consumers. While I'm much more of a smaller niche online personality, I do have behind the scenes experience with instragrammers in the 70k-160k range and the various parasocial experiences they have gone through. It's also a space where you get so accustomed to the mentality of an influencer (for lack of a better word) that it's hard to deal with someone not versed in that space; either from people who take internet clout as a vanity hobby or those who are actively seeking online privacy. Ai's double nature of being seen as the genius idol while feeling like a deceiving liar resonates pretty deeply on this front. There is a lot of sacrifice in identity that you give your fans in order to in return earn their respect and by extension business. Like Ai, I try to keep some note of regulars I meet at events but with going to multiple back to back events, it can get hard to keep hold of all that information.

Tumblr told me enough of this tangent so we'll move onto the short manga talk I meant to give.

From reading the wiki, It turns out that the twin's father is another actor who was molested in his childhood and in fact birthed a child at 11 as a result of that rape. Seeing as he is also the big bad, it points to the fact the focus on the story is not just the trauma industry workers go through but more specifically the abuse of power younger workers tend to face. While Aqua at current seeks revenge, I would not be surprised if the end goal is to process the line of trauma that has been dealt through out the show. Even if Aqua is a teenager, his previous life is thus far the oldest in terms of lived experience and possibly even older than Aqua's father at the present. He's had the most lived experience and the most chance to also live outside of entertainment that others have more so grown up in. The twin's father is currently an abuser most likely from the result of his own unprocessed abuse and to allow a new generation to grow up in a better industry than he or Ai did, it starts with stopping the past from repeating. Ultimately I think the best end state for Aqua is likely going to be some form of Manager or talent public relations keeper. The show doesn't necessarily show any sign of something like that but that would be the best route for such things.

Ultimately Japan's idol culture in reality needs to change as well as checking our parasocial expectations of celebrities. It's fair to have some critical views on celebrities in terms of say ethics but it's also important to keep in mind that anything put out in the world has some biased narrative, especially if its any form of production. The reality Ai portrayed as a dedicated idol was a lie, the reality LoveNow showed of Akane being a selfish girl was a lie. Maybe the most important lesson I've learned is not to put stock in anything that revolves around the presentation of a real person. Often I will admire and adore fictional creations but not it's creator for this reason. Those images of people you've never met on a personal level never hold up to the truth and can be hurtful on both ends. People are not myths, they are humans.

[firespirited]

Dune Messiah is the one i read as a teen. Must have been after seeing Dune84 or maybe those memories are blurring together because this time around the descriptions of the guild navigator in his tank don't match my memories.

This time, he's a little more abe sapien but in orange than the fleshy admiral akbar that's mostly head of my recollections.

Oddly enough, Momoa fits as Duncan Idaho - that was inspired casting! He has that chill self confidence bordering on cocky we've seen in other roles.

I don't see any of the current actors who've played him as Paul. I assumed he had pale tan olive skin like his dad or they'd have made a big deal of how pink and pale he was, how he'd get red and blistered in even a small walk in the sun, the way you smell slightly cooked. Yeah, we'd moved to southern climes and I wasn't adapting well.

I remembered the absolute slog through the first chapters then the loneliness and grieving of futures, trying to hold back the inevitable. must have been 15-16 because I thought I had MS but wasn't willing to say it out loud.

No idea what language I read it in, I do remember being annoyed at how pretentious the language was. A lot of talking to say nothing then these inspired little moments when he communicated crystal clear.

At first it made sense to communicate the tediousness of ruling, religious speak, business speak and whatnot then you get to a point where you realize the author's just going to be Like That. LMAO.

The price of getting a great story is sometimes having it delivered by the author's voice.

I actually was relieved that this one was more sympathetic to women (which says a lot about the sci-fi and fantasy I was stuck with) and the breeding programs were treated as something nasty.

I really enjoy having the confrontation between old memories and new reading especially as they're so different and changed this time.

As a counter example: LOTR hasn't changed much, it just gets more textured every time you revisit. The films didn't change the sense of it at all. It's not that I get a detailed image of faces and places, it's more a very vivid sense of emotions and characters. The way i don't see an apple when you say apple, i see the concept of an apple, many types and tastes and textures of apple. Gandalf is not Ian McKellen: he's a mess of actors, animation, wizard and mentor archetypes, like there's more Obi Wan in the original trilogy and snippets of Willem Defoe as Jesus (I haven't even seen the full movie) than Ian McKellen despite him doing a great job.

So having less of an attachment to Dune and only having seen 'the full picture' of the saga a couple of years ago means revisiting the one* read a long time ago is more of a collision of ideas.

*I actually don't know if I read any more at the time, I only know I read this one because it's bringing up familiar images.

Like a lot of you, I devoured books where ever whenever, whatever was available, lots of them half read because of skimming to get to the plot details, lots of meh, lots of blurring together of the same tropes.

I had a particular fondness of novellas and collections of short stories because once in a while there'd be one that really packed a punch or made you imagine something astonishing. The internet regularly coughs up some of those: as fiction, as essays or an interpretation of fiction or an event and that's as exciting as finding that one short story in a book of mostly blarg.