#i am all for discussing your faves' flaws as well as their good parts but the karlach thing is not a sign of a flaw in wyll's character

[crossdressingdeath]

Y'know, one of the odder things I see re Wyll is people claiming that him believing Mizora about Karlach being evil shows that he's too trusting or gullible or whatever. Not necessarily because he's not too trusting (see him immediately believing that all the Fists deserve to be pardoned for what they did during the game solely on the grounds that Ulder said so, despite everything we see of them in-game and despite Ulder openly admitting the god of justice himself wouldn't approve), but because... guys. Guys. We are told in no uncertain terms that the only reason Mizora could send Wyll after Karlach was that she is actually, literally heartless. I freely admit I'm not an expert on Forgotten Realms lore but I feel it is safe to assume that it's not exactly brimming with literally heartless people! I see a lot of people talking about the whole thing like Mizora used some deeply cunning loophole that she could have used in the past and could use in the future to trick Wyll into killing countless innocents, but like... no, I'm pretty sure it could only work on Karlach specifically. It would've been much more effective if Larian hadn't added the engine as a plot point and Karlach had remained just another victim of the events in Elturel (in which case Mizora would have had to use a loophole that she could use on others and it would have raised the question of how many innocent people Wyll had killed), and I suspect any dialogue suggesting any real likelihood of Wyll having killed innocent people on Mizora's orders in the past is left over from before the engine became a thing; in the final game it really is a complete non-issue, because how many literally heartless people can there actually be in Faerûn? We certainly never hear of any others in the game! It's just a little silly to act like Wyll proved himself to be overly trusting by not considering that Mizora might send him after an otherwise normal and decent mortal who literally did not have a heart. It's not about him trusting Mizora, it's about that not being something that any rational person would expect to happen.

[aspoonofsugar]

you wrote such a beautiful rwby analysis but unfortunately I think you put more thought into the plot than the entire writers room

Hi!

Thank you, I am happy you found my analysis beautiful!

That said, I am sorry, but I disagree with your statement. It is fine if you dislike the series and even if you criticize it, but as for me, I think the writing is rather strong.

Here are some thoughts, which aren't really directed at you, but rather are born by me seeing a tendency going around where it is somehow "cool" to outloud state RWBY is badly written. I even saw people like... "apologizing" because they enjoy the series. Newsflash...RWBY is good.

RWBY is a series with a writing that goes from decent to very good depending on the moment. I would give it from 7 to 8.5 or even 9 in some scenes. More importantly, it is a story the writers are clearly enjoying writing, as for now. This is why I like watching it. It is genuine, upfront in what it wants to say and it takes risks. Ironically, a series with limited resources shows much more freedom in execution than many other stories, which are economically backed up.

I would also add people keep talking about good writing, but never really elaborate on it... And like, trust me, I do think there is good writing and bad writing. The problem is that people just take examples of "well written series" and decide a series written differently must be bad. This isn't really the case.

First of all, let's focus only on a specific type of story, which is the kind most modern movies, books and series are. This type of story is built on 3 (4) factors:

Plot

Characters

Themes

(Worldbuilding)

I would say the first 3 are more important usually, but there are some stories where the worldbuilding is so strong it becomes its own selling point.

Now, a good story is usually strong in all these departments. The perfect story is top notch in all 3 (4). That is because a good plot usually lets you develop the characters better, which in turns helps exploring the theme.

However, here comes the amazing truth... even the most incredible stories. Even the masterpieces loved by everybody... even them... end up choosing only 1 or 2 of these aspects and sacrifice a little bit of the 3rd (and 4th) one.

Naoki Urasawa's Monster? Its focus is themes. He chooses to go all out on this department, which is why the story is so powerful and resonates so much with people. Still, to do so, he chooses to sacrifice some parts of the plot to the point... some mysteries are not really solved. Some people may be annoyed by it, but I would not call it a flaw. It is a choice. Leaving some things open enriches the themes.

Death Note? If the story has to choose between characters, themes and plot, it goes for plot. This is why despite having so many well liked characters, it is difficult to think of outstanding character arcs in it. The same goes for the themes, which are only touched superficially. This is why btw Death Note is not a fave of mine, really.

Now obviously, many examples can be done and we could discuss forever on some because there is always always always a subjective component. What I am trying to say is... there are different ways to write a story. Not all people would like the same. Luckily, we have tons of stories.

Back to RWBY. I would say RWBY shines when it comes to themes. Characters and plot are good and interesting, but what keeps the story together, despite it playing so much with genre is that it has a very strong thematic core. You can't invent it or fake it btw. See, Death Note's author tries to do it in later works (Platinum End cough cough), but fails. At the same time, there is another department RWBY is top notch and that is symbolism. RWBY has a very rich symbolic system. Again... surely there are coincidences, but like this is a little bit too much...imho.

Now, does it mean, the writers came up with all the patterns I and others find? Probably not, but here is the thing... writing has an unconscious component. If you go earnestly at it, you are bound to unconsciously create patterns. A good writer is able to recognize them (either consciously or unconciously) and to capitalize on them. So far, I think CRWBY has capitalized on the patterns they created. I also think it is clear they are very good at researching and at playing with different sources by going deep into them. Again, you can't come up with the Ever After if you have not read and even studied Alice in Wonderland. It is just impossible. You would end up with a shallow and uninteresting copy cat. The Ever After isn't that because it is used to explore themes, characters and lore in an interesting way. Hence... ladies and gentlemen... it is a fruit of... good writing.

But really, since people are not commenting on it... I would like to point out that in 5 episodes of less than 20 minutes, they have managed to introduce a whole world, with its own lore, set of characters and main story (Alyx's) and to tie it to the protagonists' predicament in a way that hits really hard thematically and psychologically... To do that you need exceptionally thight writing... it is not that simple to do...

Anyway, have a nice day anon and consider watching something else. Thanks God the world is full of stories!

[sunnydaleherald]

The Sunnydale Herald Newsletter, Tuesday, November 14, Part II

[Fandom Discussions]

the angst and yearning in the fuffy rooftop scene in ats sanctuary is UNMATCHED by antlerslayer

I love Willow as a character because of what she represents and teaches about the human condition by

steven s deknight says they got cautioned by the wb censors about this shot of angel pulling a knife by stellernorth

Angel Season 4 by all-seeing-ifer

James absolutely ATE with this proposal. by raisedbythetv89

It’s so important and profound and precious that Spike is present when Buffy tells her mom she’s a vampire slayer. by girl4music., winterlovesong1

but why did they give us spike w the little curl to his hair by alewifed

i feel genuinely surprised about is this idea that ppl have where spike falls into the dark, brooding, bad guy turned good trope. by alewifed

I think what gets me most is the “I am a demon” and “there’s a demon inside me” contradiction. by girl4music

Slayer-induced ADHD is very firmly part of my head canon by hersterical

I actually don’t think the Enjoining Spell is a plot hole. by austinoson

Season 1 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is all about Buffy figuring out how to not be Cordelia by coraniaid

Willow does a lot of terrible things in Season 6 but I will always refuse to accept that bringing Buffy back to life was one of them. by coraniaid

the thing that truly does kill me about angel season 4 is that the opening… five ish episodes do seem to be setting up something that could be honestly great! by all-seeing-ifer

Xander spends the first half of The Zeppo trying – largely at Cordelia’s prompting – to work out how to be cool. by coraniaid

Was "Buffy vs Dracula" a distraction for the Scoobies and Joyce so they can create Dawn? by Joshua

Which group is better at putting aside their personal drama and come together for the greater good? by Joshua

How well do Tara's accusations stand up at the time they're made? by garfan

should i watch angel? by Dogs of Winter

Fred/Gunn vs. Fred/Wesley by Bop

Queer vampires? by bonniedelarge

How would the story have been different if willow and Xander would have been/stayed a couple by

So much invisibility! by DifficultRice7075

Say something nice about season 7. by george123890yang

Who had the best Character development throughout both shows? by Virtual_Row_8445

Do you remember the first time you watched "The Body"? by jdpm1991

Willow could have killed Dawn by DifficultRice7075

First time watching Angel Season 4 by Sourpatchmoms

Am I the only one who likes Buffy season 7 and Angel season 4 by Parking-Ad-1743

SPOILER-FREE discussion on SLAYERS by johnnyorac

What I would change about season 6 by BrianTheReckless

Buffy’s Rocket launcher by DifficultRice7075

What's Your Fave AU ideas? by Girlthatbreathes

The Dawn episodes by CornflakeGrl72

Poetic excerpt from a shooting script by chumloadio

i know most people are tired of this, but seriously does someone prefer the bigfoot over the first one? by WhiteJaski

Are you surprised JM used "glee"? What what's one word you would use to describe Spike? by sushibananawater

Blood Sausage, Bangers and Mash? by Sea-Medicine-411

The Slayer Concept was Flawed From the Beginning. by loki2002

The Chip by Virtual_Row_8445

Opening Credits by johnnyorac

Buffy Tarot Hardcover Edition? by ghavrielle

What’s your opinion about the show Angel? by kindaweird0

Is Fred the most tragic character in Buffyverse? by Stegosaurus100

When SMG made my whole life as a little girl by ladybug5551111

Buffy similarities with TVD by lunarborealis

Mistreating Buffy by Mika95

Was Jasmine really a threat to humanity? by NoPoet406

Subtle thing about the room change by Itssixinthemorning

How mature or immature would you say Spike's view of love is? or was? by Foreverred97

Ugh by Mika95

What episode? by Mika95

what was your least favourite hairstyle of a character in the show by duvet-cover

What are the no-no's of magic in the Buffyverse? by SafiraAshai

Does anyone else think that the slayer council is really bad at their job? by george123890yang

Faith by Virtual_Row_8445

Fanfic request by Extra_Age2505

The Wish: a paradox by Vixen22213

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[septembersghost]

I feel like the internet has gotten so bad at being able to tell apart "human being who made mistakes and had flaws but did more harm than good" and "actual bigot/abuser/horrible criminal," which is. really bad because there's no nuance or space for flaws ever?

one of my friends and i have discussed many times that "your fave is problematic" and the culture that came with it did terrible detriment to social media and conversation - there are so many gradations to people. people can do thoughtless things or misguided things or even hurtful things, and they can grow and change and make amends for it, and that is part of being human. no one walks through this life never making a single mistake or never causing hurt, even inadvertently. i am basically chidi anagonye's white girl counterpart, i have such terrible fear and anxiety over doing the wrong thing, saying the wrong thing, ever accidentally causing harm. i've agonized over this my entire life, to the point where i intentionally wouldn't do things just to make sure i didn't mess up, and i struggle with decisions. (i don't recommend this btw, my emotional sensitivity and hyper self-criticism is not great and has never been good for my mental health. being extremely isolated due to illness, and thus less likely to be in a social situation, has only slightly dulled this, but that's, you know, also not ideal). i suspect part of my empathy for kind but very damaged people comes from this worry in myself, somehow, i don't really know. but as soon as we start judging anything through a lens of "moral purity," compassion and nuance is going to disappear. and you're right, there's a difference between "flawed, fragile human" and "reprehensible abuser/murderer/criminal" or "prejudiced bigot who actively does harm." there are really important distinctions there. to engage in any art or media EVER is to note that it came from people, and people aren't perfect, and art is influenced by its time, culture, individual experience, etc. we all decide what we do and do not engage with. for example, i can say, well, i personally won't watch works by this director or read this author, but i can't immediately assume that everyone who *does* is somehow bad/evil or condoning something that was done. (there are delineations here of course, but you know what i mean in general). i find i'm troubled by this idea of purity pervading fiction too, and people acting like enjoying a darker themed story or "bad" character makes them immoral themselves, or that we need a 21st century hays code. that's going to shrink possibility and creativity, not encourage it. besides, social mores are always changing (we hope for the better!), which means in ten years will we still have the parameters we have now? probably not. to engage with any art, any artist, any fiction, is to understand it was created by human beings who simply are never going to be perfect. since music/art/stories are my only real solace and escape in this life, i do try to choose that with care for my own well-being, and that's also unique to each individual. if everything has to be rigidly pure, we'll no longer be able to have any art at all, and what a poorer world that would be for everyone.

[littlemixnet]

To me, a good ally is someone who is consistent in their efforts – there’s a difference between popping on a pride playlist or sprinkling yourself in rainbow glitter once a year and actually defending LGBT+ people against discrimination. It means showing my LGBT+ fans that I support them wholeheartedly and am making a conscious effort to educate myself, raise awareness and show up whenever they need me to. It would be wrong of me to benefit from the community as a musician without actually standing up and doing what I can to support. As someone in the public eye, it’s important to make sure your efforts are not performative or opportunistic. I’m always working on my allyship and am very much aware that I’ve still got a lot of unlearning and learning to do. There are too many what I call ‘dormant allies’, believing in equality but not really doing more than liking or reposting your LGBT+ mate’s content now and again. Imagine if that friend then saw you at the next march, or signing your name on the next petition fighting for their rights? Being an ally is also about making a conscious effort to use the right language and pronouns, and I recently read a book by Glennon Doyle who spoke of her annoyance and disappointment of those who come out and are met with ‘We love you…no matter what’. I’d never thought of that expression like that before and it really struck a chord with me. ‘No matter what’ suggests you are flawed. Being LGBT+ is not a flaw. Altering your language and being conscious of creating a more comfortable environment for your LGBT+ family and friends is a good start. Nobody is expecting you to suddenly know it all, I don’t think there’s such a thing as a perfect ally. I’m still very much learning. Even recently, after our Confetti music video I was confronted with the fact that although we made sure our video was incredibly inclusive, we hadn’t brought in any actual drag kings. Some were frustrated, and they had every right to be. You can have the right intentions and still fall short. As an open ally I should have thought about that, and I hadn’t, and for that I apologise. Since then I’ve been doing more research on drag king culture, because it’s definitely something I didn’t know enough about, whether that was because it isn’t as mainstream yet mixed with my own ignorance. But the point is we mess up, we apologise, we learn from it and we move forward with that knowledge. Don’t let the fear of f**king up scare you off. And make sure you are speaking alongside the community, not for the community. Growing up in a small Northern working-class town, some views were, and probably still are, quite ‘old fashioned’ and small-minded. I witnessed homophobia at an early age. It was a common thought particularly among men that it was wrong to be anything but heterosexual. I knew very early on I didn’t agree with this, but wasn’t educated or aware enough on how to combat it. I did a lot of performing arts growing up and within that space I had many LGBT+ (mainly gay) friends. I’ve been a beard many a time let me tell you! But it was infuriating to see friends not feel like they could truly be themselves. When I moved to London I felt incredibly lonely and like I didn’t fit in. It was my gay friends (mainly my friend and hairstylist, Aaron Carlo) who took me under their wing and into their world. Walking into those gay bars or events like Sink The Pink, it was probably the first time I felt like I was in a space where everyone in that room was celebrated exactly as they are. It was like walking into a magical wonderland. I got it. I clicked with everyone. My whole life I struggled with identity – being mixed race for me meant not feeling white enough, or black enough, or Arab enough. I was a ‘tomboy’ and very nerdy. I suppose on a personal level that maybe played a part in why I felt such a connection or understanding of why those spaces for the LGBT+ community are so important. One of the most obvious examples of first realising Little Mix was having an effect in the community was that I couldn’t enter a gay bar without hearing a Little Mix song and watching numerous people break out into full choreo from our videos! I spent the first few years of our career seeing this unfold and knowing the LGBT+ fan base were there, but it wasn’t until I got my own Instagram or started properly going through Twitter DMs that I realised a lot of our LGBT+ fans were reaching out to us on a daily basis saying how much our music meant to them. I received a message from a boy in the Middle East who hadn’t come out because in his country homosexuality is illegal. His partner tragically took their own life and he said our music not only helped him get through it, but gave him the courage to start a new life somewhere else where he could be out and proud. There are countless other stories like theirs, which kind of kickstarted me into being a better ally. Another standout moment would be when we performed in Dubai in 2019. We were told numerous times to ‘abide by the rules’, which meant not promoting anything LGBT+ or too female-empowering (cut to us serving a four-part harmony to Salute). In my mind, we either didn’t go or we’d go and make a point. When Secret Love Song came on, we performed it with the LGBT+ flag taking up the whole screen behind us. The crowd went wild, I could see fans crying and singing along in the audience and when we returned it was everywhere in the press. I saw so many positive tweets and messages from the community. It made laying in our hotel rooms s**tting ourselves that we’d get arrested that night more than worth it. It was through our fans and through my friends I realised I need to be doing more in my allyship. One of the first steps in this was meeting with the team at Stonewall to help with my ally education and discussing how I could be using my platform to help them and in turn the community. Right now, and during lockdown, I’d say my ally journey has been a lot of reading on LGBT+ history, donating to the right charities and raising awareness on current issues such as the conversion therapy ban and the fight for equality of trans lives. Stonewall is facing media attacks for its trans-inclusive strategies and there is an alarming amount of seemingly increasing transphobia in the UK today and we need to be doing more to stand with the trans community. Still, there is definitely a pressure I feel as someone in the public eye to constantly be saying and doing the right things, especially with cancel culture becoming more popular. I s**t myself before most interviews now, on edge that the interviewer might be waiting for me to ‘slip up’ or I might say something that can be misconstrued. Sometimes what can be well understood talking to a journalist or a friend doesn’t always translate as well written down, which has definitely happened to me before. There’ve been moments where I’ve (though well intentioned) said the wrong thing and had an army of Twitter warriors come at me. Don’t get me wrong, there are obviously more serious levels of f**king up that are worthy of a cancelling. But it was quite daunting to me to think that all of my previous allyship could be forgotten for not getting something right once. When that’s happened to me before I’ve scared myself into thinking I should STFU and not say anything, but I have to remember that I am human, I’m going to f**k up now and again and as long as I’m continuing to educate myself to do better next time then that’s OK. I’m never going to stop being an ally so I need to accept that there’ll be trickier moments along the way. I think that might be how some people may feel, like they’re scared to speak up as an ally in case they say the wrong thing and face backlash. Just apologise to the people who need to be apologised to, and show that you’re doing what you can to do better and continue the good fight. Don’t burden the community with your guilt. When it comes to the music industry, I’m definitely seeing a lot more LGBT+ artists come through and thrive, which is amazing. Labels, managements, distributors and so forth need to make sure they’re not just benefiting from LGBT+ artists but show they’re doing more to actually stand with them and create environments where those artists and their fans feel safe. A lot of feedback I see from the community when coming to our shows is that they’re in a space where they feel completely free and accepted, which I love. I get offered so many opportunities to do with LGBT+ based shows or deals and while it’s obviously flattering, I turn most of them down and suggest they give the gig to someone more worthy of that role. But really, I shouldn’t have to say that in the first place. The fee for any job I do take that feels right for me but has come in as part of the community goes to LGBT+ charities. That’s not me blowing smoke up my own arse, I just think the more of us and big companies that do that, the better. We need more artists, more visibility, more LGBT+ mainstream shows, more shows on LGBT+ history and more artists standing up as allies. We have huge platforms and such an influence on our fans – show them you’re standing by them. I’ve seen insanely talented LGBT+ artist friends in the industry who are only recently getting the credit they deserve. It’s amazing but it’s telling that it takes so long. It’s almost expected that it will be a tougher ride. We also need more understanding and action on the intersectionality between being LGBT+ and BAME. Racism exists in and out of the community and it would be great to see more and more companies in the industry doing more to combat that. The more we see these shows like Drag Race on our screens, the more we can celebrate difference. Ever since I was a little girl, my family would go to Benidorm and we’d watch these glamorous, hilarious Queens onstage; I was hooked. I grew up listening to and loving the big divas – Diana Ross (my fave), Cher, Shirley Bassey, and all the queens would emulate them. I was amazed at their big wigs, glittery overdrawn make-up and fabulous outfits. They were like big dolls. Most importantly, they were unapologetically whoever the f**k they wanted to be. As a shy girl who didn’t really understand why the world was telling me all the things I should be, I almost envied the queens but more than anything I adored them. Drag truly is an art form, and how incredible that every queen is different; there are so many different styles of drag and to me they symbolise courage and freedom of expression. Everything you envisioned your imaginary best friend to be, but it’s always been you. There’s a reason why the younger generation are loving shows like Drag Race. These kids can watch this show and not only be thoroughly entertained, but be inspired by these incredible people who are unapologetically themselves, sharing their touching stories and who create their own support systems and drag families around them. Now and again I think of when I’d see those Queens in Benidorm, and at the end they’d always sing I Am What I Am as they removed their wigs and smudged their make up off, and all the dads would be up on their feet cheering for them, some emotional, like they were proud. But that love would stop when they’d go back home, back to their conditioned life where toxic heteronormative behaviour is the status quo. Maybe if those same men saw drag culture on their screens they’d be more open to it becoming a part of their everyday life. I’ll never forget marching with Stonewall at Manchester Pride. I joined them as part of their young campaigners programme, and beforehand we sat and talked about allyship and all the young people there asked me questions while sharing some of their stories. We then began the march and I can’t explain the feeling and emotion watching these young people with so much passion, chanting and being cheered by the people they passed. All of these kids had their own personal struggles and stories but in this environment, they felt safe and completely proud to just be them. I knew the history of Pride and why we were marching, but it was something else seeing what Pride really means first hand. My advice for those who want to use their voice but aren’t sure how is, just do it hun. It’s really not a difficult task to stand up for communities that need you. Change can happen quicker with allyship.

Jade Thirlwall on the power, and pressures, of being an LGBT ally: ‘I’m gonna f**k up now and again’

[lumilasi]

I'm just curious what your thoughts on Shigaraki are. Im praying he gets control back. I would be so sad if the body take over is dragged out. It looks like they are going the save Tomura route which is great but my thought is that means we won't get him back till the end.. I swear if they have Eri rewind him 😤 I hope it's OK to ask you this, if not please ignore and accept my apologies and have a good day. ☀️🌞

Ha ha it’s alright! I don’t mind talking about my favorite character, and musing out my thoughts about what might happen. Of course, keep in mind this is just my thoughts/viewpoint, and I would never say anything I muse out about this is a fact; I’m not the writer after all.  I’m just going over the story bits we already know and considering what could possibly be the story-direction we’re going towards! 

(Also warning, this is probs gonna get a little long-winded because I have a lot of thoughts about this, and Tomura and Izuku’s stories are pretty tightly tied to the larger one at hand about the world they live in.)

To give you a short summary: I think Tomura might indeed stay possessed for a while, and perhaps Izuku could team up with his friends to help save him from this possession. I also don’t think Eri should be using her powers a whole lot right now in the story, given her trauma and age. She needs to heal herself first to avoid unintentionally causing more damage to her mental state. Trauma recovery takes time, often more than what we’ve seen so far in the manga. 

And now for the long-winded explanation (under the cut so this post isn’t ridiculously long:)

So, considering the overall narration and themes Horikoshi has used in the manga, it feels reasonable to say that one of the end goals in all likeness is to “save” those the current society would not bother saving, including Tomura, and especially Tomura, considering his character and story kind of symbolizes the overall failures and problems of this society. His BG touches on so many bad things and problems wrong with the way their world runs currently.

(Apathy from people being over-reliant on heroes, lack of proper help for mental health, hero idol worship that makes people neglect their families over their duty as a hero, abusive parental figures, dehumanization, etc.)

Izuku’s main goal, the goal of his story after all, is to become the greatest hero as the beginning narration expressed. The most reasonable way to do that given the things we’ve been shown about this world, is to do something none of the current heroes would; save those deemed “unfit” to be saved. It’s not only something personally fitting to Izuku’s character, but holds larger symbolic meaning for the overall narrative. I actually saw somebody discuss this particular topic in a post a while back, that put it better than I ever could. 

(click the link if you’re curious to read it, it’s a pretty interesting one)

Now, what that saving means in practice is likely going to be more complicated, since the people in question have done bad things that deserve consequences, and I won’t deny that. 

However, one of the biggest issues is, that the way this society functions seems to kind of be the very source of these villains doing bad things. If only somebody would’ve bothered to pick up this scared kid walking on the street before AFO got to him, none of what is happening now would have happened. (or at least, it would’ve been someone else in worst case scenario)

So, to go back on what you actually asked about; I do think that in order to reach the goal Izuku was set, he does need to free Tomura from that possession, that’s probably the least he can and should do. 

In that sense, it would honestly make sense it would happen close to the end of the story as the best way to symbolize Izuku becoming the greatest hero - saving even the person who everybody else likely deemed unworthy of saving. 

Not to mention, I recall Horikoshi mentioning that he planned the ending to be something where heroes and villains have to team up to reach an end goal of sorts. Izuku teaming up with Tomura’s friends to save Tomura could fit into this concept. 

As for Eri...her rewind powers are bit of a...yeah. I also have lot of thoughts about that so bear with me.

They’re pretty difficult from narrative perspective, because they come off very “deus ex machina” or “magical fix all” that removes any stakes, and I’ve seen from the fandom people wishing Eri to just magically fix everything each time somebody is horribly injured, which...that’s a tad disturbing to me? Asking this little traumatized girl who’s seen lot of horrid injuries and gore to view MORE of it potentially, to heal your favorites? Even if she’d want to do it willingly (which she probably would out of gratitude) she’s, what, six? 

(yes I know this is fiction and I might be taking this a bit too seriously, but I am also looking at this from the narration point of view, and her doing these magic fixes would also actually be bad for the story narration IMO, I’ll explain below)

She’s just a child, she probably can’t really grasp yet what she can and can’t handle, when it comes to her trauma, and what is and isn’t good for her.  Eri “magically fixing everything” is an absolute no from me, both for her own sake and from narration perspective. 

Like I get it, anybody would be sad when their fave gets hurt, I am too, but Eri’s a traumatized child, and tbh having her magically fix everything at her current state would in my eyes go against the point the narrative is trying to make, about the need for change and doing things better from the previous generation. Her rewinding these “changes” in the story, as a traumatized kid, is basically holding up the status quo that is harmful. Using somebody’s remarkable power out of duty to do good while potentially ignoring the impact it can have on the individuals own well-being, which basically will hindrance their ability to do said good in the future.

I can let fixing Mirio’s quirk pass, because he wasn’t horrifically injured in a manner that could potentially trigger Eri’s traumas. It was still a tad risky in my eyes to make this kid do it, because even if she did train for it, what if things went horribly wrong and she made Mirio disappear? That would’ve just caused her unnecessary mental anguish. They basically got lucky there that Hori was kind enough to make it work. 

I would not mind so much, if the person having this power wasn’t a traumatized kid basically, in a story that is about a flawed system and the harmful effects it has on the individuals living in it with the way it currently runs. 

So personally, I don’t want to see Eri use her powers at this point in that manner. She’s still recovering herself and probably not mentally ready to handle these things. Once she’s in a mentally better place, older and more capable of understanding what is or isn’t good for her, then she can go ahead and rewind people’s lost limbs left and right and use her quirk as the next generation superhero healer. But not right now, not when she’s still just a kid with horrible trauma.

 Plus, I feel her point in the story was less about her power, and more about her parallels with Tomura; she could’ve become like him if she hadn’t been saved, and in turn, Tenko could’ve been like her if he had been saved. 

So, from narrative point of view, It feels likely (though I could be wrong of course) that Tomura will remain possessed for a while, and Izuku’s end goal (or one of them) is to save him from the possession, and perhaps they’ll work together to defeat AFO. This last part I’m not that sure about though, given we still don’t have all the puzzle pieces. There’s probably a lot more to be learned about AFO himself, that will have an impact on how the story goes. We’ll see.

So yeah. Sorry this is kind of long, but sometimes you need lot of text to properly convey your thoughts xD Plus I’m just kinda used to writing long pieces of text. 

[letterboxd]

How I Letterboxd #12: Joe Lynch.

Self-described cinedork and Mayhem filmmaker Joe Lynch tells Horrorville’s Brett Petersel about cinematic sausage, getting to direct Creepshow episodes and being a three-star starter on Letterboxd.

“Even when I watch what I would think is a real stinker, I also consider that there were many people involved in that film who didn’t walk on set going ‘okay people, let’s screw this up today!’” —Joe Lynch

It is always a pleasure to find film directors lurking on Letterboxd. Joe Lynch is a bona fide, OG member, having racked up more than 1,500 diary entries, giving half-star reviews to his own work, and creating lists of the movies that have influenced the making of his films.

There are the films that were in Lynch’s subconscious when he made Mayhem, a workplace splatter led by Steven Yeun and Samara Weaving. There are the movies he watched while researching the Salma Hayek-starring Everly. And this just in: films that influenced The Right Snuff, one of Lynch’s two episodes for the new Creepshow series—based on the 1982 horror-comedy classic and its sequels—which premieres on Shudder April 15.

Like so many of us, Lynch took time during the pandemic to catch up on films he had neglected to watch in spite of a previous career as a video-store clerk (a Criterion Channel subscription helped him get on top of the backlog). In this edition of ‘How I Letterboxd’, Lynch discusses how those classics have informed his craft, who his Letterboxd faves are, and why the horror genre is the future of the industry.

Steven Yeun and Samara Weaving in Joe Lynch’s ‘Mayhem’ (2017).

How long have you been on Letterboxd? Joe Lynch: I remember when Letterboxd was in its beta phase way back in good ol’ 2012 and I couldn’t wait to sign up, breathlessly waiting for an invite to the party. At the time, I had a digital database where I would log movies I’ve seen, but it was always subject to whatever laptop or device I had handy and would just be a mess of titles with no rhyme or reason.

When a member follows you, what should they expect? I put it right up top in my description: “I am not a critic”, just a lover of cinema. At first I didn’t want to write “reviews” in the description, especially since I first started using the service whilst in the throes of a horrible experience making a film that I thought would bury me and I’d never work again. I was like, and I still feel this way, “who am I to rip on a movie when someone can throw it right back at me? Like ‘dude, you directed Knights of Badassdom, sit down’.”

I’ve always had the highest regard for filmmakers who can get anything made. So even when I watch what I would think is a real stinker, I also consider that there were many people involved in that film who didn’t walk on set going “okay people, let’s screw this up today!” but instead were trying their best and circumstances just got in the way, which always happens. Having made a few films and TV now, I’m fully aware of the trials and tribulations that go into making a movie and have all the respect in the world for anyone who can steer that ship to completion. It’s hard making movies and even harder making one that is your original vision [and] that is widely embraced by an audience.

I have very weird tastes so don’t be shocked if you glance at my recent activity and you see Casablanca, The Silence of the Lambs or Bigger Than Life right next to The Legend of Billie Jean, Con Air or Candyman 3. I’m usually bouncing all over the place in terms of what kinds of movies I’m screening. From films recommended to me, to films that I may be watching for research, or even just how I’m feeling that day and maybe need a good laugh or a good cry or to be scared stiff. I like that kind of variety. There’s something out there for everyone and every emotion. If anything, I’d say expect the unexpected when it comes to my viewing habits.

What’s your favorite feature to use and why? One of the residual effects of working at video stores as a kid was my desire to siphon people’s tastes in movies and possibly recommend films to others as well, so my favorite feature is the ease of use in logging films and being able to quickly recall those films as well in the event someone asks me “what’s something I should watch?”. Getting older, the “employee’s picks” in my head is getting a little harder to cross-reference than usual so to have the ability to whip out my phone and say “oh man, I just watched Possession and it was awesome!” is exponentially helpful to a cinedork like myself.

‘Big Trouble in Little China’ (1986)—a five-star film says Joe Lynch.

How do you rate the films you watch? For example, what type of film is worthy of a five-star review? Funny, I always start out on three-stars mainly because I’m so proud of the filmmakers actually getting it completed! I’ve been there! I’m somewhat biased in my reflections because I’m always rooting for the artists and from there, it’s usually gauged on both an emotional level and a technical level. I always get made fun of while watching movies because I can point out hidden cuts or when a shot is reversed but [I’m] not trying to point out flaws, it's just how my brain is wired at this point. When you pull the curtain back enough to see how the cinematic sausage is made, it's harder and harder to objectively watch a movie without trying to dissect how it was done. I try so hard to shut that part of my brain off to just passively enjoy a movie but it’s tough. I usually skew towards the positive.

The films I’ve given five-stars are movies that have continually affected me over the years and have inspired me as a person and a filmmaker, which is everything from The Empire Strikes Back, Dawn of the Dead and When Harry Met Sally... to Big Trouble in Little China, The Blob, The Last of the Mohicans. I looked back at my five-stars and it’s mostly movies that made a significant impression on me from an early age and continue to do so, maybe even more so as I get older and I view these movies in a different light.

The anthology show Creepshow returns to Shudder this month. Tell us about the two episodes you directed for the series, ‘Pipe Screams’ and ‘The Right Snuff’. Both Creepshow and Creepshow 2 were important films in my youth and even today, they were some of the first movies I remember where I wasn’t quite sure if I was supposed to be scared or laugh. These films proclaimed we could do both! As a disciple of George A. Romero, Stephen King and Tom Savini, Creepshow really shaped how I watched movies and how I made them—consider the anthology I did a few years back, Chillerama, as a prime example. So when Shudder announced the show, I had to do everything on my part to convince them I could take the baton from these masters of the macabre and do them and the many fans proud.

To come to the table and say “I want ‘The Right Snuff’ to feel like 2001: A Space Odyssey crashed into The Andromeda Strain, and ‘Pipe Screams’ is my homage to The Blob and Delicatessen”—and then everyone just immediately getting it—was a dream. Between the casts I was lucky enough to work with and the amazing crew, especially the FX geniuses at KNB, it really was one of those dream jobs I’ll never forget. I hope audiences dig the madness we conjured up on those!

Season 2 of the Shudder series ‘Creepshow’ returns to the horror streamer this month. A third season has been ordered.

If you were to expand the Mayhem universe, what would it look like? We tried! I pitched the producers the idea of the ID-7 virus in other locations and situations because in essence the idea of being uninhibited by mental and emotional constraints is so ripe. My favorite was the idea that it would get loose in a Wal-Mart or a mall on Black Friday when consumers swarm to these department stores for the best deals. You’ve seen the videos, it’s just mass hysteria. The footage already out there would have been perfect to use already and those people aren’t even infected!

Sadly it didn’t come to pass, mainly because they asked “how do we get Steven and Samara back?” and I didn’t want to force those characters into that scenario, Die Hard 2 style. Plus they’re both huge stars now and likely unavailable for the next twelve years. But the ideas people have thrown out to me show that it was impactful enough to warrant variant scenarios in a “what if?” way that’s really exciting. Who knows, maybe the ID-7 virus could find its way onto the set of a movie production…

What excites you about the future of filmmaking, especially in horror films? The world is embracing new faces and voices more than ever and it means we’re getting stories that may not have ever had the chance to flourish and be seen and heard before. For the longest time the system was much more rigid because executives and producers thought that the audience was much less accepting of a wider world view in cinema and I think the last ten years has proven them wrong. There shouldn’t be any more “token” character or “strong [insert non-white-male] character” descriptions in development meetings. I hear it less and less, which is great because that’s not our world and since cinema—especially horror—is and always should be a reflection of our culture and times, it should reflect these evolutions as well.

When I made Wrong Turn 2: Dead End, the discussions over how one of the characters—a Black character played by Texas Battle—survived at the end was not in the original script but I pushed for it mainly because it was rare for the Black character to do so in a horror film. That shouldn’t be an anomaly! Why can’t there be a ‘final guy’ or have the survivors be LGBT+ or a POC and not the usual stereotypes?

I think now it’s more commonplace to see this and it excites me for the future of the genre that artists are being more welcome to express themselves without it feeling like it’s a gimmick or a twist on the norm.

I think generations of kids growing up with horror now are gonna see these strides in the storytelling—and who’s telling the stories—and push it even further. Places like Netflix and Shudder are willing to take chances with new voices more than the studio system, now more than ever, and that’s only going to produce some great stories now and in the future.

Erica Leehrsen and Texas Battle in a scene from ‘Wrong Turn 2: Dead End’ (2007).

How has the pandemic affected your creativity and influenced your work moving forward? Aside from losing a bunch of gigs due to the shutdown and being delayed on shooting Creepshow—which was a blessing in disguise considering the time we took to further develop the scripts and design of each episode—one of the main effects of the pandemic was how it gave many of us the time to catch up on a lot of films, mainly older ones. As you’d see from my diary entries on this very site, my viewing habits changed from a lot of modern films in that rat-race of catching up with the latest release, to mainly watching films I loved in the past and a lot of ’40s to ’70s films that I never got around to.

We have the tendency as film lovers to keep a mental list of films we’ll eventually get around to as if we have all the time in the world, but with the threat of the apocalypse and no real new content coming our way at the usual rapid clip, it was so gratifying to buy an annual subscription to Criterion Channel and start watching films like The Old Dark House, The Crimson Kimono, Contempt and many others.

All of these films impacted how I view film now and have bled into future projects I’m working on—especially on the technical side, when the world wasn’t influenced vicariously through MTV coverage and letting scenes play out in masters or longer takes, relishing in the performance or the mise-en-scéne. So, silver linings!

Before we go, who are some of your favorite follows on Letterboxd? I’m a big fan of Sean Baker, who I’ve known for almost 20 years now! We worked together in NYC and I was already a big Greg the Bunny fan but our mutual appreciation for fringe and exploitation films, especially international horror and genre films, seems to have bonded us for life. I love when he posts what he’s watching. Even if he’s just saying he screened something on Blu or streaming, his thoughts on cinema are always enjoyable and engaging.

In the same breath, filmmaker Jim Cummings has the best perspective on modern filmmaking and he’s clearly a big fan of using Letterboxd, so whenever I see peers like them using the app it makes me feel less like an obsessive movie dork myself, who should be getting back to work.

Some of the other follows I really enjoy are cineastes like Elric Kane and Brian Saur, who are the hosts of the New Beverly podcast Pure Cinema. Writers Anya Stanley, David Chen, Walter Chaw and Lindsay Blair Goeldner, musician and filmmaker Brendon Small, writer and critic Brian Tallerico, author Glenn Kenny, filmmaker Rodman Flender—just to name a few people who clearly love film and love sharing their thoughts on films in a very thoughtful way.

More times than not, I’m getting some great advice for what to watch next in my “new from friends” section! Because, like being at the video store, it’s casual conversations like the ones on Letterboxd that I love and always steering me to new films or revisiting old ones with a new perspective.

Related content

Joe’s film influences for ‘The Right Snuff’ Creepshow episode

The Video Store: Hollie Horror’s list of horror films with memorable scenes in video stores

Office Workplace Horror: J Cara’s list of office horror and workplace thrillers

Follow Brett on Letterboxd

Follow Horrorville—the home for horror on Letterboxd

[romancing-lady-whistledown]

Just wanted to comment on your last post - there was no frustration and drama for me when I was watching Elu and Skam and Skam France before I made the huge error of looking for the fandom and joining it. Now I realise it was a big mistake, I have to constantly block people on Tweeter for hating on my faves and I've come to really hate another remake which I only didn't care about before having to deal with its stans. So I totally understand what you're saying. Me, I wish I'd never joined.

So this got long af so I’m gonna put it under the cut lol

Oh I absolutely feel you, when I say frustration and drama, I am refering to the live-watching experience and all the fandom drama that comes with that. I have a very polarizing feeling about being in the online fandom personally. For me the positive aspects have been so big that I can’t say that I wish I’d never joined personally, but especially if the positive aspects I’ve experienced haven’t been part of your fandom-experience I definitely see how you can get to the point where you wish you never joined in the first place, especially in the past year, because the negative aspects...they’re rough, and they do make the experience of the actual show different from if you just watched it on your own or you watched it as a casual viewer in the country it’s airing in, rather than as a part of the fandom on Tumblr and/or Twitter.  

I watched the original Skam as a casual Norwegian viewer, I was in a Facebook-group with other casual Norwegian viewers, there was never any drama about anything, not the clips, not the characters, not the actors and not the creators of the show. It was just watching the clips, often someone commenting about how the clip was cute, funny, sad ect, and then everybody moved on with their day. There would sometimes be a thread with questions like “Where do you think William is?” or “What do you think is up with Even?”, but it was always very casual. Sometimes I think the online fandom forget that the majority of the remake-viewers are the casual local viewers, the ones who only casually watch that one remake as a show on it’s own, not as a part of the “Skamverse”. The international Twitter/Tumblr-fandom is just a little part of the people watching the show and the opinions we see here don’t necessairily reflect those of the more casual audience (as one can often see in for example reaction-videos on Youtube where the reactors watch alot of shows at the same time and might not even blink at something that might’ve been a big deal in the online fandom). 

Being a casual viewer worked so well for me with Skam, the whole viewing experience was very chill and enjoyable. I did the same thing with Skam France S1 and S2, I watched the first episode of every remake, and Skam France was the only one I felt compelled to continue watching. It wasn’t the most exciting experience plotwise since it was just the exact same as the og, but I love the cast, I love the French language and it was overall pleasant and fun enough that I kept watching both seasons all the way through. As someone who has no attention span for TV-shows, the fact that they did keep my attention without anyone to push me to keep watching is enough for me to not concider them bad in the way alot of people do. Not very exciting after having watched the og, sure. Do I prefer the og S1 and S2? Yes. But bad? I personally wouldn’t say that. If I came into the fandom before I started watching on my own I know I would’ve been told to either skip S1 and S2 or skip Skam France altogether, and that obviously wouldn’t have been very good advice in my case, although it might be for someone else. That is why, when someone shows up on Tumblr saying they wanna start watching the remakes and ask for advice, I never ever tell them not to watch a remake. I could be robbing them of something that might deeply touch them, just because it didn’t touch me. 

This brings us into one of the aspects of being in the online fandom that can be both really positive and really negative, that being the way it can affect your experience of the show itself. On the positive note, there’s no way I could’ve gone through Skam France S3 in the casual way I went through the original Skam or S1 and S2 of Skamfr. No way. Having someone to talk to about all the amazing moments with was an actual need for me. Hell, two years later and I still need that. Not to mention the fan art and fics that has kept Elu alive for me ever since S3. There was this whole detective-work in the fandom about finding Eliott’s Instagram during S3, finding out about the Instagram-posts David and Niels made about the S3 clips, being in the online fandom actually added to the experience of watching S3 for me, and even now almost two years after S3 I’m left with some actual friends, friends that aren’t even in the fandom anymore but who I still talk to almost daily, as well as some lovely bloggers who are still invlolved in the fandom and who’s blogs I prefer to visit rather than visiting the tag.

But then there’s the negative side of this. While being in the online fandom certainly can add to the experience, it can also affect it negatively. That was what happened with S5 and S6 for me, to the point where I had to switch between staying completely off Tumblr and delete the Twitter app from my phone. While S5 had a couple of plotlines I didn’t like, it also had alot of amazing moments when it actually was dealing with the main theme of the season. S6 did not give their plotlines the proper exploration and conclusion they deserved, but on the other hand the reason why that was so frustrating to me was because I found those plotlines so interesting and actually wanted to see them explored properly. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have cared if the plotlines were dropped out of nowhere, like ofc it would’ve been weird but if the whole Tiff-plot suddenly disappeared I wouldn’t complain. While they were flawed and nowhere near the level of S3 for me, I did enjoy so many of the clips and Skamfr S3, S5 and S6 are the only remake-seasons I have downloaded on my computer knowing I will rewatch them regularily. If I didn’t overall enjoy them, I wouldn’t wanna rewatch them. I don’t hate-watch anything. I could barely get through Skamfr S4 (a season I genuinely didn’t like) and I could not get through Wtfock S4, (which I liked even less). So the flaws Skamfr S5 and S6 had didn’t turn the seasons as a whole into trash for me, but I know they did for alot of people and going to the tags while in the middle of the live-watching experience couldn’t just be a bummer, it could almost transfer some feelings and opinions that weren’t my own onto me just from seeing them repeated so many times. I appreciate nuanced discussion, which does include constructive criticism, and there was alot of that too, but there were also alot of posts that I would not concider that. In this case, when I got some time and distance away from the live-watching experience and got the space to think for myself, I realized that as often is the case, my feelings about the seasons weren’t black and white, or in this case, masterpiece vs trash. Yes, I don’t like certain plotpoints (like the love triangle and car-scene from S5 or the Tiff-plot and the overly rushed conclusions to the otherwise interesting plotlines in S6), but that doesn’t mean that I personally think S5 or S6 as a whole are trash, not when the good episodes and clips were as good as they were to me personally. The online fandom experience has also, just like for you, completely turned me off from another remake that I otherwise felt neutral about and at one point even liked, which really is a shame.

So yeah this turned into a long ass essay just to say, the online fandom-experience is a true mixed bag for me. Although the positive experiences I’m taking from it, mainly the lovely and talented people, the friends I made and the full Skam France S3 experience, ultimately made it worth it for me, I can totally see how, especially if you didn’t have those experiences, you would simply wish you never joined. When it’s a pain, it’s a pain.

[twilightofthe]

Aight, one last serious post for a bit. After that I think I might back off on some rants and stuff that I’ve been doing because I created this blog to be a positive place, and tbh, discussing stuff I don’t like just makes me upset, especially since I feel like I’m just shouting into either an unhearing void or at an audience that is watching and is distinctly unimpressed

Basically though, I wanted to apologize for the slightly salty posts I’ve made recently (and one like, yesterday lol) complaining about how people portray Anakin’s intelligence. I realize I came across as critical and accusatory of people who are just having fun and likely mean no harm, and it wasn’t fair of me to be all snappy about it. So yeah, I’m extremely sorry about that. I likely hurt people and that was not my intention. Please have fun and headcanon Anakin as anything you want. I love and support you and even if we can’t agree, we can def still be friends!

But, I will take this opportunity to kinda ramble a bit about my own personal experiences with this, and why I view Anakin the way I do, what his character means to me, and why it’s kinda exhausting sometimes to engage in fandom because I have the misfortune of having the unpopular opinion regarding a character, and how hard it is to respect other people’s takes when it seems that every time I give my own takes, it’s like I’m immediately shot down for them and refuted for the popular opinions, like I’m not allowed to believe this thing myself. Why I sometimes just gotta rant a little bit, and why no one should take it personal or as a criticism of them.

This below all delves very intricately into my own personal mindset and life experiences. It’s personal. Please remember this is a very personal post.

Now, to me, I totally understand Anakin has made every mistake in the world. I know he turns into a monster and hurts/(in)directly kills everyone he’s ever loved. I know that. I’m fully aware that he makes mistake after mistake after mistake. I know he’s a flawed character. I’m not saying he’s perfect. He’s far from it.

But at the same time, I can relate to parts of his character. His anxiety, his upset at not being able to live up to the standards he feels everyone’s putting on him when really no one is but him, the feeling of being constantly on the edge because you feel like your entire life is in a spiral and you don’t know how to stop it and every choice you make out of desperation makes things worse, how everyone around you just keeps making so much better choices and it’s like, why can’t I do that? What’s wrong with me? Why are they always right???????

And I love the fact that canonically, despite his utter disaster-ness, he has the potential to be good, to rise. That he is a canonical Gifted Kid, mega-intelligent but just totally unsure how to direct that so he flounders more often than not unless it’s in relation to his few specific interests, giving the feeling like I’m a fake and really there’s only one thing I’m good for. The need to do ANYTHING for validation from others because that’s what feeds you.

I’ve suffered this same insecurity and anxiety and self-hatred I can see in him my whole life, the same inability to properly manage my life like I’m supposed to and that everyone else seems to have figured out, how I could be so much more if I actually knew how to rise to the occasion instead of constantly crash and burn

I love Anakin so much because he is enough like me that I can sympathize and feel for him, but also different enough that when I see him tear down the path of self destruction, I can feel relief that I’m never at that point, and also sympathy that he fell that far (amidst my anger at him for hurting my other faves lol)

I LOVE that he has that ability to be smart and capable but just doesn’t know how to apply himself all the time, love it so much, and that’s why it’s a struggle sometimes when I feel that every time I try and say something showing off that side of him, like comment on something smart and creative he would have done, or something he HAS done right, immediately there’s people responding to me like UH NO ACTUALLY HE IS NOTHING BUT A PURE DUMBASS :) :) :))))))))))) HE DOESN’T HAVE THAT ABILITY/WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO DO THAT BECAUSE IT’S TOO SMART/SENSIBLE/GOOD FOR HIS POOR FEEBLE MIND, PERHAPS YOU MEANT SOMEONE ELSE MORE CAPABLE?

I’m not kidding about this. I said Anakin was a good cook once? I immediately got a response saying no, he can’t be, he’s a feral gremlin who eats bugs. I tried to start a convo about him having an emotional/meaningful conversation with one of his loved ones about something because he notices something wrong with them? Someone instantly refuted me because “nah he’s too clueless and oblivious to have that kind of emotional sensitivity ever”. I write something in a fic that shows Anakin doing something cool? In comes a guest commenter passive aggressively with something along the lines of “oh your Anakin is SO MUCH smarter and capable than he should be it’s almost OOC, but I’ll believe it for now haha”

I’ve got more instances I can recount, but I’m stopping here. I totally respect people’s headcanons, and right to have fun, I do. I cannot stress enough that people can and should write what the want. But to me, when it feels like people don’t always want to ever consider my takes on his character, when it’s like fandom is constantly churning out reminders of how much they believe he doesn’t have a brain, well, like

It’s like, when you relate to a character like that and keep getting your opinions and ways to relate shut down by the majority no matter what you do or say, it just feels like everyone is telling me “SMART PEOPLE don’t ever fail at things! People with REAL gifts and talents don’t ever waste them or make mistakes. If you’re struggling, if you crash and burn, if you don’t quite have your life together, it can only mean you’re just plain stupid and a failure for the rest of your life. As a Fool, you can’t ever be considered successful or do something right— because that would be doing something Smart and you have Proven Yourself Dumb. All of your accomplishments and thing you’ve done right can either be attributed to someone else deemed More Capable, or could have been done better by something else, so those good things don’t mean anything. Since you acted the fool once, a fool is all you’ll ever be.”

I’ve struggled with that kind of talk from other people and especially from my own insecurities my entire life.

And I know that’s not what people really mean, I know fans are just sharing their headcanons. I know no one wants to hurt anyone, they’re just making a joke and having fun! I call Anakin a dumbass all the time! SW fandom is 99% good people who just wanna play with their own toys and gush about things that they love! I know this is like 90% good faith!

But it gets harder to believe sometimes the Dumb Anakin headcanons are just innocent headcanons and not genuine beliefs when people Will Not let me have different ones without playfully— or not so playfully —reminding me of how wrong they think I am and what they think about his intelligence level and abilities.

And because my own personal history with anxiety and self-destruction, being overwhelmed with that talk really just hurts, and I will never be able to make that hurt response go away, no matter how irrational it is.

But yeah. That’s how I relate to Anakin. That’s why I see him this way. That’s why I cannot resist complaining sometimes. I’ve been at a very low point recently and these negative thoughts have just been worse so I’ve been more cranky about it, but I promise I won’t bring it up too much.

Thanks for listening.

I’m probs not gonna post anything “rant”-related on here for a very long time— or do my damned hardest to try not to.

[yaboylevi]

Levi used to be my favorite and I cant stand him anymore >Ignored Eren in 123 >Not a single thanks to Hanji for saving his life >No concern for Mikasa's suffering or Jean discussing Its like he is there "yeah yeah people I dont care about your feelings, can I kill Zeke already?" Isayama needs to fix him

I hear you and I understand why you may feel the need to come here and complain about him. But I have already posted a lot about him and what I feel is needed for his character arc’s conclusion to be satisfactory, as well as highlighted flawed and weird writing Isayama has chosen for his most popular character. You can decide to like/reblog those posts, add your opinion there, etc. I appreciate that a lot more than asks that repeat things I have already talked about and 10 notes on those very same posts.

Besides, I feel like a lot of people who like even this current Levi are following me so I don’t want to spam their dashboards with the same, trite argument. I would love if you guys who agree supported my other posts, instead of sending character complaints! 人´∀｀)

Also, may I suggest taking the time to watch other series, instead of focusing so much on SnK if it doesn’t make you feel satisfied about your fave? I mean, I am salty as well, and I used to feel like complaining all day every day because I felt SO disappointed about smth I liked SO much, so I am just suggesting to spend your time on finding something more entertaining and satisfying, it is great for the soul! I’m telling you this because I understand how you feel.

If you like characters similar to Levi, I have 3 suggestions with characters that reminds me of him very loosely:

Psycho-Pass → You have the bad parts of Levi in a character named Kogami, and the good parts in Ginoza…you can imagine which one I prefer. Also adorable and strong female MC and side characters + amazing, morally gray story (much more gray than snk imo).

Sarazanmai → very weird but entertaining story, you will sob, canon gay characters, complicated MCs; the character that reminds me of Levi is Tooi, but he’s a sweetheart and legally my son.

Fullmetal Alchemist → Roy Mustang is a similar but different version of Levi, some things I prefer in Roy, some others in Levi, at first glance. I’m currently rewatching the show, so maybe I’m wrong, my memory is quite foggy. Anyway, the story and characters are amazing, you will cry a thousand tears.

So yeah, other series you may like and end up obsessing over if you like anime/manga a bit similar to snk: kimetsu no yaiba, the promised neverland, shinsekai yori are the first that come to mind that I “recently” watched.

[orihara-infobroker]

Hobbies and Criticism

I sat on this when it happened, and again yesterday but it’s something I do want to speak about because I’ve seen it happen often enough that it merits discussion. There are a few separate elements here and I will try to be cohesive in stringing them together.

It’s long so it’s going under a cut... Sorrynotsorry XD

On Unsolicited Criticism

Fan art and fan fiction are, fundamentally, hobbies. I am not addressing commissions here. I am talking about artists who create their art out of their own desire to make something based on whatever inspired them. Some people love sharing that art with the world. Some people don’t. They are not doing so because they are being paid for their work but because they want to create something out of personal love for it. Those who share it with the world are not obligated to. It is a gift. A gift, by virtue of the internet, that you are not required to accept or like - certainly I don’t like every fanfiction written about my fave pair. In fact I don’t like most of them. It is still a gift, however and the mannerly thing to do when you come across a gift that isn’t to your liking, is to simply pass on it. It’s very easy to do on the internet. Hit the back button. Scroll past it. Block the artist if you find their art repulsive. The fundamental rule of mature fandom behavior on the internet. Curate your own experience.

Further to this, when a person offers up a gift, it isn’t your place to critique them, unsolicited. You aren’t doing anyone a good turn by pointing out where they are fucking up. You may think you are somehow contributing to fandom by “helping” a struggling artist to improve their works by providing unsolicited criticism but you aren’t. In fact, from what I have seen and heard from artists, it’s usually the opposite. Many fan artists aren’t professionals. Some might be, more so I’ve noticed in the graphic art sphere than in the writer sphere, but most aren’t. Many fan artists are beginners. Many fan artists are students of their art. Many are learning as they are doing. Most importantly, many are doing this for fun, as a hobby, and aren’t aiming to become professionals. 

Many fan artists who are either learning as they go or just doing this for fun when they have time are more than aware that they aren’t professionals. They know that they aren’t the best. They usually have an idea of where their weaknesses are. Sharing their art often takes a great deal of courage for them because they know they are offering something up that isn’t perfect but they love it enough to share it in the hopes that other people will love it too. Coming into their space after they’ve shared a work of love and pointing out all the things that are wrong with it is more likely to cause a new writer or artist to recoil and give up than it is to cause them to double down and try to get better. This isn’t theoretical for me. I’ve heard former artists and writers say that they gave up because all they ever heard was how bad they were. Again, not people who wanted to be professionals. People who just wanted to create things for fun. Who had that fun stripped away from them by strangers who thought it acceptable to enter their space and shit on their work.

When a child is learning to do something we do not take the picture they drew of their stick people families and smiley suns and tell them “Honey, the sun doesn’t have a face. People aren’t sticks. That’s not how to draw hair.”

We do not do that because it is not productive. It is hurtful. We know this and yet fans seem to think it’s “helpful” and acceptable to do this to other adults. Assuming the artists are adults, which is a fallacy. Many are teens as well. Under the assumption that adults aren’t going to burst into tears because you pointed out their failings, you shovel your criticisms over them without stopping to consider that maybe, just maybe, they will because they know they aren’t that perfect. They know they can’t draw hands. They know that their grammar isn’t the best. But they’re trying and they’re creating and they just want to share their ideas. They want to share their love with people who love the thing too. 

They didn’t ask for criticism. They provided a gift and had someone take a shit on it. This is not kind and helpful and certainly I would not be inclined to continue to provide gifts to anyone who treated me in such a way. Unsolicited criticism does not improve artists, it drives them away.

On Solicited Criticism and Being Constructive

I’m going to talk from a writer’s perspective here because I am a writer and I don’t entirely understand artists methods because I never took any sort of art classes. I still think the overall theme of this applies to artists as well, especially when discussing the purpose of criticism and the method of delivery.

Many artists and writers do want to improve and would appreciate genuine criticism of their works. This is a double-edged sword, of course because in my experience we aren’t taught how to take criticism as a flaw in our skill without feeling like it is a flaw in ourselves. We associate our worth very strongly with our ability to do things and as such, addressing our flaws can become a very emotional battle.

When an artist solicits for constructive criticism, they aren’t asking you to point out everything that is wrong with their work. That isn’t what criticism in this situation is meant to be. They are asking for explanations on why things don’t work. They are asking for guidance on how to improve. If you cannot provide that kind of feedback, don’t give the criticism in the first place. 

As a writer I do wonder if I am perhaps more attuned to the way words work than the average reader. As such, I try to give people the benefit of the doubt when it comes to word choices and I want to talk about that a bit as it relates to online conversations around criticism. We give tone to certain words. A single word’s meaning might not be negative but how we use it in day-to-day conversation can very much instill a level of emotional subtext to that word that translates into how people write and read that word. 

When giving feedback to a person, it’s easy to make a checklist of all the things they got wrong. In some cases, this can be acceptable, such as with basic grammar mistakes. If you’re asking me to proofread your work for grammar, I’m just going to red pen it and note the corrections in the margins because this is simply the mechanics of writing and I know plenty of native English speakers who don’t understand the full complexities of the language. I speak about English (which is the literal worst language in existence) because it’s my native tongue but this can apply to any language.

However, when you begin to delve into deeper things like characterization, themes, plot and so on, this becomes significantly less straightforward. When you add a writer’s voice (or an artist’s vision) into the mix, it gets very messy.

The one thing that should never change when giving criticism is tone. One should not be cruel or harsh in delivering criticism. One should be kind and understanding. The artist is opening themselves up and asking for help which is difficult enough on its own. The response should be patient and helpful. Take care to choose your words to support and uplift the artist, not to tear them down. For every criticism you offer, you should also try to offer a solution or a guideline for the artist. If the criticism is about how the pacing of the story is too slow, making the story drag, then explain what makes it feel slow and why that is a negative thing. Offer suggestions on what might improve the pacing. 

Ex. I noticed that in this chapter it felt like nothing was really happening to further the plot and that left me feeling bored. Perhaps you could improve the pacing of this chapter by including some reference to how this affects the greater plot? Or add something to the end of the chapter to bring us back around to where the plot is headed?

As many “beta readers” are also not professionals, it’s understandable that maybe you don’t know how to offer constructive criticism. Maybe you just have a feeling that something doesn’t look or read write but you don’t know linguistics well enough to identify the why behind it. That’s ok too, as long as you convey that honestly and kindly.

Ex. When I was reading this part of the chapter it didn’t feel like it flowed very well but I’m not sure why. If you have another editor, maybe ask them for their opinion on it?

Because sometimes when we are reading something our own internal biases will create problems where there are none, or catch problems without knowing why they are problems. This is especially useful if you’re being asked for your opinion on whether or not someone is handling a sensitive topic well (race, sex, sexual orientation etc.). 

When it comes to the writer’s voice, this is where criticism is very difficult. If an author loves their purple prose (overly flowery descriptions of everything) and it bothers you as a reader, you’re probably not their audience and criticizing them for it isn’t actually helpful. It’s fine to ask them if they mean to write in that manner, or ask if it serves a specific purpose to them but if their response is that it is the way they enjoy writing, then it is not a topic that is open for criticism.

Conclusion

Artists - Nay, People grow by learning from their mistakes but they need support in understanding what those mistakes are and how to improve them. They do not grow by constantly being told to “get better”. Respect those who are gifting you with their art. Give them the respect they deserve for being kind and brave enough to post their creations. If they don’t want criticism, respect that boundary. If they do want criticism, give it in a kind and helpful way.

Lastly, and especially because this is what bothered me the most about the incident that caused me to write this:

Artists grow by doing. They cannot get better without doing and making mistakes and doing more and making more mistakes. This is the literal process of learning a skill. Do not ever tell an artist to stop creating because they aren’t good enough. It doesn’t make you ‘helpful’. It makes you a giant fucking douchebag.

[comicteaparty]

April 20th-April 26th, 2020 CTP Archive

The archive for the Comic Tea Party week long chat that occurred from April 20th, 2020 to April 26th, 2020.  The chat focused on Only In Your Dreams! by Tuyetnhi Pham.

Featured Comment:

Chat:

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB START!

Hello and welcome everyone to Comic Tea Party’s Book Club~! This week we’ll be focusing on Only In Your Dreams! by Tuyetnhi Pham~! (http://oiydcomic.com/)

You are free to read and comment about the comic all week at your own pace until April 26th, so stop on by whenever it suits your schedule! Discussions are freeform, but we do offer discussion prompts in the pins for those who’d like to have them. Additionally, remember that while constructive criticism is allowed, our focus is to have fun and appreciate the comic! Whether you finish the comic or can only read a few pages, everyone is welcome to join and chat with us!

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 1

1. What did you like about the beginning of the comic?

2. What has been your favorite moment in the comic (so far)?

3. Who is your favorite character?

4. Which characters do like seeing interact the most?

5. What is something you like about the art? If you have a favorite illustration, please share it!

6. What is a theme you like that the comic explores?

7. What do you like about the comic’s story or overall related content?

8. Overall, what do you think the comic’s strengths are?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

5. I like how distinctive the character designs are! The mcs are both very unique and recognizable

8. It doesn't take itself too seriously, but it also explores some real neat concepts

the story is full of personality

carcarchu

the comic's not loading for me shakes fist at wifi, gonna try again tomorrow but i just wanted to say the look of the site is really cute!

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

Got the chance to read it So here are some of my thoughts: 1. I like the romantic atmosphere that the comic starts off with warm colours and it gives a vacation ad sensation? 2. My favourite moment is in the pink strange dream world, the colours contrast to the reality of Cara. 4. Fave moment: When that mystery guy shows up and he had corny lines like a romantic parody. It seem so fantastical. 5. I like the colour palette choice of brown tones, shades of pinks. 6. I think the theme is about expectations (it's not clear atm), how Cara is distancing from real relationships and prefer to indulge. 7: I like how the creator shows Cara looking scared of confronting things. It sets an interesting tone of uncertainty. Is she hiding something?(edited)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I'm super curious about the situation of Cara not remembering her past dreams with Richie, and how that ties into the theme.

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

1. I like how I don’t know what to expect. I also like how the premise is relateable; the idea that you are scared of imperfection making you have high standards in life hit close. 2) Every single time we’re treated to....Tuyetnhi’s lovely use of expression. Also the end part of episode 2, because that’s when I realized it’s going to get dark. 3) A tie between Ana and Richie. Ana because she makes me laugh with her blunt assertions (which...aren’t wrong) and Richie because he’s so flamboyant and extra. I love how much personality they all have. 4) Hands down Richie and Cara. They have a really hilarious dynamic going on. 6) The idea that people seek perfection through their dreams instead of facing reality. Also I really liked how it tackles society’s fixation on everyone to find someone....maybe Cara doesn’t need that and needs to focus on herself first? 7) That I won’t know what to expect. I came into this thinking it was going to be a classic romcom, and then I get hit with implicit horror and trippyness. I have a feeling Tuyetnhi is hinting at some darker aspects of the story we have yet to see. 8) Good lord the expressions. They really do the story justice and make me turn the page every time. Also the colours are beautiful.(edited)

(Whoops sorry keiiii)

7) two moments actually!

The fact that their wide eyed sweaty expressions matched made me laugh really hard

And also Cara’s quick acceptance of the situation was so unexpected and hilarious I took a double take. Also props to the colour dissonance; that looks like meme material right there!

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

yeah. I want to make it clear that Cara is like "This is really not my day." lol

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

Well....you portrayed that sentiment perfectly

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

Omg yes the wide eyed expressions were also making me laugh! Well that was an expression I didn't expect coming into the story(edited)

I was wondering if that was suppose to be serious or humorous?

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

both LOL

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

I see the horror you got going there Tuyetnhi Reminds me of...I dunno Jojo?

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

well............ yes and no lol

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

But I can’t wait to see what’s going to happen

Although...if we’re going by the silhouette....is she scared of herself?

WHAT DOES THAT MEAN

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

C:

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

I like that sense of not knowing what's happening? :)(edited)

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

that will be coming up in Ch. 3 soon

so please wait till then thank u lol

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

So far it's tough to choose a fave character right now since I feel the story has just started its first segment. I would like to wait until more content is shown before I can make a firm choice? (I'm analytical, I like to go over OCs flaws and strengths once I know more about them)(edited)

I'm curious to learn about her ex crush, since we only get a glimpse of how Cara precieve him. But what is Dean really like? *Drum rolls(edited)

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

you got.... good questions

it will be rewarded.... later on LOL

mariah (rainy day dreams)

1. What did you like about the beginning of the comic? I really liked the colors and island vibe. And this was even before Animal Crossing came out and I started hardcore living that island life I just love a good, soft pink to purple gradient generally speaking so the opening of the story was like falling into a comfy brain pillow for me. 2-4 I'm just gonna answer these ones kind of all together because they thoughts on then are all kind of threaded together into one big thought. After having read through the archive I really liked the scene with Ana and Cara. When I first read it I was like "dang, she's giving Cara such a hard time," but after having read the scenes where Cara just refused to admit to Richie she doesn't know what's going on I really retroactively appreciated Ana's willingness to call Cara on her bullshit XD I think it's a really good foil trait to have for a protagonist who seems dead set on avoiding confrontation even though it seems like doing so is most likely just gonna come back to bite her later. I imagine we aren't going to see Ana for a while though unless Cara is able to use her Phone A Friend card in the dream realm XD I am also looking forward to seeing more of the Cara doppelganger and how she and Cara interact with each other going forward. That feels like an exciting and drama filled mystery

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

1. What did you like about the beginning of the comic? I also love the atmosphere. The color choices are just so beautiful. 2. What has been your favorite moment in the comic (so far)? Ana pointing out Cara's BS hahahaha. 3. Who is your favorite character? Definitely Ana. She's so down-to-earth from what I can tell, someone I'd want to be friends with. 4. Which characters do like seeing interact the most? Probably Ana and Cara. I like to see good friendships depicted, especially in a romance. 5. What is something you like about the art? If you have a favorite illustration, please share it! In general, everything is so soft and pretty. I also really appreciate the fact that all the characters have larger noses. If I had a favorite panel, it would be at the beginning, the sunset beach waves. 6. What is a theme you like that the comic explores? So far, I'm not sure about themes, but I like the talk about the pressure parents give to their children to get married. 7. What do you like about the comic’s story or overall related content? There's a lot of mystery, so I'm looking forward to learning about Cara's dreams, Richie, and the key. 8. Overall, what do you think the comic’s strengths are? The visuals are really nice. I can't stop gushing about the color choices and the pretty atmosphere.(edited)

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

The way Cronaj sums up their thoughts on OiYD, I'm agreeing with the statement on Ana and Cara! Esp friendship part

Deo101 [Millennium]

I'll answer the questions hopefully later this week, but this song reminded me of the comic!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4z5ecLCvSQ(edited)

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

@Deo101 [Millennium] damn that’s a good song

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

Oooo

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

He's definitely hot and extra

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

lmao

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

My joke idea is that Cara is secretly in a reality show starring Richie and her and the bonds they play out is meant for a live broadcast. But she's clearly not agreeing to this(edited)

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

oh god. i don't think that's good for Cara's mental state lmao

Feather J. Fern

Also I have to say, I do love how the first cover is literally Cara being the meme of "Oh no he's hot"

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

fjdkalfdjdklfj

Feather J. Fern

Also I finally started it, while a bit late, I have to relate to Cara being an accountant.

Also I think my favourite panel is "Welp that worked"

Also I have to appreciate picking a pink that doesn't grate on the eyes.

https://gyazo.com/71fe22ea6ac2ebf6b3d85531c66bf8ed Another really good panel

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

I enjoyed making that one LOL

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

that face is one of my favourites not gonna lie

Feather J. Fern

I really like the surrealness of the story, can't wait to see what happens next

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

same! I feel like something is about to happen

I'm also wondering how Richie would react to the real world

like....the ex. And her parents.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

soon™️

Feather J. Fern

More like everyone reacting to Richie XD

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

Yeah pretty much

Like can Richie handle the world?

More like

Can the world handle RICHIE

RebelVampire

I like that the beginning really contrasts the dream and Cara's reality pretty quickly. I kind of feel it catches that feeling of coming out of a dream to face reality which kind of sucks, and also plays into the themes of dream vs. reality and expectation vs. reality. It's very easy to idealize things, whether as a route of escapism or just because it sounds appealing. But the reality of things generally is always different, and I like that we're seeing this full force in the comic through Cara's perspective. And the contrasts between the two really enhance those topics. My favorite moment in the comic so far is probably when Cara meets what I assume is Dean. Cause I really loved that both parties were kind of at fault, and I also liked how quickly that convo devolved into a grumpfest, because that felt very realistic. My favorite character right now is definitely Richie, because he is ridiculous and sympathetic at the same time. I adore his exaggerated personality, while at the same time feel sorry for him since for him the memories are clearly there and like...I would not want to be in the shoes of someone where the person they loved no longer remembered them. As for character interacting the most, Cara and Richie because that entire premise of one person remembering and the other not makes for a really tense and awkward situation. It's hard to tell where it's going to go. What I like about the art is the palettes of color chosen, since there's some beautiful scenery as well as fantastic contrasts when needed to make certain moments pop (like dream vs. reality).

As for the story content, what I actually like the most is that Cara is a flawed protagonist. I've read a lot of stories where the protagonist is always 100% right in the relationship and is just eternally the victim because society pressure. But Cara has a lot more going on, since she's clearly been at fault in some interactions, and while we can sympathize with people pressuring her into relationships, she also maybe takes it too far by being avoidant of basically every relationship. However, since she has these traits, I'm more invested into her personal dilemmas since she'll actually make mistakes when dealing with stuff. Which I think this is the overall strength of the comic. Cara is just a damn good protagonist who is easily likeable but isn't perfect and whose imperfections are not just brushed off so easily.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

;_; .... thank you.

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

I love the story so far! When I first started, I figured it would be some sort of awkward story where Richie comes into the real world and he has to figure out how to, like, act natural, and hilarity ensues. But holy cow, Cara losing her memories, and the slide into somewhat of a horror angle - it's not something I expected (though admittedly I could have read the synopsis lol), but it's definitely something I like!(edited)

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 2

9. Do you think the people around Cara were right to try and pressure her into a relationship? Overall, what do you think the comic has to say about relationships and the themes regarding relationship pressure?

10. Is what Cara experiencing dream or reality, and where is the line between them in this case? Additionally, why do you think her dreams have the potential to become reality as opposed to other people? Also, what is the overall message underlying these themes?

11. Is Richie really just a dream Cara dreamt up, or is there something more to him? If he somehow makes it to Cara’s world, do you think he’ll be able to adjust to that reality? Also, can he win Cara over?

12. What do you think the Cara imposter is about, and what does this have to do with the entire situation? Do you think Cara will eventually remember her dreams? Lastly, what do you think Cara has in store for her as the story continues?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

9. I personally don’t think it was great of the people in Cara’s life to pressure her like that. Sure, they mean well, but it’s most likely bringing Cara’s self esteem down by a lot. I have a feeling that her dreams/reality colliding together is partially motivated by that; the pressure of pleasing society has made her....subconsciously take drastic measures?

10. I’m actually not sure! Maybe there’s a supernatural explanation to it, or it could all just be a dream. Dreams have a way of showing a person’s innermost desires or fears, so maybe Cara’s desires and fears are coming alive in response to external stress factors. So perhaps she opened a portal of sorts between the realms in some way (there’s a key!!!!).

11. Oh I’m thinking they might end up together. But the realist inside me thinks...perhaps what Cara needs isn’t romantic love, but more independent love and being able to love herself. What DOES worry me, however, is the fact that Richie seems...a bit desperate for Cara to like him. Is there a condition to his love after all? If so, that means that it’s possible he’s forced in some way to love her or make her love him. And that’s not really conducive to romance, is it?

12. Ah...the thing that makes me mystified the most. Cara seems to have a negative view of herself, since she told her to get out in the end of chapter two. However, Cara #2 seems to be pretty helpful; knocking on the door to tell her to get out of the house (which Richie has her in), so in a way letting her out. While our Cara seems to dislike her a lot, I think the key to the story would be our Cara needing to accept this double Cara to be really free. Maybe she will, maybe she won’t! But from what I can see from the story and like I’ve said earlier...maybe Cara needs to be able to find love within herself. Love for that Cara double, and enough love to become independent and not bend to society’s overwhelming pressure for outside romance. I hope she finds that as the story comes along, and know that it’s okay to not be ready for love.

As for Richie...hmm. He’s dealing with an amnesiac heroine, and adjusting to the real world. I’m sure it’s going to lead to some hilarious hijinks, but hopefully he can manage! He seems up to the task

RebelVampire

I think whether people were right to pressure Cara is a tricky gray area. On the one hand, no, they were wrong. Nobody should be forced into a relationship. But on the other hand, if you know a person is actively self-sabotaging, isn't it more correct to speak up? So to me this is maybe a situation of good intentions with bad execution. However, I do think overall the comic does say pressuring people into relationships sucks and plz don't do that cause that's how you make ppl run further away. I think it's both, because a dream is reality in a sense. I think many of us have had dreams that caused real emotional affects, whether negative or positive. So the line between them is merely the fact effects are limited. Cara have may have just found a way to cross that line and make a dream a tangible thing that has more consequences. As for why her dreams, I don't know. Maybe she's just super good at dreaming. I do think as the overall message though is that dreams are good but not when we get lost in them, because then we idealize and reject "reality" in ways that aren't healthy. I do think Richie is primarily something Cara dreamt up, but kind of not maybe. Like sure maybe Cara is idea creator, but something else was involved in making the physical reality of that idea. As for Richie adjusting to Cara's world, I'm sure it will be laughably hilarious. I do think he can sort of win Cara over, at least in the sense of being friends. Cause how can you hate Richie? I'm taking a shot in the dark and saying Cara imposter is the embodiment of Cara's missing memories but since they're just memories, all they can do is imitate. As for Cara remembering, I feel like it will be yes but I kind of want it to be no. I like the idea of them having to reform a relationship entire from scratch.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

Oo good impressions! I wish I have more to say but it would affect the story LOL. Enjoyed reading everyone's theories tho!

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

Ok my turn, let's see what my head theories are: 9: I felt the same annoyance as Cara but it's a mixed feeling, Even though, people shouldn't pressure a lady on her love life, she also has a problem with being in relationships. Or I remember one quote from the story was how she 'ditched her dates by rushing to the bathroom.' although I don't know her circumstance, I do know she has issues to settle too. Relationship pressure is real, especially as a young person grows older. 10. From the comic visuals, it feels much like it's her escapism dream. The only clue I got, is that her holding a literal 'key' connecting both worlds, is evidence that both world could collide. So far, we haven't seen other people's dreams, or whether this is an unusual occurrence in the world? It seems to be a message about idealistic relationships. Since Cara seem to turn away real ones, it manifested? 11. I'm curious about Richie's character too. He seems like a powerful imagination, enough to sway the lead, so he's more than a simple figment. I wonder if his submissive, flirtatious (?) personality was build in him. He doesn't seem to have a 'life' outside his dream house, or so far. 12. I'm not sure whether the 'Other Cara' might be trying to help her or is that.. actually a shadow side? I don't want to say too much, but it's interesting to see where the story goes.(edited)

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

Oh! You make a good point about Richie; I never thought about that! Do you think maybe he's simply a part of Cara and eventually gains his own sentience/personality?

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

Hehe I like analyzing dreams :3 In dream theory, I feel he could be? I was more skeptical whether he should be treated as a real character or something else.(edited)

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

man this does make me want to look up dream psychology

i have a feeling...Tuyetnhi is using some theories from that

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

Hmmmm dream psychology you say?

I guess you can say there's some elements of that, but it's not a major chunk of it if that makes sense lol

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 3

13. What are you most looking forward to seeing in regards to the comic?

14. Any final words of encouragement for the comic?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

13. Maintaining the will power to finish OIYD! so I can see it as its end lmao. As a passion project but also something that I want to invest in when I have the time, I hope ya'll looking forward in reading Ch. 3 very soon lol.

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

13. I really want to see how both Cara and Richie will develop as characters. Whether Cara will figure out for herself what being both independent means....and whether she does want a relationship for herself and not for other people. Likewise with Richie, I want to see if he'll be able to be his own person...and whether he's real or not. I have a lot of questions that I want to be answered, and I can't wait to keep reading.

14. Tuyetnhi, good luck on the webcomic. It's hard to start one and even harder to pull off a good one, and I know yours is a good one. I really look forward to reading more from you. You're amazing (edited)

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

thank you

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

13. I'm interested in learning more about Cara's conflicts, why she is hesitant about having a real relationship vs her dream one? I love the unexpected dark twist that the story seems to be going. 14. I want to say, no pressure and take your time to complete the chapter. Just know you have my support and willing to read when it is ready. Good luck

RebelVampire

I'm looking forward to more Richie being Richie. Because he is an adorable person. And also because I'm waiting for some 'reality' culture shock. My final words are that this comic has a strong themes game going on and an intriguing premise, so it'll be fun to see where the comic is in a few more chapters since I'm pretty sure we're in for a wild ride.

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB END!

Thank you everyone so much for reading and chatting about Only In Your Dreams! this week! Please also give a special thank you to Tuyetnhi Pham for volunteering the comic and creating it! If you liked Only In Your Dreams!, make sure to continue to support it via some of the links below!

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[13eyond13]

manga vs anime stuff

As much as I love the DN anime, sometimes I think it makes people who prefer to go by the manga source instead for their main ideas of the story seem like they’re just being really cynical or trying to ruin other people’s fun, or making the Death Note characters out to be much worse people than they actually are. 

I’m definitely not a fan of making edgy takes about things just to spoil people’s fun, and I agree that would be pretty obnoxious and lame to do in a fandom space. But I do think that the anime turned quite a few of the sarcastic interactions in the manga between characters sincere, and it did add and remove little things that altered the characters and their relationships to each other (and it gets even more complicated depending on which anime dub you watched, because the voice acting can change interpretations of this stuff a lot too). And since a lot of people found Death Note through the anime first (including myself), this can lead to a bit of confusion sometimes when discussing characters and their personalities and their flaws and their motives. Moments like the “you’re my first ever friend” interaction between L and Light were very differently framed between the two sources, for example. In the manga it’s clearly more of an ironic joke or a secret “you’re really good at this and I salute you as a worthy opponent” handshake between them. In the anime L and Light seem to be having an awkward moment about genuine friendship wishes between themselves, and it makes L come off a bit naive and doubtful instead of sly and knowing. 

I think the anime had good intentions when making things a little more human sometimes, but in certain ways I think it also missed the point and became a little more tone-deaf by making these interactions between the characters more sincere. They are still doing pretty horrible things to each other and other people most of the time in the anime, after all, and the whole initial premise was that this is a big high-stakes game between a handful of egotistical people that’s causing a lot of mayhem for both kind-hearted and cruel people around the world alike. And the anime also made it seem like the whole Kira saga was about L and Light’s relationship and L getting vengeance instead of the entire cast of characters’ journeys, and this easily adds confusion regarding if L is actually meant to be viewed as the “hero” or not. Of course we can all view the story and the characters however we want, and I do love some of the sweeter and more tender moments the anime added between the grueling plot events and extremely unsentimental and depressing parts. But I would honestly say that the manga strikes a more appropriate dark and ironic tone for the subject matter. And the manga also has other lovely little bits of humour and kindness and vulnerability between the cast that were taken out of the anime altogether, such as Near’s more personable interactions with his staff. And most of those little moments make more logistical and emotional sense than some of the other sweeter actions the anime added in, too.

Anyway, I think I felt the need to make this post just because sometimes I feel like I’m just coming off like a bitter old jerk by saying that I don’t think a character is a very nice or well-intentioned person. I’m always just trying to talk about them honestly as they came off to me in the original source, which I think has the best and most complex portrayal of the cast and themes and events and strikes the best tone. The great thing about these characters is that they’re all pretty complicated and flawed and very interesting and easy to get attached to despite these unlikable and unsympathetic aspects of them. So I just want to make it clear that: (1) I’m really not a big cynical jerk who wants to spoil anyone’s fun or ruin their ideas of their faves, I promise! And (2) I am almost always going by the manga for everything, so if you ask me for an opinion or meta or hc or something and you haven’t read it yet it might not line up with your idea of the character as they were shown in the anime or something like that.

If anyone wants my opinion on the anime instead of the manga version of events or about the differences between the two, please let me know and I will go by that instead. But otherwise I’m going to be going almost entirely by the manga for most asks from now on.

That’s all!

[skam-ruined-my-life]

After months of observing, but not actively taking part in the various heated discussions and tumblr discourses related to the remakes of skam, I've come to some conclusions that I finally feel comfortable sharing. You may not agree with me, and please be aware that I am not pointing any fingers here, even if some of the things I am going to say are not pretty. I am simply ranting because I've felt very uncomfortable for a long period of time, and maybe there are other people out there who relate to my feelings. Putting everything under a read more.

Firstly, many people have no critical thinking skills whatsoever. They get attached to their favourite remake/s and practically worship it/them. They refuse to see the flaws and proceed to shit on the og and/or the other remakes because they think it makes them woke, or that their fave will suddenly become and look better, when that could not be further from the truth. I have noticed a lot of extremists who can only see things in black and white, who forget that grey areas exists. It's either worshipping a remake or making a huge deal of hating another, writing thousands of posts about how hellish one remake is, and killing the joy of those who enjoy it in the process. I am in no way trying to defend remakes that hurt people, and if you were hurt and would rather not have anything to do with one remake, you are completely valid. Apologists are also in the wrong, and I've alreday pointed this out earlier. It's not good to blindly defend your fave when people have been hurt and they called the problem out. You want to watch because you love the good parts? Amazing, you do you, nobody can tell you what to do. But please acknowledge the problems, don't act like they don't exists, like everybody else is in the wrong and you are in the right. I just wish that we could all acknowledge the fact that all remakes have good as well as bad parts and discuss them all in a civilised manner. But that is practically impossible in this fandom because people are too subjective and take everything too personally. You have insulted their fave? You must hate them and their entire family. How dare you openly express an opinion on your personal blog? The policing of the fandom. God forbid. You like this and that remake? Fine you can pass, you are a good person, you can sit with us. You like *those* remakes? You are the devil in flesh, I hope you choke or at least reconsider your moral values. Also, you have no taste. People get too involved. At the end of the day, they are all just tv shows, and maybe I am guilty of this, as well, considering I am currently writing a 1k rant about them. But please, please, understand that people cannot be defined by the shows they watch. Stop calling everybody names and putting others in boxes just because they don't see things the way you do. Lastly, skam. The og if you want, but let's just say skam. Not skam norway, not norwegian skam, because, to quote Henrik, it's not a remake. It's okay to prefer a remake over it, it's totally fine and it's your personal taste and you are free to have a preference. But please, don't belittle it. I have seen a lot of people in the remakes fandom shit on it every chance they get. Maybe it wasn't perfect, but if it were not for it, your fave remake would not have existed, as simple as that. So maybe keep that in mind next time you think it would be cool to specify why your remake is so much better than it. I've noticed that lately, if people are bothered by the way others talk about skam and call them out on it, they are called 'og warriors'. Just why. Nobody is allowed to say anything anymore, it seems.

I think that if we made a slight change in our vocabulary, many conflicts could be avoided. There is no 'superior' remake and no 'superior' character, and there are no things that are 'much better than the og'. How about we start saying 'I prefer this because-' 'This is my opinion-' 'I like this remake more, I like this character more because-' or even better, let's just drop comparisons all together. 'I am in love with this remake because-' and not because it is superior to others.

To conclude this endless rant, let people enjoy things. Don't tell others what to think and what to feel, and stop being ignorant. I don't know if any of this made sense, but if you got this far, thank you for reading.

[nedraggett]

Thoughts on 2018

No need for me to be fancier than that!  And yeah I realize that nobody should be using Tumblr any more but until I figure out a proper revive of my old Wordpress site, this will do for now.

So anyway: I wrote this up for a private email list reflecting on the end of the year in terms of things I especially enjoyed culturally. Well, why not share it?

My year went very well — steady at work and in life, being 47 means more aches and pains but you have to learn to live with it.  The state of the world is something else again of course and we need not spend more time on the blazingly obvious.  That said, the history bug in me has been constantly intrigued by the slow drip of the investigations (and revelations) and were it all fiction, I’d be thoroughly enthralled instead of quietly apprehensive, of course.  November did provide some partial relief on that front so bring on the new year.  In terms of my own written work, nothing quite equalled my heart/soul going into last year’s Algiers feature for NPR, but my two big Quietus pieces this year — on Gary Numan’s Dance  and Ralph Bakshi’s Lord of the Rings  — were treats to write, while my presentation on the too-obscure Billy Mackenzie at PopCon was a great experience.

In terms of music this has been one of the most concert-heavy years I’ve spent.  Even having moved to SF in 2015 I only did the occasional show every so often — there was so much going on (even in a local scene lots of long-timers say has been irrevocably changed) that I was almost spoiled for choice, and part of me also just wanted to relax most nights.  But deaths like Prince’s and Bowie’s among many others served as a reminder that there’s no such thing as forever, and you never know what the last chance will be.  More veteran acts than younger ones in the end for me — greatest missed concert regrets this year included serpentwithfeet, Lizzo, Perfume Genius and Emma Ruth Rundle among the younger acts, while being ill when Orbital came through will be a lingering annoyance, still having never seen them live.  But the huge amount of shows I did see outweighed that, ranging from big arena stops like Fleetwood Mac to celebratory open-air free shows like Mexican Institute of Sound to small club sets by folks like Kinski, Six Organs of Admittance, Kimbra and many more, including, for the first time in years, a show in the UK, specifically a great performance by Roddy Frame of Aztec Camera.  If I absolutely had to grade my top picks among shows, Cruel Diagonals, Johnny Marr, Wye Oak, Peter Brotzmann/Keiji Haino, John Zorn/Terry Riley/Laurie Anderson, Laurie Anderson again separately, Nine Inch Nails, VNV Nation, Jarvis Cocker, Beak and, in terms of no real expectations turning into utter delight and thrills, a brilliant set by Lesley Rankine under her Ruby guise, with Martin Atkins on drums.  Best damn combination of righteous ire, hilarious raconteurism and compelling, unique approaches to how performance can work I’d seen in a while.  (As for recorded music in general, uh, endless?)

TV, as ever a bit sporadic, with a few things on my to-do list — still need to catch The Terror for sure, and what I saw of The Alienist looked good; I love both books so I need to see how it all worked out, similarly with the just-dropped version of Watership Down.  Pose I definitely need to catch up with since it sounds like Ryan Murphy stood out of the way to let the best possible team do the business on it, but my real unexpected delight of a show this year was also Murphy-based, American Crime Story: The Assassination of Gianni Versace.  While not down the line perfect, it was absolutely more compelling than not, and in fact at its best was a shuddering combination of amazing music cue choices, a reverse structure that helped undercut any attempt at making Cunanan seem sympathetic or an antihero, and, at its considerable best, a ratcheting up of terror and horror that a friend said was almost Kubrickian, and I would have to agree.  And, frankly, Darren Criss really did the business as Cunanan, a controlled and powerful turn. Only a few of us seemed to be following it at the time, but when it scored all those Emmys, then while it was as much a reflection of Murphy’s status, it honestly felt well deserved.  Meantime, you’ll pry my addiction to all the RuPaul’s Drag Race incarnations from my cold dead hands but it’s the amazing online series that Trixie Mattel and Katya do, UNHhhh, which remains my comedy highlight of the year, with at least a few jaw-dropping/seize up laughing every episode. (Kudos as well for Brad Jones’s The Cinema Snob, ten years running online and still funny as fuck while digging up all kinds of cinematic horrors.) Also, tying back into music a bit, late recommendation for something you can only see on UK TV/streaming so far, but get yourself a VPN and seek out Bros: After the Screaming Stops, in which the two brothers in the late-80s monster hit pop band Bros (never had any traction here but pretty much owned the entire Commonwealth and beyond) try for a comeback.  It’s an unintentionally hilarious and harrowing portrait of two twins who have a LOT of issues, have clearly been through a LOT of therapy, but are still…not quite there.  UK friends said it was a combination of Spinal Tap, Alan Partridge and David Brent and they were ABSOLUTELY RIGHT. 

Movies, less specifically to choose from — I remain an essentially sporadic populist when it comes to what I see in theaters, but I can say for sure that Spider-man: Into the Spiderverse is a hell of a thing and will almost certainly prove to be a real year-zero moment down the line.  Possibly the most affecting watch was Bohemian Rhapsody, in that I also saw this in the UK — in Brighton, which besides making me think of the band’s song “Brighton Rock” is also notably the country’s most LGBT-friendly city; those I was with felt the movie’s themes, successes and flaws/elisions deeply, and the constant discussion of it for the next few days was very rewarding. As for books, John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood, delving into Theranos and the amoral duo behind it, was properly enraging and compelling, while Beth Macy’s Dopesick, if not perfect, nonetheless adds to the good literature on the opioid crisis, while as ever indirectly calling into question who’s getting the focus and care now as opposed to in earlier times and places. My favorite music publications as such probably remain the two I most regularly write for, The Quietus and Daily Bandcamp, while Ugly Things is the print publication that I most look forward to with each issue, and am never disappointed. 

Podcasts now consist of a lot of my regular cultural engagement, kinda obvious but nonetheless true.  Long running faves include My Favorite Murder — Karen and Georgia are an amazing comedy team who have figured out how to reinterpret their anxieties in new ways — The Vanished, which at its best often casts a piercing eye on how official indifference from law enforcement is almost as destructive as their more obvious abuses (recent discovery The Fall Line does this as well, even more explicitly), Karina Longworth’s constantly revelatory Hollywood histories You Must Remember This, Patrick Wyman’s enjoyable history dives on Tides of History, my friend Chris Molanphy’s constantly excellent investigations into music chart history Hit Parade, the great weekly movie chats by MST3K vets Frank Conniff and Trace Beaulieu along with Carolina Hidalgo on Movie Sign With the Mads, and The Age of Napoleon, which really has hit my history wonk sweet spot.  New to me this year was It’s Just a Show,  a really wonderful episode by episode — but not in exact order — deep dive into every episode of MST3K ever, by two fun and thoughtful Canadian folks, Adam Clarke and Beth Martin. (Adam also cohosts a new podcast, A Part of Our Scare-itage, specifically looking at Canadian horror. It’s not just Cronenberg!). Among the excellent one-off series this year: American Fiasco by Men in Blazers’ Roger Bennett on the failed US World Cup attempt in 1998, Dear Franklin Jones, a story about the narrator’s experience growing up in a California cult and how his parents came to be followers in the first place, and the Boston Globe’s Gladiator, their audio accompaniment to their in-depth story of the life and ultimate fate of Aaron Hernandez. Finally, totally new series this year that quickly got added to my regular listening: American Grift, a casual and chatty look at various scams and schemes, overseen by Oriana Schwindt, The Eurowhat?, a running look at the Eurovision competition throughout the year from the perspective of two American fans, and The Ace Records Podcast, an often engaging series of one-off interviews with various musicians, fans and so forth by UK writer Pete Paphides (I highly recommend the interviews with Jon Savage and Sheila B). Hands down my two favorite totally new podcasts of the year were The Dream, a more formal story of American grifting in general hosted by Jane Marie — this first season’s focus was on multilevel marketing, and Marie and company’s careful way of seemingly backing into the larger story makes it all the more compelling and ultimately infuriating, especially in the current political climate — and the hilarious Race Chasers, a RuPaul’s Drag Race-celebrating podcast by two veterans of the show, Alaska and Willam, loaded with all kinds of fun, behind the scenes stuff, guests and an easy casualness from two pros that strikes the perfect balance between going through things and just shooting the shit.  Returning podcast I’m most looking forward to next year: the second season of Cocaine and Rhinestones, hands down.  Check out the first season for sure.

And there ya go!  Keep fighting all your respective good fights.

[meanderfall]

Naw fam, don't worry about it, sorry for making you sad though! And yeah, I can definitely see how it would be more "sigh, me too buddy," which I think maybe the difference between that and loving the character because you never were is that it's more like gallows humor maybe? Like, we're fucked up in the same ways, might as well stick it out together in solidarity, and turn it into something enjoyable. And yeah not all our faves are going to be the ones we relate the most to, or who have a (1)

flaw we have. Idk, maybe how we pick favorites is the same way we pick friends. Sometimes we pick them because they're someone you can relate to and who knows what it's like so you can commiserate together, and sometimes you pick them because they're nothing like you for the most part and that difference is exciting and refreshing, but mostly it ends up being a combo of the two so you have common ground and *get* each other, but they still bring something new and good into your life. (2)

!!!!!!!!! That makes a ton of sense to me anon!!!! A much better way to put the point of the distinction between the two. And yes, I quite agree that how you pick your faves is kind of like how you pick your friends. (lolol and now im pondering the process of how we go “that human. i love them and want to spend time with them.” because yes sometimes we connect because of our pasts, but I guess imo, it also kind of comes down to what’s in our hearts or souls?? Because man. There are some friends (and characters) that it just feels like I was meant to love with everything that I am, who speak to the very core of my being, even though in lots of ways we’re absolutely nothing alike.)

That was.... way cheesier than what you said for sure, but what can I say? In lots of ways, I’m a naive, idealistic, romantic, who believes in those epic friendships that are in all kinds of stories, the ones where they’ve been through hell together, that would do anything for each other, and you just know that they’ll be friends forever. But I can’t be the only one though, because or else they wouldn’t be so popular in the first place, huh? :3c

Lmao, idk, that was probably really cheesy and unhelpful, and I'm really sorry if that made you even more sad, I just think it's interesting to talk these sort of things out because they help me get a better idea of what my mind is doing when it does things. And you're really smart and articulate, so your response was really interesting and got me thinking about some things I hadn't really considered before. But yeah, totally sorry if this isn't something you want to talk about anymore! (3)

anon, you are too sweet and kind! something, whether that’s meta about a character or fandom, myself, friends, story ideas, concepts, etc etc. what is my life, why am i like this). And imo, sometimes the best way to think something through is to explain or put forward the idea to someone else! Though in my case, lmao, I construct what I want to say first in my head, which means I end up kind of internally ranting to either myself or the person I want to ask, but then I just sort of end up answering my own thoughts and coming to a conclusion on my own.

Anyway, tbh, it really isn’t your fault at all!!! Honestly, I probably should’ve put off answering that ask for a while :/ I was just in a pretty bad place because something happened irl that made me feel awful, and work has been exhausting me a lot recently. I would’ve seen the bad in everything in the kind of mood I was in. I’m the one that’s sorry anon :( And really, this discussion is super interesting and thought-provoking!!! So don’t feel bad, and don’t feel like you can’t talk to me. I hope you have a good evening