#i love that the reason there's so many wild cliffhangers in episode 8 is because they didn't know if they'd be getting a season 2

[acidxshark]

March 2, 1989 (night)

EVERYTHING HAPPENS SO MUCH

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL

May 2021 Wk 3

Being a highly subjective assessment of one tiny corner of the interwebs.

It’s a cray cray Friday when Vietnam gets its eng subs up before GMMTV Thailand. What alter-reality are we in? Well, the Vietnamese offerings are better right now anyway. (Oooo, feel that burn.) 

Ongoing Series - Thai

Top Secret Together Ep 2 - pulping it up in the best possible way. Sure sound and production values are pants, and in classic Thai fashion the editing in post is exacerbating (rather than fixing) pacing issues, but it’s still CUTE AF. I don’t even mind the added university storyline, because they’ve got good chemistry (and a confident gay fresher after a panicked gay hazer is an old favorite... what can I say, SOTUS was my first love). We aren’t spending too much time with any one couple, so it’s weighted a lot better than Brothers was, but also character development is slow. 

Siew Sum Noi Ep 2 - Unfortunately, it’s just too hard to find, plus no subs. I’m dropping it in the hopes it comes back on my radar some day. 

Y-Destiny Ep 8 - (Thurs) It’s rough having a ghost boyfriend, half your friends are scared, the other half think you’re crazy, and kissing shortens your lifespan. This was a cute couple even if I wasn’t wild about the surrounding story. 

Close Friend Ep 5: (Dear My Star/JimmyTommy) - about high school penpals. It had to rely entirely on voice over work as the actors only meet face to face at the end. It’s a good thing they are appealing screen presences on their own, with good vocal control. It’s hard to imagine any other BL pair carrying this kinda plot. It’s by far my favorite of the series so far, and I’m not even a big JimmyTommy fan. 

Fish Upon The Sky Ep 7 - no subs. Do we care? Not really. Because we have... 

Nitiman Ep 3 - currently my favorite out of Thailand. It’s the university Thai BL i’ve been waiting for since... when was the last good one? My Engineer? Yowza. Anyway we got: head on my shoulder, baby is a floppy drunk (but still wants to be in control), proximity alert, boyfriend’s closet, seme gets seriously jelly, and a cute twist on feeding him. There’s something fun and complex about Jin’s character. He’s not a panicked bi. He knows exactly what’s going on, he just hasn’t decided if he wants Bb or not. He clearly enjoys being looked after, the compliments, and the attention, but he’s not sure if he’s going to like what happens if he gives in. I like that twist on the usual tsundere uke archetype a lot, cautious rather than willfully obtuse or freaked out. We can see Jin realizing in stages: I like this person, I like that they like me, I like the romantic attentiveness. But in the background is... do I actually want to f*k him? It’s a dynamic we don’t often see on BL. 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

HIStory 4: Close To You (Taiwan) Ep 10 fin - the most ridiculous show using BLs worst tropes in a sort of weird smoothie of bitter greens and too ripe banana. The ending was the sappiest cheesiest thing ever, like cheese syrup tapped from the cheese tree. So of course I loved it, but I’m pretty sure I giggled through all the bits meant to be profound. Because, in the end, to tolerate this show at all, you just can’t take ANY of it seriously. RECOMMENDED (with some SERIOUS reservations and trigger warnings.) Full review here. 

Be Loved in House: I Do (Taiwan) Ep 1-2 - I don’t mind a damaged seme character but this one is a bit weird for me. Like creepy Cheese in the Trap level weird. On the bright side, the story has given our tsundere uke good motivation for his angst and great existing friendships, loyalty, and likability. Plus I’m invested in the cafe owner/innocent puppy side dishes. So if it’s only the seme character I’m not jiving with, and he’s the most established actor, it should all turn out fine. I believe in you, Taiwanese BL. 

Papa & Daddy (Taiwan) Ep 6 fin - speaking of belief. This such a good show but they gave us a cliffhanger ending. Now we must hope against hope for season two. That’s never guaranteed with Taiwan tho. So, I’m docking a few points and saying, RECOMMENDED so long as you realize it’s a cliffhanger. 

Love is Science? (Taiwan) Ep 1-9 (BL subplot) - this is a good het romance, but the fact that the BL subplot is a beautifully acted disaster bi + confident gay means you’re hearing about it whether you want to or not. Plus they just added in some GL! Come on! I gotta support Taiwan normalizing queer to this extent. They are fighting the good fight and if I also have to watch a career lady and her much younger softest straight boi get it on, too? Twist my arm with that service sub subtext. Go on Taiwan, TWIST IT. It’s on Viki. Join the revolution.   * Incidentally if you actually like the D/s het dynamic of this show, I highly recommend Japanese Kimi wa Petto - career woman keeps a hot young dancer boy as a pet. Oh yes, an actual pet, that IS the pitch. Never doubt Japan when kink is on the line. It’s also on Viki. Go get your kink on, thank me later. (If it helps: That was not a request.)  

Most Peaceful Place 2 (Vietnam) Ep 2 (AKA 5) - love triangles aren’t my thing, but if you’re gonna do it short form, by all means bring in the lead’s other BL pairing so the chemistry is on point. Now I've no idea who I want him to end up with. Can’t they just be in a poly triad? 

My Lascivious Boss (Vietnam) Ep 7 - I’m still enjoying it a lot. It’s still unabashedly queer and the tension is ramping up. We now have secret identity, blackmail, femme fatale, faen fatale, and incoming seme confrontation. Best of all, the series is still airing, which makes it longer than any other Vietnamese BL I’ve seen (aside from Tein Bromance - which is just too weird to count). 

Gossip - Thai BL 

SEVEN PROJECT TEASERS

No one is entirely sure what Studio Wabi Sabi’s Seven Project/7Project will entail. 

It might be like Close Friend (1 episode per couple, no linking), 

or Y-Destiny (2 episodes per couple, loosely linked), 

or The En of Love (4 episodes per couple, linked but independent consecutive stories). 

They’re giving the couple’s arcs separate titles. So each one would be what? Seven Project: Once Upon a Time or the like? We’re in Taiwanese title territory people and NO ONE WANTS TO GO THERE. Anygay... 

Once Upon a Time is the BounPrem (og UWMA) anchor story, and seems to be the most dramatic and likely saddest. These two can handle most of what’s thrown at them at this juncture, so it should be good. 

Vs Love is a BoomPeak (og Make it Right) university vehicle. Since I thought Boom was done with our nonsense, I couldn’t be more thrilled and surprised this pair is doing another show together. I don’t think either of them are the greatest actors but I find Peak very endearing and Boom charismatic on screen, so I’ll watch. 

Would You be My Love is the hotly anticipated SantaEarth launch. They’re a (cultivated) IRL ship and Earth is an established BL actor. They have great chemistry and high energy so this could be lots of fun. 

We are also getting a GL from this series from established BL actresses Samantha and Pineare. Nothing teased yet on that, but I’m looking forward to this installment the most. Also curious to see how the ladies handle the branding and promo side, not to mention the culture. (Thailand variety shows gonna force *girls* to play the Pepero game?) 

Secret Crush on You upcoming Thai BL with no release date, co-produced by and featuring (but NOT staring) Saint and directed by Cheewin (sigh) with all fresh faces. (Previously known as Stalker the series.) It looks like pure pulp and I’m not wild about the plot but could be better than expected as it’s adapted from a novel. Cheewin is an okay director when he has an actual story to follow. 

Don’t Say No the series. Coming from the producers of TharnType this is the JaFirst vehicle many have been waiting for. Friends to lovers + a good boy/bad boy pairing on a sports romance foundation. It’s basketball so they tapped Meen as well (he’s semi-pro). The bad news? You get one guess as to who is writing the darn thing? Yep it’s MAME. So, ya know, expect some slam dunk kidnapping, a light dribbling of rape, and me turning into a basketcase. AKA... 

Will I have to live blog this series in order to survive it? That seems to be the only way I can. So probably. Which means the bad sports puns will continue. Look, if I’m suffering, SO ARE YOU! 

Rumors of a new YinWar vehicle The Best Story (mini series) coming in July. Also rumors that their previously announced Love Mechanics (full length series) has either been delayed, is facing money issues, or is moving studios, or all three. 

Breaking News 

DELAYED (I’m talking these three off the watch list until we get new airing dates) 

Love Area’s release was pushed out but it got a trailer. 

Golden Blood was supposed to drop Weds but comments in MDL report that it is delayed due to C19.  

Love’s Outlet (Taiwan) is supposed to have started a 50 episode run (only 3-5 min each, what utter nonsense). Sadly, this delay is due to a surge in cases in Taiwan which was doing so well, but also doesn’t have many inoculations. 

Bad Buddy has started workshopping at GMMTV actual. 

Kang Insoo’s BTS for Nobleman Ryu’s Wedding is SO FLIPPING CUTE. You have to watch it. Trust me, I don’t rec behind the scenes stuff often. 

Next Week Looks Like This: 

Some shows may be listed later than actual air date for International accessibility reasons.

Upcoming 2021 BL master post here.

Links to watch are provided when possible, ask in a comment if I missed something.

[violet-t-9]

Check in on my (not very realistic) wish list for episode 137

1. Sheepleb interactions, I don’t care with whom - I need sheepleb my beloved to interact with people for reasons. I know the sheep-shifting may only last for 1 minutes but that’s 10 rounds, surely enough to get some sweet RP in.

YES Cad grab the sheep yes YASHA SCRATCH THAT BELLY sheepleb interactions my beloved. Jester yes make sheepleb move his cute little ears I love y’all. YES SHEEPLEB chew on Yasha’s coat. I never knew I would love a sheep but I do now apparently. Yasha continuing to pet sheepleb and continuing to hold Caleb after he shifts back I love her so much-

2. Caleb or Beau accidentally and telepathically speak to people by thinking too loudly. I can’t wait for their reactions, it will be hilarious.

Well, Caleb did so but more deliberately, and it was more enlightening than hilarious lol.

3. Beau and Caleb discover the third function of their eyes (if dark vision is included in true sight, then they are missing one feature).

Nope, the eyes were used against them again to expose their locations, but haven’t ever been used for mind control yet, so I’m okay with that.

4. Beau and Caleb do not gain any new eyes (pretty please, come on).

I mean they have bigger problems but yeah I got what I wanted!

5. Wait no it’s the astral sea there is no wild magic effect anymore :( but can they at least encounter some unique astral sea creatures, features or something as fun as Aeorian wild magic.

Well... That was a lot of astral sea creatures. More precisely creepy meaty enemies. I think it was fun! In a horrifying way, but fun.

6. Someone mentions Yussa and discuss the probability of saving him (honestly though I don’t know how that’s going to work).

Jester mentioned Yussa pretty soon but I think they are a bit... preoccupied to save anyone at the moment, oops.

7. Getting closer to the city and discovering more of its nature/power/how to stop it.

Wow that city description is cool oh boy I got chills from the empty city suddenly bustling with people. Also that Caleb telepathy experiment is so creepy and terrifying. Is the city alive?! With flesh and teeth?! EuughhHHh. Timorei the terrified rebel/Fear they first met (who seemed to be on Lucien’s side), with Elatis and Luctus opposing him? The Aether crux??! Ira/Wrath who acted in a sort of beast-like way and seemed antagonistic towards Mirumus and Gaudius?? It’s good to know the Somnovem are in fact far from one mind - their opinions seem pretty divided. Aether crux might be the way to go, couldn’t they just destroy all the Somnovem, since they want M9 to kill some of them anyways? Does the entire city function like a living body?

8. Beau and Yasha continue to flirt even in the astral sea and travel side-by-side or physically interact.

Twin initiative 21 yeah let’s go- wait when I said physical interaction I didn’t mean it like that come on!! Stop hitting each other. Also Yasha’s small “I love you but” aww. It was still a little bit flirty somehow lol loved it. ALSO the air kiss was so cute I can’t with these two and their awesome PDA. They also searched the building together!

9. Jester really doting on Artagan/Sprinkle like she never did before.

I mean, she paid him way more attention that’s for sure :D

10. Jester and Fjord have a longer one-on-one conversation or fight like a badass battle couple that they are.

Hey they were both great in combat and explored together! 

11. Obligatory wish for Essek’s fancy dunamancy or magical items (Bonus: we get to see one of those high-damage AOE offensive spells that he couldn’t cast).

AYY LIGHTNING BOLT HYPE! It was sort of an AOE too! Loved his flair as always. It’s not dunamancy technically but I’m counting it because cool purple-black spell.

12. Obligatory wish for Caleb’s polymorph spell (sheepleb was perfect, GIVE ME MORE).

Nope, but the sheepleb we got was awesome. 

13. Tiny Veth interactions with party members (Bonus: with Fjord, or sheepleb).

Nope, the effect probably didn’t last long? Or they just forgot about tiny Veth lol.

14. The party members try to reach Molly through Lucien and Lucien reacting more to things that they say.

They didn’t catch up to Lucien at all, but I have a feeling that they will next episode.

15. They catch up to Lucien and Cree somehow and manage to stop them from returning the city to the world (or at least start the combat).

Combat was started at the end of the episode with Cree! They did catch up to Cree! This is going in the right direction at least.

16. Successful divine intervention from Cad or Jester.

At least Cad and Jester both tried! They weren’t successful, but still.

17. Yasha decides to brute force through a problem and succeeds like the true Barbarian that she is.

I mean, all the combat is brute-force and Yasha did eliminate one of the flesh horror monsters with her cool holy avenger swing!

18. Someone pushes the big red button and derails them.

Nope! They’ve been focused and on task and that’s good! 

19. The wizards and their complicated whatever it is being addressed or developed more.

Not Caleb smirking at Essek using fire bolt then proceeding to use one himself and get a natural 20 I- that was so cool?? What?? Have I mentioned that I love those wizards because I love them. They also float the fastest of course.

20. Heroes’ feast/short rest or a long rest that they well deserve (Bonus: they have great rolls on the HP).

Nope, but I mean they probably need one soon.

21. Obligatory wish for Essek’s room in the tower.

Yeah nah this one is just a permanent feature on the wish list don’t mind it.

22. Oblitagory wish for Cad being a MVP in and out of combat.

Cad turned Caleb back (baaaaaaye sheepleb I love you), healed the group and discovered a lot about how the city worked, including using decompose. 

23. Veth being thirsty for Davexian still, or for whatever other Astral sea creature they are going to meet.

“Want to do some apple picking?” LMAO I’m not gonna count that of course but it was funny.

24. Obligatory wish for everyone to remain relatively happy and alive by the end of the episode except Lucien and Cree (they can perish, but now I kinda want Lucien to not die since he had some strange reactions), and the episode ends on a terrifying cliffhanger as always.

Score: 12/24

Welp, that took a turn. I did not expect so much Eldritch horror and expected way more humour (which in hindsight was unwise considering how the story is going lol), but honestly I’m not complaining one bit. Matt’s voice acting and everybody’s performance are top notch and the world-building is just *chef’s kiss*, terrifying or not. 

Bonus:

The subtitles said “bleating” when everybody yelled before the opening theme I’m dead lmao also “some a bit sheepish”, courtesy pun of the DM.

“I mean... *bleats*” hahahah I love sheepleb so much

Poor Essek had to start the combat on low HP, sadness. To be fair, our wonderful DM was busy playing many characters and giving beautiful expositions and the players were busy being captivated by all that! 

“When in Aeor” Fjord lmao making his face into a big red eyeball, as one does.

Torrent of Teeth ughhhhhAHH what an attack name

Caleb casting Widogast’s Web of Fire was the hottest thing I’ve seen, no pun intended - it was hotttt.

[aion-rsa]

Godzilla Singular Point: The Weird History of Jet Jaguar

https://ift.tt/3jvPBwC

The latest take on Toho’s iconic, building-crushing lizard comes in the form of Godzilla Singular Point, an anime series now available in dubbed form on Netflix. Taking place in the not-too-distant future, this reimagining of the King of Monsters involves a group of human characters becoming aware – through rather bizarre ways – of a coming apocalyptic event. Now the only thing that can save them is a behemoth out to punch monsters and look out for the little guy.

No, not Godzilla. He’s actually the apocalyptic event. No, our hero is none other than Jet Jaguar.

Yes, it’s finally time for Jet Jaguar to get his due.

A concept nearly 50 years old at this point, Jet Jaguar is one of those characters who was initially doomed to fail, but lives on due to nostalgia and the golden notion of, “I realize most people hated that thing from my childhood, but I bet I could make it good!” At best, he was a rad addition to the Godzilla mythos. At worst, he was a dumb idea from a dumb movie. For the most part, he’s remembered as something goofy that gets laughed at, despite having some genuine earnestness.

Jet Jaguar was created from both a fan contest and a corporate game of telephone. Back in 1972, to jump on the bandwagon of tokusatsu giant superhero/robot shows, Toho asked fans to design their own superhero design. The winner was a half-man/half-bird robot with a lengthy neck resembling a stack of rings named Red Alone. The concept was turned into a full-on rubber costume, but they changed the color scheme, which upset the young winner. They later decided to just scrap the whole thing, keep the color scheme, and make their own new design. And so, Jet Jaguar was born.

The superhero made an entire one movie appearance in 1973’s Godzilla vs. Megalon. As the urban legend goes, this was initially intended to be a standalone Jet Jaguar movie that the studio just didn’t have faith in towards the end and they hastily threw in Godzilla and recurring Godzilla villain Gigan. While the claim is dubious and unproven, it certainly is easy to understand where the allegations come from.

Everything about the movie feels rushed. As the last-minute replacement for another Godzilla film that didn’t pan out, filming took several weeks and production was a mere six months. Even the Godzilla costume was whipped up in record time. As for the story, outside of the intro, the preexisting elements (Godzilla and Gigan) aren’t thrown in until about 2/3 into the movie. Up until that point, it feels like a Jet Jaguar vs. Megalon movie with the production team hitting the panic button.

The plot of Godzilla vs. Megalon is that a scientist Goro Ibuki is working on a robot called Jet Jaguar, along with his little brother Rokuro and his best friend Hiroshi. They get wrapped up in a plot involving a group of beings from Atlantis-But-Not-Really, who are annoyed at all the nuclear bomb tests going on in their neck of the woods. They steal Jet Jaguar and use him to guide their insect god Megalon to different cities for the sake of smashing them up and punishing humanity.

Goro and friends get their hands on Jet Jaguar’s controls and use him to lead Godzilla to where Megalon is. Then the Seatopians call some alien friends for a solid and have them send in Gigan. Jet Jaguar is able to break away from all control and becomes fully sentient, as well as revealing the ability to turn into a giant. It becomes a big tag team battle, mostly remembered for Godzilla doing the silliest dropkick you’ve ever seen, followed by a second one for good measure.

The villains escape, Jet Jaguar and Godzilla shake hands, they go their separate ways, and Jet Jaguar reunites with the humans heroes after shrinking back down. He gets his own snazzy theme song to close things out.

In Japan, the movie wasn’t all that successful. As the thirteenth title in the Godzilla series, it brought in the worst returns yet. Between public burnout and the movie’s lack of quality, it just wasn’t grabbing people. That said, it came out at just the right time in the United States. Released in 1976, it came out months before the anticipated King Kong remake. The American movie poster for the movie even bit on the King Kong poster by featuring Godzilla and Megalon duking it out while each standing on a different Twin Tower, even though the movie at no point took place in the States.

A year later, the movie would be cut down into 48 minutes so they could broadcast it on NBC in prime time, across an hour with commercials. The only reason I mention this at all is because it was hosted by John Belushi wearing a Godzilla costume, which is sadly somewhere in the abyss of golden lost media.

Getting back to Jet Jaguar – the topic of this article – I feel the need to bring up Germany’s handling of the movie’s translation. Rather than call him “Jet Jaguar,” they referred to him as “King Kong.” I mean…sure, why not. Even weirder, when the next two movies introduced fellow giant robot MechaGodzilla, Germany once again referred to the robot as “King Kong.” Guys, I know what you’re going for here, but it doesn’t work that way.

Anyway, Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla and Terror of MechaGodzilla followed Godzilla vs. Megalon and closed off the classic Showa Era of Godzilla movies. Not only did Japan need to rest Godzilla as a concept for nearly a decade, but this also meant that whenever Godzilla would come back, it was going to be some kind of reboot or new “only the first movie counts” installment. Jet Jaguar was never high on the list to be brought back, especially since MechaGodzilla completely overshadowed him.

He would at least get a little more exposure in 1991 when Godzilla vs. Megalon was featured in the second season of Mystery Science Theater 3000. While much of the episode is spent making fun of one of the Seatopians for looking like Oscar Wilde, they toss plenty of jokes at Jet Jaguar. Most memorably, they “translate” Jet Jaguar’s ending theme, which notes that his mother never loved him and he looks a lot like Jack Nicholson.

Due to rights issues, Godzilla vs. Megalon is one of the few MST3K episodes that is no longer legally available for viewing. This does make the original MST3K Collection Volume 10 box set (which included Godzilla vs. Megalon as one of the four movies) a collector’s item, as it was later discontinued and rereleased with The Giant Gila Monster taking its spot.

A stranger use of Jet Jaguar comes in the form of Certain Distant Suns’ music video for “Bitter” in 1995. While there’s not much of a narrative outside of the band playing, footage of Godzilla vs. Megalon being shown, and a few shots of guys walking around in Megalon and Jet Jaguar costumes, I really insist you give the video a look due to the ending. It certainly goes in a direction I wasn’t expecting.

In 1997, Jet Jaguar made his next official appearance in another frankly bizarre spectacle. In Japan, a series called Godzilla Island appeared on TV in three-minute increments. While it only lasted a year, there were a whopping 256 episodes, meaning almost 13 hours of footage. If you’ve never heard of Godzilla Island, you might be thinking, “Wow, almost 13 hours of Godzilla stuff? Why isn’t this more well known?”

Well, it probably has a lot to do with the fact that instead of using guys in rubber suits, the kaiju action was done with action figures. Yikes.

Not only did Jet Jaguar show up during these adventures, but they gave him the 90s superhero action figure treatment. Much like how they released as many figures of Batman as possible for different crime-fighting scenarios, Godzilla Island gave us Silver Jet Jaguar, Medical Jet Jaguar, and even Fireman Jet Jaguar. Collect them all!

Read more

Movies

Godzilla vs. Kong Writer Talks About Spending 8 Years in the MonsterVerse

By Don Kaye

Movies

Godzilla vs. Kong Director and Writer Talk Future of The MonsterVerse

By Don Kaye

In the early 2000s, Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee was released for the GameCube and Xbox under the Atari brand. It was a fighting game featuring various characters from Godzilla lore and though Atari wanted to include Jet Jaguar, Toho refused. Still, at least Megalon was included in the game. There would be two sequels in the form of Godzilla: Save the Earth and Godzilla: Unleashed. FINALLY, Jet Jaguar was playable, because if there’s anything you can count on, it’s scraping the bottom of the barrel when you’re working on multiple installments of a nostalgic who’s who project.

He’d also return in 2014’s Godzilla game for PlayStation 3 and 4. The producer of the game didn’t even plan on putting him in there, but he saw that the programmers already were working on him and just shrugged it off. There was a special trick to summoning Jet Jaguar as a boss character. By ending up in three different Godzilla vs. Jet Jaguar scenarios and winning all three times, you would then unlock a special cutscene of the two shaking hands while a confused military woman would wonder about their history.

Around the mid-2010s, IDW Publishing was all about releasing a bunch of comics with the Godzilla license. Their mainline series was Godzilla: Rulers of the Earth, which went on for 25 issues. Early on, Jet Jaguar appeared out of nowhere during a fight between Godzilla and the team of Gigan and Orga. In human size, Jet Jaguar flew into Orga’s mouth, then expanded into giant size, causing the beast to explode. Especially awesome was that it came with the cliffhanger text, “Next: PUNCH! PUNCH! PUNCH!” a reference to Jet Jaguar’s theme song from the movie.

Jet Jaguar showed up regularly in the series, coming off as Godzilla’s designated driver friend and handler. What I mean is that he seemed to be out to protect Godzilla, but that meant having to keep his violent ally on task (ie. pointing out that Gigan was nearby to stop Godzilla from attacking Jet Jaguar) and throwing punches when the situation absolutely called for it.

This continuity played up Jet Jaguar as more enigmatic than anything, as although he was mechanical, the only human character who knew his origins was killed off before it could be explained. Even one of the invading alien villains saw him on a screen and basically went, “Oh crap. It’s THIS guy!” Regardless, he still came off as a total badass, winning fights against Godzilla, Gigan (the chainsaw-hand version), and Destroyah.

Then again, at one point he needed to be saved by the 1998 American Godzilla, which at least proved as a reminder to the robot hero that there are Toho characters far more hated than him.

Toho started using Jet Jaguar again, albeit in sillier ways. In 2019, as an April Fool’s Day prank, they put up a teaser on YouTube for a Jet Jaguar movie. They also had him appear a few times on Godziban, a Godzilla web series for kids that, once again, used dolls and action figures to tell its stories.

Now Jet Jaguar is a major part of Godzilla Singular Point. To get into specifics on the plot would be like explaining advanced calculus, but to keep on-topic, Jet Jaguar is the creation of Goro Otaki as both a way to ward off monstrous threats and as a company mascot. Considering King Kong’s role in King Kong vs. Godzilla was “kidnapped to be a company mascot,” maybe the Germans were onto something with the rename.

Anyway, this version of Jet Jaguar is more mechanical in appearance instead of having to rely on making him look like a human in a costume. Jet Jaguar is there to protect the heroes from the endless supply of monsters, usually taking some extensive damage. Still, the robot gets rebuilt stronger and stronger and becomes advanced enough to become self-aware and speak in…well, the voice of a teenage girl.

I don’t know, I guess I just figured he’d sound like Astro Guy from King of the Monsters.

There’s a big hard-to-explain twist, but the main thing to know is that Jet Jaguar becomes a full-on badass by the end of the series, turns out to be a huge key to the plot, and has a completely kickass showdown with Godzilla. In a way, Jet Jaguar’s journey in Singular Point is a lot like in real life, going from a lame idea that appealed to kids and gradually being understood as a respected part of the Godzilla mythos. Something initially representative of the worst of the franchise, proven to be something genuinely cool in the right hands.

Now it’s time for America to return the favor. Once again, timing is on Jet Jaguar’s side. The Monsterverse was on its way to the graveyard after the box office intake of Godzilla: King of the Monsters, but Godzilla vs. Kong came out at just the right time in the tail end of the pandemic to be a big success and keep the series going a little bit longer. There aren’t too many names in the toybox left to pull out, but at this point, Gigan and Jet Jaguar have to be high on the list.

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Make it happen, Hollywood!

Godzilla Singular Point is available to stream on Netflix now.

The post Godzilla Singular Point: The Weird History of Jet Jaguar appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3h787JV

[psyga315]

The problem of "I Watch RWBY For The Fight Scenes" and how to account for when that logic fails.

“I watch RWBY for the fight scenes.”

You heard these words before at some point in the RWBY community. Ever since the Red Trailer back in 2012, there was a huge emphasis on fights as shown with the titular “Red” doing nothing but battling proto-typical Beowolves. No huge emphasis was put on story bits like how she was visiting her mother’s grave or on the music (Red Like Roses pt. 1 has only 4 verses and most of it’s instrumental), and Ruby isn’t even voiced in the trailer. Hell, for a good chunk of RWBY’s pre-production stage, fans perceived Ruby as a stoic girl. RWBY’s core has been the fight scenes… Right?

Well, it doesn’t really take a rocket scientist to figure out that isn’t true. While an argument can be made of how RWBY’s fights are what makes the show, the case can’t be held true for its quantity and quality. Volume 3 is the only Volume in RWBY where there’s at least a fight scene per episode (the sole exception being Episode 8, Destiny), some even having two or three packed into one episode, making the Volume more of a roller coaster, especially in the last quarter. Conversely, Volumes 4 & 5 are the volumes with the fewest amount of fights, both totalling to 5 spread out across their 12 and 14 episode run, respectively, with Volume 5’s feature fight, the Battle of Haven, being the subject of massive ridicule to the point where a two-hour video was made to detail all the errors made, among them being that the core climax of that fight occurs off screen.

However, the reverse can be held true. Some criticisms for Volume 3 include that the fight scenes were either extraneous or had poor quality to them while the highlights of Volumes 4 & 5 were things that they made up for in spite of having the fewest amount of fight scenes. So, this begs quite a few questions towards RWBY.

Most of them, however, can be summed up into one: “What feature of RWBY can match or even rival its alleged selling point in case the viewer encounters a drought or lack of quality in fight scenes?” For these, we’ll break them down into some categories. I will try to be as fair as possible for this.

The first, obvious thing, would be:

Plot, Setting and Theme

Can a viewer enjoy RWBY for its plot when the fights prove lacking, evocative themes or even its rich environment? It depends. One of the biggest things that fans enjoyed about Volume 3 was its development of the plot. Suddenly, the world expanded and there’s tons of depth and lore to an otherwise standard “wake up, go to school, save the world” deal.

However, later complaints of RWBY involve the plot in some way. One of the biggest conflicts between fans in RWBY’s 7th Volume was the execution of its cliffhanger which involves the main villain flying in with her army of monsters, many arguing that at that point, the plot has entered a phase known as “only the author can save them now”, which causes some fans to even beg for an explanation as to why Salem never did something like what she did before.

While the setting in RWBY has been interesting, at times, they end up with the short end of the stick. No case is this more truer than when Mistral, reputed as a two-faced Kingdom which had both a cultured surface and a seedy underworld, was reduced to a few paintings and a couch and only now have the people at Rooster Teeth decided to shed more light on it as a setting for their Dungeons and Dragons campaign.

The themes are extremely interesting to dissect, especially since there’s a meta layer to some of them with the passing of Monty Oum leaking into some of the plot developments and even music decisions. This, too, however, is subjective to taste, though due to the nature of themes themselves and not because of execution. One person could have a completely different interpretation of what RWBY’s core theme is compared to another’s, and that leads to their opinions. For instance, a common theme that critics picked up on in RWBY is “Kids vs. Adults” as they end up reading the conflicts that occur in RWBY and Ruby’s wording in her speech to Qrow as “kids rule, adults drool”, something they took contention with.

While plot, setting, and theme are there, it isn’t enough to supplant fights should they fail too… So, what about…

Characters and Relationships

Can a viewer enjoy RWBY for its characters and relationships? I feel like this would be a strong case to make, but at the same time, this is also a bit of an oxymoron. While the characters can sometimes feel interesting and their relationships even more, the problem is that the characters sometimes lack the focus necessary to be fleshed out and their relationships even less.

You might heard these complaint before: “Bumblebee came out of nowhere”, “Black Sun/Fair Game was bait”, or even “RWBY has too many characters!” and that is, in of itself, a bit of a problem with RWBY. When it takes the time to do character arcs and relationship progression, it is pulled off masterfully, though whose arc it was is also subjective. A key contributor to the problem is how RWBY’s focus is spread too thin.

There’s, on average, 13 characters that make their first appearance in each Volume of RWBY, about half to three quarters of them go on to make reappearances in other Volumes and even a few of them become major characters. This becomes a balancing act for RWBY to juggle all the characters and developments, leading to two characters getting a massive shaft: Ruby, the main character of RWBY, and Oscar Pine, a plot important character.

Ruby has the criticism of being a flat character. While there’s no inherit problem in of itself, the fact that the plot has been shifting and stakes become raised while the most we got out of Ruby before Volume 6 is that, sometimes she expresses sadness, was concerning. Even after Volume 5, a common complaint is that her “character development” consists of her delivering speeches.

Oscar’s problem is that the most pivotal moments of his character are relegated to the background, to the point where his nickname is “Offscreen Pine”, as every Volume since his first in Volume 4, there has always been some moment of his story that happened off screen and, often, it was that moment that makes his character arcs of those Volumes incomplete.

That is also a bit of a problem with relationships as well. Sometimes they end up being complete without any actual set up or they do have set up, but it’s either a red herring for the actual ship or, most infamously, it was never intended to be a ship to begin with. Now, there are ships that have been well-developed, but, again, it’s subjective. One such example is Bumblebee, which, to this day, has been hotly debated as whether it’s the best ship RWBY’s done, a rushjob of a ship that was only made to appease the fans after a lackluster Volume, or, at worst, a ship so polarizing, that merely criticizing it would have you accused of being a homophobe.

In fact, some characters develop at different rates, to the point where it is almost whiplash and requires a fan to actively point out how the development was foreshadowed from the start of RWBY (which, itself, leads to a common criticism). Two infamous examples of this are Adam Taurus, who only appeared in a short trailer before making his full debut appearance three years later and showing a completely different side to him, and General Ironwood, whose status as an antagonist is still being debated to this day.

So, these two fields are also wild cards in terms of enjoying RWBY… So, what then? Perhaps we could turn to…

The Community

Watching RWBY is one thing, but talking about RWBY with other people might make it worth it, right? … Yeah, depends. RWBY has become a rather… interesting subject matter. Trawl around the internet enough and you’ll find people in a fight about whether RWBY was good or not… though it’s more often one side calling the other side names and insults nowadays.

No example is truer than Youtube, which if you ask a RWBY fan, is a minefield and that, if you watch just one video of a person saying how they dislike even one aspect of RWBY, you’re suddenly swarmed with videos on “RWBY sucks and here’s why” essays… Even though that’s not how the Youtube algorithm works.

Even RWBY’s Reddit isn’t safe from this. Since the end of Volume 6, it had fractured into a smaller subreddit, RWBY Critics, where people freely share their opinions of RWBY that they would otherwise be judged harshly on the main Reddit. It feels like, when you traverse through the RWBY community and interact with it, you either love it or hate it and your first impressions could mean the difference between getting welcomed or rejected.

It doesn’t help that, with every hiatus in RWBY, the fanbase becomes more and more unstable, to the point where a contest made in good fun with the purpose to help Rooster Teeth with designs for Grimm (a win-win) was eventually turned into a toxic environment simply because one of the artists chose to base a Grimm off something that people found culturally insensitive and made even worse when endorsements were made in favor of and against this aforementioned Grimm, eventually forcing Rooster Teeth’s hand in removing the public’s ability to vote and judging on the three remaining Grimm designs (two of them ended up being removed for different reasons).

I know that was a very specific example, but it highlights just how broken the community has become. It bears repeating: a fan contest where Rooster Teeth would use the winning design in RWBY ended up becoming a flame war because one of the designs was determined to be problematic and a couple of people promoted/denounced the design, effectively rigging the contest to be centered around this one design. I will not be surprised if, years down the line, when someone else chronicles the worst dramas in RWBY, this would at the very least get an honorable mention.

And then there are where you stand on certain characters or plots. Should you ever find that your opinion differs from the majority’s opinion on a certain matter, prepare for a world of hurt or even being asked “why do you even watch RWBY?” That said, I doubt the entire community is as dark as I put it. I think there’s parts of the fandom you can enjoy, like fanmade content or even just a simple conversation with a close-knit group, especially if you enjoy RWBY…. Which, I guess leads to…

So… What do you watch RWBY for?

The point of this article was to see what part of RWBY one can find enjoyable when fight scenes prove to not work and, given what I said, you might expect me to say that there’s nothing enjoyable… Though, surprisingly, my conclusion is a lot more optimistic than that.

If you watch RWBY solely for the fight scenes, then prepare for droughts or lack of quality, or even just watch fight compilations. However, if you watch RWBY solely for the plot, setting, themes, characters, relationships, or even the community itself, then you’ll need to be prepared for similar problems.

There’s two keys to enjoying RWBY: having tolerance or patience, and having more than one thing to watch RWBY for. I think a major reason why you usually have a bunch of people drop RWBY after a volume is because they were disappointed with how RWBY did something or how RWBY lacked in something and decided to quit while they were ahead. For the most part, it might be that they took all they could get from RWBY and decided they had enough.

That said, I’ve seen people sing praises for RWBY’s story, setting, theme, characters, relationships, and even community. It’s led me to think of this struggle to find enjoyment in RWBY to be similar to a theme found in the show: the theme of persevering in the face of despair. Several characters in the show have become bitter, cynical, or even evil because they had enough of the hardships that the world threw at them while the heroes are those who try desperately to keep moving forward in spite of that.

And it’s not easy, I will admit that. It’s not easy to come back to enjoying RWBY once you begin to feel contempt for it. After the finale of Volume 5, I felt confused. Before, I had wanted to enjoy every episode of the Volume, but this one felt so rushed and so incomplete that I found myself thinking “that’s it?”. While I started to become cynical about RWBY after Volume 4 and had temporarily dropped RWBY in between “The First Step Pt. 1”’s release and sometime after “Breach”’s premiere, it was Volume 5 that made me begin to lose enjoyment. Just knowing that Rooster Teeth could do something like Volume 5 again had me lose faith.

However, there are moments that made RWBY enjoyable for me. Certain episodes were hailed as being good watches, there were a few plots, characters, and relationships I enjoyed (even ones I normally wouldn’t got some delights), settings I wished would be better explored, and I’m always going to examine themes of RWBY since that’s one thing I enjoy about it.

And, true enough, RT has done stuff that even the more hardened of critics enjoy. It’s all about patience, tolerance, and perseverance.

I know this isn’t a straight and narrow answer, but there are no easy answers. The major takeaway from this is that “I watch RWBY for the fight scenes” has the potential to backfire and you need backup reasons to enjoy RWBY and a little bit of patience in order to appreciate RWBY.

[merinnan]

DMBJ Explore with the Note Ep 2

Okay, I wasn't sure if I'd get to ep 2 today, but I need Iron Triangle shenanigans to cheer me up after the feels fest that was Train to Busan

So here we go! DMBJ S2 Ep 2!

The counts at the start of ep 2! 

Season 2 Xiaoge Rescue Count: 1 for Wu Xie, 1 for protagonists, 2 for everyone 

Season 2 Wu Xie Swoon Count: 0 

Cumulative Xiaoge Rescue Count: 11 for Wu Xie, 16 for protagonists, 18 for everyone 

Cumulative Wu Xie Swoon Count: 6

- Opening with Wu Xie wandering around somewhere, so I'm guessing this is another dream/nightmare 

- 'Somewhere' turns out to be a sunken ship 

- Minus all the water 

- I'm expecting a jump scare any moment now

- Not as bad a one as I expected, but still 

- a wild Sanshu suddenly appears! 

- This dream Sanshu being just as creepy as the dream Sanshu in the previous ep 

- And just as murderous 

- And now he wakes up thanks to Pangzi, and it's daytime now 

- Looks like the storm is over, too

- OMG Pangzi that is not how you're supposed to meditate 

- lol @ Wu Xie's confused reaction to it 

- Hahah, A-Ning was not successful in hiding the booze from Pangzi 

- Wu Xie, baby, I love your confidence here about there being no complicated traps, but it's entirely misplaced

- He definitely has to suspect that that's Xiaoge after the whole ghost ship thing, he wouldn't be giving that cute little smile otherwise

- Oh god, the English dubbing is so bad. The words and lips don't sync at all 

- And it looks like her boss is a foreigner this time? 

- This water is so murky 

- This swimming around underwater making exaggerated gestures bit could have been much shorter than it is 

- Like seriously

- It wouldn't be quite as bad if the water wasn't just this constant murky green so that you could actually see properly 

- But as it is I'm mostly just looking at this dirty green screen with some shapes moving past sometimes

- I get padding out an episode, but it's been almost five minutes of this now 

- Oh, at least now we're at least getting little flashes of Wu Xie recognising this stuff from his grandfather's notebook 

- But still 

- HURRY THE FUCK UP AND GET TO THE TOMB

- 5 1/2 mins before something even marginally interesting happens >.< 

- Because apparently now the statue is opening its eyes. Maybe. 

- Wait no, I counted wrong 

- 7 1/2 MINS 

- 8 1/2 mins before they get to any breaking and entering 

- 8 1/2 mins to do what should have taken 2

- It wasn't even marginally interesting filler >.< 

- Just....dirty green screen with some dark shapes, and the occasional close up on faces or wrist notepads 

- And this knife is cutting through the mortar holding these bricks together suspiciously easily

- Oh, the evil hair is making its first appearance 

- Evil Hair Count: 1 

- Yes, touching it is a great idea! Well done! 

- Oh, it scared it away this time 

- Apparently, the evil hair being scared away is what triggers the brick door to automatically open for them

- Oh, I like this shot of the wetsuit hood almost looking like a hoodie hood. I'm not sure if that was intentional, but I still like it.

- SUDDEN CORPSE APPEARANCE 

- Oh, sudden thing swimming real fast into/around them 

- Most of this episode has just been...murky green

- Like. They've been in the water for 10 minutes so far. And the only important/interesting things that have happened have been finding Sanshu's stick, finding the statues that reminded Wu Xie of shit in the notebook, Wu Xie thinking the statue eyes opened, the appearance of the evil hair, the door opening, the corpse appearing, and now this thing swimming by them. All of which could have been done in, like, a third of the time.

- Since they all took only a few seconds each

- Oh, it was evil hair lady, who is now swimming away super fast when Pangzi shot at her. 

- I'm amazed he could see clearly enough in the murk to even aim, tbh 

- Oooh, dramatic music 

- It would be nice if I could see clearly enough to know the reason for the dramatic music

- PANGZI. WU XIE. YOU HAVE NOTEPADS ON YOUR WRISTS. 

- YOU DO NOT NEED TO TAKE OUT YOUR OXYGEN MOUTHPIECES TO TRY TO TALK UNDERWATER 

- YOU ARE WASTING YOUR OXYGEN 

- OH HI EVIL HAIR LADY 

- I will make that Evil Hair Count: 2, because it was a lovely shot of her hair as well

- Oh, they've made that maelstrom-like tunnel the entrance to the tomb in the drama 

- Oh god, the greenscreen 

- I think Chongqi is the only one I've seen so far that does greenscreen even halfway well 

- It took them 11 1/2 mins to get into the tomb

- An entire quarter of the episode was just them fucking around underwater where the viewer could barely see what was happening at the best of times 

- Since the ep is 45 mins including opening and ending credits

- Oh, they've come out into the room with the pots, except it has a pool in it this time 

- Sigh. Of course they gave A-Ning pink-accented gear.

- They all have a different colour on their goggles to tell them apart, but in the underwater stuff it was too dark to tell what colours she and Xiaoge had. Now that they're out of the water, I can see that hers is pink. 

- And I'm like 

- WHY 

- PLEASE 

- STOP

- Why are there spiderwebs in the underwater tomb? 

- The babby zombie footprints! 

- Yes, Pangzi, those tiny little footprints are Sanshu's 

- Hahah, I love little shit Wu Xie 

- Apparently spiders even have to be built into underwater ones. Either that, or spiders can now dive

- Maybe when they built the tomb, they made sure to have spiders in there. Which also means they had to ensure there was spider food in there. 

- Oh, hey, in the drama they actually think to look inside the jar! But babby zombie is not in there this time.

- Oh, it was in one of the other jars instead 

- Okay, time to follow the baby in the jar 

- Oh, this hallway 

- A-Ning is about to be a very bad girl 

- Also, so many cobwebs 

- So many

- I think that lends credence to the 'spiders were put here when the tomb was built and so have lived here for thousands of spider generations' 

- WHY ARE ALL THE CANDLES LIT 

- WHO LIT THEM SO RECENTLY THAT THEY'RE STILL BURNING

- I still can't get over them subbing 'Sanshu' as 'Uncle San' 

- And random English because why not

- I was about to say the traps are stupidly obvious in this hall, then I remembered the Starfinder adventure I ran where the trigger was a giant mosaic on the floor that practically screamed 'trap' & the PCs just walked over it. And then were surprised when the trap triggered.

- Oh, here we go, A-Ning's about to do the thing 

- Complete with evil villain smirk as she does so 

- I wish there was better lighting in this hallway, because A-Ning's moves are amazing and I would like to be able to see them better

- Xiaoge Rescue Count: 2 for Wu Xie, 2 for protagonists, 3 for everyone

- Those are some wuxia-esque spinny moves from A-Ning there 

- Nooooo, Xiaoge, don't leave Wu Xie there without you! 

- I wondered how they were going to have Wu Xie get hit by them since Xiaoge stopped him from being hit by the initial shots 

- Dammit, A-Ning

- I appreciate that Pangzi's first reaction is to run to check on Wu Xie 

- Even though that got him shot himself 

- lol, these two dummies sitting there screaming once they notice all the arrows that they hadn't noticed before

- Good Pangzi, showing off that you're actually smart by realising Something Is Up with these arrows 

- "Does it feel this good to be shot to death?" 

"I've never died before, I have no idea" 

 - Hahahah, waving the arrow to see it that would attract more firing

- Then oh so carefully peeking up over the edge 

- Ah, finally Xiaoge reveals himself properly! 

- That face mask is just ridiculous 

- lol, Wu Xie's reaction 

- Those wide puppy eyes 

- lol, Xiaoge's little smirk at Wu Xie

- And again. THEY'RE SO CUTE I CAN'T

- Here we are at the first chamber switcheroo 

- I wish they'd subtitle at least the important parts of Wenjin's notebook when Wu Xie reads it and gets clues 

- They were good with subtitling the wrist notepads when they were aimlessly swimming around for 11 mins 

- But nothing else

- "Do you have Alzheimers" OMFG, Pangzi 

- Pangzi gonna Pangzi 

- I seem to say something along those lines about all of the Iron Triangle 

- But it's true 

- Ahahah, Wu Xie's facial expressions when he's brushing off Pangzi here 

- It's little shit Wu Xie all over

- Look, okay, flashbacks are fine and all, but does it have to be a flashback to the FUCKING GREEN MURKY WATER 

- Okay, at least that part wasn't too long 

- That container is not sealed, that paper should not have been dry

- Certainly not so dry that exposure to air made it crumble and blow away

 - Professor Zhang? 

- HOW WERE THE IMPRINT OF WORDS LEFT BEHIND IN THE DUST?! 

- IDK why they needed two archaeological teams in this flashback 

- Also, hi, flashback Xiaoge 

- Hey, it's the copper snek fishy

- Oh, that was a good cliffhanger to leave this episode on! 

- Xiaoge remembering that he has been there before

So! Ep 2 ends with: 

Season 2 Xiaoge Rescue Count: 2 for Wu Xie, 2 for protagonists, 3 for everyone 

Season 2 Wu Xie Swoon Count: 0 

Season 2 Evil Hair Count: 2 

 Cumulative Xiaoge Rescue Count: 12 for Wu Xie, 17 for protagonists, 18 for everyone 

Cumulative Wu Xie Swoon Count: 6 

[familyagrestefanblog]

My notes to Ezras and Veronikas blind-reaction video

I’ve watched this video like at least 3 times today because honestly, Ezra is comedy gold and a whole ass mood. Also I wanted to get as much information out of their reactions as possible and at the same time try to figure out what episode we are dealing with here. My guess is “Kwami Buster” what do you think?

But now for my notes. Get something to eat and drink I’ve got 4 whole pages ^^

Ezra just dead ass comfirmed Mark + Nathanael as canon, nice!

episode starts in a location we’ve already been in s1 but rarely and we havent discovered it much so my guess is this:

The only time an akuma attack took place in there was in “Mr. Pigeon” and it rarely came up in other episodes.

a “her” is possibly up to something

a “she” (It didnt seem to be the same person) has alot to speak in this episode but normally doesnt speal much -> Ezra; she kinda does -> Veronika

A character has an ongoing theme, it happenes over and over (progression in the season/s). They dont know wjere the creators will go with it but Ezra theorizes it’ll be a massive sacifice. ( I think they are talking about Marinette here, who will maybe see something like Adrien and Kagami together and gets sad over it again. Since she will give up her love for him in s3 finale I find this more than likely). Also Veronika said first she cant imagine it being super sad and then mentioned Marinette slightly with “Like, Ladybug’s...” but then cuts off and agrees with Ezra that “it could be very sad” because Ezra said that he thinks itll be a massive Sacrifice because the show doesnt shy away from real emotions/feeling, espacially love and passion.

something new came up that teaches us about the term all of season 3 has been dealing with. We havent seen it yet, but its setting up why “they” happen. (No idea on this one)

something completely different and exciting came up (They are MARELING!) “Its beautiful!” “This is gorgeous!”. Never done before and something slightly origin story like (My bets are that this is a continuation of Master Fus backstory in “The collector” and its done kinda in the way of his painting like flashback pics

A “him” is in it and they are very excited about it (could be younger Fu but it could be anyone, really)

The voice actor whos telling the tale (another reason why I think its Fus backstory) is gonnabe very very busy

the whole sequence is going on for a while

Huge responsibility for Marinette (also another reason for the Backstory. I think this would be the episode he will start actually making Marinette a guradian of the Miraculous and therefore trusts her with even more of his backstory and what happened in the past

Veronika feels for a character alot of other people start to feel for too. She calls the person “missunderstood” (I think its Natahlie)

One story line Ezra knows very little about came up next and Veronika wonders if it will come up again “at the end of recordings” (so the Finale) (I thinks its the storyline of what happened to Emilie)

Very funny Adrien and Plagg moment that has alot of Fanart already -> its cute

right afterwards something “very different” happened and Ezra was SHOOK AF

A “hat thing” came up several times in the whole episode. Its gonna need a voice actor, its new to the story but not a character per se. “Its like a significant character in another characters being” (wtf??)

Once again something “very different” happened and Ezra is delighted and shook part 2

“look at its/his mouth” followed immediatly by a little conversation about hawkmoth winning and that it becomes more and more possible by every passing episode

“Sweet Plagg” Plagg either being normally cute or adorable or hes sweet and sensitive in a bad situation (ITs so THE laTER ONE YALL!!!)

SOMETHING HAPPENED! Ezra was so fucking SHOOK PART 3 that they repeated his high pitched “WHAT???!!?!??!?!?” three times!

Veronika: “How can they do that though! :D”

Ezra: “NOOOOOO WAY!!!!! (°ロ°) 

Veronika: “What are they gonna do? :D”

Ezra: “There he goes! D:”

She was smiling and so excited and he dead ass sat beside her this close to having a mental breakdown (like I said this glorious man was a whole ass mood this entire video)

It seems something so massive happened that Ezra yelled: “The series is over! How can we have a Series if THAT happened? We dont have a Series if THAT. JUST. HAPPENED!!!!”

The only thing massive enough to end the series is Hm getting the ultimate power in one way or another. (everything else from reveal to betrayal and death is just an obstical to overcome in the plot, but Hm getting the ultimate power is presented to us as instand game over!) And with the little context we got from them from just moments before it seems to actually fit?? WTF??? In the episode I’m trying to put together with the context here it seemes that through Kwami buster Hawkmoth has got both Plagg and Tikki and was able to power up through them without getting the ultimate power just yet because for that he needs the jewellery to channel the powers. So I guess now Hm would only need Lbs and Cns empty jewellery so he cant combine them and game over.

Both Veronika and Ezra are just seriously loosing it (but most of all him)

“look how giant it is!” “And much bigger!” implying that we say whatever they talk about smaller before (for some reason my mind immediatly went to the giant butterly Hawkmoth head in the “origins”)

They are confused about how something (important) works

Something is there that we have seen in another episode before (1 Episode? Not sure but it has to be something rarely seen) + they are confused by it

something hilarious happened

a new ship can be merged in this episode (Maybe Marinette and Adrien with other Miraculous’? Maybe this is where we’ll get Dragonbug and Snake Noir because at some point later in the episode they would have to get Tikki and Plagg back making DB and SN possible)

The puns (in english) are WILD

Someone is being very courageous

it seems to feel like a classic Ml episode but with so many new elements. Not something we’ve seen before and I believe them! :D)

Ezra screams Part 8 + “That thing is dangerous!”

“How are they gonna- (stop him/it/whatever?)” <- Veronika

“How are they gonna, THEY DONT HAVE A WAY!” <- Ezra

Ezra screams part 9

Ezra gets to do something in the episode and I dunno what

“Thats when that happpens??” -> Veronika

“He wants that!” -> Ezra

A character we have seen more of this season is in this episode too

they fucking CLAPPED saying “finally, yes!” but it seems to be about something commen because Veronika seems to do it every time she wrapps up an episode

Adriens fucking parfume ad on a bench and neither of them remeber the words (SHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME)

Hawkmoth moment + hilarious Hawky impression by Ezra saying “Ladybug and Cat Noir”

Hm and probably Lb and Cn are inside it/something

There is a weird noise but is has a purpose

a thing is “hUngry”

Ezra and Veronika a little shook part 10

“Thats so sad! :D” -> Veronika (I fucking love that woman xD)

“Dont do it! D:” -> Ezra concerned af

But “he” wont do it. Veronika and Ezra are relieved

Both doing Cataclysm impressions

Ezra being our very own Ladybug and being very passionate about her catchphrase lines (”Miraculous LadybuuuUUUUUUUUUUUUUUG!!          (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧ )

THEY POUND IT! :D

He asks her if she knows a character near the end (she does) so I’m taking from that that there is an important new character coming up in future

huge episode for 3 characters  

Ezra repeats, one plagg moment was adorable

SHOOK PART 11

“Thats a huge reveal!” <- Ezra. “Unless he takes it back or she refuses" (my bets are on Gabriel revealing himself to be Hawkmoth to Tomoe. The contract they made in the beginning of the season, their growing partnership and some of Tomoes words in “Ikari Gozen” make me highly suspicious for what the future holds. Her knowing him to be Hawkmoth and that their partnership turns out to be more twisted than we though wouldnt surprise me, if anthing i would be PUMPED for it!)

It’ll (probably)be a huge thing in s4

something happened that reminded Ezra of karate kid

someone is in a disguise and Veronika laughs

Cliffhanger that Ezra describs as “dark”

no classroom episode, no ther students. “This was like to the heart of the matter of the miraculous powers and hat they can do and finding out things that we have no idea they could do and it opens up the lens and shows you more of this world and how dark it CAN be!” <- Ezra

[mcrmadness]

I was tagged by @cupcakecurl a while back (thank you!) and finally I’m on the mood for doing this myself as well!

Rules: tag 9 people you’d like to get to know better!

Top 3 current ships: I actually have just one OTP, which is Bela/Farin (aka FUB) from Die Ärzte, and then multiple smaller ones here and there. I’m finding new ships way too easily and sometimes it bugs me because I meant to enjoy a thing and boom, suddenly I have a ship there to fuck up with my brain. B/F is pretty much the only ship that I can say to actually ship, the rest are more like just for fun, I enjoy seeing stuff but I don’t really do anything about it, you know?

But now as I think of it, I think of it, I could say another band ship here: Paulchard aka Paul Landers and Richard Z. Kruspe from Rammstein, about these I have also watched videos and read some fancomics too and last summer’s tour was a wild one and I was following the events quite a lot.

And then maybe I could throw one fictional ship here too as it’s pretty much current one since I just finished watching the 5th season of Gotham last week, and that is, of course Nygmobblepot aka Penguin/The Riddler aka Oswald Cobblepot/Edward Nygma. I’ve never in my life shipped these before, even tho I’ve been a Batman fan since 1999 (I was 8) as I saw the 60s series on TV and I can remember almost shipping Batman and Robin back then, and I was only 8 years old!, and then had been watching the movies more or less during my childhood, but this was never something I’d even think of before I started watching Gotham and things started happening in the show. But it’s an interesting one. And I have to admit that while the show was still running and I couldn’t watch it because I live in Europe (and was too lazy to look for a website to watch it :D), I was still browsing the tag on Tumblr after each episode and giving myself spoilers of what happens with them. But I think the ending was a lot different than what I thought based on the Tumblr posts, and I’m actually not sure what to think of it. Imho it was not as bad as everyone else seemed to think.

I’m putting this under a read more link as this is getting way too long and I don’t know if people are interested in reading my weird thoughts about ships and other random stuff, so here you go... 

Top 3 all-time ships:  Oh my gosh, I have had so many but only like 2 actually strong ones? And I have to say Bela/Farin here as well, the reasons are found from above and I’m just so obsessed with them and idc what it is, already the friendship is like friendhip goals, you know? But yeah, I’ve been making videos about these two idiots for like last 10 years so... :D

And the next one, okay I’m usually not so talkative about ships. I can talk about them with people in private but I don’t like to go and shout about them publicly, probably the only one I talk about this way is Bela/Farin but it’s because Tumblr is a safe place for this and there’s no hate with this ship or anything (and the other one is Paulchard, every now and then I will reblog something that crosses my dash). But mainly I like to keep ships to myself and like I said in that other tag game post, ships are more like a guilty pleasure. Maybe because of my age as it was very normal at the age of 15 but now as I’m 28? Why am I still “in love with other people’s love”? I actually don’t mind it but I think many people would find it weird, especially when I don’t read fanfictions anymore and I don’t want to imagine anything, I just like seeing cute stuff, but with many ships I don’t even want to see too much, I just like seeing them being close but with many ships even seeing them kiss would be too much.

But anyway, top 3 all-time ships... I think I need to mention here a ship that I was very much obsessed when I was 15-17, that I wrote LOTS OF fanfiction and was there to make lots of fan theories and all, and that one was Frerard aka Gerard Way/Frank Iero from My Chemical Romance. I was SO obsessed it’s insane. If you know anything about MCR and Frerard, you maybe are aware of how was the year 2007 and you can probably imagine how crazy we all went when Project Revolution stuff happened. So yeah, I need to mantion that here even tho I no longer “believe in this ship”, but I guess I’d lie if I said, that I didn’t believe that there was something there back in the day. I’ve actually recently been watching some Frerard theory videos just for fun, because there’s so many things I had forgotten and so many things I still can remember, but also lots of stuff that I kinda missed because they happened in 2010-2012, and even tho I was still very much in the fandom and I was to their second gig in Finland in 2011, I still was not that much into the Danger Days album so I was not so into digging up stuff either. And I had my own identity crisis and Die Ärzte had been my favorite band for 1-2 years at that time so I was spending lots of time watching DÄ videos, so MCR was kinda at the background. And then the whole band went quiet for some time until they quit in 2013 (and now they’re back), so all that Frerard hype kinda died after each of them started to get married to other people and the kids were born, so there just... kinda was no more room for the ship, you know? But Freard was my first actual huge slash ship, I’ve had others before it (for example, my first touch to slash fiction was Harry Potter fanfiction and of course Harry/Draco stuff, but that one also later died out), but it was the first really strong one and then Bela/Farin kinda took its place as Frerard died out but B/F has been going strong and the ship has been sailing itself since the 80s, so... :D

And as the last one I think I could again mention something fictional but at the same time something that is super weird for me as it’s not slash fiction but hetship, which is something REALLY weird for me. I usually don’t like heteroships as they’re just... boring and so cliché. But I need to mention this one that I got into when I was 15: Fox Mulder and Dana Scully from The X-Files. Yeah I know it was 2006 and the series had ended already in 2002, but I was a new fan! I had known about the series since I was a little kid as my dad was watching it back then, but I started watching it myself when the show had a rerun here in 2004-2005. And then I met my friend in 2006 when we were 15 and we found out that we both were very much into TXF and I remember how we somehow both started to ship Mulder and Scully (having no idea of how the series ended), and it was probably until the 6th season (there was 9 seasons at the time) when they stopped airing it altogether, so we were so furious about the fact because the last episode was such a cliffhanger and we NEEDED TO KNOW, so I had to buy them on dvd! So I remember how we would meet at school every day and after every episode, we went so crazy, discussing what had happened in the episode and if there was any Mulder/Scully activity, we were just so hyped :D And then, as we STILL hadn’t seen all the seasons, we went to see the second movie (”TXF: I want to believe”) in theaters in 2008 or so, and it’s set to happen after the events of the seasons, we were both so blown away by what was in the movie because we had no clue :D Fun fact: I actually finished watching the 9th season only last year. So now I understand the events of the second movie a lot better, and I’ve also seen the 10th and 11th seasons so now I’m finally aware of everything. But that really is a hetship that I accept and that is not like a typical movie romance type of ship. It has interesting dynamics.

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Last song: Tatuoituna by Tehosekoitin

Lipstick or chapstick: Chapstick, I don’t use any make-up, but chapstick I need to use daily.

Last movie: Iron Sky. I’ve seen it before tho, but we’re gonna watch the sequel soon, so we had to watch this to remember what happened :D (And it’s made partially by Finns, so..!)

Reading: Atm I have 3 books I’m reading, all of them in Finnish:

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, which has all the short stories in one. But I think there’s some of the newer ones missing and that’s why I bought this bit newer book with more stories, and I’m gonna read those once I’m finished with this one. And I’ve been reading this now for years lol... but I’m slowly getting there, I’m already over halfway through :D

A collection of Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories, I don’t know the name for this book and it doesn’t say any name for the original. This one I also started to read a years back, only to pause if for years and then last year I borrowed it again from my dad and tried to continue from where I was left the last time.

The Heroes of Olympus: The Mark of Athena by Rick Riordan. I’ve been reading his books ever since I was a, well, teenager probably, and I have had a long pause with these books and reading overall, but now I’m back at it and trying to buy and read all of his books I still haven’t read.

I wanted to read the latter only after finishing with SH and Poe’s stories but I needed to read something and they’re bit too difficult reading at the times, and I needed something lighter but also didn’t want to start over with Harry Potter for the 5th time so I decided to go for this series instead. I really like reading SH and Poe’s stories, but like I said, they’re bit difficult at the times. You can’t just read them, you need to think and use your brains meanwhile you’re reading, and sometimes it’s just so incredibly hard to stay focused on it and I need to go back so often because I wasn’t paying attention and then had no clue what was happening and why.

And I sometimes I skip some of Poe’s stories because they’re so purely scientific about a topic that I cannot comprehend nor care about, e.g. this one story that was almost like a science essay about hot-air balloon flight in the form of a story, probably super interesting for someone who likes this kind of stuff and even more interesting for a writer interested in stuff like that, but I’m really not the target audience of that story :D But then there’s also lots of really interesting ones, I especially like the ones that have something to do with insanity. I guess people would call them as the horror stories, but idk, I just love that kind of mystery. For some reason all of my favorite stories are those where there is a dead woman/love interest :DD But probably my ultimate favorite is the one about writing an article to a magazine with horror stories, and how this guy become beheaded and all just to write a story about how it feels like and stays alive meanwhile, and I just LOVE IT when fictional works play with death and when something that is supposed to kill you, doesn’t, and I just love the idea of that story so much :D It’s just that you never know how a story will be like, as you start reading, is it a scientific essay or a mystery or a horror story or about insanity or what is it? And then when in the middle of reading and you realize this is bit boring or uninteresting, but still want to finish, but also want to skip, and that’s why I get stuck with that book, and I change to SH or something else. Often I also grab some of the comics (or non-fiction books) I own whenever I feel like reading but these books feel too heavy for that moment.

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I should tag 9 people but I don’t even know that many people to tag lol. Okay I do know people, but I still don’t know who wants to be tagged and who doesn’t. Maybe I’ll be boring and tag @stufenlosregelbar again? :D And idk, maybe @annika-of-the-lost? Eh, I’m so bad at this whole tagging thing. I’m having a bad conscience if I don’t tag anyone/enough people in case they want to be tagged and I can’t read minds; and then I’m having bad conscience when I DO tag people in case they’re all somewhere facepalming and screaming “WHYYYYYY” into the void, as I still can’t read minds. So you can choose, do this tag game or ignore it and ban me from ever tagging you people again, I don’t mind :p

[lady-alayne]

All multiples of 2 for the TV show asks 💖

ohhh that’s a lot! thanks babe! answers are under the cut

2. if you could have saved one TV show from cancellation, which one would it be?Pushing Daisies, hands down. It ended too soon and on a huge cliffhanger!!! I’ll never find peace. What’s up with the piemaker’s dad???

4. are there any shows you wish could just be cancelled already?Honestly, and I know how weird this sounds coming from me, but Game of Thrones. They have killed, raped and defiled everything I ever loved about this show and it needs to end.

6. which shows do you think are underrated and need more love?Better Call Saul, but I also like that we are such a tiny fandom.

8. do you prefer week-to-week content, or just binging all in one go?BINGING IT ALL.

10. what’s one show you thought you’d love but turned out to really hate?there are SO many shows like that. Most recently: you, sick note. And I mean really hate.

12. have you ever watched a show just for a specific actor? did you enjoy it?I think 85% of all shows I only watch for a specific actor. Most recently I gave BoJack Horseman another chance because of Will Arnett and Aaron Paul and I LOVE it.

14. do you tend to stick to one type of TV show (eg, short-form comedy), or are you into many different genres?I’m into many different genres.

16. do you feel like there are any underrated TV show formats?Idk the mockumentary has kind of gotten out of fashion I think, which is sad because I always liked that format.

18. have you ever drawn fanart for a show?no, because I cannot draw. I’ve made gifs tho, does that count?

20. Netflix, Hulu, or Prime originals?I don’t really care.

22. if you could write your own TV show, what would it be like?it would definitely be like 80% women in the cast, female directors, female producers, everything female. but it wouldn’t be this “wow this is a show about women by women for women portraying women’s lives!” it would just be this really cool story of… people. who do cool shit. they just all happen to be women. like maybe a team of scientists works on genetic engineering and discovers something huge and then they don’t know what to do with it. publish their research, because it could help millions of people, but then other scientists could change their formula and use it for evil? or burn the lab notes and never speak of it again because humanity is too selfish and shitty to handle it? sell it to the military? or to some rich weirdo? of course every scientist on the team has a different idea and over the first season we explore their characters and back stories and what made them come to the conclusion that their idea is the best idea and how their disagreement influences the group dynamic. damn I’d watch that.

24. how do you feel about bottle episodes?omg I love them. there’s the famous Breaking Bad episode “Fly”, but let’s not forget The one where no one’s ready", one of my favourite Friends episodes.

26. favourite TV show theme song?That’s though! I like This Life from SoA, but also the song from Mayans MC (don’t remember what it’s called). And the one from BoJack Horseman because it’s really sad and heartbreaking.

28. who would be your dream cameo on your favourite show?AARON PAUL ON BETTER CALL SAUL

30. what’s one show you could probably write a 2,000 word essay on, and what would be your topic?well lol I did write a bunch of essays! One was on the construction of femininity, masculinity and sexuality in the black wedding (5,000 words), one was on the male gaze in SoA (2,000 words), and my 18,000 word dissertation was on the respresentaion of motehrhood in GoT, SoA and Scandal. Which made me fall in love with Gemma all over again because she’s so real and flawed and I love her.

32. what’s one show you could watch over and over?I always watch everything over and over again. I have no concept of “casually watching something and then moving on”. I am currently on my fourth watch of BoJack Horseman. In a row. I have watched Better Call Saul at least four times this year. I recently started watching SoA again.

34. what are your top 5 shows right now?Better Call Saul, Breaking Bad, BoJack Horseman, Friends (that one is always there), Arrested Development

what TV character would you die for?36. James Morgan McGill, Esq. And child/teenage BoJack Horseman.

38. do you prefer hour long episodes, or 30 minute?I think it depends on the format.

40. is there a show coming out soon that you’re really excited about?yeeeesss good omens!

42. what’s the longest amount of time you’ve ever watched a show in one sitting?I once spent 37.5 hours watching how I met your mother.44. if you could replace any actor on TV in playing their role, who would you like to play and why?like... replace with myself? well I don’t think I could do anyone justice, you know? part of the reason I love to many characters is because they are played so wonderfully. but if I have to choose... Kim Wexler. Sorry, Rhea! I love you! But I want to kiss Bob Odenkirk. although now that I think of it. Sansa Stark or Daenerys.

46. do you prefer to watch TV alone or with friends?omg. alone. other people only distract me.48. are there any shows your friends love but you aren’t interested in?no, my friends all have different tastes.50. what’s one TV cliche you love?I don’t know if that’s a cliche, but i like live audiences. Some say it’s very 90s, but I like the laughter and the cheers. I love it when they have a famous guest star and the audience cheers for like 2 minutes, but the guest star obvisouly has to stay in character so has to act silently until the audience has stopped cheering and they can say “hello”. I love that. It’s so wild.

Thanks again love!

[weirdandpissedoff]

Rian Reads: X-Man #2

Writer: Jeph Loeb Artist: Steve Skroce Inker: Mike Sellers, Bud Larosa & Kevin Conrad & Scott Hanna Letterer: Richard Starkings & Comicraft Colorist: Mike Thomas & Digital Chameleon

Cover Date: April 1995

As X-Man #2 opens we catch up with Domino, who was tasked by Apocalypse with tracking down the source of great telekinetic energy that he’s been sensing (psst! It’s X-Man). Along with Caliban and some big, red guy named Grizzly, she tries beating information concerning their prey out of a big Russian mutant named Rossovich who seems like a combination of Omega Red and Dr. Octopus. A quick trek down Google Avenue informs me that Grizzly is a member of Wild Pack/Six Pack in the 616 Marvel Universe while Rossovich is, indeed, the Age Of Apocalypse incarnation of Omega Red. So, there you go.

Inevitably, Domino kills Rossovich without gleaning any useful info from him and we move on to see Nathan Summers (aka X-Man) training with Forge. After Nate has a temper tantrum he wanders off in a bad mood because he feels that Forge still treats him like a child, which is the perfect frame of mind for him to be in so that a less-than-ethical guy like new member of the group Essex can take advantage of him. Despite Forge’s orders for Nate to keep his power usage to a minimum so as to avoid detection, Essex is like, “Hey boi, can u fly, tho?” Then Nate’s all like, “Dunno, son. Let’s give ‘er a go, eh?” X-Man then does a few aerial laps around the forest clearing they’re in, after which he and Essex decide to keep this little experiment to themselves.

Later on the group is discussing what their next plan of action should be when Essex pipes up and tells everyone that he just so happens to know about a lab that is integral to Apocalypse’s plans that they could go and try to sabotage. The group hesitantly agrees to at least go check this place out and where they end up is the facility where beast performs all of his twisted mutation experiments and creates Apocalypse’s army of homegrown goons. When the group spots some members of the Madri (who, to recap, are one of the many groups of particularly dangerous mutants in Apocalypse’s employ, all of whom I find it hard to keep straight from series to series and issue to issue), the consensus is that they should peace out, but X-Man has other plans. And those plans consist of diving into a fight head first to destroy some of Beast’s equipment.

Following the obligatory fight scene of the issue during which X-Man substantiates Forge’s concerns about him not being ready for a real fight, the team retreats to an abandoned farmhouse to get some rest. Desiring answers, Nate sneaks away and, with new girl Theresa (who now goes by the codename Sonique because of her sonic scream powers, and also because Jeph Loeb can’t help himself when he has the opportunity to give characters unnecessarily weirdly spelled names) in tow, takes a little trip through the astral plane to the would-be X-Mansion in Westchester, New York just as he did in the previous issue. There he once more observes Magneto, who can’t see or hear him and Theresa in their astral forms. As it turns out though, Magneto’s young son Charles CAN see them and, freaked out by all this, Theresa somehow breaks their “psi-link,” sending them back to the farm.

Finally, Brute, the biggest, strongest and dumbest member of Forge’s little band of merry men, has an epiphany about where he recognizes Essex from and confronts him in a barn. Just as Brute calls Essex out as actually being Mr. Sinister (which, I mean…we all knew that’s who he was, but they hadn’t come right out and said it until now), Domino and her gang show up and pose menacingly for some of Jeph Loeb’s overbearing “Hey, it’s a cliffhanger!” narration.

I enjoyed this issue of X-Man much more than I did the first one, which is due in no small part to the fact that there’s nary a mention of Shakespeare nor traveling theater troupes this time around. Steve Skroce’s art, while, as I mentioned before, would get much better in subsequent years during his Marvel tenure, is still a welcome addition to the line-up of AoA artists. Conversely, if you couldn’t tell from the amount of jabs that I took at Jeph Loeb’s writing in the preceding review, his dialogue and narration hasn’t grown on me at all. 

This issue marks the official halfway point of my journey through the Age Of Apocalypse. Part of the reason why I began reading Uncanny X-Men starting at #300 all those months ago was that I wanted to experience an era of X-stories that I’ve always felt I’d missed out on. Another part of the reason for starting this little project of mine was that, while I love the X-Men, I haven’t been able to get into any of their recent runs or stories. So many mainstream superhero comics these days seem to have a “every story arc has to be 5-8 issues long so that it neatly fits into a trade paperback for the aftermarket even if the pacing and storytelling suffer as a result” vibe to them. Those earlier days of superhero comics rarely worked out into neat little story arcs and flowed more naturally as episodic, ongoing stories, which is a style of superhero comic storytelling that I sorely miss these days. 

While I’m glad that I’m finally taking the opportunity to scratch the Age Of Apocalypse off of my bucket list of comics that I’ve been meaning to get around to reading for years, I have to admit that, even though I’m largely enjoying it, AoA does have a bit of that larger storyline stink to it that I was hoping to avoid. The experience has been largely positive though, and while I’m excited to move past the Age Of Apocalypse and tackle some more of the random issues and stories beyond it, I am very curious to see how this whole crossover event is going to wrap up. 

Onwards and upwards, true believers!

- R.

[bizarre-dollhouse]

My Top 10 Favourite Anime (And Why You Should Watch Them)

This is normally something I would put on my main blog, but I wanted to celebrate a follower milestone and also I know this will reach a significantly wider audience on this blog.

Consider this both a list of recommendations and a *get to know me* thing, I guess.

Honourable Mentions:

Bakemonogatari: A really stylized show about a semi vampire helping people with their supernatural afflictions born from emotional issues. The subsequent seasons get a little questionable, but this is definitely a standalone story with great dialogue and visuals. (15 eps)

Shiki: Creepy story about a small town infested with vampires. Really brutal and sick, but it has fascinating themes. The pacing is a bit slow and it has a kind of bad scene towards the end, but the show is 100% worth it. (24 eps)

Cardcaptor Sakura: Because this is mostly aimed at younger viewers, I would only really recommend this show for either magical girl fans, or people who watched the extremely altered dub as a kid. That being said, its a cute, fun show about magic with a likeable cast and surprisingly creative and original ideas, especially towards the latter half. (70 eps)

Jojos Bizarre Adventure 4: Diamond is Unbreakable: Full disclosure, I have not seen the first 3 jojo series, but its not necessary to enjoy this show. This is a super creative and really fun series about superpowered badasses in a strange city fighting each other and trying to solve a murder mystery in the background. Weird, but in the best way. (39 eps)

Kuroshitsuji: Book of Circus: This should be higher on the list, but in truth I would recommend the manga way over the show. But, if you want to watch a supernatural horror/comedy without reading a 138+ chapter manga, OR you were a fan of the original Black Butler seasons and want to see something way better, give this a watch. (10 eps)

*drumroll*

10. Trigun

So Trigun takes place is this old west, yet mysterious science fiction-y world where, through a bunch of complicated scenarios, a pacifist is the most wanted criminal known to man. Due to his status as a “natural disaster,” two insurance workers are tasked with reining him in to save their business. It’s an incredibly charming series, and the protagonist is really likeable. It’s extremely creative, funny, and emotional near the end. I do have some problems with the ending because it almost seems like the final conflict just...solves itself, but that’s a nitpick. The first episode is basically a short film, so give that a watch and see how you feel. (26 eps)

9. Paranoia Agent

This was directed by the late and great Satoshi Kon and has his usual themes about the blurring between fiction, dreams, and reality. It’s about a string of mysterious assaults committed by a kid with a baseball bat, and how these assaults seem to solve the problems of the victims. It’s very arthouse and has a twist that makes me ball my eyes out even though it’s not sad it’s just...odd and overwhelming. It drags a bit near the middle, but if you like kind of surreal stuff that’s also just really good, you have to watch this show. (13 eps)

8. Baby Steps

The amazing thing about this show is that its premise is specifically designed to make me hate it. It’s about a nerdy teenager who starts to play a sport for the sole sake of getting fit and having a more well rounded life style, and also he has a crush on this really popular girl. That sounds fucking awful, but the main character is actually really likeable (he reminds me a lot of Deku from BNHA) and I swear to fucking god every time I thought this show was going to do something awful and cliched with its romantic comedy plot, it doesn’t. The beauty and the geek trope is still there, but all of the bullshit that comes with it is omitted in a way I feel was kind of self-aware. The sports aspect is really good too: it’s well paced and there’s lots of tension even though the show as a whole is really upbeat and pleasant. I had a blast watching it, and if you can make it past the fact that is has god awful animation, give it a watch.

7. Higurashi: When They Cry

Yet another great show with absolute garbage animation. Anyways, this show is about a group of teenagers in a small town who are unknowingly trapped in a time loop. In each loop there’s a bunch of new mysteries, as well as some extremely brutal murders and tortures experienced my the main cast. I’ve seen a number of Western shows (Orphan Black, BBC Sherlock, Lost, Supernatural, etc.) fall apart because the writers want a really clever and intricate mystery to play out, but they don’t want to actually put the time into crafting one, so it’s just a bunch of cliffhangers with no answers or pay off. THIS SHOW SUCCEEDS AT WHAT ALL OF THOSE OTHER SHOWS FAIL AT. While not all of the answers are great (the second season isn’t as good) the original author somehow made the world’s most ludicrously complicated mystery story work, with a lot of it relying on the audience to put all of the pieces together even when the characters can’t. Its very clever in doing that: it makes its audience feel smart. It also has themes that don’t really show up in other horror stories, even though they’re incredibly relevant to fear and violence. Great show, go watch it. (50 eps)

6. Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood

Everyone knows about this show, everyone says it’s great, and everyone’s right. If you’ve been living under a rock for ten years: the show is about two brothers who break an alchemy taboo, which destroys their bodies, They’re on the hunt for something to restore them to normal and along the way they meet like 8990354578579 characters with interesting stories. It’s tightly written and really gripping. It’s fun, but also really dramatic and emotional when it needs to be. My only problems with it are that the ending is reaaaallllly convoluted, and there’s a minor plot point earlier on that gets weirdly dropped, but everyone kinda forgets about those things because the show’s so good. Also the brotherly bond makes me cry. (64 eps)

5. FLCL

I honestly don’t even know where to start with this show because it has the unique property of being the only show I have ever seen that I have literally no problems with. Not even nitpicks. There is nothing wrong with this show; it’s perfect. The only reason it’s not number 1 is because some other shows have more ideas or more fleshed out characters. So this arthouse spastic comedy is about a boy who is disappointed with all of the adults in his life, then some chick hits him in the face with a guitar and giant robots from a secret facility start coming out of his head. It’s fucking wild and has like 30 different aesthetics and I love all of them. It’s the best looking show I’ve ever seen and one of the best directed. It feels like someone read a really weird poem and turned it into a 6 episode show. It’s funny, it’s emotional, it’s cartoony, it’s beautiful, it’s raunchy, it’s poetic, it’s silly, it’s creative, and it’s got strong themes. The wtf visuals, the nonsensical plot, and the amazing soundtrack make an aesthetic experience more than anything. (6 eps)

4. Princess Tutu

I already made a post about this show and why it’s good, which you can check out here, but the gist is it’s a meta fairytale about a duck that turns into a girl to help a storybook prince find his emotions. I used to love stories that were “twists on fairytales” or whatever, but after watching this show I realized that the genre is pretty derivative. This show is so amazing it honestly made me reevaluate an entire genre and come to the conclusion that this is the only member of that genre worth watching. It’s truly creative and well crafted with fantastic characters. (26 eps)

3. Hunter x Hunter (2011)

This show is basically a bunch of creative ideas, unique set pieces, and interesting characters stacked on top of each other in a trench coat disguised as a narrative. It’s about a perky shonen protagonist and a child assassin becoming friends while also trying to become hunters (a position involving vast wealth and adventure). It’s in a modern fantasy setting so literally anything can happen. In one arc they have to play life-or-death dodgeball against robots, and another is an insanely epic tale about the intense evil that people are capable of (feat. a 25 episode climax). I can’t even talk about all of the themes or ideas because there are just too many. Because of it’s wild, sprawling story, it has a lot of ass pulls and retcons, but in the grand scheme of things they don’t really matter. It’s long, but super easy to watch in huge chunks. (148 eps)

2. Neon Genesis Evangelion and The End of Evangelion

The most efficient way to describe this show is to say that it’s the most interesting show ever made. It’s about an apocalyptic future in which emotionally disturbed teenagers must pilot giant bio-machines to fight monsters which are referred to as angels. It’s got deep characters, a creative story, and is probably the most well directed show I’ve ever seen. The ending infamously fell apart due to production problems, so there’s a movie called The End of Evangelion to conclude the story. It’s a very disturbing arthouse movie, so watch out for that, but the show as a whole is moooosssstly more straightforward and fascinating, This is an absolute must watch. (26 eps and 1 movie)

1. Baccano!

Baccano! takes place in 1930s New York, and is about thieves, gangsters, criminals, terrorists, alchemists, and immortals interacting in this nonlinear comedy/action thrill ride. I felt like I was on a rollercoaster while watching this show. It’s the perfect blend of action, comedy, romance, drama, horror, and creative storytelling. It’s fantastic to rewatch since the first episodes barely make any sense without context (but are still an absolute joy to watch). It’s got great characters and it’s a great story. Go watch it. And then watch it again. (13 eps and 3 OVAs)

That’s it for this list! Check out my MAL page for more recommendations if you’re interested and have a great night! 

[xtremedespair3d]

Anime Spring 2019 Final Impressions + Plans for Summer

My favorite anime season, Summer, is almost here! As for this Spring season, it feels like this was the most shallow season yet in terms of how many shows I watch. I usually watch over 10 shows total, with one or two every day, but now I only had Tuesdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays to watch anime.

It’s more like I’m going back to the good old days where I watched one or two shows before I started watching like a crapton of shows since around 2016.

Regardless, this season still packed a couple of good titles (and one I really wasn’t fond of) that I can’t wait to talk about!

Before I rank all the anime I watched this season, I’m gonna address something:

In my previous Anime Winter 2019 post, after Kemurikusa 12.1′s release, I added this sentence: “ I don’t know how long this is going to be but I’m sure it could be a weekly release,” which I was hoping to see more of what happens next, well, lately I’ve been obsessed with wanting to see 12.2 because there was no way this was going to be just a one-off short given the cliffhanger, but a little while ago as of the writing/publishing of this post, I noticed this tweet from Tatsuki which I had it in my history, I reread the tweet and I just noticed that “there may not be 12.2″... WHICH I’VE BEEN OBSESSED WITH WANTING TO SEE 12.2 FOR NOTHING, I MIGHT HAVE FORGOTTEN ABOUT THIS TWEET OR I’VE NEVER USED GOOGLE TRANSLATE OTHER THAN THE MICROSOFT TRANSLATION FROM TWITTER... Oh well, I guess Kemurikusa 12.1 really is going to be a one-off short, I wanted to see more Wakaba interacting with Ryou, Ryoku and Riku, oh well, looks like we’re going back in full circle with Kemono Friends 12.1. I had to address this so I wouldn’t constantly update the previous post and nobody would have read it anyways (just like every post I make).

Anyways, sorry for making a long speech that drags the purpose of this post, so let’s get right to my rankings! Starting with my brand new tier list, then I’m going to explain what do their rankings mean:

1.- Kimetsu no Yaiba: This is it. This is the GOAT of the season. I have become quite the Ufotable fan since the Fate specials with Emiya-san chi no Kyou no Gohan and FGO x Himuro no Tenchi, and now it was the perfect time to keep up with their recent projects, and I did not expect their next big TV project would happen to be a Shonen Jump series.

Not only I would expect the good old exact same animation from Ufotable from Fate, Tales or even Touken Ranbu, but they have delivered something MORE than that, they delivered like really wild new additions to their style, like the water splashes from Tanjiro’s attacks and stuff. They even started doing CG on the characters when they’re like really far from the camera, which it’s a first for Ufotable and I’m VERY impressed, I’m so impressed to the point where I’d really love to see a Ufotable anime with their inhouse CG 100%, I don’t care if it would look good or bad, I just want that to happen.

I was initially disappointed that they didn’t deliver this face (pictured) like I wanted, but later episodes are really bringing the hilarious faces from the manga (I really haven’t read much, but I did see an image in 4chan which compiles the hilarious faces in one image. I read the first three chapters and then chapter 26 just so I can see when does Inosuke’s face reveal happen).

It’s even better that this is a two-cour series, I’m always really looking forward to watch Kimetsu no Yaiba every Saturday!

Ufotable continues to be the GOAT! I don’t give a shit about tax fraud and stuff, they just keep going!

10/10 - Rank: S++ - 100%

2.- Bungou Stray Dogs season 3: After seeing the film, Dead Apple, I was so ready to watch season 3 if this great series. And surprisingly this season only lasted for one-cour compared to the previous seasons (I always thought it was just like one season but with two-cour episodes and they just called it season 1 and season 2).

Anyways, I hope Bones will continue making more Bungou Stray Dogs seasons. Cheers to another great season of Bungou Stray Dogs!

9.5/10 - Rank: S++ - 97%

3.- Isekai Quartet: This is the perfect isekai crossover I had hoped for, and thank god there’s a second season happening. Now, who are the new characters going to be introduced in that season as teased in the first season finale...? 🤔

9.5/10 - Rank: S+ - 95%

4.- Watanuki-san Chi No: To be honest, I really liked this one a lot than Virtual-san wa Miteiru. There’s just something about the production values(?) that makes this stand out and become way better than Virtual-san wa Miteiru, it’s doesn’t include much over-the-top craziness and stuff like that. Unlike Virtual-san wa Miteiru, this one’s classified as a “drama” (or dorama even) and it’s hard for me to classify this as an anime like Virtual-san wa Miteiru.

Why do I keep bringing Virtual-san wa Miteiru a lot? Well, I think we’ve come to the point where anime with Virtual Youtubers such as this and Watanuki-san Chi No is becoming part of the animation industry’s future. Instead of handdrawing the VTubers (which I would definitely prefer for a VTuber anime 100%), how about just using Unity?

Anyways, let’s go to the topic of Watanuki-san Chi No because I’m dragging this with all the Virtual-san wa Miteiru talk. Though, to be honest, there isn’t much to discuss here. It’s a slice-of-life show with three sisters (Played by Tokino Sora, Sarugakuchou Futaba and Hibiki Ao) and all kinds of random situations happen, that’s about it.

...You know, I think I should rewatch Virtual-san wa Miteiru. I don’t want to disservice how poorly made and wonky it can be, they’re trying to be really wacky as possible (but there are moments that did cringe me out but whatever), this and Watanuki-san Chi No could be one of my Top anime of the year.

By the way, there’s something I forgot to address on Watanuki-san Chi No. Yes, there are torrents, but surprisingly no one has done any subtitles for them and Crunchyroll or any other streaming platform has picked up this series (yet). And everytime I watch an episode of Watanuki-san Chi No, I want to subtitle the series myself.

8.5/10 - Rank: A- - 87%

5.- Attack on Titan season 3 part 2: Seems like the wait was quite worth it, this second part of the third season really delivered some really good plotlines, twists and everything. And season 4 is indeed coming out... and it’s going to be the last.

The planned release for season 4 is, get this, Fall 2020. It’s long ages away and I can’t even process how would WIT Studio be able to adapt the manga’s ending if it’s possible, because Fall 2020 sounds like a good time for the manga to have ended since, depending on when will it be.

I really hope this fourth season could be two-cour, or maybe even more if they can, they’ve come a long way from the long delay for the second part of season 3 only for season 4 to be one-cour to adapt little material, it would be a huge waste if that were to happen. And I really hope we won’t get an anime original ending or something.

Maybe it could be like a Tokyo Ghoul:re situation, where they started doing the anime adaptations when the manga was about to finish (or has already ended?), then the second season came and it adapted the finale. That could defintely work for Attack on Titan, except WIT would definitely adapt the manga properly, unlike Pierrot because they had no idea what to do.

Anyways, we’ve come a really long way to see Attack on Titan end, especially the anime. With the manga and the anime ended, what will it be for the future of Attack on Titan, or even Hajime Isayama himself?

8.5/10 - Rank: A+ - 86%

6.- Fruits Basket 2019: This remake of Fruits Basket, even without reading the manga or seeing the original anime, is definitely quite solid.

Speaking of the original, I started to feel like I wanted to the original just for comparison, but I don’t really feel like watching the original as much as like I did with Kemurikusa. Besides, there are some changes that I’m not too comfortable with in the original, such as minor details like character appearances, and a big one I recently found was Akito’s gender (she’s female in the manga, the original anime made her male), so I don’t need to watch the original and just stick with this one, instead.

Like Kimetsu no Yaiba, this one is going to be two-cours (or seasons?) too, so I’m looking forward to see the ending of the series adapted.

8/10 - Rank: B+ - 82%

7.- Miru Tights: This is one of the shows I legit have mixed feelings on but I don’t know why. I’m trying to find some logical reasons why I shouldn’t make a disservice for this show. Like, this series is supposed to be targeted for Yom and tights fans, which it’s fine, but I’m kind of too biased on stockings than tights, and secondly, there isn’t much of a story that’s supposed to have, all we can do is just watch tights, that’s all. The animation is really quite solid for a newly founded studio and for a 3 minute short series, and they made a pretty good job on recreating Yom’s art style really well.

If what I mentioned sound positive, then why do I feel mixed on Miru Tights? ...I honestly don’t know. 😂 

Maybe I’m on the same field as Virtual-san wa Miteiru, this is not for the faint of heart for normal people and such (I searched on YouTube and there was one akidearest video where, even from the title and description, I can tell that she’s confused. I’m not gonna watch the actual video, so I’ll let you watch and interpret from what you saw).

I’ve been expecting someone to ever say this, and it breaks my heart to say this myself, but... Yom, you’re better off doing only illustrations and never do an anime like this ever again.

At least the one thing I can highlight is that it can be viewed on YouTube with English captions and... uh... I just noticed that episodes 2 to 7 are... Privatized... (As of the publishing of this post, the series is up to episode 8)

Okay, I’ve always been feeling mixed on Miru Tights for a while now, but now I have found an actual reason to HATE Miru Tights! Way to waste accessibility for Western viewers, TRUSS.

Some people say that it could be for the Blu-Ray release, I don't fucking believe it because they have uploaded these episodes and I already witnessed them all, how come they could privatize these videos for the BD release? And I can't even bother to care to support TRUSS at all.

Anyways, the other and BETTER highlights are that they actually made the Twitter accounts of two of the main characters featured in one episode. Yua’s account, Ren’s account. This is the kind of meta easter eggs I love to see. Things from in-universe that are in real life.

One last thing, TRUSS...

6/10 - Rank: C - 64%

It definitely deserves these scores!

UPDATE - July 27th:

Now that the series has ended (and a 13th special episode is underway), my impressions on the series remains but I might have slightly changed a bit: This is the most boring anime I’ve ever watched in my life and I can’t stress enough on how TRUSS wasted their YouTube accessibility by privatizing... every episode...

WELL, I’LL BE DAMNED!

Okay, forget about the whole thing about TRUSS privatizing every episode as a new one comes every week, problem solved! 👍

However, my impressions on Miru Tights still remains, it sucks. Not only I’m not the biggest tights person (as I’m mainly biased to stockings), the anime overall is very boring. It has some decent moments here and there and the animation is great too, but the series didn’t impress me and give me high hopes like I wanted to.

I wish I wasn’t this negative on the series but for some reason I feel conflicted about it.

One last thing to say: Getsuyoubi no Tawawa is way better than this.

UPDATE - July 30th:

I randomly checked TRUSS’ channel and... episodes 2 to 11 are gone once again. Jesus christ, this is unbelieveable...

Literally as soon as episode 12 went live, all of the episodes were available, but now you just privatized the rest of the series again? I fucking hate you guys so much.

End of update.

And finally...

8.- One-Punch Man season 2: One-Punch Man 2 was destined to be my worst anime of the season, if not of the year, two seasons in a row (Kemono Friends 2 was my worst of Winter), and boy, it really delivered. The moment I heard that they were changing studios from Madhouse to J.C Staff, I always knew things weren’t going to be right and indeed happen.

There’s a lot to talk about what’s wrong with OPM2 and I can’t even process, let me get straight to the point.

For starters, the story of the season is relatively faithful to the manga. The next arc after the Boros starts with King casually walking, finds a monster and then King runs away freaking out that he’s not a real hero and stuff, that’s the first thing I caught on. I really can’t remember what I read from the manga for a long time, other than the Metal Bat vs Garou and, of course, the Miss Blizzard vs Do-S fights, but still, my point remains that story is faithful.

The story being close to the manga should be one of the things why season 2 shouldn’t be bad, but you’re wrong, let’s talk about the most important thing I’ve been looking forward to find out if it turned out to be good or bad: The ANIMATION.

The animation, well, the animation is not My Sister, My Writer-tier, or worse, Marchen Madchen-tier god awful, let’s get that out of the way. But it just doesn’t go in par with season 1′s visual style and everything. Let’s start with the metal textures because, look at this!

The metal textures just look AWFUL, even worse when they’re in motion, they just don’t blend with everything else. Maybe they tried to emulate Murata’s style with the metal, but they failed miserably.

There are also a couple of moments that had some action but they’re ruined by motion blur, I wouldn’t like to judge their decision on why they’re doing this, I mean, dimming the screen down is one thing, but motion blur? That shit can get really confusing, and the first season never had these kinds of blurs, it’s always been more smear.

There was this one episode from the Metal Bat vs Garou fights that had a giant centipede monster that was fully CGI. Seeing CG in OPM is something I never knew I needed, but it actually looks really well animated and well blended with the background and visuals, this was one of the few decently animated moments from this entire season. (Here’s a GIF of it)

The later episodes definitely have some sakuga, but even so, they couldn’t even come close to redeem myself on being optimistic with this entire season, I just can’t forgive its existence in general.

One last thing to talk about the animation, THE MOST INCRIMINATING THING EVER, was to show this flashback from the first season and LOOK HOW THEY KEPT THE SEASON 1 VISUALS AND STUFF!

Everytime I’m seeing clips of the first season, it’s always so painful to see how awesome they were and then look at season 2, what a big downgrade.

Voice performances and music are the highlights of this season. Though, in terms of the music... JAM Project’s opening for this season is SO DISAPPOINTING. I seriously expected something to top THE HERO!! or be around the same level of awesomeness as THE HERO!! and the Genos character song, Burning Blue ～蒼炎のソルジャー～ , but no, this opening is just boring. While at times it was stuck in my head, but it shouldn’t be somewhat catchy, I wouldn’t like to judge their direction too much, but come on...

And I think that’s pretty much everything I needed to discuss. Overall, I’m not really hoping for a third season of One-Punch Man, or maybe I do want it but with, you know, Madhouse? Just what kind of excuse was for the change of studio from Madhouse to JC Staff? All Shingo Natsume and Madhouse did recently was the new Boogiepop anime with mediocre character designs. But then there’s also the fact that this Monsters Association arc in the manga is taking forever to finish, so we might not see a third season in like another 4 or 5 years.

For some reason One-Punch Man 2 is still praised by Japanese viewers, I saw a screenshot of a NicoNico stream with over 80% of “I really liked it”, even ONE and Yusuke Murata still praise, which I don’t really mind if they like it, but we, Westerners, hate it to death because it’s just not the same at least in terms of animation. The story is mostly fine but it just cannot be told properly with poor animation. Season 1 may not be a perfect adaptation, as there are some things that doesn’t do the manga justice, especialy this, but it did have heart and some really clean animation that season 2 completely lacks.

At least the good thing to spawn from season 2 is more Miss Blizzard fan arts and started to give Do-S fan arts and cosplay. (I’m a simple person, don’t judge me.)

Another weird thing that this second season spawned is... a video game. Like, really? Why a video game of all things now? Not to mention that it has Boros on it, and this game would most likely cover the first season, which it’s been like 3 and a half years (I wish I could say 4 years but not without doing the math) and we’re already into season 2, which is what Bandai Namco is trying to capitalize.

Anyways, let’s settle this:

Ups:

+1: Story faithful to the manga, performances, soundtrack, etc.

+1: Few moments with decent animation.

Downs:

-98: The god awful animation and tryhard sakuga moments, even some action scenes ruined by motion blur.

Overall:

2/10 - Rank: D - 22%

At least One-Punch Man 2 deserves a bit of high score unlike Kemono Friends 2 which I gave it a perfect 0.

Let’s move on to the hottest titles I’m looking forward this Summer!

(Get it? Hottest, because... it’s Summer... and... it’s really hot... uh...)

1.- Girls’ Frontline short anime - Late July: I really want to watch this so bad and yes, it was supposed to be slated for a Spring release but nothing came of it, and I’m angry, but now we definitely have some more information that it’ll come out in Late July... As for Late July when ,exactly? As of the writing/publishing of this, there’s still no info about this series, hopefully they won’t delay it again until the Fall season with a definitive air date or something. (although, if they were, please make sure it’s going to be on October 4th)

Another interesting thing I just discovered was that I saw a random Japanese person tweet this GIF which kinda looks suspicious... I asked them where did they find it and they gave me the Imgur link, which happened to be posted on... JULY 16TH, 2018. HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE?!

I don’t know how long this anime has been in development, but for a scene to be leaked as a GIF in Imgur last year is quite something. A scene happened to be leaked but nobody has ever even talked about it, and with how long this has been in the making, only to be announced to Chinese and Japanese streams now really boggles my mind.

Anyways, I really hope I get to watch this Girls’ Frontline anime at long last, at least the one with the story characters like the AR Team and 404, the other one... speaking of which, I don’t think I’ve ever heard about that one either. What if that one is going to be this short series instead of the one with the AR Team and 404? Whatever it ends up being, just give me this Girls’ Frontline short anime series, please. I’ve been waiting so long not to watch it... or if it could ever get downright cancelled.

2.- Lord El-Melloi II Case Files - July 6th: Episode 0 from the Fate New Year in December 2018/January 2019 was relatively solid and I’m definitely looking forward to watch this series. The one thing that’s kind of holding back the interest is that, first off, this is going to be a two-cour series, which it’s cool, but the first cour is going to be entirely anime original, and then the second cour is going to adapt the first volume (or first couple? I can’t remember), like... isn’t that troublesome, especially for the Type-Moon community. At least the author, Makoto Sanda, is supervising the series, but is it really necessary to make an entirely anime original first cour and then the second cour to adapt the volumes? Was there some sort of proper communication or Makoto Sanda really wanted this?

I feel like there’s definitely some Fate anime fatigue going on, people might be getting burned out on these adaptations recently, Fate/Apocrypha and Fate/Extra: Last Encore, neither of which were kind of well-received. I really wouldn’t like to rely too much on opinions from the people I trust or I think way too highly of them, but if that’s what they feel, then I wish to stop talking to them in my entire life.

The thing is, I definitely started to have quite the hatred for fandoms and stuff, not only they could be annoying but I always picture them as hardcore elitists, extremists, etc. (Yes, I have that kind of an outlandish imagination), because I always feel like if I say something like I didn’t have problems with an adaptation, or that I really enjoyed it, I stan it, etc., I feel like I’m gonna get my ass contradicted and I hate when people do that to me. You should learn to respect other people’s opinions and let them have the right to enjoy things you don’t like. That’s why I want to be independent, I want to be alone and have all my interests to myself, instead of being in communities, because people tend to be really hateful on things I don’t care, I don’t have problems with or things I outright love. (I’m very sensitive about my tastes, okay?)

Anyways, I’m still going to watch Lord El-Melloi II Case Files, and then the Fate/Grand Order Babylonia series on Fall and so on. I just love watching Fate anime adaptations regardless of what people think of Apocrypha and Extra: Last Encore (Especially the latter because I have indeed played the original Fate/Extra game, while it did kind of freaked me out with the changes in a negative way, I’ve come to really like Last Encore, I might go so far that it’s an underrated masterpiece for the Fate/Extra players like me, who has high positive opinions on the games, unlike UQXveva sebz ECT Fvgr)

3.- Danmachi season 2 - July 12th: I wish I had seen the film before I start watching season 2. Hell, the film was even on Mexico, but I had to choose John Wick 3 over the Danmachi film.

UPDATE - August 9th:

Long after started watching the season, around the premier day, I had watched the movie which thankfully it got torrented, I thought I had to wait forever for the subs because movies tend to take so long to release, but now I don’t have to worry about it anymore.

End of update.

4.- Okaa-san wa Suki desu ka? - July 12th: I plan on watching this mainly for one thing: Recreating Iida Pochi’s art style faithfully, and from what I’ve seen in the trailers, JC Staff did a very good job, it looks solid. (At least this is one thing I forgive JC Staff for, unlike that piece of shit that is One Punch Man season 2)

So, with this isekai mom series, will we get an Ane Naru Mono adaptation some day?

5.- Fire Force - July 5th: I have never watched Soul Eater but this series is by the same person who did Soul Eater, with David Production doing the adaptation, from what I’ve seen and given that it’s David Production, this is legit giving me Cells at Work! vibes, this is like Cells at Work! but with fire fighters.

(Speaking of Cells at Work!, season 2 babyyy)

6.- Granbelm - July 5th: This little original project seems interesting. Well, probably the main selling point for me is the Re:Zero artist doing the character designs. Since this is an original anime with mecha, I hope the outcomes and everything turns well, because original mecha anime tend to be controversial. Look at Evangelion and even Franxx.

Watching the trailers, for some reason this kind of gives me Princess Principal vibes, but it’s not really like Princess Principal, unless I’m talking about interesting looking original anime with character designs by well-known illustrators. (Speaking of Princess Principal, when will we get updates from the 6 films and who’s going to be the new voice of Ange?)

7.- Dumbbell Nan Kilo Moteru? - July 3rd: I can already feel pain and regret from watching this because I recently decided to quit going to the gym because I was getting bored. 😂

8.- Tejina Senpai/Magical Sempai - July 2nd: I’ve seen some crossover/mash-up fan arts of the heroine and Hotaru Shidare from Dagashi Kashi and I believe that’s quite a lovely selling point. I was feeling 50/50 before but now I’m definitely feeling like doing it.

Why would the English title be called “Magical Sempai”, with Senpai being an M?

Thanks for reading this post, what is your anticipated anime of the season? And make sure you’re well hydrated because the world is fucking burning and I can’t stand a moment without having the AC on.

---

Carrd.

I can’t dividers on Tumblr anymore?! THAT SUCKS!!!

[youthmagazinecas-blog]

Best Video Games (Unedited)

By Angelina Gonzalez, Age 12, MS 319. Grade 7    

1. Telltale’s The Walking Dead-The Final Season (August 14th 2018)

Telltale’s The Walking Dead was first released in April 24th 2012. It gained popular over the last 5 years. The whole point of the game is to make the choices in this video game and what happens next. And this is your own story. You are the main character and this means that you can do whatever you want and you get to pick whatever you want to pick. There are also little fight scenes in between the story. This video game is episodic adventure game.

Now, a number of Telltale’s The Walking Dead games have been released over the 5 years, and now, it’s coming to an end. Now for those who have played throughout the games, all the stories have been focused on a little girl named Clementine, who grows up and now is a teenager, maybe possibly an adult! But now, this story revolves around Clementine and a little boy named AJ. Now, Clementine and AJ are alone and they are trying to survive in this zombie apocalypse by themselves. Now, this is one of the best video games because, for one, it creates suspense for what is going to happen in the story. Not to mention the cliffhangers in this video game when you finish an episode and you have to wait for the next episode to release. But also because of we never know what’s going to happen to Clementine and AJ after this final season. Also, because of its lovely graphics, we see Telltale’s graphic from before when it released its first The Walking Dead episode, to now in 2018. I really like this game because I can’t wait to see what happens with Clementine and AJ in this season!

2. Resident Evil 2- (January 21st 1998) (January 25th 2019)

Okay, Resident Evil, in my opinion, is one of the scariest games I have ever witnessed. My uncle, for one, is actually playing Resident Evil 2, and to be honest, those monsters are something else in that game. Resident Evil 2 was released January 21st 1998, but it was remastered 21 years later. On January 25th 2019, it was remastered and it’s great! Resident Evil 2 is based on a survival horror game.

Resident Evil 2 starts with police officer Leon S. Kennedy and a college student Claire Redfield. The both of them need to escape Racoon City from a zombie apocalypse. Now, the 1998 version is REALLY different from the 2019 version. I mean, it is remastered and all, but the graphics, compared to both versions of the game, are really good. It has changed after 21 years of creating this game. And throughout the Resident Evil games, things have changed. It really is cool to be playing the same game, but it has changed a lot. I mean, the graphics are awesome, and they added some things into the new Resident Evil 2 that they didn’t add from the 1998 version. For instance, you can play as Flan, a dessert which contains a sweet filling, as a character in the 2019 version. I have never seen something where we can play as a dessert and other numerous foods in a video game which as a survival horror game. It really is fun. And also, the monsters in Resident Evil 2 are really great. They are truly scary, including the zombies. They are truly something else. In other words, the remastered version of Resident Evil 2 has really improved from its original stage.

 3. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (December 7th 2018)

Who waited for the next Smash Bros game to come out? *raises hand* Super Smash Bros Ultimate was released on December 7th 2018 and many people rushed to GameStop to obtain this game. It was really popular, considering that everyone was going to be back in Super Smash. Some of which include Snake, a character who wasn’t included in the pervious Smash Bros game. But now, he’s back! Super Smash Bros Ultimate is a crossover fighting game.

Now, everybody loves Super Smash Bros Ultimate! A crossover fighting game with everybody and you fight everyone, now that’s a game that you can enjoy! Now, the whole purpose of Super Smash is that you get to fight people! Now, I know what you’re thinking, that’s nothing! Well, it isn’t. To many people that have purchased the game, Super Smash Bros is an amazing game! All the characters, and the characters who have come back to Smash, not to mention most of their smashes are awesome!

 4. Red Dead Redemption 2 (October 26th, 2018)

8 years ago, the first Red Dead Redemption game was released on May 18th, 2010. Then, 8 years later, the prequel, known as Red Dead Redemption 2 was released on October 26th, 2018. The second game takes place in 5 states. New Hanover, Ambarino, Lemoyne, New Austin and West Elizabeth. And the years it takes place is 1899 through 1907. The game’s genre is a Western action-adventure.

From the very beginning, Red Dead Redemption is set in the year 1911, when the whole game reflects on John Marston, who’s a former outlaw. In case you don’t know, an outlaw is someone who has broken a law. Anyway, John Marston’s wife and son are taken hostage by the government for ransom for his services as a hired gun. John Marston, takes it upon himself and brings three members of his former gang to bring justice. Now, Red Dead Redemption 2 is set in the years 1899 through 1907. It starts off with another outlaw named Arthur Morgan, and follows along with the main protagonist from the first game, John Marston. Red Dead Redemption 2’s plot follows Arthur Morgan, who he’s a member of the Van der Linde gang. He’s dealing with decline of the Wild West while trying to survive against government forces, rival gangs, and other enemies along the way.

Now I don’t know about you, but Red Dead Redemption was a game I was hoping they would make another game. Whether it was a prequel or a sequel, I wanted them to make another game. I really like the setting and the plot is something that I admire in the game as well. And the fact that they made another game, AND to add, it’s a prequel, we get to see more deeper about the Wild West before, and hopefully the members of the Marston family.

 5.  Portal: (October 10th, 2007) Portal 2: (April 18th, 2011)

The Portal series, I love. I remember playing the second game of Portal. Never really played the first game, so I was confused, honestly. But anyway, the Portal series doesn’t have an exact date but apparently, it takes place in 2010. The setting of the game is at a private laboratory called Aperture Science. The Portal series is a puzzle-platform video game.

 The plot of the Portal series starts off with a woman named Chell. Chell is a test subject for the Aperture Science Labs. Chell is instructed with an artificial intelligence named GLaDOS, who hands her a handheld portal device. This gives Chell the ability to get items from places she can’t reach, and she can solve puzzles this way. GLaDOS, in the end, promises Chell a piece of cake when she’s completed all the puzzles in the game. But this all refers to the phrase “The cake is a lie.” And GLaDOS tries to kill Chell. But in an attempt to, Chell uses the portal gun and fights GLaDOS. In the end, Chell is dragged back into Aperture Science, and is put to rest in there. Now, Portal has ended.

Now, let’s fast forward to Portal 2. Chell awakens from her deep sleep by another robot from the facility named Wheatley. There, Chell obtains her old portal device from the first game, and from there, Chell and Wheatley are on their way through the labs once again. Wheatley wants to become one with the facility, like GLaDOS was, but it all fails when GLaDOS awakens from her deep sleep and crushes Wheatley, when the two of you are caught trying to sneak past her. Later, it is revealed that Wheatley isn’t dead. For some reason… Later, while retrieving Wheatley, Chell runs into GLaDOS, again, and then Wheatley tells Chell to plug him into the spot GLaDOS once was, which is where if anyone is linked up there, they have all power to the facility. Then, Chell is instructed to press a button, which GLaDOS is beaten and Wheatley is now in control of the whole facility. GLaDOS becomes a potato and she’s through down underground of the laboratory and so is Chell. The reason? Well, let’s say Wheatley betrayed you and he brought you along with GLaDOS down underground. Now, cutting this short, Chell is forced to find her way out of the underground with GLaDOS, using substances to help Chell jump higher, run faster, and etc. Later, Chell is with GLaDOS dealing with puzzles once they found their way upstairs. And they need to defeat Wheatley before it’s too late. Now, Wheatley is defeated by being sent to the Moon, and GLaDOS is in control of the facility once again. Now, everything is back to normal, GLaDOS wants nothing to do with Chell anymore and she sends her back above and out of Aperture Science, where this is the end of the game.

Now, I love Portal and it’s a nice puzzle game. I love the plot towards the first game and the second game. It’s something great! I absolutely love the graphics And the fact that apparently, Portal and Portal 2 take place within another game called Half Life really concerns me. It’s something that really fascinates me! I love this game and it resembles my childhood!

[travelerwashere]

CritRole Asks

General

1. How did you first discover Critical Role?

Recommended to me by one of my DMs.

2. Do you prefer the livestreams, VODs/posts, or podcasts?

I prefer the VODs because I can pause them.

3. What was the first CR episode you watched/listened to?

Campaign One, Episode One. I believe at starting at the beginning.

4. What episode have you reached in each CR campaign, or how many times have you watched/listened to each campaign?

I am halfway through my first rewatch of Campaign One, but otherwise I am all caught up.

5. What has been your biggest CR binge?

When I first started watching, I watched all of Campaign One in 34 days.

6. Do you play in a D&D campaign inspired by CR or the Tal'Dorei/Wildemount guides?

No, but I am planning to DM one.

7. Do you have any official CR merch?

So many t-shirts, the calendar, the blanket, the CR cap, the Wildmount dice, the VM D20s, and the Whitestone dice.

8. Have you ever been to a CR liveshow?

Nope.

9. Do you participate in any CR fan celebrations (Essek Week, Critmas, etc.)?

I do Critmas on Facebook.

10. Have you ever spotted a fellow Critter out in the wild (via merch, cosplay, etc.)?

Once!! At a local Staples.

11. Have you become friends with any other Critters?

Not because of CR, but I have gotten a bunch of friends into it.

12. Do you watch/listen to CR alone or with others?

I usually watch alone, but my wife listens sometimes.

13. Do you do anything else while watching/listening to CR?

Usually play games on my computer or phone.

14. How do you cope with high tension in CR (stress-snacks, screaming into the chat void, skipping it, etc.)?

I cry to my wife.

15. Are there any loose threads in any campaigns or one-shots/miniseries that you desperately wish would be resolved/addressed?

I want more Cinderbrush. Desperately.

16. Have you picked up any mannerisms/sayings/speech from the CR cast or their characters (the Marisha perch, “toothy maw”, Jester’s accent, etc.)?

I definitely do the stress Okay, Okay, Okay now. 

17. Has CR helped you get through any tough times (loss of a loved one, quarantine, etc.)?

When I started I was very depressed and suicidal, but the cliffhangers gave me a (sad) reason to keep going through the worst of it.

18. What life lessons have you learned from CR?

That you should take time to tell your friends that you love them. Always.

Favorites

19. Who’s your favorite CR cast member (Matt, Laura, etc.)?

Taliesin

20. Who’s your favorite CR crew member (Dani, Maxwell, etc.)?

Dani

21. Who’s your favorite CR1 PC?

Percy

22. Who’s your favorite CR2 PC?

Beau

23. Who’s your favorite CR1 NPC?

Kima

24. Who’s your favorite CR2 NPC?

Marion

25. Who’s your favorite CR1 villain?

Ripley

26. Who’s your favorite CR2 villain?

Isharnai

27. What’s your favorite “How do you want to do this?” moment?

Vex vs. Delilah Briarwood

28. What’s the most satisfying CR enemy defeat/death?

Definitely the Briarwoods

29. What’s the most devastating CR PC defeat/death?

When Vex died and Vax traded his life for hers.

30. What’s your favorite CR romantic/sexual relationship?

Vax and Keyleth. Doomed romance does it for me.

31. What’s your favorite CR platonic/friendly relationship?

Keyleth and Percy

32. What’s your favorite CR rivalry?

Grog and Lionel

33. What’s your favorite CR familial (sibling, parent/child, etc.) relationship?

Vex and Vax. Hands down.

34. What’s your favorite CR downtime episode/scene?

Dalen’s Closet.

35. What’s your favorite CR fight?

Chroma Conclave.

36. What’s your favorite CR group/organization (Darrington Brigade, Cerberus Assembly, etc.)?

Slayer’s Take.

37. What’s your favorite CR magic item?

Fenthras

38. What’s your favorite CR homebrew spell/reflavor (Wristpocket, Fortune’s Favor, Cat’s Ire, etc.)?

Transmogrification

39. What’s the coolest CR sound effect (the cork pop, monster sounds, etc.)?

Anything that makes Travis hide in his shirt.

40. What’s your favorite CR quote?

“You were not born with venom in your veins, you learned it.”

41. Who are all your favorite active Critters (artists, writers/meta analysts, cosplayers, gif makers, memers, livebloggers, community organizers, timestamp posters, stat trackers, etc.)?

GalacticJonah and GinnyDi are high on the list.

42. What’s your favorite critrolestats statistic or other lore/fun fact?

Kiri Immitations

43. What’s your favorite Sam ad?

Hack the Planet

44. What’s your favorite CR one-shot or miniseries (Honey Heist, Cinderbrush, etc.)?

Grog’s One Shot.

45. What’s your favorite non-campaign CR content (All Work No Play, Handbooker Helper, etc.)?

All Work No Play

46. What’s your favorite CR location (Vasselheim, the Lavish Chateau, etc.)?

The BallEater

47. Who’s your favorite CR companion (Doty, Frumpkin, etc.)?

Trinket

48. What’s your favorite CR signature move (Bigby’s Hand, pop pop, etc.)?

I Would Like to Rage

49. What’s your favorite CR motif (chest stabs, seducing shopkeepers, etc.)?

Doors and Chairs

50. What CR backstory/arc/moment resonates with you the most?

Jester’s desperate attempt to connect with her absentee father.